The Meaning of Bodhidharma Coming from the West
Teisha by Seido Suzuki Roshi
Shuto Daishi of Kyogenji Temple, with the monk’s name of Shikan, who was transmitted from lsan Reiyu, once told the assembly. "For instance, if you climbed up a tree on a thousand foot cliff and were hanging by your teeth, without holding on to the branches with feet or hands, then suddenly a person came up under the tree and asked, ‘tell me what is the meaning of Bodhidharma coming from the west?' In that circumstance, if you replied by opening your mouth, you would be dead straight away. If you do not reply, that would ignore the questioner. Tell me then, what should you do?" Then Sho, senior monk, came to the front and said, "Please, I would like to ask your favour not to ask the question while we are on the tree, instead, ask us before we get on the tree." Then Shuto Daishi burst into laughter.
This story has been talked of very often but rarely does anyone say anything decisively, most just rack their brains and end up dazed. However, if you think through ‘not thinking’ and 'non-thinking (beyond thinking)', you can get the same experience of sitting on the same cushion with Kyogen Roshi. If you sit zazen without any distraction together with Kyogen Roshi, you could understand the case thoroughly before he opens his mouth. Seeing it thoroughly, you will not only steal his eye-ball but also take up Shakyamuni Buddha's treasury of the true dharma eye.
It is like a man on a thousand foot cliff and climbing up a tree. You must study these words quietly. What is a man? If it is not a pillar, you should not call it a stake. Even if we have smiling faces of Buddhas and Ancestors, we must distinguish self and others. The tree where you are hanging by the teeth is neither the great earth nor the top of the one hundred foot pole. It is a one thousand foot cliff. Even if you escape from there, you are still within the one thousand foot cliff. There is time to fall as well as climb up. There is a saying that 'It is like a man on a thousand foot cliff and climbing up.' If so, there are times of going up and going down. Then going up is one thousand feet and going dOINn is one thousand feet. Going to the left is one thousand feet and going to the right is one thousand feet. One thousand feet here, one thousand feet there. Or, you are also one thousand feet, the tree is one thousand feet. The one thousand feet spoken of above is just like this. Then let me ask you: what is the size or one thousand feet? Let me tell you it is just like the size of that old mirror, that furnace, or that seamless tower.
As for holding a tree branch by your teeth, what is the mouth? Even if you do not know the entire mouth, you should look for the branch, pick up the leaves and gradually find out how the state of your mouth is. Then, since grasping the tree branch is so far the mouth, the whole mouth is the branch and the whole branch is the mouth. Or the whole body is the mouth and the whole mouth is the body.
Because the tree steps its own tree. the feet do not step on the tree, it is said. It is also the same to say that the feet step on themselves. The branch climbs on itself, thus, it is said the hands climb on themselves. However. the heels step forward and backward and the hand makes a fist and opens. Ordinary people think that this case is about hanging in emptiness. But that is not right. There is a meaning in hanging from the tree by the teeth.
Suddenly a person came under the tree and asked, tell me what is the meaning of Bodhidharma coming from the West? This could be said that there is somebody inside the tree. It may be a person tree. It could be said that there is a person under a person asking the question. Accordingly the tree asks the tree, a person asks the person. The whole tree asks the whole question. The question of What is the meaning of Bodhidharma coming from the West? asks the question of What is the meaning of Bodhidharma coming from the West? The person asking the question also asks the person as a person hanging from the tree by the teeth. Without hanging from the tree by the teeth, questioning is not possible, voice would not fill the mouth, no mouth would fill the words. When you ask the meaning of Bodhidharma coming from the West, you hang by the teeth from the question of the meaning of Bodhidharma coming from the West.
If you open your mouth to respond, you will lose your life. Now examine intimately the words If you open your mouth to respond. There could be a way of responding by not opening your mouth. If so, you will not lose life. Opening or not opening the mouth does not hinder hanging from the tree branch by the teeth. Opening and closing are not only the activities of the entire mouth. But the entire mouth opens and closes. Opening the mouth to respond, does this mean responding by opening the tree branch or by opening coming from the West? If the response does not open coming from the West it does not respond to the question. The response is not any more to others. The whole body maintains life and we cannot say you lose your body and life. If you have lost your life already, you cannot respond. However, what Kyogen Roshi meant was that he would dare to respond and lose his life.
You should know that if you do not respond, you maintain life: if you respond, you will lose your life, and then reverse into life. From this we see that everybody has his mouth filled with something to say. Then, respond to the other person, respond to yourself. Ask the other person, ask yourself. This means hanging from the words by the teeth. Hanging from the words by the teeth was meant to be hanging from the tree branch by the teeth. In responding to the other person, you better open your mouth on top of your mouth. If not responding to the other person, it certainly responds to your own question, even if you do not attend to the other person's question.
Thus, you should know that all buddhas and ancestors, who responded to the meaning of Bodhidharma coming from the West. responded. at the decisive moment of climbing up a tree and hanging by the teeth. Buddhas and ancestors who ask, What is the meaning of Bodhidharma coming from the West?, all ask the question at the very moment of hanging by their teeth from a tree branch. Seccho Myokaku Zenji (Juken Osho) said. "Speaking on the tree is easy, speaking under the tree is difficult. Now I am on the tree. Bring me a question." Regarding Bring me a question, no matter how hard one tries, this comes after the answer. I would like to ask sharp-witted elders and seniors throughout past and present: Then Shuto Daishi burst into laughter, is it speaking to the tree or under the tree? Did it respond to the question of What is the meaning of Bodhidharma coming from the West? or not? Tell me how you see it.
This talk was given at Toshoji and translated by Isshin Taylor