Nansen's Flower “Like a Dream”

Engo's commentary on the case

Official Lu Gen had studied with Nansen for a long time. Ordinarily he lodged his attention within principle and nature and swam about in the Zhaolun. One day, while seated, he picked out these two lines as extraordinary: “Master Sengzhao said, ‘Heaven and earth share one root with me; the myriad things form one body with me.’ How extraordinary!” Master Sengzhao was an eminent monk of the Jin. Along with Daosheng, Sengrong, and Sengrui, he studied under Kumārajīva; they were called the Four Sages. In youth he liked to read Zhuangzi and Laozi. Later, while copying an old version of the Vimalakīrti Sutra, he had an awakening and understood that Zhuangzi and Laozi had not exhausted the matter. Drawing the scriptures together, he composed four treatises.² The intent of Zhuangzi and Laozi was that heaven and earth are the largest of forms and my form is likewise a form, all born together from emptiness. Zhuangzi's central intent only discusses making things equal. Sengzhao's central intent discusses nature, returning everything to oneself. In his “Middle Treatise,” Sengzhao says: The perfected person is empty and open, without image, yet among the myriad things none is not fashioned by me. Who gathers the myriad things as oneself? Is it only the sage? Divinities, humans, worthies, and sages remain distinct, yet all share one nature and one body. An ancient said, “All heaven, earth, and the great world are only one self. When cold, the whole sky and earth are cold; when hot, the whole sky and earth are hot. When existent, the whole sky and earth exist; when nonexistent, the whole sky and earth do not exist. When right, the whole sky and earth are right; when wrong, the whole sky and earth are wrong.” Hōgen said: It, it, it; I, I, I. North, south, east, and west—all may, may. May not, may— only I have nothing that may not.³ Therefore it is said, “Above heaven and below heaven, I alone am honored.” When Sekitō read the Zhaolun and reached the passage about gathering the myriad things as oneself, he suddenly awakened. He later composed the Cantong qi, whose intent does not depart from this. Look at Lu asking in this way. Tell me: the same as what root, one with which body? Arriving here is undeniably extraordinary and unlike ordinary people who do not know heaven's height or earth's depth. Yet although Lu's question is extraordinary, it does not emerge from the teaching's meaning. If doctrinal meaning were the ultimate, why did the World-Honored One raise a flower? Why did the ancestral teacher come from the west? In his answer Nansen uses a Zen monk's grip. He draws out Lu's sore place and breaks his nest. Pointing to the flower before the courtyard, he calls, “Official! People these days see this one flowering plant as though in a dream.” It is like leading someone to a cliff ten thousand fathoms high and pushing him, making his life cut off. Push someone down on level ground and even when Maitreya descends into the world, that person still will not know life cut off. It is also like a person dreaming, wanting to wake but unable, who is suddenly called awake. If Nansen's eye had not been true, Lu would certainly have smeared him over and carried him away. Nansen's statement is undeniably difficult to understand. A living person whose eye is steady hears it as the finest clarified butter. A dead person hears it and turns it into poison. An ancient said, “See it through events and you fall into ordinary feeling. Calculate beneath the root of thought and in the end you cannot feel your way to it.” Gantō said, “This is the livelihood of the person beyond; it reveals only a little directly before the eyes, like lightning sweeping past.” Such is Nansen's central intent. He has the hands and feet to capture tigers and rhinoceroses, and to determine dragons from snakes. Here you must understand for yourself. Have you not heard: “The road beyond is not transmitted by a thousand sages; students weary their bodies like an ape grasping at a reflection”? See how Setchō brings it forth. Nansen speaks a little sleep-talk; Setchō speaks great sleep-talk. Although they dream, they make a good dream. Earlier the text spoke of one body; here it speaks of not being the same: “Hearing, seeing, sensing, knowing—not each one separate. Mountains and rivers are not viewed within a mirror.” If you say they are viewed inside the mirror and only then become clear, you never leave the mirror. Mountains, rivers, the great earth, grasses, trees, and forests—do not use a mirror to reflect them. If you do, you divide them into two. Only let mountains be mountains and waters be waters: Each dharma abides in its Dharma-position; the forms of the world constantly abide.⁴ “Mountains and rivers are not viewed within a mirror.” Then where do you view them? Do you understand? Arriving here, Setchō takes you to “In a frosted sky the moon sets; night approaches its midpoint.” This side has been cleared away for you; measure the other side for yourself. Do you know that Setchō uses the matter of one's original share to help people? “Who shares the clear pool, its reflected image cold?” Does one reflect alone, or share the reflection with someone? Only when mechanism and interpretation are cut off does one reach this realm. Right now no clear pool is needed, nor need one wait for a frosted sky and setting moon. Right now—what is it?