| Daehaeng 대행 大行 | |
| Birth Name: | Jum Soon No/ 노점순 / |
| Dharma Name: | Daehaeng Kun Sunim |
| Posthumous Name: | Myo Gong Dang (묘공당, 妙空堂) |
| Birth Date: | February 3, 1927 |
| Birth Place: | Seoul, Korea |
| Death Date: | May 22, 2012 (age 85) |
| Death Place: | Anyang, Seoul, South Korea |
| Nationality: | South Korean |
| Religion: | Buddhist |
| School: | Jogye Order of Korean Buddhism |
| Dae Seon Sa (Great Zen Master) | |
| Teacher: | Hanam Jungwon (漢巖 重遠) |
| Works: | founder of Hanmaum Seon Centers |
Daehaeng Kun Sunim (대행, 大行; 1927 - 2012) was a Korean Buddhist nun and Seon (禪) master. She taught monks as well as nuns, and helped to increase the participation of young people in Korean Buddhism.[1] [2] She made laypeople a particular focus of her efforts, and broke out of traditional models of spiritual practice, teaching so that anyone could practice, regardless of monastic status or gender. She was also a major force for the advancement of Bhikkunis (nuns), heavily supporting traditional nuns’ colleges as well as the modern Bhikkuni Council of Korea.[3] [4] The temple she founded, Hanmaum Seon Center, grew to have 15 branches in Korea, with another 10 branches in other countries.[5]
Daehaeng Kun Sunim was born in Seoul, Korea, in 1927. Her family was originally quite wealthy, and owned large pieces of land stretching from what is now Itaewon down to the Han River. Her father was from an old Korean military family, and had continued to secretly support resistance to the Japanese Occupation of Korea. As a result, in 1932 or 1933, the Japanese secret police, the Kempeitai, came to arrest him. He was warned a few minutes before their arrival and escaped out the back of his home with his family. They fled south across the Han River, and lived in the mountains there in a dugout hut. Unable to safely contact friends or family, they lived in poverty, having to glean fields for leftover grains of rice or vegetables.
Daehaeng Kun Sunim often slept outdoors in order to avoid her increasingly angry father. Obsessed with the question of why people suffer, she awakened when she was around eight years old.[6] She was formally ordained by Hanam Kun Sunim in around 1948, and received Dharma transmission from him at the same time. She spent many of the years that followed wandering the mountains of Korea, wearing ragged clothes and eating only what was at hand. Later, she explained that she hadn't been pursuing some type of asceticism; rather, she was just completely absorbed in entrusting everything to her fundamental Buddha essence and observing how that affected her life. Around 1959, she settled in a hermitage below Sangwon Temple in the Chiak Mountains, and in the mid 1960s moved to the Wonju area. Later she moved to the Cheongnyangni area of Seoul, before eventually moving to Anyang, where she established the first Hanmaum Seon Center in 1972.(Daehaeng 1993, 19-141)[7]
At the time of her passing on May 22, 2012, she was the guiding teacher of over one hundred nuns, and the Dharma teacher of over fifty monks. The center she founded has a lay membership of over one hundred fifty thousand people, and has grown to twenty five branches around the world.[8] [9] [10]
The goal of Daehaeng Kun Sunim's teachings was to help people to discover the great potential within themselves. In this way, they would be able to make their own way forward, and use the abilities inherent within them to help themselves and others. To this end, she taught people to rely upon the great wisdom and energy inherent within each of us, often called "Buddha-nature," through which she said each one of us is connected to every other being and thing.
In her own life and practice, Daehaeng Kun Sunim had experienced for herself that each and every person has this infinite potential of Buddha-nature within themselves, which she said could be called "the owner of mind," "ordinary mind," "the pillar of mind," "inherent nature," "God," "inherent Buddha," "Father," and so on.[11] She was determined to teach such that spiritual practice was something everyone could participate in, and which wasn't limited to certain groups such as monks or nuns.
It was important to her that people develop the strengths and tools to be able to practice and overcome whatever might confront them, without becoming dependent upon some outer teacher or guru. To this end, she taught people to rely directly upon this "inherent Buddha." She also frequently used the Korean expressions for "foundation," "fundamental mind," "Juingong" (the empty doer that is truly doing things), and "Hanmaum" (one mind). While she did say that an outer teacher may be necessary until people find their own, true, inner teacher;[12] nonetheless, as Pori Park points out:
She advised that people should not be deceived by anyone, including her, and instead they should strive to find Juingong. She warned followers that they should be wary of her physical form but have faith in the truth that she taught. She advised them not to blindly follow her or the Buddha but just to take refuge in their own Buddha, Juingong. She also told them not to make her their teacher but to make themselves, the true Juingong, their own teachers.[13]As Daehaeng herself says, "I encourage you to trust in your own Ju In Gong completely. Just remember that the Ju In Gong is within you all the time. There is no need to try to analyze or quantify it. Just return all conditions to it. If you are earnest in your effort you will not need me or anyone else to teach you."[14]
Daehaeng taught that we should have faith and leave everything to our foundation, Juingong, without worrying about anything. She likened Juingong to a skillful servant that knows how to execute its tasks well. However, the more we try to intervene or meddle in its affairs, the more it steps back, leaving us to rely on our own devices.[15] So, instead, we should just entrust everything to Juingong and let go. This entrusting and letting go is not something we need to force. She says:
Thank you for working so hard. But you're trying too frantically to entrust. You don't need to force it. Your true nature is already with you. Everyone born into this world already has this foundation complete within them. You're here, so your foundation is also here. So just trust that and relax. And whether you're awake or asleep, sitting or standing, doing this or that, know this: "Ahh, Juingong, you're here; you're the one who's taking care of things." Just trust this foundation and turn everything over to it. This is entrusting.[16]Daehaeng taught that we should not get caught up in the thought, "I have to let go", since we are already naturally letting go of every moment.[17] She says, "we've already let go of everything. Life is changing instant by instant, with nothing to grasp on to. The very essence of life is letting go. When you met your son just a moment ago and said goodbye, the moment is already gone. It's been let go of. But even 'letting go' is just a name, a word, and a theory. Our living itself is just flowing, with nothing to cling to or let go of."[18] Accordingly, even letting go itself is to be let go of:
Inherently, everybody is naturally going forward while letting go. In fact, there are no such things as holding or letting go. However, people think that something remains or that something really exists. Thus they are caught by such thoughts, so they cannot move as they want and they experience numerous hardships. This is why I say, "Let go, release." Let go and rest such that your mind feels comfortable. Let go again of even this comfort, and finally, let go of even letting go. Then, this is sitting Seon, true Seon, and Seon in daily life.[19]
Daehaeng exhorted people to work on letting go of thoughts such as "I," "mine," and "I did," as well as to be careful to interpret events positively. In addition, she warned about getting caught up in blaming others for the things one experiences. Instead, we should understand that we've had a role in creating everything that we experience. So if we can handle things wisely, if we can entrust them to our foundation, those will change and move in a more positive direction.[20]
She didn't emphasize fixed periods of sitting meditation, nor did she encourage the systematic study of hwadus (kong-an).[21] [22] She wanted people to get used to listening inwardly and discovering what they needed to do at any particular time to brighten their own hearts, as opposed to getting caught up in others' fixed forms and traditions. To this extent, she taught people to take the issues of their own daily life as the material of their spiritual practice, and to practice entrusting that to one's inherent Buddha-nature.
Regarding hwadus (questions used in Zen meditation), Daehaeng held that although they can still be effective, they don't work as well with modern people, and at any rate, each person has their own fundamatal hwadus that they were born with. "Why am I here?" "What am I supposed to be doing with my life?" and so on. She called these kinds of questions "original hwadus":
Daily life is itself a hwadu, so there is no need to receive a hwadu from others or to give a hwadu to others. Your very existence is a hwadu. Thus, if you are continuously holding on to a hwadu someone else gave you, when will you be able to solve your original hwadu? Trying to solve another person's hwadu is like turning empty millstones or spinning a car's wheels without moving forward. Your body itself is a hwadu. Birth itself is a hwadu. Work itself is a hwadu. The vast universe is a hwadu. If you want to add more hwadus to these, when will you be able to taste this infinitely deep world we live in?[23]
In the late 1970s, Daehaeng Kun Sunim began translating the traditional ceremonies used in Korean Buddhist temples.[8] These were used at the temples she founded, Hanmaum Seon Centers, beginning in the early 1980s, with the first collection of these ceremonies being widely published in 1987,[24] but it would not be until late 2011 when Korea's largest Buddhist order, the Jogye Order, would begin to introduce modern Korean translations of the traditional Chinese-character (hanmun) ceremonies.[25] Daehaeng Kun Sunim had been concerned that laypeople were missing the benefits and help that understanding the ceremonies could provide, so she began translating them from the traditional Sino-Korean characters into modern, phonetic Korean (Hangul).These included:
In addition, she translated the Flower Ornament Sutra (華嚴經). Her Korean version of the Thousand Hands Sutra and the Great Compassion Dharani has been published in English as A Thousand Hands of Compassion.[26]
Hanmaum Seon Center(or Hanmaum Seonwon-한마음 선원) is large Buddhist temple complex near Seoul, South Korea. Founded in 1972, in Anyang City, it is part of the Jogye Order of Korean Buddhism. It is run by Daehaeng Kun Sunim's Bhikkuni disciples, and has fifteen Korean branches and ten overseas branches. In addition to its role as a center for teaching the Dharma, it is well known for its choir and youth groups. The youth group is the driving force behind many award-winning lanterns and floats that take part in the Buddha's Birthday parades.
Primary Works
Secondary Works
Principle Works
Major Secondary Works