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寂室元光 Jakushitsu Genkō (1290-1367)
Jakushitsu Genko was a medieval Japanese Zen master of the Rinzai school.
Jakushitsu was born into an aristocratic family during a period of unrest and political instability in Japan. At the age of 12, he was sent to a monastery in Kyoto. Monasteries were often the best place to receive a good education. While Jakushitsu was a boy, he apparently did not have a strong religious vocation, but a meeting with a visiting Zen monk deeply impressed him. The monk's focused meditation, along with his peace and wisdom, inspired the young Jakushitsu and he decided to dedicate himself to Zen practice.
As a young monk, Jakushitsu traveled to China to study Ch'an practice with several well-respected masters. When he eventually returned to Japan, he spent many years as a wandering hermit, preferring contemplation in remote locations far from the major cities.
He gained a reputation for his asceticism, upholding traditional Zen/Ch'an practices and ideals, as well as for his genial nature, his flute playing... and his poetry.
In the final few years of his life, he was coaxed by a local lord to settle down and become a teacher and spiritual guide to other monks. Eigen-ji temple was built for him and he became its first abbot.
As did other Zen monks, Jakushitsu questioned at times the value of writing poetry. Why pursue words, when one truly seeks silence? Yet he kept returning to his poetry, which has come to be recognized as being among the finest examples of Zen poetry handed down to us.
Jakushitsu Genkō's Dharma Lineage
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菩提達磨 Bodhidharma, Putidamo (Bodaidaruma ?-532/5)
大祖慧可 Dazu Huike (Taiso Eka 487-593)
鑑智僧璨 Jianzhi Sengcan (Kanchi Sōsan ?-606)
大毉道信 Dayi Daoxin (Daii Dōshin 580-651)
大滿弘忍 Daman Hongren (Daiman Kōnin 601-674)
大鑑慧能 Dajian Huineng (Daikan Enō 638-713)
南嶽懷讓 Nanyue Huairang (Nangaku Ejō 677-744)
馬祖道一 Mazu Daoyi (Baso Dōitsu 709-788)
百丈懷海 Baizhang Huaihai (Hyakujō Ekai 750-814)
黃蘗希運 Huangbo Xiyun (Ōbaku Kiun ?-850)
臨濟義玄 Linji Yixuan (Rinzai Gigen ?-866)
興化存獎 Xinghua Cunjiang (Kōke Zonshō 830-888)
南院慧顒 Nanyuan Huiyong (Nan'in Egyō ?-952)
風穴延沼 Fengxue Yanzhao (Fuketsu Enshō 896-973)
首山省念 Shoushan Shengnian (Shuzan Shōnen 926-993)
汾陽善昭 Fenyang Shanzhao (Fun'yo Zenshō 947-1024)
石霜/慈明 楚圓 Shishuang/Ciming Chuyuan (Sekisō/Jimei Soen 986-1039)
楊岐方會 Yangqi Fanghui (Yōgi Hōe 992-1049)
白雲守端 Baiyun Shouduan (Hakuun Shutan 1025-1072)
五祖法演 Wuzu Fayan (Goso Hōen 1024-1104)
圜悟克勤 Yuanwu Keqin (Engo Kokugon 1063-1135)
虎丘紹隆 Huqiu Shaolong (Kukyū Jōryū 1077-1136)
應庵曇華 Yingan Tanhua (Ōan Donge 1103-1163)
密庵咸傑 Mian Xianjie (Mittan Kanketsu 1118-1186)
松源崇岳 Songyuan Chongyue (Shōgen Sūgaku 1132-1202)
無明慧性 Wuming Huixing (Mumyō Eshō 1162-1237)
約翁德儉 Yakuō Tokken (1244–1320)
寂室元光 Jakushitsu Genkō (1290-1367)
Selected Poems of Jakushitsu
Translated by Nyogen Senzaki
In: Like a Dream, Like a Fantasy: The Zen Teachings and Translations of Nyogen Senzaki
Wisdom Publications, Boston, 2005, pp. 54-64.
Didn't I tell you it was there?
You could have found it without any trouble at all.
The south wind is warm;
The sun shines peacefully;
The birds warble their glad songs.
Spring blossoms in every treetop.
No living soul comes near the water.
A vast sheet of water as blue as indigo!
The abyss has a depth of ten thousand feet.
When all is quiet and calm, at midnight,
Only the moonlight penetrates the waves
And reaches the bottom easily and freely.
He walks freely in the world,
And goes just one way.
From the eternal past to the eternal future,
He is alone,
No one accompanies him.
If you ask him how old he is,
He will look at you with a smile,
And point to the endless sky.
To make every day a pleasant day is not an easy task.
The doors please and the lights smile in this house.
If you want to know why,
Sit on the veranda and face the cold moon.
Ryo-Ryo (LONELINESS) Ko-Fu (OLD WAY)
Like Virnalakirti,
She shuts her mouth,
Following the old way.
All day long, she sits within the gate.
She does not tell anyone her inner treasure.
When she sees the Blue Mountain
Through the veranda, and recognizes it,
She feels she has spoken too much.
FREE HANDS
(Sasshu or San-shu in Japanese; Sa-sbou in Chinese)A flawless gem illuminates the whole mountain.
It casts pure light in every direction.
To attain this gem is not difficult.
Just keep your hands off the cliff.
THE HOUSE OF EVERGREEN: SOSUI-AN
The wind shakes the thousand-year-old evergreen.
Day and night, it raises the sound of ocean waves on the mountain peak.
The pines refuse to associate with the common trees.
More than a hundred feet high, they greet each other
As they try to reach the clouds.
PDF: A Quiet Room
Poetry of Zen Master Jakushitsu
by Arthur Braverman (1942-)
Tuttle Publishing, 2000, 128 p.
ZEN MASTER JAKUSHITSU (1290-1367)
In 1326 a ship from mainland China reached the shores of Japan in the province of Nagato. 2 Among the passengers were a Chinese Chan master named Ching-cho and a number of Japanese monks returning from the mainland. Ching-cho was a disciple of Ku-lin, the teacher most responsible for the spread of a literature and a style of Zen poetry that was to define learning in Rinzai Zen monasteries in Japan throughout the fourteenth century.
A Japanese monk on the ship gave his fellow travelers all the mementos he had received from his meetings with Chinese masters, said his good-byes, and slipped away into obscurity. There is no record of his whereabouts for the eight years following his return to Japan, and little is known of his life for decades after. He eschewed life in big cities where powerful lords and prominent monks sponsored the construction of large monasteries—places where new Zen literature was to flourish. Other than the recorded entries of his visits to their temples, nothing is known of his relationship with Ching-cho and Ching's teacher Ku-lin. His love for the art of verse, however, is evident in the poems he left us. The Japanese monk's principal teacher in China was Ming-pen, a recluse whose hermetic leanings were to influence the writings of his Japanese students. This Chinese master shunned the large religious centers on the mainland as did his disciple when he returned to Japan.
The Japanese monk's name was Jakushitsu. Like many Zen masters and Buddhist poets before him, he seems to have questioned the appropriateness of a man of Zen creating verse. 3 Though he may have given up poetry for long periods of time, he left us with enough poems to provide us a fuller understanding of his Zen than if we had only his letters and sermons to refer to. Whether he had developed a relationship with Ching-cho or Ku-lin, we can only guess. The style and subject matter in his poems leads us to believe that he was greatly influenced by Ku-lin at least indirectly Because of his love of this art form, he left us descriptions of nature expressed with an immediacy that is the signature of good poetry This apparently withdrawn Zen master came alive in verse—writing of friendship, loneliness, and death with a sensitivity that was both dynamic and vulnerable. And he managed this while maintaining an altitude that was both serious and playful:
Alone
playing in this joyful leisure
White haired
I face the green mountain
JAKUSHITSU'S LIFE: LIVING IN THE MOUNTAINS
Neither seeking fame
nor grieving my poverty
I hide deep in the mountain
far from worldly dust
Year ending
cold sky
who will befriend me?
Plum blossom on a new branch
wrapped in moonlightEigenji Monastery, is situated on Mount Zuiseki in a remote part of Shiga Prefecture overlooking the Eichi River. It exemplifies the ideal of rinka Zen. Rinka, meaning “under the forest,” is contrasted with sôrin , or “forest,” and refers to the many temples located away from the large centers of Kyoto and Kamakura. Rinka characterizes ideal Zen life, away from the hustle and bustle of big cities and apart from the political pressure of the powerful and wealthy. Eigenji, hidden amid mountains, woods, and streams, reflects the natural beauty of rural Japan. The poet-monk Jakushitsu, reluctant as he was to give up his life as a wandering recluse, was lured away from the remote hills and backwoods of Japan to settle in Eigenji when his aged bones could no longer easily carry him from one mountain hermitage to another. Though Jakushitsu previously declined offers to take charge of two large sôrin or gozan 4 monasteries, at seventy-one he became founding abbot of Eigenji. His close relationship with his disciple Sasaki Ujiyouri, ruling lord of Ômi (present-day Shiga Prefecture), who had the temple built for the master, and the fact that Eigenji was away from the centers of political intrigue, Kyoto and Kamakura, certainly influenced Jakushitsu's decision to finally settle down as a teacher in a Zen monastery.
The Ox-Herding Pictures are a series of ten illustrations accompanied by commentaries in prose and verse describing the stages of religious practice in Zen. The tenth picture, entided Entering the Marketplace with Giving Hands, depicts one of the central themes in Zen: the final stage in the life of a Zen practitioner in which he shares his understanding with others. This is one way of looking at this period in Jakushitsu's life.
Roaming the mountains of Japan certainly seemed an intricate part of the lifestyle of this poet-monk whose most famous poem ends with the verse: “If I die at the foot of this cliff / even my bones will be pure.” From the fact that Jakushitsu refused previous requests to serve as abbot of large monasteries we know that he must have struggled with this decision to take charge of Eigenji. What went through his mind at the time he made the decision, we can only surmise. This perceptive and elegant Zen master devoted five years to teaching and left a well-kept record of his letters, lectures, and, most important, some of the best Chinese poetry a fourteenth-century Japanese monk-poet ever produced. To better understand Jakushitsu's life and teaching, we must start with his early years, which, to borrow again from the Ox-Herding series, this time from the first picture in the series, can be described as “Searching for the Ox.”
In 1303, when the thirteen-year-old Jakushitsu entered the Tôfukuji Monastery in Kyoto, Zen Buddhism was beginning to establish itself as a religion among the nobility and warriors of Japan. Yet the power of the older sects, Tendai and Shingon, was still to be reckoned with in the capital. Tôfukuji was a large Zen monastery founded by Enni Ben'en (1201-1280) in 1255. Along with a Zen meditation hall, it had facilities for Shingon and Tendai rites. Enni had received the seal of esoteric teaching in the Tendai tradition before traveling to China and completing his Zen training. He had also studied Confucianism for three years in Kyoto and was reputed to be one of the greatest scholars of his time. His reputation as a learned monk set the scene for an intellectual atmosphere at Tôfukuji that would help define that monastery through the ages. By the time the thirteen-year-old Jakushitsu entered Tôfukuji, along with the esoteric rituals, the practice of literature—eventually to be known as the literature of the Five Mountains (gozanbungaku )—played a major part in the activities of the monastery.
Jakushitsu was an unusually bright and sensitive boy. He did not enter Tôfukuji with the intention of devoting his life to religious pursuits. It was most likely the cultivation of academic learning rather than religion that prompted Jakushitsu's parents to entrust him to the care of the monks at Tôfukuji. Buddhist monasteries were best equipped to give him a sound education. Although he left Tôfukuji a few years later in search of a place where he could engage in a more concentrated Zen practice, during his time at the Kyoto monastery he felt the importance of a religious life and desired to become a monk. We can only speculate about the kind of education Jakushitsu received prior to his ordination into Zen monkhood from the direction his life took subsequently and from the scanty biographical information about his early years.
Jakushitsu was born in 1290 in the province of Saku (present-day Okayama Prefecture) into a branch of the Fujiwara family. The circumstances surrounding his birth as reported by his biographer resemble too closely other Buddhist hagiographies to be taken literally. According to his biographer Miten Eishaku, his mother had no difficulty giving birth, an auspicious sign. The room at the time of birth, Mitan said, was filled with a divine light, which caused the relatives present to conclude that the child would be exceptional.
The second entry in the biography describes an incident that took place when Jakushitsu was seven. A group of friends on a fishing excursion left Jakushitsu in charge of the catch. He thought to himself; “As trifling as these little creatures are, they are alive and one shouldn't take a life.” To the group's consternation he set all the fish free. Nothing more is written about Jakushitsu's life before he entered Tôfukuji. One story pointing to the religious conversion leading to the boy's ordination tells of an invitation to an aunt's house sometime after he entered the monastery. The aunt prepared a meal for Jakushitsu including some boiled meat. The boy said to his aunt; “How can one who has entered a Buddhist monastery commit an act forbidden by the Buddha?” and refused to eat it.
His biographer writes nothing more of Jakushitsu's years at Tôfukuji other than to describe the events connected with his leaving the Kyoto temple. At fifteen, approximately two years after entering Tôfukuji, Jakushitsu was ordained. That same year, while traveling to Tanakami, a town in the province of Go (present-day Shiga Prefecture), Jakushitsu saw a Zen monk absorbed in zazen.
The monk had just returned from Kantô (eastern Japan, including Kamakura). To quote Mitan, Jakushitsu was “secretly drawn to this practice and wanted to learn the way beyond letters.” Apparently zazen wasn't a major part of the lives of monks at Tôfukuji, because Jakushitsu soon left the monastery in search of the kind of practice that this monk embodied. The practice of poetry, one of the central activities at Tôfukuji and one that was to mark Jakushitsu's genius in the future, was for him at age fifteen an indulgence that was keeping him from engaging in the life of a “pure” practitioner. This realization started to form as he journeyed through Tanakami, very near where he was to stay some fifty-five years later when he was drawn away from his life as a itinerant mountain monk to become the founding abbot of Eigenji. The period between Jakushitsu's departure from Tôfukuji until his installment as abbot of Eigenji saw him traveling through most of central and eastern Japan and parts of China.
Through a fellow monk at Tôfukuji, Jakushitsu learned of a teacher of rare quality, Yakuô Kenkô, who might fulfill the earnest young initiate's need for a severe champion of pure Zen. Yakuô was a disciple of Lan-chi Tao-lung (Rankei Dôryû in Japanese), a Chinese Zen master from Szechuan who had arrived in Japan in 1246. Soon after hearing this, Jakushitsu, together with his new friend, left for Zenkôji, the temple in Kamakura where Yakuô then resided. The young monk was intent on becoming a disciple of this Zen master. The evening before Jakushitsu arrived at Zenkôji, Yakuô is said to have had a dream in which “many saints had descended and a light bright enough to illuminate mountains and rivers was manifest.” Hence the name Genko, “Original Light,” which Yakuô was to bestow on Jakushitsu.
Jakushitsu studied with Yakuô for the next few years, winning the master's respect and serving as his personal attendant. It was during this period, in his eighteenth year, that he had one of those profound experiences that defines the Zen school. He was attending the master when Yakuô suddenly became ill. Jakushitsu asked the master for a final poem. What he received was a slap on the face which acted as a catalyst for a kenshô , a glimpse into his true nature. There are two interpretations of the expression “matsugo no ikku” which I have translated as “final poem.” One is “deathbed poem” and the other is “master's final word on Zen.” It is difficult to know whether Jakushitsu thought that the master was dying when he asked for the final poem. If he did believe that Yakuô was dying and the master was only afflicted with a mild disease, then Jakushitsu, obsessed with receiving a final teaching from a man who was not in his final stages of life, was not really looking at what is. In that case the master's slap might have revealed to his disciple that he was living in a world of ideas and missing the present moment. If Jakushitsu was in the right state of mind, and it appears that he was, this realization would have a profound effect on him.
Jakushitsu remained close to his teacher until Yakuo's death in 1320. During this period, when he wasn't serving his master, he was training with teachers in accord with Yakuô's instructions. At age twenty Jakushitsu studied the precepts under a precept master, Eun, in Kanazawa for three months. This was followed by periods of study with three Chinese masters who came to teach in Japan. Yakuô, having received transmission from a Chinese master, wanted his prize student to study with the leading Chinese masters in Japan and was no doubt connected with many who resided there. Jakushitsu studied under the most eminent of them, I-shan I-ning (in Japanese, Issan Ichunei, 1247-1317), third abbot of the Nanzenji Temple during I-shan's final years. I-shan, one of the men most responsible for spreading the Chinese culture through the pre- gozan Zen world in Japan, had high praise for a poem Jakushitsu composed in his seventeenth year, “Bodhidharma in the Snow.” This was the first mention of Jakushitsu's poetic skills in Miten's biography. I-shan most probably encouraged him to develop these skills. I-shan died in 1317 when Jakushitsu was twenty-eight, three years before the death of Yakuô. The year his teacher died Jakushitsu traveled to China, beginning a new chapter in his life. He was thirty-one years old.
Chung-feng Ming-pen (1263-1323), a well-known Chinese master who worked to restore Rinzai Zen, received visits from many Japanese Zen monks. He practiced in rigorous fashion and loved the quiet of secluded retreats. He insisted on faithful practice of zazen and well-regulated communal life, and many serious practitioners from Japan and China knocked on his brushwood gate. His lineage was referred to as the Genjû line and was one of the two important models for rinka Zen.
Jakushitsu stayed in China for six years, from 1320 to 1326. During that stay he visited many famous temples and met with many experienced masters. But his principal goal was to meet and study with Ming-pen. Little is recorded in Miten's biography of the time Jakushitsu spent with Ming-pen. But mention of one incident, which occurred at his first meeting with the Chinese master, is detailed, perhaps to emphasize Jakushitsu's determination to study with the renowned teacher.
In the fourth year of Bunhô, the master was thirty-one years old. At that time he had heard of the Way of the priest Chûhô (Ming-pen) of Tenmoku—a flower that had shaken southern China. He sailed to China and climbed Mount Tenmoku. The sun was setting and the temple garden was covered with snow With his two companions, Nen Kaô and Shun Donan, he stood in the garden, refusing to leave. Hô (Chuhô) wrote four characters on the master's arm, “come back following day.”
The master immediately ran to the temple toilet, scooped a ladle full of water and washed off the writing. This story is followed by a list of places and teachers Jakushitsu visited in China.
Thirty years after Ming-pen's death, Jakushitsu composed a poem with a prose preface that demonstrated his great respect for his Chinese teacher. It was probably composed and brushed on a portrait of the late master. In the preface he begins: “If I am to comment on the old priest's presence, I would say the mountains, rivers, and the great earth are all illusion; form, emptiness, light and dark are all illusion; all the Buddhas of the three worlds are illusion.” Playing on the word gen (illusion) which is the first character in one of Ming-pen's names, and the name of the school derived from his teaching, the Genjû line, Jakushitsu is suggesting that Ming-pen is all of these things, or that all is illusion in the face of his truth. Here is the poem that follows the preface:
Myriad virtues majestic perfection body
Even with the open sky for a tongue how can I describe him?
I make myself speak
“Since the time of the Buddha there has been only one”Jakushitsu acclaims his Chinese teacher greatly here. Since this is a convention in a particular style of Zen poem, it cannot be taken alone as proof of his great respect for the Chinese master. The other piece of evidence, much more convincing, is Jakushitsu's style of Zen practice from the time he left Ming-pen. Ming-pen practiced a rigorous style of Zen in the seclusion of a mountain hermitage. He turned down the invitation of a Yuan dynasty emperor to come to the capital because he considered life in a cosmopolitan center incompatible with true practice. As was the case with most Chinese masters, Ming-pen advocated a blend of Pure Land teaching and Zen.
We have very few details of Jakushitsu's travels from the time he left Ming-pen. Like the Chinese master he stayed away from metropolitan centers and well-known monasteries, keeping his whereabouts unknown. His poetry abounds in references to a life of seclusion in the mountains and to rigorous practice:
Green-tinged mountains cut off worldly dust
Moonlit ivy and wind in the pines: good neighbors
Severe life harsh practice
No one visits my quiet dwellingIn his poetry and his sermons Jakushitsu refers to the Pure Land teachings with great respect. For him the true spirit of the Pure Land was no different from Zen. Whereas this attitude was quite compatible with the teachings of Ming-pen, it could not have developed under the influence of his Japanese teacher Yakuô, whose teacher Lan-hsi tried to purge Zen of influences and practices of other Buddhist sects.
Ming-pen died in 1323 at age sixty-one. Jakushitsu was thirty-four. He spent three more years in China visiting other teachers and historical spots where many of the old masters lived. He returned to Japan in 1326 to continue a life of wandering. Very little is known of Jakushitsu's travels from the time he arrived back in Japan until he agreed to become abbot of Eigenji some thirty-five years later.
One way of celebrating the new understanding arrived at by a disciple is through the presentation of a new Buddhist name. This milestone was usually accompanied by a poem brushed and composed by the teacher. When a Japanese monk trained in China, most, if not all, of his contact with his Chinese teachers was through the written word. Hence a poem brushed by a Chinese teacher was usually taken back to Japan and cherished by the disciple for the rest of his life. Jakushitsu went to China as Tessan Genkô, having received the name Genko from his Japanese teacher Yakuô and the name Tessan from the Chinese teacher I-shan, whom he had served for two years in Japan at the request of Yakuô. On his return to Japan Jakushitsu carried with him, along with calligraphy and other presents from teachers he visited throughout his seven years in China, a poem brushed by Ming-pen. The poem was presented to him with the name Jakushitsu, given him by the master. According to his biographer, Jakushitsu gave all these possessions to his fellow travelers before leaving the ship in the Japanese port of Nagato.
After a brief stay in Misumi (present-day Shimane Prefecture), Jakushitsu disappeared for eight years, leaving his biographer to write: “hidden among the crags in the valleys, he remained far from society.” Though Mitan was able to account for the monk's whereabouts for part of the seventeen years following this eight-year disappearance, Jakushitsu remained in relative obscurity, and few details of his life are known outside of the names of some places and temples he visited during a twenty-five year period after his return from China. And although the names of teachers he met and places he traveled in China appear in his biography, they are followed by the statement “as for the discussions with these teachers, Jakushitsu revealed them to no one.” Jakushitsu seems to have made a conscious decision to remain inaccessible. His unconventional Chinese master, Ming-pen, whose love of solitude led him in his youth to go into hiding to avoid being appointed abbot of a monastery on Mount Tien-mu, was certainly a major influence on his decision.
During this twenty-five year period, Jakushitsu continued his life as an itinerant monk traveling through the southwestern part of Japan's main island, Honshu, staying in Bizen, Bitchû, and his hometown of Mimasaka (in present-day Okayama Prefecture) and Bingo (present-day Hiroshima Prefecture). He stayed in small rural temples, many of the Daikaku 5 branch of Zen to which his late teacher Yakuô belonged. His poetry is full of descriptions of the solitude and beauty of the mountains, valleys, and streams that surrounded him and of the animals who shared them with him.
Two major developments in the country at this time would appear to have been instrumental in keeping Jakushitsu from traveling anywhere near the capital or the religious centers of Japan. One was the continuation of a civil war that began in 1331 (Nambokuchô), and the other was the growing involvement the larger Zen monasteries were beginning to have with the government and the powerful warrior clans. The civil war started when the leader of the southern court decided to test the power of a then weak military council in an attempt to advance the waning emperial power. The struggle was to continue between the loyalists and the leading military clan, the Ashikaga, throughout the greater part of the fourteenth century. Military clans shifted allegiances so often and political intrigue was so common that it became difficult to see the possibility of any settlement ahead. The rising prestige of the Zen monasteries was to a great degree a result of the military government adopting the gozan (Five Mountains) system of ranking Zen monasteries, which led some of the larger temples to jockey for political power. Jakushitsu despised this mixing of politics and religion and remained as far away from it as he could. In his writings he didn't hide his disgust with the intrigue that was going on in many of the larger monasteries, but he rarely wrote about war. The following poem, however, is an exception. Composed toward the end of his twenty-five years of wandering through western Japan, it reveals his frustration with the war that plagued the country for a quarter of a century:
Smoke of war everywhere when will it end?
Weapons in every temple and town
A dream last night even gold can't replace
Briefly frolicking in nowhere landAttempting to remain reclusive in the Zen world does not always bring about the desired results. During this period Jakushitsu received invitations to take charge of at least two major monasteries, which he politely refused. But at age sixty-two he started to move away from the southwestern area to travel as far east as Kai (present-day Yamanashi Prefecture). No mention is made in the records of why Jakushitsu started his move east at this time, but the political climate in Japan again gives a hint of a possible motive. The constant fighting that had plagued the country for the last twenty-five years had escalated in the western provinces as an old feud between two of the Shogun's chief generals and his brother and chief advisor, Tadayoshi, intensified. In an attempt to restrain supporters of his enemies in his brother's government in the west, Tadayoshi appointed his adopted son governor of the eight western provinces. It was at this time that Jakushitsu composed the poem “Smoke and war everywhere.” This rare confession of his disgust for war makes one wonder whether he moved east to get away from the immediate fighting.
In another poem written at this time Jakushitsu asks his friend and fellow monk Reisô:
My mountain temple gate extends to town
How can I endure the daily hustle and bustle?
I could buy a hoe for 100 copper coins
Spend my remaining years cultivating the green mountain.In a second poem to Reisô, the poet laments the passing of so many old companions and asks if his own death might someday disturb Reisô's peace of mind. But it was Reisô who died first. Reisô had been in charge of the training temple at Myôzenji in Okayama. When he died, the monks there asked Jakushitsu to guide them through their training season. Jakushitsu couldn't refuse the disciples of his old friend and agreed to join them for a three-month summer training period ( ango ). Although his poems expressed more and more the desire to live and die in the mountains, his sense of obligation seems to have worn his resistance down. His modesty only added to his appeal as a Zen teacher, and with his reputation grew a circle of new friends and disciples. When he spoke, disciples secretly recorded his words and treasured them.
Sometime during this period Jakushitsu made the acquaintance of the governor of Ômi, Sasaki Ujiyori (1326-1370). Sasaki, a devout Buddhist, met Jakushitsu at Kuwanomi Temple where the master was temporarily residing. Sasaki was greatly impressed with the master's style of Zen and proposed to build him a temple at the foot of Mount Zuiseki along the Eichi River. Although in his new home Jakushitsu would be surrounded by the mountains and forests of rural Japan, where he felt most at home, he still would be a master committed to settling in one place. He did so, but from some comments in his letters it is apparent that it was not without some degree of sadness and even reluctance. The man who had spent most of his life wandering through the mountains of Japan and China, avoiding society and shunning public favor, was now to be founding abbot of a monastery with more than two thousand visitors passing through it during Jakushitsu's first year as abbot.
Jakushitsu's life at Eigenji was unassuming as ever. In his first year the young Bassui Tokushô, who had received dharma sanction from the Zen master Kôhô Kakumyô, visited the master. Bassui had been roaming the mountains of eastern Japan, advancing his practice in much the same way Jakushitsu had done years before, visiting teachers from whom he hoped to learn. Bassui had high standards for himself as well as for the teachers he met. Few teachers lived up to his standards, and he did not hesitate to express his disappointment with those who didn't. But he was not disappointed with Jakushitsu. His biographer relates that he was very impressed with the elegant simplicity of the master.
The following year the master refused invitations tendered by the Shôgun Ashikaga Yoshiakira and the retired emperor Gokôgen to become abbot of two well-known gozan head temples. He even went so far as to leave town so that he would not be present when the Shogun's messenger came with an official request for him to be abbot of Kenchôji.
Five years after Jakushitsu took charge of Eigenji, he handed it over to his disciple Miten Eishaku. On the eighth month of the following year, 1367, Jakushitsu wrote his last will and testament and asked his two chief disciples to make sure his requests were carried out. On the first day of the ninth month of that same year he wrote his final poem and then passed away at the age of seventy-six.
JAKUSHITSU'S ZEN
Jakushitsu is officially affiliated with the Daikaku Zen lineage, inherited from his Japanese teacher Yakuô, who was a prominent disciple of Lan-hsi Tao-lung, a Chinese master. When he arrived in Japan in 1246 Lan-hsi quickly won favor from Japan's most powerful figure, the regent Tokiyori, who made him founding abbot of Kenchôji, the leading Zen temple in the military capital of Kamakura. Lan-hsi devoted his energy to purging Zen temples of the practices of other sects, particularly Shingon and Tendai, which he felt diluted the teaching of pure Zen in the Rinzai sect. He was successful in spreading this unadulterated Rinzai Zen throughout Japan, but not without the support provided by the government-sponsored monasteries and the unavoidable pomp and circumstance provided by the patrons from the ruling class.
Though Jakushitsu remained in contact with friends and fellow practitioners from the Daikaku line, the teaching of his Chinese master Ming-pen was far more suited to his temperament. Upon his return from China in 1326, Jakushitsu roamed the mountains of western Japan, visiting and staying with many of his old friends of the Daikaku Zen line. Even the temple he was to found, Eigenji, was considered to be in the Daikaku line. But Jakushitsu's greatest inspiration came from the eccentric Ming-pen, after whom the Japanese monk-poet seems to have modeled his life. Like his Chinese master, Jakushitsu spent many years wandering the mountains of Japan, refusing appointments to large monasteries. His own practice was quite austere. He refused to allow himself any possessions outside of the bare minimum needed for survival. In a letter to a Zen practitioner named Sai, he refused the present of a quilted coat. He wrote that he couldn't accept the coat because it was too valuable for an ordinary monk like himself to possess, and he returned it to Sai with his apologies.
Jakushitsu's biography and his letters to disciples and friends draw for us a picture of a humble monk who meticulously followed the teachings of the Zen patriarchs. But it is through his poetry that we can catch the true flavor of the heart-mind of the Mahayana, a mind that is broad enough to understand the possibilities of the unlimited while accepting the small, sometimes petty particulars of ordinary thinking. It was perhaps the need to express his feeling of the unlimited by way of the ordinary that compelled Jakushitsu to compose verse despite his own reservations about Zen practitioners writing poetry. In “Walking in the Mountains,” one of four short poems on the topic of the “four dignified manners” (in Japanese, Shiigi) he writes: “The sound of my voice bearing the pain blends with the sound of the river's flow.” Jakushitsu's personal conflicts blending with the universal and hence coming into proper perspective is an implicit theme in much of his verse.
Jakushitsu sees his own view as small but recognizes it as one side of a more complete picture. In his poem “Buddha's Nirvana,” he mistakes death for life: “Flowers that decorate valleys and mountains in spring/ I mistake for red leaves in autumn wind.” While in his poems he identifies with the pain of a lone wild goose and the joy of a mountain bird, he recognizes the tentativeness of all these emotions and the mind that stands on firmer ground. In “Kingfisher” he writes: “Body rests on hazardous withered reeds / Mind remains in the depth of the waters bottom.”
In his writings, particularly his poetry, he presents us with the extent of human emotions: longing, pain, anger, joy, and so forth, but there is always the opening for the unknown to enter: “I view a thousand peaks and push open the gate.”
SÔTEI (ANCESTRAL GARDEN)
In front of the Patriarch's room
the road is smoothA thousand years pass in vain
moss growsBright moon
shines like snowThe Second Patriarch
his arm severed
still hasn't arrived.---
PRESENTED TO HERMITAGE MASTER KYÔ
The mind is Buddha
how crude!No mind
no Buddha
no deliberationStraw sandals trampling snow on barrier mountains
Everywhere the smell of winter plums
---
A Visit to Hattoji Temple
Lone mountain dominating three provinces
White clouds cover a green peak
Summit soaring to great heights
Old temple nearly a thousand years
A monk meditates alone in a moonlit hall
A monkey cries in the mist in an old tree
Saying to worldly folk:
"Come here; free yourselves of karmic dust."---
Gathering Tea
To the branch's edge
and the leaf's under surface
be most attentive
Its pervasive aroma
envelopes people far away
The realms of form and function
can't contain it
Spring leaks profusely
through the basket---
Living in the Mountains
Neither seeking fame
nor grieving my poverty
I hide deep in the mountain
far from worldly dust.
Year ending
cold sky
who will befriend me?
Plum blossom on a new branch
wrapped in moonlight---
Rain in Autumn
Look at the moon before you point or speak
Illuminating the sky
an unstained round light
If your face doesn't possess the monk's discerning eye
You become blinded by evening rains of autumn---
Sitting in the Mountains
Rock slab seat
legs folded
sitting alone
Not loathing noise
not savoring silence
The carefree clouds concur
Poems by Jakushitsu Genkō
by Burton Watson
in The Rainbow World: Japan in Essays and Translations,
Broken Moon Press, 1990, pp. 121-126.
Jakushitsu Genkō (1290-1367) was one of the most distin-
guished poets of the Gozan bungaku, or "Literature of the
Five Mountains," the body of prose and poetry written in
Chinese by Japanese Zen monks of the Kamakura and Mu-
romachi periods. Born in the Katsuyama region of Mima-
saka in present-day Okayama Prefecture, he went to Kyoto
at an early age and entered Zen training at Tōfuku-ji tem-
ple. Later he continued his studies in Kamakura and
became a Dharma-heir of Yakuō Tokken (1245-1330), a
disciple of the Chinese monk Lan-hsi Tao-lung.
In 1320 Jakushitsu went to China, then under Mongol
rule, studying first at Mount T''ien-mu west of Hangchow
and later at other Zen centers in southern China. After re-
turning to Japan in 1326 he spent some thirty years in self-
imposed obscurity, residing at a succession of country
temples in the Okayama area, and later at various temples
in the areas of modern Tottori, Shizuoka, and Shiga pre-
fectures. In 1360 he was persuaded by Sasaki Ujiyori, con-
stable of the province of
Ōmi (present-day Shiga Prefec-
ture), to settle down in a remote hilly site east of Lake
Biwa. The following year a temple, Eigen-ji, was built for
him there, where he lived until his death six years later.
Students flocked to study under him, and the temple has
remained an important center of Rinzai Zen study down
to present times.
Jakushitsu clearly cherished the life of reclusion and
refused all invitations that would oblige him to live in
proximity to the centers of political power in Kyoto and
Kamakura. Something of his attitude, and his distaste for
the great Zen establishments of the cities, can be seen in
the following introduction to a poem that he wrote for a
monk who shared his views:
In the first year of the Kōan era (1361) I came to live out my
old age at the foot of Mount Hankō [Eigen-ji] in the prov-
ince of Ōmi. At that time the attendant Sōrin Ka¹ came
from the capital and, joining me in my drab and uneventful
life, we passed the spring together and went on in that way
till winter. I admired him for his unequaled innate quali-
ties and the fact that he did not let his keen intelligence
lead him astray. Instead he worked doggedly and deter-
minedly at the search for enlightenment, pursuing his
practice without wasting a single moment.One night as we were seated around the fire leisurely
chatting, he said to me, "When I was living in the temple
with the other monks, I used to be so fond of reading old
books that I would almost give up going to bed or forget to
eat my meals. But then it suddenly occurred to me that
trying to gain understanding through learning and the ex-
ercise of reason was in all probability merely prolonging
my delusion, making my egoistical outlook worse than
ever and laying foundations that would most likely lead me
into a scramble for fame and profit. Was it not in fact the
root cause that kept me bound to the realm of birth and
death? How much better, I thought, if I put all study-desk
matters out of my mind and contented myself with being a
know-nothing, understand-nothing fellow, better if I left
the temple, took a closer look at myself, and made enlight-
enment my only goal."It also occurred to me that the men of past times, even
after they had come to understand the Great Truth, would_______
¹ Sorin Chūka, a monk of Tenryū-ji temple in Kyoto and Dharma-
heir of Musō Soseki (1275-1350). By this time Musō Soseki was
dead and Chūka had evidently become dissatisfied with the atmo-
sphere at the temple. At this period many monks of the major Zen
temples devoted more time to learning and literature than to reli-
gious training.
still try to avoid becoming entangled in material things
and everyday affairs. Some went off to the western moun -
tains and never came back again. There were some whose
whereabouts only became known because of the vegetable
leaves that came drifting down the valley stream; some
composed lines such as 'Vexing, vexing, worldly affairs, /
better off in the mountains and hills! / Sleep under the
vines and creepers, / let a heap of stones pillow your head."
How different such men are from me and the likes of me,
who do nothing but put our heads together, raise a rumpus,
and let the seasons pass without accomplishing anything!
So I vowed that from now on I would never return to the
monastery, but would try to follow in the venerable foot-
steps of those wise recluses, spending the rest of my life on
that alone."I was more than ever impressed with the lofty character
and wonderful vision of this man, not the kind that could
ever be matched by our common run of mediocrities. So I
wrote this poem to present to him.
Some three hundred and fifty poems in Chinese by Jaku-
shitsu are preserved in a work compiled after his death,
the Eigen Jakushitsu Ōsho Goroku. (I have used the an-
notated edition published in Kyoto in 1644.) Many of the
poems are doctrinal in nature or otherwise rather special-
ized but in the selection that follows, I have concentrated
on works that reflect Jakushitsu's delight in his mountain
retreats and his relations with friends and students.
______
² The man who went off to the western mountains was the
Chinese monk known as Abbot Liang, who originally lectured on
Buddhist texts but later became a disciple of the Zen master Ma-tsu
(709-788) and eventually disappeared into the mountains. The man
whose hiding place was given away by vegetable leaves washing
down the mountain stream was another disciple of Ma-tsu named
Lung-shan. The author of the verses quoted was Lan-tsan, a monk
who lived in a cave on Mount Heng and refused to leave his retreat
even at the summons of the sovereign, Emperor Su-tsung (r. 756-762).
The verses are from his long poem entitled "Song of Delighting in
the Way."
Though he shunned the cities, he was by no means averse
to the company of others. On the contrary, like many re-
cluses, he was acutely aware of the pleasures of compan-
ionship. His poetry is marked by warmth, lightness, and
an engaging sense of humor, qualities that I hope will be
apparent in the examples I have chosen. All the poems in
my selection are in the four-line chüeh-chü or zekku form,
the first two using a five-character line, the remainder, a
seven-character line. The texts of the preface quoted
above, and of all but one poem (No. 2), will be found in
Harada Ryūmon's Jakushitsu Genkō (Tokyo: Shunjūsha,
1979), a work to which I am much indebted. For the text
of No. 2, see Kitamura Sawakichi, Gozan Bungaku Shikō
(Tokyo: Fuzambō, 1941), p. 296.
No. 1
Written on the Wall of a Mountain Retreat in Shii VillageWater in the ravine flows down to the world of men,
clouds from the scarps pass on to other mountains.
Listen a while to the hidden birds chattering,
as though they're extolling the idleness of this countryside monk!
No. 2
Spending the Night at Kongō-ji
(There are several temples by the name Kongō-ji and it is
uncertain which is intended here.]Often I come visiting this nearby temple.
We talk all night, never breaking off.
In this mountain village there are no signal drums.
When the window whitens, then we know it's dawn.
No. 3
Putting Up for the Night at Senkō-ji
[Senkō-ji was a temple in Onomichi on the Inland Sea.]Ten years ago I visited my friend.
At sight of each other, we clasped hands, talked on like spring.
Who'd have thought tonight I'd sleep in his old room,
moonlight piercing the cold window, wind rocking the bamboo.
No. 4
Two Poems Written on the Wall at Mount Konzō
(At Konzōsan-ji temple in Tantō, Hyogo Prefecture;
second of two poerns.]Wind buffets the waterfall, sending me cold sounds.
From peaks in front, a moon rises, the bamboo window brightens.
Old now, I feel it more than ever—so good to be here in the mountains!
Die at the foot of the cliff and even your bones are clean.³________
³ The last line is probably an allusion to the following poem by the
Chinese poet Wei Ying-wu (b. 736), who shared Jakushitsu's love of
the reclusive life:Visiting Someone on My Day Off but Not Finding Him Home
(A variant version of the title makes it clear that the person
visited was the poet-recluse Wang Chien.)Nine days racing a round, one day free:
I looked for you, didn't find you—now l go home empty-handed.
I'v e wondered why your poems seem to clean a man to his bones:
ah, your gate looks out on the cold brook, snow blankets your hills.
No. 5.
My former attendant Zaiō came to visit me at my new
place m Nobe (Shizuoka Prefecture). We sat around the
fire pit all night talking of worthwhile matters. When
he got ready to leave, I put together this little poem to
express my gratitude.I cut reeds for a new hut in a crook of the empty mountain.
You must have cared, coming so far to see me in my distant retreat.
We've burned up all the dry sticks, run out of words as well;
together we listen to the sound of icy rain pelting against the window.
No. 6.
Spring Day, Mountain WalkingHead covered with wispy hair, twisted in silvery tufts:
can't tell if I'll be around to welcome spring next year.
Bamboo staff, straw sandals, lots of delights in the country;
looking at mountain cherries-how many trees does this make?
The poems quoted so far have reflected Jakushitsu's be-
lief in the purifying nature of the mountain setting its
power to "clean a man to his bones." Jakushitsu in fact
viewed the scenes of nature as the most eloquent guide to
enlightenment, as is seen in the two poems quoted next.
In these, he directs the student's attention to the elements
of the mountain landscape and calls upon him not only to
observe them, but to learn to identify with them, since
they constitute a concrete embodiment of "this thing"
that the student is seeking, the ultimate principle of Bud-
dhism. As Jakushitsu puts it elsewhere in a short prose
piece addressed to a student, "You are the green mountain,
the green mountain is you!"
No. 7.
Two Poems to Show a Monk
(First of two poems)This thing—I show it to you clear as can be!
No need to plot any special feats or exploits.
Breezes mild, sun warm, yellow warblers caroling,
spring at its height already there in the blossoming treetops.
No. 8.
To Show to the Priest Named SonA man of the Way comes rapping at my brushwood gate,
wants to discuss the essentials of Zen experience.
Don't take it wrong if this mountain monk's too lazy to open his mouth:
late spring warblers singing their heart out, a village of drifting petals.
The following poem is one of a series describing various
Buddhas and bodhisattvas. This one is about the bodhi-
sattva Manjushri or Monju, a fictional being who repre-
sents Supreme Wisdom. His statue is a regular fixture in
________
⁴Kageki Hideo, Gozan Shishi no Kenkyū (Tokyo: Kasama Shoin,
1977), p. 136.
Zen meditation halls, since it is his understanding that
meditators are seeking to acquire. He is customarily por-
trayed riding on a lion and holding a "wordless sutra" and
a sword, the latter used to cut off delusions. It was by awak-
ing to his wisdom that the seven Buddhas of the past, the
last being Shakyamuni, were able to attain enlightenment.
No. 9
Haven't finished reading the last of your wordless sutra,
old sword, its blade dulled, uselessly held in your hand,
so many years stupidly seated on the back of the golden-maned lion—
who'd believe you were once teacher to the seven Buddhas?
The last poem to be quoted was written to accompany
a painting, a chinsō, or formal portrait, of Jakushitsu him-
self. The portrait, which no doubt showed Jakushitsu wear-
ing full priestly robes and looking very solemn, was painted
at the request of a woman lay-believer.
No. 10
At the Request of the Woman Lay-Believer Jigen
Who took these splendid robes of purple and gold,
wrapped them around the old fool's lump of red flesh?
When bystanders see him, I'm afraid they'll laugh—
better send him back to stay in his old green mountain!Translated 1987
Jakushitsu Genkō
In: Poems of the five mountains : an introduction to the literature of the Zen monasteries
by Marian Ury
Ann Arbor, MI, 1992
Jakushitsu Genkō (1290-1367) was a pupil of Issan, though like Kokan not his dharma-disciple. Jakushitsu studied in China from 1320 to 1326. After his return to Japan he founded a temple in Bingo Province and spent twenty-five years in the area of modern Okayama Prefecture, refusing summonses from both the shogunate and the imperial court. His fame was such that great numbers of eminent monk-disciples came to him in his mountain retreat.
Double Yang
Braving the dawn to sweep leaves I stand by my garden’s edge
Westwind blows through the reed fence; dew soaks my hem.
Just now a mountain child comes to pluck chrysanthemums -
He says to me: “Today is Double Yang!”In Chinese science the number nine represents the ascendancy of yang and is called Greater Yang; accordingly the ninth day of the ninth month is known as Double Yang Day. On this day it was customary in both ancient China and Japan to drink a millet wine infused with chrysanthemum leaves and petals in order to ward off evil influences and obtain long life. In Japan, where this day provided the occasion for one of the five great festivals celebrated annually at court, there were many other observances involving chrysanthemums — chrysanthemum contests, chrysanthemum poem contests, etc. Alone in his hermitage the poet must be reminded what day it is.
Living in the Mountain
I don’t crave fame and profit or care that I’m poor;
Hiding in the depths of the mountains I keep far away the world’s dust;
The year has waned and the skies are cold: who’d be my companion?
The plum blossoms are adorned in moonlight — one branch, new.Counsel for the Congregation of Monks
To train in meditation you must be truly stalwart,
Make all your body and mind as hard as steel —
Look well at the Buddhas and patriarchs of former times:
Was any among them a trifler at his ease?Events of a Cold Night
Wind disorders the cold forest, bright under frost-moon;
A guest comes: lofty talk past the Middle Watch.
Chopsticks laid on the hearth-rim and roasting yams forgotten:
Through the stillness I hear on the windows the rain taps of falling leaves.
Notes from ]akushitsu
Translated by Thomas F. Cleary
In: The Original Face: An Anthology of Rinzai Zen, Grove Press, 1978. pp. 75-78.
To Wayfarer Zentatsu
To Blind Tsumei
To Wayfarer Ryosei• To Wayfarer Zentatsu
The sixth patriarch of Zen in China, in replying to a
question from a government inspector, Mr. I, said,
"Deluded people invoke a buddha's name seeking to be
reborn in that buddha's land, but enlightened people
purify their own minds. That is why the Buddha said
that as the mind is pure, so is the Buddha land pure. Mr.
inspector, you are a man of the East; as long as your
mind is pure, you are faultless. Even people of the West
[in the direction of paradise], if their minds are not
pure, still have something wrong with them . When
people of the East commit crimes, they invoke
Amitabha Buddha's name seeking to be reborn in
western paradise; when people of the West commit
crimes, what land should they seek to be born in by
invoking Buddha's name? The ignorant don't com-
prehend their own nature and do not recognize the pure
land within their bodies, but wish for the West, for the
East" and so on.Essentially invoking of Buddha names is for libera-
tion from birth and death; investigation of Zen is for
realizing the nature of mind. We have never heard of
anyone who awakened to the nature of mind who was
not liberated from birth and death; how could someone
freed from birth and death misunderstand the nature of
mind? It should be realized that Buddha name re-
membrance and investigation of Zen have different
names but are essentially the same.Nevertheless, as an ancient said, "The slightest
entanglement of thought is the basis of the most
miserable types of behavior; if feelings arise for a
moment, they lock you up for ten thousand eons." 50
even Buddha name remembrance is producing dust on a
mirror, even investigating Zen is putting rubbish in the
eye. If you can just trust completely in this way, then
you will not be deceived.Wayfarer Zentatsu has diligently practiced con-
centration on Buddha name remembrance for years,
and has suddenly come to my house asking for a robe
and bowl, and to receive the great precepts; as he needs
some admonitions for his daily life, so I hurriedly wrote
this and gave it to him.
• To Blind Tsumei
In ancient times Aniruddha used to indulge in
sleeping, so the Buddha scolded him, "You're like a
clam." So he didn't sleep for seven days and awakened
the power of clairvoyance, whereby he could see the
whole universe like looking at a fruit in his hand.If you have real will regarding the great matter of
birth and death, you should take the koan "mind itself
is Buddha" and bring it up time and again to awaken
you, summoning it up wherever you are. One morning
you will suddenly break through the lacquer bucket of
ignorance-this is called "having the eye of the truth on
your forehead." At that time will you fly around seeing
the worlds of the universe? Hundreds of millions of
polar mountains, infinite Buddha fields, you see on the
tip of a hair-there is nothing else. This is my ultimate
bequest to you.
• To Wayfarer Ryosei
A monk asked great master Baso, "What is
Buddha? "Baso said, "The mind itself is Buddha."
That monk was greatly enlightened at these words.
It seems that what is so close that it is hard to see is the
mind , and what is so far and yet easy to approach is
buddhahood. If you misunderstand your mind, you are
an ordinary man; if you realize your mind, you are a
sage. There is no difference at all whether man, woman ,
old, young, wise, foolish, human, animal, whatever.
Thus, in the Lotus of Truth assembly, was it not the
eight-year-old Naga girl who went directly south to the
undefiled world Amala, sat on a jewel lotus flower, and
realized universal complete enlightenment?In ancient times, master Ganto once was a boatman.
A woman came with a child in her arms and asked, "I
don't ask about plying the pole and rudder - what about
the child in this woman's arms, where does it come
from? "Ganto immediately hit her once. The woman
said, "I have nursed seven children; six did not meet a
real knower, and this one can't appreciate it. "Then she
threw the child in the river. This woman found out the
way that mind itself is Buddha.
JAKUSHITSU (1290-1367)
Poems & Ten Warnings to the Congregation
Translated by Lucien Stryk & Takashi Ikemoto [池本喬 1906-1980]
In: ZEN: Poems, Prayers, Sermons, Anecdotes, Interviews
Anchor Books, Doubleday & Co., Inc., Garden City, New York, 1963, pp. 6, 59-60.
Founder of the Eigenji school of the Rinzai sect,
Jakushitsu had an awakening at eighteen when, at his
query, "What is the ultimate word of Truth?", his
master, Yakuo, gave him a slap. After working with
several other masters, he went to China and remained
there seven years, enriching his Zen under important
masters. It is said that during his voyage back home a
violent storm arose and the ship was about to sink,
but, sitting in Zen, Jakushitsu was able to invoke the
aid of Avalokitesvara (a Bodhisattva) and the storm
subsided. Once back in Japan he led a very secluded
life for twenty-five years. His followers built for him
the Eigen Temple in Omi Province, and many came
to him for guidance. The "warnings" that follow give
an idea of how he disciplined them.
Poems
Refreshing, the wind against the waterfall
As the moon hangs, a lantern, on the peak
And the bamboo window glows. In old age mountains
Are more beautiful than ever. My resolve:
That these bones be purified by rocks.*
Mugo's life cry: “Don't be
Hoodwinked!” Zuigan's: “My master!”
Napping by the sunny ivied window,
I'm only roused by mountain pines.The poet compares himself, as enlightened master, with the two famous Chinese masters Mugo and Zuigan. The former always gave his followers the same advice, the latter trained himself by having daily the following dialogue with himself (Mumonkan, Koan twelve): “My master!” “Yes, sir!” “Be wide awake!” “Yes, sir!” “And from now on don't let anyone deceive you!” “Yes, sir! Yes, sir!” The poem suggests the varying needs of Zen men, as men seeking the truth, as well as their distinct personalities.
Ten Warnings to the Congregation
1. Always bear in mind that life, whose gravest prob-
lems are birth and death, is impermanent.2. In order to avoid violating commandments, gov-
ern mind and body.3. Take care not to adhere to nothingness, nor brag
of your industry, nor backslide into the views of the
Sravaka-Pratyeka Buddhist.4. Regulating mind and body, avoiding all illusions,
sit fast in Zen.5. If you would avoid the tenebrous cave of demons,
do not mistake mere divine illumination for satori.6. Do not indulge in eating and sleeping. Spine like
an iron bolt, sit night and day in Zen.7. Scrutinize your Original Face, which had its be-
ing long before the birth of your parents.8. Weigh your koan to the minutest detail, but do
not be impatient to gain satori.9. Rather than spend aeons without an awakening,
have no second thoughts.10. Clearly understanding the Grand Law, be firm in
resolution, preserve all Buddha-wisdom.
Masumi Shibata: Les maîtres du zen au Japon
Éds. G.-P. Maisoneuve & Larose, Paris, 1969,
Ch. VI, Jakushitsu, pp. 85-86.
Jakushitsu naquit en 1290 dans la préfecture d'Okayama.
Il devint moine à 13 ans. Plus tard il succéda dans la Loi à
Yakuô-tokken et à 31 ans il se rendit dans la Chine des Yuan. Il
y étudia sous la direction du Maître du Zen Tchong-fong, lequel lui
donna ce nom de moine « Jakushitsu » (Pièce tranquille). Après
un séjour de sept années en Chine il s'en retourna au Japon. Il
ne demeura jamais dans une capitale telle que Kyôto ou Kamakura
par exemple, mais vécut vingt-cinq ans en province,
tantôt dans la préfecture actuelle d'Okayama tantôt dans celle
d'Hiroshima. Souvent, de grands monastères l'appelèrent, mais
il refusa toujours. Or, en 1361, un seigneur de la province Ômi
(non loin du lac Biwa) faisait construire le temple Eigen-ji et à
son appel, Jakushitsu vint y séjourner. Mais à l'invitation qu'il
reçut encore, après la mort de Musô, de prendre la direction du
Tenryu-ji, il répondit par un refus. Il reçut enfin une dernière
invitation du shôgun ASHIKAGA Yoshiakira à venir diriger le
temple Kenchô-ji à Kamakura, mais il refusa encore. Les moines
se rassemblaient de plus en plus autour de lui, très sensibles à
ses vertus et à son mépris des mondanités, et il eut jusqu'à
deux mille moines rassemblés autour de lui dans des ermitages
ou temples. Il mourut à l'âge de 78 ans en l'an 1367.Jakushitsu est demeuré vivant dans la mémoire des Japonais,
non pas à cause de paroles fameuses mais grâce à sa poésie« Le vent caresse l'eau de la source
Et vient nous apporter un bruit de fraîcheur.
La lune monte au-dessus du pic, en face.
La baie en bambou est éclairée.
Depuis que j'ai vieilli, j'ai senti combien
Il fait bon au coeur des montagnes.
Un mort au pied d'un rocher --
Ses os demeureront à jamais purs. »L'eau et le rocher sont les deux éléments à la source de la
beauté de cette poésie, comme de celle due au peintre chinois
Kouo Hi (vers 1020-1090), de l'époque des Song du Nord;« Les rochers et les pierres sont les os du ciel et de la terre.
L'eau est le sang du ciel et de la terre ».Dans la poésie de Jakushitsu, le dernier mot « purs », exprime
vraiment bien l'esthétique et l'éthique des Japonais. Dans le
bouddhisme, le paradis lui-même est appelé Terre Pure. Dans
les temples shintoïques, l'objet du culte vénéré est souvent un
miroir, symbole de pureté. Cela est très différent du christianisme
qui base la religion sur la sainteté.
Nous citerons une autre poésie de Jakushitsu exprimant la
tranquillisation extrême sur une roche :« J'ai passé tout un an
Dans cette cellule calme.
Les nuages autour des sommets
Et la lune sur le vallon,
Accompagnent les Zénistes desséchés.
Demain, au matin
Je descendrai le long du sentier
Qui passe devant le rocher.
Après, sur quelle roche de la montagne
Dormirai-je? »Au Japon, il est des hommes qui s'en vont à la recherche de
pierres ou roches et pérégrinent dans les montagnes isolées pendant
des jours et des jours dans l'espoir d'y découvrir la ou les
pierres qui leur inspirera le souffle vital de la Nature. Souvent
des moines ou philosophes ont choisi une pierre ou roche qui
reflète leur personnalité. C'est ce qui se dégagera des oeuvres
peintes par Sesshû environ un siècle plus tard. Les roches ou
pierres sont ce qu'il y a de plus adapté pour l'évocation de la
rigidité, de l'austérité, du silence, de la solidité des moines du
Zen.
寂室元光 Jakushitsu Genkō (1290-1367) verse
Ferenczy Éva fordítása (Lucien Stryk és Takashi Ikemoto után)
A Kőrösi Csoma Sándor Intézet Közleményei, Budapest, 1974/1-2., 35. oldal
Fölüdít a vízesés szele,
a hold lámpásként függ a csúcson;
A bambusz-ablak parázslik, az öreg hegyek
szebbek mint valaha. Elhatározom:
tisztítsák meg a csontokat a sziklák.
