Chan Buddhism

[triveni93]

There has been a lot of discussion on this forum about the influence of Asian philosophies, such as Advaita Vedanta and Tantra (including Kaula and Tibetan tantras) on Kenneth Grant's philosophy. The most obvious exploration of Grant's interest in Indian philosophy is probably to be found in At the Feet of the Guru, but I understand that it permeates all (or most) of his writings. I'm sure there is much more to say about that, and I hope the conversation continues.

What hasn't been covered much, however, is the influence of Chan Buddhism on his work. I am very interested in researching this, and wonder if any of you have any thoughts on the matter, or specific references at your finger tips. I noticed that someone on this forum mentioned his exploration of Chan in Nightside of Eden. Are there other direct references?

[squareye]

KG does make references to Chan, in a number of places in the trilogies (alas none to hand at the moment!). Suffice to say that the Chan school(s) being part of the Mahayana wing of Buddhism and the borrowing relationship between Advaita and Mahayana it is not surprising that it gets mentioned.

It took about 400 years for Buddhism to 'become' Chinese but when it did they devised four main schools - Hua Yen, Pure Land, Tendai & Chan. These schools tended to borrow ideas from each other and from Confucianism and Taoism. This was only carrying on a tradition from India, which, being urbane and quite used to philosophical debate migrated ideas from school to school and religion to religion.

A practice that our Western religions, addicted to a curious sense of exclusivity, also practiced but lived in denial about until more recent times.

There is a close relationship between Chan and Hua Yen in particular; Huang Po being lineage holder for both Chan and Hua Yen also being teacher of Lin chi founder of the Lin chi/Rinzai school of Buddhism (the one with the strong koan practice).

Hua Yen is the philosophical basis for Chan practices and is based on the Flower Garland sutra (Avatamsaka). The thesis of this scripture can be summed up as 'All in the one, and One in the All'. There are some lovely descriptions of cutting open a mote of dust and finding a universe inside it and yet the universe does not shrink to fit inside neither does the dust mote expand to contain the universe.

The interpenetration and simultaneous harmony between all phenomena features much in the quotes and koan cases which are used to investigate these teachings. Of course, all this depends on emptiness or 'sunya' of pheonomena the corollary of this being the inter dependency of, what the Chinese liked to call, ' the ten thousand things'. This is the equivalence of the non-duality of Advaita, a central theme in Grant's writings.

[artilect]

Mar 3, 2015 18:22:01 GMT triveni93 said:

I noticed that someone on this forum mentioned his exploration of Chan in Nightside of Eden. Are there other direct references?

I can confirm that Grant references Chan quite a few times across chapters 4-6 in Outer Gateways.  I don't have a solid grounding in Buddhism so can't comment on whether his 'take' on Chan is anything new but I'm sure I'll get around to studying more about this down the line.  

[Michael Staley]

May 19, 2015 0:22:21 GMT artilect said:

Mar 3, 2015 18:22:01 GMT triveni93 said:

I noticed that someone on this forum mentioned his exploration of Chan in Nightside of Eden. Are there other direct references?

I can confirm that Grant references Chan quite a few times across chapters 4-6 in Outer Gateways.  I don't have a solid grounding in Buddhism so can't comment on whether his 'take' on Chan is anything new but I'm sure I'll get around to studying more about this down the line.  

There are direct references to Ch'an Buddhism throughout Kenneth's work. Whilst he was immersed in Eastern mysticism generally, and Buddhism in particular, his principal interest was probably the Madhyamaka of Nagarjuna. The best exposition of this in Kenneth's work is probaly chapter 5 of Outer Gateways, 'The Madhyamake & Crowley'.

[triveni93]

Thank you for the clarification re: Madhyamaka, Michael. I look forward to reading it in the new edition of Outer Gateways when it arrives! :-) I'm currently re-reading the Typhonian Trilogies again, starting with The Magical Revival, and so far his direct reference to Chan (by name) contained within it a reference to Madhyamaka.

[Raj Don Yasser]

I recently received At the Feet of the Guru but have yet to read it, thus I can't reference any of Grant's work in relation to the Chan tradition. That being said, I've read several of Maharishi's works and also practiced traditional Soto, and later, Rinzai Zen since early 1993. One clear and concrete association between Advaita and Chan (in particular, the Rinzai tradition) is the focus on the koan "Who am I", the experiential realization of the non-verbal "answer" being an important step in the Work.

[Michael Staley]

Apr 7, 2016 14:56:13 GMT Raj Don Yasser said:

I recently received At the Feet of the Guru but have yet to read it, thus I can't reference any of Grant's work in relation to the Chan tradition.

At the Feet of the Guru collects together Kenneth's articles for various Indian magazines which were published from the early 1950s onwards, and includes various kindred articles published in for instance Man, Myth & Magic. However, the topic is Advaita, and contemporary Indian exponents of Advaita such as Pagal Haranath, Ramana Maharshi, Anandamayi Ma, Shivananda, etc. The focus of At the Feet of the Guru is thus quite narrow; there aren't any articles on what might be considered kindred areas such as Cha'an Buddhism, the Madhyamaka, etc.

Considerations of Cha'an Buddhism, the Madhyamaka etc can be found elsewhere throughout the trilogies, in for instance Outer Gateways. Kenneth was interested in all forms of mysticism, but it was probably the Madhyamaka of Nagarjuna and his colleagues which paticularly engaged him.