Three Gates

The Buddha together with his noble disciples erected three majestic gates for his company to pass through. Once they had reached and entered each gate, they could then achieve the ultimate state.

Q) What do these three gates represent?
A) Moral precepts, meditation and wisdom

They can be elaborated as follows:

Moral precepts: Are manners of good practice which when adopted and practiced regularly will lead to a “common happiness”. “Common” in terms of common people everywhere who chooses to practice restraint in committing any bad actions (mentally, verbally and physically). “Happiness” is the result of their noble practice.

Therefore, the first gate was erected to prevent one from committing wrong doings in terms of mental, verbal and physical actions. The door of “do no evil”.

Meditation: Are methods used to develope a concentrated mind. There are three states of concentration:

1. Momentary concentration; which is common in our daily life.
2. Access concentration; which is a longer type of concentration, near to developing absorption. Within this state, mental signs will occur.
3. Attainment concentration; this is the highest state of concentration, the achievement of absorption.

Concentration can temporarily reduce our tendencies towards ill-will, greed, hatred, fear, sloth and torpor, anxiety, worry, depression, and is a catalyst in clarifying skeptical doubt. But any time that concentrating is lacking; then the above characteristics will arise again in the mind, giving rise to skeptical doubt.

Therefore, the second gate was erected to instill concentration in both calming down the mind and also training it to achieve mindfulness.

Wisdom: Is all about having a clear comprehension of things together with right understanding. Wisdom can be divided into two:

1. Worldly wisdom: Knowing about how to exist within the world we live in, such as the means to make a living;
2. Spiritual wisdom: Knowing how to deal with general problems that may occur in our daily lives.

Both of these wisdom must be developed so that we can live a happy life, especially spiritual wisdom which realises that there is suffering, knows the causes of suffering, can identify the right solution to end suffering and is wise to the path leading to the cessation of suffering.

Therefore, the third gate is erected to develop wisdom to overcome obstacles and attain liberation.

In opposite to the three gates explained above, there exist three other gates that obstruct humanity and hinder our progression and prevent us from happiness. These three are wrong actions, hindrances and misunderstanding. Only when we can overcome these three hindrances can we reach the ultimate truth; enlightenment.

Similarly, there is a Zen story that I found to be about three gates. It is a good story and so I would like to share it with you.

There was once a Zen teacher named Tosotsu who built three gates and made his students pass through them. The first gate was the study of Zen*. He said to them, “By studying Zen you can see your own true nature. But where is it?”

The second gate was the practice of Zen. He said, “By going through the second gate, you can free yourself from birth and death. But when you are a corpse, how can you free yourself?”

The third gate was the realization of Zen. He said, “Going through the third gate, your body separates into the four elements. But where do you yourself go?”

It is a nice story that tells us that if we want to get an insight into a realization, we also have to pass through three gates; study, practice and realization. We can see our own true nature; what and where it is. After seeing our own true nature, we know how to treat our nature in the right way; how we can free ourselves. After freeing our own nature, we will realise that nothing of the “self” is left; we are just made up of the four compounded elements which when we die, they dissolve back into their original form, hence the notion of non-self.

All three gates of Zen’s teacher are established for students to study and practice and when they pass through them, they can get an insight into the ultimate realization, truth and enlightenment. It is similar to the three gates in which the Buddha had erected together with his disciples. The gates give rise to the same goal and we all must learn to walk through them if we are to become liberated.

Would you like to have a go at passing through the gates?

If you are, you are most welcome to try as the opportunity is open to all.

* Zen (Japanese: 禅), the Japanese translation for Chán (Traditional Chinese: 禪; Simplified Chinese: 禅), is a school of Mahāyāna Buddhism notable for its emphasis on mindful acceptance of the present moment, spontaneous action, and letting go of self-conscious and judgmental thinking. ^[1]

It emphasizes dharma practice and experiential wisdom—particularly as realized in the form of meditation known as zazen—in the attainment of awakening. As such, it putatively de-emphasizes both theoretical knowledge and the study of religious texts--the vast body of the Taisho Buddhist cannon contains writings by Zen monks--in favor of direct individual assessment of one's own experience. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zen]