A rather useful discussion popped up recently on one of my sangha's listservs, and I thought I'd repost here. So here's a few things on the etymology of the word "zen", why we sit and sleep on marsh-grass, and pushy cats.

I am wondering what the Buddha taught about sitting.

The Buddha said this of life and living:

"Meditate.
Live purely. Be quiet.
Do your work with mastery.
Like the moon, come out
from behind the clouds!
Shine"

Did he say "The more you sit, the more likely you are to become enlightened?"

Not really. We (read: "zen practitioners") sit zazen because that is our primairy method of meditation. But we also walk (kinhin), bow in gassho, walk through the zendo in shashu, and many other physical action that are forms of meditation in their own right. Effectively, every movement in life, all the way down to simply sitting with no meditation object at all (shikantaza) is meditation. Often we swap "sitting" ( za+zen = literally "sitting meditation") for "meditation" when we probably shouldn't.

The Buddha said; "All that we are is the result of what we have thought. The mind is everything. What we think we become."

So if you want to "become" enlightened, you must use the mind (the thinking thing) and the body (the sitting thing).

The monks and teachers sit so much. Should the world be sitting as much or more than them if it wants to become enlightened?

The Buddha said; "Peace comes from within. Do not seek it without."

Meaning that you can't make the world more peaceful externally; only internally. But when you accept that there is no "you", only "us", the way to get the world to be a better place is for as many "us'es" as possible to practice things that generate peace and equanimity. That's mindfulness. For most schools of Buddhism, the best and most direct form of mindfullness is whole-hearted and full-bodied concentration on the moment, and that is sitting meditation in one form or another.

Did he say that generosity is the "fastest way to enlightenment"? I have heard that he did. What did he mean?

I don't know that he actually did say that, but food for thought: You can never take too much if you're giving something freely. The first of the Ten Perfections is giving.

Is it possible to put "my enlightenment" as my first priority in life?

A more important question may be "Should I make achieving enlightenment my first priority in life?" Also, "my enlightenment" has an extra word in it that sets a condition of the ego.

We often say "May all beings reach enlightenment, even before I do" that encompasses both noble conditions: that all escape suffering, and that as a Bodhisattva, you help all do so even before you do.

What is a good guide for deciding to 'get more involved' or to 'do more sitting, studying, chanting, etc'?

What may be better to do is consider the Bodhisattva Vow instead: "Beings are numberless: I vow to free them. Ilusions are inexhaustible: I vow to end them. Dharma gates are boundless: I vow to enter them. The Buddha way is unsurpassable: I vow to embody it."

My motto: If you feel like doing it, do it. If you don't feel like doing it, do it even more ;)

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I have wondered if "sitting" can mean in more than just the physical sense. Can we be "sitting" while rocking a baby to sleep; while raking leaves; or cooking? Can being fully present in these moments be considered "sitting"?

This deserves its own answer, but it is tied into the previous questions, so...

When I said, in my previous post; "Often we swap 'sitting' ( za+zen = literally 'sitting meditation') for 'meditation' when we probably shouldn't" I was being literal. Here's a brief on the etomology of our favorite word "zen", and how it relates to "sitting".

The word "zen" is the Sino-Japanese interpretation and pronunciation of the Chinese character 禅, which is typically pronounced "ch'an" in modern Standard Mandarin Chinese, but was more likely pronounced "d​'zen" (form a "d" with your mouth and lips, but pronounce "Zen") in Middle Chinese. The term "zen" is actually a contraction of the seldom-used long form zenna (Mandarin: chánnà), which is itself a derivation from the Sanskrit term dhyāna (pali: jhāna), which refers directly to a specific type of meditation: the use of the mind as a tool for examination of mind and body states without attachment or judgement. This manner of examination--meditation--was given to us directly by the Buddha, and is explained to us in the Pali Canon -- the first and most complete collection of scriptures in the Theravada Buddhist tradition. The Sanskrit word is derived from the Indo-European root that means "to see" or "to look". Bodhidharma brought this kind of meditation from India with him to China. Initially, it was poorly recieved. Bodhidharma left southern China, heading north, purpously living in obscurity in the Shaolin monastery so he could practice this "seeing" meditation with his whole being, famously sitting facing a cave wall for nine years in dedicated practice. Eventually, this practice established itself, and developed into what is known as "Chan". From China, Eihei Dōgen, a Japanese Tiantai monk, brought this practice back with him to Japan, where it became the basis of the Soto school of Buddhism, and was pronounced "zenna", later shortened to just "zen".

So, very literally, the term "zen"--in all its forms and machinations--means "to see deeply, rightly, clearly and directly". One of the most important aspects of the etmology of the word often gets left behind and that is "directly". Zen is an experiential practice, not merely a mental or intellectual one.

Sitting is a form of "zen", but to say "can we sit while doing other things" is a bit wonky and erroneous. It's more right to ask "can I practice Zen while doing something else?" The answer to that is "absolutely". The other answer to that is, arguably "That's the point..." "Zen" is whole-hearted attention to the moment, no matter what that moment may be. When you sit, just sit with your entire being. When you rock the baby, just rock the baby, being present in every action of that task with your entire being. When you rake, just rake. When you sing, just sing, and so on. When you look at it that way, every single action--physical or mental--in life can be (and our teachers, all the way back to the Buddha say is) meditation, including the very last act of life, death.

So:

• "zen" = examining meditaion
• "za" = sit
• "zazen" = sitting examining meditation

Additionally, just for fun, here are a few more interesting origins of some of our common zendo things:

• zen + "do" (hall) = meditation hall
• za + "fu" = zafu, or "sitting cushion" (literally: "sitting on cattails" ["fu" = "stuffed with cattail fluf", a common stuffing for cushions in China and Japan])
• za + "buton" = zabuton or "sitting mattress" ("buton" being a varriant root of "futon" or "cattail-filled mattress" [fu+ton])

Sorry for being so long-winded. Apparently not very "zen" of me ;)

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Then maybe I would know which level to use (when cooking a dinner to be ready at a certain time use 'Level 6', when petting the cat/dog use 'Level 2')

Well, in all honesty, with Zen, the "goal" is to do everything "turned up to 11"; that is, to experience every moment in as "zen" (or "meditative attention") manner as possible. Remember, it's not about intensity, it's about intention--whole-hearted and complete attention to every aspect (both subtle and gross) of everything you do. Right. Easy-peasy. Guess that's why they call it "practice" ;)

The exercise of "other" meditative tasks that are not zazen brings to mind the pursuit of traditional Japanese archery (kyūdō) often practiced by zen students. You often here "be the arrow", or "be the bow". This, too, is zen ("meditative attention"). So it is no stretch of the imagination to take, say, cooking dinner, and think "be the whisk", "be the knife", "just dice" and "just beat the batter". It may sound silly at first, but anyone who does any task that takes great concentration to achieve a particular result often talks of "finding a zone" and experiencing a falling away of the deliniations that define where they stop, and the task or given action begins.

And seriously, what cat doesn't want "level 11" attention at all times? ;)

I find this little blip of Brad Warner in his latest HCZ blogpost spot-on...

I think it's good to visit a number of practice spaces if you can. I've noticed that people who attend just a single teacher's practice often develop a slightly warped attitude (and this includes people who attend only mine, maybe it goes especially for people who attend only mine). I'm not a fan of the practice of running around from meditation center to meditation center picking and choosing the parts you like of each one's practice and rejecting anything that bothers you. I know a lot of teachers out there make a good living offering such cobbled together practices. But I've never seen one of those that had the least bit of value. They're always very nice and completely undemanding. Sweet and useless, like high fructose corn syrup.

On the other hand, it's traditional to visit as many teachers as you like until you find one that suits you. Dogen did this as did a lot of the great teachers of the past. Once you find the right teacher it's best to stick with that teacher even if you don't like everything she or he does or says. The one that suits you won't always be the one you like best. Naturally if they start mixing up cyanide flavored Kool Aid it's probably time to go. But it's not good to jump ship just because certain things bug you. It's good to get bugged sometimes. Often that's exactly what you need. Remember the thing that bugs you is never solely "out there" in your teacher. In a very profound way these are things you create yourself even when they appear to be coming from someone else.

So anyway, it's good to check out other ways of practice and see how they really do things. You'll always be surprised. I know I always am.

So, Brad having said that, I want to expand on a few things.

Finding a good Dharma teacher is one of the core challenges of beginning a Buddhist practice, and it really can be a challenge. It's not like finding a professor you like, a new friend to hang with, or a favorite new author. Honestly, finding the proper sensi, yogi or baba for you is more akin to finding a quality doctor, dentist or therapist (or hell, good auto mechanic!)

But one thing I see far more often than I thought I would is people having trouble with ritual and form between sanghas, and especially as the establishment of that form relates to their dharma teachers. Tres interesting.

I've heard so often from (certain kinds of) practitioners that this or that zendo's form is "too loose", "too formal", "sloppy", "hippy-dippy", "zen-lite", "needlessly complicated", "not authentic enough" and on and on. They will often grouse about it 'mongst themselves, but never bring their opinion to the attention of the shusho, let alone the sensi/roshi. They may even really like the sensi's teachings and manner, but just bristle at certain ideas: we have to do [x] minutes of zazen? What about kinhin? What about bowing practices? Why don't we do it this way, so more people are this way or that? That chanting doesn't make me feel warm and fuzzy. Meh. I'll just sit through it until we get to the dharma talk. At least sensi gets that right...

Well, first off, if you think that the only thing your teacher can do well is speak to you, you probably haven't done enough research in picking a teacher. Of course, the way the teacher communicates his or her ideas or understanding is important, but what many of the "form whiners" aren't getting is that the form is part of the teachers' understanding. Not only part of, but quite possibly the basis for whatever understanding they're bringing to you. That very form is as much a part of the language that sensi is using to communicate their understanding experience to you as the words they use, and here you are, telling them the language they're using is all wrong!

Let's look at this in a slightly different way.

Let's say that I have a special pair of glasses, and because of their special lenses, these glasses have the ability to allow the wearer to see something in a very specific way, not unlike 3-D glasses do. It's very easy to understand that if two people go to a theater and see Bawana Devil, and one wears the specs while the other doesn't, the two viewers will experience inherently different views, even though the primary content will be the same. The glasses, by virtue of those colored lenses, allow the user two things, one that's overt, and one that's more subtle. On the surface, the wearing of the glasses helps people see (generally) the same thing. This is essentially an appeal to the intellect via a few of the senses (most notably, sight). The information (the moving picture) is being conveyed in the manner the artist (the director) intended, so everybody more-or-less comes away with the same intellectual experience. So this relates to the "form as language" analogy above; wear the gear to get the whole message sensi is trying to convey. Now, the more subtle effect is this; the wearing of the glasses also allows for a shared experience in the wearing of the glasses with everyone else in the theater. That's right; part and parcel of the whole 3-D thing is, for lack of a better descriptor, looking like a dweeb with everyone else! It is the shared experience that brings the whole thing together. So, in this regard, you're also doing what everybody else in the theater/zendo/shala did in order to essentially be on the same page as everyone there. Having close to the same experience as everyone else allows for a base of commonality that encourages communication laterally as well as up and down. If not, when asked about the movie, someone would say "Did you jump when the spear came at you?" and the other would respond "Feh! Sean Connery didn't look anything like King Arthur!"

Each sangha, each zendo, each meditation group does things a little differently, and this is typically established by the sensi, leader, organizer, etc. for a number of reasons, not the least of which is simple continuity. So, when it comes to zendo form, and the manner in which your sensi runs the show, take away this from me if anything. It's perfectly alright to experience a number of different forms while investigating Buddhist practice at first. But if you actually want to get anywhere with a teacher, you must have a bit of faith in their form (or at least a faith in the power of form at all) and give the teacher's form a chance to work for you. This takes time, and can easily take years (one should think months at a minimum). If in a year, you still don't connect to their form, then look for a different teacher. It's very easy to be moved by someone's intellect and their ability to speak to you. But Buddhism is an experiential practice, not merely an intellectual one. So give the sensi some time to conect with you on all levels. Think of them as explaining it this way; "This is my form, and is part of the over-all manner in which I try and communicate to you this thing that is nearly ineffable. If we stick to mere language, it will truly remain ineffable. I didn't have just a realization. I didn't merely have an understanding. I had a comprehension. I had an experience of both mind and body. It came under these circumstances, through this form, doing things in this way. I can try and describe what I comprehended to you, but unless you're doing what I was doing, it's pointless. So, if you are coming to me in order to have me teach you how to hit the nail on the head, we'll need a board, a nail and a hammer..."

Pre-conceived notions are the death-knell of Buddhist understanding.

"Already knowing" is the enemy...

...but I've seen the film before, so watch out for that freaky spear!