The Call of the Whip-Or-Will

Dharma Talk by Dosho Port-sensei
Sunday, March 22, 1998, at Clouds in Water Zen Center

Ananda asked Mahakasyapa, "The World-Honored One transmitted the robe of gold brocade to you. What else did he transmit to you?" Mahakasyapa said, "Ananda!" Ananda answered, "Yes!" Mahakasyapa said, "Knock down the banner at the gate!"

I would like to talk a little about this turning point. First, let me explain the context of this meeting. Mahakasyapa was the second ancestor in the Zen tradition. His name, "Light Drinker," comes from his birth story. Often ancient sages have wonderful birth stories. Since my children were born, I have a different appreciation of these stories. Every birth - remarkable. Every birth - a great story.

When Mahakasyapa was born, light filled the room, he opened his mouth, maybe to cry, and the light streamed into his mouth! His parents named him Kassyapa or "Light Drinker." "Maha" means "Great" or "Universal." When he became a Buddhist practitioner, Light Drinker became Universal Light Drinker, Mahakasyapa, receiving everything. Everything already perfectly provided.

All ten of the Buddha's great disciples are renowned for a particular excellent quality. Mahakasyapa was renowned for discipline. He astounded the community with the full devotion and precision of his practice. Once the Buddha came before the assembly, held up a flower, twirled it and raised an eyebrow. Then only Mahakasyapa smiled. The Buddha said,

"I have the eye treasury of right Dharma, the subtle mind of Nirvana, the true form of no-form, and the flowless gate of teaching. It is not predicated on words and phrases. It is a special transmission outside tradition. I now transmit it to you, Mahakasyapa."

After this, when the Buddha gave a talk, Mahakasyapa would sit on the same seat as the Buddha - sharing a zafu.

Ananda is a central figure in the transmission of the dharma. A cousin of the Buddha, he was born on the night of the Buddha's enlightenment. After the Buddha had taught for some twenty-nine years, Ananda joined the community and became the Buddha's attendant, and was with the Buddha day and night for twenty years. Can you imagine?

Ananda was renowned for his memory and intelligence. He was the smartest guy in the Buddha's sangha. He remembered everything the Buddha said so that after the Buddha's death he was able to recite the entire collection of talks that we refer to as the Suttas of the Pali Canon. Not only that, it is said that he could also recite the talks the Buddha gave during the first twenty-nine years of his teaching, before Ananda had become his attendant!

Even though Ananda memorized everything he heard and many things he hadn't heard, he didn't receive it fully. He was carrying a load, seeking self in that which lacks an enduring self. He was good at receiving, but just with the head. After the Buddha died, Ananda became a disciple of Mahakasyapa and continued his practice by serving Mahakasyapa for twenty more years just as he'd served the Buddha.

During these years of practice, then, Ananda asked Mahakasyapa, "The World-Honored One transmitted the robe of gold brocade to you...." Often in the Zen tradition, the robe and bowl of the previous generation is handed on to the next generation. "What else did he transmit to you?"

What a delicious question! Is Ananda now ready to fully receive? The opportunity is there in the sound of the bus [during this moment in the talk a bus was driving by on the street outside the Zendo], in the movement of light and shadow, in the touch of a friend. The opportunity is always there. How are you receiving this precious life?

"What else did he transmit to you?" Receiving transmission from the Buddha or from any of the ancestors in the Buddha's lineage is not about getting something from outside or attaining a special mind inside. For instance, once I asked Katagiri-roshi, "How can I get free of the limits of self-grasping?" He slapped the floor and said in a strong voice, "Already you are stuck! Turn over a new leaf now!"

Even though this experience gave me the chance to turn around, it is just a small piece of the whole tapestry. The whole tapestry was present from the beginning. How can we express the whole tapestry of what we receive from each other? How are you giving this precious life?

If you say that it's just the gold brocade robe, just a piece of the tapestry, you fall into the world of this and that and inherit the frustration of imputing a self into that which is non-self. On the other hand, if you say that it isn't the gold brocade robe, "Well, I didn't get anything," that also misses. You become nihilistic and can't even get out of the bed in the morning: "What does it matter anyway, there is nothing."

If the Way is perfect and all pervading, what is there to get and who is there to get it? Wu-Men's commentary says about this,

"If you say the eye treasury can be transmitted, that would be as if the golden-faced old fellow (the Buddha) were swindling people in a loud voice at the town gate. If you say the eye treasury cannot be transmitted, then why did the Buddha say he transmitted it to Mahakasyapa?"

"The World-Honored One transmitted the robe of gold brocade to you. What else did he transmit to you?" Mahakasyapa says "Ananda!" Is he changing the subject here or not? Is he calling or responding? "Ananda!" is a demonstration, a dharma presentation.

In this moment the whole world comes together, and we call it Mahakasyapa. It isn't really Mahakasyapa; it's the whole world coming together. The whole works is unattainable, unknowable.

Just as you say when you go up to the counter at the Black Dog [coffeehouse] and say,

"Italian, please," eons of evolutionary activity come together. In the same way, the 10,000 things come together and say, "Ananda!" This is ringing like a bell with no remainder: "Ananda!"

Ananda says, "Yes!" The face-to-face meeting of Buddha and Buddha has now been realized. In the Zen tradition the spiritual path is not culminated in personal isolation, sitting on your cushion in a cave. It is culminated in meeting the teacher, the community, and the coffee maker at the Black Dog. In each situation, we have the great capability to say, "Yes!" Receiving the whole works.

Mahakasyapa then says to Ananda, "Ananda, go knock down the banner at the front gate." We strike a Han [a wooden instrument in the hallway of Clouds in Water] before the dharma talk. In ancient times, they would raise a banner in front of the temple before a teaching and take it down at the conclusion of the teaching.

In this story, the teaching is over. Can you hear the vigor in it? Mahakasyapa does not whine, "Time to take down the flag, Ananda." He says, "KNOCK DOWN THE BANNER!" The whole teaching has been thoroughly given and received, without remainder.

The poet William Stafford wonderfully rings the bell of this point.

"There was a call one night, and a call
back. It made a song. All
the birds waited - the sound they tried for
now over, and the turning of the world
going on in silence. Behind what happens
there is that stillness, the wings that wait,
the things to try, the wondering, the music."

"There was a call one night." We have been focusing this last month on this issue of clarifying intention, of taking responsibility. I've been encouraging you not to wait for your innermost request to magically appear before you. However, when you see yourself as an object, then you wait for the world to clarify your heart and mind. When you assume the position of the subject, then you can take responsibility, clarify your innermost request, and live clearly without wasting time.

"There was a call one night." When you hear that line, do you think that it's someone else calling and it's your job to respond? In this koan who called and who responded? Ananda put his hand forward. He knocked on the door. Hello! Notice he didn't come forward and recite a sutra that he'd memorized.

"There was a call one night." That call may be your voice or your beating heart. "And there was a call back. It made a song." When I hear this line I remember when I was doing practice periods at Hokyoji, the Minnesota Zen Center monastery in southeastern Minnesota. During one spring practice period, there was a Whip-Or-Will that would come and sit in the trees right on the edge of the forest and call every few moments during evening zazen, looking for his/her lover. "Hello!" "Woo Woo Wooooo!" I recently mentioned this to my dharma brother, Nonin, and even though it must have been 15 years ago, he remembered it too.

If you're sitting in zazen, wallowing in your stuff, you miss the call. You miss the Whip-or-Will. If you open and allow the 10,000 things to fill you to the brim, then the Whip-or-Will's call is for you. It is your call.

"All the birds waited - the sound they tried for now over, and the turning of the world going on in silence." In the present koan, Ananda calls, responds and is entrusted with the dharma. This Ananda is the Ananda that is unknowable and unattainable. The whole community of living beings receives the gold brocade robe and is thoroughly confirmed. YES!