The Moon is Not the Moon:
Non-Transcendence in the Poetry of Han-shan and Ryokan~

Christopher Ryan Byme
Faculty of Religious Studies
McGill University, Montreal
August 2005

A thesis submitted to Mc Gill University in partial fulfillment of the requirement of thedegree of Masters of Arts.
Copyright © Christopher Byme 2005

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•••CanadaTable of Contents

Abstract
Résumé
Acknowledgments
Conventions

4

Chapter One. Han-shan and Ryokan: The Problem of Transcendence

8

5
6
7

Han-shan and Ryokan as Cultural !cons
Han-shanRyokanInterpretations of Han-shan
Interpretations of Ryokan
Transcendence and Trans-descendence
Structure of Thesis
Hermeneutical Problems
Chapter Two. Poetry: The World and Its Words

26. Introduction
Poetry as a Practice and the Problem of Linguistic Inadequacy
Models of Linguistic Adequacy
Han-shan's and Ryokan's Views ofPoetry and Language
Han-shanRyokanConclusion
Chapter Three. White Clouds and Red Dust: Eremitism and Society

69

Introduction
Han-shan as Recluse
Ryokan as Recluse
Conclusion
Chapter Four. Trans-descendence: The Path to Cold Mountain97

Introduction
Cold Mountain
RyokanConclusion
Bibliography

126
130

ii

Abstract
The Zen (Ch'an) poets Han-shan (circa 6th_9th C.) and Ryôkan (1758-1831) participate inliterary activity, reclusion, and ordinary emotions in a manner that questions their typicalimage as models of transcendence. They participate in literary activity without
attachment to either linguistic adequacy or a dualistic notion of "beyond words," andpoetry serves as their mode of communication from reclusion. Reclusion is a context torealize the nature of the conventional world rather than a me ans of transcendence to an
ultimate realm and is significant as a social and political act. Interpreted through thefunctional model of language, the poets' expressions of sorrow experienced in theirreclus ive lives embody the Zen ideal of selflessness. Ultimately, the poetry ofboth Hanshan and Ryôkan supports a non-transcendent, or trans-descendent, ideal consistent with
the nonduallogic of Zen Buddhism and contrary to scholarship that assumes a dualistic
view of Zen enlightenment.

iii

RésuméLa manière dont les poètes Zen Han-shan (vers VIe_IXe siècle) et Ry6kan (1758-1831)
participent à l'activité littéraire, à la réclusion et aux émotions ordinaires remet enquestion l'image typique de modèles de transcendance qui leur est attribuée. Ils
participent à l'activité littéraire sans attachement à la rectitude littéraire ou à une notion
dualiste de ce qui est "au-delà des mots" et se servent de la poésie comme un moyen decommuniquer à partir de l'état de réclusion. Plutôt qu'un moyen de transcender le mondeordinaire pour accéder à un royaume de l'absolu, la réclusion est un contexte permettant
de réaliser la nature du monde conventionnel, de même qu'un acte social et politique:Interprétée au moyen d'un modèle fonctionnel du langage, la tristesse de la réclusion
qu'expriment les poètes incarne l'idéal Zen de l'absence de moi. En bout de ligne; etcontrairement à ce que suggère la recherche présupposant une vision dualiste de l'éveil duZen, la poésie de Han-shan et Ry6kan s'inscrit en faveur d'un idéal non pas transcendantmais "trans-descendant" en accord avec la logique non dualiste du bouddhisme Zen.

iv

Acknowledgements

l would like to give thanks to my family for their support.
Thanks to fellow students who provided generous discussion.
Thanks to Tara -for her editing, encouragement, and compassion.

Thanks to Dr. Hori. l am greatly indebted to his valuable criticism, demanding questions,keen insight, and hard work.

v

Conventions

The names for those whose primary language is Japanese or Chine se are listed with theirsurnames first. 1 have listed Ryüichi Abé with his surname last since that is how his nameappears in English works. The Wade-Giles system for Romanization has been used for
Chine se words and names and the Hepbum system ofRomanization for Japanese. Since
the Sanskrit terrns, nirvana and sam sara, are now commonly found in English, they willappear without diacritical marks.

In-text citations follow the pattern (Author page), or (Author year, page) when necessary.
However, poem nurnbers have been added with the # sign preceding the poem nurnber
where appropriate: (Author #poem, page). The book and chapter nurnbers cited from
D.C. Lau's translation of The Analects have been included preceding the page nurnber.
My copy of Red Pine's The Col/ected Songs ofCold Mountain does not have pagenurnbers; therefore, only the poem number appears, except for citations from theintroduction for which 1 have provided page numbers. When quoting only a section of alonger poem, 1 have put the word "from" before the author and page nurnber.

When copying poems, 1 have tried to follow the punctuation of the original, and sorne
appear without a final period.

viChapterOne
Han-shan and Ryokan: The Problem of Transcendence

Han-shan, the legendary Chinese poet (circa 6th _9th C.), and the Japanesepoet Ryokan (1758-1831) are both hermits and Zen (Ch'an) Buddhists who areoften associated with an ideal of transcendence. Han-shan in particular is se en as
an embodiment of Zen wisdom and is depicted as being beyond the ordinary
concerns and emotions of everyday people. The image of Ryokan is more
complex, especially since much more is known about him historically;
nevertheless, many considered him to be a man who transcended the dust ofordinary life and kept his distance from worldly pursuits at his hermitage. Bothpoets are well known for their often unconventional, rule-breaking poetry andtheir simple, direct language that goes beyond tradition and refuses to conform tosocietal norms.
However, at the same time, both poets display emotions of sadness anddesire that contrast with the Buddhist ideal of non-attachment. Furthermore, thecontent of their poems and the act of writing poetry itself suggest a greater
involvement in social affairs than their reclusive image presupposes. These
contradictions question the nature oftheir transcendence as it is usually
imagined.

Han-shan and Ryokan as Cultural Icons
Han-shanAccording to his poems, Han-shan appears to have been an unsuccessful
Confucian scholar who initially withdrew to a life of private scholarship andfarming with his wife and child until he eventually isolated himself at Cold
Mountain (Ch. han shan), the place from which he takes his name, and spent hisdays investigating the Buddhist Dharma. Han-shan became a cultural icon,
however, more as a result of later legends and paintings that glorify his eccentric,
eremitic lifestyle as a manifestation of Zen (or Ch'an) enlightenment. The
preface 1 to his poems by Lü-ch'iu Yin establishes Han-shan as a Zen lunatic who
would have nothing to do with society or monastic institutions and instead
wandered around laughing wildly and disappearing into the mountains.
Supposedly, his friend Shih-te worked as cook in the temple and provided Hanshan with leftovers to sustain him in reclusion. The master of the temple, Fengkan, identified Han-shan and Shih-te as the bodhisattvas Mafijusrï andSamantabhadra, respectively, but others only saw them as poor fools. As Fengkan noted: "When you see him you don't recognize him, when you recognize him
you don't see him" (Snyder 1966, 32). Of course, Han-shan and Shih-te refuse to
be admired as anything special. 2
Beginning as early as the 12th century, artists, inspired by this legend,
have painted images of Han-shan and Shih-te together, usually pictured with aseroU and a broom, each with a big toothy grin and long, frazzled hair. These two

1 Dated by Pulleyblank to be from the late-T'ang (Pulleyblank 174).
2 Han-shan mentions Shih-te and Feng-kan only once in his poems (see Henricks 80).

2

figures even made it into a play of the popular kabuki theater of Japan in which
Han-shan (Kanzan in Japanese) and Shih-te (Jittoku in Japanese) dance and goofaround gawking at a scroll that is then shown to the audience to be completely
blank (Leggett 169-171). At the site of Cold Mountain today is Cold MountainTemple, which features a wooden sculpture and portraits of Han-shan and Shih-te
and also provides Han-shan souvenirs to tourists (Kahn 31).
Besides the popular iconography and legends, Han-shan's poetry has also
been highly esteemed by the Zen tradition and has been printed alongside therecorded sayings offamous Zen masters (see Iritani and Matsumura). Han-shan's
poetry rarely made it into the officialliterary collections of secular society,however, and did not make it into any collection ofT'ang poetry until1707. At
the same time, a tradition ofwriting poems in imitation of Han-shan did begin
around the Sung dynasty (960-1278) (Kahn 2). In the 20th century, Han-shanfound his way into the West with a number of translations in English and French.
His image has been particularly popularized by Gary Snyder's lively andcolloquial translation and has been connected to the Beat generation and counterculture movement through the mention ofSnyder's translations in Jack Kerouac's
popular, Buddhist and mountain-hiking inspired novel The Dharma Burns.

RyokanIn 1758, Ryôkan was bom in a small fishing village called Izumozaki
where his father was the village headman and Shintô priest. As a youth Ryôkan
enjoyed reading and studied the c1assics. He was expected to take over his

3father's position in the village but instead entered the Soto Zen monastery at
Kosho-ji in 1777 and later trained at Entsü-ji, beginning around 1780, where hecontinued to study literature and writing. His monastic name is Ryokan Taigu,"Taigu" meaning "Great Fool" and "Ryokan" meaning "Goodly Tolerance"(Watson 1977,5). In 1790, Ryokan became head monk at the temple andreceived inka, official transmission to teach the Dharma from his master. When
Ryokan's master died the next year, he left the monastery and spent sorne years
wandering the Japanese countryside until he eventually settled outside ofhis
home village in a small hut on Mount Kugami at the age offorty. His de ci sion tolive in reclusion and not rejoin the monastery as an abbot was probably due inpart to contention between two branches of the Soto school at that time. On
Mount Kugami, he sustained himself and mingled with the villagers through his
begging rounds. In the village, he became known for playing with children,
drinking sake, and being forgetful- activities that fit the image of the simple
and innocent Zen mind -and his poetry and calligraphy received attention by

the locals. Unconventional for Buddhist monks, at the end ofhis life he fell inlove with the nun Teishin and their relationship entailed a memorable poetic
exchange that has been preserved in print.
Many ofRyokan's friends began developing legendary biographies ofhis
life, after he died in 1831, as they greatly admired his behavior and personality.3
These legends emphasize Ryokan's sincerity, playfulness, and selfless concem
for others. Peter Haskel makes the insightful point that one would expect

3 For a discussion ofthese stories see Ryüichi Abé's article, "Commemorating Ryokan: The
Origin and Growth of Ryokan's Biographies" (in Abé and Haskel 76-87).

4

Ryokan's role as an eccentric recluse to be looked down upon by Japan's
conformist culture (Abé and HaskeI20). Nevertheless, the simplicity ofhis poor
lifestyle has made Ryokan into a popular icon in Japan. His poems are read bymany, literally thousands ofbooks on his life have appeared in the last century(see Abé and Haskel xii), and the anecdotes ofhis life have been included incollections of Zen stories, such as Paul Rep's English language collection, Zen
Flesh, Zen Banes.

Interpretations of Han-shan
Despite the awareness that Zen is based in a philosophy ofnonduality,translators and critics of Han-shan and Ryokan have typically analyzed theirpoems with a dualistic interpretation of enlightenment and Buddhist insight. In
the conventional view, enlightenment is reified as a distinct state of tranquillity
and wisdom that is divorced from delusive passions and ignorance. Based on thisassumption, critics often glorify Han-shan as a sage beyond the ordinary desiresof the world, and in their struggle to make sense of Ryokan's feelings ofsorrow,sorne label him as a Zen failure. Sorne critics do make room for the significanceof ordinary emotion in the authors' poetry but never do they relate it clearly to
Buddhist realization. In Mahàyâna nonduallogic, however, delusion is nodifferent from enlightenment, and this thesis aims to provide a nondual
interpretation of Han-shan and Ryokan through the application of this logic.
Burton Watson comments that the uniqueness and attractiveness of Hanshan is his display of "intense emotion" that includes feelings of loneliness and5melancholy in contrast to the typical "calm, cool air of emotional detachment" ofother Buddhist poets in the T'ang dynasty (618-907) (Watson 1992, 36). While
alluring to readers, this emotion provides a dilemma for critics and scholars who
attempt to reconcile Han-shan's expressions with the Zen ideal of non-attachmentthat he is supposed to portray. As Watson explains:
The commentators have been forced to resort to sorne drastic wrenchingin their interpretations of the poems by the fact that Han-shan, though attimes speaking from a pinnacle of calm and enlightenment, just as often
seems to be profoundly involved in the misgivings and anxieties thatenlightenment is supposed to dispel. (Watson 1962, 14)
Watson goes on to explain that commentators often adopt the view that thesuffering expressed by Han-shan is merely a means to sympathize with thesuffering of others in order to effect the Mahayana bodhisattva ideal of
postponing complete enlightenment in order to save aIl sentient beings (aninterpretation we wiIllater see applied to Ryokan).
A man, once enlightened, is expected to stay that way. Zen commentators
have therefore been forced to regard Han-shan's professions of loneliness,doubt, and discouragement not as revelations of his own feelings but asvicarious recitals of the ills of unenlightened men which he can still
sympathize with, though he himself has transcended them. He thus
becomes in effect the traditional bodhisattva figure - compassionate, inthe world, but not ofit. (Watson 1962, 14)
In his introduction to Red Pine's translations of Han-shan, John Blofield
adopts the role of the Eastern Romanticist in providing the stereotypical,
absolutist, and dualistic misinterpretation of Zen. For Blofield, the realization of
the nonduality of self and other results in a "total spontaneity to every situation,"and he argues that both Buddhists and Taoists seek "an identical intuitive
experience that would liberate them forever from the bonds of desire, passion and6ignorance and result in imperturbable and essentially joyous tranquillity" (RedPine 1983,4). He deals with Han-shan's failure to live up to this ideal by seeing
him as a "pellucidly honest person," for whom "there must be times whenmemories ofworldly joys, either experienced or once longed for, temporarily
disturb his serenity" (Blofield's italics, Red Pine 1983, 5). Furthermore, his"occasionallongings for lovely women, and for the fame, honor and material
advantages enjoyed by successful scholars" are "due to the fact that his poems are
not, as far as one can tell, arranged in chronological order" (Red Pine 1983, 5).
While granting that Han-shan is human and not always perfect, enlightenment isstill essentialized and idealized as an absolute experience beyond the world of
passion, and Blofield assumes that if Han-shan's poems were in chronologicalorder, we would see that his desires were eradicated at sorne point.
lnhis translation ofHan-shan's complete works, Robert Henricks does
not blatantly romanticize Zen or Han-shan, but he also holds to the dualistic viewof a delusion-free enlightenment that he imposes on Han-shan in his translation,
as examined in Chapter Four.
Burton Watson would like to present a more realistic view of Han-shan'slife and religious practice: "Personally 1 prefer to read the poems as a chronicle ofspiritual search -rewarded at times by moments of wonderful contentment, but

at other times frustrated by loneliness and despair -rather than as a pat report ofsuccess" (Watson 1970, 14). In this view, however, Watson still maintains theconventional separation between enlightenment and desire and as such,7enlightenment is still defined in transcendent terms of contentment and freedom
from sorrow.
In his dissertation, The Transmission ofBuddhism in the Poetry of Han

Shan, Stephen Ruppenthal explains that Han-shan's expressions of sadness can beconsistent with Buddhism when they arise spontaneously, and he even refers to
the idea that delusive passions are enlightenment. The problem is that Ruppenthal
only does half of the equation. Delusive passions are turned into enlightenment,"as [passions] ofthemselves will vanish whenprajna, or transcendental wisdom,
is illuminated" (Ruppentha127), but there is no recognition that the very notionof "enlightenment" is delusive. Thus, although Ruppenthal claims to adhere tocertain Buddhist expressions of nonduallogic, his argument ends up negating
conventional reality and affirming a separate, transcendental state, where theBuddhist attains "total equanimity," a "higher reality," and a "pure experience
unmediated by the intellect" (Ruppentha13, 37, 58).

Interpretations of Ryokan
Ry6kan's image is more complicated than that of Han-shan. Ryüichi Abé
explains that in Japan, opinion on Ry6kan's significance is split into two
opposing groups: the first sees Ry6kan as a Zen Master and the other as a Zen
failure (Abé and Haskel28). The first group considers Ry6kan as a "religiouscultural hero" and affirms his status as an enlightened master, who is praised forhis disassociation from conventional Buddhist establishments. According toprofessor Hasegawa Y6z6, "It seems apparent to me that Ry6kan did actually8attain enlightenment in part proven by 'his genuine attainment of the samadhi of
blissfulness' and taught Buddhism through his poetry and calligraphy" (quoted in
Abé and Haskel 29). The opposing faction presents Ryokan as a non-religious
poet who failed to attain enlightenment and thus, pursued art instead. They view
him through a Marxist lens in which Ryokan is seen as sympathizing with thesuffering of the common people (Abé and Haskel 30). Ryokan's failure is
exemplified by his expressions ofloneliness, suffering, and poverty, which areuncharacteristic of the stereotypical enlightened Zen master. Kurita Isamu asks,"Can such a heart-devouring loneliness be called a state of enlightenment? ....
What Ryokan expresses in his poems are the ultimate states of the sameagonizing solitude that we experience in our own everyday life" (quoted in Abé
and Haskel 31). This second argument also presupposes a degree ofincompatibility between Buddhism and literary pursuit since participation inartistic activity is seen to coincide with failure at Buddhist practice. 4
Kodama and Yanagishima adopt the typical Zen master view of Ryokan
and consider many of Ryokan's poems to be "expressive ofhis safari (spiritual
awakening or enlightenment)" (Kodama and Yanagishima 43). Theyemphasize
the legendary accounts of his innocent and genuine behavior and argue that "hecould always keep himself standing above the phenomenal-that after all he hadreached this stage must have been due to the genuine safari he had wisely

4 Scholars are also split on whether Kamo no ChOmei is a literary figure or Buddhist, and thisdivision parallels the split between literary scholars, who supported a Shinto-Nationalist ideology,
and Buddhist scholars in the Tokugawa and Meiji periods (Pandey 3-4).

9acquired" (Kodama and Yanagishima 49). Kodama and Yanagishima explain that
Ryôkan was somehow above the passions that he felt:
It mayas weIl be said that his mind had been so much refined andfortified as not to be subdued by the gaunt loneliness of his surroundings
until at last he could sublimate himself and stand above the sentient loveno matter how profoundly he was attracted by natural beauty or humanties. (Kodama and Yanagishima 12)

Although it is unclear what it means to "sublimate" oneself, it is obviously atranscendent ability allowing access to an ultimate state and is associated with therealization of the nonduality ofsubject and object through which Ryôkan "could
sublimate himself into the transphenomenal region" (Kodama and Yanagishima
31).
John Stevens portrays Ryôkan as a genuinely enlightened Zen Master
who exemplifies "the Zen Buddhist idea of attaining enlightenment and thenreturning to the world with 'a serene face and gentle words'" (Stevens 1977, 9).
Stevens sticks to the legendary and over-simplified accounts of Ryôkan who
always acted with perfect behavior: "Even as a child, he never told lies or argued
with other boys" (Stevens 1993, 105). Stevens often conflates the legends of
Ryôkan's compassion for others to a point of absurdity, as in this story:
Ryôkan slept inside a mosquito net, not to prote ct himselfbut to protect
the bugs-be feared he might accidentally kill them in his sleep.
However, he left one leg outside the net so the insects would not gohungry. (Stevens 1993, 119)
Ryokan certainly cared for Însects, but storÎes like these deny Ryokan any

ordinary, self-interested concerns or feelings.
As Ryüchi Abé notes in the introduction to his and Peter Haskel'stranslations, many biographies and legends ofRyôkan's life give an "overly

10

idealized picture of the Master" (Abé xv) and Abé and Haskel aim to provide amore nuanced view ofhis character. Abé and Haskel in their translation wish togobeyond the typical image ofRy5kan often "presented in one-dimensional. terms" and stress that Ry5kan is "above all a cultural hero" (Abé and HaskeI91).
While rejecting the idealized Zen Master image, Abé is also critical of those who
present Ry5kan primarily as a literary figure, and he criticizes Burton Watson for
doing so (Abé and Haskel 27). Unlike the Japanese critics who have seen Ry5kan
primarily as a poet, Abé rightly points out that Ry5kan did not give up on
Buddhism; instead his Buddhist practice and his expression of sorrow continued
simultaneously and reflect an "intertwining" of Ry5kan's poetic and religious life
(Abé and Haskel39). Abé's solution to Ry5kan's expressions offailure is to see
sorrow as figurative and instrumental as a critique of Buddhist institutions andbureaucracy and also as a means to sympathize with and save others from
suffering. But in doing so, Abé denies the literaI interpretation of Ry5kan's
poems and denies significance of sorrow to Ry5kan's own religious insight.
Oddly enough, Abé sees Ry5kan as a cultural hero primarily for Marxist-likeactions of challenging hierarchical authority and sympathizing with the sufferingof the "underprivileged" (Abé and Haskel58). While Ry5kan is critical of
Buddhists ofhis day, Ry5kan does not express any particular allegiance to theunderprivileged. The hardship ofhis own poverty may very well subtly critique
Buddhists living in comfort, but he is more concemed with the selfish strivings ofaIl individuals, not with a transformation of poverty and despair. Abé's arguments
will be examined again in Chapter Four.

11

Yuasa Nobuyuki argues against Ryokan's characterization as unusual andeccentric and instead emphasizes his realization ofhis ordinary nature and his
expression of a "profound humanity" (Yuasa 21): "Ryokan's greatness depends
not so much on his unusualness as on his deep understanding of himself and of
the world around him" (Yuasa 3). It is Ryokan's expressions of ordinary
humanity and emotion that 1 wish to explore and clarify in their connection with
the ideals of Zen Buddhism.

Transcendence and Non-transcendence
There is an inherent problem with the notion of transcendence in Zen
Buddhism. Zen is based on a philosophy of nonduality derived from Mahayana
Buddhist thought in which the ultimate and conventional are identified. Thus,
there can be no ultimate world, experience, or knowledge separate from theconventional world; there can be neither an ultimate state to transcend to nor aconventional world to transcendfrom. Furthermore, Zen is based in the Buddhist
notion that there is no self: there is no independent, permanent self essence forany being or thing, or expressed in nondual terms: there is no fundamental
difference between subject and object, self and other. Therefore, there is no
independent self to transcend the world, and there is no world that exists apartfrom the self.
There is, on the other hand, transcendence of the duality between self andother and of the reification of independent, permanent self-essences. Since noself, impermanence, and nonduality characterize the conventional, immanent

12

world, this transcendence is best described as a non-transcendence, or "transdescendence," to use the term of20th C. Japanese philosopher, Nishitani Keiji(Nishitani 171). Instead of transcendence from the world, it is a transcendence
that realizes the inherent nature of the world. Non-transcendence is a standpoint
different from those oftranscendence and immanence as it rejects both theultimate state of transcendence and the reification of the immanent world aspermanent and substantial.
Non-transcendence is found in the third stage of the three-part logic of
nonduality that proceeds from: 1. duality, 2. to nonduality, 3. then to thenonduality of duality and nonduality, in which duality is reaffirmed (Hori 2000,
300-301). First, the ordinary world is accepted as substantial and bothphenomenal objects and words are reified as independent entities. This is thestage of dualistic thought, pursuit of desire, and attachment to the immanent
world. In the second stage, one rejects the dualistic nature of reality andsubscribes to a nondual metaphysics. At this stage, one rejects language andpursues a transcendence and detachment from the illusory world. In the final
stage, one realizes that this second stage is still stuck in the dualistic thinking of
the first with only the polarity reversed in a mirror-like reflection of conventional
thinking. At the second stage, there still remains attachment to the linguistic
distinctions between conventional and ultimate, immanent and transcendent,
linguistic and non-linguistic, duality and nonduality. At the third stage, theconventional and ultimate cannot be different. This is neither a transcendence
from nor an attachment to the immanent world; it is a simultaneous

13

transcendence from the world and descendence to the world. One returns to theworld and language but without the attachment to the duality of language that isfound in the first two stages.
The importance of language in this logic is evident, and a nontranscendent view of "beyond words" will be explored in the discussion of
poetry. We will also see how this dialectic can function in the process ofreclusion.

Structure of the Thesis
This work will discuss the following problems in the context of Hanshan's and Ry6kan's poetry: 1. Poetry: the tension between poetry as a worldly
activity involving dualistic language and the transcendence of words and social
engagement, 2. Reclusion: the problem of worldly withdrawal creating an
attachment to the solitude and purity of nature and thus, establishing a duality
between nature and society, 3. Transcendence: the tension between theexpression of ordinary emotion and the Buddhist ideal of enlightenmenttranscending passions and suffering.
Chapter Two will survey how the tension between poetry and Buddhist
practice, in terms ofboth worldly involvement and use of language, has surfaced
and has been dealt with in various contexts. This will not only provide insight
into the possible relationships between poetry and Buddhism but will also
provide hermeneutical tools for examining Han-shan's and Ry6kan's poetry; theseinclude the functional model of language and a nondual interpretation of14

symbolism. Han-shan's and Ryôkan's own poetic practices and views onliterature and language will be examined. 1 will argue that poetry is a ground for
non-transcendence and that Han-shan's and Ryôkan's poetry ultimately support a
non-transcendent view of language, which is expressed in the logic andphilosophy of their poetry itself and which is consistent with the logic of the Zen
Buddhist tradition. Poetry is a ground for re-entering the world and re-emerging
within the realm of duality without attachment to either worldly gain or otherworldly transcendence.
Chapter Three will discuss the duality between reclusion and public
service, or nature and society in contrast to nondual philosophy. This chapter willsurvey the traditional modes ofreclusion within Chine se and Japanese societies
and identify Han-shan's and Ryôkan's place within them. We will see how
reclusion itself is a social and political act and that the practice of reclusion for
Han-shan and Ryôkan is a way to engage with and challenge the conventions ofsociety. Furthermore, Han-shan and Ryôkan provide a nondual view of the purity
ofreclusion that is not fundamentally different from society.
ln Chapter Four, 1 will analyze Han-shan's and Ryôkan's understanding of
the ideals of Zen and show how their expressions of sorrow, suffering, and failure
relate to this ideal. Their understanding ofbuddha-nature and enlightenment
relies on a non-transcendent and nondual realization oftheir ordinary, humannature. 1 intend to show that their selflessness is realized in a non-transcendent
behavior which is not attached to the notion of a separate self and whichtranscends selfish grasping for other-worldly transcendence. Using the functional

15

theory of language, 1 will illustrate how their expressions of failure to reach a
non-attached ideal actualize the notion of no self.

Hermeneutical Problems
The mysterious nature of the poet Han-shan provides a number ofinterpretive difficulties as it is uncertain who he was, when he lived, and whatreligion he practiced. As the Preface by Lü-ch'iu Yin to his poems begins: "No
one knowsjust what sort ofman Han-shan was" (Snyder 1966, 32). After aIl, thename Han-shan itself literally means "Cold Mountain" and refers to the place
where the author supposedly lived; this place is more certain than the author andperson that Cold Mountain refers to. Conflicting evidence for the date ofhis
poems suggests that they were probably written by more than one pers on.
According to E.G. Pulleyblank, Han-shan's dates are traditionally said to be
between the end of the 6th C. to the middle of the 9th ; Burton Watson, Arthur
Waley, and Iriya Yoshitaka put him in the late 8th to early 9th centuries(Pulleyblank 163). Pulleyblank has attempted to determine Han-shan's dates
through evidence provided by the use of rhyming patterns in his poetry and has
split the poems into those by Han-shan 1 (who is placed in the early T'ang
dynasty) and Han-shan II (who is placed in the late T'ang dynasty) in order to"separate the work of the original poet from the later accretions" (Pulleyblank
165).
The uncertainty of Han-shan's identity problematizes the linguistic theory
that this thesis partly relies upon, namely, the expressive-affective theory of16

language, which is based on the ability to know the poet's heart/mind from hiswords. l have chosen to treat Han-shan's poems as expressions of a particular
attitude and philosophical world-view that has remained popular in the Zen
tradition. Besides, the name Han-shan or Cold Mountain is often considered bymany translators to be primarily representative of a state of mind. At the sametime, as Pulleyblank suggests by his intention to discover the original poet, there
does seem to have been a single author responsible for much of the work, andthese Han-shan l poems have been more attractive to translators. l concur with
the impression of Burton Watson that although sorne ofhis poems were later
additions, "a large part ofthem appears to be by one man, a gentleman farmer,
troubled by poverty and family discord, who, after extensive wandering andperhaps a career as a minor official, retired to a place called Cold Mountainamong the T'ien-t'ai range" (Watson 1962, 9). l have therefore noted where lhave included poems attributed by Pulleyblank to Han-shan II.
There is also disagreement on Han-shan's religion, often considered to beeither Taoist or Buddhist. Although most scholars highlight his affiliation with
Zen, others see him as more of a Taoist, as does John Blofield, who writes: "To
my mind, Cold Mountain owed more to Taoism than to Buddhism, so complete
was his unconventionality and so profound his empathy with nature" (Red Pine
1983,5). Fortunately, Robert Henricks has made a complete, annotatedtranslation of Han-shan's poetry and has noted his references to Buddhism,
Taoism, and Confucianism. According to Henrick's findings and his own
opinion, Han-shan's poems are primarily Buddhist in their themes, images, and17

terminology and express a particular emphasis on Zen (Henricks Il). The factthat Han-shan's poems also contain Taoist and Confucian themes should not be
surprising as Zen itself is a syncretic mix of Mahayana Buddhism, Taoism, andConfucianism. Ryokan too, like any educated person in China or Japan, studied
Confucian and Taoist texts and as weIl, incorporates themes from other Buddhist
sects, especially the Pure Land school; nevertheless, he received his training in
the Soto school of Zen. In the case of Han-shan, it is still difficult to prove that heis a Zen Buddhist, and as Nishitani Keiji has suggested, "If there is a touch of
Zen in the genuine Hanshan, it is not because he was a follower of thatmovement" (quoted by T.H. Barrett in Hobson 136). There may be moreevidence for Han-shan's affiliation with Zen than Nishitani acknowledges;
nevertheless, 1 do not aim to establish Han-shan as distinctly a Zen Buddhist.
Rather, 1 would like to again stress the fact that he was and remains influential to
the Zen tradition and illustrates aspects of the Zen ideal for practitioners like
Ryokan, who expresses his indebtedness to Han-shan in his poetry, and thefamous Zen Master Hakuin, who wrote a detailed commentary on Han-shan's
poems.

18

ChapterTwo
Poetry: The World and its Words

Introduction
The act of writing poetry poses a serious dilemma to Buddhist literati.
First, writing poetry is an act of worldly involvement generally performed bymembers of the aristocracy. In Chinese and Japanese society the locus ofpoetic
activity was the court; poetry was most often written by and for gov€rnment
officiaIs or elite members of the political hierarchy. Poetry often contained apolitical message and also served as a political act in itself. The writing of poetry
also involved the potential manifestation of worldly attachments that would
considerably conflict with the Buddhist ideal of non-attachment. The pursuit ofliterary success, necessary for a Confucian official establishing himself in thepolitical hierarchy, would encourage egotistical desires ofworldly wealth andfame and attachment to the pleasures of literary life and practice. In addition,
poetic themes often explore emotions usually seen to be delusive by Buddhism.
The second major problem with poetry is the use of language itself. Thisis especially problematic for the Zen sect, which emphasizes a direct experiencethrough meditation that is "beyond words." The First Patriarch of Zen,
Bodhidharma, laid down the foundations of Zen with a verse, claiming that Zen
is "A separate transmission outside doctrine, Not founded on words or letters"(Hori 2003,643). Since Zen is rooted in the Mahayâna logic ofnonduality andsince language is based on dualities (i.e. the distinctions made with words),19

language is thus seen as obscuring the nondual nature ofreality.Therefore, Zen
often prefers silence to speech and traces its lineage from the silent transmission
from Sakyamuni Buddha to Mahakasyapa; when Buddha raised a flower in frontof his disciples, only Mahakasyapa smiled and understood, the classic example of"mind-to-mind transmission" in Zen. The most striking example of linguistic
inadequacy is the "thunderous silence" ofVimalakïrti. In the Vimalakfrti Sütra, anumber of bodhisattvas are asked to clarify the nature of nonduality and theyeach elaborate on an instance ofnonduality. When Vimalakïrti is asked to givehis explanation, however, he remains silent, and he is praised for his wise answer,
which avoided the use of dualistic words as used by the previous commentators. 5
Besides the dualities inherent in words, language also presupposes a duality
between subject and object, since linguistic statements are formed anddetermined from a subjective perspective in response to objective phenomena, acondition that hinders the realization of no self, the nonduality of subject andobject, fundamental to Zen practice.

Poetry as a Practice and the Problem of Linguistic Inadequacy

Poets and Buddhists in China and later Japan were weIl aware oftheselinguistic issues, and sorne Buddhist-influenced poets decided that poetry andBuddhism were incompatible and gave up writing poetry -at least temporarily.

5 It should be noted, however, that the Vimalakïrti Sütra itself should not be seen merely as an

advocate of silence and linguistic inadequacy. In another chapter, when the dupe of the sütra,Sariputra, remains silent, he is chastised for being attached to silence and not having true insight.

20

Nevertheless, many Buddhists and Buddhist-influenced poets continued to pursue
poetic activities, although this was done with hesitation and great effort wasmade to justify engagement in literary arts as a Buddhist.
At the forefront of the attempt to reconcile poetic and Buddhist practices
was the T'ang poet, Po Chü-i (772-846), whose views on poetry laid thefoundation for the justification of poetry as a Buddhist practice, although this was
not his intention. Although there were other poets from within Buddhism who
wrote religious poetry and other poets who made reference to Buddhism or were
Buddhists themselves, Po Chü-i may be considered the first poet in the secular
poetry tradition in China to write "true religious and devotional poetry" as a
Buddhist (Watson 1988a, 1). Po Chü,;.i, like most poets of the T'ang, was active in
the imperial government and wrote poems as a government official, most often asa means for political critique and social commentary. Since, in the T'ang, poetry
was used to examine potential candidates for positions in the Confucian
meritocracy, Po studied and wrote poetry in order to succeed in the Confucian
examinations and establish himselfin office. Privately, Po also studied Taoist
Texts and Buddhist Sütras (Waley 1949, 74); eventually, he became involved
with China's "Southem School" ofCh'an Buddhism and was instructed by Weik'uan (755-817) a disciple of the famous Ch'an master Ma-tsu (d. 788) (Waley
1949,99). Po practiced meditation, befriended monks, and visited Ch'an temples.
At least in his early years, Po idealized Zen as a way oftranscending,conventional human emotions and the bonds of human relationships. Therefore,
he was concemed with his attachment to words and poetry and viewed it as an

21

addiction similar to his love of wine. Later, Po managed to control his intake ofwine: "But the Karma ofWords still remains; he has not abandoned verse"(Waley 1949,207). Elsewhere, Po describes "the devil ofpoetry" that disrupts
the stillness of his mind. Po reflects his concem about literary attachment in a
passage that became the centerpiece for the rationalization of poetic activity
among Buddhists. Po sent a copy of his poems to be housed in a library of a
Buddhist temple, but concemed about the appropriateness of his secular verses ina Buddhist collection, he wrote this note to accompany them:
These worldly literary labors of my present existence, thesetransgressions of wild words and fancy phrases, may be transformed into
causes that will bring praise to the Buddha's doctrine in age after age tocome, into forces that will tum the Wheel of the Law. (Watson 1988b,
115)
Later, sending a copy of poems to another Buddhist library, he included "hisconstant prayer that in a future incarnation his poems might be 'rebom' as hymns
ofpraise" (Waley 1949, 200).6
Although it is doubtful that Po would have intended to make such an
impact, Po's statements on the relationship between poetry and Buddhism also
became extremely influential in Japan as the Japanese sought a way to rationalize
involvement in poetry within the context of Buddhist ideas. The Japanese did nothave a literary tradition before the introduction of Buddhism; both Buddhism anda system of writing were imported simultaneously from China, and thus,-6 Po used the term k'uang-yen iyu, "wild words and fancy phrases," to apologize for his

miscellaneous verse, which became more popular than his other works that he valued more. Hispolitical works did not need apology because oftheir conformity to Confucian values in whichpoetry functioned to establish morality and criticize social evils (Pandey 14-15; Waley 1949, 111113).

22

Buddhist ideas immediately began to shape Japanese literary aesthetics (Pandey
1). The Japanese soon became self-conscious of the tension between literary
activityas a "fundamentally worldly pursuit" and the "goals of detachment andrenunciation" central to Buddhist practice; the debate itselfbecame a "wellestablished literary trope" (Pandey 1,3). Rajyashree Pandey argues that Po
simultaneously expresses the conflict between Buddhism and literary practices
and their potential reconciliation:
His phrase k'uangyen iyu (wild words and fancy phrases), which wasrendered as kyogen kigo or kyogen kigyo in Japanese, became a popular
catchphrase in the Heian and Kamakura periods, encompassing both acensure of creative writing on religious grounds and, paradoxically, ajustification of it that was also based on Buddhist doctrine. The phrase
provided one way to articulate and resolve the tension between an
engagement with "words" and a commitment to the ideals of Buddhism.
(Pandey 9)7
Although "wild words" (kyogen) and "fancy diction" (kigo) are two of the four
Buddhist "Sins of the Mouth," along with "slander" and "hypocrisy," and refer to"non-religious poems" or "any literature that exists for the sake of art," theseterms were also used to rationalize literary activity (Pollack 53). As suggested by
the definition of kyogen kigo, provided by Pollack, these terms did not criticize
writing itself, only writing that was not Buddhist or written merely for the sake ofeloquence and literary merit. Certainly room is made for the role of language inthe Buddhist context and could be justified as skillful means, Le. conventional
me ans to teach the ultimate, the Dharma. Pandey notes that the Lotus Sütra

Interestingly, the expression "wild words and fancy phrases" has now made it into Western
literature. Gary Snyder, the American poet who studied Zen in Japan and translated Han-shan,cites PO'S famous expression, concerning the transformation ofhis poems into Buddhist teachings,
at the end ofhis epic work of Buddhist influenced poetry, Mountains and Rivers Without End,
with the wish, "May it be so!"7

23

condemns writings that go against Buddhist practice but "endorses writing thatpraises the Buddhist dharma" (Pandey Il). Thus, the writing of poetry could bevalidated if it functioned as a Buddhist teaching and did not indulge in literary
extravagance.
The use of skillful means to teach the Dharma is supported in the
Mahayana philosophy ofNagârjuna, who argues and demonstrates that although
no thesis or statement about ultimate reality can be established without leading tocontradiction, nevertheless, the ultimate cannot be taught without relying on theconventional world:
Without a foundation in the conventional truth,
The significance of the ultimate cannot be taught. (Garfield 68)
Pandey notes that even the paradigmatic examples of linguistic inadequacy in the
Buddhist tradîtion, Vimalakïrti 's "thunderous silence" and Sakyamuni's silent
transmission to Mahakasyapa are known and taught through language (Pandey
10). Po chü-i himself commented humorously on the paradox of linguistic
inadequacy found in the Tao Te Ching, or Lao Tzu (often referred to as the "FiveThousand Words"), in his poem, "On Reading Lao Tzu":"One who speaks does not know: one who knows is silent":
This remark 1 have heard from the Old Master.
If you say the Old Master was one who knew,
Wherefore did he himselfwrite his "Five Thousand Words"?
(Liu 1988, 7)
Nevertheless, the use of poetry could be justified as an expedient andconventional means to teach the Dharma. Po himself never makes the claim thathis poems teach the ultimate, however, only his wish for them to do so.

24

In Japan, Kyagen kigo was joined by other expressions such as: shaji soku
nehan (samsara is nirvana), bonna soku bodai (delusion itselfis enlightenment),and hab en (expedient means) (Pandey 6,38). Those who claimed that theconventional and the ultimate are identical accepted the idea that the use of words
or language could not be avoided and that conventionallanguage could be ameans of serving the Dharma. Furthermore, if nirvana (the cessation of suffering)is identical with samsara (the world of cyclic existence marked by suffering) andenlightenment is no different from delusion, then engagement with language andworldly activities could not be separate from the ultimate and enlightenment.
There is even the suggestion that there can be no distinction between secular andsacred writing. Because of the nonduality ofsacred and secular, the Japanesepoet Shunzei (1114-1204) argued: "Secular verse must be a Buddhist activity"(LaFleur 1983,91). These arguments, however, do not clarify the function orsignificance of language and writing in Buddhism, nor do they clarify the natureor meaning of Buddhist practice. Any activity, including behavior usuallyconsidered to be unethical, could be defined as Buddhist in this manner, and thisdoes not seem to be the conclusion that Buddhism wants to advocate or the pointof Buddhist practice. N evertheless, since the ultimate is not separate fromconventional, secular activities, poetry could theoretically be a medium to realize
the Dharma.
There is also the idea that poetry itself must be fundamentally empty andidentical with Buddha and buddha-nature. According to Zen master Daitô (12821337): "Even in ordinary conversation ... an awakened person speaks in the25voice of the Dhanna" (Kraft 167). Even if the conceptual content or viewpoint of
the speaker is dualistic, the nature of the words and language does not contain apermanent essence. The manifestation of emptiness through language ishighlighted by Zen Master Dôgen (1200-1253).8 This theme is mirrored by
Dôgen's poem entitled, "No reliance on words or letters," a clear reference toBodhidhanna's verse:
Not limited
By language,
It is ceaselessly expressed;
So, too, the way of letters
Can display but not exhaust it. (Heine 103)
Language is connected to impermanence as weIl. In one of Dôgen's poems heplays on the fact that the character for word in Japanese (kotoba) contains thecharacter for leaf (ba), and suggests that his "petais of words" will blow away
(Heine 107). The Japanese poets of the Gozan period also interchange the imagesof "crows" and "spattered ink" that turn into "lines of poetry" and blur the
distinction between the 'real' object in nature and the 'imagined' object in poetryor painting (pollack 87, 129); thus, poetry and literature are presented as naturalactivities.
Although outside the realm ofpoetry, chanting is another area of
language that Buddhists promoted through ritual use. The Japanese advocate of
Esoteric Buddhism, Kükai (779-835), established a theory of language in which
mantra, the empowered phrases repeated in chanting, would reveal aIl of

8 Dôgen was an important influence on Ryôkan, not only as founder ofSôtô school in Japan, butalso through his writings and collection ofpoetry (See Heine "Appendix C: Dôgen's influence on
Ryôkan" 155-159).

26

language to be the speech of the Buddha. In Kükai's theory, not only is all
language a manifestation of the Dharmakaya, the absolute body of the Buddhathat comprises the whole universe, but the entire universe itself is a sutra that iscontinuously expounding the Dharma; every phenomenal object is a letter thatreveals its own emptiness if read with true insight. Through the chanting ofmantra, "the practitioners realize that they, too, are signs of scripture, whichconstitute the 'body oftext'" (Abé 1999,303). The distinguishing feature ofmantra compared to ordinary language is its ability to both embody and point to
the emptiness of allianguage; extending this the ory to the realm of poetry, we
could see that if poetry could effect an awareness of emptiness, it would have arole in Buddhist practice.
The view that poetry and language are also manifestations of emptinessprovides a place for language that is often denied in Buddhist thought. However,it does not give any special significance to the practice of poetry itself or expIain
exactly how poetic practice can coincide with a philosophy of non-attachment
and direct experience beyond words. A stronger rationale for the use of poetry asa Buddhist practice came about from the association of the traditional Japanesepoetic form, waka, with the ideal ofmichi (from the character for tao in Chinese,
which is also do in Japanese, meaning "the way") developed in the 12th C(Pandey 37). Michi involves a single-minded dedication to any discipline and1,"eflects the concentration demanded by Buddhist meditation practice. Michi ispursued in "the belief that total dedication to a particular pursuit would lead tothe intuitive understanding of a universal truth" (Pandey 37). The ideal is based27

on the premise that any object or activity is fundamentally empty and thus,
identical with the ultimate nature ofreality. Realizing emptiness in any activity orobject is the realization of the emptiness of aIl objects and activities. AH michi's
are valued equaIly, but to be defined as michi, they must involve a realization of
emptiness: "Unless universal truth is ultimately attained through concentrated
specialization in a given art, it is not a true michi" (Konishi 1985, 184).
Buddhist priests, like Mujü Ichien (1226-1312) defended waka as areligious practice and argued that instead of the attachments involved inconventionalliterary pursuit, Buddhist-inspired poetry could create an attitude ofnon-attachment to worldly objects and worldly activities (Pandey 45). Mujü
suggests that the attention drawn to impermanence through the practice of writing
or reading waka would weaken one's attachments to the phenomenal world andhuman ambition for wealth and fame. He distinguishes, however, between
writing that falls under the category of kyogen kigo and poetry that serves as ame ans to the comprehension of Buddhism and the act of non-attachment toworldly goals. Thus, waka could be a medium for the realization of theimpermanence and emptiness ofreality. Although the Japanese and Chinese
traditionally turned their attention to the ever changing nature of things, from aWestern perspective there does not appear to be an explicit or inevitableconnection between poetry and impermanence.
The Buddhist aesthete-rec1use Kamo no Ch6mei (1153?-1216?) used theideal of suki, "the single-minded pursuit of one artistic practice, a devotion to amichi" (Pandey 39) to link and reconcile the opposing notions of attachment and28detachment. "In Ch6mei's writings, suki becomes the linchpin that holds together
two potentially contradictory impulses, namely, the urge to write, which implies
an engagement with and an attachment to the world, and the imperative toabandon literary endeavor and to attain detachment from the world" (Pandey 82).
Attachment is central to the cultivation of poetry as a ground for single-minded
devotion. Devotion in this sense involves a complete reversaI of attachment. As
Pandey explains, Ch6mei sees the "unique place of suki in the attainment ofenlightenment. It is striking that extreme attachment to the arts ... is not viewed
in those terms but is seen rather as a measure of otherworldliness. Attachment insuch instances is turned on its head and redefined as total detachment" (Pandey
134).
The problem with Ch6mei's ideal is its continuaI attachment to atranscendental, other-worldly state, described by Pandey as "the state of purity
and detachment upon which Buddhist salvation is dependent" (Pandey 7). Sukicontains a desire to separate oneself from worldly passions and ordinary life, andthis separation suggests egotistical desire and the notion of an individual self. In
Ch6mei's ideal the ultimate and conventional, worldly and other-worldly remain
fundamentally distinct. Even though attachment is included in the means, theideal is still a total detachment independent from the world and still retains an
attachment to non-attachment itself. However, at the end ofhis Hojoki, Ch6mei
admits his failure to attain salvation and non-attachment, and this failure may
imply "that aesthetic practices belong to the realm of deluded attachment andthus impede a true immersion in the way of the Buddha" (Pandey 171).

29

Nevertheless, Ch5mei's failure to attain this Ideal is more appropriate as an
expression of selflessness, which is seen in his concession of his inability totranscend the world and represents his return to the world. This is a nontranscendent view which maintains that an ultimate cannot be attained (at least by
Ch5mei himself) outside of the conventional world, and it is a concession ofcontinuaI attachments and delusion, not the justification of attachments as
detachment. In any case, we are stillleft with the Interpretation of language andliterature as delusive attachment.
These justifications and rationales for poetry still do not say much about
the significance of poetry itself. The nonduality of conventional and ultimate,delusion and enlightenment could be used to justify any practice and says nothing
particular about poetry. In the same way, the Ideals of suki or michi placeemphasis on the importance of selfless devotion but a coherent reason for the
primacy of poetry as the object of this dedication is barely developed. There are acouple of strong claims made for the uniqueness of poetry, but the logic behindthose daims is not analyzed or explained. Kyogen kigo, on the other hand,suggests a justification specified to literary practice itself as potential means for
Buddhist teachings, but it does not imply any Inherent qualities of poetry thatwould imply its effectiveness or importance in this role but rather maintains thenotion oflinguistic inadequacy. A step further can be taken to examine the views
oflinguistic adequacy underlying the practices ofChinese and Japanese poetics
that may suggest grounds for the significance of poetry itself in Buddhist
practice.

30

Models of Linguistic Adequacy

Poetry often takes a privileged place in the Buddhist tradition and East
Asian culture in general; thus, one would expect an idea of linguistic adequacy
underlying literary activities. In Zen, Bodhidharma's founding statement that Zen
is "not dependent on words and letters" is itself expressed in verse. Often poetry
is means to transmit, certify, or manifest the enlightened mind. According to
Pollack, "Most early Zen masters believed that while no amount of talent for
poetry would help make one a better Zen monk, advancement in Zen practicewould reveal itself immediately in one's poetry. Thus developed the tradition ofwriting a poem to demonstrate one's enlightenment" (Pollack 12). In The Sixth
Patriarch Sütra, insight into the Dharma is tested and transmission is given

through means of a poetry contest in which the illiterate Hui-neng becomes the
Sixth Patriarch. This may not be "secular" poetry, but the lines between the twoare certainly ambiguous, and Zen has paid great attention to secular poets such as
the great Chinese writers of the T'ang dynasty. In the Zen k6an tradition, Zenmonks are expected to use capping phrases, drawn from various sources
including T'ang poetry and the classics of Chinese literature, to demonstrate andperhaps add further insight into their penetration of the k6an. While earlier poetsin the Gozan period privileged Zen practice over poetry, poetry and Zen wereeven equated by Gozan period poet K6zei Ryiiha (1375-1446) who claimed:"There is no Zen outside ofpoetry, and no poetry outside of Zen" (Pollack 155156). Of course, there was still criticism from Chinese and Japanese Zen masters,
sometimes those who wrote poetry themselves like Mus6 Soseki (1275-1351)

31

and D6gen, who discouraged Buddhist practitioners from literary pursuits thatwould distract from meditation practice and induce emotional attachment(Watson 1988b, 116; Heine 17).
The rationale for the use of poetry in Zen may be traced back toparadigms of linguistic adequacy that focus on the functional aspect of language.
After aH, language is rejected as inadequate primarily in terms of its descriptive
qualities that set up false dualities between an object and its environment andimpose conceptual content on the "thing itself." The primary source for afunctional theory of language is the expressive-affective model found in the
Great Preface of the Book ofSongs, one of the Confucian dassics, which daims
that poetry reveals the intention of the heart or mind of the author. According to
the Great Preface, "Poetry is ... the manifestation of intent. In the heart it isintent; sent forth as speech it is poetry" (Saussy 77). This theory is elaborated
into a series of movements from feeling to speech to music:
Feeling is moved inwardly and takes form in speech. It is not enough to
speak, so one sighs [the words]; it is not enough to sigh, so one draws
them out and sings them; it is not enough to draw them out and sing them,so without one's willing it, one's hands dance and one's feet stamp.
(Saussy 77)
There is a performative aspect involved here in which the author is not merely
describing his heart/mind but presenting his heart/mind itself through words.
These ideas led to a theory of reading in which one could trace back the words ofthe poet to the original feeling:
In the case of composing literature, the emotions are stirred and the words
come forth; but in the case of reading, one opens the literary text andenters the emotions [of the writer], goes up against the waves to find thesource; and though it be [at first] hidden, it will certainly become32manifest. None may see the actual faces of a faraway age, but by viewing
their writing, one may immediately see their hearts/minds. (Wen-hsintiao-lung trans. by Owen 59)
Thus, the project of reading for the Chinese was directed to the knowledge of the
poet's genuine feelings and mind (Owen 62). Po Chü-i rumse1fwas inspired bythis theory of reading:W ord is the sprout from intent;
Acts are writing's root;
Thus as 1 read your poems,
1 know the man you are. (Owen 108)
The the ory that poetry can reveal the mind of the poet underlies the use of poetryin Confucian official examinations (Owen 77) and, according to Hori, even the
Zen idea of "mind-to-mind transmission," the wordless transmission advocatedby Bodhidharma and illustrated by Mahakasyapa (Hori 2003, 56-61).
Although the Japanese were not as concemed with the use ofpoetry to
determine moral character, they were influenced by the theory of poetics
developed in The Book ofSongs, and they began to develop an expressive theoryof poetics of their own (Ueda 2, 22). In the preface of the
Kokinshü (or Kokin,"

Waka Shü, 905 C.E.), the first collection of Japanese waka in Japanese script
rather than Chinese characters, one of the compilers, Ki no Tsurayuki, wrote thefollowing in rus famous preface:
The poetry of Japan has its seed in the human heart [kokoro] andflourishes in a myriad of leaves of words [koto no ha]. Human beings are
creatures of many experiences, many deeds; it is in poetry that they give
expression to the meditations of the heart in terms of what they see andhear. Hearing the warbler sing among the blossoms, or the frog in rus
fresh waters, is there any living being not given to song? (quoted in
Pandey 24)

33

As Ueda notes, the two fundamental criteria established in Tsurayuki's preface
are the "spontaneity ofpoetic expression and the genuineness of the poet's
emotion" (Ueda 6). Therefore, assuming that the poem succeeds in presenting thesincere feelings of the poet, this is also a case where the reader should be able toknow the poet through the poem.
There is one catch in the expressive-affective model of linguistic
adequacy as developed in the Great Preface that could prevent a complete theory
for the superiority of poetry as a medium of expression. This is the fact thatmusic has been privileged as the expressive ideal and poetry is sometimes held tobe subordinate because of the distortion created by the division between theword, its object, and its meaning. 9 Regardless ofwhether poetry or music is theideal form of expression, poetry do es not hold exclusive reign over the expressivearts. Nevertheless, Buddhists often preferred the medium of poetry; therefore, anadditional step can be taken to account for the adequacy of poetry itself, and thisadequacy must be found in poetry's unique qualities in terms of language andfigurative techniques. It appears that, like the image of the pure lotus emerging
from the filthy mud, poetry must be significant to Zen Buddhism not in spite ofbut because ofthe fact that it uses dualistic language that assumes a division ofsubject and object and contains metaphors and symbols that divide conventional
and ultimate meaning. Because of these characteristics, poetry becomes a

9 Saussy explains: "Music was, for the ancients, the model of adequacy and self-sufficiency inworks of art, but it is in the nature of the linguistic sign not to be self-sufficient. The very fact that
poems have a content separable ... from their fonn caUs into question the validity of the analogy
with music" (Saussy 98). The priority of music was later turned over to poetry: "Therefore forpinpointing success and failure, for stimulating heaven and earth, for moving ghosts and spirits,
nothing is equal to poetry" (Great Preface quoted by Saussy 78).

34

principal medium to express the nonduality of speech and silence, ultimate andconventional, self and no self, enlightenment and delusion, and even the
nonduality of duality and nonduality. After all, as Paula Varsano comments, "Thehistory of Chinese poetry is driven in part by the development of strategies toovercome the paradox of using words to convey the inexpressible" (Varsano

43).10Poetry captures the rational language of prose along with the expressive
emotion of music and is significant for both its descriptive and performative
levels of meaning. What language describes and signifies literally can often exist
in contradiction to the performative function of a statement's expression. A
typical example for the performative theory of language is: Question: "What isthe difference between ignorance and apathy?" Response: "1 don't know and 1
don't care" (adapted from Hori 2000, 305). Taken literally, the response refuses
to answer the question and provide a descriptive definition, but performatively,
the answer itselfis a concrete example of ignorance and apathy. This is theperformative aspect of the functional theory of language, and its often
paradoxical relationship with descriptive meaning will be shown to operate in
Han-shan's and Ry6kan's poetry, particularly in their expressions ofsorrow.
According to both Pauline Yu and Stephen Owen, central to theexpressive-affective model is the interpretation ofpoetry as historical non-fiction.
Yu explains that the reason for the non-fictive method ofinterpretation is the

10 In Language Paradox Poetics, James Liu traces the formation of Chinese poetics around an
inherent paradox oflanguage, woven through Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism, in which
words are used to claim the fundamental ineffability ofreality (Liu 1988).

35

Chine se "non-dualist cosmology" (Yu 159). Metaphorical and symbolic
interpretations are not suitable because they are "predicated on a fundamental
ontological dualism" that separates the ultimate, transcendent realm from theconventional, historical world (Yu 5). In contrast with Eastern poetic modes,"Western allegory creates a hierarchicalliterary universe oftwo levels, each ofwhich maintains its own coherence, but only one of which has ultimate primacy"(Yu 21). According to Yu, the expressive-affective mode1 is contingent upon a"monistic view of the universe," which places emphasis and attention on theimmanent world rather than a transcendent reality (Yu 32).
According to Owen, in contrast to the Western literary tradition, theChinese generally assume that poetry is not metaphorical, and images are onlyinterpreted metaphorically by the reader if the image has an establishedmetaphorical meaning (Owen 57). After all, established metaphors are common
in Zen writings, and Han-shan and Ryokan use them extensively. Owen does
recognize that metaphors do occur in Chinese poetry but claims that themetaphorical or symbolic meaning is not held to be superior to the conventional,
literaI meaning of the words and the concrete images of the poem (Owen 292293).
While it is true that there can fundamentally be no hierarchy between
conventional and ultimate meanings that are found in the metaphors andsymbolism of Zen poetry, it does not follow that a distinction between
conventional and ultimate meaning cannot be made. Symbols of emptiness andenlightenment (as well as many other themes) pervade Zen literature, including36

the poems of Han-shan and Ryokan. Presenting the division between
conventional and ultimate meaning seems to be precisely the point of using animage such as "the moon" to represent "enlightenment." However, it is within
this duality of conventional and ultimate that the strict distinction between themcan be broken in order to realize that the moon do es not exist apart fromenlightenment and enlightenment do es not exist apart from the moon. Or as theHeart Sütra says, "Form itself is emptiness and emptiness itself is form" (Hori2003,660).
William LaFleur provides an altemate reading of symbolism in the
Mahliyiina Buddhist tradition. He notes the contradiction that Mahliyiina
Buddhism "pursued, on the one hand, the elaboration of an extensive system of
Buddhist symbols, and, on the other, the subjection of the entire symbolization
process to a radical critique that was itself grounded in Mahliyana Buddhist
thought" (LaFleur 1983, 20). LaFleur sees a process in the use of imagery andmetaphor in language in which the reader is ultimately led back to the concrete
and immanent from the abstract and symbolic -a process parallel to the Tendai

Buddhist concept ofjukü-nyüke, "leaving the empty and entering into theprovisional" (LaFleur 1983, 96). LaFleur concludes: "Poetic depth involves morethan the use of symbolism; it is not as much a move away from surfaces to seek
inner essences and meanings as a move away from such inner 'meanings' toreaffirm the reality of the so-called surface" (LaFleur 1983,96). LaFleur argues
that the symbolic or metaphorical use of an image to point beyond itself does not
require "negating the physical and phenomenal world;" instead the image "is37

itselfboth the symbol and the symbolized" (LaFleur 1989,203). Here we have areturn from the ultimate back to the conventional at which point the ultimate andconventional are no longer fundamentally different.
The use of symbolism arises with the absence of religious terminology inZen. Watson notes that one of the distinguishing characteristics of Zen as a formof Mahayana Buddhism is "the demand that the student view enlightenment andits implications in terms ofhis own immediate situation" (Watson 1988b, 106).
Because of the emphasis on one's own immediate experience, the use of everyday
language as weIl as secular imagery and verse forms are essential to theaesthetics of Zen poetry and often make it "indistinguishable from the secular
poetry ofthe time" (Watson 1988b, 106). The primacy given to the use of
everyday language and images also relates to Zen's general "avoidance oftechnical religious terminology" (Watson 1988b, 107). In this way, Zen poetry
generally discards abstract, philosophical terms for the ultimate that could beinterpreted as being independent from the phenomenal world and prefers to use
concrete images that serve to unify the conventional and ultimate throughmetaphor. As we will see, however, this is not always the case with Han-shan andRyokan.
This view of symbolism allows for a non-transcendent reading of themetaphors and symbolism central to poetic discourse and is essential to a nontranscendent interpretation of symbolism contained in Han-shan's and Ryokan's

38

poetry, particularly in Han-shan's use of symbolism for buddha-nature. ll How
Han-shan uses these symbols in a manner consistent with a non-transcendent,
nondual philosophy will be explored in Chapter Four. Also in Chapter Four, the'functional model for language will serve as a basis to illustrate how their poetry
can express a non-attached and selfless attitude while describing failure. The next
section will explore how Han-shan and Ryokan express nonduality and a nontranscendent interpretation of "beyond words" through their engagement withpoetry.

Ban-shan's and Ryokan's views ofpoetry and language
Ryokan and Han-shan engage in poetry as a way to re-enter the world andaddress human society from the standpoint of reclusion. Ryokan and Han-shan
do not transcend participation in language or the conventional but delve into thedualities of language to create a poetry without attachment to either tradition(characterized by society and formaI education) or individualism (characterized
by direct experience, reclusion, and originality), even though their poetry isestablished within the tradition and fully expresses their individuality.

11 Although 1 have given attention to the functional model oflanguage and a nondual use ofsymbolism, there are other figurative modes in operation in Han-shan's and Ryokan's poetry.
According to Yu and Owen, images in Chinese poetry, instead of pointing to a symbolic meaning,
evoke a series of conventionally associated correspondences. While 1 daim that there can besymbolic content to an image, this symbolic content in the Buddhist context is generally found interms of emptiness, and therefore, the ultimate meaning itself is open and ambiguous. We can see
the potential for correspondences in a term like "Cold Mountain," which refers to a number ofobjects and ideas, while at the same time it has a particular symbolic meaning.
There is also the use of allegory used to make a discreet and indirect reference,
traditionally use fuI for socio-political critique. We see this use of indirect language in Ryokan' s
explanation oftears (Abé and Haskel165) and Han-shan's allegory of the crane (Watson 1970,#83,101); in both cases, the poets are discussing an expression ofsorrow that they are unwillingto admit directly, and it is dear that the literaI meaning of the poem is supposed to be fictitious.

39

Furthennore, their views of language coincide with both the theory of linguistic
inadequacy and the functional model of language.

Han-shan
The legends surrounding Han-shan describe his life as completely
carefree, and the ideal of non-attachment imbues his practice of writing poetry.
Although Han-shan's poems do not directly confront the issue of attachment in
the practice of writing poetry, the awareness of the potential dilemma presents
itselfin the legends of Han-shan that carefully emphasize his non-attachment towriting and any possible wealth or popularity associated with it. Han-shan was
most likely unaware ofthe problem of poetry as outlined by Po Chü-i, since his
poems were probably written before Po's and make no clear reference to theT'ang poets ofhis day. Nevertheless, Han-shan himself as weIl as his admirers
developed a legendary account ofhis non-attached method ofwriting.
According to the Preface to Han-shan's poems, Han-shan left his poems
scattered on cliffs, trees, and rocks. The author of the preface, Lü-ch'iu Yinalso an obscure figure -c1aims to have ordered the collection of these poems,

which he then edited and published. Lü-ch'iu Yin ordered a group of monks "tohunt up poems written on bamboo, wood, stones, and c1iffs-and also to collectthose written on the walls ofpeople's houses" (Snyder 1966, 34). This legend
frees Han-shan of the responsibility for having collected and published his own
work, which could implicate him in a quest for worldly renown. AIso, his methodof writing illustrates his non-attachment to his poems by leaving them in random

40and uncertain places. Interestingly, Han-shan himself mentions his practice ofwriting poems on cliff walls:
Once at Cold Mountain, troubles cease-No more tangled, hung-up mind.
1 idly scribble poems on the rock cliff,
Taking whatever cornes, like a drifting boat. (Snyder 1966, #19, 40)
The image of the rock cliffmay be more suggestive of the life of reclus ion andwithdrawal from society and its ink and paper, than an indifference to the fate ofhis poems. However, Han-shan has an intentionless and effortless attitude toward
writing, in which the words come and go "like a drifting boat," and he writes
without thought of success or failure. Henricks translates the "cliff" in the poem
above as "stone walls," perhaps implying a greater involvement with society;nevertheless, his translation of the final image as '.'1 do not tether my boat" is aclear reference to being "unattached" (Henricks 256).
Despite the legends of scattering poems, Han-shan did not transe end
involvement with society as his poems are directed to an audience and often
contain direct statements to the reader in the form of challenge, invitation,
criticism, or teaching. Han-shan appears to have been a failed Confucian scholar,
which would account for his ability to write and his knowledge of the literary
tradition. Thus, he must have known the use ofbrush and paper, and his poems
are often social critiques in line with the Confucian poetic tradition. After aIl,
officiaIs were often Confucian in public and BuddhistlTaoist in private.
Since a couple ofhis poems mention receiving criticism ofhis poetry,sorne ofhis poems must have been read by others, and in his poetry, he engages
in dialogue with other poets and scholars. The criticism he receives, however,41

supports his image as an unconventional poet untainted by the ordinary pursuitsof society. Han-shan often laments that people (even Buddhists) do not grasp themeaning ofhis non-traditional verses and ideas, and he finds himself
misunderstood by the critic in the following poem:
Some critic tried to put me down"Your poems lack the Basic Truth of Tao"And l recall the old-timers
Who were poor and didn't carel have to laugh at him,
He misses the point entirely,
Men like that
Ought to stick to making money. (Snyder 1966, #20, 40)12The second line is often translated as: "Your poems make no sense at all!"(Watson 1970, #73, 91), and the last lines ofthe poem have been interpreted aseither a criticism from the voice of Han-shan, as above, or from the voice of thecritic: "Money's the only urgent matter" (Hemicks 262). In either case, the critic
disapproves ofHan-shan's devotion to the way ofpoverty and humility, and thepoem plays on the distinction between the profit-oriented writing of society andHan-shan's reclusive style.
Han-shan is well-known for distancing himselffrom conventional poetic
form by using language that is described as "simple, often colloquial or evenslangy" (Watson 1970, Il). Han-shan himself comments on criticism he hasreceived for breaking traditional rules of poetry:
A certain scholar named Mr. Wang
Was laughing at my poems for being so clumsy.
"Don't you know you can't have two accents here?
And this line has too manY beats.
You don't seem to understand meter at all
But toss in any word that comes to mind!"
12 Henricks notes this poem is Han-shan II.

42

1 laugh too, Mr. Wang, whenyou make a poem,
Like a blind man trying to sing of the sun. (Watson 1970, #28, 46)
As noted by Hemicks, this poem deliberately contains two errors in terms ofstandard rhyming patterns (Hemicks 386). Han-shan chooses not to follow theconventions as the primary function of the poem is to transmit direct experiencerather than strictly adhere to official standards and techniques. He is not trying to
get ahead in the literary world by conforming to the tradition; instead, ms
concern is with poetry based on direct insight, often related to the Buddhist
Dharma, as in 'seeing the sun,' where the sun can function as a symbol for
enlightenment.
Behind his unconventional techniques, however, is a well-groundedknowledge of the literary tradition. Hemicks comments that for scholars of Hanshari "too much has been made of his use of the colloquial: many most -1 would say

ofhis poems are written in good, classical Chinese" (Henricks 12). Han-

shan is not as distanced from the literary tradition as it may first appear. He was
weIl acquainted with Confucian and Taoist texts, Buddhist Sütras, and theClassics ofHistory and makes reference to them in his poems. The "Nineteen Dld
Poems," a collection of anonymous poems from around the second century C.E.
that stress the inevitability of death, and the work of T'ao Ch'ien (T'ao Yüanming; 365-427 C.E.), the primary founder of the reclusive poetry geme, also
considerably shape Han-shan's literary efforts. Although Han-shan's popularity isbased on his thematic variety and creative imagery, he addresses many
conventional themes, such as impermanence, and provides moral criticism andcommentaries on the life of officiaIs.

43

At least in his early years, Han-shan did not reject conventionalliterary
pursuit and had a great fondness for reading. While describing his reclusive
lifestyle in the countryside with ms wife, in the time before he ventured to Cold
Mountain, he writes: "And in my house what do l have? / Only a bed piled highwith books" (Watson 1970, #2, 20). In the next poem, we see that even as Hanshan's life was transformed from a scholar-farmer to a mountain recluse, hecontinued to enjoy reading books:
l took along books when l hoed the.fields,
In my youth, when l lived with my older brother.
Then people began to talk;Even my wife tumed against me.
Now l've broken my ties with the world of red dust;
l spend my time wandering and read aIl l want.
Who williend a dipper of water
To save a fish in a carriage rut? (Watson 1970, #32,50)
At the same time of his indulgence in scholarship, Han-shan never ceases
to make light of and criticize the significance of books, leaming, and generalengagement with words. While reading Taoist texts, he writes:
While l, with a book or two of the immortals,
Read under the trees - mumble, mumble. (Watson 1970, #72, 90)
Although absorbed in reading, he belittles the ultimate importance of the words
and presents them as insubstantial gibberish. In one poem Han-shan claims thatpoetry is the only joy for "a bunch of poor scholars" who are starving andunemployed (whether Han-shan includes himself in the group or not depends on
the opinion of the translator) (Watson 1970, #10, 28). But he suggests that these
poems are worthless and no one will read them: "We could inscribe our poems on
biscuits/ And the homeless dogs wouldn't deign to nibble" (Watson 1970, #10,4428). The poem gains deeper meaning from the added critique of the "dogs,"
officiaIs who refuse to appreciate the work and advice of scholars, and thus,
words could be meaningful if only understood by those in power (Kahn 25).
Besides these musings on the significance of reading, Han-shan makes
stronger arguments for linguistic inadequacy and the inexpressibility of reality. In
terms ofBuddha-nature, or "the Way" he applies the standard Zen and Taoist
positions to assert: "There's no word to describe it; moreover, there's neither
sentence nor phrase" (Henricks 253), similar to Bodhidharma's claim that Zen is"not founded on words and letters." In many instances Han-shan is advocating
the typical Zen preference for direct experience over language. He compares theinability for words to cure hunger with their inability to provide knowledge of
buddha-nature, which is not found in words but in one's own mind: "You justspeak of the difficulties in looking for the Buddha./ Turn your mind 'round-that's the Buddha!" (Henricks 296).
Han-shan goes further to comment on the defiling nature ofwords andhow his reclusive lifestyle is necessary to cleanse him ofhis earlier education. He
contrasts his previous involvement in the dust and illusion of society, in which hestudied and wrote Confucian poetry, with his CUITent life of reclusion:
In my first thirty years of life
1 roamed hundreds and thousands of miles.
Walked by rivers through deep green grass
Entered cities of boiling red dust.
Tried drugs, but couldn't make Immortal;
Read books and wrote poems on history.
Today l'm back at Cold Mountain:
1'11 sleep by the creek and purify my ears. (Snyder 1966, #12, 38)

45

Watson translates the last line as "To pillow my head on the stream and wash myears" (Watson 1970, #38,56), and it contains a reference to the traditional storyof the recluse Hsü Yu. When asked by legendary Emperor Yao to succeed him as
ruler, Hsü Yu washed his ears out in a stream as he considered the suggestion ofworldly power to pollute his moral integrity (Watson 1970, #38, 56; Henricks400). Han-shan, however, is not rinsing his ears of an inappropriate comment orsuggestion but rather aIl of history and learning. Snyder's translation implies thatmerely listening to the stream cleans his ears; instead of the water as c1eansingagent, the impermanent nature of the stream and the non-intellectuai activity oflistening clear his ears and his mind. The stream still carries the notions ofimpermanence and direct experience; nevertheless, Watson is more accurate intranslating the Hne in relation to the literary reference.
Han-shan often comments that his words are not effective in transmitting
his message to his reader or society:
When men see Han-shan
They aIl say he's crazyAnd not much to look at Dressed in rags and hides.
They don't get what 1 say& 1 don't talk their language.
AlI 1 can say to those 1 meet:"Try and make it to Cold Mountain." (Snyder 1966, #24, 41i3

Han-shan and the people of ordinary society misunderstand each other because
they do not use the same type oflanguage, and from the perspective of society,Han-shan has sorne outrageous ideas. In Snyder's translation, he claims to be

13 Altemate translation of lines 5 and 6: "The things we say he doesn't understand/ The things hesays we wouldn't utter!" (Watson 1970, 75).

46

using an unconventionallanguage that can only be understood if one has thesame experience and attains his mind. This is a plausible interpretation since inthis poem, Han-shan gives up on explanation, and instead his language functions
as a direct challenge to the reader to make it to "Cold Mountain" that is symbolicof both the religious path and an enlightened state of mind. 14
Even trying to communicate this state of mind to his reader throughtraditional images fails:
My mind is like the autumn moon
Shining clean and clear in the green pool.
No, that's not a good comparison.
Tell me, how shall 1 explain? (Watson 1970, #97, 115)15Here, Han-shan's question prevents the reader from relying on Han-shan's own
explanation and images. Contrary to the typicill presentation of the symbol of themoon, which Han-shan himself uses over and over again, he surprisingly admits
that the symbol is insufficient and demands the reader to provide an explanationin his or her own words.
Alongside Han-shan's views on the inadequacy of language, he attempts
to express his mental attitude in words. A poem attributed to Han-shan II
contains a statement, which suggests the genuine feelings behind his poetry andmirrors the expressive-affective theory of language: "If the heart is sincere, thewords set forth are direct;/ With a direct heart, there is no behind" (Henricks

14 Waley, Watson, and Henricks aIl translate the last line in a manner consistent with its
interpretation as a direct challenge or invitation, even though Waley translates it as a question
rather than an imperative statement (Waley 1954, 16; Watson 1970, 75; Henricks 305).
15 An altemate translation for the third line; "There is nothing with which it compares" (Henricks
95).

47

326). In his other poems as weIl, Han-shan wishes to convey his mind to hisreaders.
Sorne people laugh at my poems;
But my poems stand side by side withtheelegant and refined.
Still l've not troubled Mr. Cheng to add notes,
And what use having Master Mao explain?
1 don't regret that those who understand them are few;
It's just that those who know inIler thoughts are quite rare.
Ifyou chase and pursue C and D/ 6
With my faults, you'Il never come to the end!
But should my poems suddenly meet up with someone
with a sharp eye
Then they'll naturally circulate throughout the world. (Henricks 404)
Han-shan's direct speech does not require the analytical commentaries like thoseof Mao and Cheng on the Book ofSangs, but understanding them requires "those
who know inner thoughts," or in other words, someone who understands themind and heart of the poet. Thus, Han-shan intends to reveal his mind to those
who can understand as in the Zen model of mind-to-mind transmission.
Despite the preference for direct experience over words, Han-shan's
poems are still meant to serve as Buddhist teachings. His poems frequently
contain Buddhist based teaching or criticism and can be quite didactic in style.
He claims that his words are like bitter medicine that "no one will believe"(Watson 1970. #99. 117) suggesting that they are designed to help or cure people
even though people are unwilling to accept them. In contrast to Po Chü-i who

16 "C and D (kung-shang) are the frrst two musical tones in the Chinese pentatonic scale. Herethey seem to stand for the tone categories used in regulated verse" (Henricks 405).

48

hoped his poems would be transformed into Buddhist teachings, Han-shan, rather
arrogantly, proc1aims his poetry to be superior to the sUtras:
Do you have the poems of Han-shan in your house?
They're better for you than sutra-reading!
Write them out and paste them on a screen
Where you can glance them over from time to time. (Watson 1970, #100,
118)
Poetry is the way through which Han-shan engages with the world,
humans, and society. It is through poetry that we can read the poet and know of
his non-attachment, rec1usive lifestyle, and critiques of the dust ofhumanambition. Although Han-shan places emphasis on direct experience and belittles
the significance of language, it is through language that Han-shan attempts tochallenge his readers and transmit direct insight. It is only through language that
we are made aware of the insufficiency of intellectual understanding and pursuit.

RyokanRyokan, like Han-shan, is known for leaving his poems in a variety oflocations without keeping a single compilation of them. Since Ryokan lived only
a couple of centuries ago, much more is known about his life, and interestingly,
ms habit of scattering poems appears to be historically accurate. There is no
mention of Ryokan leaving his poems on c1iffwalls, stones, or trees, however.
Rather, ms poems were either written for his own pleasure or distributed to ms
friends with letters and pictures or on fans and other objects -a practice thatreflects his involved, social behavior. He did not publish or create any collection
ofpoems himself(except for a small selection ofChinese poems), and it was49

Teishin, a nun who developed an intimate relationship with Ryokan at the end of
his life, who made the first collection of his poems (Watson 1977, 6).
For Ryokan, poetry is connected to withdrawal from society and also thepractice of Zen. Like Mujii Ichien, Ryokan engages with poetry to loosen his ties
with the pursuit of wealth, fame, and other personal desires as well as draw
attention to the impermanent and selfless nature of all things. As he says: "mineis a life of poetry/ with worldly cares allleft behind" (Abé and Haskel 112).
Ryokan relates the withdrawing practice of poetry to the Zen mind when
discussing hi~ life of reclusion:ln the house, what does one find?
Books of poetry and prose covering the floor
By nature 1 shun the clamor of the world
When 1 come here to visit, 1 like to stay
The mind ofpoetry, the mind of Zen
Come together effortlessly (from Abé and Haskel 110)
Reading and writing for Ryokan is not associated with attachment to language
and worldly desires but instead, poetry is explicitly equated to the nonattachment of Zen with a more evident rationale than many who have made thelink before: literary practice and enjoyment draws him away from self-interested
pursuits.
Despite his intention to withdraw from the world, Ryokan did become
quiet well-known for his poetry and even more well-known for his calligraphy. In
the following poem, he is humorously annoyed at the popularity ofhis poetry:
1 shaved my head, became a monk,plowed through the weeds, spent years looking for the Way.
Yet now wherever 1 go they hand me paper and brush,
and all they say is "Write us a waka!" "Write us a Chine se poem!"(Watson 1977, 111)50

Ryokan never appears to have intended to get ahead in the literary world,
however, and adhered to a humble lifestyle and simple mode of writing.
Ryokan is not concemed with the use of elegant words and phrases, andhis poems present their message simply and directly without the interference ofabstract and obscure literary references. Although literary allusion and play areabundant in Ryokan's poetry, the imagery and meaning of the poem, at least on
the surface, are presented c1early and immediately to the reader without a demand
to analyze the poem intellectually, and the content ofhis poems generally
concemhis everyday, ordinary experiences, which are readily accessible to thereader. In fact, the depth of Ryokan's poetry often appears in the deceptively
simple images and statements on the surface ofhis poems that Ryokan provides
without an explicit, logical connection or explanation.
Ryokan consciously kept his poems accessible and avoided artificial andpretentious figures of speech. A friend ofRyokan's, Suzuki Bundai, wrote that
Ryokan detested three things: "professional calligrapher's calligraphy;
professional poets' poems; and professional cooks' food" (Abé and Haskel2425). On his list ofthings to avoid, he inc1udes "fancy words" and "sugary speech"(Stevens 1993, 147). Writing appears to be a completely natural, effortlessprocess for him. After describing a natural, lazy summer scene, Ryokan
comments: "1 take a few phrases/ and they just turn into poems" (Abé and Haskel
107).
Ryokan was not intent on following the customs of refined poetry andthus, like Han-shan, often created an unconventional poetry that broke the51

traditional mIes of rhyme and meter and made "frequent use of colloquialism andhumble images" (Yuasa 3). His friend Suzuki Bundai adds: "Metrical mIes arewhat my teacher disliked most" (Yuasa 17). Like Han-shan and in line with theexpressive theory of Ki no Tsurayuki, Ryôkan preferred the sincerity of
expression over inordinate attention to eloquent language and literary technique.
One anecdote contained in a biography compiled by Ozeki Bunchü particularly
captures Ryôkan's rationale for by-passing traditional mIes: "Someone criticized
the Zen Master's poems for transgressing many phonetic regulations. The Master
said, '1 simply speak what my mind desires to express. How can 1 be bothered byphonetic mIes? If there are those who care about poetics, they should feel free togo ahead and make the corrections'" (Abé and Haskel 79). Similar to Han-shan's
response to a critic who writes poetry like a blind man singing about the sun,Ryôkan criticizes those who are attached to the refinement of words and fail toexpress genuine feelings or thoughts.
How pitiful, those virtuous fellows!
Moving into the recesses, they immersethemselves in composing poetry
For Ancient Style, their models
are the poems of Han and Wei
For Recent Form,the T'ang poets are their guideWith gaudy words their lines are formed
And further adomed bynovel and curious phrases
Yet if they fail to express
what's in their own minds
What's the use, no matter
how many poems they compose! (Abé and Haskel 26).
Watson translates "what's in their own minds" as "things in the heart" (Watson
1977, 101), reflecting the double meaning of the Chinese character for52

heart/mind. Thus, the expression of one's genuine state of mind and thoughts areinc1uded alongside sincere emotion. For Ryokan, it is the transmission ofthis tme
mind of the poet rather than the "wild words and fancy phrases" that is theessential function of poetry.
In a poem to Teishin he expresses a view that corresponds to theexpressive-affective model of language by equating words with genuine emotion:
Not for a moment
Must you think our voices die
Leaving no traces;
Truly more than what they are,Words are equal to our hearts. (Yuasa 176)
Thus, Ryokan wrote from the perspective that words could transmit the heart andmind of the poet and it was the poem's function to do so.
Ryokan's most radical statement on the unconventional nature ofhis
poetry and his disregard for literary artifice occurs in the following poem:
Who says that my poems are poems?
My poems aren't poems at all
When you understandThat my poems really aren't poems
Then we can talk poetry together (Abé and Haskel 23, 108)
Abé interprets this poem as a reply to criticism ofhis habit ofbreaking the mIes
ofChinese verse (Abé and HaskeI26), and Yuasa confirms this interpretation in
his translation, which inc1udes the line: "my poetry is unworthy of its name"(Yuasa #79,64). A nondual view ofpoetry and the logic of the Diamond Sütra(A is not A, therefore A) also lurk behind Ryokan's words. The first part of the
Diamond Sütra's equation is explicit: "my poems are not poems." This is not a

rejection ofpoetry, however, but a prerequisite standpoint to understanding the53

nature of poems -an understanding necessary to be able to truly discuss poetrywith Ryokan; thus, the poem completes the logic: poetry is poetry again. In either
interpretation of the poem, it is evident that Ryokan privileges an understanding
and expression beyond the fancy words and formalities of literature and beyond
any fixed view of the structure and significance of poetry.
Despite his apparently direct and often unconventional style, it would be a
mistake to think that Ryokan did not employ traditional forms and did not draw
upon the literary tradition in a sophisticated manner. Ryokan wrote poems in both
Chinese and Japanese and was well-acquainted with Confucian, Taoist andBuddhist texts and classical Chinese and Japanese poetry, from which he subtly
and skillfully wove references into his poems. Anecdotes and poems about
Ryokan's childhood suggest that he was seemingly obsessed with books andwould stay up all night reading. He paid special attention to the Man 'yoshü, theclassical 8th century anthology of Japanese poetry, whose "crude but direct style"he imitated (Abé and Haskel 25).
Han-shan (or Kanzan in Japanese) was more of an influence on Ryokan
than any other individual poet, as is attested by the number of allusions to his
poems (see Yuasa 18). He occasionally writes about reciting Han-shan's poems in
his hut and made this verse in imitation of Han-shan's own self-praise:
The volume of Kanzan's poetry in my house, I esteem moreThan the sacred sütras or countless commentaries on them.

A brush in hand, I have made copies on my bedside screen,
And now and then, I brood on them, feasting on each poem. (Yuasa # 186,
98)

54

William LaFleur draws attention to the symbolism and play of language
found in Ryokan's poems and argues that the simplicity of Ryokan's verse
consists ofhis effortless use ofliterary techniques and allusions that prove
Ryokan's mastery and skill of language, rather than an untrained lack ofsophistication (LaFleur 1980, 124-125). Ryokan is a prime example of the East
Asian ideal ofwu wei, non-action, i.e. selfless, spontaneous, and non-intentional
action that is nevertheless attained through practice and cultivation. In thisway,
he conforms to the ideal ofthis unknown Taoist Master: "In the highest
craftsmanship there is no craftsmanship; the fine st poetry is where there is no
Poetry" (Owen 51).
Ryokan also supports the theory of linguistic inadequacy and frequently
warns us not to get caught up in words and dualistic ideas like delusion andenlightenment, right and wrong, true and false. The Buddha, or buddha-nature
itself, is merely a linguistic conception, "something made up in the mind"(Watson 1977, 102) that one should not attach to without real understanding.
Penetration into the Dharma itself does not depend on the intellectual teachingsof Buddhism, and the words of these teachings can be a hindrance to direct
insight:
If we really knew ourselves
We would not have to rely on old teachers.
The wise go right to the core
And leap beyond appearances;
The foolish cleave to details
And get ensnared by words and letters. (from Stevens 2004, 80)
Ryokan often gives a question and then answers it in a non-rational way
by using expressions of silence or action that are typical of Zen. When he is55asked why he spends his time playing with children, he refuses to provide an
intellectual explanation:
We hit it going, hit it coming,
never knowing how the hours fly.
Passers-by turn, look at me and laugh,"What makes you act like this?"
1 duck my head, don't answer them1 could speak but what's the use?
You want to know what's in my he art?
From the beginning,just this! just this! (from Watson 1977, 74)17
We see the performative function oflanguage in the last words: "just this! justthis!" These exclamatory statements do not de scribe or justify the reasons for
Ryokan's behavior or feelings; rather, they both draw attention to and express theimmediate present through language. Interestingly, Ryokan do es not deny thepossibility of explanation but questions its utility, and even though he rejects theimperative to "speak" in terms of logical argument, he still continues to employ
language to convey his meaning.
Often these poems point to a silence on Ryokan's part, although thissilence is still known and presented through language.
Those old days-I wonder,
did 1 dream themor were they real?
ln the night 1 listen
to the autumn rain (Watson 1977, 62)
Ryokan does not analyze the relationship between dreams and reality or commenton their identity or difference but simply offers a natural scene of phenomenal

17 Even if! were able to say something

how could 1 explain?
Do you really want to know the meaning of it aIl?
(from Abé and Haskel 132)
This is it! This is it!

56existence that expresses the answer through both the sound of rain and Ryokan's
silence. In another poem,his response to questions about the nature ofenlightenment and delusion is to "stretch both feet in answer" (Stevens 1977,26).
Following Han-shan, Ryokan makes reference to the recluse Hsü Yu but
in doing so, considers a very different standpoint on language. He writes: "Tohear the words of truth, you must wash your ears clean" and explains themeaning: "It means to rid yourself of aIl you have heard beforehand" (Yuasa#101, 71). Without doing this, Ryokan wams we will fail to recognize the truth
and will be deceived by falsehood. Again, there is a waming against leaming andlanguage and the recognition of the stream as purifying the mind of defilingwords. However, for Ryokan, this is not done to transcend language but to beable to hear words clearly and accurately without being deceived. It is apurification in order to comprehend the nature of words and enter the realm of
language instead ofwhite-washing the mind of aIl conceptual activity andabandoning words.
Many ofhis comments on direct experience and linguistic inadequacy
contain a subtle playon words that carefully points to the interrelationshipbetween insight and language. As he does in his disregard for the importance ofliterary style, Ryokan emphasizes the importance of dirèct experience over words
and books. Here is one poem that undermines the ultimate value of reading while
simultaneously advocating the value ofwords that are directed toward
immediate, non-intellectual knowledge:
Even if you've read through countless books
y ou're betler off sticking to a single phrase57

If anyone asks which one, tell him:
"Know your own mindjust as it is" (Abé and Haskel153)
This poem creatively uses language both to question the value of words and topoint to the mind, and as always Ryokan focuses on the transmission of mind
rather than conceptual understanding. Another poem develops a skillful play
between words and phenomenal experience and uses a possible allusion to thesilent transmission of Buddha to Mahakasyapa by holding up a flower:
My words cannot hope to match
The Buddha's exquisite teaching
My sermon:
This gardenia from the mountains (Abé and Haskel205)
At first, Ryokan seems to compare his own words to the written teachings of the
Buddha, but in the next line, he transforms his own words and "sermon" into apresentation of phenomenal experience, and Buddha's teaching is no longer
linguistic or intellectual in content but rather the very nature of ordinary
phenomena. Ryokan's words function to draw attention to ordinary objects rather
than provide an intellectual explanation of reality. The force of the poem,
however, is not so much the emphasis on an experience "beyond words" but theinterplay between the words ofhis "sermon" and their transformation into
phenomenal experience; thus, Ryokan is playing on the interdependence of theconventional (words) and the ultimate (experience beyond words). While
Ryokan begins with position oflinguistic inadequacy, his "sermon" is still
effective through language.
Ryokan's primary intent in his poetry is to present direct insight of theDharma or advocate Buddhist teachings. In this way, his poems can be·58

considered as conventional means to point to the ultimate, like a finger pointing
to the moon. However, Ryokan advises against making a fundamental distinction
between conventional and ultimate:Because of the finger
you can point to the moon
Because of the moon
you can understand the finger
The moon and the finger
Are neither different nor the same
This parable is used only to lead students to enlightenment
Once you've really seen things as they are
There's no more moon, no more finger(Abé and Haskel152)
Like Nagarjuna, Ryokan argues that the distinction between conventional andultimate is necessary but not a true reflection of reality. According to the parableof the fmger and the moon, the conventional (the finger) should be abandoned
once the ultimate (the moon) has been seen. Ryokan takes a step beyond this andsays even the truth ofthis parable (the distinction between conventional andultimate) must be ultimately discarded, and he illustrates the interdependent andempty nature ofboth the moon and finger, the ultimate and conventional.
Ultimate meaning and understanding, on both a literary and religious
level, is not transcendent from conventionallanguage, imagery, and phenomena.
In the first level ofunderstanding, linguistic understanding (the conventional) isabandoned once the ultimate (non-linguistic) understanding is reached. At thisstage, language is not truly transcended since there is still atlachment to the
linguistic distinction between linguistic and non-linguistic. On the next level ofunderstanding, the distinction between the linguistic and non-linguistic is
discarded; thus, the abandonment of language must also be refuted, and language

59

returns. In this last stage, the transcendence of the language based distinction
between language and beyond words simultaneously allows for the re-emergenceoflanguage. Paradoxically, this is a simultaneous transcendence from anddescendence to language. It is a transcendence of the dualistic idea oftranscendence and thus, places the poet back in the world.

Conclusion
Consistent with the model of non-transcendence, Ryokan's and Hanshan's poetic practices are neither a transcendence from nor an attachment tosociety, language, and literature. Both Ryokan and Han-shan maintain an imageof non-attachment from the selfish pursuits of wealth and fame and a nonattachment to the ultimate significance of words and books, while they pursue
literary arts and use their poetry to engage with society. Their occasional use of
nontraditional poetic form is a sign of non-attachment to success in the literary
world and devotion to the direct expression of insight over strict adherence toliterary convention. At the same time, Han-shan and Ryokan are not radical
individualists who have transcended or ignored the tradition, but skillfully engage
with the tradition and employ their training in the classics with mastery andselfless ease. Ryokan and Han-shan also toss Mahahayana and Zen terms into
their poetry in order to place these allusive concepts into concrete and personal
situations as weIl as to dismiss the dualistic notions behind them. "Beyond
words" then does not refer to the abandonment of language or transcendence to a60

non-conceptual pure state of consciousness but an active participation in therealm of language without reification of linguistic dualities.
Although Han-shan and Ryokan seek to remove themselves from worldly
pursuits, for neither author is poetry a way to distance themselves from society
and the conventional world. They choose the path of poetry not to forget about
phenomenal experience as in Chomei's ideal but to engage in literarypractice inorder to encourage a reclus ive lifestyle that leaves worldly, individual gain
behind. The nature of their reclusion and its relationship to social engagement
will be the issue for the next chapter.

61

Chapter Three
Eremitism and Society: White Clouds and Red Dust

Introduction
Han-shan and Ryokan are typically seen as recluses that never troubled or
criticized anyone but kept to themselves and remained uninvolved in social
affairs. John Blofield presents a typical image of Han-shan as an enlightened
hermit beyond the dust of society, who did not "go around telling [people] how
wrong they were, how right his own beliefs and actions. He never interfered withpeople .... Nor did he get angry, indignant, disgusted or shocked .... " (RedPine 1983, 13). However, in his poetry, Han-shan is often quite critical anddidactic and strongly asserts his view of the way things are. He is evidently more
involved in society than his stereotypic image would suggest, as Blofield himself
implies: "Ifhe were really a solitary forest dweller, where did he store the paper,
ink and brushes needed for writing poems?" (Red Pine 1983, 10).
John Stevens adheres to a similar passive image of Ryokan, who "neverpreached or exhorted" (Stevens 1977, 12), and instead of adrnitting Ry6kan could
be critical of others, Stevens writes that he "gently chided fellow Buddhists"(Stevens 1993, 129). Ryfichi Abé more appropriately labels Ryokan's complaints
as "sharp criticism" (Abé and Haskel 49). According to Abé, Ryokan's eremitic
lifestyle and begging practice were designed to critique conventional Buddhist
monastic practice and institutions and served as "an effective antidote for the
problems resulting from the excessive bureaucratization of the Zen temples"62

(Abé and Baskel 52-53). Stevens, on the other hand, sees Ryokan's lifestyle, not
as a critique ofbureaucracy, but as exemplary of the Zen ideal of one who has"returned to the marketplace with bliss-bestowing hands," a description of the
final stage of the Zen path illustrated by the Ten Oxherding Pictures (Stevens
1977, 16), and claims that instead ofpromoting the superiority ofhis hermitage,
Ryokan "was detached from his detachment" (Stevens 1977, 16). In this view,
Ryokan is seen as someone who has progressed through the stages of Zen
training and has returned to the world to save other beings. The question thenarises: what is the significance of living in reclusion for someone who has
retumed to the marketplace?

Despite its non-political and removed appearance, reclusion, in its many
forms, always remains a particular mode of engaging with society, often forpolitical motives and often without physical distance. Frederick Mote, Aat
Vervoom, and Alan Berkowitz aIl agree that the basic paradigm for eremitism inChina appears to have been first established by the works of Confucius and ispredicated primarily upon the withdrawal from public office or service to thestate; eremitism is not dependent upon physical isolation, and the general purpose
ofwithdrawal is for self-cultivation and preservation of moral integrity(Berkowitz xi, 228; Mote 253; Vervoom 8). Confuciusjustified the eremitic life
according to his ideal of public service: "The gentleman serves in office as longas by doing so he can further the Way; once that becomes impossible he must

63

resign to avoid moral compromise" (Vervoom 30).18 Therefore, Confucianism
promotes an eremitism of moral integrity that emphasizes one's individual
morality over service to the state, and hermits following this ideal became ethicalmodels in Confucian society. Confucius praised the righteousness oflegendary
recluses Po Yi and Shu-ch'i who starved to death in reclusion rather than serve
what they considered to be an illegitimate govemment, and they became
exemplars for officiaIs who followed them into retreat (Lau 1979, 16.12, 141).
This withdrawal did not prevent social interaction, however. Certain hermits did
physically distance themselves from society, but since eremitism was dependent
upon withdrawal from public service and not on solitude, manY so called"hermits" had significant social contact, and according to Vervoom, theirepithets, such as "men of the cliffs and caves," often did not reflect reality(Vervoom 6-7).
In contrast to the Confucian model of moral integrity, Taoist philosophy
advocated a different form of eremitism, an eremitism of anonymity, which
nevertheless still depended on withdrawal from public service. The Taoist thinker
Chuang-tzu rejected the practice of physical isolation and supported the ideal ofmental reclusion instead, which involved withdrawal from ordinary humanpursuits (Vervoom 40). Largely as a means of self-preservation, one should
remain anonymous and stay out of politicallife altogether in order to avoid

18 Vervoom's quote is a paraphrase ofthis passage of The Analects: "The tenn 'great minister'
refers to those who serve their lord according to the Way and who, when this is no longer
possible, relinquish office" (Lau 1979, 11.24, 109). This passage also has been used to support
reclusion: "Show yourselfwhen the Way prevails in the Empire, but hide yourselfwhen it doesnot" (Lau 1979, 8.13, 94).

64

drawing attention to oneself and thus, avoid being the object of jealousy or anger(Vervoom 55-56). In contrast to the Confucian hermit who displays his
individual morality, the key to the Taoist is to remain unknown. Thus, one does
not separate oneselfby physical withdrawal but becomes invisible within society(Vervoom 58). In the Confucian ideal, there would be no hermits since everyone
should be serving the govemment when it conforms to moral standards(Vervoom 230), but for Taoists, ideally everyone should renounce pursuits thatwould establish one's individuality and thus, create an "eremitic society"(Vervoom 60).
Eremitism within society led to the ideal of the "hermit at court," defined
as an attitude of detachment from worldly concems while still in public office(Vervoom 186). This is the ideal exhibited by Vimalakïrti, who represents the
Chinese Buddhist model for eremitism. Vimalakïrti's life embodies his message

011 nonduality; thus, his behavior is marked by a number of seeming
contradictions. Although he lives as a layman in society with a wife and children
and engages in aIl aspects of society, he fundamentally remains solitary, nonattached, and undefiled (Thurman 20-21). Vimalakïrti's life and the "hermit atcourt" ideal express the nonduality of reclusion and public service, an ideal thatsorne actually attempted in Chinese officiallife. Others, like Han-shan andRyokan, however, did physically withdraw while pursuing Buddhist ideals.
While many adopted Buddhist and Taoist motives in enacting eremitic ideals,, Berkowitz argues that the nature of their eremitism is still essentially defined by
the secular practice of withdrawing from an official career (Berkowitz 2), and65this is basically the criteria followed by Han-shan and Ry6kan despite their
physical seclusion and Buddhist practice.
In Japan, the pursuit of Buddhist ideals most often provided the motive
for reclusion. Reclusion is often defined not only in terms of withdrawal frompublic service but withdrawal from monastic institutions as weIl. This is true ofthe aesthete-recluse tradition where individuals pursued Buddhist ideals throughtheir dedication to poetry and music (Pandey 49). Even these aesthete-recluses,
however, could have political motives. According to Marra, the theme ofreclusion in Japanese literary arts serves as the only available medium to express
political dis content against the "dominant ideology" (Marra 7), and the loss ofpolitical power by members of court families serves as the basis of their"aesthetics of discontent" (Marra 10-11). Reclusion also served as a political tool
for those in power. In the Japanese political system of insei, emperors abdicatedthe throne and went into withdrawal in order to secure the royaI successor. Theseemperors continued to exert political power despite the appearance of
withdrawal.
The theme of reclusion in poetry is also tied to political involvement in
China. As argued by Stephen Owen, the audience for poetry was limited to anelite, literate class, mostly composed of government officiais, and poetry
generally served to express support for the imperial government (Owen 27).
Ironically, the theme of reclusion became important in poetry for precisely thisreason. Poetry was used to express either public service or private withdrawal,
and since the theme of reclusion in poetry emphasized the "purely personal

66

inclination" of the individual who chose to withdraw from society, it, therefore,
removed any sense of challenge to the central government (Owen 30). For thesereasons, the theme of reclusion became a legitimate option, which did not
directly threaten the government's power through the support of an altemate
political force (Owen 30) and was often adopted by those who were not truly
withdrawn from society. Because of the use ofreclusion as a literary trope,
Berkowitz states that "the alluring imagery of reclusion in the abstract is, in acertain sense, a disembodied construction" (Berkowitz xii). Nevertheless,withdrawal from public service often questioned the government's moral
legitimacy, and although in the case of Han-shan and Ryokan their reclusion did
not directly challenge the structure or morality of the government, it did
challenge -on a much broader scale -the fundamental orientation of society

and its individual members.
For the Zen practitioner, the essential problem with the mode of
eremitism is the potential dualities between public service and withdrawal andnature and society. Although Ryokan and Han-shan both lived in solitude in themountains,19 their reclusion is still primarily defined by withdrawal from public
service, not by isolation. In their case, not only are their modes of reclusion not
as distant as expected, but reclusion serves as a means of social critique andengagement. According to Michele Marra, the ideal of non-attachment is

19 According to historical evidence, Ryokan did live in solitude in the mountains even though he
did spend much time interacting with village people. The case of Han-shan is not so clear but if
we take his word for it and from the evidence in bis poems that he was led into reclusion fromfailure at public office, we can gather that he lived in seclusion. According to the legend, Hanshan survived through the help ofhis friend, Shih-te, who was the cook at the temple andprovided his meals. Apart from this legend, how he would manage to sustain himselfis a mystery.

67hampered by reclusion since, "In the end, the figure of the enlightened recluse
emerges as one who lives in constant awareness of the unsolvable contradiction
existing between his artachment to a life of reclusion and the total, spiritual
detachment which must be the target of reclusion itself' (Marra 70). Han-shan
and Ryokan, like VimalakIrti, avoid this dilemma by illustrating a nondual andnonartached mode of reclusion, while still providing significance to the role of
the recluse. Ultimately, the recluse withdraws from the world, not to transcend it,
but to realize its very nature. In line with the logic of non-transcendence, at thesame time as these poets withdraw from the ordinary goals of society, theirreclusion becomes a means to critique and transform society primarily throughthe medium of poetry and thus, does not transcend social engagement.

Ban-shan as RecluseHan-shan has established a legendary reputation for his reclusive lifestyleand takes his name from his remote and austere residence, Cold Mountain, as in
the Chinese custom of taking the name of one's place or social role. Although a
distinction is often made in English language scholarship between "Han-shan,"the poet, and "Cold Mountain," his residence, a clear distinction cannot always be
made in the Chinese; Cold Mountain (transliterated as "Han-shan") is the term
used for both the poet and his residence. As expressed by Arthur Waley: "In his
poems the Cold Mountain is often the name of a state of mind rather than of a
locality" (Waley 1954, 3). It is true that the poetic descriptions ofhis home areoften allegorical for a religious quest or state of mind. However, these can still be

68valid descriptions of the nature ofhis residence, as the nature ofhis home and thenature ofhis mind are often mutually reflective, even if the descriptions of themountain are totally allegorical. Furthermore, ms identification with his place is. symbolic ofhis reclusion and identification with nature.
That being said, Han-shan could weIl have been an urban bureaucrat who
did not live in the mountains and merely adopted the reclusive literary trope inorder to startle readers with provocative images of renunciation and establish an
attractive allegory for Buddhistenlightenment. Chinese poets often took on thevoices of others, including writing in the reclusive mode without altering theireveryday public service. Despite the fact that Han-shan actually criticizes these"nominal recluses," (Henricks 378) and although it is impossible to establish his(or other authors') actual mode of living, it appears unlikely that Han-shan lived
in as austere conditions as he portrays, as many of the images of remoteness,such as the consumption of fems for sustenance, are merely literary references in this example, to a political act by Po Yi and Shu-ch'i (mentioned previously)
who, according to legend, actually died while trying to survive on fems, as theyrefused "to eat the grain" of the CUITent govemment, which they considered to beillegitimate (Hori 2003,695). In any case, according to biographical informationin his poems, it seems likely that Han-shan did live in sorne degree of isolation,and his often realistic view of the hardships of eremitic life would suggest actual
experience living in seclusion. If Han-shan was in fact merely an official living inan urban dwelling called Cold Mountain Hall, his poetry still effects the "hermit

69

at court" ideal and can express the withdrawal found in a non-transcendent
paradigm.
Whether or not Han-shan was merely an urban bureaucrat, according to
the evidence in his poems, it is true that Han-shan did not always live so far
removed from society as his legendary image supposes. He initially adopted,
voluntarily or involuntarily, a Confucian style ofreclusion, defined bywithdrawal from public service and justified with Confucian ideals, which
gradually became more and more imbued with Buddhist goals and .values. At
first, Han-shan became a "fields and gardens" recluse in the model of the wellknown poet-recluse T'ao Ch'ien (T'ao Yüan-ming)20(365-427 C.E.), to whose
poetry Han-shan makes various allusions. Apparently, Han-shan initiallywithdrew from public office voluntarily, and he, hi~ wife, and child supported
themselves through farming. Since the Chinese model of reclusion, being strictly
defined by withdrawal from service to the state, did not necessitate a life ofsolitude, withdrawing with one's family was not an uncommon option. This
image of Han-shan paints quite a different picture of his reclusive life comparedto the usual portrayal of his austere, solitary existence. Here he fits the model of
the Confucian gentlemen who goes into reclusion to pursue scholarly activities
and maintain moral integrity:
A thatched hut is home for a country man;Horse or carriage sel dom pass my gate:
Forests so still aIl the birds come to roost,
Broad valley streams always full of fish.
20 Ryokan also includes many allusions to his poems (see Yuasa 17-18). According to Watson,

Tao Ch'ien is the father ofreclusive poetry and takes as his themes: "quietude and rustic
simplicity, the joys ofwine and family life, and a vague longing for the past" (Watson 1971, 7677).

70

1 pick wild fruit in hand with my child,
Till the hillside fields with my wife.
And in my house what do 1 have?
Dnly a bed piled high with books. (Watson 1970, #2, 20)
Han-shan even claims to be bothered by Confucian scholars who try to convince
him to return to public life and accept office (Watson 1970, 54) -a practicewhich was common since recluses were thought to be men who held steadfast toConfucian values and thus, were considered to be ideal for public office.
ln other poems Han-shan appears not to have become a recluse in order totranscend the dust of society, either for Confucian standards ofmorality or
Buddhist goals, but because ofhis failure to succeed at Confucian examinations
and obtain public office:l'm not so po or at reports and decisionsWhy can't 1 get ahead in the government?
The rating officiaIs are determined to make life hard.
AlI they do is try to expose my faults.
Everything, 1 guess, is a matter of Fate;
Still, 1'11 try the exam again this year.
A blind boy aiming at the eye of a sparrow
Might just accidentally manage a hit. (Watson 1970, # 19, p 37)
Furthermore, at least early in his life he did not glorify the life of poverty that helater acclaimed. In one poem he reveals that living in poverty was not his choice:1 used to be fairly poor, as poor goes;
Today 1 hit the bottom of poverty and cold.
Nothing 1 do seems to come out right;
Wherever 1 go 1 get pushed around.
1 walk the muddy road and my footsteps falter;1 sit with the other villagers and my stomach
aches with hunger.
Since 1 lost the brindle cat,
The rats come right up and peer into the pot. (Watson 1970, #24, 42)71

After being laughed at for "being a hick" he even exclaims: "One day when l geta lot ofmoney/ 1'11 have a hat as high as that pagoda there!" (Watson 1970, #26,
44). One scholar thinks that this is a later addition since the interest in money is
so inconsistent with Han-shan's other poems (Henricks 260). The events of the
poet's early life may very we11 have been the impetus for his satires on the valueof Confucian learning and the lives of Confucian scholars as we11 as his criticism
of greed and wealth and his sympathy for the poor.
According to his poetry, his wife eventua11y left him while living a life ofa farmer-recluse; he then moved further from society to his final home at Cold
Mountain, which is characterized by the austere remoteness typica11y associatedwith the poet's lifestyle. The mountain is described as a cold, rugged landscape ofcliffs and gorges and is marked by an absence of human activity and work:
The path to Han-shan's place is laughable,
A path, but no sign of cart or horse.
Converging gorges - hard to trace their twists
Jumbled cliffs - unbelievable rugged.
A thousand grasses bend with dew,
A hill of pines hums in the wind.
And now l've lost the shortcut home,
Body asking shadow, how do you keep up? (Snyder 1966, #1,35)21
The paths and trails on the mountain take on a very different meaning from roads
used for the transportation of material goods; on Cold Mountain, they are either
symbolic of the path of religious pursuit or associated with the natural trails ofwildlife. Han-shan, seemingly, has gone so far down this path that he is greatly
separated from his old home and the people he knew in society.

21 There is still a trace of the fields and gardens recluse in this poem as the second line is anallusion to a poem by T'ao Ch'ien (Henricks, 34).

72

Han-shan's emphasis on the purity ofhis solitary life in nature creates aduality between nature and society and contains an attitude of transcendence
from society. Images of c1arity and purity abound in Cold Mountain. The moon
frequently appears as a symbol of light and pure white color. The jade-colored
streams are fresh and crystal c1ear. Han-shan constantly finds himself driftingwith the white c1ouds, hanging c1ear and distant from worldly dust. Even thecoldness of the mountain penetrates aIl perfectly without fault. Cold Mountain is
an ideal setting of idleness and calm that c1ears away conventional worries.
The purity of Han-shan's natural surroundings is contrasted with thedefilement of the city. Snyder uses direct, modem language to humorouslytranslate the following lines that criticize the impure pursuits of society:
In a tangle of c1iffs l chose a place Bird-paths, but no trails for men.
What's beyond the yard?
White c10uds c1inging to vague rocks.
Now l've lived here - how many years Again and again, spring and winter pass.
Go tell families with silverware and cars
"What's the use of aIl that noise and money?" (Snyder 1966, #2, 35)
Han-shan has no desire to be stained by the material desires and chaotic nature ofurban life, and after describing the wonders of his mountain home, he proc1aims
from his detached standpoint in rec1usion:
Though l look down again on the dusty world,
What is that land of dreams to me? (from Watson 1970, #44,62)
The problem with the dusty world, according to this passage, is not any physicaldefilement ofthe city, however, but rather its illusory dreams. Dust is a standard
Buddhist metaphor referring to the "six dusts," or "six gunas," which are the73sense perceptions (sight, sound, smeIl, taste, touch, and thought) that defile thepurity of the mind. Here, the dust of the city appears as the pursuit ofinsubstantial objects such as wealth and money. The physical dust and the noiseof the city are disdained as the unpleasant by-products of egotistical striving but
in themselves are also manifestations of impermanence and insubstantiality,
which are precisely the notions that the image of "dust" is meant to provoke.
As seen in the next poem, Cold Mountain's purity does not depend on its
remoteness but its lack of distinct boundaries, suggesting the limitlessness ofHan-shan's habitat as weIl as his individual self:
Cold Mountain is a house
Without beams or walls.
The six doors left and right are open
The hall is blue sky.
The rooms are aIl vacant and vague
The·east wall beats on the west wall
At the center nothing. (from Snyder 1966, #16, 39).
In this case, Cold Mountain is identified with the conventional ("house") but is
ultimately constructed. His home is no longer in human society but neither is it
limited to a specific or "pure" location. Han-shan's home is pure in its lack ofdivision, and fundamentaIly, he has no home. This is true in a literaI sense as
weIl, since after all, he may very weIl have been forced into solitude from his
failure to establish a secure place in society. From the top ofhis mountain, Hanshan declares the boundlessness ofhis world:
High, high from the summit of the peak,
Whatever way 1 look, no limit in sight! (from Watson 1970,62).
This may be allegoricai for the limitless view from the peak of religious insightand the boundlessness of buddha-nature, but even if it is allegorical, it is still74

reflective ofhow Han-shan conceptualizes and perceives his place as well as thenature of all phenomena. Han-shan's nature as an individual, the nature ofhis
home, and the nature of religious insight are all mutually reflective of one
another in their manifestation of emptiness.
Although Cold Mountain is symbolic for the ultimate, it is not asupematural world of immortals. Instead, Cold Mountain is ultimate in its lack of
distinction between self and other and as a locus for Han-shan's identification
with the ordinary, phenomenal world and the realization of its emptiness. Thereis little difference between Han-shan's home and the natural environment. We see
the conventional elements of his hut completely composed of and blended withthose ofhis natural surroundings until no distinction can be c1early made:I divined and chose a distant place to dwellT'ien-t'ai: what more is there to say?
Monkeys cry where valley mists are cold;
My grass gate blends with the color of the crags.
1 pick leaves to thatch a hut among the pines,
Scoop out a pond and lead a runnel from the spring.
By now I am used to doing without the world.
Picking fems, I pass the years that are left. (Watson 1970,43)
In another poem, he de scribes the "grass" as rus "mattress," the "blue sky" as his"quilt," and uses a "stone" for a pillow (Snyder 1966, 7). His home is not limited
to a thatched hut but extends over all of Cold Mountain, and Han-shan identifies
himself as his place and not as a separate individualliving on Cold Mountain.
Nevertheless, Han-shan do es not conflate his human form beyond ordinary

bounds but sees his individual form as insignificant in nature.
There's a naked bug at Cold Mountain
With a white body and a black head.
His hand holds two book-scrolls,

75One the Way and one its Power.
His shack's got no pots or oyen,
He goes for a walk with his shirt and pants askew.
But he always carries the sword of wisdom:
He means to cut down senseless craving. (Snyder 1966, #15, 38)
Despite being an insignificant bug, the poem ends with a return to the grandiose
image of Han-shan carrying the "sword ofwisdom." The great wisdom of Hanshan, however, is the realization of the insubstantiality of both himself andobjects of desire.
On the surface, the wildemess ofHan-shan's residence is sharply
juxtaposed to the Chinese walled cities with their square, rigid boundaries andgrid-shaped organization. But, although Cold Mountain symbolically represents
an ultimate realm, its impermanence, boundlessness, and naturalness are notfundamentally different from the characteristics of cities. It is not that society is
unnatural, but human-centered activity distracts people from the perception of
their impermanence and dependence on the natural, phenomenal world as weIl as
the insignificance of their values and pursuits in the greater context of the everchanging environment. Cities deceive urban-dwellers with the construction of
permanent walls and fixed divisions, but these illusions of stability soon crumble
with the inevitable passing of human lives and royal dynasties. In contrast, Hanshan's lifestyle is well-suited for the realization of the "true nature" ofhimself
and his place as empty and selfless, because of the absence of human value andhuman-centered activity and goals, often predicated upon notions of an
independent, permanent self. It is this insight that Han-shan is advocating in his
poetry addressed to those of urban society. Over and over again he stresses the76impermanence, not of the mountains, as much as the impermanence of the livesof civilized humans and their wealth, fame, power, and beauty.
Wise men may be free of greed,
But not the fool, who loves to dig for gold.
His fields encroach on his neighbors' lands;
And the bamboo grove? "This is aIl mine!"
See him elbow his way in search of money,
Gnash his teeth and drive his horses and slavesLook there, beyond the city grates,
How many grave mounds under the pines! (Watson 1970, #27, 45)
Han-shan's critique ofworldly pursuits is always founded upon the inevitabilityof death, as presented here in the image of the cemetery, and the failure toconform to one's impermanent nature.
Along with being a context for the realization of emptiness andimpermanence, reclusion also serves as a locus of trans-descendence. Han-shan
has not cut aIl his ties and attachments to the social world of humans as reflected
in his participation in poetic discourse. While Han-shan believes that engagement
in social interactions will inevitably lead to suffering and loss, he is not able toleave social practices behind:
Go into the world, and you're bound to be troubled and disturbed.
The affairs of the world are not all alike.
l'm not yet able to leave common customs behind;
It is these that follow me around.
Yesterday we mourned the death of Hsü Number Five;
Today we escort Liu the Third to his grave.
AlI day long l've been unable to rest;
Because ofthis, my heart is saddened and grieved. (Hemicks 212)
Here, Han-shan also reveals rus nature as a social individual who has been
conditioned by "common customs" of society -in this case the rituals of77mourning. Even Han-shan's radicallifestyle is shaped by Confucian ideals ofreclusion and poetry. Evidently, instead of cutting off one's human ties,
withdrawal from social interaction into a life of solitude makes one's dependence
on others and the desire for social interaction strikingly real and clear. Consistent
with the paradigm of trans-descendence, at these moments of sadness, Han-shan
is realizing his humanity and relationship with the human community, notachieving an independence from them. Oddly enough, particular to the reclusive
literary trope is the theme offriendship (Watson 1971, 73), and Han-shan
expresses his desire to have "a companion in my search for the Way" (Watson
1970, #60, 78), someone who can appreciate his mind and also enact thereclusive ideal. It would seem that the recluse does not intend to separate himself
from human contact as much as establish a loose "society" of reclusivecompanions and even construct lineages of eremitic families in the model of the"fields and gardens" recluse, where people subsist within communities
withdrawn from worldly gain.
Han-shan's poetry is the means through which he involves himself insociety and attempts to re-orient its self-centered motives, and it is from his placeof reclusion that Han-shan speaks with society and challenges us to meet him
face to face. In this context, Han-shan criticizes both silence and quietist
reclusion, both aspects commonly and inappropriately attached to Buddhism:
If you sit in silence and never speak,
What stories will you leave for the young people to tell?
If you live shut away in a forest thicket,
How can the sun of wisdom shine out?
No dried up carcass can be the guardian ofthe Way.
Wind and frost bring sickness and early death.

78Plow with a clay ox in a field of stone
And you will never see the harvest day! (Watson 1970, #53, 71)
Han-shan's poems directly confront and criticize various aspects of society. Often
his poems are social satires of Confucian society but also contain criticism of
Buddhist monks and institutions. He has plenty of opinions and worldly advice
on poverty, marri age, and greed; he adamantly protests against the habit of eating
meat, and in one poem he even gives advice on making money: "A man should
never stay poor;/ If you're penniless you must manage and plan" (Hemicks 198).
As in the context of poetry where he do es not abandon language for a
non-linguistic mode ofbeing, Han-shan's point in his reclusive life is not to cut
himself off from social interaction but rather to engage in society with a selflessorientation: to engage in society without atlachment to fulfilling the futile desires
for permanence and individual wealth. This is not only the message of Han-shan's
poems but his mode of operation within poetry and his mountain hermitage.

Ryokan as Recluse
Ryôkan left home to enter the monastery and rejected a future career asvillage headman. After training in the monastery, Ryôkan retumed to his village
to live at his hermitage, Gogo-an, named after the five portions of rice thatsustained the previous reclusive inhabitant. His move to hermitage was somewhat
voluntary, but the information about the situation that led to his decision to live is
not completely certain. In a reference to Han-shan he describes himself as, "Toofoggy to earn my own livelihood ever since l was bom," although he alsodeclares: "1 aspire not to gain the dust ofworldly fame and fortune" (Yuasa 59).

79

It is possible that non-religious factors may have encouraged Ryokan into a lifeof reclusion, but without doubt, his withdrawn lifestyle was a means to realize
Buddhist ideals.
His hut in the mountains remained at a distance from society, and inanother reference to Han-shan, he de scribes it as being "barred from humanapproach" (Yuasa 47). However, Ryokan gives the impression that his life is lessremote and austere than that of Han-shan and it always retains a social character.
He was far more involved with the town's people as he spent much of his timeinteracting with society on his begging rounds, and he enjoyed meeting withfriends and playing with children. Nevertheless, his life is characterized by its
simple poverty and solitude. He writes often ofhis loneliness, cold, hunger, andhardship, and his hut was cut offfrom human contact in the winter.
Like his idol Han-shan, Ryokan's life appears to be free and easy without
the work or worry of ordinary human life, since at his mountain hermitage "noworldly troubles intrude" (Abé and HaskeI120), but this does not mean that hislife is without contact from "worldly" humans. Although it is true that humanpresence is limited at his hut itself, it is the worries of self-interested pursuit, nothuman relationships, that fade away in the mountains. By accepting the risingand falling away of pleasure and pain, profit and loss, there are no pressing
concems of gaining social status or material prosperity that become irrelevant
outside the human context. Ryokan is not without sadness, loneliness, hunger andother difficulties, but he do es not worry himself with the establishment of wealthor fame and explains the resultant joy:80How many winters and springs have passed
Since 1 came to live in this secluded place?
My only vegetables are bean leaves and wild spinach
For rice, it's whatever 1 can beg from the neighbors
My greatest joy is to have so few worldly concems
l've never minded the poverty of a hermit's life
Since coming home l've grown uncommonly lazy
1 sit, 1 lie down, 1 do just as 1 like (Abé and Haskel198)
As a hermit, his life derives its playful freedom from his lack of purpose orintention, and he proudly calls himself: "The most useless man there ever was!"(Abé and HaskeI201).
Ryokan is more interested in the opportunity to interact with like-minded
individuals than to separate himself from the human world. On several occasions,Ryokan expresses his longing for companionship in his life of renunciation, andalso asks if anyone is willing to join him through similar invitations andchallenges as those of Han-shan:
All alone, leaning against a solitary pine
Together with the tree again
letting the time slip by
Is there anyone in this whole wide world
Who'll come along with me? (Abé and Haskel194)
These verses promote the reclusive ideal while at the same time inviting others tojoin in his solitude and making reclusion accessible to others.
While Ryokan claims to have "never minded hardship, hunger, and cold"(Abé and Haskel 115), he does not glorify solitude or poverty nor transe end the
difficulties associated with them:Will my stupidity and stubbornness ever end?
Poor and alone--that's my life
Twilight on the streets of a ramshackle town
Going home again with an empty bowl (Abé and Haskel114)

81

Instead of praising himself for the righteousness of reclusive life, Ryokan refers
to his stupidity and stubbornness and even holds his attachment to the beauty ofnature responsible for his poverty (Abé and Haskel141). Consistent with thismundane view of solitude is Ryokan's intolerance for transcendental images of
Taoist recluses. On his list of things that he dislikes and wishes to avoid, the one
entry for "Groundless beliefs" is: "Stories about mountain hermits who fly
through the clouds and eat only mist" (Abé and HaskeI251).
The difference between the life of reclusion and the life of society isalways predicated upon the absence or presence of worldly intention,
respectively.
A Buddhist monk of the old Indians' school
1 hid myself on Mount Kugami
1 don't recall how many springtimes ago
l've wom out countless pairs of robes
But my staffhas never left my side
Following the mountain streams
1 wander singing along distant paths
Or sit and watch the white clouds
billowing from jagged peaks
Pity the traveler in the floating worldof fame and fortune
His life spent chasing after specks ofswirling dust! (Abé and Haskel 199)
The "traveler in the floating world" is pitied for the futile pursuit of impermanent
objects, the "dust" offame and fortune, as ifthese ends were substantial andultimately obtainable. As with Han-shan, Ryokan's social criticism is based onhuman failure to realize impermanence:
How short, and how deplorable, is man's life on the earth!
A hundred years' joy once past is just a springtime dream.
Soon as our breath fails, we are already out of the world.
We are men, as long as the four elements dwell in harmony.

82

What is all this, then, 1 hear about men fighting proudly
For fame and gains, like heroes, in defiance of other men?
Come, 1 pray you to cast your eye through the windy gloom
Over the sagebrush moors, dotted with unearthed skeletons.
(Yuasa #107, 74)
However, in contrast to Han-shan, Ryôkan explicitly states that there neednot be a fundamental difference between the life of reclusion and life in society,since the primary concem is avoiding the perpetuation of self-interested pursuits
and not with the physical differences between nature and society. Living in themountains is not essential for one who can live in society without addiction toworldly desires:
Don't envy me living apart from the world of men
If you're content, you'll naturally be at peace
Who can say that amid the green hills
Are not lurking the wolves and tigers of the mind? (Abé and Haskel136)
While reclusion in the mountains may be an opportune place for selflessrealization, it do es not immunize one from delusive passions, i.e. "wolves andtigers." This poem, like the next one, which belittles the significance of isolation,
explicitly illustrates that Ryôkan's purpose is to renounce the pursuit of delusive
passions and not to escape society itself.
It's not that 1 don't care
To mingle with others
Only that l'm better
At amusing myself (Abé and Haskel 209)
And also:
l'm content just living this life of mine
It's not that 1 loathe the dust of the world (from Abé and Haskell95)

83

A similar rejection of the exceptional nature of the reclus ive life isexpressed in Dream Dialogue where Ry5kan appears to validate both living in
the city and living in solitude:
Going into town to beg
1 meet a wise old man on the roadHe asks me: "Master, why do you live there
in the mountains, among white clouds?""And you," 1 ask him:
"Why do you live out your days
here in the world's red dust?"
We both start to answer, but then remain silent
And the dawn gong startles me from my dream (Abé and Haskel184)
Ry5kan and the wise man both have their reasons for their chosen lifestyle, butthey are unable to put them into words as words are insufficient in justifying
either lifestyle. Neither man can fundamentaIly distinguish between social andsolitary living nor ultimately rationalize a higher value for one or the other. In
place of rational explanation, their silence and the sound of the gong resolve theirdilemma and disagreement. The gong is representative of the Buddhist temple,
and its sound permeates aIl indiscriminately. Although urban-dwelling andmountain-dweIling each retain their unique function and significance, the soundof the beIl connects both modes of being and wakes up both men to the goal of
selfless action regardless of the environment. The beIl shatters Ry5kan's "dream"of the fundamental difference between reclusion and social engagement andawakens him to their nonduality.
One significant feature of reclusion, however, is that it provides Ry5kan
with a context in which he can realize his identification with the natural world
and lose a sense of separate human identity. On the one hand, Ry5kan finds

84

himselfbecoming friends with non-human and even inanimate objects, such as
the neighboring plants, hills, and streams (Abé and Haskel195; Yuasa 62), andhis best friend is always his poor and simple and often empty begging bowl. Even
more so, Ryokan becomes the natural objects around him. The description ofnatural images in Zen poetry can reflect the nonduality of self and other as thepoet is cut out of the picture while identifying with the object. Ryokan.is often
more explicit about his deep connection with nature. In one poem, he refers tohimself as "sütra-chanting spring bird" (Yuasa 127) and in another he identifies
his life with a stream:
Faint trickle ofmossy water froma crevice in the mountain rock:the clear still way
1 pass through the world (Watson 1977,20)
Here we see Ryokan's clarity and purity expressed by his impermanence and lackof fixed boundaries -features which are not unique to Ryokan but which heputs into practice in his daily actions. Ryokan takes running water as his model ofaction in this poem on the surroundings ofhis hut, Tribute to Gogo-an:
The water of the valley stream
Never shouts at the tainted world"Purify yourselfl"
But naturally, as it isShows how it is done (Abé and Haskel21O)
Here, Ryokan acknowledges his preference for actualization over rational
arguments and demands. The stream shows us how to be pure by actualizing its
original, impermanent nature without the attempt to be permanent. For Ryokan
the world is "tainted" not because it lacks purity, but through its striving for85

independence and permanence, it does not realize, in either a conceptual or actual
way, that it is always and already pure. When the purity of impermanence isacknowledged, the entire universe becomes pure: "Everywhere 1 look, the worldis vast, clear / without a trace of dust" (Abé and Haskel 166). Nevertheless, theconventional distinction of "tainted" or "impure" is used for actions that fail torealize these fundamental conditions of existence.
Reclusion is also a context for Ryokan to accept his fundamental
homelessness that inhibits the reification of his physical residence as a realm
independent from society:1 have been wandering
Like a floating cloudAs 1 have no place to stay in;Thus 1 have lived so far. (Kodama and Yanagishima 63)
The transience ofboth Ryokan's environment and his individual selfprevents
Ryokan from resting in any permanent place.
From the distance of reclusion, Ryokan realizes his dependence on others
more profoundly than Han-shan does and illustrates a greater sense ofcompassion. His reliance on others is particularly exemplified by the constantactivity ofhis begging rounds and the sustenance he receives through gifts fromfriends. Ryokan acknowledges this dependence in his poems as weIl as his
enjoyment ofbeing in the company offriends:
In my thatch hut, with nothing but the four bare walls
Relying on others, 1 live out my remaining years
Sometimes an old friend comes to stay
And we sit up together listening
to the music of the bell-ring insects (Abé and Haskel122)86

Ryokan's life of solitude exaggerates feelings of loneliness and awarenessofhis attachment to people and thus, illustrates a trans-descendence back into
human bonds. As he notes, his reclusion is not helpful in forgetting about humansociety:
It may seem that 1 have locked myself
Away from the people of the world
AndyetWhy is it
1 have never ceased to think ofthem? (Abé and Haskel 211)
Many of Ryokan's poems are expressions of the loneliness he feels in seclusion
and the sadness at the passing ofhis friends, his teachers, and even objects ofnature. So many ofhis poems end with the mention ofhis tears that the theme
starts to seem insincere. However, his genuine sadness and loneliness cornes
through in poems like this one:
It's not the same this year as lastThings now aren't what they were
1 wonder where my old friends are?
New friends already have begun drifting off
It's worst of all at this time of year
now when the leaves are scattering down
When mountains and streams turn somber again
nothing anywhere seems to please
Everything 1 see
Fills me with icy loneliness (Abé and Haskel 170)
Even from the remoteness ofhis home, he identifies with the suffering of
those living in society, and in contrast to Han-shan his concem with worldly
pursuit is often expressed as compassion rather than criticism. On seeing peopleof the world "aU busy trying to satisfy their hungry desires," he comments:
Alas, 1 cannot but take pity on the proud men of the world,
For they are doomed to an endless struggle, robbed of rest.
Tears run down my face, in spite ofmyself, as 1 sit alone,87

And muse on man's wretched state over and over in the dark.
(from Yuasa #105, 73)
For Ryokan, reclusion is an opportunity to develop a sense of compassion for theworld rather than a detached position oftranscendence, and it is Ryokan's
realization of interdependence in solitude that leads to an awareness of his
inseparability from both human settlements and non-human wildemess. As wewill see, it is not Ryokan's transcendence from suffering but his ordinary desiresthat allow for his compassion and egoless connection to the world.

Conclusion

While Han-shan and Ryokan withdraw from the ordinary pursuits ofhuman society, their reclusion is not a transcendence fromthe conventional
world. Rather, their withdrawn, solitary lifestyles are a me ans to realize thenature of the conventional world as empty and impermanent. Their intention is
not to uphold their individual moral integrity, as in the Confucian model, or
remain anonymous for self-preservation like the Taoist model but to challenge
self-centered orientations that are particularly exaggerated in urban settings. Hanshan and Ryokan only serve as models of the ideal reclusive lifestyle in theirsubmission to nature as the ultimate paradigm for ethical activity. Nature here
refers not just to wildemess but to the empty nature of things. While thewildemess is skillfully juxtaposed to the profit driven structures ofhumanhabitation, Ryokan and Han-shan emphasize the fundamental, selfless nature ofboth the wildemess and the city. Their concem is not with abandoning or
fundamentally altering the social nature ofhumans; rather, they criticize society

88for failing to realize, through self-centered strivings for wealth, power, fame, andimmortality, its own impermanent, interdependent nature.
While both poets, particularly Han-shan, often desire to cut all emotionalties and interaction with human society, their emotion for people of the past andengagement with society through poetry attest to their dependence on, rather thanindependence from, human society. Reflecting the three stages of nonduallogic,
reclusion as an other-worldly goalends up with a return to the secular. At first,
the recluse rejects the conventional householder life with its pursuit of ordinary
human goals and attempts to leave the world of delusion and attachment behindin order to seek the purity and freedom of the mountains. In reclusion, however,
one finds that it is humanly impossible to transcend the immanent world or
human interaction.
Despite their rants against worldly pursuits, it should be made c1ear that
Han-shan and Ryokan are not without desire or self-interest, i.e. delusive
passions. These desires are exemplified by Ryokan's love of sake, nature, goodfriends, and children as well as his feelings of sadness; Han-shan also expresses
both joys of solitude and periods of sorrow, and of course, both poets enjoy
literature and writing. The next chapter will investigate how these desires
function in their poetry and fit into the poets' ideas of buddha-nature andenlightenment.

89

Chapter FourTrans-descendence: The Path to Cold Mountain

Introduction
As outlined in the introduction, the dualistic separation of enlightenmentand delusion has prevented scholars from reconciling Han-shan's and Ryokan's
emotions of sadness and expressions of failure with the Zen ideal. Examining
Han-shan's and Ryokan's interpretation ofthat ideal, however, including the ideasof enlightenment and buddha-nature, the concept that aIl sentient beings are
already Buddhas and inherently enlightened, reveals a non-transcendent view that
does not deny ordinary feelings or seek a higher level of consciousness,
existence, or knowledge. Instead, their ideal is to realize the very nature ofordinary existence and human nature with its passions and ignorance.
Furthermore, seen through the interpretive lens of the functional model oflanguage, expressions of sorrow and loneliness can manifest the selfless, nontranscendent heart/mind ofthese poets as weIl as their profound humanity. These
expressions may be failures to fulfiIl a transcendent ideal but invoke a greatawareness of impermanence and a non-attachment to a transcendent ego.

Cold MountainAs mentioned previously, the name Han-shan, or Cold Mountain,
traditionally represents the author, ms place, and his state of mind. Encompassing
aIl these elements is Cold Mountain's symbolism as buddha-nature, one's original90

nature as empty, impermanent, and enlightened. Next to impermanence, buddhanature is the most common theme in Han-shan's poems. Buddha-nature is often
referred to through conventional images as the pearl or as a priceless jewel that is
the mind; it is more valuable than any external object and maintains its character
and worth despite the ever-changing nature of the phenomenal world. Here, Hanshan uses the images of the moon (as enlightenment) and sky (as emptiness) toillustrate the enlightened mind and its value:
On top of Cold Mountain the lone round moon
Lights the whole clear cloudless sky.
Honor this priceless natural treasure
Concealed in five shadows, sunk deep in the flesh. (Snyder 1966, #22,

4oi2

Buddha-nature is not outside of ourselves, and its value is always put in terms ofpricelessness since it is not an object that can be exchanged from one to anotherbut is the inherent nature of things themselves.
While, on the one hand, Cold Mountain stands as t~e ever-present natureof the poet and the world, it also represents the spiritual goal to be atlained. These
conflicting elements are expressed together in discussion of the path:
Men ask the way to Cold Mountain
Cold Mountain: there's no through trail.
In summer, ice doesn't melt
The rising sun blurs in swirling fog.
How did I make it?
My heart's not the same as yours.
If your heart was like mine
You'd get it and be right here. (Snyder 1966, #6, 36)

22 The "five shadows" are the five skandhas, the five elements (fonn, sensation, perception, will,

and consciousness) that compose the self(Henricks 283).

91Fundamentally, there is no path that goes to Cold Mountain since it is not an
object to be attained or a final destination. Han-shan made it without a trail since

it is not a separate condition or experience -he is already there -and hisrealization does not depend on a physical path but the realization of originalmind. Or instead, the path can be seen in another way:l climb the road to Cold Mountain,
The road to Cold Mountain that never ends. (Watson 1970, #40,58)
While there is a way of practice, there is no end to the practice since it does nothave an end different from its beginning. Being on the path to Cold Mountain,
then, is the constant realization of one's immediate existence. After all, Han-shan
is not only on the path to Cold Mountain, he is Cold Mountain. Or, in otherwords, Cold Mountain is on the path to Cold Mountain -a practice that

actualizes the equality of the ends and me ans as well as their difference andparallels the idea that buddha-nature is bOth the mind that desires enlightenment
and the mind of enlightenment. Interestingly, in the first poem, Han-shan
distinguishes his own heart (or mind) from the heart/mind of those who ask how
he arrived at Cold Mountain. Here there is a play between the ideas of original
enlightenment and attainment. Although Cold Mountain is the original nature of
the mind and all things, it is nevertheless something that humans fail to realize.
Thus, Han-shan can maintain the conventional distinction between the awakened
and deluded without denying original enlightenment. Here, the life ofrec1usion,

does not depend on a physicallocation or physical exertion. Being "right here" orin the "center" (Henricks 44) does not refer to the mountains as much as theawareness of the immediate present.

92

Ihat Cold Mountain symbolizes original enlightenment is also expressedin Han-shan's language of returning to Cold Mountain. His poem, citedpreviously, on purifying his ears after his early years ofworldly living andeducation contains the Hne: "Ioday l'm back at Cold Mountain" (Snyder 1966,#12,38), or "today l've come home to Han-shan" (Henricks 400). Henricks notesthat the use ofhome is: "Not in the sense that he has lived here before, but in thesense that this is where he truly belongs" (Henricks 400). He belongs here since
Cold Mountain nianifests his empty nature, not only in terms of ontological being
but in terms of selfless action associated with reclusion. Selfless behavior can be
described as a return because it puts Buddha-nature, previously obscured byegotistical thoughts and clinging, into action.
As in LaFleur's model of symbolism discussed in Chapter Iwo, Cold
Mountain, as symbol, functions as the identification of conventional and ultimate,form and emptiness. Emptiness, enlightenment, and buddha-nature only exist
within the concrete world of Cold Mountain as physicallocation and as theidentity of the poet. Buddha-nature and emptiness do not exist apart fromordinary objects or everyday mind. For this reason, despite the language of
buddha-nature as a pearl within the mind, neither buddha-nature nor emptinessare distinct objects to be grasped or attained. Henricks de scribes Zen and Hanshan's message ofbuddha-nature as "Buddha is on the inside not on the outside"(Henricks 19) and also "in reality there is only one thing, the one mind"(Henricks 20), but this view also objectifies buddha-nature, which ultimately
cannot have inside or outside, and turns mind into a 'thing' rather than 'no-thing,'

93

the absence of a fixed nature. One poem is particularly clear on the non-objective
and nondual nature ofbuddha-nature and its connection to the image ofCold
Mountain:
My home was at Cold Mountain from the start,
Rambling among the hills, far from trouble.
Gone, and a million things leave no trace
Loosed, and it flows through the galaxies
A fountain of light, into the very mind Not a thing, and yet it appears before me:
Now l know the pearl of the Buddha-nature
Know its use: a boundless perfect sphere. (Snyder 1966, #23, 40)

There is no inside or outside to this notion of buddha-nature which although is"not a thing" does not exist apart from the objective, phenomenal world
appearing before Han-shan. After aIl, Han-shan's notion of mind and buddhanature is without distinction of self and other, inside and outside.
When you have leamed to know in this way,
You will know there is no inside or out! (from Watson 1970, #86, 104i3
The previous poem simultaneously describes the selfless nature of Cold
Mountain as a physicallocation where impermanent objects "leave no trace" andas a symbol of Buddha-nature, whose ultimate referent remains undefined, nonobjectifiable, and ungraspable.
The realization of buddha-nature is not a transcendence from the world
but a complete identification with the immediate conditions of the ordinary
world, which, according to Buddhism, is marked by impermanence, suffering,and selflessness. Han-shan does not transcend the impermanence of life and the

23 Ifyou can know the mind in this way,

This is a knowledge that has no back side. (from Henricks 294-295)

94inevitability of death nor is he free from the conditions and causes of thephenomenal world. Over and over again Han-shan lashes out against the foolishpursuit of immortality, associated with Taoist practices, and emphasizes death as
the natural outcome to life. Although outnumbered by poems pointing to theinevitability of death, there are sorne poems, however, in which Han-shan
appears to support the search for immortality. This may be explained by the factthat he did experiment with immortality practices and potions in his youth: "Trieddrugs, but couldn't make Immortal" (Snyder 1966, #12, 38). He clearly failed,however, and he feels his strivings were in vain: "A waste ofyourself, the search
for long life" (Henricks 125). He never ceases to point out that aIl the Emperors,
Buddhists, and Taoists who attempted to avoid death aIl ended up in graves
overgrown with weeds:
Lots of wise men have lived since ancient times,
And there they lie, under the green hill. (from Watson 1970, #87, 105)
In the end, the only place Han-shan identifies with the land of the immortals is
the royal cemetery (Henricks 91), since for Han-shan, death is the only definite
outcome where everyone will rest.
Moreover, the delusive search for immortality leads to unnecessary pain
and sorrow as expressed in this aIlegory of a crane, a conventional symbol ofimmortality, who sets out to a legendary mountain to gain etemallife:
The crane, with a twig of bitter peach in his bill,
Rested but once in thousand miles.
He wanted to go to the mountain ofP'eng-lai,
And the peach was to serve him as food on the way.
Still far from the goal, his feathers dropped off;
Parted from the flock, his heart grew sad.
And when he hurried home to his nest,

95

He found that his wife no longer knew him. (Watson 1970, #83, 101)
This poem appears to be allegoricai for Han-shan's own life and religious que stand is reminiscent ofhis poem on the separation from his wife:
Last night in a dream l returned to my old home
And saw my wife weaving at her loom.
She held her shuttle poised, as though lost in thought,
As though she had no strength to lift it further.
l called. She turned her head to look,
But her eyes were blank - she didn't know me.
So many years we've been parted
The hair at my temples has lost its old color. (Watson 1970, #63,81)
The poem also invokes a sense of sadness for his distance from his wife and evenhis loss of recognition in the world. The above allegory of the crane interestingly
warns against Han-shan's own decision to separate himselffrom society to search
for transcendent goals. In stark contrast to the legends of Han-shan's independentand joyfullife out of the dust of society, here, he puts forth a humble, nontranscendent confession -albeit indirectly -of his ordinary human nature,dependent on human interaction, and his inability to reach the illusory land ofimmortality. The language of allegory creates a more appealing poem through its
placement in a broader context of spiritual search and its critique of conventional
symbols ofimmortality, but as weIl, the replacement of the subject with theimage of the crane attests to a sense of shame for the foolish pursuit ofunobtainable goals.
In his rejection of immortality, Han-shan affinns on severa! occasions that
there is no transcendence from samsara, the world of rebirth and suffering, nor
the pain and sadness associated with it:
The greatest sages from ancient times

96

Have not shown us life immortal.
What is bom in time must die;
AlI will be changed to dust and ashes.
Bones pile up like Mount Vipula,
Tears ofparting would make a sea,
And aIl that's left are empty names.
Who escapes the wheel ofbirth and death? (Watson 1970, #74, 92)
Since Han-shan rejects escape from the realm of samsara, he is forced to identify
with its suffering and desire. This is the realization of the Mahayana Buddhist
maxim that nirvana is itself samsara. As Han-shan realizes there is no separationfrom sam sara, there is no samsara to transcend and no self to transcend it; thus,
liberation and suffering become one. While Han-shan rejects freedom from deathand change, this acceptance itself is a transcendence of egotistical striving forindependent, permanent existence. The realization of impermanence is like acontinuous death and re-birth of the self, and thus, one's final death can be seen
as merely a part in the constant flow of experience. However, this detached view,
while important, eventualIy succumbs to the ordinary feelings and suffering of
humankind.
We see Han-shan's humanity in a number of poems on the loss of friends
and separation from others. One of the most well-known expressions ofhis
attachment to others is found in the folIowing poem:l have lived at Cold Mountain
These thirty long years.
Yesterday l called on friends and family:
More than halfhad gone to the Yellow Springs.
Slowly consumed, like a passing river.
Now, moming, l face my lone shadow:
Suddenly my eyes are bleared with tears. (Snyder 1966, #10, 37)

97

In this poem, we see Han-shan in the unusual activity of looking for people heknew from human society. Finding many ofthem gone to the "Yellow springs,"
which refers to the underworld, he initially takes on a seemingly detached view
as he relates their passing to the ordinary impermanence of natural things. But,
when he faces his own loneliness, impermanence, and insubstantiality ("my loneshadow"), he is surprised by his sudden tears and sadness. Perhaps this is aturning point in the poems of Han-shan -a point at which he had thought he hadtranscended attachments to the human world and ordinary feelings of sadness anddespair but is suddenly aware ofhis ordinary humanity. On the surface, this poem
reveals a failure on the path to being a non-attached Buddha. But if we read thepoem as an expression of the poet's mind, as in the expressive-affective model oflanguage, Han-shan reveals a selfless and sincere expression of humanity -anon-attachment to a transcendent ideal. Although he knows that things areimpermanent, Han-shan realizes that he is not beyond ordinary desires forpermanence and companionship. On the descriptive level, this poem recounts anexperience of sadness that reveals ordinary, delusive attachment, and although
rus sadness is revealed in descriptive language, it is performative as a sincere andhumble confession that embodies the selfless mind, unattached to asserting anegotistical image of transcendence. The descriptive and performative, then,function together in a paradoxical and nondual manner that clings to neither
attachment nor non-attachment.
Another key feature of the expressive theory of language is the
spontaneous, nonintentional display of emotion. In Han-shan's poem, not only98

does the expression of emotion arise without self-conscious premeditation but theintention to be selfless is also absent. Han-shan does not attempt to put forth aselfless, detached image of himself, but instead he expresses his own
attachments.
Han-shan recognizes only through ms attempts to avoid sadness that it is
not a condition from which he can separate himself permanently or completely:
l've heard it said that sorrows are hard to dispel;
These words, l've said, are not true.
Yet yesterday mom 1 drove them away,
And today l'm encumbered again.
The month cornes to an end, but my sorrow doesn't end;
The year starts afresh, but my sorrows are also renewed.
Who is to know that under this cap of cane
There is fundamentally a man who's been sad a very long time.
(Henricks 72)
Here we have a testament to Han-shan's complete failure to transcend sufferingand his final and fundamental identification with sadness. Even a poem attributedby Pulleyblank to Han-shan II dec1ares his unbearable depression (Watson 1970,#36,54; Henricks 344); thus, ifwe accept Pulleyblank's division of Han-shan's
poems, the theme of sadness was seemingly relevant even to those who madelater additions to the Han-shan collection.
In a poem supposedly written in Han-shan's old age, the idea that sadness
is an inevitable experience of existence arises from Han-shan's connection
between his feelings at the 10ss of his family and youth with the impermanence ofthe seasons and natural objects:
Last year, in the spring, when the birds were calling,99

1 thought of my brothers and kin.
This year, when faU chrysanthemums bloom,
1 remember the time of my youth,
When green waters murmured in a thousand streams
And yellow clouds filled the sky.
Ah, all the hundred years of my life
Must 1 recall with such heartache those days in the capital?
(Watson 1970, #52, 70)
Waley translates the fifth line as "Green waters sob" (Waley 1954, #21, 7), aninterpretation supported by Henricks (Henricks 254). Not only is sadness anatural response to the impermanence of things but nature itself appears to be sadin Han-shan's poem. In another poem, even hearing the songs of a fishermanfrom his distant life in reclusion fiUs him with sadness as he identifies with thefeelings of others (Watson 1970, #41,59). The attention to transience is not
limited to external objects but takes on full meaning when impermanence relatesback to the self and dislodges egotistical attachments to an independent self thatmerely observes change as an object. Han-shan's sadness is not only expressed
for the passing away of others but for his own impermanence:
1 sit alone in constant fret,Pressed by endless thoughts and feelings.
Clouds hang about the waist of the mountain,
Wind moans in the valley mouth.
Monkeys come, shaking branches;
A bird flies into the wood with shrill cries.
Seasons pass and my hair grows ragged and grey;Year's end finds me old and desolate. (Watson 1970, #51,69)
This is quite a different picture of Han-shan from the one who is free ofaU troubles and joyfuUy lives his life of solitude without regret. However, besides
the images of transcendence and wisdom constructed around Han-shan, like thesuggestion that he is the incarnation of Mai'ijusrï, the bodhisattva of wisdom,100Han-shan's poetry also contains themes of freedom and transcendence fromordinary troubles and suffering. Many of them comment on his clear and calm
state of mind and his undefiled nature free of delusion:
Among a thousand clouds and ten thousand streams,
Here lives an idle man,In the daytime wandering over green mountains,
At night coming home to sleep by the cliff.
Swiftly the springs and autumns pass,
But my mind is at peace, free from dust or delusion.
How pleasant, to know 1 need nothing to lean on,
To be still as the waters for the autumn river! (Watson 1970, #61, 79)
Sorne poems also present Han-shan's life in the mountains as etemally happy andcarefree:Ever since 1 escaped to these co Id cliffs,
Happy l've been, forever 1 sing and 1 smile. (Henricks 401)
The contrast between these poems and his expressions of sadness raises thequestion of the exact nature of delusion and enlightenment in Han-shan's poems ..
His identification with sadness does not mean that Han-shan iscompletely sorrowful and does not experience the joy and happiness that he often
expresses about his life of reclusion. Han-shan has not transcended ordinary
feelings of either sadness or happiness. His attitude of non-attachment is not one
that lacks passion but corresponds to the model presented by Japanese Zen poetof the Gozan era, Gid6 Shüshin:
Miserably cold, the temple before dawn,
Still and lonely, few monks to be seen;
The temple is old, with soot-blackened walls,
The pond overgrown, its surface like folds in a robe;
Incense before the Buddha has bumed, gone out, tumed cold,
The sermon over, blossoms fly in the rain;l've reached the point of doing away with happiness and sadnessA white board door swinging to and fro in the breeze. (Pollack 47)

101

The swaying emotions of happiness and sadness still arise like a door swinging inand out, but one does not separate oneself from the coming and going of ordinary
emotions by trying either to avoid sorrow and pursue a permanent state ofhappiness like an addiction or eliminate feelings altogether. As mentioned in the
introduction, Watson and Blofield see Han-shan's poems as a series offailuresand successes on his religious path. This is partially true, but Han-shan's
successes and failures at realizing the Buddhist ideal are the inverse of what thesescholars assume. Han-shan's failure to be always content and beyond humanemotions and attachments is his realization of his selflessness, impermanence,and humanity. In contrast, Han-shan's occasional conflations ofhis joy ofreclusion to be a permanent, transcendent condition are failures to realize his
impermanent and human nature.
Han-shan himself provides a nondual view of enlightenment as notseparate from desire. Henricks translates the following poem as:
Have you not seen the dew that descends in the mom?
With the sparkling rays of the sun, of itself it dispels and is gone.
Man's life is also like this;Jambudvïpa24 - this is just where we stop over awhile.
Never, never pass your time just going along;
Moreover, you must cause the three poisons to leave.
Wisdom must take the place of delusion;
You must totally make this so -let no delusion remain. (Henricks 292)

24 ln the cosmology of Mount Sumeru, "Jambudvïpa is the Indian name of the continent on which
we live" (Henricks 292).

102But Henricks notes that the second to last line literally says, "bodhi is none otherthan klda," (Henricks 293), or in other words, "enlightenment itselfis delusion."
Henricks' translation misses the point by imposing a dualistic interpretation onto
the nondual message of the original. Han-shan is simultaneously advocating theabandonment of the three poisons (anger, desire, and ignorance) while saying that
delusive passions are themselves enlightenment. In the last line, he says "let nodelusion remain" or as Red Pine translates: "let there be nothing left at aIl" (RedPine 1983, #208). Delusion in the finalline cornes to mean the duality ofenlightenment and delusive passions. When there is "no delusion" or "nothingleft at all" there is a complete nonduality of delusion and enlightenment, nirvana
and samsara. The three part logic of Zen is evident here: first, there is delusion;then delusion is no other than enlightenment; finally, delusion is delusion again.
Delusive passions are thus transcended only by accepting one's own ignorance
and desire. Since Han-shan does not have any transcendent wisdom, he describes
himself as neither a wise man nor a fool. His wisdom is that he knows theignorance and desire inherent in his human nature, and this mundane wisdom
liberates him from arrogant assertions of knowledge and transcendence.

RyokanLike those that admire him as a Zen master, Ryokan also depicts his life
in an apparently transcendent manner, and in sorne poems he suggests that he isunaffected by the concems of ordinary life:
My nature is to be free of attachment
Whatever 1 do, my thoughts are at ease (from Abé and Haskel113)

103

It is often his simple life of reclusion that prompts his contemplation on thefreedom of his life. After reading the poems of Han-shan in his hut, he asks,"What is there to worry about / what is there to trouble me?" (Abé and Haskel
126), and he paints himself as living in a mode of ideal non-attachment in which
he does not discriminate between good and bad: ''l'm naturally happy, whatever
cornes my way" (Abé and HaskeI201).
But, more often his poems express his humble way of life, his sorrow forfriends, teachers, and relatives who have passed away, and his loneliness inreclusion. Ryokan associates his lonely life ofpoverty with the image ofhis"empty bowl."
Shivering in the autumn wind
1 find shelter for two nights
in a pious home
One robe and one bowl
This is my life, simple and pure (Abé and Haskel 146)
These are the poems that sorne scholars see as evidence ofhis failure at Zen, andRyokan remarks on his own lack of success:As a boy, 1 studied the arts, failing to become a scholar.
In youth, 1 studied zen, failing to obey my master's lamp.
1 now live in a grassy cottage, merged in a Shinto shrine,
Not unlike a shrine-keeper, or unlike a prophet of Buddha. (Yuasa #88,

66i

5

However, as Abé has noted (Abé and Haskel 36), Ryokan never ceased to engage
in Buddhist practice and employ Buddhist themes. If we examine Ryokan's own

25 As a boy 1 studied literature,

but was too lazy to become a Confucian;in my young days 1 worked at Zen,but got no Dharma worth handing down. (Watson 1977,99)104

interpretation of enlightenment and Buddhist realization, he gives us a nontranscendent view of Zen practice that can help make sense ofhis simultaneous
Buddhist practice and expressions of sorrow.
Ry6kan, like Han-shan, provides a similar model of realization andbuddha-nature that is nondual and non-transcendent. Ryôkan is very clear that his
Zen training did not a110w him to bec orne anything special nor did it change himin any fundamental way. This is not to say his Zen training failed in its purpose,but that it served to reveal the nature of his ordinary being.
When 1 was young, 1 abandoned my father
and ran off to other domains
1 struggled hard to paint atiger
But couldn't even come up with a cat
If anyone asks about my realization, 1'11 say:"Just the same old Eiz6." (Abé and Haske1142)
As Eiz6 is Ry6kan's given name from before he became a monk, it is evident that
Ry6kan did not attain anything extraordinary. While Ry6kan very humbly admits
that he hardly lived up to his ideal ofbecoming a tiger, he does not deny having
insight. Although his realization may appear to be trivial and irrelevant, unlike
the arrogance and power associated with becoming atiger, its selflessness andhumility are consistent with the idea of no self. In other poems, Ry6kan explicitly
identifies the relationship between the nature of insight and the absence ofchange.
How mçmy years 1 spent parting the wild grasses
to penetrate the inmost depths
Then suddenly 1 understood my teacher
and came back to my native place
You go there and come back again
Yet everything remains the same
Clouds covering the mountain's summit

105

Streams flowing by at your feet

(Abé and Haskel 148)

This poem is reminiscent of a well-known Chinese poem, attributed to Su Tungp'o, that explicitly makes the point that after is the same as before:
Misty rain on Mount Lu, tide in the River Che;
If I do not go there, a thousand regrets will never let me be.
I went and returned, it was nothing special:
Misty rain on Mount Lu, tide in the River Che. (Hori 2003, 595)
As Abé notes (Abé and HaskeI67-68), Ryôkan's poem can be read as both adescription of his life (going to the monastery and then returning to his home)and of the Buddhist path. His understanding from "parting the wild grasses"(delusive thoughts) brings him back to his "native place," his original buddhanature, without any fundamental change. The final images of clouds and streams
are manifestations of the impermanence that is characteristic of the originalnature ofRyôkan and all things. The interplay between conventional and ultimate
meanings is found in the image ofhis "native place," which effectively represents
both his home village (the conventional interpretation) aùd buddha-nature (theultimate interpretation). The banality of the literaI, conventional interpretation isessential in highlighting the ordinariness of its symbolic meaning; buddha-nature
is not something to be found outside of everyday experience and phenomena.
Like Han-shan, Ryôkan rejects the idea of a path that leads to a separate, extraordinary state of enlightenment.
No path leads us to our spiritual awakening
Nor do we find our destination
When we catch sight ofSome state of enlightenment and pursue it directly
We shall find it receding from us farther than ever.
(from Kodama and Yanagishima 93)

106

Enlightenment is not an object that can be grasped or attained as impermanenceand selflessness are manifest in all phenomenal experience.
Despite the evident realization ofhis nature, Ryôkan, unlike many ofhis
admirers, does not make any daim to enlightenment (or safari).
AlI my life too lazy to try to get ahead,l leave everything to the truth of Heaven.
In my sack three measures of rice,by the stove one bundle of stickswhy ask who's got satori, who hasn't?
What would l know about that dust, fame and gain?
Rainy nights here in my thatched hut
l stick out my two legs any old way l please. (Watson 1977, 89)
Judgments of enlightenment and delusion are based in the dualistic and selfcentered perspectives of worldly minds, and Ryôkan warns not to get attached toidealistic concepts that miss the point of Buddhist teachings. Abé comments, "Asif mocking the polemic of modem Ryôkan scholarship, Ryôkan asserts that, to begenuinely enlightened, practitioners must free themselves from the dualities of'enlightenment' and 'nonenlightenment'" (Abé and Haskel 42). Ryôkan does
discard the duality between enlightenment and delusion, but he is not exactly free"from" this duality since he also distinguishes between the two, as does Abé inthe above quote ("genuinely enlightened"). Abé wants t~ maintain a distinction
between enlightenment and duality, but he fails to both distinguish and identify
them. "While enlightenment and nonenlightenment are inseparably intertwined,
the latter, like the waves, is secondary, transient, and has no innate essence ....

To attain enlightenment is ... to realize thoroughly the indestructible quality ofthe originally enlightened mind amid the ever-changing waves of ignorance"(Abé and Haskel 44). A stronger daim can be made for the identification of107

enlightenment and delusion, however; according to Mahâyâna Buddhist rhetoric,
enlightenment and delusion are not merely interconnected, enlightenment itself isdelusion. The goddess in the Vimalakïrti Sütra explains the connection and pokes
fun at the dualistic definition of enlightenment (such as the one given by Blofieldin the introduction): "'Liberation is freedom from desire, hatred, and folly' -thatis the teaching for the excessively proud. But those free of pride are taught thatthe very nature of desire, hatred, and folly is itself liberation" (Thurman 60). Abéreifies enlightenment as being a superior entity "amid" but not "as" delusion
itself. But enlightenment do es not have an "innate essence" either, and whenenlightenment itself is delusion, enlightenment, thus, becomes defined by thecomplete absence of enlightenment. It is this absence of enlightenment that
Ryokan displays in his poetry, and it is the delusion that an independent,
permanent state of enlightenment exists that Ryokan strives to dispel. Thereinlies the identity and difference of enlightenment and delusion.
Delusion and enlightenment
two sides of a coin
Universal and particular
just parts of one whole
AH day I read the wordlessscriptures
AIl night I practice no-practice meditation
On the riverbank, a bush warbler
sings in the weeping willow
In the sleeping village, a dog bays at the moon
Nothing troubles the free flow of my feelings
But how can this mind be passed on? (Abé and Haskel155)
His feelings are not impeded by his Buddhist practice but flow freely. At
the same time, Ryokan recognizes that desire leads to suffering, as in this passage
reminiscent of the Tao Te Ching:108

Desire nothing, and you're content with everything
Pursue things, and you're thwarted at every turn(from Abé and Haskel196)
In the foHowing poem, Ryokan appears to advocate the avoidance ofhumanbonds because of the inevitable suffering created through their impermanence:
We meet, we part
Free as white clouds that come and go
AH that remains
are the fugitive traces of brush and ink
The world of human bonds
is not the place to find what we seek (Abé and Haskel171)
However, even though human bonds are a source of suffering, loneliness,
attachment, and sadness, Ryokan cannot help but desire and enjoy friendship, andhe even describes himself as "Chained by the bond of attachment to my native
village" (Yuasa 61). He desires companionship when he's lonely, he is sad about
things that have passed away, and he had a strong attraction to the nun Teishin at
the end ofhis life. Ryokan sees his feelings as part of the conditions and causes
ofhis life:
What is this life of mine?
Rambling on, I entrust myself to fate.
Sometimes laughter, sometimes tears. (from Stevens 2004, 25)
He does not seek to separate himself from the emotions of happiness or sadness
as he explains:
Let me laugh when I am inclined to;
Let me shed tears when I am sad!
Indeed, I am neither for the world not against it.
(Kodama and Yanagishima 21)
This last line is key to understanding Ryokan's relationship to the ordinary world.
He realizes that the world is impermanent and insubstantial; he knows that109

desires lead to suffering, but nevertheless he is not independent from desire,
suffering, or impermanence, and he constantly contrasts the non-attached ideal of
the Buddhist to ms real, ordinary life.
Nowand thenl hear leaves falling
While sitting alone.
l have cut off my ties
With the world, and yet
Why should l shed tears? (Kodama and Yanagishima 86)
Abé insists that Ry5kan's expressions of sadness and failure are not to betaken literally but as figurative expressions. Ifhis poems are taken literally, notonly will his life appear to have been sorrowful but because of the contrast
between his expressions of detachment and failure, his poems "only provide
conflicting pictures ofhis daily life" (Abé and Haske136). Abé, relying on
Aristotle's distinction between poetry and history, sees the problem with theliteraI interpretation of Ry5kan's poems is that poems are not reliable, historical
records (Abé and HaskeI36). Abé argues that Ry5kan's descriptive poems arereally metaphorical and redesèriptive and cites Paul Ricoeur's theory on the
power of metaphor to "redescribe reality" (Abé and Haskel 37). "Poetic reference
arises out of the suspension by the metaphorical of the literaI reference, asuspension that generates a condition to unleash poetry's power to redescribe
what is conventionally accepted as reality" (Abé and Haskel 38). But Ry5kan'sfunction as a Zen poet is not to deny literaI interpretation nor divide themetaphorical significance from its literary meaning. Not only is this a dualistic
approach to literature and metaphor, but it is not an approach or a distinction
generally accepted by the poetics of Chinese and Japanese literature or Ry5kan

110himself. Like Ki no Tsurayuki's expressive theory ofpoetry discussed in Chapter
Two, Ryokan's feelings are supposed to be his genuine response to nature.
Ryokan followed the Japanese aesthetic principle of mono no aware, aheightened attention to the sadness and beauty of fleeting, natural objects, which
was popular among contemporary critics like Motori Norinaga (1730-1801), who
upheld the view that "poetry is produced when the human heart is moved by thebeauty ofthings" and Kamo no Mabuchi (1697-1769) whose disciple was incontact with Ryokan and who advocated the quality of makoto (sincerity), which
he defined as: "Whenever one has an emotion in one's heart, one voices it
spontaneously, producing poetry" (Yuasa 6, 7). Ryokan's attention to his natural
reaction to phenomena is illustrated by Abé and Haskel's own translation:
Human beings are not metal or stone
As the seasons change
my heart can't help but respond (from Abé and Haskel194)
Ryokan's role as a Zen poet is to realize the nature ofreality, including his very
human emotions, and put it forth in language, not to create a fictional account of
the way things are. This is not to say that there are not fictional, metaphorical,
and often exaggerated elements to Ryokan's poems, but that these elements are
only intended to exaggerate, point to, and express the reality of the conventional
world and ordinary feelings (which are nevertheless illusory).
Abé sees Ryokan's poems of foolishness and failure as primarily apolitical tool to distinguish himself from conventional Buddhist institutions:Ryokan's strategy ... is playful ridicule: he quietly, yet unmistakably,
juxtaposes his own life of mendicancy with the institutionalized monastic
life. Ryokan deconstructs the hegemonic authority of the monastic
establishment by exposing its discriminatory posture of the privileged111

over the masses .... Then, by way of contrast, Ryokan presents his
humble routine of begging among the villagers as a model forrectification. From the viewpoint of the institutional establishment,
Ryokan, who left monastic life without establishing himself in the SotO
hierarchy, is a failure. But it is precisely because ofhis failure that
Ryokan's criticism is effective .... (Abé and Haske154-55)
Abé, ironically, deconstructs the religious significance offailure as weIl as theliterary and religious significance of genuine emotion and essentializes themetaphorical and political function. For Abé, Ryokan is only a "religious-cultural
hero" in political terms ofhis Marxist-like challenge ofhierarchy and "repressive
authority," and his commiseration with the po or and "underprivileged" (Abé and
Haskel 58). As weIl, his suffering is primarily a political tool and does not lend
significance to any religious insight or realization on Ryokan's part. It is true that
Ryokan is concemed with the suffering of the poor and he is critical of Buddhist
priests and those who pursue wealth and fame. But, his primary concem isdelusion and suffering that are not dependent on class but are inherent in every
individual. His identification with the suffering of others is not limited to thepoor, and his commiseration is most often for those who pursue wealth and fame.
For Abé, suffering is instrumental as metaphor, political criticism, andcompassion but has little to do with Ryokan's own human nature and Buddhist
realization. Abé uses the Bodhisattva model to interpret Ryokan's suffering ascommiseration with the suffering of others (Abé and Haskel 58). Abé explains:"Because of the 'illness'--that is, the ability to suffer-the practicers of thebodhisattva path understand the nature of the suffering of the other beings.
However, because their illness is metaphorical of compassion, they escape frombeing consumed by it and remain optimistic about the possibility of saving

112others" (Abé and Haske159). Abé admits that Ryôkan feels suffering, but he also
"always escapes from being consumed by'~ suffering (Abé and Haske169). The
meaning ofbeing "consumed" by suffering is quite vague but nevertheless,unsubstantiated in Ryôkan's poems. In general he is not demonstrating his ability
to identify with the suffering of others but is expressing his often unbearable
personal sorrow. It is not just his ability to suffer, seen as compassion from a
detached, metaphorical perspective, it is Ryôkan's failure to transcend sufferingthat connects him to the suffering of other's and reveals his own humanity.
Begging for Rice

A solitary three-mat hut
A pitiful, wom-out old bodyIt's worse still now, in the depths of winter
My suffering can't be described (Abé and Haskel 171)
Furthermore, he is hardly optimistic about saving others and presents his
dejection and sorrow in response to the endless passions of the world. His desire
to protect and save aH humans and sentient beings arises from a feeling ofhopelessness and inability and is imbued with sadness and despair rather than
optimism.
How deeply 1 am concemedWith the sorrows of the world
And as often am 1
Quite at a loss what to do! (Kodama and Yanagishima 26)
If my arms draped in these black robes
Were only wide enoughHow gladly 1 would shelter in them
AH the people of this floating world (Abé and Haskel 211)
Suffering, of course, is the root ofhis compassion, and he does identify with thesuffering of others:

113

When 1 think about the sadness of the people
in this world,
Their sadness becomes mine. (Stevens 1977, 76)
However, Ryokan is not a savior figure for whom suffering is a mere metaphor;
he is a normal human being whose only salvation cornes from giving up selfdriven attempts and egotistical notions of saving himself and others. He desires tosave himself and all others, but he cannot; he is only an ordinary person. The
selfless realization that he is unable to transcend his own sadness is itself thegreatness of Ryokan.
So many reports
Of the Land of Lasting Joy
Have edified me,
Yet never can 1 get there,
Not knowing the road to go. (Yuasa #389, 155)
Suffering and sadness are not just tools to aid others but are key to therealization of Ryokan's own impermanence and humanity. According to Stephen
Heine, Dogen, the founder of Ryokan's Soto school, held "an emotional
attunement to impermanence," similar to the aesthetic concept of mono no aware,
to be essential to his own poetry (Heine 22). Dogen was of course an extremely
strong influence on Ryokan, who alludes to Dogen's writings in his poems; in one
famous poem, he cries in response to reading Dogen's works since he feels
people fail to see the truth in his words. Ryokan also displays in his poetry thefollowing ideal ofDogen, described by Heine: "Genuine spiritual realizationmust be found by embracing -rather than by eliminating -one's emotional

response to variability and inevitable loss" (Heine 29). Heine explains therelation between no self and sorrow: the experience of sorrow in response to114

impermanence is necessary for the detachment from one's ego and for giving up
of one's self. This is in contrast to a monochrome-type detachment that separates
the subject from ordinary emotions and phenomena and makes for bad poetry.
The aesthetic perception - or awakening of an aesthetically atluned heart- dislodges even a priest's clinging to the view that perishability issomething objective and apart from one's own existence by highlighting
the way it pervades subjectivity. Therefore, the refined emotion of sorrowis more conducive than strict detachment to exploring the existential
depths of enlightenment. (Heine 30)
The emotion of sadness not only dismantles the logical and detached viewpointthat it is futile to chase after illusions of permanence but brings the logic of noself to its full conclusion. In the preliminary stage of nonduallogic, one canadopt the rational perspective that divides the states of dualistic atlachment andnondual detachment; however, the experience of sadness brings the practitioner
back into the realm of the emotional and fulfills the nondual conclusion that
attachment and detachment cannot be separate. It is emotion rather than rational
thought that arises as the impetus for transcending the conventional, selfcentered, and logical reification of worldly detachment.
One wonders why Ry6kan ends so many poems with tears to the pointthat the theme often becomes trite and cliché. Certain poems are truly suffusedwith a profound sense of sadness, but in many, tears appear as a conventional
response to impermanence and death. Ry6kan's point must be to continuously
draw attention to both human impermanence and human emotion that are theroots of compassion and selflessness. This is Ry6kan's humble offering to theworld. He cannot provide any cure for suffering or maintain an air of detachment;
all he has to offer is the simple fact of ordinary emotion:

115

But for sheer lonelinessOf a mountain hut in winter,
What could 1 treat you to
As 1 can offer nothing el se. (Kodama and Yanagishima 61)
By reading Ry6kan's poems as a sincere expression ofhis heart/mind as in theexpressive-affective model of interpretation, we see that while Ry6kan describes
his failure to transcend suffering and the attachments of the world and while thisdescription retains its literaI validity, he simultaneously expresses a non-attachedand selfless attitude to any arrogant notion of detaching himself from ordinary
existence and experience. These poems of genuine expression neither de scribe
nor symbolize the concept of no self but, as in the performative model, provide a
concrete example of the workings of the selfless mind.
One of Ry6kan's poems in particular symbolically connects theexperience of ordinary emotion with enlightenment:
In the world of dreams
l've been dreaming on and on
And upon waking up
How loneliness pierces me (Kodama and Yanagishima 77)
If dreams and "waking up" are interpreted according to their conventional
associations with illusion and enlightenment, then it is on awakening that Ry6kan
truly realizes his suffering and ordinary human emotion. It is only in the world of
dreams that Ry6kan can pretend not to be afflicted by the passions of the world.
Ry6kan's awakening to his ordinary human nature parallels the theory oftrans-descendence. He is simultaneously transcending delusion of the world anddescending back down into it. Ry6kan presents an image of the Buddhist pathconsistent with the model of trans-descendence in his own poetry:116

Buddha's return to the world
This is the road he traveled in his escape from the world.
This is the road he traveled upon his return to the world.
In going and coming we must march along this sacred avenue
Through life and death, shiny false flowers on either side.
(Yuasa #198, 102)
This is not a description of two different roads, but one road that simultaneouslytranscends from and descends to the world. Yuasa's choice of the words "eitherside" is appropriate to the idea of illusion ("shiny false flowers") as clinging toeither side of the path. In other words, there is no escape from the world without
return; there is no other world to escape to or self to escape. The ascendance ofenlightenment is mediated by the descendance of compassion, when one realizes
that one shares in the suffering of aU beings. In the context of no self, thesalvation of oneself is dependent on the salvation of others, and that salvation isnone other than the giving up of one's self- without attachment to one's
individual desires and without attachment to one's individual transcendence.
Ry6kan's failure and inability to transcend suffering is his selflessness his giving up of egotistical notions -and thus, his salvation. This is not asalvationfrom suffering, but a salvation that derives from his complete
identification with suffering and his act of forgetting the self. He forgets about
the self as something independent from suffering. Suffering is not seen as anexternal phenomena imposing on the self nor is the self seen as an agent able tofree itselffrom the world ofsuffering. To summarize Ry6kan's message, there
are no better words than those of Teishin, the nun with whom Ry6kan shared a
deep affection:117

We monastics are said
To overcome the realm
Of life and deathYet l cannot bear the
Sorrow of our parting. (Stevens 2004, 101)

118

Conclusion
Han-shan and Ryokan both exemplify a non-transcendent ideal, which isconsistent with the logic of Zen Buddhism and which permeates their poetic andreclusive lives along with their religious practice and goals. Their ideas ofbuddha-nature and enlightenment are based on the realization of the immediateand original nature of conventional reality as impermanent and empty, and theyboth reject the idea of transcending the ordinary world and its desires.
Enlightenment and buddha-nature are not objects to be grasped nor elevatedstates to be attained but form a process of complete identification with the natureofthings.
Han-shan and Ryokan illustrate their identification with emptiness andimpermanence through their poetry. The content ofHan-shan's and Ryokan's
poems as weIl as their poetic practice transcend the dualities of language andsilence, withdrawal and engagement, and even the duality of transcendence andattachment. These poets do not seek to transcend words but engage in literary
activity without attachment to self-promotion or the self-sufficiency of language.
They effect an unconventional poetry for the purpose of conveying theirhearts/minds to their readers, advocating and manifesting direct experience, andchallenging the fixed dualities of language. At the same time, they express theirindebtedness to the literary tradition and engage in language and tradition in a
direct and accessible manner without intention to establish an image of literary
eloquence. As weIl, their poems intend to confront their readers with the119impermanence of reality and reveal the poets' own human experience rather thanmerely display intelligence and wit.
Reclusion is ideal as a mode ofrealizing no selfthrough the identificationof nature and through the renunciation of self-centered pursuits, while poetry is
the means for the poet to engage within society while simultaneously remaining
withdrawn from the world. The recluse is often associated with silence as thewithdrawal from society parallels the withdrawal from language, but for Hanshan and Ryokan, their poetry and reclusion illustrate a simultaneoustranscendence of and descendence to the world. They engage in society andlanguage from a standpoint that rejects the pursuit of worldly gain as well as theultimate significance, efficacy, and exclusiveness of the dualities oflanguage,and it is only through language and social engagement that the se perspectives ofreclusion and ineffable experience can be transmitted. The recluse not only
embodies the paradox that reclusion itself is a social and political act but also theparadox of language. As Paula Varsano indicates, "The figure of the recluse, as alocus of contradictory and mutually dependent moral ideals, closely mirrors themedium of poetry, that territory where language and the ineffable meet and givesustenance one to the other" (Varsano 70).
The realms of poetry and reclusion also serve as contexts to bothcommunicate and realize Buddhist trans-descendence. Since Han-shan andRyokan both subscribe to a poetics based on the direct expression of genuine
emotion, instead of dividing feelings of attachment from religious realization asprevious scholars have done, 1 have reconciled these expressions of sorrow with120

the Zen Buddhist ideal. Sorrow not only provokes deep awareness of theimpermanence of oneself and others but also connects the poets to the ordinary
suffering and desires ofhumanity. Without intention, their expressions of sorrowattest to their inability to transcend emotions and human attachments. Read fromthe expressive-effective model, these are expressions of their selflesshearts/minds that have given up egotistical grasping for a special state orexperience outside of everyday reality and reveal insight into the nature of their
humanity. Reclusion effectively aids in the realization of one's dependence onsociety and one's attachment to human bonds. In this way, feelings oflonelinessand longing for companionship are essential to deconstruct the notion of an
independent and detached self. For Ryokan in particular the emotion of sadness
engenders compassion for the suffering of others, and Han-shan too is affected by
the sorrow in the world and is connected to others through it.
Han-shan and Ryokan demonstrate an attitude consistent with the logic of
non-transcendence or trans-descendence. As with the second stage of nondual
logic, they reject the common perception that things have permanent andindependent essences, and they reject the pursuit of selfish desires based on thiscommon standpoint. With the knowledge of emptiness and impermanence thatarises at this stage, one can claim to be detached from the desires for permanenceand self-interest. In the final stage, however, the stage oftrans-descendence, thepoets return to the ordinary passions of the world. While they understand theimpermanence of things and do not return to a reification of self-essences, they
are not separate from human bonds or desires for permanence. The pursuit of121

selfish desire is still denied, but the poets are forced to admit the existence ofdelusive passions.
In conclusion, the Zen master and the Zen failure need not be mutuaHy
exclusive. Failing to attain a dualistic state of enlightenment is itselfthe profoundinsight that enacts a truly nondual mode ofbeing. AH self-centered attempts toimprove one's condition and attain a particular Zen state oftranscendence arethus swept aside, and the inevitable arising ofhuman emotion is the key to a
nondual realization. When examined from the perspective of the nonduality ofenlightenment and delusion, enlightenment never appears as enlightenment, only
as delusion. It is only through Han-shan's and Ry5kan's confessions of selfish
desires that their selfless minds are truly revealed. Thé true transcendence ofselfish attachment tums out to be no transcendence at aIl.

122

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