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, 26 January 1200 – 22 September 1253 was a Japanese people Zen Buddhism Bhikkhu, writer, poet, philosopher, and founder of the Sōtō school of Zen in Japan. He is also known as Dōgen Kigen (道元希玄), Eihei Dōgen (永平道元), Kōso Jōyō Daishi (高祖承陽大師), and Busshō Dentō Kokushi (仏性伝東国師).
Originally ordained as a monk in the Tendai in Kyoto, he was ultimately dissatisfied with its teaching and traveled to China to seek out what he believed to be a more authentic Buddhism. He remained there for four years, finally training under Tiantong Rujing, an eminent teacher of the Caodong lineage of Chan Buddhism. Upon his return to Japan, he began promoting the practice of zazen (sitting meditation) through literary works such as Fukan zazengi and Bendōwa.
He eventually broke relations completely with the powerful Tendai School, and, after several years of likely friction between himself and the establishment, left Kyoto for the mountainous countryside where he founded the monastery Eihei-ji, which remains the head temple of the Sōtō school today.
Dōgen is known for his extensive writings like the Shōbōgenzō ( Treasury of the True Dharma Eye, considered his Masterpiece), the Eihei Kōroku ( Extensive Record, a collection of his talks), the Eihei Shingi (the first Japanese Zen monastic code), along with his Japanese poetry, and commentaries. Dōgen's writings are one of the most important sources studied in the contemporary Sōtō Zen tradition.
This question was, in large part, prompted by the Tendai concept of Hongaku (本覚 hongaku), which states that all human beings are enlightened by nature and that, consequently, any notion of achieving enlightenment through practice is fundamentally flawed.
The Kenzeiki further states that he found no answer to his question at Mount Hiei, and that he was disillusioned by the internal politics and need for social prominence for advancement. Therefore, Dōgen left to seek an answer from other Buddhist masters. He went to visit Kōin, the Tendai abbot of Mii-dera (園城寺), asking him this same question. Kōin said that, in order to find an answer, he might want to consider studying Chan Buddhism in China. In 1217, two years after the death of contemporary Zen Buddhist Eisai, Dōgen went to study at Kennin-ji (建仁寺), under Eisai's successor, Myōzen (明全).
In China, Dōgen first went to the leading Chan monasteries in Zhejiang. At the time, most Chan teachers based their training around the use of Koan (Japanese: kōan). Though Dōgen assiduously studied the kōans, he became disenchanted with the heavy emphasis laid upon them, and wondered why the sutras were not studied more. At one point, owing to this disenchantment, Dōgen even refused Dharma transmission from a teacher. Then, in 1225, he decided to visit a master named Rújìng (如淨; J. Nyojō), the thirteenth patriarch of the Caodong (J. Sōtō) lineage of Zen Buddhism, at Mount Tiāntóng's (天童山 Tiāntóngshān; J. Tendōzan) Tiantong Temple in Ningbo. Rujing was reputed to have a style of Chan that was different from the other masters whom Dōgen had thus far encountered. In later writings, Dōgen referred to Rujing as "the Old Buddha". Additionally he affectionately described both Rujing and Myōzen as "Ancient Teacher".
Under Rujing, Dōgen realized liberation of body and mind upon hearing the master say, "cast off body and mind" (身心脱落 shēn xīn tuō luò). This phrase would continue to have great importance to Dōgen throughout his life, and can be found scattered throughout his writings, as—for example—in a famous section of his Genjōkōan (現成公案):
Myōzen died shortly after Dōgen arrived at Mount Tiantong. In 1227, Dōgen received Dharma transmission and inka from Rujing, and remarked on how he had finally settled his "life's quest of the great matter".
However, tension soon arose as the Tendai community began taking steps to suppress both Zen and Jodo Shinshu, the new forms of Buddhism in Japan. In the face of this tension, Dōgen left the Tendai dominion of Kyōto in 1230, settling instead in an abandoned temple in what is today the city of Uji, south of Kyōto.
In 1233, Dōgen founded the Kannon-dōri-in in Fukakusa as a small center of practice. He later expanded this temple into Kōshōhōrin-ji (興聖法林寺).
His followers built a comprehensive center of practice there, calling it Daibutsu Temple (Daibutsu-ji, 大仏寺). While the construction work was going on, Dōgen would live and teach at Yoshimine-dera Temple (Kippō-ji, 吉峯寺), which is located close to Daibutsu-ji. During his stay at Kippō-ji, Dōgen "fell into a depression". It marked a turning point in his life, giving way to "rigorous critique of Rinzai Zen". He criticized Dahui Zonggao, the most influential figure of Song dynasty Chán.
In 1246, Dōgen renamed Daibutsu-ji, calling it Eihei-ji. This temple remains one of the two head temples of Sōtō Zen in Japan today, the other being Sōji-ji.
Dōgen spent the remainder of his life teaching and writing at Eihei-ji. In 1247, the newly installed Shikken, Hōjō Tokiyori, invited Dōgen to come to Kamakura to teach him. Dōgen made the rather long journey east to provide the shōgun with lay ordination, and then returned to Eihei-ji in 1248. In the autumn of 1252, Dōgen fell ill, and soon showed no signs of recovering. He presented his robes to his main apprentice, Koun Ejō (孤雲懐弉), making him the abbot of Eihei-ji.
Dōgen also described zazen practice with the term hishiryō (非思量, "non-thinking", "without thinking", "beyond thinking"). According to Cleary, it refers to ekō henshō, turning the light around, focussing awareness on awareness itself.Thomas Cleary, Rational Zen, p.69, note 3 It is a state of no-mind which one is simply aware of things as they are, beyond thinking and not-thinking - the active effort not to think. In the Fukanzazengi, Dōgen writes:
...settle into a steady, immobile sitting position. Think of not thinking ( fushiryō). How do you think of not-thinking? Without thinking ( hishiryō). This in itself is the essential art of zazen. The zazen I speak of is not learning meditation. It is simply the Dharma-gate of repose and bliss, the cultivation-authentication of totally culminated enlightenment. It is the presence of things as they are.Masanobu Takahashi writes that hishiryō is not a state of no mental activity whatsoever. Instead, it is a state "beyond thinking and not-thinking" and beyond affirmation and rejection. Other Japanese Dogen scholars link the term with the realization of emptiness.Hee-Jin Kim. Eihei Dogen: Mystical Realist, pp. 62-63. Simon and Schuster, Jun 25, 2012 According to Thomas Kasulis, non-thinking refers to the "pure presence of things as they are", "without affirming nor negating", without accepting nor rejecting, without believing nor disbelieving. In short, it is a non-conceptual, non-intentional and "prereflective mode of consciousness" which does not imply that it is an experience without content. Similarly, Hee-Jin Kim describes this as an "objectless, subjectless, formless, goalless and purposeless" state which is yet not a blank void. As such, the correct mental attitude for zazen according to Dōgen is one of effortless non-striving, this is because for Dōgen, original enlightenment is already always present.
Dōgen certainly saw zazen as the most important Zen practice, and saw other practices as secondary. He frequently relegates other Buddhist practices to a lesser status, as he writes in the Bendōwa: "Commitment to Zen is casting off body and mind. You have no need for incense offerings, homage praying, nembutsu, penance disciplines, or silent sutra readings; just sit single-mindedly." (1996). 9780674304987, Harvard University Asia Center. ISBN 9780674304987 While Dōgen rhetorically critiques traditional practices in some passages, Foulk writes that "Dōgen did not mean to reject literally any of those standard Buddhist training methods". Rather, for Dōgen, one should engage in all practices without attachment and from the point of view of the emptiness of all things. It is from this perspective that Dōgen writes we should not engage in any "practice" (which is merely a conventional category which separates one kind of activity from another).
Indeed, according to Foulk:
the specific rituals that seem to be disavowed in the Bendowa passage are all prescribed for Zen monks, often in great detail, in Dogen's other writings. In Kuyo shobutsu, Dogen recommends the practice of offering incense and making worshipful before Buddhist art and stupas, as prescribed in the sutras and Vinaya texts. In Raihai tokuzui he urges trainees to revere enlightened teachers and to make offerings and prostrations to them, describing this as a practice which helps pave the way to one's own awakening. In Chiji shingi he stipulates that the vegetable garden manager in a monastery should participate together with the main body of monks in sutra chanting services (fugin), recitation services (nenju) in which buddhas' names are chanted (a form of Nianfo practice), and other major ceremonies, and that he should burn incense and make prostrations (shoko raihai) and recite the buddhas' names in prayer morning and evening when at work in the garden. The practice of Repentance (sange) is encouraged in Dogen's Kesa kudoku, in his Sanji go, and his Keisei sanshiki. Finally, in Kankin, Dogen gives detailed directions for sutra reading services (kankin) in which, as he explains, texts could be read either silently or aloud as a means of producing merit to be dedicated to any number of ends, including the satisfaction of wishes made by lay donors, or prayers on behalf of the emperor.
The shushō-ittō teaching was first and most famously explained in the Bendōwa (弁道話 A Talk on the Endeavor of the Path, c. 1231) as follows:
In the Fukan zazengi ( Universal Recommendation for Zazen), Dōgen explains how to practice zazen and then explains the nature of verification
If you grasp the point of this [practice], the four elements [of the body] will become light and at ease, the spirit will be fresh and sharp, thoughts will be correct and clear; the flavor of the dharma will sustain the spirit, and you will be calm, pure, and joyful. Your daily life will be [the expression of] your true natural state. Once you achieve clarification [of the truth], you may be likened to the dragon gaining the water or the tiger taking to the mountains. You should realize that when right thought is present, dullness and agitation cannot intrude.Carl Bielefeldt. Dogen's Manuals of Zen Meditation, p. 183, University of California Press, 1990.
Therefore, the very impermanency of grass and tree, thicket and forest is the Buddha nature. The very impermanency of men and things, body and mind, is the Buddha nature. Nature and lands, mountains and rivers, are impermanent because they are the Buddha nature. Supreme and complete enlightenment, because it is impermanent, is the Buddha nature.Takashi James Kodera writes that the main source of Dōgen's understanding of buddha-nature is a passage from the Nirvana sutra which was widely understood as stating that all sentient beings possess buddha-nature. However, Dōgen interpreted the passage differently, rendering it as follows:
All are (一 切) sentient beings, (衆生) all things are (悉有) the Buddha-nature (佛性); the Tathagata (如来) abides constantly (常住), is non-existent (無) yet existent (有), and is change (變易).Kodera explains that "whereas in the conventional reading the Buddha-nature is understood as a permanent essence inherent in all sentient beings, Dōgen contends that all things are the Buddha-nature. In the former reading, the Buddha-nature is a change less potential, but in the latter, it is the eternally arising and perishing actuality of all things in the world."
Thus for Dōgen buddha-nature includes everything, the totality of "all things", including inanimate objects like grass, trees and land (which are also "mind" for Dōgen).
According to Ko'un Yamada, Dōgen "repeatedly emphasizes the importance of each person attaining enlightenment".Yamada Ko'un, "Dogen Zenji and Enlightenment." in Maezumi, Taizan; Glassman, Bernie (2012). On Zen Practice: Body, Breath, and Mind. Simon and Schuster. Dōgen writes about this in a fascicle of the Shōbōgenzō titled Daigo, which states that when practitioners of Zen attain daigo they have risen above the discrimination between delusion and enlightenment.Kosho Uchiyama Roshi; Shohaku Okumura, (1997) The Wholehearted Way, Tuttle Publishing, p. 82.
While Dōgen did teach the importance of attaining enlightenment, he also critiqued certain ways of explaining it and teaching about it. According to Barbara O'Brien, Dōgen critiqued the term " kenshō" because "the word kenshō means 'to see one's nature', which sets up a dichotomy between the seer and the object of seeing."O'Brien, Barbara (2019). The Circle of the Way: A Concise History of Zen from the Buddha to the Modern World, p. 204. Shambhala Publications. Furthermore, according to Bielefeldt, Dōgen's zazen is "a subtle state beyond either thinking or not thinking" in which "body and mind have been sloughed off". It is a state in which "all striving for religious experience, all expectation of satori (daigo), is left behind." As such, while Dōgen did not reject the importance of satori, he taught that we should not sit zazen with the goal of satori in mind.
Recently in the great Sung dynasty of China there are many who call themselves "Zen masters". They do not know the length and breadth of the Buddha-Dharma. They have heard and seen but little. They memorize two or three sayings of Linji Yixuan and Yun Men and think this is the whole way of the Buddha-Dharma. If the Dharma of the Buddha could be condensed in two or three sayings of Lin Chi and Yun Men, it would not have been transmitted to the present day. One can hardly say that Lin Chi and Yun Men are the Venerable ones of the Buddha-Dharma.
Dōgen was also very critical of the Japanese Daruma school of Dainichi Nonin.
Although these stories are commonly referred to as kōans, Dōgen referred to them as kosoku (ancestral criteria) or innen (circumstances and causes or results, of a story). The word kōan for Dogen meant "absolute reality" or the "universal Dharma".
Another collection of his talks is the Shōbōgenzō Zuimonki (Gleanings from Master Dōgen's Sayings) in six volumes. These are talks that Dōgen gave to his leading disciple, Ejō, who became Dōgen's disciple in 1234. The talks were recorded and edited by Ejō.
Jakuen, a student of Rujing, who traced his lineage "directly back the Zen of the Song period", established Hōkyō-ji, where a strict style of Zen was practised. Students of his played a role in the conflict between Giin and Gikai.
A notable successor of Dogen was Keizan (瑩山; 1268–1325), founder of Sōji-ji Temple and author of the Record of the Transmission of Light (傳光錄 Denkoroku), which traces the succession of Zen masters from Gautama Buddha up to Keizan's own day. Together, Dōgen and Keizan are regarded as the founders of the Sōtō school in Japan.
In Menzan Zuihō's well-known 1753 edition of Dōgen's biography, it records that while traveling in China with his companion Dōshō, Dōgen became very ill, and a deity appeared before him who gave him medicine which instantly healed him:
This medicine, which later became known as Gedokuen or "Poison-Dispelling Pill" was then produced by the Sōtō church until the Meiji Era, and was commonly sold nationwide as an herbal medicine, and became a source of income for the Sōtō church.
Another famous incident happened when he was returning to Japan from China. The ship he was on was caught in a storm. In this instance, the storm became so severe, that the crew feared the ship would sink and kill them all. Dōgen then began leading the crew in recitation of chants to Kannon (Avalokiteshwara), during which, the Bodhisattva appeared before him, and several of the crew saw her as well. After the vision appeared, the storm began to calm down, and consensus of those aboard was that they had been saved due to the intervention of Bodhisattva Avalokiteshwara. This story is repeated in official works sponsored by the Sōtō Shū Head Office and there is even a sculpture of the event in a water treatment pond in Eihei-ji Temple. Additionally, there is a 14th-century copy of a painting of the same Kannon, that was supposedly commissioned by Dōgen, that includes a piece of calligraphy that is possibly an original in Dōgen's own hand, recording his gratitude to Avalokiteshwara:
Another miraculous event occurred, while Dōgen was at Eihei-ji. During a ceremony of gratitude for the 16 Celestial Arahants (called Rakan in Japanese), a vision of 16 Arahants appeared before Dōgen descending upon a multi-colored cloud, and the statues of the Arahants that were present at the event began to emanate rays of light, to which Dōgen then exclaimed:
Dōgen was profoundly moved by the entire experience, and took it as an auspicious sign that the offerings of the ceremony had been accepted. In his writings he wrote:
Dōgen is also recorded to have had multiple encounters with non-human beings. Aside from his encounter with the kami Inari in China, in the Denkōrou it is recorded that while at Kōshō-ji, he was also visited by a deva who came to observe during certain ceremonies, as well as a dragon who visited him at Eihei-Ji and requested to be given the eight abstinence Precepts:
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