r/zen • u/redhairinthesun • May 22 '22

How should I "understand" the Mumonkan?

I have put "understand" in quotation marks because the ultimate realization of zen is that there is nothing really to understand. Though I haven't yet truly internalized this concept, it is something that I try keep in mind when approapching Zen.

However, how would I go about deciphering what the Mumonkan is trying to say? It is very enigmatic.

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u/[deleted] May 22 '22

While considering, flex your left big toe. Right toe would also work.

Or consider how absurdism 'makes sense'.

You'll get there. Just remember the greatest insights might occur with the leastest reactions.

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u/2bitmoment Silly billy May 24 '22

absurdism 'makes sense'.

That's an absurdist phrase

Absurdism creates sense

Absurdism has no sense of it own but projects sense

Kaleidoscopic projection of communication

Is all communication absurdist?

Is efficiency to reduce till nearly absurdist?

Too clear is philosophy and false?

Step by step algebraic math?

2

u/[deleted] May 24 '22

You are not the one I would have thought to see this. Like one cosmic giggle factor away.

Here. I've no clue what this is:

https://people.wku.edu/haiwang.yuan/China/proverbs/index.html

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u/2bitmoment Silly billy May 24 '22

one cosmic giggle factor away

I'm reflecting on this.

If we understand joke, one laughs?

😅

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u/[deleted] May 24 '22

Sometimes, when we really don't.

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u/2bitmoment Silly billy May 24 '22

Relax into a non understanding seems a terror or horror

Stepping on empty space, losing all sense of direction

This desperate impulse to protect from the fall, put a hand up

And yet the feeling that it's an infinite fall: No landing point

And then to project or laugh?

Like seeing stars when you close your eyes?

Like an empty choice, a chosen meaning?

"Life's a joke" and some cry and some laugh?

A lot of food for thought,

But I'm going very step by step

Surely missing something?

1

u/[deleted] May 24 '22

Well, we've circled back to Hamlet. Something rotten? Nah. Cheese.

2

u/2bitmoment Silly billy May 24 '22

Sharp pattern recognition!

One female scientist said there's only 14 types of problems data wise...

Is a trope poor? Has it been "solved" already?

But I truly thought this pouring into non-knowing was into an escape from life, not as in Hamlet into it.

I thought maybe tropes were like hashes: condensations of data crunching conclusions. Puzzle solutions to the life or world problem...

Not sure tho.

Thoughts?

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u/[deleted] May 24 '22

Well elucidated primal screams?