Return to the Original Style

Text

In the Dharma hall, Tsūgen addressed the assembled monks: 'What did Dōgen bring from China? Not Chinese manners. Not Sung dynasty taste. He brought the marrow that Bodhidharma brought from India. He brought seated buddha. If your Zen looks increasingly like a Gozan poetry salon, examine whether Dōgen's marrow is still in it. If it is, the poetry is fine. If it is not, no amount of elegant verse will substitute for it. Our task is not novelty. Our task is fidelity — to what was transmitted before there was a school, before there was a name, before there was a robe. Sit. Sit as if the entire lineage is watching, because it is. Sit as if it is not watching, because it is not. This contradiction is where you live.'

license: public_domain

Attribution

• Speaker
  Tsūgen Jakurei

Lineage: Sōtō

By Tsūgen Jakurei

• Death Verse of Tsūgen Jakureiverse

Sources

• contentSōtō Zen in Medieval Japan

  William M. Bodiford

  Cf. Bodiford, Sōtō Zen in Medieval Japan, pp. 103–110, on Tsūgen's reform program

  Tsūgen-ha Dharma Hall Records: Return to the Original Style