Original face

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Concept in Zen Buddhism

title: "Original face" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["zen-buddhist-philosophical-concepts", "kōan"] description: "Concept in Zen Buddhism" topic_path: "philosophy" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Original_face" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary Concept in Zen Buddhism ::

The original face is a term in Zen Buddhism, pointing to one's real essence or Buddha-nature, one's 'real face'.

Origins

The phrase "original face" originates in Huangbo's Chuanhsin fayao (857) and the Hui-sin edition (967) of the Platform Sutra:

This question appears in case 23 of the Mumonkan:

Eno, the sixth patriarch, was pursued by Monk Emyo up to Daiyurei. The patriarch, seeing Emyo coming, laid the robe and the bowl on a rock, and said to him, "This robe represents the faith. Is it to be fought for by force? You may take them now." Emyo went to move the bowl and the robe and yet they were as heavy as mountains. He could not move them. Hesitating and trembling, Emyo asked the patriarch, "I come for the teaching, not for the robe. Please enlighten me!" The patriarch said, "What is primordially Emyo (i.e., your true self), if you do not think this is good nor do you think this is evil?" At that moment Emyo was greatly awakened. His whole body was covered with sweat. Emyo cried, bowed, and said, "Is there or is there not any other (deep) significance (in Zen) than your secret words and teachings a minute ago?" The patriarch answered, "What I have told you is no secret at all. Once you have realized your own true self, the depth (in Zen) rather belongs to you!" Emyo said, "When I was at Obai with the other monks, I never realized what my true self was. Now you have dispersed the clouds of my ignorance to realize it, just like a man capable of discerning warm and cold by tasting water. From now on you are my teacher!" The patriarch said, "We both have Obai for our teacher. Guard your own self!"

Mumon's Comments: We should say that the sixth patriarch was in an emergency. This revelation of his, however, resembles the deed of an overly protective grandmother, who peeled a fresh lichi (a dessert fruit), removed its stone and put it to her grandchild's mouth ready for him to swallow.

You describe it in vain, you picture it to no avail,

Praising it is useless, cease to worry about it at all.

It is your true self, it has nowhere to hide,

Even if the universe is annihilated, it is not destroyed.}}

This koan is transformed in the question

Interpretation

According to Victor Hori, the "original face" points to "the nonduality of subject and object":

Comparable statements are: "Look at the flower and the flower also looks"; "Guest and host interchange".

According to Victor Hori, it is not "pure consciousness", as it is often understood in western thinking, reached by "cleaning the doors of perception":

Comments

Zen masters have commented on the original face:

|author=Daito}}

|text=Cease practice based On intellectual understanding, Pursuing words and Following after speech. Learn the backward Step that turns Your light inward To illuminate within. Body and mind of themselves Will drop away And your original face will be manifest. |author=Dogen}}

|text=You cannot describe it or draw it, You cannot praise it enough or perceive it. No place can be found in which To put the Original Face; It will not disappear even When the universe is destroyed. |author=Mumon}}

Artistic impressions

Philip Whalen

The American poet Philip Whalen has written a poem, Metaphysical Insomnia Jazz Mumonkan xxix, inspired by the Original Face-koan: Course I could go to sleep right here

With all the lights on & the radio going

(April is behind the refrigerator)

Far from the wicked city

Far from the virtuous town

I met my fragile Kitty

In her greeny silken gown

fairly near the summit of Nanga Parbat & back again, the wind

flapping the prayer-flags

"IT IS THE WIND MOVING."

"IT IS THE FLAG MOVING."

Hypnotized by the windshield swipes, Mr. Harold Wood:

"Back & forth; back & forth."

We walked beside the moony lake

Eating dried apricots

Lemons bananas & bright wedding cake

& benefits forgot

"IT IS THE MIND MOVING."

& now I'm in my bed alone

Wide awake as any stone}}

Keith Kumasen has commented on this poem.

Stuart Davis

The American Buddhist musician Stuart Davis has recorded a song called "Original Face". The chorus goes: Bright enough to swallow the sun,

Every mask will be erased,

There is just the original face.}}

Notes

References

Sources

References

  1. Martin Goodson (April 14, 2021), [https://www.thezengateway.com/culture/a-sermon-on-the-original-face A Sermon on the Original Face]
  2. [http://www.quotedb.com/quotes/2653 Quote DB]
  3. Bankei Zen: Translations from the Record of Bankei, by Peter Haskel, page 65, Grove Press, 1984
  4. [http://www.bigbridge.org/fictkabbott.htm Keith Kumasen Abbott, ''Satori Kitty Roshi Style (Or, Enlightenment Practices For Stones). A Commentary on Philip Whalen's "Metaphysical Insomnia Jazz Mumonkan xxix"'']

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