For this series of excerpts I'll put different translations of the Third Patriarchs "Faith in Mind" poem up side by side for us all to chew over together.
If you wish to know the truth,
then hold to no opinions for or against anything.
To set up what you like against what you dislike
is the disease of the mind
Richard B. Clarke
If you want to get hold of what it looks like,
Do not be anti- or pro- anything.
The conflict of longing and loathing, --
This is the disease of the mind.
R. H. Blyth
If you want the Way right here before you,
have nothing to do with assent or dissent.
Where acceptance and rejection vie for mastery,
this is sickness to the mind.
Burton Watson
Immediately we have Sengcan identifying the "conflict of longing and loathing" as being the "disease of the mind". Let's take a step back and consider the following:
Plenty of religions and philosophers identify various things as "diseases of the mind". What are some of the ones you have heard of?
How do those "diseases" contrast with what Sengcan identifies as being it?
In the end though, Sengcan gives us the antidote and then points out the poison. If we forget both the antidote and the poison, where do we end up?
Submitted February 02, 2020 at 10:41PM by ThatKir https://ift.tt/391Qg00
No comments:
Post a Comment