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'The Casting of Shadows'
Easton, ME
One of Shitou's (b. ca. 700) main disciples asked him about the essential meaning of Buddhadharma [Enlightened Wisdom]. Shitou responded, "Not to attain, not to know." The student asked whether there was any other pivotal point, and Shitou said, "The wide sky does not obstruct the white clouds drifting."
Shitou's wisdom goes against our unnatural socialization not to be the wide sky. Rather, we enter the Way wanting to accomplish something remarkable. Yet, the remarkable is non-attainment. Attainment happens, you do not attain anything. The planter can plant seed. The seed will grow. The seed will become fruit. Still, no one attains. The natural Way is the way of not-attaining, while something remarkable happens. This remarkable is profoundly remarkable, for it does not appear remarkable.
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Having been raised on a farm, I planted seeds, cultivated soil, and harvested crops. This husbandry is a natural process, yet fruition relies on the ground one places the good seed in. So, while this was a natural process, it required wise action based on a history of seed-planting and seed-planters. Planter, seed, and soil needed to be in agreement. The divine Qualities within us are present, and we are both the Qualities and becoming them. The fruition is the becoming. Yet, this is not assured. We nurture. To cultivate is to nurture. We are seeds, we are soil.
We are a seed without a purpose to grow into fruit, yet having the nature to mature into fruit. Once we no longer need the goal, it drops. Then, we do not walk the Way to grow, while in walking the Way, we grow. Growth is fruition. It is that simple: walking is growth, growth is walking. To grow means the Qualities ripen - love, joy, peace, ... They walk with us, too, being our Self. So, the best way to grow is without a purpose to grow. However, walking the Way is cultivating. You cultivate. That makes all the difference. Therefore, no-purpose is not no-action; no-purpose is non-action and action.
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A Jesus story, often called the Parable of the Sower, appears in the Gospel of Matthew 13.1ff (NLT). Jesus is teaching by a lake. He gets into a boat after a large crowd gathers around him. Sitting in the boat, he begins by telling a wisdom story -
Listen! A farmer went out to plant some seed. As he scattered it across his field, some of the seed fell on a [hardened] footpath, and the birds came and ate it. Other seed fell on shallow soil with underlying rock [limestone shelf]. The seed sprouted quickly because the soil was shallow. But the plant soon wilted under the hot sun, and since it didn't have deep roots, it died. Other seed fell among thorns [on the outskirts] that grew up and choked out the tender plants so they produced no grain. Still other [seed] fell on fertile soil, and they sprouted, grew, and produced a crop that was thirty, sixty, and even a hundred times as much as had been planted!" Then [Jesus] said, "Anyone with ears to hear should listen and understand."
Here, we see soil with differing degrees of receptivity to seed. We refer to each in the condition of the heart. We have the hardened heart, shallow heart, crowded heart, and fruitful heart. The first, the seed cannot penetrate, so it is soon eaten. The second, the seed lacks depth, so soon is gone. The third, the seed is suffocated after initially growing well - too many self-desires, self-concerns, and self-thoughts. The fourth, the seed flourishes and becomes fruit.
Interestingly, in the above story, the seed is the same. We cannot speak of a bad seed, not in the story - all the Qualities are wholesome. The soil cannot blame the seed. Hence, to nurture the seed means resigning it to soil prepared to receive it, for seed and soil are one. One cannot cultivate the seed without cultivating the soil. So, that is what we do - we keep cultivating. Our life becomes one whole act of ceaseless nurturing. We are caretakers. We never take a vacation from this. It is every moment.
What do we take care of? - the heart. With a good heart environment, the Qualities emerge and become stronger. So, we do not jump to being fruitful. First, we tend our heart, ourselves.
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Kobun Chino Otogawa, in Embracing Mind, refers to the "almost painful recognition" of our seeing how alone we are in this world. He says of the dawning of this recognition ...
It is like a persimmon tree whose fruit drops after ripening, and you discover you are among people, all alone. What do you do with your life, then?
Many seeds surround us, yet we are that one seed. We have to be the one to take care of our heart. No other one can do that for us. We are alone, and we alone can nurture ourselves. While the presence and sharing of others bless us, they cannot take care of our heart for us. So, we can forget about the quantity and quality of fruit. We can walk the Way, which is taking care of ourselves. If we take care of our heart-environment, the fruit will mature.
This self-care may sound selfish - it is not. The fruit demonstrates how wise heart-care is. And it is not our business to compare our fruit to others. We focus on walking the Way, and walking the Way is this nurture, then our basic, innate goodness will flourish.
So, unlike much religion, we begin at a positive place. Rather than starting with faith in basic, innate badness (unenlightened, sinful), we begin with basic, innate goodness. The seed is good, so we just take care of it. We do not need to become good; goodness manifests in not trying to be good. Good means neither right nor not-right - that is why it can be said to be innately good. Each time we enter the Silence, we practice remembering the Good, we attend to our heart and encourage the Qualities with our kind presence and gentle attention.
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*(C) Brian K. Wilcox, 2021
*Brian's book, An Ache for Union: Poems on Oneness with God through Love, can be ordered through major online booksellers or the publisher AuthorHouse. The book is a collection of poems based on mystical traditions, especially Christian and Sufi, with extensive notes on the teachings and imagery in the poetry.
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