Bodhidharma

Buddhist monk

• Born: Fifth century
• Birthplace: Southern India
• Died: Sixth century
• Place of death: Unknown

Bodhidharma is credited with originating Chan (Zen) Buddhism in China.

Early Life

From the standpoint of modern history of religion, nothing definite can be said about the early life of Bodhidharma (boh-dee-DAR-mah). Stories about his life have long played a central role in the practice of the Chan Buddhism he is traditionally credited with having brought to China. For that contribution, he is called First Patriarch of Zen, as well as (by most counts) Twenty-eighth Patriarch of Buddhism generally. As anthologists Nelson Foster and Jack Shoemaker remark: “That Bodhidharma . . . lived seems reasonably certain, but if scholarly standards of evidence are maintained, everything else about him is subject to question, including his role, if any, in the establishment of Ch’an.”

According to the earliest biography by Tanlin (T’an-lin), written in the early sixth century c.e., Bodhidharma was the third son of an Indian king. Attracted to Buddhism, he became a monk and after some years went to China as a missionary. “Why did Bodhidharma come from the West?” became a standard Zen meditation puzzle, or koan. The answer, to some extent, defines one’s understanding of the nature of Zen. D. T. Suzuki, for example, proposes that Bodhidharma’s coming

was simply to introduce this satori [enlightenment] element into the body of Buddhism, whose advocates were then so engrossed in subtleties of philosophical discussion or in the mere literary observance of rituals and disciplinary rules.

The traditional account has Bodhidharma coming to South China (modern Canton) around 520 c.e., where he is said to have had an interview with Emperor Wudi (Wu-ti; r. 502-557 c.e.), which may have been the single most dramatic encounter in the history of Zen Buddhism. Accounts of the interview vary, but it seems to have consisted essentially of three brief questions and three cryptic answers.

As his first question, the emperor, who had devoted much money, time, and effort to supporting Buddhist enterprises, asked Bodhidharma what religious merit he (Wu) had earned through this zealous support. “No merit,” replied Bodhidharma. To understand Bodhidharma’s response, it is important to keep in mind that, as Buddhism developed, the tendency to divinize the Buddha grew, generating an elaborate mythology.

As historian Xingu Liu notes:

All the new deities were willing to share with their worshipers the merit they accumulated. Consequently, Buddhist literature increasingly stressed worship and donation, which ultimately became the major route to enlightenment. . . . That the Bodhisattva could save other people through the merit he accumulated implied that merit, like goods, could be transferred and exchanged. Merit was no longer restricted to what an individual could achieve through his own efforts.

The emperor probably would have agreed with the doctrine that “A king who builds a palace of precious materials for a Buddha has the full right to claim Buddhahood by virtue of this act of merit.” A different conception of spiritual merit is found in Bodhidharma texts, as translated by Red Pine: “If you don’t see your nature, invoking buddhas, reciting sutras, making offerings, and keeping precepts are all useless.”

Puzzled by Bodhidharma’s response, the emperor inquired about the meaning of holy doctrine. “Emptiness,” Bodhidharma replied, “no holiness.” In interpreting the central idea of emptiness, Buddhist philosophers have always had to struggle against turning processes—including those constitutive of the self—into things (reification). Another Bodhidharma text advises: “Our mortal nature is our buddha-nature. Beyond this nature there’s no buddha. . . . Don’t think about buddhas. . . . At every moment, where language can’t go, that’s your mind.”

Finally, the emperor asked the identity of this perplexing person before him. Bodhidharma’s reply: “Don’t know.” In a more talkative mood, he might have added, as another Bodhidharma text puts it:

You ask. That’s your mind. I answer. That’s my mind. . . . To search for enlightenment or nirvana beyond this mind is impossible. . . . The truth is, there’s nothing to find. But to reach such an understanding you need a teacher and you need to struggle to make yourself understand.

Life’s Work

Bodhidharma, evidently not the right teacher for Emperor Wu, left and, according to the traditional story, traveled to North China, crossing the Yangtze River on a reed (raft, presumably). He settled at the Shaolin monastery near Loyang (famous in American popular culture because of its associations with the 1970’s television show Kung Fu), where he is said to have taught the Lankāvatāra Sūtra and practiced “wall gaze” (pi kuan) for nine years. What this was, or even how “wall” is to be understood (whether the wall of a chamber, wall of the mind, or wall of mountains), remains uncertain.

The work most often attributed to Bodhidharma, and possibly the only text that can attributed to him, is a short treatise, Er jing ru (c. 6th c. c.e.; The Two Ways of Entrance, 1986). According to this text, the two ways are entrance by principle or reason (li ru) and entrance by practice (xing ru).

Entrance by principle or reason involves a condition of cognitive indifferentiation, in which the unity of things outweighs their differences—a kind of mystical state growing out of Bodhidharma’s practice of meditation, or “wall gaze”:

When one . . . abides in Pi-kuan, one finds that there is neither selfhood nor otherness, that the masses and the worthies are of one essence. . . . He will not then be guided by any literary instructions, for he is . . . free from conceptual discrimination, for he is serene and non-acting. This is called “Entrance by Reason.”

A famous koan describes the disciple Huike (Hui-k’o) asking Bodhidharma to calm his mind. Bodhidharma tells him: “Go get your mind and bring it here, and I will calm it.” After a while, Huike has to admit that he cannot locate his mind. “I have calmed your mind,” says Bodhidharma. Huike is thereupon enlightened.

Practice, the second entrance described in the Bodhidharma treatise, involves four key ideas: karma—accepting that suffering is rooted in one’s past; impermanence—accepting that all things, including life’s satisfactions, depend on changing conditions; acquiescence—quelling the desire that things be otherwise than they are; and, finally, dharma—being virtuous, in particular treating others generously.

How are the concepts of principle and reason connected to these four elements of practice, which compose the basic ethos of Buddhism? The first entrance (li ru) involves recognizing in contemplation the emptiness of conventional conceptual categories. The second entrance (xing ru) involves recognizing in practice the emptiness of conventional motivations. Accepting responsibility for difficulties encountered, declining credit for (and so accepting gratefully) life’s gratifications, ceasing to try to change the nature of things, and contenting oneself with simple service to others—these allow one to live harmoniously in the light of what principle or reason reveals.

In addition to his role as First Patriarch of Zen, Bodhidharma often has been claimed as founder of various martial arts traditions, usually based on nothing more substantive than “what my instructor told me.” Oral tradition has value, but only high scholarly standards can guard against misinterpretation, exaggeration, self-deception, and fabrication. The idea that Bodhidharma was an innovator in the martial arts exerts a perennial fascination, and the claim continues to be made. It probably cannot be shown to be impossible, but because there is prestige (and therefore profit) in such associations, skepticism is in order.

In fact, a skeptical view seems appropriate in several aspects of the colorful mythology surrounding Bodhidharma’s name. He is said, for example, to have cut off his eyelids to stay awake while meditating (his eyelids turned to tea leaves as they fluttered down to the ground, establishing the use of tea as an aid to concentration during meditation), and his legs are said to have withered away during his protracted sitting meditation. The former is unlikely, and the latter is quite fantastic, as well as inconsistent with other parts of his legend (such as that he was encountered, albeit posthumously, walking back to India with one shoe). The Bodhidharma lore is various, and has him ending his sojourn to China by being poisoned, or returning to the West, or going on to Japan.

Significance

Within Zen, Bodhidharma is revered as the conveyor of a spiritual line that began with the Buddha’s wordless transmission to Mahakashyapa, who smiled when Śākyamuni silently presented a flower in place of a sermon. This event is celebrated in four lines traditionally attributed to Bodhidharma (but now usually thought to date from several centuries later):

A special transmission outside the scriptures,Not founded upon words and letters;By pointing directly to mindIt lets one see into nature and attain Buddhahood.

These lines, which, as Heinrich Dumoulin says, have represented for later generations “the quintessence of Zen as embodied in the figure of Bodhidharma,” indicate, like a finger pointing at the moon, Zen’s transmission beyond, even if through, words of a realization that the differences the conceptual mind draws between things are ultimately empty, or superficial: never more than useful, often less.

Although little is known about Bodhidharma, and certainly much less than has often been claimed, he is still an intriguing figure, floating among the koans with blue eyes and red beard. Despite all historical disputes, the story of Bodhidharma remains, as Dumoulin concedes, “a legend without which it would be altogether impossible to understand the history of Zen.”

Bibliography

Bodhidharma. The Zen Teachings of Bodhidharma. Translated by Red Pine. San Francisco: North Point Press, 1989. Translation of four sermons traditionally ascribed to Bodhidharma. Includes Chinese text, brief introduction, and notes.

Broughton, Jeffrey L. The Bodhidharma Anthology: The Earliest Records of Zen. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999. Translation of and commentary on essential Chan texts from the cache found in Dunhuang (Tun-huang) early in the twentieth century. The author’s revisionist account emphasizes the importance of a previously unknown Master Yuan mentioned in these manuscripts. Includes glossary, bibliography, and index.

Dumoulin, Heinrich. India and China. Vol. 1 in Zen Buddhism: A History. Translated from German by James W. Heisig and Paul Knitter. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall, 1994. This revised edition of a standard history of Zen Buddhism includes a substantial supplement on the Northern School of Chinese Zen. Chapter 6 provides a cautious discussion of what (little) can be said to be known about Bodhidharma. Includes glossary, chronological and genealogical tables, and index.

Foster, Nelson, and Jack Shoemaker, eds. The Roaring Stream: A New Zen Reader. New York: HarperCollins, 1996. This outstanding anthology of Zen material devotes its first chapter to Bodhidharma. Includes bibliography.

Kalupahana, David J. A History of Buddhist Philosophy: Continuities and Discontinuities. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1992. Chapter 23 situates Bodhidharma in the context of earlier and later disagreements within Buddhist philosophy. Includes bibliography and index.

Liu, Xingu. Ancient India and Ancient China: Trade and Religious Exchanges, A.D. 1-600. New York: Oxford University Press, 1988. Provides insight into the mutual influence of religious practice and economic trade between India and China during the period in which Bodhidharma is supposed to have undertaken his mission. Includes bibliography, index, and appendices.

McRae, John R. The Northern School and the Formation of Early Ch’an Buddhism. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1986. This influential study of the early (northern) Chan school, obscured by the southern school of Huineng and Shenhui, revised understanding of the context of the gradual-versus-sudden enlightenment debate in Chinese Buddhism. Includes translations of important texts, bibliography, and index.

Suzuki, D. T. Essays in Zen Buddhism. First Series. 1927. Reprint. London: Rider, 1949. This classic, along with many other books by Suzuki, played a major role in popularizing Zen in the West during the twentieth century and exerted some influence on the East as well. Suzuki’s traditional, ahistorical account has been much criticized in recent decades. Includes index and illustrations.

Wong, Kiew Kit. The Complete Book of Zen. Boston: Tuttle, 2002. A recent popular account of Zen, and of Bodhidharma, representing the perspective of a contemporary martial arts practitioner.