Doshin

Doshin represents the Sanskrit bodhicitta. Do, which means “way” or “truth,” is a translation of the Sanskrit word bodhi, and shin means “mind/consciousness” or “will.” In this chapter, Master Dogen preaches the will to the truth, devotion to the Three Treasures, the making of buddha-images, and practicing zazen. The teachings in this chapter are rather concrete and direct, and some Buddhist scholars suppose that this chapter may have been written and preached for laypeople.

[99] In pursuing the Buddha’s truth, we should see the will to the truth as foremost. People who know what the will to the truth is like are rare. We should inquire into it under people who know it clearly. Among people of the world there are people who are said to have the will to the truth but who really do not have the will to the truth. There are people who really have the will to the truth but are not known by [other] people. Thus, it is hard to know of its existence and nonexistence. For the most part, we do not believe and do not listen to the words of people who are stupid and bad. At the same time, we must not see our own mind as foremost. We should see as foremost the Law that the Buddha has preached. Constantly, night and day, we should obsess our minds with how the will to the truth should be; and we should hope and pray that somehow true bodhi might exist in this world. In a degenerate age there is almost no-one with a genuine will to the truth. Nevertheless, applying the mind for a while to inconstancy, we should not forget the unreliability of the world and the precariousness of human life. We need not be conscious that “I am thinking about the unreliability of the world.” Deliberately attaching weight to the Dharma, we should think light of “my body” and “my life.” For the sake of the Dharma we should begrudge neither body nor life.

[101] Next, we should profoundly venerate the Three Treasures of Buddha, Dharma, and Saṅgha. We should desire to serve offerings to and venerate the Three Treasures, even through exchanging a life or exchanging the body.¹ Asleep and awake, we should consider the merit of the Three Treasures. Asleep and awake, we should chant the Three Treasures. Even between abandoning this life and being born in a next life—in which period there is said to be a “middle existence” whose life is seven days—even during that period, we should intend to chant the Three Treasures without ever lulling the voice. After seven days we [are said to] die in the middle existence, and then to receive another body in the middle existence, for seven days. At the longest [this body] lasts seven days. At this time we can see and hear anything without restriction, as if with the supernatural Eye.² At such a time, spurring the mind, we should chant the Three Treasures; we should chant without pause, not forgetting to recite “namu-kie-Butsu, namu-kie-Ho, namu-kie-So.”³ When, having passed out of the middle existence, we are drawing close to a father and mother, we should steel ourselves and—even when, due to the presence of right wisdom, we are in the womb-store [world]⁴ that will commit us to the womb—we should chant the Three Treasures. We might not neglect to chant even while being born. We should profoundly desire that, through the six sense organs, we might serve offerings to, chant, and take refuge in the Three Treasures. Again, it may be that when this life ends [a person’s] two eyes become dark at once. At that time, knowing already that it is the end of our life, we should strive to chant “namu-kie-Butsu.” Then the buddhas of the ten directions will bestow their compassion. Even sins for which—due to the presence of contributing causes—we might go to an evil world, will be transformed, and we will be born in the heavens above; being born before the Buddha, we will worship the Buddha and hear the Dharma which the Buddha preaches. After darkness comes before our eyes, we should strive unflaggingly to recite the three devotions, not letting up even until the middle existence, and even until the next birth. In this manner, exhausting life after life in age after age, we should recite [the Three Devotions]. Even until we arrive at the buddha-effect of bodhi, we should not let up. This is the truth practiced by the buddhas and bodhisattvas. It is called “profoundly to realize the Dharma,” and is called “the Buddha’s truth being present in the body.” We should desire never to mix it with different ideas.

[104] Again, within our lifetime we should endeavor to make a buddha. Having made it, we should serve to it the three kinds of offerings. The three kinds are seats of straw, sugared drinks, and lights. We should serve these as offerings.

[104] Again, during this life we should produce [copies of] the Sutra of the Flower of Dharma. We should write them, should print them, and should retain them. Constantly we should receive them upon the head in reverence, make prostrations to them, and offer them flowers, incense, lights, food and drink, and clothing. Constantly keeping the head clean, we should humbly receive them upon the head.

[105] Again, constantly we should wear the kaṣāya and sit in zazen. There are past examples of the kaṣāya [leading to] attaining the truth in a third life.⁵ Already it is the attire of the buddhas of the three times: its merit is unfathomable. Zazen is not a method of the triple world:⁶ it is the method of the Buddhist patriarchs.

Shobogenzo Doshin

Date not recorded.