The Five Ranks of Zen were first elucidated by the 9th-century Zen master Tozan (Ch.: Dongshan Liangjie) and have become essential in the training of Zen students from all lineages. In my lineage, the White Plum lineage, the Five Ranks are studied at the end of our koan curriculum as the pinnacle of our training. In a way, they are also a summary of all the koan study that preceded them. My dharma sister Roshi Egyoku Nakao told me that at the time her senior students start to study the Five Ranks, many of them have an “aha” moment when everything falls into place.

When I studied physics at Pomona College, we were taught different subjects—such as mechanics, optics, electricity and magnetism, thermodynamics, and atomic physics—as if they were separate and self-contained. Then, as I dug deeper into the material in graduate school at the University of California, Berkeley, it became obvious that each subject overlapped and interacted with every other subject. For example, the study of thermodynamics informed the study of mechanics. That, in turn, informed electricity and magnetism, which informed atomic physics, which also was informed by thermodynamics, and so forth. Physicists continue to seek a unifying theory that includes everything. In an analogous way, the Five Ranks are the unifying theory of Zen.

The marvelous secrets contained within the Five Ranks, however, will not be revealed through conceptual study. In order to understand the Five Ranks, you must experience them with your entire body, not just with the cells of your brain. They must penetrate your heart, bones, and marrow for the depths of their content to be revealed.

The Five Ranks represent different ways of experiencing the relationship between and interpenetration of the absolute and relative spheres of reality. From the relative perspective, each of us manifests reality in a human form with all of our relationships, foibles, and brilliance. From the absolute perspective, each of us is whole, complete, spacious, transparent, and luminous. I suspect all of us can relate to the relative aspect of being human, yet we don’t always experience ourselves as having qualities such as completeness and luminosity. Perhaps [studying the Five Ranks] can assist you in transforming your understanding of the relative and recognizing your existence within the absolute. Here is my translation of all five:

1. The relative in the midst of the absolute
2. The absolute in the midst of the relative
3. Coming in the midst of the absolute
4. Reaching in the midst of the relative
5. Arriving in the midst of absolute/relative (unity realized)

Dogen’s “Genjokoan” and the Five Ranks

The most famous lines of Dogen’s Shobogenzo, “Genjokoan” (“The Way of Everyday Life”), correspond directly to the Five Ranks, and examining them can give us help toward a deeper understanding of each rank.

Dogen’s verse is as follows:

To study the Buddha Way is to study the self.
To study the self is to forget the self.
To forget the self is to be enlightened by the ten thousand dharmas.
To be enlightened by the ten thousand dharmas is to free one’s body and mind and those of others.
No trace of enlightenment remains.
And this traceless enlightenment is continued forever.

To Study the Self

The first line of Dogen’s verse is “To study the Buddha Way is to study the self.” When we start on the path of our practice, that’s what we are doing. The first instruction in zazen is to quiet the mind. You need to focus your mind on something that’s rhythmic and steady, like your breathing, to connect with the self that exists beneath all the chatter of your mind. This is the start of the journey.

To Forget the Self

At the beginning of our practice, we notice that all of our mental activity is generally designed to protect our ego identification from any kind of intrusion so that it feels safe. The ego self just wants whatever is comfortable, whatever feels safe, whatever maintains it. Drawing on its survival mechanisms, the ego simply tries to push away the whole notion of impermanence. But as you sit more and more, you notice how thoughts arise, persist, and then decay. Then you start to see these little gaps between the thoughts. Your image of who you are starts to dissolve, and you begin to realize that “to study the self is to forget the self.”

This line of Dogen’s corresponds to the first of the Five Ranks, “the relative in the midst of the absolute,” with its verse line “no wonder they meet without knowing each other.” In the first rank, the practitioner experiences the emptiness of self and no longer knows who they are. It is the absolute state wherein there is nothing to grasp. The absolute is bearing witness to the relative, since the practitioner embodies the absolute state while functioning in the relative state. And the relative is in the midst of the absolute.

This first rank and Dogen’s line “to forget the self” are illustrated in the famous koan case 41 of The Gateless Gate, which records a dialogue between Bodhidharma and his successor Master Eka (Ch.: Dazu Huike).

Eka went to Bodhidharma and said, “My mind is not at peace, please pacify it for me.”

Bodhidharma replied, “Bring me your mind and I will pacify it for you.”

Eka said, “I have exhaustively searched for this mind, and it is ungraspable.”

Bodhidharma responded, “Then I have pacified it for you.”

The key phrase in this koan is “I have exhaustively searched for this mind, and it is ungraspable.” Within that phrase there are two key words. One is exhaustively. That’s what Zen masters tell us over and over. If you are working on a koan, exhaust it. Exhaust the mind. The beginning of Dogen’s Shobogenzo, “Bendowa” (“The Wholehearted Way”), contains the line, “After searching exhaustively, the way is perfect and all-pervading.” It is only “after searching exhaustively” that you realize the perfect and all-pervading nature of the Way.

Eka says, “After searching exhaustively, I find that mind is ungraspable”—and that is the second key word: ungraspable. He is not saying, “I cannot grasp it.” He is saying that the very nature of mind is that it is ungraspable.

To exhaustively study the self is to forget the self. You have to penetrate every nook and cranny looking for it and let go of everything you think is it. It’s not that. It’s not that. It’s not that. Then you get down to the fine dust and start running it through your fingers and looking for the self. Is it that? Search forever, and you will not find the self. When you realize that the self is ungraspable, you have realized the “to forget the self” of which Dogen speaks and the “meet without knowing each other” of which Tozan speaks.

To Be Enlightened by the Ten Thousand Dharmas

Dogen goes on to say, “To forget the self is to be enlightened by the ten thousand dharmas.” What are the ten thousand dharmas? The dharmas are the phenomenal world, and in the classical Sino-Japanese context, “ten thousand dharmas” means everything. The verse for the second rank, “the absolute in the midst of the relative,” says, “She finds her ancient mirror and she clearly sees her face which cannot be elsewhere.” Her true face is everywhere. It is no longer obscured by the false egoic self. It is the ten thousand dharmas. It is the relative bearing witness to the absolute. Because the practitioner has experienced the absolute, they are able to see it everywhere they look.

A teacher once told me that I should hear every sound as the dharma. He said dharma has multiple meanings, and in this case, the dharma is the teachings of the Buddha. So hear every sound as the teachings of the Buddha. Be enlightened by the ten thousand sounds.

If you read the stories of the Zen masters, there were all kinds of occasions where they became enlightened by one of the ten thousand dharmas, such as Zen Master Kyogen becoming awakened to the sound of a pebble hitting bamboo. Another Zen master became enlightened while he was going to the bathroom. One monk was awakened when his leg was crushed in a door. To forget the self is to be enlightened by the ten thousand dharmas, and any dharma might do the trick. Hear every sound as the sound of the dharma. See every sight as the sight of the dharma. Experience every place as nirvana. This very cushion upon which you sit is the lotus land. The old woman’s ancient mirror reflects her face, which is none other than the ten thousand dharmas.

To Free One’s Body and Mind and Those of Others

Dogen’s verse continues: “To be enlightened by the ten thousand dharmas is to free one’s body and mind and those of others.” The verse of Tozan’s third rank, “coming in the midst of the absolute,” states that “in the midst of nothing, there is a way free from dust.” So one must free one’s body and mind. But how?

This relates to the koan that Dogen Zenji was working on when he had his enlightenment experience. According to the account in Transmission of Light, Dogen and the other monks were sitting when his teacher said, “Drop off body and mind.” Let your mind and body fall away. Liberate your body and mind.

How do you free your body and mind and those of others? Bernie Glassman said, “Bear witness to the absolute.” In the act of bearing witness to the absolute, you realize that you and all beings everywhere are intimately connected. There is no separation between “me” and all beings everywhere. When you free your body and mind, you simultaneously free those of others. That’s what the Buddha said when he became enlightened: “I and all beings everywhere have simultaneously attained enlightenment” (Transmission of Light, case 1).

No Trace of Enlightenment Remains

The last line of Dogen’s verse starts, “No trace of enlightenment remains.” No trace remains. This is where the contradictions of life end. The seventh of the ten ox-herding pictures shows the enlightened person resting in his hut and no trace of the ox exists. This corresponds to Tozan’s fourth rank, “reaching in the midst of the relative,” the verse for which says, “There is no need to avoid crossed swords.” Bearing witness to the relative is “a good hand, like a lotus blooming in a fire.” Tozan’s verse for this rank and Dogen’s line teach us how to live in the relative without being trapped by the relative. Being selfless, one can act according to conditions without hanging on to anything.

This Traceless Enlightenment Continues Forever

According to Tozan’s verse for the fifth rank, “arriving in the midst of absolute/relative,” we are all “sitting in the darkness as black as charcoal.” What a beautiful image for ongoing traceless enlightenment. There is light within the darkness, and we could just as easily say that we are sitting in the light as clear as the bright sky. These metaphors represent the bodhisattva’s practice, which is endless. It is not just sitting. It also includes standing, walking, and dancing. Our bodhisattva activity and the effects of this traceless enlightenment continue forever. When we fully engage in our lives, when we “bear witness to life itself”—in the words of the Zen Peacemaker version of this rank—there is no end and no beginning to life. Generation after generation, this traceless enlightenment continues.

If you are not careful, you can get stuck anywhere. When you practice meticulously, no trace of enlightenment remains, whatever you realize and whatever you reveal.

♦

From The Five Ranks of Zen: Tozan’s Path of Being, Nonbeing, & Compassion by Gerry Shishin Wick © 2024 by Gerald L. Wick. Reprinted in arrangement with Shambhala Publications, Inc. Boulder, CO.