Since it is a severely practical form of Buddhism, Zen is par excellence meditational Buddhism. In Rinzai Zen, as is well known, kooans are introduced into the meditation situation. These kooans, among other things, can be regarded as functioning as reminders or warnings that intellectual and logical types of thinking are out of place. But whether kooans are introduced into the meditation situation or whether this situation is itself regarded as a kooan, the

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15. Ibid., para. 111.

16. Ibid., para. 127.

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effect at first is to generate deep puzzlement and perplexity. For here the individual does not know his way about, and even if he is given useful hints and admonitions he does not know how to adjust to the situation. Nor is he told or shown, supposing that were possible: this would defeat the entire point of the procedure. He must find his own way himself. This makes Zen deeply personal in a very direct way. Recognition of this adds another dimension to what we should understand by direct concrete experience in Zen and adds another difference to what we would understand even if we spoke of 'direct concrete personal experience'. This with all deference to Wittgenstein who also thought that philosophy was deeply personal and not something formal, neutral, and detached.

　　 Because the person does not know his way about in the kooan cum meditation situation, the situation seems to have the typical form of one which can be cleared up by intelligent inquiry, experimentation, and reflection. Despite warnings and reminders he will tend to treat it as if it were a situation of this kind and become more puzzled and perplexed than ever. He displays a tendency to force all problem situations into the same general mold, thus showing how his thinking is nourished by one-sided examples, which Wittgenstein remarks is a main cause of philosophical disease; a statement with which any Zen master could agree. A crucial step is made when the person sees, not merely intellectually but deeply feels, that his rigid and stereotyped approach is not correct. It is a very intelligent kind of insight. Rather too much by way of overcorrection of prevalent tendencies is apt to be made of the so-called non-rationality of Zen.

　　 The deep puzzlement and frustration generated in this situation has an analog in Wittgenstein's procedure with his students. He did his utmost to ensure that they were thoroughly perplexed by a philosophical problem. They had to actually feel and live it and work their way into and through it. A person has to feel the need of the clarification, which a comment or observation on a philosophical problem may bring, otherwise it is worth very little. He does not give us any so-called answers, but only methods and suggestions to be used according to the circumstances; nor does he explain to us how to use his methods, although he gives us examples to illustrate their point, which we have to see for ourselves. Again, he believed that a question is often best disposed of by a question; to give an answer is often unfair for it is apt to involve one-sidedness and in any case is too apt to close up further inquiries. Sometimes he disposes of a question or a thesis by a joke. He once even suggested that a perfectly serious philosophical work could be written which consisted entirely of jokes or of questions. The similarity in the type of procedure used to that used by a Zen master is too obvious to require further comment.

　　 Finally, Wittgenstein has no intention of trying to tie us to philosophy. On the contrary, by freeing us from philosophical perplexities he aims to free us

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from philosophy; for the discovery which really counts is the one that makes one capable of not philosophizing when one wants. It is hardly surprising that various professional philosophers should regard such a standpoint with amused incredulity and scepticism. In Buddhism too the aim, among other things, is to free us from the grip of doctrines and teachings, even Buddhist ones: for these are merely like rafts, which enable us to cross a river. When we have crossed we have no further use for them. Here again, whatever we may say about the similarity or lack of it between the final goal of peace and clarity for which Wittgenstein was striving and the goal of Zen, one can hardly deny a similarity in attitude to theses and doctrines.

　　 Wittgenstein saw philosophical problems, not as interesting, intellectual puzzles but as deeply personal and genuinely tormenting, and for him the practice of philosophy was a way of life for freeing us from them. He speaks of the peace that comes from the real philosophical discovery, "the ... discovery which makes me capable of stopping doing philosophy when I want to." [17] So for him, philosophy can be regarded as a way of liberation from obsessive worries and perplexities that have a central role in our lives and find their expression in philosophical problems. The culminating question of whether there is any analogy between 'the real philosophical discovery' of which he speaks and the serenity and clarity and the ability to 'take up and put down' theses, attitudes, and feelings as they come and go, without agitation or disturbance, which are products of Zen meditation and training, must now be faced.