Learning and Enlightenment
Learning and Enlightenment
I
was staying in Uttar Kashi then, in Tapovan Kuti, originally a tiny
one-room cottage that belonged to my grand teacher Swami Tapovanamji,
later enlarged and developed by his disciple and my guru Swami
Chinmayanandaji into a large ashram with scores of rooms with modern
comforts. This is in Ujeili, on the lower slopes of Varanavat Mountain,
facing Har Parbat across the Ganga in the east and the famous Balakhilya
Mountains some distance away in the south east. It is a beautiful
place, the whole area this side of the Ganga filled with ashrams.
I
used to watch every day a serious looking young monk on the terrace of a
nearby ashram. He would walk up and down on the terrace the whole day,
with an open book in hand, and from the constant movement of his lips it
was clear he was repeating and learning by heart the book. Eventually
one day I asked him what the book was and he showed it to me. It was a
commentary on the Brahma Sutras. On top of each page was the text of the Sutras, below it in a different font and size the vyakhya, and below that the tika in yet another font and size and still below the tippani. And what the young monk was doing was learning by heart the entire text – the sutras, the vyakhya, the tika, the tippani,
all. During our conversation he told me his dream was to become a
mahamandaleshwar – that is the head of large division of spiritual
organizations, below the position of the Shankaracharya.
I
do not know what later became of the young monk – this was in the late
nineteen seventies and I never met or heard of him after that. But
recently when I read the story Zen master Kyogen, this incident came to
my mind. Kyogen was also a scholar of great learning and his story tells
us that his very learning stood in the way of his achieving the goal of
spirituality – enlightenment.
One
day Isan, who was his friend from their days with their master Hyakujo,
asked him, “Tell me, Kyogen, when you were with our master in his
monastery, you were very brilliant. You used to answer a single question
in ten different ways. Now answer this question: What is your real
self? The self that existed before you came out of your mother’s womb,
before you knew east from west?”
It
is said that this question puzzled Kyogen completely. He searched for
the right answer in his mind and came up with answer after answer, but
every time Isan rejected it. Eventually Kyogen was reduced to saying, “I
fail. Explain it to me.” And Isan said, “The answer I know is my
answer. It will be of no use to you. Find your own answer.”
But
of course Kyogen did not know how to find his own answer – that was his
problem. The only thing he knew was to find answers from books – of
which he had a huge collection. Once again he went through all his
books, searching for the answer to Isan’s question. He found none. No
book answered that question – at least, they did not answer it
satisfactorily. Eventually he told himself, “A hundred pictures of rice
cakes are not going to fill a single hungry stomach.” The story tells us
that as this realization dawned, Kyogen gathered his books and
destroyed them all.
The
pursuit of the scholar was no more for him. It hadn’t taken him
anywhere. He left his friend Isan, said goodbye to all monasteries and
teachers, and became a grave keeper.
One
day he was sweeping the grounds of the grave when something very
ordinary happened. A stone that he had swept away went and struck a
bamboo.
Kyogen stood speechless. He forgot himself. He forgot all his learning.
He forgot the whole world. And then his stillness was broken by a burst
of spontaneous laughter arising from him. He laughed as he had never
laughed before in his entire life.
Kyogen
had attained enlightenment. He had attained what all his books had not
helped him attain, what he has been searching all his life. He was now a
Buddha in his own right.
Kyogen performed a ritual of purification and then returned to his old
friend Isan. He lighted incense before him and paid homage to him.
“Great master,” Kyogen said addressing Isan, “thank you! You have been
kinder to me than my own parents. Had you given to me the answer when I
begged you to, I would have never attained it. I would have never
reached where I stand today.”
It is customary for Zen masters to write a poem in celebration of their enlightenment. Here is the poem composed by Kyogen:
One stroke and all is gone.
No need of stratagem or cure.
Each and every action
Manifests the ancient way.
My spirit is never downcast,
I leave no tracks behind me,
Enlightenment is beyond speech,
Beyond gesture.
Those who are emancipated
Call it the unsurpassed.
In the Chhandogya Upanishad,
Narada, the great scholar approaches Sanatkumara and asks him to teach
him. In response, Sanatkumara asks Narada to tell him all that he
already knows. Here is Narada’s response:
"Bhagavan,
I know the Rig Veda, the Yajur Veda, the Sama Veda, the Atharva as the
fourth Veda, the epics and ancient lore as the fifth, grammar which is
the Veda of the Vedas, the rules of sacrifices, the science of numbers,
the science of portents, the science of time, logic, ethics, etymology,
the science of pronunciation, ceremonials, prosody, etc., the science of
elemental spirits, the science of weapons, astronomy, the science of
serpents and the fine arts. All this I know, venerable Sir.
"But, Bhagavan, with all this I know only words; I do not know the Self.
I have heard from men like you that he who knows the Self overcomes
sorrow. I am afflicted with sorrow. Please help me, Bhagavan, to cross
over to the other side of sorrow."
Narada
has learnt all that could be learnt – every branch of knowledge that
existed in his days. And yet he is far from that knowledge which ends
all sorrow, which takes you to the other side of sorrow, into
enlightenment and bliss.
The highest knowledge can only be attained beyond words. It is attained
in a world where no words exist, no language exists, where only silence
exists – silence and stillness. Kyogen reaches that world when the stone
strikes the bamboo. Chiyono, another Zen master, attains it when the
old pail in which she was carrying water breaks, leaving no water and no
moon in it. Tokusan attains enlightenment when his master suddenly
blows out a burning candle.
The stories may be different, but in all cases enlightenment happens in
silence and stillness, when we are ready for it. All preparations, all
sadhanas, are to make us ready for it.
- See more at: http://www.boloji.com/index.cfm?md=Content&sd=Articles&ArticleID=10596#sthash.9TC9gh5r.dpuf
I
was staying in Uttar Kashi then, in Tapovan Kuti, originally a tiny
one-room cottage that belonged to my grand teacher Swami Tapovanamji,
later enlarged and developed by his disciple and my guru Swami
Chinmayanandaji into a large ashram with scores of rooms with modern
comforts. This is in Ujeili, on the lower slopes of Varanavat Mountain,
facing Har Parbat across the Ganga in the east and the famous Balakhilya
Mountains some distance away in the south east. It is a beautiful
place, the whole area this side of the Ganga filled with ashrams.
I
used to watch every day a serious looking young monk on the terrace of a
nearby ashram. He would walk up and down on the terrace the whole day,
with an open book in hand, and from the constant movement of his lips it
was clear he was repeating and learning by heart the book. Eventually
one day I asked him what the book was and he showed it to me. It was a
commentary on the Brahma Sutras. On top of each page was the text of the Sutras, below it in a different font and size the vyakhya, and below that the tika in yet another font and size and still below the tippani. And what the young monk was doing was learning by heart the entire text – the sutras, the vyakhya, the tika, the tippani,
all. During our conversation he told me his dream was to become a
mahamandaleshwar – that is the head of large division of spiritual
organizations, below the position of the Shankaracharya.
I
do not know what later became of the young monk – this was in the late
nineteen seventies and I never met or heard of him after that. But
recently when I read the story Zen master Kyogen, this incident came to
my mind. Kyogen was also a scholar of great learning and his story tells
us that his very learning stood in the way of his achieving the goal of
spirituality – enlightenment.
One
day Isan, who was his friend from their days with their master Hyakujo,
asked him, “Tell me, Kyogen, when you were with our master in his
monastery, you were very brilliant. You used to answer a single question
in ten different ways. Now answer this question: What is your real
self? The self that existed before you came out of your mother’s womb,
before you knew east from west?”
It
is said that this question puzzled Kyogen completely. He searched for
the right answer in his mind and came up with answer after answer, but
every time Isan rejected it. Eventually Kyogen was reduced to saying, “I
fail. Explain it to me.” And Isan said, “The answer I know is my
answer. It will be of no use to you. Find your own answer.”
But
of course Kyogen did not know how to find his own answer – that was his
problem. The only thing he knew was to find answers from books – of
which he had a huge collection. Once again he went through all his
books, searching for the answer to Isan’s question. He found none. No
book answered that question – at least, they did not answer it
satisfactorily. Eventually he told himself, “A hundred pictures of rice
cakes are not going to fill a single hungry stomach.” The story tells us
that as this realization dawned, Kyogen gathered his books and
destroyed them all.
The
pursuit of the scholar was no more for him. It hadn’t taken him
anywhere. He left his friend Isan, said goodbye to all monasteries and
teachers, and became a grave keeper.
One
day he was sweeping the grounds of the grave when something very
ordinary happened. A stone that he had swept away went and struck a
bamboo.
Kyogen stood speechless. He forgot himself. He forgot all his learning.
He forgot the whole world. And then his stillness was broken by a burst
of spontaneous laughter arising from him. He laughed as he had never
laughed before in his entire life.
Kyogen
had attained enlightenment. He had attained what all his books had not
helped him attain, what he has been searching all his life. He was now a
Buddha in his own right.
Kyogen performed a ritual of purification and then returned to his old
friend Isan. He lighted incense before him and paid homage to him.
“Great master,” Kyogen said addressing Isan, “thank you! You have been
kinder to me than my own parents. Had you given to me the answer when I
begged you to, I would have never attained it. I would have never
reached where I stand today.”
It is customary for Zen masters to write a poem in celebration of their enlightenment. Here is the poem composed by Kyogen:
One stroke and all is gone.
No need of stratagem or cure.
Each and every action
Manifests the ancient way.
My spirit is never downcast,
I leave no tracks behind me,
Enlightenment is beyond speech,
Beyond gesture.
Those who are emancipated
Call it the unsurpassed.
In the Chhandogya Upanishad,
Narada, the great scholar approaches Sanatkumara and asks him to teach
him. In response, Sanatkumara asks Narada to tell him all that he
already knows. Here is Narada’s response:
"Bhagavan,
I know the Rig Veda, the Yajur Veda, the Sama Veda, the Atharva as the
fourth Veda, the epics and ancient lore as the fifth, grammar which is
the Veda of the Vedas, the rules of sacrifices, the science of numbers,
the science of portents, the science of time, logic, ethics, etymology,
the science of pronunciation, ceremonials, prosody, etc., the science of
elemental spirits, the science of weapons, astronomy, the science of
serpents and the fine arts. All this I know, venerable Sir.
"But, Bhagavan, with all this I know only words; I do not know the Self.
I have heard from men like you that he who knows the Self overcomes
sorrow. I am afflicted with sorrow. Please help me, Bhagavan, to cross
over to the other side of sorrow."
Narada
has learnt all that could be learnt – every branch of knowledge that
existed in his days. And yet he is far from that knowledge which ends
all sorrow, which takes you to the other side of sorrow, into
enlightenment and bliss.
The highest knowledge can only be attained beyond words. It is attained
in a world where no words exist, no language exists, where only silence
exists – silence and stillness. Kyogen reaches that world when the stone
strikes the bamboo. Chiyono, another Zen master, attains it when the
old pail in which she was carrying water breaks, leaving no water and no
moon in it. Tokusan attains enlightenment when his master suddenly
blows out a burning candle.
The stories may be different, but in all cases enlightenment happens in
silence and stillness, when we are ready for it. All preparations, all
sadhanas, are to make us ready for it.
- See more at: http://www.boloji.com/index.cfm?md=Content&sd=Articles&ArticleID=10596#sthash.9TC9gh5r.dpuf
I was staying in Uttar
Kashi then, in Tapovan Kuti, originally a tiny one-room cottage that belonged
to my grand teacher Swami Tapovanamji, later enlarged and developed by his
disciple and my guru Swami Chinmayanandaji into a large ashram with scores of
rooms with modern comforts. This is in Ujeili, on the lower slopes of Varanavat
Mountain, facing Har Parbat across the Ganga in the east and the famous
Balakhilya Mountains some distance away in the south east. It is a beautiful
place, the whole area this side of the Ganga filled with ashrams.
I used to watch every day a
serious looking young monk on the terrace of a nearby ashram. He would walk up
and down on the terrace the whole day, with an open book in hand, and from the
constant movement of his lips it was clear he was repeating and learning by
heart the book. Eventually one day I asked him what the book was and he showed
it to me. It was a commentary on the Brahma Sutras. On top of each page
was the text of the Sutras, below it in a different font and size the vyakhya,
and below that the tika in yet another font and size and still below the
tippani. And what the young monk was doing was learning by heart the
entire text – the sutras, the vyakhya, the tika, the tippani,
all. During our conversation he told me his dream was to become a
mahamandaleshwar – that is the head of large division of spiritual
organizations, below the position of the Shankaracharya.
I do not know what later
became of the young monk – this was in the late nineteen seventies and I never
met or heard of him after that.
But recently when I read the story Zen master
Kyogen, this incident came to my mind.
Kyogen was also a scholar of great
learning and his story tells us that his very learning stood in the way of his
achieving the goal of spirituality – enlightenment.
One day Isan, who was his
friend from their days with their master Hyakujo, asked him, “Tell me, Kyogen,
when you were with our master in his monastery, you were very brilliant. You
used to answer a single question in ten different ways. Now answer this
question: What is your real self? The self that existed before you came out of
your mother’s womb, before you knew east from west?”
It is said that this
question puzzled Kyogen completely. He searched for the right answer in his
mind and came up with answer after answer, but every time Isan rejected it.
Eventually Kyogen was reduced to saying, “I fail. Explain it to me.” And
Isan said, “The answer I know is my answer. It will be of no use to you. Find
your own answer.”
But of course Kyogen did
not know how to find his own answer – that was his problem. The only thing he
knew was to find answers from books – of which he had a huge collection. Once
again he went through all his books, searching for the answer to Isan’s
question. He found none. No book answered that question – at least, they did
not answer it satisfactorily.
Eventually he told himself, “A hundred pictures
of rice cakes are not going to fill a single hungry stomach.” The story tells
us that as this realization dawned, Kyogen gathered his books and destroyed
them all.
The pursuit of the scholar
was no more for him. It hadn’t taken him anywhere. He left his friend Isan,
said goodbye to all monasteries and teachers, and became a grave keeper.
One day he was sweeping the
grounds of the grave when something very ordinary happened. A stone that he had
swept away went and struck a bamboo.
Kyogen stood speechless. He forgot himself. He forgot all his learning. He
forgot the whole world. And then his stillness was broken by a burst of
spontaneous laughter arising from him. He laughed as he had never laughed
before in his entire life.
Kyogen had attained
enlightenment. He had attained what all his books had not helped him attain,
what he has been searching all his life. He was now a Buddha in his own right.
Kyogen performed a ritual of purification and then returned to his old friend
Isan. He lighted incense before him and paid homage to him. “Great master,”
Kyogen said addressing Isan, “thank you! You have been kinder to me than my own
parents. Had you given to me the answer when I begged you to, I would have
never attained it. I would have never reached where I stand today.”
It is customary for Zen masters to write a poem in celebration of their
enlightenment. Here is the poem composed by Kyogen:
One stroke and all is gone.
No need of stratagem or cure.
Each and every action
Manifests the ancient way.
My spirit is never downcast,
I leave no tracks behind me,
Enlightenment is beyond speech,
Beyond gesture.
Those who are emancipated
Call it the unsurpassed.
In the Chhandogya
Upanishad, Narada, the great scholar approaches Sanatkumara and asks him to
teach him. In response, Sanatkumara asks Narada to tell him all that he already
knows. Here is Narada’s response:
"Bhagavan, I know the
Rig Veda, the Yajur Veda, the Sama Veda, the Atharva as the fourth Veda, the
epics and ancient lore as the fifth, grammar which is the Veda of the
Vedas, the rules of sacrifices, the science of numbers, the science of
portents, the science of time, logic, ethics, etymology, the science of
pronunciation, ceremonials, prosody, etc., the science of elemental spirits,
the science of weapons, astronomy, the science of serpents and the fine arts.
All this I know, venerable Sir.
"But, Bhagavan, with all this I know only words; I do not know the Self. I
have heard from men like you that he who knows the Self overcomes sorrow. I am
afflicted with sorrow. Please help me, Bhagavan, to cross over to the other
side of sorrow."
Narada has learnt all that
could be learnt – every branch of knowledge that existed in his days. And yet
he is far from that knowledge which ends all sorrow, which takes you to the
other side of sorrow, into enlightenment and bliss.
The highest knowledge can only be attained beyond words. It is attained in a
world where no words exist, no language exists, where only silence exists – silence
and stillness. Kyogen reaches that world when the stone strikes the bamboo.
Chiyono, another Zen master, attains it when the old pail in which she was
carrying water breaks, leaving no water and no moon in it. Tokusan attains
enlightenment when his master suddenly blows out a burning candle.
The stories may be different, but in all cases enlightenment happens in silence
and stillness, when we are ready for it. All preparations, all sadhanas, are to
make us ready for it.
I
was staying in Uttar Kashi then, in Tapovan Kuti, originally a tiny
one-room cottage that belonged to my grand teacher Swami Tapovanamji,
later enlarged and developed by his disciple and my guru Swami
Chinmayanandaji into a large ashram with scores of rooms with modern
comforts. This is in Ujeili, on the lower slopes of Varanavat Mountain,
facing Har Parbat across the Ganga in the east and the famous Balakhilya
Mountains some distance away in the south east. It is a beautiful
place, the whole area this side of the Ganga filled with ashrams.
I
used to watch every day a serious looking young monk on the terrace of a
nearby ashram. He would walk up and down on the terrace the whole day,
with an open book in hand, and from the constant movement of his lips it
was clear he was repeating and learning by heart the book. Eventually
one day I asked him what the book was and he showed it to me. It was a
commentary on the Brahma Sutras. On top of each page was the text of the Sutras, below it in a different font and size the vyakhya, and below that the tika in yet another font and size and still below the tippani. And what the young monk was doing was learning by heart the entire text – the sutras, the vyakhya, the tika, the tippani,
all. During our conversation he told me his dream was to become a
mahamandaleshwar – that is the head of large division of spiritual
organizations, below the position of the Shankaracharya.
I
do not know what later became of the young monk – this was in the late
nineteen seventies and I never met or heard of him after that. But
recently when I read the story Zen master Kyogen, this incident came to
my mind. Kyogen was also a scholar of great learning and his story tells
us that his very learning stood in the way of his achieving the goal of
spirituality – enlightenment.
One
day Isan, who was his friend from their days with their master Hyakujo,
asked him, “Tell me, Kyogen, when you were with our master in his
monastery, you were very brilliant. You used to answer a single question
in ten different ways. Now answer this question: What is your real
self? The self that existed before you came out of your mother’s womb,
before you knew east from west?”
It
is said that this question puzzled Kyogen completely. He searched for
the right answer in his mind and came up with answer after answer, but
every time Isan rejected it. Eventually Kyogen was reduced to saying, “I
fail. Explain it to me.” And Isan said, “The answer I know is my
answer. It will be of no use to you. Find your own answer.”
But
of course Kyogen did not know how to find his own answer – that was his
problem. The only thing he knew was to find answers from books – of
which he had a huge collection. Once again he went through all his
books, searching for the answer to Isan’s question. He found none. No
book answered that question – at least, they did not answer it
satisfactorily. Eventually he told himself, “A hundred pictures of rice
cakes are not going to fill a single hungry stomach.” The story tells us
that as this realization dawned, Kyogen gathered his books and
destroyed them all.
The
pursuit of the scholar was no more for him. It hadn’t taken him
anywhere. He left his friend Isan, said goodbye to all monasteries and
teachers, and became a grave keeper.
One
day he was sweeping the grounds of the grave when something very
ordinary happened. A stone that he had swept away went and struck a
bamboo.
Kyogen stood speechless. He forgot himself. He forgot all his learning.
He forgot the whole world. And then his stillness was broken by a burst
of spontaneous laughter arising from him. He laughed as he had never
laughed before in his entire life.
Kyogen
had attained enlightenment. He had attained what all his books had not
helped him attain, what he has been searching all his life. He was now a
Buddha in his own right.
Kyogen performed a ritual of purification and then returned to his old
friend Isan. He lighted incense before him and paid homage to him.
“Great master,” Kyogen said addressing Isan, “thank you! You have been
kinder to me than my own parents. Had you given to me the answer when I
begged you to, I would have never attained it. I would have never
reached where I stand today.”
It is customary for Zen masters to write a poem in celebration of their enlightenment. Here is the poem composed by Kyogen:
One stroke and all is gone.
No need of stratagem or cure.
Each and every action
Manifests the ancient way.
My spirit is never downcast,
I leave no tracks behind me,
Enlightenment is beyond speech,
Beyond gesture.
Those who are emancipated
Call it the unsurpassed.
In the Chhandogya Upanishad,
Narada, the great scholar approaches Sanatkumara and asks him to teach
him. In response, Sanatkumara asks Narada to tell him all that he
already knows. Here is Narada’s response:
"Bhagavan,
I know the Rig Veda, the Yajur Veda, the Sama Veda, the Atharva as the
fourth Veda, the epics and ancient lore as the fifth, grammar which is
the Veda of the Vedas, the rules of sacrifices, the science of numbers,
the science of portents, the science of time, logic, ethics, etymology,
the science of pronunciation, ceremonials, prosody, etc., the science of
elemental spirits, the science of weapons, astronomy, the science of
serpents and the fine arts. All this I know, venerable Sir.
"But, Bhagavan, with all this I know only words; I do not know the Self.
I have heard from men like you that he who knows the Self overcomes
sorrow. I am afflicted with sorrow. Please help me, Bhagavan, to cross
over to the other side of sorrow."
Narada
has learnt all that could be learnt – every branch of knowledge that
existed in his days. And yet he is far from that knowledge which ends
all sorrow, which takes you to the other side of sorrow, into
enlightenment and bliss.
The highest knowledge can only be attained beyond words. It is attained
in a world where no words exist, no language exists, where only silence
exists – silence and stillness. Kyogen reaches that world when the stone
strikes the bamboo. Chiyono, another Zen master, attains it when the
old pail in which she was carrying water breaks, leaving no water and no
moon in it. Tokusan attains enlightenment when his master suddenly
blows out a burning candle.
The stories may be different, but in all cases enlightenment happens in
silence and stillness, when we are ready for it. All preparations, all
sadhanas, are to make us ready for it.
- See more at: http://www.boloji.com/index.cfm?md=Content&sd=Articles&ArticleID=10596#sthash.9TC9gh5r.dpuf
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