All Unreal

Master Nanquan said to an assembly, ​

The Burning Lamp Buddha said it—if what is thought up by mental descriptions produces things, they are empty, artificial, all unreal. Why? Even mind has no existence—how can it produce things? They are like shadows of forms dividing up empty space, like someone putting sound in a box, and like blowing into a net trying to inflate it. Therefore an old adept said, “It is not mind, not Buddha, not a thing,” teaching you how to practice.

It is said that tenth stage bodhisattvas abide in the concentration of heroic progress, gain the secret treasury of teachings of all Buddhas, spontaneously attain all meditations, concentrations, liberations, spiritual powers, and wondrous functions, go to all worlds and manifest physical bodies everywhere, sometimes present the appearance of attaining enlightenment, turning the wheel of the great teaching, and entering complete extinction, causing infinity to enter into a pore, expound a one-line scripture for countless eons without exhausting the meaning, teach countless billions of beings to attain acceptance of the truth of no origin; yet this is still called the folly of knowledge, the folly of extremely subtle knowledge, completely contrary to the Way. It’s very difficult, very hard; take care.

From the Dahui Shobogenzo

Note: Nansen, Joshu, and Bankei are definitely my three favorite Zen masters. It's been pretty cool finding new sayings from Nansen and Joshu in this only recently translated text.

The tenth stage bodhisattva does all that practicing and studying. They attain all of those characteristics and abilities. Yet they are completely contrary to the Way.

Submitted December 30, 2017 at 09:12PM by koancomentator http://ift.tt/2q18Une