Hyakujo: The Everest of Zen, with Basho's Haikus - Oshorajneesh.com

CHAPTER 1. THE LANGUAGE OF SUDDENNESSNO SOONER WERE THESE WORDS SPOKEN THAN HYAKUJO RECEIVED A GREATILLUMINATION AND RECOGNIZED HIS OWN NO-MIND. BESIDE HIMSELF WITH JOY, HEBOWED IN DEEP GRATITUDE.HYAKUJO SPENT THE NEXT SIX YEARS IN ATTENDANCE UPON MA TZU. BUT AS TAO-CHIH,HIS FIRST TEACHER, WAS GROWING OLD, HE WANTED TO RETURN TO LOOK AFTER HIM.BEFORE HYAKUJO LEFT MA TZU, HE WENT TO PAY HIS FINAL TRIBUTE TO HIM.SEEING HIM COMING, MA TZU RAISED HIS HORSE WHISK STRAIGHT UP. HYAKUJO ASKED,”ARE YOU IN THE USE OF IT, OR APART FROM THE USE?”MA TZU HUNG THE HORSE WHISK ON THE CORNER OF HIS CHAIR. AFTER A MINUTE ORSO, HE ASKED HYAKUJO, ”HENCE FORWARD, HOW DO YOU OPEN THOSE TWO LEAVES OFYOUR MOUTH TO WORK FOR OTHERS?”AT THIS, HYAKUJO TOOK THE HORSE WHISK AND RAISED IT STRAIGHT UP.MA TZU SAID, ”ARE YOU IN THE USE OF IT, OR APART FROM IT?”HYAKUJO HUNG THE HORSE WHISK ON THE CORNER OF THE CHAIR.JUST AT THAT MOMENT, A GREAT ROAR, LIKE HUNDREDS OF THUNDERBOLTS FALLING,RAINED ON HYAKUJO’S HEAD. MA TZU HAD GIVEN A SHOUT WHICH, IT IS SAID, DEAFENEDHYAKUJO FOR THREE DAYS.Maneesha, before I speak on the sutras of Hyakujo, I have to say a few words as a preface.Hyakujo was the direct heir of Ma Tzu and became most well known for his establishment of the firsttruly Zen monasteries and his treatise on sudden enlightenment.To understand Hyakujo, the first thing is to understand that enlightenment can only be sudden.The preparation can be gradual, but the illumination is going to be sudden. You can prepare theground for the seeds, but the sprouts will come suddenly one day in the morning; they don’t comegradually. Existence believes in suddenness. Nothing is gradual here, although everything appearsto be gradual; that is our illusion.In the past science used to think that everything was gradual: a child gradually becomes young;the young man gradually is becoming older... Now, we know that is not the case because of AlbertEinstein and his discoveries about atomic energy. He himself was puzzled when he saw for the firsttime that the particles of an atom don’t go from one place to another place the way you go from yourhouse to the market. They simply jump. And their jump is so tremendous that Einstein had to finda new word for it: ‘quanta’, the quantum jump. It means that the particle was in one place, A, andthen suddenly you see it in another place, B. The path between has never been traveled.A strange jump that you cannot see the particle between the two points. That gave him an idea thatin existence everything is jumping, and because the jump is so subtle, you cannot see it.Hyakujo: The Everest of Zen, with Basho’s Haikus3Osho