The World-Honored One’s Intimate Speech

Dharma Discourse by Abbot John Daido Loori

Master Dogen's 300 Koan Shobogenzo,* Case 34

Featured in Mountain Record 18.1, Fall 1999


 The Main Case

The great Master Yunju was once asked by a government official who had brought an offering, "It is said that the World-Honored One had intimate speech.1 And Mahakashyapa did not hide it.2 What is the World-Honored One’s intimate speech?" 3
Yunju said, "Officer." 4
The officer said, "Yes?" 5
Yunju said, "Do you understand?" 6
The officer said, "No, I don’t." 7
Yunju said, "If you don’t understand it, that is the World-Honored One’s intimate speech. 8
If you do understand it, that’s Mahakashyapa’s not hiding it." 9
[View Footnotes]

The Commentary

The intimate speech of the Buddha is the original face of all buddhas and ancestors. It cannot be given, nor can it be received. It is not inherent, nor is it newly acquired. If you think that Master Yunju’s calling and the official’s answering is the Buddha’s intimate speech, you have missed it. In intimacy the ten thousand things have merged and thus cannot be spoken of. In understanding, heaven and earth are separated, and nothing is hidden.

The Capping Verse

One has intimate speech,
The other did not conceal it.
The World-Honored One held up a flower,
Mahakashyapa smiled.
This is known as the relationship of no gaps.

The Footnotes

1. No communication whatsoever is possible.
2. Indeed, there is no place to hide it.
3. What will he say? It simply cannot be explained.
4. Can this be called intimate speech?
5. Can this be called not hiding it?
6. What’s he saying? Where is this going? Understand what?
7. His honesty is admirable.
8. I don’t understand it either.
9. He pushes down the cow’s head to make it eat grass.

[Return to Main Case]

Footnote: *300 Koan Shobogenzo is a collection of koans gathered by Master Dogen during his study in China. The koans from this collection, often called the Chinese Shobogenzo, appear extensively in the essays of Dogen’s Japanese Shobogenzo. These koans have not been available in English translation but are currently being translated and prepared for publication by Kazuaki Tanahashi and Abbot John Daido Loori. Abbot Loori has added a commentary, capping verse, and footnotes to each koan.


Abbot John Daido Loori

This koan is the core of Master Dogen’s Shobogenzo fascicle titled Mitsugo. Some people translate mitsugo as "secret speech," or "secret teachings." The Japanese word mitsu means "secret" or "mystical," in the sense of something not being apparent to the senses or intellect. It implies a direct, immediate, and complete experience with no separation, like two things that are actually the same. The other part of the word, go, means "words," so mitsugo means "secret talk," something communicated directly without sound.

In Zen Buddhism we frequently refer to secret talk that can be recognized and appreciated though it doesn’t rely on sound. Such secret talk suggests the existence of intuitive perception. It is a fact that we sometimes discover meaning or secrets without receiving any external stimuli. We don’t need to see this as particularly mystical. Direct, intuitive perception is an ability all beings have. When Dogen speaks of mitsugo, he explains that it is a state of direct contact with reality which is secret only in the sense that it is beyond explanation. He is not referring to something esoteric.

Dogen says: Shakyamuni possessed the secret speech but Mahakashyapa did not conceal it. This is the transmission and original face of all the buddhas and ancestors. It was not gained from another person. It did not come from the outside. Yet it was not possessed originally nor was it newly acquired.

In connection with this koan, I recently ran across an article in the New York Times describing a quantum physics experiment that took place in Geneva, Switzerland. The researchers took pairs of photons and sent them along optical fibers in opposite directions, to sensors in two villages north and south of Geneva. Reaching the ends of the fibers the photons were forced to make a random choice between alternative and equally possible pathways. Since it is expected that there is no way for the photons to communicate with each other, classical physics predicts that one photon’s choice of a path will have no relationship or effect on the other photon’s choice. But when the results were studied, the "independent" decisions by the pairs of photons always matched and complemented each other exactly, even though there was no physical way for them to relay information back and forth. If there was communication, it would have had to exceed the speed of light. Anticipating this experiment, and claiming that nothing can move faster than the speed of light, Einstein, before he died, said that the type of communication implied by this experiment was impossible. Clearly, in this experiment information was not being transferred from one place to another. Still, each photon knew what happened to its distant twin and mirrored the twin’s response. This took less than one thousandth of the time a light beam would have needed to carry the news from one place to the other. The connection and correlation between the two particles were instantaneous. They were behaving as if they were one reality.

This experiment indicates that long-range connections exist between quantum events and that these connections do not rely on any physical medium. The connections are immediate and reach from one end of the universe to the other. Spatial distance does not interfere with or diminish the connectedness of events.

At the end of the Times article there was a related biographical story about Heinz Pagels. It said: The late physicist, Heinz Pagels, like many other theorists believed that quantum physics is a kind of code that interconnects everything in the universe including the physical basis of life itself. In his book The Cosmic Code, Pagels, an ardent mountain climber, wrote, "I often dream about falling. Such dreams are commonplace to the ambitions of those who climb mountains. Lately I dreamed I was clutching at the face of a rock but it would not hold. Gravel gave way. I grasped for a shrub but it pulled loose. And in cold terror I fell into the abyss. Suddenly I realized that my fall is relative; that there is no bottom and no end. A feeling of pleasure overcame me. I realized that what I embodied, the principle of life, cannot be destroyed. It is written into the cosmic code, in the order of the universe. As I continued to fall in the dark void embraced by the vault of the heavens I sang to the beauty of the stars and made my peace with the darkness."

The last line of the note read, "Heinz Pagels was killed in a climbing accident in 1988."

The central concern of this koan about Master Yunju (Jpn., Ungo) is the essence of a genuine teacher-student relationship in the context of Zen training. This relationship embodies the connections this kind of communication revealed in the photon experiment and the reflections of Heinz Pagels.

In the Zen tradition we speak of five ways that teachers and students interact: formal discourses, face-to-face meetings in dokusan, question-and-answer periods called mondo, Dharma combats, and casual encounters. All of these forms of relating make use of speech, gestures, listening, hearing, looking, and seeing. But then we also have intimate speech, where no communication whatsoever is possible. Intimate speech is beyond space and time. It has nothing to do with distance. It has nothing to do with the passage of time. It is not about words. It is not about intellectual comprehension. The intimate speech of Shakyamuni Buddha, 2,500 years ago, exists right here, right now. The intimate speech on Mount Gudhakutra is here on this mountain.

Our usual way of approaching the teacher-student relationship is through conventional understanding which expects the teacher to possess something to pass on to the student. The teacher has information, appreciation, certain skills that the student lacks. In the conventional way of looking at it, the teacher gives, the student receives. This is not how the mind-to-mind transmission works in Zen training. Nothing passes between the the teacher and the student. There is no exchange; there is nothing to impart and nothing to receive. The teacher-student relationship in Zen is not about understanding, not about comprehending knowledge, not about accepting beliefs. It is about personal realization. This teaching is beyond words, beyond sight and sound. It requires a different kind of seeing and hearing.

In the Zen ancestral lineage, the Dharma transmission from generation to generation depends on this teaching of secret speech. In some Buddhist lineages, what is required for transmission to the new generation is a comprehension of the teachings contained in the sutras, or an appreciation of the precepts and their manifestation as a virtuous life. In Zen, transmission requires realization. Realization is not a process of something going from point A to point B, from one mind to another. In that sense, the very word "transmission" is already somewhat misleading. Transmission implies an exchange, but that is not what actually happens. We use this word simply because we do not have a better one.

"Realization is not a process of something going from point A to point B."

Yunju was a teacher in the Caodong (Jpn., Soto) school of Zen. He was a Dharma heir of Dongshan (Jpn., Tozan), the founder of that school, which continues here at this Monastery.

The koan begins, Yunju was once asked by a government official. The official was evidently a Zen student and knew something about Buddhism. He said, "It is said that the World-Honored One had intimate speech, and Mahakashyapa did not hide it. What is the World-Honored One’s intimate speech?" The comment that the World-Honored One had secret speech appears in the records of the ancestors and the official was obviously familiar with it. He wanted to know more about it, so he probed Master Yunju.

I have added footnotes to the koan to help clarify it. For the line, "It is said that the World-Honored One had intimate speech," the footnote says, No communication whatsoever is possible. What state of existence and consciousness is it when no communication whatsoever is possible?

The next line says: "And Mahakashyapa did not hide it." The footnote to that comments, Indeed, there is no place to hide it. "No place to hide it" means everything is always present. Since everything is a single reality, there is no place to hide anything. One reality encompasses and includes all space and time.

"What is the World-Honored One’s intimate speech?" The footnote says, What will he say? It simply cannot be explained. The minute you start talking about intimate speech you move away from it. That is why all the skillful means and devices used in Buddhism are necessary. They are necessary because there is nothing to impart. What needs to be realized is already present. We need skillful means to allow that realization to come to life. The intimate talk of Shakyamuni is just such a skillful means. This koan is also a skillful means.

Yunju said, "Officer." The footnote says, Can this be called intimate speech?

The officer said, "Yes?" The footnote says, Can this be called not hiding it?

Yunju said, "Do you understand?" The footnote says, What’s he saying? Where is this going? Understand what?

The officer said, "No, I don’t." The footnote says, His honesty is admirable.

Yunju said, "If you do not understand it, that is the World-Honored One’s intimate speech." The footnote says, I don’t understand it either. "If you do understand it, that’s Mahakashyapa’s not hiding it." The footnote says, He pushes down the cows head to make it eat grass. That kind of pushing just doesn’t work in Zen training. Realization is not something you can force on somebody. It needs to happen naturally. What needs to take place is a connection which is direct and intuitive, not mediated by words and explanations. Intellectual understanding is a valid way of navigating the realities of our lives. But it is limited and it perpetuates the illusion of separation and duality.

The intimate speech of the Buddha is the original face of all buddhas and ancestors. It cannot be given nor can it be received. It is not inherent, nor is it newly acquired. The steepest challenge of Zen training is to change the way we learn. We are all conditioned by the conventional learning process because most of us are successful at it. We are comfortable using our intellectual faculties. We come to Zen practice and try to approach and grasp it intellectually as well. In doing so we get frustrated and quickly run into a dead end.

I certainly did this. Before I went to see a Zen teacher I studied everything available. I prepared. When I finally came face-to-face with a teacher, I regurgitated all the things I had read and learned. I repeated the process that I was familiar with in taking school tests and exams. The Zen teacher did not want to hear it. He advised me to stop reading. I persisted. Each time I presented my neat grasp of the Dharma, he would send me away, emphatically encouraging me to let go of my dependence on books, and begin trusting myself. Finally he started sticking his fingers in his ears when I began talking. At last, I took him seriously and stopped studying, really putting myself into my sitting. Soon after, I began to realize I was seeing and hearing things differently just out of the zazen I was now engaging. I was not processing information so obsessively. I began experiencing direct seeing and direct cognition.

Many of my own students fall into the same rut. But with continued practice, a student finally reaches a point where it is easy for the teachings to take place. We eventually become skilled at perceiving intimate speech. That’s what happened to Mahakashyapa during the famous sermon on Mount Gudhakutra. There were two thousand people in the assembly when Shakyamuni held up the flower. Mahakashyapa was the only one who got it. Though he was sitting right next to Shakyamuni, Ananda didn’t get it. He knew all the talks of Shakyamuni and was able to recite them from memory. He clearly had all the information. What was missing?

During my residency at the Zen Center of Los Angeles, there was a professor with a doctorate in Buddhist studies practicing there. He taught at the University of California and was a renowned scholar who published many books on Buddhism and Zen. Meanwhile he had been working on the first koan for over ten years, unable to see it. Along came a young carpenter from South Carolina, who hadn’t even completed high school. He began practicing, and within six months had a breakthrough and saw this first koan very clearly.

Realization has nothing to do with knowledge. The Sixth Ancestor was illiterate. He wasn’t a monk, or even a Buddhist. He was a poor woodcutter from the southern part of China. Upon hearing a single line of the Diamond Sutra, he immediately saw into the nature of reality. What did he see? What was it that transformed his life? He received no formal teachings after that initial realization. He went to study with the Fifth Ancestor, but the Fifth Ancestor put him to work in the rice shed where he shucked rice. He had no extensive contact with the Fifth Ancestor. At a certain point during his stay he wrote a poem setting forth his appreciation of the Dharma. The Fifth Ancestor approved his realization and transmitted the Dharma to him. The Fifth Ancestor then told him to isolate himself and not to teach for sixteen years until he had matured. That is what he did. Today, every single Zen lineage that has remained alive and active — in the Vietnamese, Korean, Chinese, and Japanese schools — comes from the Sixth Ancestor.

Our minds are wonderful instruments. At this point in the history of our species, we haven’t even scratched the surface of what we can do. Even the great scientists and sages have not attained the full potential of their minds. Mind has many aspects. Analytical thinking is one significant human ability. Logical and linear thinking has allowed us to enjoy many of the wonderful things we have. But there are other aspects to mind. Our mind can be intuitive and direct, operating like a flash of lightning. This dimension of the mind does not proceed by logical steps. And it is this facet of human consciousness that is barely recognized by or developed in our educational system and culture. We live in a time and place where we treasure and reward linear, sequential thinking, and distrust or denigrate other aspects of our consciousness.

Intuitive and direct consciousness functions in creative ways not only in the arts and spiritual endeavors, but also in science. People quickly conclude that science is logical and linear. And indeed, scientific discoveries are communicated to others logically, after they are made. But that is not the way they happen. Einstein did not employ rational and sequential thinking to arrive at his understanding of relativity. He rode a light beam into space. In that moment he attained an immediate, personal appreciation of the nature of light. But that can’t be communicated. It needs to be translated into a commonly understood language. He had to prove it mathematically.

It was the same with Newton when he discovered one of the planets in our solar system. Through intuition he predicted the planet would be there. Then someone asked if he could prove it. He tried to establish the proof but quickly realized that the mathematics of his day could not provide the necessary tools. So he invented differential calculus to prove the planet’s existence. But the proof came after the discovery. Rational thought is important, but it is by no means the only way to use our minds.

Intimate speech arises out of the non-linear aspect of our minds. It exists throughout space and time. Even if the Buddha-dharma disappeared from the face of the earth, and five hundred years hence somebody came to realization, that realization would be the intimate speech of Shakyamuni transmitted through space and time. How is that possible? How is it that photons can "know" their paths instantaneously? How is it that no communication whatsoever is possible in the teacher-student relationship? You can only have communication when you have separation. You need two things to communicate, A and B. When there is no A and no B, no communication is possible.

The commentary takes up these issues. It says, The intimate speech of the Buddha is the original face of all Buddhas and ancestors. It cannot be given, nor can it be received. It is not inherent, nor is it newly acquired. It is not something you already have, it is not something you get. It can’t be received; it can’t be given. So what is it?

The next line of the commentary says, If you think that Master Yunju’s calling and the official’s answering is the Buddha’s intimate speech, you have missed it. That is similar to an incident that took place between Mahakashyapa and Ananda. After Buddha died, Ananda became the attendant of Mahakashyapa. One day he asked, "That time on Mount Gudhakutra, when the World-Honored One gave you the bowl and robe, and transmitted the Dharma to you, what else did he give you?" Mahakashyapa called out, "Ananda." Ananda responded, "Yes, Master?" Mahakashyapa said, "Take down the flagpole." At that point, Ananda finally had a realization. He realized what Mahakashyapa had realized. So it has been, down through successive generations, mind-to-mind for 2,500 years.

The World-Honored One had intimate speech, and Mahakashyapa did not hide it. What does this mean? The commentary says, In intimacy the ten thousand things have merged and thus cannot be spoken of. In understanding, heaven and earth are separated, and nothing is hidden. In the "Identity of Relative and Absolute" we chant, "Within darkness there is light, but do not look for that light. Within light there is darkness, but do not try to understand that darkness." In light there is differentiation. Everything is revealed. In darkness there is no way to identify anything.

I once read about two Zen students who were sitting around having tea one night. It was several years after their teacher’s death, and they were reminiscing. One of them said to the other, "You know that conversation I had with Roshi about such and such eight years ago?" The other one said, "Yeah, I remember." The first student said, "I think I am beginning to understand what he was saying." When I first read that exchange I thought it was a rather romantic view of Zen teachers and probably not quite true. Then I lost my own teacher. Again and again, I find things he taught me many years ago coming home only now. What extraordinary process is taking place?

The intimate and non-linear nature of our ability to communicate was also recently echoed in an experiment done with two hundred chronically ill people. They were divided into two groups: one hundred of them were prayed for, and the other hundred, the control group, were not prayed for. People all over the United States were asked to pray for the health and well-being of a particular person in the first group. They had the person’s name and some biographical information about them. Every day they prayed for whatever person they had been assigned. The results were extraordinary. The recovery rate for the people prayed for was astounding. They did not know they were being prayed for. Nobody did except for the person doing the praying and the people running the experiment. How did the healing happen? What is the process that allows somebody in Florida praying for someone who is ill in California to connect and to affect each other?

The Avatamsaka Sutra speaks of the Diamond Net of Indra, in which all things are interconnected, co-arising, sharing mutual causality. Every connection in this net is a diamond with many facets, and each diamond reflects every other diamond in the net. In effect, this means that each diamond contains every other diamond. You cannot move one diamond without affecting all the others and the whole net, a net that extends throughout all space and all time.

"Every connection in this net is a diamond with many facets"

This net is not a metaphor. It’s an accurate description of reality. It is a description of what all the buddhas who have preceded us have realized, and it will continue to be the realization of all the buddhas in the future. We are totally, completely, intricately interconnected over time and space, with all of time and space. Everything occurs instantaneously.

And nothing remains static. The only constant in the universe is the fact that nothing is constant. The minute we grab onto something and say this is it, it has changed, we have changed, and everything else has changed. Delusion is the idea that self and the objects around it will somehow remain fixed.

The Diamond Net of Indra describes just about everything relating to our universe and our lives. But what does its meaning boil down to? The central point of the image is that each diamond contains every other diamond. Each thing contains every other thing. You and I are the same thing, but I’m not you, and you are not me.

This interconnectedness of all things seems to be the crucial theme of most modern particle physics, as revealed in the experiment in Geneva. It is at the heart of experiments in medicine showing that someone praying for a sick person hundreds of miles away can help them to heal. These contemporary discoveries, which have suddenly come to light, were implicit in the wisdom of an illiterate layman from the southern part of China over a thousand years ago. The Sixth Ancestor already knew it. Thousands of Buddhist practitioners throughout history have had direct access to these truths. That is why I always say that it is no small thing to be born human. We have the inherent ability to transform our lives. We have the inherent wisdom, the inherent capacity to nourish and heal. Yet too often we waste our lives jousting with windmills, struggling when that is not necessary.

In encountering Buddhism, we have a tendency to focus on the First Noble Truth — life is suffering. Yes, life is suffering, but it is also possible to put an end to suffering. People forget that the cause of suffering is greed, anger and ignorance. They forget about the possibility of putting an end to suffering. They forget about the Way, the process for ending our suffering.

In Zen training, the first experience of intimacy is usually catalyzed within the teacher-student relationship. Suddenly a connection becomes available and is appreciated, a connection that happens outside the normal, accustomed channels of communication. Suddenly you are hearing something not coming from the outside. Once you experience this, you begin to get some sense of the intimacy Master Yunju was referring to. Vistas begin to open up. Then you see that this "mystical" teaching is actually quite ordinary. It is part of your life and my life. It is an ordinary aspect of the life of all beings, which is none other than the life of a buddha, an enlightened being. That is why it is important to realize it for ourselves. Not understand it or believe it, but realize it. That is no small thing.

John Daido Loori, Roshi is the Abbot of Zen Mountain Monastery. A successor to Hakuyu Taizan Maezumi, Roshi, Abbot Loori trained at Zen Center of Los Angeles in rigorous koan Zen and in the subtle teachings of Master Dogen, and is a lineage holder in the Soto and Rinzai schools of Zen. 

[Main Case] [Index of Dharma Discourses] [Mountain Record 18.1 Table of Contents]


mountains & rivers order | training in the mro | zen mountain monastery | fire lotus zendo | dharma communications | zen environmental studies institute | society of mountains & rivers | the monastery store | wzen.org | contents | contact us |

©2003 Zen Mountain Monastery
All words and images on these pages are protected by copyright