Recently, I have become increasingly fascinated by koans.
I find myself reading them, thinking about them, sitting with them.
Sometimes they even come with me when I go cycling.
A question appears somewhere on the road and stays there.
Not necessarily asking for an answer.
Just refusing to disappear.
One of the classic questions in Zen is:
Why did Bodhidharma come from the West?
Bodhidharma was the Indian monk traditionally credited with bringing Zen—or Chan—to China.
So, on one level, the question seems straightforward.
Why did he come?
What was his purpose?
What did he bring?
But in Zen literature, the question appears again and again.
And the answers are rarely historical.
Nobody seems particularly interested in Bodhidharma’s travel arrangements.
The question becomes something else.
Recently I came across two koans that approach it in completely different ways.
The first is Case 5 of the Mumonkan, Kyōgen’s Man Up a Tree.
Kyōgen said:
“It is like a man up a tree, hanging from a branch by his mouth; his hands cannot grasp a branch, his feet won’t reach a bough.
Suppose there is another man under the tree who asks him, ‘Why did Bodhidharma come from the West?’
If he does not answer, he fails the questioner.
If he does answer, he will lose his life.
What would you do in such a situation?”
It is a wonderful image.
A man hanging from a branch by his teeth.
He cannot use his hands.
He cannot use his feet.
And then, of all the possible things someone could ask him, a man standing safely underneath the tree decides to ask:
“Why did Bodhidharma come from the West?”
What do you do?
Answer and fall.
Remain silent and fail to respond.
There does not seem to be anywhere to go.
The intellect immediately begins looking for an escape.
Perhaps there is a clever answer.
Perhaps the question is symbolic.
Perhaps the tree represents something.
Perhaps the man should somehow communicate without opening his mouth.
But the koan remains there.
A man.
A branch.
Teeth.
And a question.
Then there is Case 37 of the Mumonkan.
A monk asked Jōshū:
“Why did Bodhidharma come from the West?”
Jōshū replied:
“The oak tree in the garden.”
That is all.
No explanation of Bodhidharma.
No discussion of India or China.
No teaching about Zen.
The oak tree in the garden.
The same question.
Two completely different scenes.
In one, a man is hanging in the air with his life depending on whether he opens his mouth.
In the other, an oak tree stands in the garden.
One suspended in the air.
One rooted firmly in the ground.
And somewhere between them:
Why did Bodhidharma come from the West?
I can try to explain Kyōgen.
I can try to explain Jōshū.
I can explain Bodhidharma.
I can explain the tree.
I can probably explain until the man finally loses his grip and falls from the branch.
But the question remains.
Perhaps that is one of the reasons I have become so fascinated by koans.
They do not always cooperate with our desire to understand them.
You can carry one around for days.
You can sit with it.
Walk with it.
Take it out on the bicycle.
You can think you have understood something, and then one small part of the case opens the question again.
So I am still carrying this one.
A man hanging from a branch.
An oak tree standing in a garden.
And Bodhidharma, apparently still travelling from the West.
