Dogan's Great Doubt

Dogen's Great Doubt

Both exoteric and esoteric Buddhism teach the primal Buddha-nature [or harma-nature] and the original self-awakening of all sentient beings. If this is the case, why have the buddhas of all ages had to awaken the longing for and seek enlightenment by engaging in ascetic practice? [Masao Abe, A Study of Dogen, 19]

How did Dogen's "Great Doubt" influence his approach to the philosophy and practice of Zen? How is this approach reflected in his conception of zazen (seated meditation) as "just sitting" (shikan taza)? Contrast Dogen's "just sitting" with the koan style of zazen that developed in the Rinzai school of Zen.

To understand his primal Buddha-nature, the Buddha of all ages paradoxically had to stand outside of the material world of suffering. Through meditation, he was able to break within himself the chain of infinite actions or desires that make up the material world. Dogen's great doubt stresses the need for the Buddha within all individuals, before that Buddha can return to the world and its infinite processes that drain and tax sentient beings with the never-ending process of rebirth, suffering, and more rebirth, to be able to engage in 'just sitting,' or a kind of non-action that takes the individual (the 'not-I') outside of this fruitless and ultimately illusionary cycle.

Just sitting' is not ascetic in the sense that it does not force one to engage in the spiritually unfulfilling practices as undertaken by the Buddha before he experienced his final enlightenment. 'Just sitting' does not involve starvation or intense pain. Rather it involves rendering the body into a state of complete and utter present mind, of focusing on the simplicity of just sitting. Of course, it would be nice to always exist in such a state, even when driving a car or engaging in an argument. But to train the mind and body, to exit the cycles of the world, it is really necessary to enter into a state of 'non action' or just sitting or present mindfulness outside of the world, to most easily attain a state of enlightenment or at least present mindfulness and consciousness.