Night Boat

by Alan Spence

I took one of the small pieces of paper. Beside me was an iron incense holder, blackened with soot. I rubbed my finger in it, drew Shi on the scrap of paper and handed it back to Torei. He took it reverently, touched it to his forehead, then tore it in half, threw the pieces aside.

  There’s no end to it, he said.

  I laughed. So clear up this mess and get on with your practice.

  Suio looked haggard, dark lines under his staring eyes.

  What’s this? I said. You look like something the cat dragged in.

  We die, he said.

  Yes, I said.

  I knew this before, he said. But not . . .

  Not in your bones. Not with every living breath.

  I could see it. The quality of that knowing had deepened in him.

  We die, he said.

  We die, I said. And knowing this, how do we live?

  Knowing this, we live.

  We live.

  I continued to drive the monks through koan practice. Both Suio and Torei had gained strength from their meditation on Shi. Now I urged them deeper into the heart of Mu.

  Where is this nothing? Where does it reside?

  One winter evening I had spoken to them in turn, Torei then Suio. I had coaxed and cajoled them, pushed them further. Now I sat alone, far into the night, questioning, as the lamp burned low. I saw their faces before me, earnest, intent on breaking through. I saw myself, just as earnest, determined to pass on what I thought I’d understood. A great laugh burst out of me.

  Old fart! I shouted, in the empty room, and I clapped my hands.

  My head was suddenly a huge cavern, and the sound of my handclap seemed to echo and fill the space. I looked at my hands, held in front of me. I folded them in gassho, then looked at them again, separate, and a question formulated itself, took words.

  When you clap your hands together, it makes this sharp sound, distinctive and unmistakable.

  I clapped my hands again, listened.

  But what is the sound of just one hand?

  Sekishu no onjo.

  I raised my right hand in front of me, palm facing out.

  What do we hear in the empty valley? The echo of the soundless sound.

  Next morning I sat again in front of Torei and Suio and half a dozen others.

  So, I said. I have a new koan for you.

  They straightened their backs, sat attentive. I continued.

  Sound is made by striking two things together.

  I raised both my hands, then swiftly brought them together in a sharp slap. One monk twitched, startled. The others folded their hands, waited. I clapped my hands again, harder, and the sound was louder.

  Two hands clapping, I said.

  I raised the right hand only.

  But what is this sound, the sound of one hand?

  I sat for some time in silence, the hand raised, then spoke again.

  It is not an outer sound. It cannot be heard with the ear.

  I left another silence, hand still raised.

  In fact it is beyond all hearing, distinct from all perception.

  Further silence.

  Beyond all difference, all discrimination.

  Outside the wind blew, a crow called.

  Meditate on this koan, I said. The sound of one hand. Proceed with it. Enter into it. Do not give up. Whatever you are doing, walking or standing, sitting or lying down. The sound of one hand. Eventually you will reach the place where reason is exhausted and there are no more words. The phoenix will escape the golden net. The crane will fly free.

  Outside, the wind blowing, the crow calling.

  Enter into this soundless sound and see through all the worlds, your own world here and now, and all the realms of heaven and hell. Enter into vast perfection, vast emptiness.

  I raised my right hand again, palm out.

  Abhaya Mudra. The gesture made by Shakyamuni Buddha on attaining enlightenment.

  One hand.

  Listen.

  Once again I picked up my brush, did a drawing of Hotei seated on a meditation cushion – a great sack stuffed with all his wealth, the blessings of good fortune he bestowed on mankind. His hand raised in benediction, he smiled his mischievous, knowing inner smile. Behind him I drew a spray of plum blossom in a bamboo vase, and down the left-hand margin of the painting I wrote an inscription.

  You think you understand anything?

  Unless you hear the sound of one hand

  It’s all just nonsense.

  May as well stretch a skin

  Over a wooden koto.

  I found the image strangely satisfying and it made me smile, I imagined, with the same smile I had drawn on Hotei’s face. Skin on a koto. Animal hide stretched taut over the beautiful paulownia wood, making the instrument impossible to play. The thought of it would cause anguish, that great ball of discomfort in the chest, rising into the throat, a good koan doing its work.

  Ha!

  I continued with another verse.

  You think you just have to dig in the ground

  To unearth ingots of pure gold?

  You’ll have to work hard to hear

  The sound of one hand.

  The drawings continued to flow. A monkey hanging from a branch over a pool of water, reaching out with his free hand, trying to grab the moon reflected there.

  The monkey tries to grasp

  the moon in the water,

  again and again until

  death grabs him.

  If only he’d let go of the branch,

  dive into the deep pool,

  the world itself would shine,

  dazzling, clear.

  I sat a while longer, made another drawing, playful. It showed a smaller monkey, a character, hand cupped behind his ear as if straining to hear some far-off sound.

  Is he listening

  to the cuckoo?

  The monkey holding up

  one hand.

  I set down the brush, smiled, listened.

  I watched them struggle with the koan – grapple with it, grab it by the throat, laugh at it, smile and approach it sideways, turn their back on it, rage at it, ignore it and hope it would go away. If any of them caught my eye, in the meditation hall, on their way out to beg, looking up, mindless, from some seemingly menial task, I would raise my right hand, glower or smile, and say nothing.

  They sweated over it, they ground their teeth and clenched their fists. But the fact that it was new to them, a fresh challenge, an unexplored path, meant they made fast progress, and one by one they broke through the barrier, experienced kensho, heard the soundless sound.

  And after the Sound of One Hand, I said, what then?

  I came up with my own answer, challenged them further.

  Go beyond, I said. Put a stop to all sounds.

  Vast emptiness. Vast silence.

  Stop. All. Sounds.

  One of the younger monks looked stunned. He had come this far, made headway with the koan, experienced his first kensho. Now this. This.

  There’s nothing else, I said, but to keep going. Your life is as short as the span of an insect that’s born at dawn and dies at dusk. But even if you lived like one of the immortals, for a hundred thousand seasons, it would all be just froth and foam, the flickering of illusory flowers. Your days are like wild horses galloping by, just glimpsed through a crack in the wall.

  The young monk straightened his back, grimly determined, his mouth a tight line.

  For fear of hell, I said, you gave up the outer life. Looking for certainty in the world of transience is like trusting a blind donkey to lead you. You gave up comfort and security. You turned away from human love, from affection and family life. For what?

  I left a pause in which he didn’t answer.

  I had asked myself these self-same questions as a young man.

  For this, I said. To be here. Now, concentrate. Put a stop to all sounds.

  It is like the ocean, I said. The further you enter in, the deeper it gets.

  It is like the mo
untain. The further you climb, the higher it gets.

  Continue. Go on.

  Silence at the heart of sound. Sound in the depths of silence. And beyond both?

  Again they broke through, one by one, in their own time. They entered the gateless gate, heard the soundless sound. I could see it in them, in their eyes. I could hear it in the way they spoke. They rang true.

  For each one who crossed the barrier and achieved kensho I made a drawing, a priest’s staff carved from a single sturdy branch, a Zen teacher’s whisk wrapped round it, a smaller branch entwined round its base. The whole staff in the process of changing into a dragon, its head at the top. A moment of transformation. Underneath I wrote Hearing the Sound of One Hand. Putting a Stop to All Sounds. And trailing down the scroll I wrote lines from the Hekiganroku with a declaration from master Ummon.

  My staff has transformed itself into a dragon

  And swallowed up the whole great universe.

  Where are mountains, rivers, the world itself ?

  Each drawing was unique. Each dragon had a life and a character of its own.

  To remind you, I said to each monk as I handed over the scroll. Now roar!

  In time I drove some of my lay students through this twofold koan. Sound of One Hand. A Stop to All Sounds. It turned them inside out more quickly, more effectively, than Joshu’s Mu. And to each of them also I gave the Dragon Staff Scroll as a kind of certificate of graduation. Without exception they received it with profound gratitude, often moved to tears.

  But once I was visited by an old priest who had travelled from another temple. He had heard about the scrolls and came to Shoin-ji to take me to task.

  You’re heading straight for hell, he said, for the sin of unremitting flattery. You’re debasing the Dharma, devaluing the teaching.

  Great enlightened being, I said, do tell me more.

  Your pieces of paper are worthless he said. You might as well wipe your arse on them and hand them out to these gullible fools.

  Don’t hold back, I said. Rain down your hammer-blows on me!

  You make light of it, said the priest, his voice squeaking higher, his face reddening. But some of these idiots think by earning this useless certificate they have attained enlightenment. They give up their practice and go back to wallowing in ignorance.

  And how do you know this?

  I have ears, he said. I can hear.

  Hear what? I said. Rumour? Gossip? Better to hear the Sound of One Hand. Better to Put a Stop to all Sounds.

  Are you trying to offer me your spurious wisdom?

  No point, I said. Pouring water into a bowl that’s full to the brim. You’re full of yourself, full to bursting. No room for a single drop of my venom.

  He glared at me, eyes vicious.

  You exploit these people, he said. You take their money and fob them off with a piece of paper.

  Now it was my turn to glare, tiger-eyed. I left a silence the length of three long breaths. Then I spoke again.

  Each and every Dragon Staff Scroll was issued on merit. These men and women may be lay followers, but their realisation was genuine and hard earned. They sweated white beads. They persevered and broke through.

  Most convenient, said the priest.

  Many lay followers make donations to Shoin-ji, I said. Survival would be even more difficult without them. But not all those who pay receive the scroll. And not all who receive the scroll have paid. Attaining kensho is not easy, and I would never diminish the experience in the way you suggest. I give the scrolls only to those who have crossed the barrier and gained insight.

  He snorted, clearly unwilling to be convinced. He wiped his nose with the back of his hand.

  Mind you, I said, in your case I might make an exception. If you hand me a sheet of paper, I’ll gladly wipe my arse on it as an acknowledgement of your great spiritual attainment.

  He stood up to go, neck muscles tensed as he constrained himself to make the slightest, most perfunctory bow.

  Everything I’ve heard about you is true, he said.

  It’s been an honour to meet you too, I said. I look forward to seeing you again in hell.

  When the priest had gone I chuckled to myself. Arse-wipe! Then I thought I could make a story of the incident, tell a tale that might reach some of those very lay followers he had been talking about. The Buddha’s message had to spread ever wider. Beat the Dharma drum.

  I would give the story a supernatural element, make it an otherworldly tale of spirit possession, a message from the beyond.

  A bitter twisted old priest condemns the practice of issuing Dragon Staff certificates to mark attainment of kensho. He has harsh words for the monk responsible – let’s call him Hakuin.

  A young man named Yukichi is praying at the local Inari shrine and is possessed by the presiding Shinto deity.

  A crowd gathers to hear as the young man beats a drum. He wails in the singsong incantatory voice of the spirit that speaks through him.

  He says the monk – yes, we’ll call him Hakuin – is absolutely right to do what he’s doing. The certificates he has issued are thoroughly merited and issued personally by Hakuin to each student who has attained kensho. Far from encouraging laziness and complacency, becoming an end in themselves, they inspire the students to continue, to work even harder.

  Let the dragon continue to roar.

  Let all sentient beings be enlightened.

  I read the story to a few of the monks.

  Another tale from the Night Boat? asked Torei.

  Another, I said.

  I told more tales, alongside my formal lectures. I made more drawings, wrote more poems and songs. And this too was teaching. All of it. Direct transmission. Expedient means.

  I drew an iron grindstone from the tea ceremony, and on its rim a tiny ant.

  Endlessly circling the rim of a grindstone,

  The tiny ant goes round and round.

  Round and round without rest.

  We’re born, we die. Then what?

  For liberation we have to hear

  The sound of one hand.

  A long thin bridge, a single log, spanning a ravine, and three spindly figures crossing it, blind men with their canes, edging forward.

  Blind men crossing a chasm – that’s us.

  Our lives, this fleeting world, a log bridge.

  How to cross to the other side?

  An old monkey-trainer, laughing as he makes a little monkey dance to the beat of a drum, played by another smiling figure in the foreground. The trainer holds the monkey by a string and carries a thin stick to beat time.

  He tames his monkey-mind

  And makes it dance.

  Monkey and master linked together

  In the void, in all the worlds.

  Two white foxes, dressed, like the monkey, in trousers and smocks, up on two legs, and like the monkey, dancing, playing. They look knowing. Are they the guardians of Inari shrine?

  White foxes – are you

  full of yourselves,

  bewitching us?

  Pilgrims making a circuit of thirty-three temples, many of them determined to leave their mark in passing, write their name on a wall, scrawl an aphorism, some observation. The same urge in me, perhaps, that has me write this, leave these drawings, these scribbles. I was here. I existed. I passed through.

  In this drawing two pilgrims are in front of an official notice, high on the wall. One has climbed on the other’s back so he can reach up to write something on the notice. The one reaching up has a sash on his back. Bodhisattva Kannon Official Tour.

  The notice reads, Absolutely No Graffiti. By Order. Across it, the pilgrim has written, So sorry!

  This too.

  The Seven Gods of Good Fortune. I’ve drawn them celebrating New Year, enjoying the festivities. Daikoku with his mallet is pounding grain – a good harvest, prosperity.

  Shoki with his long beard is dancing. Hotei beats a big drum. At the back is Fukurokuju with his elongated head bumping the ed
ge of the frame. He’s playing a smaller hand-drum, as is Jurojen, and Benzaiten blows on a bamboo flute. Ebisu is reading a manuscript, chanting a verse from the noh play on Shoki in his role as demon-slayer.

  The mice that inhabit some of my other drawings are here too, dressed as monks and priests, courtiers and street entertainers. They dance attendance on Daikoku, gathering round him. Behind him is a banner with another inscription.

  Without extravagance, no greed.

  Without laziness, no poverty.

  Be loyal and devoted

  And I’ll give you all I have.

  On his hat is written Ju, the symbol for longevity.

  The blessings of all the gods, showering down.

  It’s one great party, on the good ship Long Life.

  Long Life.

  I painted the symbol, larger, in the centre of another scroll.

  JU

  The very form of it held a power. Gazing intently at the word, or chanting it out loud, was an invocation of all that is benign, all that the gods bestow on true followers of the Buddha-way. In itself it is a spell against the dark, a magic amulet.

  JU

  The sage Liao-fu drank the waters of a sacred spring and lived to be 150 years old.

  I could see Torei raise a quizzical eyebrow at that, but say nothing.

  In Liao-fu’s honour, the character Ju was carved in the wall of the cliff above the spring. It was written large, then surrounded by 100 smaller versions of the same character.

  I did the same with my scroll. Around the symbol I had painted I wrote it 100 times more, each time subtly different.