Reverend's Message

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The Badgers Burrow
Ito, Kozen Sensei

Rev. William Masuda, Translator

The following is an interesting story of how hunters catch badgers.

It is a known fact from long ago that when hunters discover a badger's burrow in the mountains, they find that the burrow has been dug so deeply that it is difficult to catch the badger. The hunters, first of all, place a pile of leaves at the mouth of the entrance and set it on fire. They then fan the smoke into the burrow. Even in doing this, the badger will not come out easily. Finally, when it can no longer stand the heavy smoke settling deeply in the burrow, it rushes out with a tremendous force and energy. The hunters, waiting for this precise moment, pull the trigger and kill it. This is how I heard the badger is caught.

This is an interesting metaphor for those seeking the Buddha-dharma. It is true that our badger-like ego-self and doubt never readily or easily shows itself fully. In this sense, it is difficult to detect is real form. We may pick at it with a stick, but we still will not be able to strike it completely.

On the surface of our daily life we may present a clean and happy persona. This may even include an appearance of understanding the Buddha-dharma. But below this appearance lies this badger of blind ego-self. For this very reason, the fire of Buddha-dharma is lit at the mouth of the entrance of our ego-self. The eye burning smoke, which is teaching us how to cast away all doubts through faith, is fanned vigorously.

In the beginning the badger-like ego-self is difficult to detect. But it finally manifests itself with tremendous force and energy. In that precise moment, however, it is struck by the power of the primal vow of Amida Buddha's wisdom and is destroyed. This moment of the death of our doubting badger-like ego-self is the very moment of the awakening of faith (shinjin). And though this process is difficult to truly understand until the ego-self dashes out with great force, it is important that the fire and smoke of Buddha-dharma is fanned continually at the mouth of its burrow. The awakening of faith unfolds unlimited experiences of joy and happiness in our life in the Buddha-dharma.

On the other hand, there are those, including priests and scholars, who preach and encourage a superficial kind of happiness found in their understanding of the Buddha-dharma. This is like throwing the badger what it simply wants and craves. In other words, there are some people who merely stroke our badger-like egoism and feeds it what it wants and desires to hear. If people listen to Buddha-dharma with such an attitude, our badger-like egoism will never be uprooted and they will never penetrate into the depth of true and real faith with its accompanying experiences of joy and happiness.

Dharma Verses
Nami Sogi

Rev. William Masuda, translator