Cautions on Zazen by Kei Zan Zenji
(Translation: Nyogen Senzaki)

Students, do not eat any unripened fruit, poorly cooked food, or anything hard to digest. If you have any trouble with your stomach, it will disturb your Zazen. Take your food to keep up your physical processes. Do not do Zazen too soon after a meal.


Students, when you do Zazen, do not lean your back against a wall, chair, or screen. Do not sit facing a strong wind. Do not do Zazen in a highly elevated place; it may cause you illness.


Students, when you do Zazen, if you feel as though you have a sort of fever or chill, or sense that your physical mechanism seems dull (inert) or too smooth (alter); or it is too hard (tense) or too soft (relaxed); or heavy (sluggish) or too light (buoyant); or you alarm yourself with no cause; these are all due to your improper breathing.


Students, I will tell you how to regulate your breath. Open your mouth and breathe naturally in your own way. If you always have long breath, follow it. If your habit is short, breathe that way accordingly. When you recognize that your breathing is in your own natural condition, shut your mouth and breathe with the nostrils.


Students, if your mind sinks or floats; if it is too dark or too light; or it is too dull or too sharp; or you see outside the world with your mental power; or you observe physical organs by imagination; or see images of Buddhas or Bodhisattvas; or make arguments in your mind; or think the teaching of the Buddha transparent; you may think these are wonderful phenomena, but quite you are quite mistaken. Your breathing needs regulation, that is all.
Students, if you are sick, keeps your attention upon the soles of your feet. If your mind sinks down, hold it around your forehead and the border of your hair. If your mind inclines to scatter away, be conscious of the tip of your nose or concentrate your attention upon the hypogastric region of your abdomen. Usually, you should hold your mind in your left palm. If you keep your Zazen in this way, you can reach to a quite state of concentration with ease.


Books written by the old teachers are helpful to your reflection but if you read them too often, or copy them greedily or make discussion about them, it will be rather a disturbance to your study of Zazen. You must avoid karma-relation which stirs your mind. If you force Zazen when you are tired physically and mentally, it will cause you illness and increase more delusions.

In a monastery where there is a Zen-master is the proper place to study Zazen. Usually a monastery is built in a remote part of the mountains, or in a thickly wooded valley. You can make "Zen walking" near green hills or running water. You can purify your mind sitting under a tree or near murmuring creeks. You can think of the impermanence of the world. It will encourage you to search for permanent truth.


Students, when you do Zazen, you should use a think cushion, then you can sit up a long time with ease. The place in which you do Zazen should be clean, and always burn incense there and offer flowers. Good Gods guard the Dharma and preceding Buddhas and Bodhisattvas will protect you from devils and demons. Always place a picture of statue of Buddhas or Bodhisattvas in the room where you do Zazen.


Students, make your heart dwell in great loving-kindness and whatever you you may have of merit from your Zazen, offer it to all sentient beings. Avoid having personal pride especially if you have more or better knowledge that others. Other teachings fail because each student believes only in his particular teaching. Just do Zazen innocently, without any aiming. This is the best Zazen.


Students, your should keep your eyes and feet clean. (Wash your eyes with cold water and your feet with hot water.) You must live quietly both physically and mentally. Both your appearance and manner should be in good form. You should avoid worldly interests, but also do not cling to unworldly things.
You should not hesitate to spread teachings, but unless someone asks you, you should not open your mouth. Buddha generally only preached when his disciples had asked three times. If you have to tell others, speak only of what you have actually experienced; and your speech must come out of the true source-that is, Buddha-Dharma. Your listeners must get real profit and also enjoy your preaching. When you want to say something, nine times out of ten it is better to refrain from speaking. You know, fans in winter time sometimes mold through lack of use, but when summer time arrives they are much in use, and are smooth and shining. Your mouth should be like that. Your mouth is like a stationary bell, hanging in the air unmindful of wind from any side. That is the way you should guide yourself. Whatever you preach is for nothing but Dharma. Do not expect any merit or compensation whatever.

Students, in general, Buddhist study is in three processes - teaching, practicing, and realizing. Now, Zazen does not follow these processes. It includes all three. If one "aims" at realization, he is not a true Zen student. If he strives to follow the teachings which Buddha prescribed, he is not a good student. If he strives to stop doing wrong things and do good things according to scriptures, he is not a good Zen student.


Zen also must have some teaching, but that teaching is not the ordinary dualistic explanation. It points directly to the Essence of Mind. Therefore, every word expresses the whole, and that word transcends worldly thinking. When the road of thinking is blocked off, before any word is ever spoken, the message is already delivered in that very moment. Is not this the true teaching of the Buddhas and the Patriarchs?


Usually a man understands reason through practicing it, but in Zen, practicing itself is understanding. There is no "two-fold" process, but merely "one-process." If a man does everything aimlessly, he does not have to think philosophical theories. His six organs will be purified and his surroundings have no spot of impurity at all.


Zazen does not belong either to discipline or contemplation or the achievement of knowledge, but it contains all of these tree. Discipline is to prevent a person from doing wrong actions, but Zazen sees no separation between a person and his actions. When one does Zazen in the Zen way, he stops all actions and accordingly all "karma-relation" is cut off. He has nothing to do with laws of the world, or laws of Buddhism. He does not see good or bad, liking or disliking. Why should he prevent himself from doing any action? This is called the "formless discipline of Zen."


Contemplation (general contemplation) observes inner and outer conditions thoroughly. (Subjectivity and objectivity.) Zen transcends both body and mind. It has nothing to do with delusion or realization. It never changes and never moves. There is no action and no tardiness (slowness). It is like the seemingly "foolish person" who rooted to the ground maintains immovability. It is like the mountain or like the ocean. There flares no phase of "motion" or "stillness" It transcends all terms applied to "human activity." It is contemplation which has no "form of contemplation" ; therefore, it is called the "greatest contemplation."


All Teachings of Buddha in the world could be classified into three parts: precepts, contemplation and wisdom. Now Zen has no precepts that are not kept; no contemplation that is not practiced; no wisdom that is not revealed. It is said that Buddha conquered demons and attained enlightenment; that he turned down the wheel of Dharma to enlighten others, and that at the last he entered Parinirvana. These were all phenomena of his Zazen. There are those who describe the miraculous deeds of Buddha, who was considered to have brilliant emanations from his body. Those dreamers should sit down in Zazen and break through to ultimate bottom.


While you are in Zazen, if you feel sleepy, move your body a trifle; open your eyes wide; or become conscious of the border of the hairline; or concentrate on the tip of the nose. If you still feel sleepy, rub your hands together, or rub your body gently with your hands; or stand up and walk a few paces. If you walk 100 paces, you will be wide awake.


Those who do Zazen should think this: "To find out what Life and Death are is a great matter; and time passes so quickly that one may not solve the question. One's life may end before the answer is found! Why then, should one devote time to sleeping greedily?" Students, you should take a vow to conquered the karmic effects which make you wish to sleep so much, and ask the help of Buddha and the Patriarchs to sustain you toward this accomplishment.


If your mind scatters around, be conscious of the tip of your nose, or lower part of the abdomen, or count your breaths. If you cannot succeed in the above mentioned ways, you should bring forth a koan and question yourself- "What is this?"


If your mind still wanders, you should think of your own death; that is, your breathing stops, and your eyes shut forever.


Or else you should think: "Who were you before you were born?" Or else: "What were you thinking in that moment before thinking can be raised?" If you work on these questions, you will realize two sorts of emptiness: the emptiness of material things and the emptiness of mind (non-material): and your mind will be naturally concentrated on the subject.


At last I only say: "Go on, to rest, Go on, and stop. Go on, and make yourself the autumn lake full of water. Go on, and make your one moment of thought the length of ten thousand years. Go on, and make yourself cold ashes and a decayed tree. Go on, and make yourself an incense burner, with no trace of incense. Go on, and make yourself white silk of endless length. I congratulate you all!"


"Gate, gate, paragate, parasamgate, bodhi, svaha!" Oh Bodhi, gone, gone, gone to another shore, landed at the other shore, Svaha!
Prajanaparamita-hridaya Sutra.