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An Ancient Koan [1]
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Date: 2025-01-26
Nan-ch‘üan once delayed taking his seat in the dining room. Huang-po, his disciple and chief monk, took the master’s seat instead of his own. Nan-ch‘üan came in and said, “That seat belongs to the oldest monk in this monastery. How old are you in the Buddha’s Way?” “I am the ancestor of the Seven Buddhas,” responded Huang-po. “Then,” said Nan-ch‘üan, “you are my grandson. Move down.” Huang-po gave the seat to the master, but took the place next to it for his own.
Well, he fell straight into that one, didn’t he? But he still took the seat of the son, and became one of the great Zen Masters of his time, including teaching Lin Chi/Rinzai.
The Seven Buddhas are named in the Pali suttas as
Vipassī (lived ninety-one kalpas ago) Sikhī (lived thirty-one kalpas ago) Vessabhū (lived thirty-one kalpas ago in the same kalpa as Sikhī) Kakusandha (the first Buddha of the current good eon) Koṇāgamana (the second Buddha of the current eon) Kassapa (the third Buddha of the current eon) Gautama (the fourth and present Buddha of the current eon)
Gautama is the lay name of the Blessed One (Bhagavan), Shakyamuni Buddha, who only ever referred to himself as Tathagata (Thus Come or Thus Gone) after his awakening, when he abandoned self. Later texts name 28 past Buddhas, but Hindu/Buddhist cosmology says that there is no limit to past kalpas, and thus to Buddhas.
Don’t worry about it.
It is regular Zen practice to thank the Seven Buddhas every day, as the ancestors of all Zen masters and their disciples.
As long as bowing continues, Buddhism will last.
Bowing continues as long as we put ourselves aside and leave the entanglements of the world alone.
We live in the world as if in the sky,
Just as the lotus blossom is not wetted by the water that surrounds it.
Pure and beyond the world is the Buddha Nature of the trainee.
Oh, holy Buddha, we take refuge in thee.
I will have more to say about entanglements next week, when we will take up Pema Chödrön’s book Welcoming the Unwelcome.
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