To lose Ejo as a master was unbearable. “A master is for your entire life.” By giving me his stick and his fan, he made me not only his peer but also his successor. He must be saying that he was leaving, that he was sick, or that he thought he was about to die. I felt nauseous at this thought. I was losing my support. The axis around which I turned, thinking it always protected me, was about to be taken away. I had countless questions and no real answers. Ejo was the only one who could provide the one answer to all my questions. A cloud veiled my vision. If Ejo perceived in me the value of a master, he was mistaken, and if he could make such a mistake, then he was not a true master. I felt like vomiting. I collapsed, sitting upon a cement bench. I fanned myself with his fan. With the stick I gave myself several blows on my shoulder blades.
“Master. .”
An exceedingly skinny youth with brilliant eyes came up to me. Feeling ridiculous, I immediately stopped striking and fanning myself. I forced myself to smile at him. He kneeled before me.
“Please allow me to introduce myself. My name is Daniel. I just came from your lecture. I saw your film The Holy Mountain. It changed my life. I have made a short film, inspired by your work. I wanted to thank you. .”
His admiration came at a most inopportune moment, but I replied, simulating a warm friendliness: “Stand up and come sit down beside me. Thank you for your thanks. Would you like an autograph?”
“Well, of course, that would give me pleasure, Master. But if you don’t mind, I would like to ask a favor of you. .”
“Ask whatever you like, but don’t call me ‘Master.’”
“Actually, I’m a writer as well as a filmmaker. I’ve been reading ever since I could think. Yet I know nothing about Zen. I’ve never heard of these strange koans before. When you asked them, I had no idea how to answer, and afterward I didn’t understand your answers. Nor did I understand the ones you gave to the monk. Could you explain the meaning of all this to me?”
I had to get a grip on myself in order not to burst into tears. The absurd dance of fate had sent me a boy who took me for a master, whereas my mind was like a mirror broken into a thousand pieces. His desire to understand was so naive and his trust in my artistic mastery was so great that I felt incapable of disappointing him. Mustering a tone of calm and assurance, I improvised a little speech for him.
“Mountains do not have rocks any more than the world has individuals. The rocks are the mountain; the individuals are the world. The totality of the universe is one. The mouth is below the eyes; the birds fly in the sky; the fish swim in the sea. Everything has its natural place, without effort, in happiness. The bird drowns in the water just as the fish drowns in the air. Happiness means being ourselves in the place that is right for us. We think but we are not our thoughts. When we identify ourselves with our thoughts, we cease to be ourselves. Thoughts are, but we are not. The sound of an empty mind is the noise of the words of the one who is asking questions. ‘From where does a thought spring and what is it?’ That question is a bunch of words that cannot be answered properly by another bunch of words. One thought springs from another thought, and so on to infinity. Yet saying ‘bread’ does not satisfy our hunger. I should have just screamed at every question and given that as an answer. When the mind is empty, the observer-actor dualism disappears. If we see ourselves, we are not empty — no one arriving, no one leaving, everything just always here. Every thought is a mirage. There is no first cause; it is neither the chicken nor the egg. No beginning, no end. Permanent impermanence, formless present. Accept this appearance of change!”
Daniel tried to thank me, but I left in a hurry.
The trees in the forest were half hidden in a grayish, toxic, morning smog. In a clearing at some distance from the hordes of automobiles rushing like sheep to the slaughterhouse, Ejo and I had established a custom of meditating for two hours at six o’clock in the morning. I found him there, in zazen position. He was wearing jeans and a black T-shirt. Beside him was a mesh sack. I prostrated before him and placed the stick and fan in front of him.
“You are mistaken, Ejo. I am not a master.”
He shouted “Kwatzu!” at me so loudly it must have been heard a mile away. Then he seized me by the shoulders and forced me to sit in his place. He kneeled before me, touched his forehead to the ground, and spoke softly:
“Sometimes we are disciples, sometimes masters. Nothing is fixed.”
I did not want to accept this. I took him by the shoulders and sat him again in his place. I prostrated again before him, pressing my face obstinately against the ground three times.
Sighing with exasperation, Ejo recited a text that he had apparently learned by heart: “Are we ourselves? Where are we when we are? If I close my hands, water still escapes from them. When these hands play the lute in the moonlight, they are like the hands of the Buddha. Master Rinzai said: ‘Sometimes a cry is like a precious sword molded of the purest gold. Sometimes a cry is like a magnificent lion merged with the bushes. Sometimes a cry is like a fishing pole in the middle of the grass in whose shadow fish gather in a group. Sometimes a cry does not function as a cry.’ A monk asked him: ‘What is the meaning of the first maxim?’ Rinzai said: ‘When the seal is removed, the red ink becomes visible. Though the letter has not yet been read, the roles of the guest and host are already decided.’ The monk asked again: ‘What is the meaning of the second maxim?’ Rinzai said: ‘Careless one! Why should the work be inferior to the ideal?’ The monk insisted: ‘What is the meaning of the third maxim?’ Rinzai said: ‘When the puppet dances on the stage, the movement comes from the hand of the actor hidden in its clothes.’ And he added: ‘If you understand the first maxim, you will become the Buddha’s master. If you understand the second maxim, you will become a master of men and gods. But if you understand the third maxim, you will not even be able to save yourself.’ Then he continued: ‘Sometimes you remove the man without removing the surroundings. Sometimes you remove the surroundings without removing the man. Sometimes you remove both. Sometimes you remove neither.’”
These words, recited rapidly by Ejo, engraved themselves in my memory. I can regard them from several points of view. Their apparently different elements fit together like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. An understanding came to me through these words like luminous flashes (I can find no better metaphor for it). Ejo was now showing me the higher level of koans!
Are we ourselves? It is impossible to define ourselves, for we do not belong to ourselves; we are the world. Where are we when we are? Reality is formless and fluid, constantly changing. The dry leaf carried away by the stream is in the water, not in a place. If I close my hands, water still escapes from them. If my intellect identifies itself with a separate self, it does not capture eternal truth. When these hands play the lute in the moonlight, they are like the hands of the Buddha. The Buddha imagined by our intellect lacks any hands. When my hands produce beauty, they are the hands of the cosmos. All things are one and one thing is all things! Sometimes a cry is like a precious sword molded of the purest gold. The master transmits his satori directly to the disciple without words, like an electric shock. Sometimes a cry is like a magnificent lion merged with the bushes. The master seeks to open the stagnant mind of the disciple, who believes the world is dark because his eyes are shut. Sometimes a cry is like a fishing pole in the middle of the grass in whose shadow fish gather in a group. The master penetrates the unconscious of the disciple, trying to bring light to his hidden treasure, his essential being. Sometimes a cry does not function as a cry. The master cries without finality, naturally and spontaneously, from the highest heaven to the depths of the earth. It is thunder resounding in the blue sky with a bright sun. There is no disciple. There are two masters.