Painting of a Rice Cake

I ponder the relationship between the real place and its representation. Maybe Master Dogen’s discussion is helpful in making connection of the three.

An ancient Buddha said “A painted rice cake does not satisfy hunger.” Dogen comments:

“There are few who have even seen this ‘painting of a rice cake’ and none of them has thoroughly understood it.”

“The paints for painting rice cake are the same as those used for painting mountains and waters.”

“If you say the painting is not real, then the entire phenomenal universe and the empty sky are nothing but a painting.”

“Since this is so, there is no remedy for satisfying hunger other than a painted rice cake. Without painted hunger you never become a true person.”

Eihei Dogen (A.D. 1200-1253) is a Japanese Zen Buddhist. In many of his teachings and discussions, he is excelled in using non-logical ways of thinking (in other words, to break the fixed logics/theories) to reach enlightenment. In the quoted passages, he demonstrates how phenomenal world and representation are related to each other. As EH community members, are we aware of our hunger?

Too often we are possessed by binary oppositions and our ways of thinking are regulated by theories created by academic disciplines. Sometimes it is inspirational when we read some non-mainstream writings. Moon in a Dewdrop is a good translated work in which a reader can see Dogen’s practice of non-dualist thinking. Western readers might encounter some cultural barrier in the process of reading, but it is fun to try. I recommend the chapter of “Painting of a Rice cake.” This short chapter helps us to locate our positions between physical realities and their representations (for example, natural writings). Believe it or not, I use the key idea of the chapter as a theoretical framework to read Silko’s Ceremony rather than using postcolonialism, psychoanalysis, or other mainstream theories.