Today begins the countdown to “Buddha.” As the legend has been passed down Siddhartha Gautama had a difficult last few weeks before Rohatsu, having continued his movement to less and less (asceticism). He reasoned having lived in opulence moving to the complete other end of the spectrum would bring about his seeing deeply into: awakening. This was not turning out to be the case so he met with other teachers for possible answers, left his mendicant brothers and became an occasional eater. He fainted, almost drowned and was rescued by a goat herder who gave him a thin goat’s gruel. His body was emaciated and his resolve was changing.
I think it is here his awareness changed, this shift or insight was–if neither extreme works, then what does? Remember he was looking for how one transcends dukkha in one life-time. The skew of either/or opposites, had to be dropped. In Twelve-Step Program lingo he had reached bottom. He then decided to stop and just sit in stillness and silence on a small hill under a tree.
A vow to sit until clarity. These eight days that follows depict what we’ve come to know as Shikantansa. The form and function of letting go . While he had meditaed many times, here and now, Kasanti, Virya, and Dhyana unfolded.
Each year we sit for twelve hours on a Friday close to December eight. We just stop and sit without defined goals or expectations, finding what Dogen-Zenji describes as dropping away of body and mind.The ego of Siddhartha sheds its remaining delusions.
Again, here the pivot toward teaching slowly occurs over forty more days as Buddha builds toward the turning of the Dharma. On Saturday morning December 6, 2025 we will read Shakyamuni’s first sermon to the Five Assectics at the Deer Park at Isipatana (the Resort of Seers) near Varanasi (Benares) https://www.buddhanet.net/bp_sut17/
108 Bows
Sangaku