Many people will define Zen Buddhism as a mixture of Mahayana Buddhism and Taoism, a Far Eastern mystical teaching. In fact, this definition is not entirely wrong. The whole problem depends on what is understood when mysticism is mentioned. Mysticism is understood as reaching God, reaching higher truths beyond perception, in a state of ecstasy, trance, with a transcendence that transcends reason and normal consciousness in order to verify these dogmas based on a series of dogmas. The aspects of Zen Buddhism that do not fit this definition are more than the aspects that do. There is no dogma of any kind in Zen, and there is no concept of God that fits the design in monotheistic religions. Furthermore, Zen does not encourage its followers to seek spiritual states such as ecstasy or trance, which would disrupt the transparency of the mind and lead one to unreal dreams and delusions.
Its sole purpose is to provide an education that will enable the mind to free itself from all delusions, to grasp the truth as it is, in its entirety, with all its sharpness, and to open the eyes of those who follow the Zen path to the complete and indivisible truth hidden behind delusions.
Wouldn’t it be unfair if Zen Buddhism were to be described as mysticism just because it defends that our minds, which work under the “tyranny of opinions, decisions, judgments” and are dependent on the rules of logic and language and words, will not be able to grasp the truth as it is, in its true reality, and that a way, a method must be found to overcome the limitations of the mind, as Suzuki puts it? Similar trends can be observed today in branches of science such as depth psychology, sociology, semantics, communication, semiology, and linguistics. But for this reason alone, it does not cross our minds to say that these sciences are mystic.
Apart from this, an important feature that distinguishes Zen Buddhism from other mystical teachings is that Zen Buddhism does not seek a truth or a secret outside of what exists.
According to Zen, the whole truth, the whole secret, is here and now before us. If we cannot find the truth here and now, where else can we find it? If only we open our eyes to the here and now. "From the very beginning nothing was hidden from you. It was you who closed your eyes to the truth!
It was you!... There is nothing in Zen that can be explained, nor is there anything that can be taught to increase your knowledge. No knowledge will benefit you unless it grows and develops within you. Even if you decorate yourself with borrowed bird feathers, the false feathers will not grow.« (1).
Zen has made it one of the most fundamental principles of its teaching that unless we free our minds from dogmas, prejudices, and conditionings resulting from dependence on traditions, our minds will not be able to escape from the cage of concepts and therefore will not be able to see and understand the truth in its reality.
For someone who has attained Zen life, there is only one truth. The truth that we can find and experience in our daily lives, and that we can observe to the same extent in the most meaningless details. When the Chinese sage Chao Chou was asked, "What is the Zen truth (Tao)?" he replied, "It is your everyday life, your everyday thoughts."
The purpose of Zen, or wisdom in Zen, is to gain sensitivity to life and our own inner being, to merge with the world we have become accustomed to and alienated from, to awaken to its extraordinary beauty, and to eliminate our alienation from ourselves.
Despite all these differences, the aspect that Zen resembles to other mystical teachings is the formal similarities in the methods it uses to train its followers. For example, monastic order, collective and ceremonial meditation practices, etc. A person who follows the path of Zen must first learn that there is no truth that can be reached only at the level of thought, and that one cannot find the truth unless one perceives it with one's whole being. The sixth patriarch, Huineng, whom we can say is the greatest name in Zen Buddhism, said: "You should put aside writings and words and wait for insight and intuition to enlighten you from within. The whole point is to be able to follow one's own mind without disturbing the mind's work. This is what it means to know our true inner being... The task is not to numb, relax and make the mind dull, but to sharpen it enough to grasp the most subtle and inner things." (2)
Zen has placed all its emphasis on the experience of awakening and enlightenment. Awakening and enlightenment is, first of all, becoming aware of the forces that guide us from the unconscious, and being able to see what a puppet, what a toy we are in their hands.
Once we recognize these forces, we can free ourselves from being a puppet controlled by unconscious instincts. This is what we might call inner freedom or true freedom. Wisdom is to adjust one's life to the demands of awakening—perhaps it would be more accurate to say this—this inner, true freedom. According to the Zen view, awakening and enlightenment should not be taken as a goal to be reached. Enlightenment is not a goal but a process. To say that I have awakened and am enlightened is not awakening or enlightenment but another kind of sleep.
Wisdom is knowing that every moment of wakefulness will be followed by moments of sleep and confusion, and that staying awake will require constant effort.
How? Zen gives us some clues to ensure this alertness. The first clue is widespread and constant attention. There is a story attributed to the Zen master Ikkyu (1394-1481): One day, a man from the public said to Ikkyu, "Master, write down the basic rules of the highest wisdom on this paper." Ikkyu immediately grabbed his brush and wrote "Attention!" on the paper. When the man asked, "Is that all? Isn't there anything else to write?", he picked up his brush again and wrote "Attention! Attention!" twice. When the man said with some annoyance, "I don't see such a subtle meaning, such a depth in what you wrote," Ikkyu grabbed his brush again and wrote "Attention! Attention! Attention!" on the paper a third time (3).
The second tip is to learn to live here and now. Just as the axle in the middle of a wheel remains where it is without moving, no matter how fast the wheel turns, just as there is a still hub in the middle of a typhoon that does not catch the wind, so here and now is the center of gravity of life that never moves and always remains where it is. If we can live here and now, we will find a shelter from the regrets of the past and the anxieties of what the future may bring, a lifebuoy that will keep us afloat without being swept away by the whirlpool and vortex of life's flood.
Staying afloat, learning to flow with the flow of life without resisting or resisting, deep down understanding the impossibility of living even a single moment of life twice in a flow of no return, can lead to embracing life with enthusiasm and joy, savoring every second.
A third tip is the ease that comes from accepting life as it is, and instead of struggling to live, to abandon oneself effortlessly to the arms and lap of life. The following words attributed to Lin Chi, a Zen master from the T'ang period, explain this aspect of Zen in a very clear language:
"There is no compulsion in Buddhism. Just be who you are, that's all... Eat your fill, empty your bowels properly, go to bed when you feel like it, and go to bed when you get tired. The ignorant will laugh at my words, but the wise will understand what I mean."
Zen Buddhism and Wisdom / İlhan Göngören
(1) Zen Buddhism, selected writings by DT Suzuki, p. 89.
(2) Zen Buddhism, An Art of Living, p. 146 in DT Suzuki, Essays in Zen
Quoted from Buddhism, First Edition, p. 220.
(3) Buddha and His Teaching, p. 144 also in Philip Kapleau, The Three Pillars of the Universe, p.
Quoted from 10-11.