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Oxherding Pictures Index

Drawings by Mark T. Morse

Searching for the Ox: The Path to Enlightenment in 10 Pictures
by Josh Bartok
Drawings by Mark T. Morse

In Zen’s famed 10 oxherding pictures, the ox is enlightenment and the herder is you, the meditator. Created by 12th-century Chinese master Guo-an Shi-yuan, the oxherding pictures have mapped the path for Buddhist practitioners ever since, inspiring countless commentaries and new renderings. Here is a contemporary take by graphic artist Mark T. Morse, with commentary by Boundless Way Zen teacher Josh Bartok.

Josh Bartok (Keido Mu'nen) is the abbot (head teacher and spiritual director) at the Greater Boston Zen Center. He is a Dharma heir of James Ishmael Ford Roshi in both of the roshi's lineages: the ordained Soto Zen lineage of Jiyu Kennett, and the koan introspection lineage of John Tarrant.

https://www.lionsroar.com/searching-for-the-ox-the-path-to-enlightenment-in-10-pictures/

1. Searching

Here we become aware of our spiritual questions, perhaps Where can I be free from suffering? Who am I? Why does it hurt so much to be me? How can there be such evil? or What is my True Nature? We may be motivated by fear of death—or fear of life. This is raising the mind of enlightenment.

2. Seeing the footprints

Here we embark in earnest on the path. We discover the tools of dharma exploration, the teachings of the ancestors. When we first encounter meditation, though we may not understand it, there is a glimmer of rightness, a dimly perceived potential of coming home. Pushing aside weeds and grasses, we wonder how we might express our Original Face.

3. Glimpsing

Here we see for ourselves that the buddhas and ancestors and our own teachers have not been deceiving us. We glimpse the Great Matter through a small opening, a small intimation. Perhaps this comes with fireworks and, in our delusion, we think we’ve seen the whole ox, though all we’ve seen is the head. But that tiny tail!—what a wonderful thing it is.

4. Catching

Having become oriented to the nature of the spiritual work to be done, here we must begin to truly do it. Conditioned by eons of karmic habit, the work can be painful and slow. We see just how much of a mess our minds are, how quickly and inevitably we respond from grasping and aversion—and perhaps we even see no change at all. This is a period of excruciation and great effort, the work of lifetimes.

5. Taming

Here at last we begin to see that patterns can change, habits can be unlearned, and compassion and wisdom truly can be realized and practiced. We rely on the support of the three treasures—buddha, dharma, and sangha—because we can’t do it by ourselves, and nobody else can do it for us either. In diligent application, patience and generosity toward ourselves and others is the moment-by-moment practice.

6. Riding home

Here we can begin to loosen our grips on our minds, on our stories of how we and the world are or should be, and even on the tools of the dharma. We play freely on the iron flute with no holes. Entrusting ourselves to the universe, we receive all that comes and we release all that goes.

7. Transcending other

Having returned home, here we can rest. We’ve lost the ox, we’ve found the ox—who can even remember what that search was for? Original Face? As soon as it is mentioned, the arrow sinks in stone. Yet in this very place, where fundamentally nothing is acquired, we really do acquire it.

8. Transcending self-and-other

Here, in this one bright pearl of a universe, there is not even a single thing. No self, no True Nature; no delusion, no wisdom; no seeking, no finding. No seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, touching—and of utmost importance, no knowing. There is also no dharma. And even emptiness is empty.

9. The source

And yet… and yet… Though form is indeed exactly emptiness, form is also form. The one bright pearl manifests as the myriad things. From the beginning, nothing was ever missing. Time after time, just this has always been it. The universe of emptiness arises thus.

10. Returning

Here we dive back into the great fertilizing muddle of life and death. We partake and participate. Our debt to the buddhas and ancestors, and to our own teachers, can never be paid back—but we vow together with all beings to pay it forward, ceaselessly.