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BUT WHAT IS ZEN?
103 slips away, ..." For that which has been successfully defined has been successfully killed”, as someone brightly said. In the end one can only say of Zen, “That's it!"
What's it? Let us try again. This is a steep hill that we have to climb, so let us undress a trifle before we attempt to rush it. Zen is, so let us forget that it is anything. Remove philosophy, and with it theories and classification. Remove religion, and all yearning, for there is nothing for which to yearn. Remove all science, and all learning, for the greatest of Masters stated with pride that he knew nothing of Buddhism-or of Zen. Sit loose to life, the waistcoat buttons undone and the frown erased from the brow; pour out the soiled bath-water of habitual thought, and into the void flows Zen, and with it joy, and a giggle or two of relief, and a new delight in a bottle of beer, or darning, or the morning cup of tea.
For the life of Zen has enormous gusto, which cannot be said for the average professor, scientist or man of God. There is nothing holy about Zen, or "far too technical for the little ones".
“Look children,
Hail-stones!
Let's rush out!" Thus one of the poems of Basho, the most famous poet of Japan. In England the equivalent poem is in A Child's Garden of Verses, not in a book for the "adult” mind.
The friendly cow, all red and white
I love with all my heart; She gives me cream with all her might
To eat with apple-tart. 1 The Spirit of Zen, p. 12.
