Walk Like a Mountain. Innen Ray Parchelo

and the one whose absence presents as a large question mark for us here, is the walking pose. Over the centuries, less than a handful of depictions have chosen such a pose. An 11^th century Japanese artist created the unusual standing Buddha, Amida Looking Back, from Zenrin-ji temple in Kyoto. It poses the standing Buddha, right hand in the wheel-turning mudra, and head glancing over the left shoulder, compassionately checking for suffering beings who may have been left behind. According to another story, this image startled a dozing priest, Eikan, who fell asleep while doing walking nembutsu practice. There is another beautifully slender Thai statue which presents Shakyamuni in full stride.

      If a walking Buddha is rare, then the rarity is clearly compensated for by the image of Jizo Bosatsu, the walking Bodhisattva, which can be seen almost everywhere in East Asia. Even when he is not actually shown stepping along, he carries the shakujo, the pilgrim staff. This reminds us of his vow to walk through The Six Realms of Existence, bringing Dharma to beings, especially those unable to hear it due to the situation of their unhappy birth. Further, his figure is commonly located along roadsides, at crossroads or anywhere fellow walkers, travellers and pilgrims may need his assistance.

      Even given the activity of Jizo, (whom we will meet more fully in Chapter 2), walking practices remain minor and usually adjunctive for most practitioners. Herein lies the puzzle which occasioned this book: why are walking practices relegated to the back rows of Dharma practices? Consider the pre- and post-Enlightenment activities of Shakyamuni once he dismounted his beloved Kantaka and bade farewell to his loyal manservant, Channa:

      …and so he passed

      free from the palace.

      When the morning star

      Stood half a spear’s length from the eastern rim,

      And o’er the earth the breath of morning sighed,

      Rippling Anoma’s wave, the border stream,

      Then drew the rein, and leaped to earth and kissed

      White Kantaka betwixt the ears and spake

      Full sweet Channa: “This which thou hast done,

      Shall bring thee good, and bring all creatures good.”

      The Light of Asia, Arnold, 4^th Book

      There is no biography of Shakyamuni which disagrees on the facts. We have a description of his departure, his studies with the four renunciants, his near death and decision to seek awareness beneath the Vesak moon. We know of the temptation and victory. His choice to return to the world of dukkha, his various sermons. We know of his stops and addresses which spanned some forty or so years before his Parinirvana. Forty years or so of travels.

      Imagine, if you will, an itinerary for the Buddha at almost any time of those forty years, with the exception of the ‘rains’ when they took shelter for that period of weeks. There would be time for seeking food and eating twice daily, time for sleep and, one assumes, the usual bodily necessities. There would be time for pauses on the way, perhaps to visit some royalty or other dignitary. There were periods of formal sitting meditation practice, in whatever grove or shade could be found. However, during most of the time spent over those forty-odd years they were engaged in walking. Lots of walking. Any scan of the maps of the Buddha’s travels will confirm that there were major distances between sermons and stops, and so the majority of His and those of his followers’ waking hours were spent wandering on foot hither and yon over the dusty roads of North India.

      Again, as Arnold imagines:

      I choose

      To tread its [the Earth’s] paths with patient, stainless feet,

      Making its dust my bed, its loneliest wastes

      My dwelling, and its meanest things my mates;

      Clad in no prouder garb than the outcastes wear,

      Fed with no meats save what the charitable

      Give of their will, sheltered with no more pomp

      Than the dim cave lends or the jungle-bush.

      The Light of Asia, Arnold, 4th Book

      In some respects, the life of the Buddha is a model for the leader in chapter seven of The Lotus Sutra, mentioned above, who takes his followers on a perilous journey leading to the ultimate treasure. If we accept that Shakyamuni Buddha was the presentation of the Living Dharma, and that his every gesture was the expression of the Way, we must imagine the great amounts of teaching which occurred while the first Sangha walked and walked, year after year. Its inconceivable that during all that time there wasn’t some structured practices of reflection, chanting or even question-and-answer that emerged. Could all that have been so trivial that it doesn’t merit a place in the practice routine of the Buddha and his followers?

      The question is worth noting, as we look into the performance of these practices. However, the deeper examination and possible answer to such questions belong to another, as-yet-undertaken study. For now, we raise the puzzle while we ourselves join the Buddha, feeling the Earth beneath us and “…tread its paths with patient…feet.”

WALKING PRACTICE AS METAPHOR

      Our journey here may not reveal to you the secrets of green mountains walking or an ultimate treasure, but we will most certainly follow Dogen’s sage advice, and investigate clearly our own walking. Although walking might seem a minor practice, compared to the highly-praised seated postures, walking inspired the early Buddhist imagination in other ways. Way, path, vehicle, step. These are the prominent metaphors of Buddhadharma. Consider:

      • The fourth of the initial and pivotal Buddhist teaching is, of course, the Eightfold Path, the arya-arta ga-marga. A marga is a well worn path, such as a wild animal would leave behind, and also suggests an expedient route, a passage or the proper course;

      • Using another road metaphor, all the schools of Buddhism refer to themselves as yanas, vehicles. Hence, we have the Lesser Vehicle (hina-yana), the Great or All-Encompassing Vehicle (maha-yana), the Vehicle of the Thunderbolt (vajra-yana) and The Harmonizing Vehicle (eka-yana). The sense here is of practice as a conveyance, that is how one gets from here to one’s destination; thus, these vehicles have the capacity to carry us to liberation or over the river of suffering;

      • One of the most beloved books in the early Buddhist canon is the Dhamma-pada, literally, Dharma steps or footsteps;

      • In the earliest Buddhist art, images of the Buddha were forbidden and symbols for the Teacher were used. One popular symbol was the padanka, the Buddha’s footprint, which became an object of worship;

       The padanka symbol

      • The story of the infant Shakyamuni, following his miraculous birth, includes the detail that, unlike the awkward stumblings of most infants, he stood up and took three bold strides, symbolizing his conquest of the Three Worlds. As he stepped, brilliant lotus flowers sprang from the earth. Its worth noting here again that with all the possibilities of things he could have done to show his extra-ordinariness, it was walking which characterized this miraculous child.

      Curiously, with all these road metaphors, the word for teaching remains Dharma, which is a symbol of something static, not moving. It suggests a pillar or foundation – a set of rules or a natural order. Perhaps the common contemporary (to the Buddha) usages of Dharma in Hinduism simply transferred over to Buddhist teaching. As Buddhism moved across into China and Japan, it became more associated with Tao, The Way, the foundational concept of Chinese religion which captures more of the sense of movement and flow.

WALKING AS A ‘YOGA’

      Walking practices, as we will see, are usually noted as adjunctive practices, such as a relief from sitting meditation, as with doing kinhin, as special practices, like the kaihogyo,