redraven
3rd September 2006, 11:15 PM
First of all kensho is a form of satori. Satori is the more general term. Satori isn't really "enlightenment" or the bodhi, the "complete salvation" of Buddhism, but more means "intuitive insight." For example, perhaps you are being selfish in a relationship and you are blind to it. One day it hits you, doesn't have to be in meditation, that you are being pretty bad to your friend. That is a lesser satori experience.
It is also kensho, because kensho is satori where one has an insight into one's self. So for example, when I realized I was a bad person, that was a very high degree of kensho. I saw a very complete picture of myself, and it didn't look so good. Monks say the same thing: I came to the monastery to gain the siddhis and become a spiritual superhero, I am mean to my fellow monks, I am lazy in my work habits... those are the kinds of things monks see when they undergo kensho.
Satori has all sorts of different forms, and unlike the meditative absorptions more commonly found in Thereveda and other Mahayana traditions, it is not highly codified. The highest form of satori is the bodhi, but there are all sorts of other kinds. Insights into the teachings of Buddha, absorption in existence, and all other kinds of things.
There are two main levels of kensho and those are "small face" and "vast face." Small face is a small insight into yourself and happens many many times. Vast face usually only happens once or twice in one's life, and it is a huge insight into who you are. It is usually very painful.
In fact, many of the forms of satori are painful. I have a poem I'm going to post, it is very personal, but it relates my second satori experience after my kensho experience. It sounds vaguel psychedelic, but it's not. It is very hard to describe.
Without further ado:
~~~~
In Contemplation of Pain: Satori
The feeling was transient; there was nothing to do;
The water hissed across my feet and up the shore, and then hissed back;
The crest of the wave’s roiling boil curled across the distant sea;
Then the water hissed about my feet, and the holes of shore creatures bubbled up.
Then no longer transient, there was a thousand points of light;
And like a great wall of bees, flying in a swarm,
The thousand points of light coalesced,
And from all sides, a thousand points of pain impressed their will upon my body.
~~~~
It is also kensho, because kensho is satori where one has an insight into one's self. So for example, when I realized I was a bad person, that was a very high degree of kensho. I saw a very complete picture of myself, and it didn't look so good. Monks say the same thing: I came to the monastery to gain the siddhis and become a spiritual superhero, I am mean to my fellow monks, I am lazy in my work habits... those are the kinds of things monks see when they undergo kensho.
Satori has all sorts of different forms, and unlike the meditative absorptions more commonly found in Thereveda and other Mahayana traditions, it is not highly codified. The highest form of satori is the bodhi, but there are all sorts of other kinds. Insights into the teachings of Buddha, absorption in existence, and all other kinds of things.
There are two main levels of kensho and those are "small face" and "vast face." Small face is a small insight into yourself and happens many many times. Vast face usually only happens once or twice in one's life, and it is a huge insight into who you are. It is usually very painful.
In fact, many of the forms of satori are painful. I have a poem I'm going to post, it is very personal, but it relates my second satori experience after my kensho experience. It sounds vaguel psychedelic, but it's not. It is very hard to describe.
Without further ado:
~~~~
In Contemplation of Pain: Satori
The feeling was transient; there was nothing to do;
The water hissed across my feet and up the shore, and then hissed back;
The crest of the wave’s roiling boil curled across the distant sea;
Then the water hissed about my feet, and the holes of shore creatures bubbled up.
Then no longer transient, there was a thousand points of light;
And like a great wall of bees, flying in a swarm,
The thousand points of light coalesced,
And from all sides, a thousand points of pain impressed their will upon my body.
~~~~