Uji

An ancient Buddha said, "Sometimes one stands on the highest peak; sometimes one walks in the deepest ocean floor. Sometimes one manifests with three heads and eight arms; sometimes one appears as a sixteen-foot golden body. Sometimes there is the staff and whisk; sometimes there are the pillar and lantern. Sometimes there is Zhang-san and Li-si; sometimes there is the great earth and empty space." What is called 'sometimes' means time already is this existence; all existence is time. The sixteen-foot golden body is time; because it is time, it possesses the glorious illumination of time. One must study within the present twelve hours.

The three heads and eight arms are time; because they are time, they are one with the present twelve hours. Though we do not measure the length or brevity of the twelve hours, we call them the twelve hours. Because the traces of coming and going are clear, people do not doubt or cling to them; yet, though they do not doubt or cling, they do not know them. Since sentient beings, from the outset, do not know each thing and each event, their doubting and clinging is not fixed.

Therefore, the future course of their doubting does not necessarily correspond to their present doubting. It is merely that doubting is temporarily time. Arranging myself, I have made the entire realm. One must see that each and every thing in this entire realm is each and every time. That things do not obstruct each other is like times not obstructing each other. Therefore, there is simultaneous arousing of the mind, and there is the same mind arousing time. Practice and attainment of the Way are also like this. Arranging myself, I see this. The principle of one's own time is thus.

Because the principle is such, throughout the entire ground there are all phenomena and every blade of grass; one must study that each single blade of grass and each single phenomenon is throughout the entire ground. Such coming and going is the first step of practice. When one reaches such a stage, it is precisely a single blade of grass and a single phenomenon; it is meeting the phenomenon and not meeting the phenomenon; it is meeting the grass and not meeting the grass.

Because it is precisely the time of suchness, every 'sometimes' is an exhaustive time; both having grass and having phenomena are time. In each and every time, there is the exhaustive existence and the exhaustive realm. One should contemplate whether there is or is not an exhaustive existence and exhaustive realm that has slipped away from the present time. However, for an ordinary person who does not learn the Buddha Dharma, all views during the time-seasons, upon hearing the words 'sometimes,' think: 'At one time, I was with three heads and eight arms; at another time, I was a sixteen-foot golden body. It is like having crossed a river and passed over a mountain.

Though those mountains and rivers may still exist now, I have crossed them and now dwell in jeweled palaces and vermilion towers; I think the mountains and rivers and I are as separate as heaven and earth.' Yet, the principle is not limited to this one thread. It is said that when climbing the mountain and crossing the river, there was I; there must be time with me. Since I already exist, time cannot be lacking.

If time is not a mark of coming and going, then the time of ascending the mountain is the 'now' of 'sometimes.' If time maintains the mark of coming and going, then I have the 'now' of 'sometimes'; this is 'sometimes.' Could that time of ascending the mountain and crossing the river not swallow or spit out this time of the jeweled palace and vermilion tower? Three heads and eight arms is the time of yesterday; sixteen feet and eight feet is the time of today. Yet, the principle of that past and present is precisely the season of entering directly into the mountains and surveying the thousand peaks and ten thousand peaks; it is not something that has passed.

Three heads and eight arms are also, precisely, my 'sometimes' that has been fully experienced; though resembling something over there, it is 'now.' Sixteen feet and eight feet are also, precisely, my 'sometimes' that has been fully experienced; though resembling something in that place, it is 'now.' Therefore, the pine is time; the bamboo is time. One should not understand time merely as flying away; one should not learn that flying away is merely a capability of time.

If time were entirely entrusted to flying away, there would likely be gaps. Not having fully heard the Way of 'sometimes' is due to learning it merely as something that has passed. To state the essential point: all exhaustive existences throughout the entire realm, while forming a series, are each and every time. Because there is 'sometimes,' I have 'sometimes.'

There is merit in the passage of time. This means passing from today to tomorrow, passing from today to yesterday, passing from yesterday to today. It is passing from today to today, passing from tomorrow to tomorrow. Passage is itself the merit of time. Though the times of past and present are not piled up nor arranged side by side, Qingyuan is time, Huangbo is time, Jiangxi is time, and Shitou is time. Since both self and other are already time, practice and realization are all times. Entering mud and entering water are equally time.

The views of ordinary people in the present, the causes and conditions of seeing, are what ordinary people perceive, yet they are not the dharma of ordinary people; it is merely that the dharma temporarily conditions ordinary people. Because one learns that this time, this existence, is not the dharma, one recognizes that the sixteen-foot golden body is not oneself. The attempt to escape, thinking "I am not the sixteen-foot golden body," is itself a fragment of existing time, a glimpse of one who has not yet attained proof.

Even the horses and sheep now arrayed in the world being startled is the suchness of abiding in the dharma position, its rising and falling, ascending and descending. The rat is time, the tiger is time, birth is time, the Buddha is time. In this time, one realizes the entire world with three heads and eight arms, and one realizes the entire world with a sixteen-foot golden body. To exhaustively realize using the entire world to exhaust the boundaries of the entire world—this is called thorough investigation.

The manifestation of the initial aspiration, practice, enlightenment, and nirvana through enacting the sixteen-foot golden body with the sixteen-foot golden body is precisely existence, is time. It is only thoroughly investigating the entire time as the entire existence. There is no surplus dharma, precisely because surplus dharma is surplus dharma. Even if it is a half-investigated existence-time, it is the thorough investigation of half-existence-time. Even a form that appears to be a missed opportunity is existence. Furthermore, if left to itself, both before and after the missed opportunity manifests, it is the abiding position of existence-time.

The lively, vibrant state of abiding in the dharma position—this is existence-time. One must not cling to it as nothingness, nor forcefully make it into existence. Do not merely calculate merit, thinking time always passes straight through, and fail to understand it as not-yet-arrived. Understanding is time, yet there is no condition for it to be illuminated by another. There is no skin-bag that recognizes coming and going and sees through to the existence-time of the abiding position. How much less could there be a time of passing through the barrier? Even if one recognizes the abiding position, who could speak of having already attained and maintained suchness?

Even if one has spoken of suchness for a long time, there is none who has not yet traced the features present before them. If one simply leaves it to the existence-time of an ordinary person, then even enlightenment and nirvana are merely the existence-time of the aspect of coming and going. Generally, existence-time manifests without lingering in the sieve-basket. The heavenly kings and hosts now manifesting on the right and manifesting on the left are also the existence-time of my exhaustive exertion.

The various water and land beings existing elsewhere—these are what I now exhaustively exert and manifest. The various kinds and heads of beings in the dark and bright that are existence-time are all my exhaustive exertion manifesting, my exhaustive exertion passing through. You should investigate and learn that if it were not for my exhaustive exertion passing through now, not a single dharma or thing would manifest or pass through. The term 'passage' should not be learned as merely like wind and rain going east and west. The entire world is not immovable, nor is it non-progressive or non-regressive; it is passage. Passage is, for example, like spring.

In spring there are many aspects and appearances; this is called passage. You should investigate and learn that passage occurs without external things. For example, the passage of spring necessarily passes through spring. Though passage is not spring, because it is the passage of spring, passage now accomplishes the Way in the time of spring. You should investigate meticulously, coming and going.

When speaking of passage, if you think the objective realm is outside and the dharma capable of passage faces east, travels beyond hundreds of thousands of worlds, and passes through hundreds of thousands of kalpas, this is not single-minded devotion to the investigation and learning of the Buddha Way.

The Great Master Yaoshan Hongdao, following the instruction of Master Wuji, went to inquire of the Chan Master Daji of Jiangxi. "Regarding the three vehicles and the twelve divisions of the teachings, I have roughly clarified their essential meaning. But what is the meaning of the Patriarch's coming from the West?" When he asked in this way, Chan Master Daji said, "Sometimes I instruct him to raise his eyebrows and blink his eyes; sometimes I do not instruct him to raise his eyebrows and blink his eyes.

Sometimes the one who instructs him to raise his eyebrows and blink his eyes is right; sometimes the one who instructs him to raise his eyebrows and blink his eyes is wrong." Hearing this, Yaoshan experienced great awakening and said to Daji, "When I was formerly at Shitou, it was like a mosquito trying to climb an iron ox. The way Daji expresses it is not the same as others. The eyebrows and eyes are the mountains and seas, because the mountains and seas are the eyebrows and eyes. That 'instructing him to raise' is to see the mountain; that 'instructing him to blink' is to take the sea as one's fundamental principle. This is familiar to him; he is led by the instruction.

'Wrong' is not 'not instructing him'; 'not instructing him' is not 'wrong.' These are both 'sometimes.' The mountain is also time; the sea is also time. If there were no time, there could be no mountains and seas; one must not say that in the very now of mountains and seas there is no time. If time is destroyed, the mountains and seas are also destroyed; if time is not destroyed, the mountains and seas are also not destroyed. Within this principle, the morning star appears, the Tathagata appears, the eye appears, the holding up of the flower appears. This is time. If it were not time, it would not be so.

The Zen master Guisheng of Yexian was a dharma descendant of Linji and the direct heir of Shoushan. Once, he demonstrated to the assembly, saying: "There are times when the meaning arrives but the phrase does not; there are times when the phrase arrives but the meaning does not. There are times when both meaning and phrase arrive together; there are times when neither meaning nor phrase arrives. Both meaning and phrase are 'there is a time'; both arrival and non-arrival are 'there is a time.' Though the time of arrival is not yet complete, the time of non-arrival comes. Meaning is the donkey; phrase is the horse. The horse is taken as phrase, the donkey as meaning.

Arrival is not 'coming'; non-arrival is not 'not yet.' There is a time like this. Arrival is obstructed by arrival, not obstructed by non-arrival. Non-arrival is obstructed by non-arrival, not obstructed by arrival. Meaning even sees meaning itself. Phrase even sees phrase itself. Obstruction even sees obstruction itself. Obstruction obstructs obstruction; this is time. Though obstruction may be used by other dharmas, there is not yet an obstruction that obstructs other dharmas.

I meet a person; a person meets a person; I meet myself; emergence meets emergence. If these do not attain time, they are not like this. Furthermore, meaning is the time of the manifest koan; phrase is the time of the ultimate pivotal point. Arrival is the time of the cast-off body; non-arrival is the time of 'just this, apart from this.' One should discern and affirm thus; there should be a time."

Even if all the venerable masters of old have spoken thus, is there not still a place where the Way must be expressed? It must be said: there are times when the meaning and the phrase arrive halfway, and there are times when the meaning and the phrase do not arrive halfway. One must investigate in this way. There are times when instructing him to raise the eyebrows or blink the eyes is halfway, times when instructing him to raise the eyebrows or blink the eyes is mistaken, and times when not instructing him to raise the eyebrows or blink the eyes is doubly mistaken. It is precisely in this way, coming and going in investigation, arriving and not arriving in investigation, that there is the time of "there is a time."

The "Shobogenzo" "Uji" fascicle, number twenty.

Written on the opening day of winter in the first year of Ninji, the cyclical year kōshi, at Kōshō Hōrin-ji, and transcribed during the summer retreat in the cyclical year kibō of the Kangen era, by Kaijō.