Warlock bit (was:Re[2]: a koan answered?)

[fuhrel at ccrouter.ccsn.nevada.edu]

     Just scored a copy, looks like first edition, of _Warlock_, at a used 
     bookstore in Big Bear, California.  Viking Press, 1958.  This 
     particular copy has been withdrawn in October, 1961,from the Patients 
     (sic) Library, Women's Auxiliary, Presbyterian Intercommunity 
     Hospital,  Whittier, California.  I like to think the the only person 
     who ever read it was Richard Nixon, back home recuperating from his 
     loss to JFK.
     
     Bob Fuhrel


______________________________ Reply Separator _________________________________
Subject: Re: a koan answered? 
Author:   Rick Vosper <maxrad at mail.cruzio.com> at SMTP-CCSN
Date:    7/9/97 11:50 PM


At 08:27 PM 7/9/97 -0300, you wrote:
     
>A nice post, Will; very nice indeed. 
>Vaska
>
>At 05:33 PM 7/9/97 W. Karlin wrote: 
>
>>  to wit:  on p. 22 L.E.D. relates the koan in which a student asks 
>>"whether a Dog hath the nature of the divine Buddha."  The master answers 
>>with a single word: "mu."  
>>
>>  Later on p. 61 the phrase "assigning to every Looking-Glass a 
>>Coefficient of Mercy,-- term it u,--..."  Actually, that "u" is the greek 
>>character "mu" (can't do the real symbol).  
>>  The answer to the koan is mercy.  The question whether the dog hath the 
>>nature of the divine buddha (and hence deserving the respect we *should* 
>>afford our fellow man) is not the right question. I think the real 
>>question,-- how do we treat the dog without knowing whether it hath the 
>>NDB?,-- is answered...we show it mercy.  (Which may mean that the Dog 
>>hath the NDB.)
>>
>>  Goes along with the "soul in every stone", I think.
     
Nice, try, but no pickle, sorry. Please consider the following:
     
     
1: The pun is weak (even by Pynchonian standards).The Mu of the zen koan is 
generally transcribed "muh"; the greek Mu is pronounced "myu", and stands 
for, well, any number of things; angstroms coming most easily to mind.
     
2: Pynchon knows his koans well enough to know that "mercy" is *not* the 
"answer" to Josho's Mu (about dogs and Buddha-nature). This is evidenced by 
his "correct" answer to the famous "one hand" koan elsewhere in the Canon 
(I thought this was in GR, but have been unable to find it therein; perhaps 
another P-Lister can assist me?) and by his knowledge of published 
"answers" elsewhere in Buddhist literature.
     
3: My own interpretation is that a dog/Buddha-nature koan as posed by the 
LED is simply too wonderful an opportunity to pass up, and its relation to 
other parts of M&D, sadly, is minimal.
     
Other ideas?
     
--rick