Ten Thousand Words Miss the Point; One Silence Is Like Thunder
The trap is for catching the fish; once the fish is caught, the trap is forgotten... Words are for catching meaning; once meaning is grasped, words are forgotten.
—Zhuangzi, External Things
Poetry has a special talent, unrelated to books; poetry has a special appeal, unrelated to reason. Yet without much reading and fathoming of principle, one cannot reach its peak. What does not touch the tracks of reason and does not fall into the trap of words is supreme. Poetry is the chanting of feeling and nature. High-Tang poets sought only interest, like an antelope hanging its horns—no trace to be found.
—Yan Yu, Canglang's Remarks on Poetry
In Chan Buddhism, master and pupil have a tradition of valuing tacit understanding over words. Beginning with the Buddha holding up a flower and Mahakasyapa smiling, Chan opened this nonverbal method of teaching.
Ancient Chinese Chan monks used the shout and the stick, grinding bricks to make a mirror, and lodging Chan in tea; all aimed at prompting the learner's own awakening.
Language, a tool of human communication, sometimes fails to communicate. The speaker talks until lips are dry, yet the listener remains confused. But silence sometimes stirs thought and understanding better than words, which is why Chinese has the idiom "one silence is like thunder."
Master Mazu Daoyi loved sitting in zazen, believing it could awaken him. Nanyue Huairang smiled inwardly but wished to guide him. So while Mazu sat, Huairang ground a brick before him. Mazu asked curiously, "What are you grinding the brick for?" Huairang replied he wanted to polish it into a mirror.
Mazu laughed that a brick could never become a mirror. Huairang seized the moment: if grinding a brick cannot make a mirror, how can sitting in zazen attain the Way? Mazu thereupon had his great awakening.
A good teacher need not chatter; a single gesture can provoke deep thought. The premise, of course, is that the pupil is also fine timber—a "loud drum that needs no heavy beat."
Grasping a meaning is hard, and making another grasp it is hard. What seems simple to one person is puzzling to another. Differences in life experience, knowledge, character, and even intelligence make communication between two people sometimes like "speaking duck to chicken."
When words become powerless, choose silence; when understanding needs no words, choose silence; when silence comforts better than words, choose silence.
Chan insight can appear in silence; feeling can be conveyed in silence. A look, an embrace, are worth more than a heap of chatter.
An essay can also end in silence.