Exhaustive investigation and grinding practice

"Followers of the Way, he who is a renouncer of home must needs study the Way.

Take me, for example—I started out devoting myself to the vinaya and also delved into the sutras and śāstras. Later, when I realized that they were only remedies to help the world and displays of opinion, I threw them all away, and, searching for the Way, I practiced meditation. Still later I met a great teacher. Then, indeed, my dharma-eye became clear and for the first time I was able to understand all the old teachers of the world and to tell the true from the false.

It is not that I understood from the moment I was born of my mother, but that, after exhaustive investigation and grinding practice, in one instant I knew for myself."

-Linji (Record of Linji, p.21-22)

Submitted January 27, 2020 at 12:04PM by Temicco https://ift.tt/2uA0eXA