Baizhang's Fox

On the matter of life and death, its a most serious discussion!

Life and death. Life then death. Forget it. Remember it.

When Baizhang lectured in the hall, there was always an old man who listened to the teaching and then dispersed with the crowd.

One day he didn't leave; Baizhang then asked him, "Who is it standing there?"

The old man said, "In antiquity, in the time of the ancient Buddha Kasyapa, I lived on this mountain. A student asked, 'Does a greatly cultivated man still fall into cause and effect or not?" I answered him, 'He does not fall into cause and effect,' and I fell into a wild fox body for five hundred lives. Now I ask the teacher to turn a word in my behalf."

Baizhang said, "He is not blind to cause and effect." The old man was greatly enlightened at these words.

When we are born, we are fated to die. When we were born, we create a not born. When we are not yet dead, we are a not dead.

Really, when are not living or not dead? Such terms are ridiculous when written down.

Denying cause and effect seperates you from it but you can never seperate from it. If you deny the need for breathing, this body needs breath but instead of steady breathing, you hold your nose and mouth until the body gasps for it. You are at its mercy.

The answer "He is not blind to cause and effect." is a clear and honest statement.

We cannot be blind to it. We cannot afirm it or deny it either. Either path leads to delusion. The old man denied all that was that led to here. In his denial, he forgot the body and the circumstances.

Affirmation sets all that was as a certainty. You are binding pieces of paper into a book.

An honest statement and no more. Nothing to latch on to.

My fear of death always came from attachment to past or present. Worries about being bound by the past. Worries about not having a future. Now, i know I am not seperate from causation. Not grasping to life or death...

Just here.

What do you have to say about the case?

Submitted August 11, 2022 at 10:16PM by Turbulent_Highway_51 https://ift.tt/cAbJMUW