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From: nedludd@ix.netcom.com(Ned Ludd)
Newsgroups: alt.buddha.short.fat.guy,alt.zen
Subject: Re: Ts'ao-shan (was ..
Date: 10 Mar 1999 03:24:54 GMT
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In <36E591E5.C2A134C2@worldnet.att.net> tjn <ryugin@worldnet.att.net>
writes: 

Ned:
> Hold on a minute, the standard Japanese negation, ie. the answer
> 'no' to any incorrect question, such as "Is one plus one three?" -
> is that word "mu" in Japanese?

Toshu:
> no it is not.
> Japanese characters have 2 pronunciations. one is a truly Japanese
> reading and the other is after the old Chinese style. for instance
> the character for mountain is "yama" in the Japanese reading and 
> "zan" in the Chinese reading. in current Chinese it is pronounced
> "shan".
> to answer your question:
> Japanese: "Iie" (sounds like eeyeh). the character has the Chinese
> style reading reading "Hi" (sounds like English pronoun "he").
> the character that is pronounced "mu" in Japanese has more the 
> meaning "lacking", "without", "nothing". it is definitely not a 
> simple negation.  the translations that render it so are 
> editorializing.
> 

 Well, here's the long version from Green's translation of Record
 of Chao-chou, where Chao-chou says "not", and also "why not":

   A monk asked, "Does a dog have a Buddha nature or not?"
   Chao-chou said, "Not [Mu]!"
   The monk said, "Above to all the Buddhas, below to the crawling
     bugs, all have Buddha-nature.  Why is it that the dog has not?"
   Chao-chou said, "Because he has the nature of karmic delusions."

                                      - Record of Chao-chou, #132