Free Sample issue of The Empty Vessel - CommunityAwake

The study of Chan and its subtlety, lies in Chan’sallegoric connotations, or ‘the understanding which isgained in an instant’. This incorporates a rational element,but leaves no opening for any form of speculation.Only mutual affinity can prompt the sudden perceptionand understanding of the allegorical meaning, whichprimarily arises from the attained idea that “all thingsthat are produced by cause and associated conditionshave no reality,” and “the mind remains unimpeded, nomatter what.”The subtlety of immortality study however, lies inthe Mysterious Pass, which serves as the only channelof communication connecting both the Pre-heaven andPost-heaven domains. The Mysterious Pass lies neitherwithin nor outside the corporeal body and neither withinthe interior nor the exterior. It presents itself only whenthe interior resonates with the exterior, so allowing thenatural to concur with the artificial, with the prerequisitethat both Shen and Chi are already sufficient for the process.We can use the analogy of love to illustrate the stateof being: the feeling of love between a woman and a manarises spontaneously, and the majority of people knowthat love cannot be forced. Similarly, both emptiness andnaturalness begin to meet in harmony and communicatewith each other, though both vary in the degree to whichthey become apparent.You may perhaps wonder whether it is possible forimmortality study/internal alchemy and the study ofChan to meet up with each other in one place, or on onethoroughfare, without there being obstacles betweenthem? Let us read the following passage which is anexcerpt from Chuang Tzu, entitled “The Fasting of theMind”, translated by Victor H. Mair“I have nothing further to propose,” said Yen Hui. “Iventure to ask you for a method.”“Fasting,” said Confucius. “I shall explain it for you. Ifyou do things with your mind, do you think it will be easy?Bright heaven will not approve one who thinks it will be easy.”“My family is poor,” said Yen Hui, “and it’s been severalmonths since I’ve drunk wine or tasted meat. May this beconsidered fasting?”“This is fasting suitable for sacrifices, but it is not fastingof the mind.”“I venture to ask what ‘fasting of the mind’ is,” said Hui.“Concentrate your mind-will. Hear not with your ears,but with your mind; not with your mind, but with your Chi.Let your hearing stop with the ears, and let your mind stopwith natural concordance. Chi, however, is vacuous and empty,accommodating all. There is none but Tao who dwells in theempty vacuity. And becoming empty and vacuous is the fastingof the mind.”“Before I am able to exercise fasting of the mind,” said YenHui, “I truly have an identity. But after I am able to exercise it,I will no longer have an identity. Can this be called emptiness?“Exactly so!” replied the master. “Let me tell you. Enter androam about this realm, but without any awareness of what therealm is. In the event of arrival in it sing in concert with it; incase of no arrival in it stop at the cessation. Let the door openand close, by its own course. House all as an undivided wholeand lodge in that which takes the course all in its natural way.Then you are close to it. To leave no footprints is easy; to walkon no ground is difficult.“If you are impelled by human feelings, it is easy to befalse; if you are impelled by nature, it is hard to be false. I’veonly heard of creatures that fly with wings, never of creaturesthat fly with nonwings. I’ve only heard of people knowingthings through awareness, never of people knowing thingsthrough unawareness. Observe the void – the empty roomemits a pure light. Good fortune lies in stopping when itis time to stop. If you do not stop, this is called ‘gallopingwhile sitting.’ Let your senses communicate within and ridyourself of the machinations of the mind. Then even myriadthings are transformed. It is that to which Yao and Shunbound themselves, and that which Fuhsi and Chich’u exercisedall their lives. All the more is it suited for the masses.”The famous inner alchemist Chen Yingningonce wrote 24 stanzas of NeiDan poetry. Below,we have selected two for your appreciation:The first poemUltimate reality shines forth, illuminating the grains of sandwhich line the banks of the river GangesThose of the world, the sages, the enlightened, all, at theirorigin, sharing one common source.Each, when free of thoughts arising, converging in stillnesstowards complete expression,Yet, when moved by just one single sense, is already eclipsedby clouds.Ridding oneself of all affliction. And to what end? The additionof illness!Drawing near to true thusness. And to what end? The emergenceof a diverging path!Meekly following the predestined relationship as it arises andkeeping the mind free of hindrance. And to what end?Nirvāna, birth and death, do but compare to hollow flowersfloating in the air.The second poemOvercome emptiness, free yourself of accumulated kalpaand endure for a billion years,Bid farewell to the canoe that ferried us to the far shore.End your endless search for the countless tomes written onimmortality, even though you know the final words have notyet been composed.So what is meant by ‘the final words’? Are theywords that could not be uttered, or words that the authordid not wish to voice? The answer, provided by Chen12 Summer 2011