'Among those who give thoughts to things, is there one who does not think of suicide?' With me was the knowledge that that fellow Ikkyu twice contemplated suicide. I have 'that fellow', because the priest Ikkyu is known even to children as a most amusing person, and because anecdotes about his limitlessly eccentric behavior have come down to us in ample numbers. It is said of him that children climbed his knee to stroke his beard, that wild birds took feed from his hand. It would seem from all this that he was the ultimate in mindlessness, that he was an approachable and gentle sort of priest. As a matter of fact he was the most severe and profound of Zen priests. Said to have been the son of an emperor, he entered a temple at the age of six, and early showed his genius as a poetic prodigy. At the same time he was troubled with the deepest of doubts about religion and life. 'If there is a god, let him help me. If there is none, let me throw myself to the bottom of the lake and become food for fishes.' Leaving behind these words he sought to throw himself into a lake, but was held back. ... He gave his collected poetry the title 'Collection of the Roiling Clouds', and himself used the expression 'Roiling Clouds' as a pen name. In his collection and its successor are poems quite without parallel in the Chinese and especially the Zen poetry of the Japanese middle ages, erotic poems and poems about the secrets of the bedchamber that leave one in utter astonishment. He sought, by eating fish and drinking spirits and having commerce with women, to go beyond the rules and proscriptions of the Zen of his day, and to seek liberation from them, and thus, turning against established religious forms, he sought in the pursuit of Zen the revival and affirmation of the essence of life, of human existence, in a day civil war and moral collapse.

Zen·Philosophy·Doubt·Mental health·Suicide·Thinking