Quote from Zen Master Yunmen
Zen Master Yunmen
by Urs App
Shambhala Publications, Boulder, Colorado, 2018 297 pp.
But what remains if all paths, all ways, and all props are pulled away? Isn't that a hopeless situation with no way out? This dilemma and the Chan way to its resolution are delineated in a conversation that took place around the middle century between the modern Japanese Zen teacher Shin'ichi Hisamatsu and the American professor and seeker Bernard Phillips:
Phillips: 'If you follow any way, you will never get there; and if you do not follow any way, you will never get there. So one faces a dilemma.'
Hisamatsu: 'Let that dilemma be your way! (i.e., it is that very dilemma that is the way you must follow!)'
Because of his inner rift and alienation, man is forced to find ways to inner peace and contentment. Neither his diverse roles in society nor the various kinds of therapy, etc., are ultimately capable of bringing about this peace; they may be able to lead to or mediate something, but not that which is immediate par excellence and thus is exactly not something. In the words of the Chan masters, "What you find outside is not the treasure of your own home."
This does not mean, however, that one can simply abandon seeking. One cannot help but seek this ultimate contentment, even if one realizes that it is not something that can be found in this way. This is the point made by Professor Phillips, who had traversed the world in search of a path, and it is congruent with Master Shitou's statement. The closing remarks of Hisamatsu and Shitou have an identical thrust: they point out the Zen way by challenging one to take this very dilemma as the way. In other words, it is exactly the no-way-out situation in which the human being finds itself - the fundamental and unbridgeable inner cleavage of that being which is conscious of itself - that is said to be the way. (pp. 51-54)
-- quote submitted by Matt M.
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