"Stop fighting! You're fighting!" or, "What's Chan got to do with it?

I'm thinking a bit more about the Shaolin/Buddhism/commercialism issue and Barbara's recent post here on this subject, and I think it might be a bit useful to expound a bit on the martial arts from my rank beginner point of view.  It might inform the discussion on why folks might flock to Shaolin and why folks at Shaolin might seek to protect their name.

I don't come naturally to martial arts, and I suspect most folks don't.  One has to seriously practice to get to a level of skill.  It seems part of the "fight or flight" response, triggered by the rush of adrenalin, is that "fight" tends to mean a tense hyper-vigilance.

One of the aspects of Wing Chun, which, I think is shared in other martial arts (it's too profoundly useful not to have been exploited by others), is the notion that force and tenseness are not usually used to the exclusion of relaxed action.  In fact, the vast majority of such moves are made in a relaxed, smooth, flowing manner.  This can be quite difficult when one has been conditioned from late toddler-hood to expect a "fight" simply because someone is facing you who is going to punch you.

In fact, it is so conditioned that folks, myself included don't even know how to punch effectively at first.  Even experienced students in my class will hear the sifu chiding them with a chuckle, "Stop fighting! You're fighting me now!"  All well know the guy is pretty much impenetrable when it comes to actually, uh, fighting. And it's not the point of the exercise anyway.

If you're "fighting" you're not going to be applying the iota of force in the right place and time that makes it all devastatingly effective.

All of the above is to say that martial arts can, and if practiced will teach aspects of ourselves that we didn't even know we needed to learn.

Of course it's the same with a Zen practice as well; thus in John Daido Loori's book The Eight Gates of Zen a chapter is devoted to "body practice," an application of Zen practice in the awareness of the body which might otherwise be called "body kung fu" (功夫) perhaps.

To me, it's an extremely important thing to learn because it has implications for pretty much near everything I do from day to day, most of which I'm not remotely aware of at this time.

And it goes beyond this: it calls into question (just like good Zen practice should) the most basic preconceptions and conditioning I have about myself and others.

If what they do at Shaolin is remotely related to the above, I could see why they would want to make sure it's not ripped off by cheap knock-offs. 

Turns out Zen is about Buddhism

NellaLou has a great post on the continuing saga at Madhushala, and hits all the right notes, in my opinion, about Merzel and what his Sangha and Board should do.

But in writing about that, and  doing some stuff at work related to my company's business as well as searching for temples in which to visit in my upcoming trip to China this summer, I became aware of a few things, not all of which appear to be immediately related to the subject at hand, at least at first:

1.  I was still wondering why this Rube Goldberg financial structure existed that to the casual visitor's mind, conflated "Big Mind" with "Kanzeon Zen Center." It was, I think, clear enough in retrospect: "Big Mind" served as Genpo Merzel's way of introducing "Zen-like" things into non-Buddhists.  It would  end up  to be a case of the tail wagging the dog here.
2. Ditto for this "Integral" stuff:  It still appears - to me - that this whole "Integral" thing is nothing more and nothing less than a clumsy attempt to try to "make Buddhism better" by blending it with pop-psychology and New Age woo. 
3. In Southeastern China, there is a plethora of Zen temples; some of which are undoubtedly brand spanking new (like the one in North East China I wrote about in 2009) but many of which are remnants and regrowth of the original temples. And there's an obvious reason for the original temples and the growth of Chan in this part of China if one thinks about  the realities of that part of the world: Guangdong, Fujian, Zhejiang, and Jiangsu provinces are a melting pot of dialects/languages, more than a few of which are not mutually intelligible in any meaningful degree; look up each of the places on Wikipedia if you want more information about that.  If ever there was a place that needed a doctrine of "no reliance on words or letters" it was this place.  And if there was any place here that was "the right" place to see Chan Buddhism in China, it would be here. But exact temples and locations might not matter all that much, eventually; it was the practice itself that mattered. 
4. Introducing Zen Buddhist concepts to non-Buddhists is not in any way an easy task facilitated by "dialogues" with other "gurus" or creating meta-concepts in order to "bridge" or "transcend" ideologies.  It took Japan over a thousand years to come up with the concepts of Ma ( 間) and Wabisabi (侘寂 ) - not to mention the application of Zen to the martial arts the like.  And they're still struggling with what kind of a culture they want to have!

All of which is to say that Zen Buddhism is about the cultivation of skill of Buddhism.  It took folks a long time to figure out a whole bunch of things related to how we live, including, but not limited to why it's good to boil water, how to get to eat rice, vaccines, karma, how much sleep to get, and 10,000 other things.  Ditto for how to cultivate the skill of Buddhism. And we have to practice it, even when it's painful or not what we "like" or what others "like."

It is true we take vows in Mahayana Buddhist to save all beings, but we do that through living our own mundane little lives which briefly flicker in this place in the blink of the blink of an eye in the life of this small speck of iron in an unfashionable part of the Milky Way galaxy.  And there are no shortcuts in our own little mundane lives. If there were, we'd be cutting out the profundity of it all along with the mundaneness.

Zen Buddhism is about the cultivation of skill of Buddhism. That means that our lives are crafted by us, slowly but surely, imperfectly, impermanently, and surely incomplete.  As NellaLou points out, there is an infusion of doubt (and I'd also add faith) in this.   This skill may be passed to others in the way a craftsman passes his skill to an apprentice; in the same way it's folly to think that one can pass the gist of any highly refined skill to just anyone without emphasizing that diligent training is needed to be able to make any fruitful use of skills.

Temples and sanghas are good of course, but there's a time and a place  for everything, and if the "sangha" in question is more devoted to something that goes against the way in which a life is rightly to be lived, it's time to re-examine what that sangha is all about, just as in finding "the" historical temple of Chan Buddhism overlooks the Much Bigger Thing.

The Wenzhou region is replete with Chan Temples

As I had previously mentioned, this year I'm going to spend a near two weeks in China, visiting my wife's family, among other things, in China. My wife comes from Wenzhou, which, as Wikipedia describes it:

Wenzhou, also known as Yongjia (or Yung-chia，永嘉) has a history which goes back to about 2000 BC, when it became known for its pottery production. In the 2nd century BC it was called the Kingdom of Dong'ou. Under the Tang Dynasty, it was promoted to prefecture status and given its current name in 675 AD.

Throughout its history, Wenzhou's traditional economic role has been as a port giving access to the mountainous interior of southern Zhejiang Province. In 1876 Wenzhou was opened to the foreign tea trade, but no foreign settlement was ever established there. Between 1937 and 1942, during the Second Sino-Japanese War, Wenzhou achieved importance as one of the few ports still under Chinese control. It declined in the later years of the war, but began to recover after coastal trade along the Zhejiang coast was re-established in 1955...

Wenzhou is also the birthplace of China’s Mercantilism. From the Southern Song Dynasty, in contrasted to the Confucianism represented by Zhu Xi and Lu Jiuyuan in China urging people to study to be officials in the future, the theory of Wenzhou’s Yongjia School represented by Ye Shi, emphasized the importance of business. The theory has an enduring impact on the mindset of Wenzhou natives and has become the “cultural gene” in the economic development of Wenzhou ever since.

Renowned as the cradle of mathematicians in China, the city has teemed with over 200 mathematic professors in the recent 100 years, among whom Su Buqing, Gu Chaohao, Jiang Lifu and other mathematicians have enjoyed great fame both at home and abroad. Furthermore, Wenzhou is also reputed as the “Home of Swimming in China”, “City of Chess” and “City of Poetry in China”.

They speak a rather unusual dialect/language. 

Anyway, I've been there a few times before, and whether it's an improvement in Google maps, an improvement in the opening up of China or what-not, it seems now that there are many more Chan temples in Wenzhou than I'd been able to find before. I do hope to visit at least one of them, as I have when I went to Tianjin and Xi'an, to talk to the monks, and perhaps find an afternoon for practice at a temple.

That last part might be difficult, since it is difficult for a layman to actually spend time practicing at a Chinese Chan temple, for the moment at least. But then again, my darling wife is one heck of a negotiator...but then again, we're talking theA-list of top seeded world class negotiators when we're talking about Wenzhou, as the rest of the Wikipedia entry would imply.  These are the folks who basically started China's upward climb to economic dominance.

(Click on the link below and it has 3 links at the lower left, with increasing radius.)


View Larger Map

And oh...they have a Shangri-La Hotel there now! Considering that it's only slightly more expensive than the Shiloh Inn in Long Beach Washington  (and substantially cheaper than anything 3 steps down in comfort and quality from its price equivalent in any major American city)...and this is the finest hotel chain I've stayed at in Asia...well...I gotta do some negotiating on my own...maybe I'll bring them for the breakfast at least. You can't beat a Shangri-La breakfast...

A bit more on the experiences of the 20th Century Chan Masters

Information related to this particular post seems to be like Brigadoon - it seems to appear in some places in some searches but then disappear.  But Wikipedia has the information I wanted to note about Hsu Yun:

After returning to China, During the Master's fifty-third year, he joined with the Venerable Masters P'u Chao (Universal Illumination), Yueh Hsia (Moon Aura) and Yin Lien (Lotus Seal) to cultivate together. They climbed Chiu Hua Shan Mountain and repaired the huts on Ts'ui Feng Summit, where Dharma Master P'u Chao expounded the Mahavaipulyabuddha Avatamsaka (Flower Adornment) Sutra ^[11].

When the Master was fifty-six, the Abbot Yueh Lang (Clear Moon) of Gao Min Monastery Gaomin Temple, 高旻寺)in Yangzhou was going to convene a continuous twelve-week session of dhyana meditation. Preparing to leave, the group asked the Master to go first. After reaching Ti Kang at T'ung (Great Penetration), he had to cross the water, but had no money. The ferry left without him. As he walked along the river's edge, the Master suddenly lost his footing and fell into the rushing water, where he bobbed helplessly for a day and night ^[12]. and was caught in a fisherman's net. He was carried to a nearby temple, where he was revived and treated for his injuries. Feeling ill, he nevertheless returned to Yangzhou. When asked by Gao Ming whether he would participate in the upcoming weeks of meditation, he politely declined, without revealing his illness. The temple had rules that those who were invited had to attend or else face punishment. In the end, Gao Ming had Hsu Yun beaten with a wooden ruler. He willingly accepted this punishment, although it worsened his condition.

For the next several days, Hsu Yun sat in continuous meditation. In his autobiography, he wrote: "[in] the purity of my singleness of mind, I forgot all about my body. Twenty days later my illness vanished completely. From that moment, with all my thoughts entirely wiped out, my practice took effect throughout the day and night. My steps were as swift as if I was flying in the air. One evening, after meditation, I opened my eyes and suddenly saw I was in brightness similar to broad daylight in which I could see everything inside and outside the monastery..." But he knew that this occurrence was only a mental state, and that it was not at all rare. He did not become attached to this achievement, but continued his single-minded investigation of the topic, "who is mindful of the Buddha?" over and over again, he delved into this topic without interruption ^[13].

During the twelfth lunar month, on the third evening of the eighth week of the session, after six hours of sitting meditation, the attendant made his rounds, filling up the tea cups. The Master's hand was burned by spilling boiling water, and his cup fell to the floor. At the sound of the crash, the root of his doubt was instantly severed. He was joyous beyond words at having fulfilled his lifelong ambition. It was as if he had just awakened from a dream, and he observed how the conditions of the past unravel. If he had not fallen into the river and become gravely ill, if he had not met good advisors who plied him with both adversity and felicity, how would this present experience have been possible?

The Master's verse explanation says:
When a cup fell down and struck the floor,
The sound of the crash was distinctly heard;
Emptiness was pulverized
And the mad mind stopped on the spot.
Another verse by the Venerable Master Hsu Yun says:
The hand let go-the cup was shattered.
Family broken up, people have died-there's no way to talk about such things.
Spring arrives, flowers are fragrant, and everywhere is infused with splendor.
The mountains, rivers, and great earth itself are just Tathagatas.^[14].

All of the above evidently comes from here. 

Oddly enough, links related to this - as well as an inquiry about this - keep appearing and disappearing.  Perhaps what's written here is embellished.  Perhaps not.  But what is clear is that despite perceived hardship, like other masters and seekers who find, Hsu Yun persevered. Oddly enough though, it appears that his successors' sites are a bit less Chan flavored, at least as far as the public is concerned. That is why, as many before me have said, Great Determination, along with Great Faith and Great Doubt is necessary.

I might have more to say on this later.