of becoming, and therefore  of all endeavor including  ethics
and  morality, and  for  the  sake  of  convenience  we shall
continue to speak metaphorically  of these and all particular
things or events as its self-expression.
  Here, then, is a very basic  presupposition  which  we must
keep in mind as we proceed to look briefly at some aspects of
Doogen's moral philosophy.
  Doogen  begins  the  chapter-of  the  Shooboogenzoo  we are
considering  by quoting  a familiar  passage  which occurs in
several  places throughout  the Buddhist  scriptures:

　　　　　　   The Buddha  said,
　　　　　　   Do not commit evil;
　　　　　　   Do good devotedly;
　　　　　　   Purify  your mind.
　　　　　　   This is the precept of all Buddhas.

Having stated his text, so to speak, Doogen next isolates the
first part of it- "Do not commit evil"--and begins to expound
its meaning  at some length.  He does the same, subsequently,
for each section  of the verse, but we shall have space  only
to consider  his treatment  of this first  line.  Since this,
however, will  produce  the  essence  of his view  about  the
questions we have in mind, we can be satisfied.
  Every Buddha, it seems, has left us this injunction against
evil.  On  the  face  of  it, it  seems  both  a trivial  and
imprecise  command  and  suggests  the image  of the faithful
Buddhist   as  a  sort  of  simpleminded   Oriental   Puritan
preoccupied

p.36

with the negative  function  of avoiding  whatever  orthodoxy
disapproves. Doogen, however, sees this injunction in quite a
different  way.  It is important not because it is a piece of
good, if pedestrian, advice but because  it is pregnant  with
ontological illumination.  To put the matter briefly, "Commit
no  evil"  is  the  self-expression  of the  Unborn, and  the
practice of it is the Unborn itself in action. He says, "This
'Do not commit evil' is not something  contrived  by any mere
man.  It is the Bodhi (the Supreme Enlightenment) turned into
words.... It is the (very) speaking of Enlightenment."
  The significance  of this is that the Enlightenment  spoken
of here cannot be separated from Ultimate Reality itself.  It
is an important  Mahaayaana  understanding  that the Absolute
and the knowing  of the Absolute  are identical--the  knowing
and the  being  are  one.  Consequently, to say that  "Do not
commit evil" is the very speech of Bodhi means that it is the
self-expression  of the Absolute.  Having  established  this,
Doogen goes on: "Being moved by the Supreme Enlightenment one
learns  to aspire  to commit  no evil, to put this injunction
into practice, and as one does so the practice-power  emerges
which covers all the earth, all wortds, a11 time,
and a11 existences without remainder."
  To understand this important sentence it is essential to
realize  that  for Doogen  the "practice-power," that is, the
power  by which  a man  performs  what  is good  and  attains
enlightened  urideystanding  is not simply  the power  of the
individual  ego, the sort  of thing  a man  boasts  of as his
"willpower."  It is, rather, the Bodhi-power or Dharma-power,
the Absolute itself conceived as power.
  While  our last quotation,therefore, is rather  unclear, it
seems to mean that the practice-power  which is manifested as
the Buddhist applies himself to avoiding  evil (the power not
to do evil) and the injunction not to do evil are united. "Do
not commi, evil"  is, in a sense, the verbal  self-expression
of  the   Absolute   and  jts  fuifillment   is  the   active
self-expression of the same.Absolute.
  Doogen  goes on: "The just  man at precisely  the moment(of
the practicepower emerging) is the one in whom we see that no