While Master Sheng-yen agrees that insightful experiences akin to the transcendence of self in Zen occur in many spiritual traditions, Christianity, Sufism etc, he states that the enlightenment of which the Buddha spoke depends on realisation within an understanding of the Zen view.　In particular this means an experiential insight into the emptiness of all phenomena including both self and universe.　His teaching is thus based in the Praj~naapaaramitaa and Maadhyamaka insights of Buddhism and their development in Chinese thought emphasising the Tathaagatagarbha as the root of mind.　Although I have not discussed the point with

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him in depth, I doubt whether he would consider an insightful experience of no-self within Christian Zen as “seeing the nature” (kensho) unless the God of the practitioner was perceived as “empty.”　And this of course would be a tall order for most Christian believers although less problematic for those versed in apophatic theology and contemplation.

　　 Master Sheng-yen completed his own training in Japan studying for a doctorate at Rissho University and sitting traditional retreats.　On coming to America he brought with him both the koan tradition and the methods of Silent Illumination.　Whereas Suzuki rejected the latter as a useful path, Master Sheng-yen has in recent years taught this approach increasingly beginning in Wales in 1989.　He has presented Silent Illumination retreats in Poland, Russia, Croatia and Sweden and in 1999 in Berlin where his coverage of the subject was exceptionally complete.　We may argue therefore that it is through his teaching of Silent Illumination that Master Sheng-yen is making a profound contribution to European Zen.

Keys to Illumination

　　 Rather than a precipitate gallop up the slopes of some koan mountain Sheng-yen lists four modest aims for beginners on retreat.　These are: to realise that one is not in control of one’s own mind, to discover how to train in awareness, to calm the mind, to provide opportunities for repentance and hence to regain the freedom of immaculacy, and to practice with an individually suitable method that will yield insight (praj~naa) (Sheng-yen 1982, Crook 1991).　A beginner will usually start with watching the breath.　He/she soon discovers the truth of the first aim and seek to develop awareness encountering the barriers of wandering thought and fatigue in the process.　In addition, prostration sessions focusing on repentance are a means of facilitating the fourth aim.　Only when a mind has achieved at least a relative calm may the method shift through negotiation in interview to the use of

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either a koan or to Silent Illumination.

　　 Koan practice does not differ from that taught in Japanese or Chinese monasteries.　There is the requirement to develop the “great doubt” from which after intensive effort a resolution may come.　Often stress is placed on a life-koan to be realised over many years of focussed effort.　In Master Sheng-yen’s retreats the emphasis is on working without tension, correct but not strained sitting, relaxed mind and “letting the universe do it.”　Since different participants may be using contrasting methods, the collective even obsessive focus on koans of a traditional Rinzai retreat with its accumulating power is less in evident and koans are unlikely to be solved with the explosive force described in some accounts of these retreats.　The realisation under Sheng-yen’s guidance seems likely to be gentler.

　　 In teaching Silent Illumination Master Sheng-yen lists several stages of practice (See New Chan Forum 15, Summer 1997).[2]  While these may result in a gradual evolution of insight the stages do not necessarily follow one another.　Some practitioners may quickly develop an advanced stage omitting or running quickly through the early ones.　Usually however the first practice is to develop “Total Body Awareness”──unlike the Japanese focus on posture the attention here is directed to the awareness of presence within the sitting body.　A successful awareness here depends on focussed attention on the sensation arising within the sitting.　Success leads to a calmed mind in which the boundaries between interior and exterior gradually disappear and time before and time after merge into one flow ── what Dogen may have called “without thinking.”  As one practices at this stage various meditation experiences of an encouraging nature appear and a realisation of “one mind” may arise in which the practitioner feels himself in confluence with

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nature and the universal process.　These stages may arise through focussed intentionality.　“No-mind” as in the experience of “seeing the nature” (kensho) cannot however be the result of any deliberative practice.　When intention is present so also will be desire.　Where desire is present so must the self be there.　The concern with achievement, with getting a result has to be entirely abandoned but the attempt to do this merely completes a circle, the self still being present in the attempt to go beyond itself.　Here is the ultimate “gateless gate” likewise come upon in the intense focus within the Great Doubt of koan work.