FIGURE 49. Day and Night, by M. C. Escher (woodcut, 1938).Mumon's Commentary:
If you call this a short staff, you oppose its reality. If you do not call it a short
staff, you ignore the fact. It cannot be expressed with words and it cannot be
expressed without words. Now say quickly what it is.
Mumon's Poem:
Holding out the short staff,
He gave an order of life or death.
Positive and negative interwoven,
Even Buddhas and patria"chs cannot escape this attack.("Patriarchs" refers to six venerated founders of Zen Buddhism, of whom
Bodhidharma is the first, and Eno is the sixth.)
Why is calling it a short staff opposing its reality? Probably because
such a categorization gives the appearance of capturing reality, whereas the
surface has not even been scratched by such a statement. It could be
compared to saying "5 is a prime number". There is so much more-an
infinity of facts-that has been omitted. On the other hand, not to call it a
staff is, indeed, to ignore that particular fact, minuscule as it may be. Thus
words lead to some truth-some falsehood, perhaps, as well-but certainly
not to all truth. Relying on words to lead you to the truth is like relying on
an incomplete formal system to lead you to the truth. A formal system will
give you some truths, but as we shall soon see, a formal system-no matter
how powerful-cannot lead to all truths. The dilemma of mathematicians
is: what else is there to rely on, but formal systems? And the dilemma of
(^252) Mumon and Godel