Ten Buddhist Koans

A Buddhist Koan is a short tale used to nudge people closer toward Zen enlightenment. Since I really appreciate and love these witty little verses, I decided I’d share some of my favorites here. At first, I thought I’d garnish them with some detailed commentary and analysis. Then I realized, the verses are like works of art, there is no wrong interpretation when it comes to these Japanese stories. So, I’ll still give them some light “analysis”, but not the same kind of deep probing scrutiny I was originally planning

One of the distinguishing characteristics of Buddhism which sets it apart from a lot of Western religions: followers are encouraged to alter and change old teachings rather than try to preserve them. Such preservation would go strongly against the whole philosophy of “This too shall pass.” So, I shall take the liberty of “modernizing” a couple of the stories below, but you’ll have to guess which ones. Also I’ll completely ignore the names other people have given them and make up my own names.

About the title: technically the plural of “koan” should be “koan” (just like the plural of “ninja” should be “ninja”), but in English the plural has become “koans”.

1. The Delicious Strawberry

A man traveling across a field encountered a tiger. He fled, the tiger after him. Coming to a precipice, he caught hold of the root of a wild vine and swung himself down over the edge. The tiger sniffed at him from above. Trembling, the man looked down to where, far below, another tiger was waiting to eat him. Only the vine sustained him.

Two mice, one white and one black, little by little started to gnaw away the vine. The man saw a luscious strawberry near him. Grasping the vine with one hand, he plucked the strawberry with the other. How sweet it tasted!

My interpretation: Rather than try to impose one strict interpretation, I’ll just offer a couple questions: what are the tigers in your world, and what’s the strawberry?

2. Tozan’s Brain Twister

A monk asked Tozan, “How can we escape the cold and heat?” Tozan replied, “Why not go where there is no cold and heat?” “Is there such a place?” the monk asked. Tozan explained: “When cold, be thoroughly cold; when hot, be hot through and through.”

My analysis: This one’s over my head; but that’s good! If I could understand all the parables, there’d be no point in meditating upon them.

3. The Soul

What is this mind? Who is hearing these sounds? Do not mistake any state for self-realization, but continue to ask yourself even more intensely– what is it that hears?

My commentary: Nothing I write here can do the verse justice. Instead I offer the following link: Three Ways to Greater Presence.

4. No Coming and No Going

Just before Ninakawa passed away, Zen-master Ikkyu visited him. “Shall I lead you on?” Ikkyu asked.

Ninakawa replied: “I came here alone and I go alone. What help could you be to me?”

Ikkyu answered: “If you think you really come and go, that is your delusion. Let me show you the path on which there is no coming and no going.”

With these words, Ikkyu had revealed the path so clearly that Ninakawa smiled and passed away.

My comments: No comment on the meaning, I’ll only say that the first time I read this one, it almost brought me to tears.

5. Lively and Buoyant

If you want to be free, get to know your real self.
It has no form, no appearance, no root, no basis, no abode,
But is lively and buoyant.
It responds with versatile facility, but its function cannot be located.
Therefore when you look for it, you become further from it;
When you seek it, you turn away from it all the more.

6. Counterculture

Zen Master Unmon said: “The world is vast and wide. Why do you drive to work at the sound of the alarm clock?”

7. How To Avoid Crusades

A university student visiting Master Gasan asked: “Have you ever read the Christian Bible?”

“No, read it to me,” said Gasan.

The student opened the Bible and read from the gospel of St. Matthew: “And why take ye thought for rainment? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow. They toil not, neither do they spin, and yet I say unto you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these… Take therefore no thought for the morrow, for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself.”

Gasan said: “Whoever uttered those words I consider an enlightened man.”

The student continued reading: “Ask and it shall be given you, seek and ye shall find, knock and it shall be opened unto you. For everyone that asketh receiveth, and he that seeketh findeth, and to him that knocketh, it shall be opened.”

Gasan remarked: “That is excellent. Whoever said that is not far from Buddhahood.”

My remarks: You probably know this already, but the man St. Matthew was quoting was Jesus.

8. A Warning

A monk asked Master Kegon: “How does an enligthtened one return to the ordinary world?” Kegon replied, “A broken mirror never reflects again; fallen flowers never go back to the old branches.”

9. Condescending and Judgmental

In Tokyo in the Meiji era there lived two prominent teachers of opposite characteristics. One, Unsho, an instructor in Shingon, kept Buddha’s precepts scrupulously. He never drank intoxicants, nor did he eat after eleven o’clock in the morning. The other teacher, Tanzan, a professor of philosophy at the Imperial University, never observed the precepts. Whenever he felt like eating, he ate, and when he felt like sleeping in the daytime he slept.

One day Unsho visited Tanzan, who was drinking wine at the time, not even a drop of which is suppposed to touch the tongue of a Buddhist.

“Hello, brother,” Tanzan greeted him. “Won’t you have a drink?”

“I never drink!” exclaimed Unsho solemnly.

“One who does not drink is not even human,” said Tanzan.

“Do you mean to call me inhuman just because I do not indulge in intoxicating liquids?!” exclaimed Unsho in anger. “Then if I am not human, what am I?”

“A Buddha,” answered Tanzan.

10. The True Nature of Reality

 

 

 

 

 

FURTHER READING

Three Ways to Greater Presence
My Adventure in a Buddhist Cult
Kubla Khan
Connections between Japanese and Buddhism