Dogen and dillard

To study the Buddha Way is to study the self.
To study the self is to forget the self.
To forget the self is to be:

          *actualized by myriad things
          *confirmed by all dharmas
          *enlightened by the myriad dharmas
          *experienced by millions of things and phenomena
          *authenticated by the myriad things
          *enlightened by all things
          *verified by all things
          *perceive oneself as all things
                 (thezensite.com)

Translation is a tricky business
certainly when translating Dogen.
Eight translations of an essential point -
what it is to forget the self.
Do these all mean the same thing?
Do any accurately translate Dogen's intention?

I think we get to take our pick
the one that speaks to our heart.
For me, I go with the clunkiest one:
"...EXPERIENCED BY millions of things and phenomena."
The rest seem to leave self in place
as the actor whose studies
have accomplished the thing.
But to be experienced BY all things and phenomena
seems to me to be quite a different thing.
To believe that all things cooperate
in the experience of a sense life
that communicates with us
is profound beyond measure
but no more profound
than our Bodhisattva vows.

My inspiration comes from Annie Dillard:

"Then one day I was walking along Tinker Creek thinking of nothing at all and I saw the tree with the lights in it. I saw the backyard cedar where the mourning doves roost charged and transfigured, each cell buzzing with flame. I stood on the grass with the lights in it, grass that was wholly fire, utterly focused and utterly dreamed. It was less like seeing than like being for the first time seen, knocked breathless by a powerful glance."

I'll keep studying but while I do I'll remember Annie Dillard's experience and words, ones that have stayed with me for fifty years, since I first read and was stunned by her magnificent work, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek.

She gets the final word here:
"...I had been my whole life a bell and never knew it until at that moment I was lifted and struck."

My photo of Tinker Creek, near Roanoke, Virginia.

Living Zen Life