The extract below is from the Chan poem ‘Song of Enlightenment’ of Chan master Huan Chuen Yung Chia (665-713 C. E). Yung Chia was the Dharma successor of The Sixth Chan Patriarch, Hui-neng. He was a founder of modern Chinese Chan Buddhism transmitted to Japan to emerge as Zen tradition. Yung Chia had penetrated into the teaching of Vimalakīrti Sūtra pertaining to the doctrine of entrance into non-duality. Hui-neng certified that Yung Chia had actualized the Chan experience of self-enlightenment. Yung Chia is believed to have composed the ‘Song of Enlightenment’.
Do you not know the ease of the man of the Way
Who has gone beyond learning,
And whose state is non-action.
Who neither suppresses thoughts nor seeks the Truth?
To him, the reality of ignorance is the Buddha Nature ;
The empty illusory is the Dharmakāya.
Commentary:
Not dependent upon the scripture or beyond the orthodox teaching, the enlightened Chan practitioner enters into the door of non-duality. Realizing non-duality is transcendence between the perceiver and the perceived, the subject and object or one and others. The notion or sign of a perceiver and the notion or sign of the object of perception as two independent or separate self-contained entity are eliminated. There is no self-identity of the perceiver nor the self-identity of the object perceived. There exists merely the perception of a process or an activity of perception. It is equanimous perception without attachment nor aversion towards the external stimuli. Entrance into this door of non-duality consummates in the arising of perfection of wisdom. All his or her actions through the body, speech and mind are cankerless or karmaless. In other words, the enlightened Chan practitioner is capable of dwelling in everything and producing the pure consciousness which produces non-actions. Non-actions are selfless actions in which the egoistic selfish self is annihilated. In short, the Buddha-nature is revealed and the Buddha mind of no-mind(pure consciousness) is manifest. There is neither the volitional activities of suppressing thoughts nor the egoistic or selfish seeking of the ultimate truth. All notions of I and You are transcended. Equanimity or non-discriminative wisdom of non-duality arises. He discerns the Buddha-nature even in the ignorance of the illusive multiplicity of the empirical world. He realizes his spiritual body (dharmakāya) by discerning into the illusions of the multiplicity of all phenomena which are the shadows or images of the Essence of Buddhahood. The Chan masters declare that , the mind, the sentient beings and Buddhas are identical as far the Buddha-nature and Dharmabody are concerned. Even saṃsāra and Nirvāṇa are perceived to be identical. In emptiness, there are no signs, marks nor characteristics. The Heart Sūtra explicates this truth very clearly. The enlightened Chan practitioners perceive Buddha-nature or Dharmabody everywhere.
