Sacred Life
At present I am in living circumstances that I don’t care for, being in Houston, Texas and not on the Big Island of Hawaii where I used to live. I won’t go into how the relocation came about. I’ve noticed that even with the unpleasantness, my mood is positive and I am eager to begin each day. Words of Eihei Dogen keep occurring to me: “The great ocean has only one taste.” [1]
I do have some sense of Dogen’s perception of the undivided sacredness of life. Many of Dogen’s expressions of this perception, like the quote above, are very moving to me. He says, for instance, shortly after that quote, “Hundreds of grasses and myriad forms – each appearing ‘as it is’ – are nothing but buddha’s true dharma body. . . .” Whether coarse or fine, all things are the dharma body. Again, more plainly, Dogen says that it is a “limited view that separates ordinary from sacred.”[2]
The sacredness of life is also a theme of Chogyam Trungpa, who speaks of the “unconditional sacredness” of life.”[3] He says, “The whole of existence is well constructed, and there’s no room for mishaps of any kind.”[4] Far beyond the perfection of life, for Trungpa life is also full of wonder. He exclaims, “How wonderful the world is! How beautiful the world is! How exotic and how fabulous the world is!”[5]
Spiritual practice will bring a sense of the sacredness of life. After saying that all activities in living have “a sense of holiness or sacredness in them,” Trungpa adds, “. . .This approach always has to be accompanied by the sitting practice of meditation.”[6]
If it hasn’t already, the faithful practice of zazen will bring a practitioner to a sense of the joy and sacredness of life.
Footnotes
- Moon in a Dewdrop: Writings of Zen Master Dogen, New York, 1985, p. 62. This is a very useful book that collects many of Dogen’s important statements from his numerous talks and writings.
- Ibid., p. 138.
- Chogyam Trungpa, Smile at Fear, Shambhala Publications, Boston and London, 2009, p. 111.
- Ibid, p. 97.
- Ibid., p. 77.
- Ibid., p. 36.