Bill!,<br/><br/>As you say, we do need to live in the world of illusions and
that is why we need to see things as "real" in terms of the relative (I've
never claimed anything as not being illusory, just that to do so is not
practical to live a human life). For example, in Zen the saying is 'When hungry
we eat' (how's that for cause and effect!). It doesn't say 'When hungry - just
dismiss hunger as illusion'. <br/><br/>My reading of the last part of the koan
is just that karma is not fixed (determined) and can be changed. Even the
negative karma of living as a fox for 500 lifetimes was eventually extinguished
(it could even be argued that 500 lifetimes was necessary before the old man
could become enlightened, therefore making it positive karma if that is what
was required for his enlightenment). <br/><br/>I cut this from
angelfire.com:<br/><br/>"Causation" in this passage refers to "moral
causation." The Buddhist concept of Karma acknowledges that
good/bad deeds, thoughts, and so forth result in good/bad effects. Thus the
import of the question posed by the "fox" is whether or not the Enlightened
person is subject to Karma. Hyakujo's answer, in effect, affirms that the
Enlightened person is subject to moral causation. Katsuki Sekida offers a
common Zen interpretation of this passage in his comment: "Thus to ignore
causation only compounds one's malady. To recognize causation constitutes the
remedy for it." See Karma and Free Will.<br/><br/>Dogen Zenji's employment of
this story in the "Daishugyo" chapter of the Shobogenzo implies that, on one
level, he thinks Hyakujo's answer indeed provides a "remedy" for the old man's
predicament. Yet Dogen was rarely content with merely citing traditional Zen
interpretations of passages; typically, he sought to push his students to a
further understanding by a creative reinterpretation of a passage. Lest his
disciple therefore think this
not-ignoring/recognition of causation is de facto a release from it in an
ultimate sense, Dogen answers that the passage means "cause and effect are
immovable." In other words, moral causation, for Dogen, is an inexorable fact
of human existence."<br/><br/>For me then (this is Mike speaking!), the
enlightened person is still subject to cause and effect, but is not fooled by
it. <br/><br/>Mike<br/><br/><br/>
