EXTRACTS FROM DAISETZ TEITARO SUZUKI’S FOREWORD TO EUGEN HERRIGEL “ZEN IN THE ART OF ARCHERY”
1.
… One of the most significant features we notice
in the practice of archery [and Wu Shu] is that it is not intended for
utilitarian purposes only or for purely aesthetic enjoyments, but is meant to
train the mind; indeed, to bring it into contact with the ultimate reality.
Archery is, therefore, not practiced solely for hitting the target [or self-defence];
the swordsman does not wield the sword just for the sake of outdoing his
opponent; the dancer does not dance just to perform certain rhythmical
movements of the body …
2.
… If one really wishes to be master of an art [including
a martial art], technical knowledge of it is not enough. One has to transcend
technique …
3.
… What differentiates Zen most
characteristically from all other teachings, religious, philosophical, or
mystical, is that while it never goes out of our daily life, yet with all its
practicalness and concreteness Zen has something in it which makes it stand
aloof from the scene of worldly sordidness and restlessness …
4.
… As soon as we reflect, deliberate, and
conceptualise, the original unconsciousness is lost and a thought interferes …
The arrow is off the string but does not fly straight to the target, nor does
the target stand where it is. Calculation which is miscalculation sets in. The
whole business of archery goes the wrong way. The archer’s confused mind
betrays itself in every direction and every field of activity …
5.
… Man is a thinking reed but his great works are
done when he is not calculating and thinking. “Childlikeness” has to be
restored after long years of training in the art of self-forgetfulness … When a
person reaches this stage of “spiritual” development, they are a Zen artist of
life. They do not need, like the painter, a canvas, brushes, and paints; nor do
they require, like the archer, the bow and arrow and target, and other
paraphernalia. They have their limbs, body, head, and other parts. Their Zen-life
expresses itself by means of all these “tools” which are important to its
manifestation …
6.
…. a strange and somewhat unapproachable Eastern
experience …
