The birds have vanished into the sky
And now the last cloud drains away.
We sit together, the mountain and me
Until only the mountain remains.
~ Li Po
“In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities;
in the expert’s mind there are few.”
– Shunryu Suzuki Roshi
“This pure Mind, which is the source of all things,
shines forever with the radiance of its own perfection.
But most people are not aware of it
and think that the Mind is just the faculty
that sees, hears, feels, and knows.
Blinded by their own sight, hearing, feeling, and knowing
they do not perceive the radiance of the source.”
– Zen Master Huang-po
“There is the dual nature of self:
The incomplete self and the complete self…
As humans, we are seeing from the perspective of the incomplete self.
This incomplete self is undoubtedly very important. But if we attach to this incomplete self, although this incomplete self is important, then we’ll never be able to experience the complete self.
We Zen people say, if you believe in God, this complete self means the same thing as God.
That is it shares the same standpoint as God.”
– Joshu Sasaki Roshi
“Meditation opens the mind to the greatest mystery that takes place daily and hourly;
it widens the heart so that it may feel the eternity of time and infinity of space in every throb;
it gives us a life within the world as if we were moving about in paradise;
and all these spiritual deeds take place without any refuge into a doctrine,
but by the simple and direct holding fast
to the truth which dwells in our innermost beings.”
– Suzuki Roshi
I sit and gaze on this highest peak of all;
Wherever I look there is distance without end.
I am all alone and no one knows I am here,
A lonely moon is mirrored in the cold pool.
Down in the pool there is not really a moon;
The only moon is in the sky above.
I sing to you this one piece of song;
But in the song there is not any Zen.
Han-Shan, 750
Translated by Arthur Waley
The Buddha Mind contains the universe.
In this universe there is only one pure substance,
One absolute and indivisible Truth.
The notion of duality does not exist.
The small mind contains only illusions of separateness, of division.
It imagines myriad objects and defines truth in terms of relative opposites.
Big is defined by small, good by evil, pure by defiled, hidden by revealed, full by empty.
What is opposition?
It is the arena of hostility, of conflict and turmoil.
Where duality is transcended peace reigns.
This is the Dharma’s ultimate truth.
– Maxims of Master Han Shan Te’Ch’ing, # 76, 1600
As Suzuki Roshi, a great contemporary Zen master,
wrote in his classic book, Zen Mind Beginners Mind:
“When you are practicing Zazen meditation, do not try
to stop your thinking. Let it stop by itself. If
something comes into your mind, let it come in and let
it go out. It will not stay long. When you try to stop
your thinking, it means you are bothered by it. Do not
be bothered by anything. It appears that the
something comes from outside your mind, but actually
it is only the waves of your mind and if you are not
bothered by the waves, gradually they will become
calmer and calmer . . . Many sensations come, many
thoughts and images arise but they are just waves
from your own mind. Nothing comes from outside
your mind . . . If you leave your mind as it is, it will
become calm. This mind is called Big Mind.”
If you can smash through a single thought,
Then all deluded thinking will suddenly be stripped off.
You will feel
Like a flower in the sky that casts no shadows,
Like a bright sun emitting boundless light,
Like a limpid pond, transparent and clear.
After experiencing this,
There will be immeasurable feelings of light and ease,
And a sense of liberation.
There is nothing marvelous or extraordinary about it.
Do not rejoice and wallow in this ravishing experience.
If you do, then the Mara of Joy will possess you.
Han Shan Te’-Ch’ing, 1600
Essentials of Practice and Enlightenment for Beginners
Translated by Guo-gu Shi
From the Autobiography of Han Shan:
“I then went to sit on a solitary wooden bride and meditated thre every day.
At first, I heard the stream flowing very clearly, but as time passed I could hear the sound only if I willed it. If I stirred my mind, I could hear it, but if I kept my mind still I head nothing. One day, while sitting on the bride, I suddenly felt that I had no body. It had vanished, together with the sound around me. Since then I have never been disturbed by any sound.
My daily food was a gruel of bran, weeds, and rise water. When I first came to the mountain someone had given me three packs of rice, which lasted for more than six months. One day, after having my gruel, I took a walk. Suddenly I stood still, filled with the realization that I had no body and no mind. All I could see was one great illuminating Whole, omnipresent, perfect, lucid, and serene. It was like an all-embracing mirror from which the mountains and rivers of the earth were projected as reflections. When I awoke from this experience, I felt as “clear-and-transparent” as though my body and mind did not exist at all, whereupon I composed the following stanza:
In a flash the violent mind stood still;
Within, without are both transparent and clear.
After the great somersault
The great Void is broken through.
Oh, how freely come and go
The myriad forms of things!
From then on, both inward and outward experience became lucidly clear. Sounds, voices, visions, scenes, forms, and objects were no longer hindrances. All my former doubts dissolved into nothing. When I returned to my kitchen, I found the cauldron covered with dust. Many days had passed during my experience, of which I, being alone, was unaware.”
“Gone, and a million things leave no trace
Loosed, and it flows through the galaxies
A fountain of light, into the very mind–
Not a thing, and yet it appears before me:
Now I know the pearl of the Buddha-nature
Know its use: a boundless perfect sphere.”
– Han-Shan, Translated by Gary Snyder
“The Buddha Mind contains the universe.
In this universe there is only one pure substance,
One absolute and indivisible Truth.
The notion of duality does not exist.
The small mind contains only illusions of separateness, of division.
It imagines myriad objects and defines truth in terms of relative opposites.
Big is defined by small, good by evil, pure by defiled, hidden by revealed, full by empty.
What is opposition?
It is the arena of hostility, of conflict and turmoil.
Where duality is transcended peace reigns.
This is the Dharma’s ultimate truth.”
- – Han Shan Te’Ch’ing, # 76, 1600
The Faith Mind Sutra
Hsin Hsin Ming
by Sengstan Third Zen Ancestor
The Great Way is not difficult
for those who have no preferences.
When love and hate are both absent
everything becomes clear and undisguised.
Make the smallest distinction, however
and heaven and earth are set infinitely apart.
If you wish to see the truth
then hold no opinions for or against anything.
To set up what you like against what you dislike
is the disease of the mind.
When the deep meaning of things is not understood
the mind’s essential peace is disturbed to no avail.
The Way is perfect like vast space
where nothing is lacking and nothing is in excess.
Indeed, it is due to our choosing to accept or reject
that we no not see the true nature of things.
Live neither in the entanglements of outer things,
nor in inner feelings of emptiness.
Be serene in the oneness of things
and such erroneous views will disappear by themselves.
When you try to stop activity to achieve passivity
your very effort fills you with activity.
As long as you remain in one extreme or the other
you will never know Oneness.
Those who do not live in the single Way
fail in both activity and passivity,
assertion and denial.
To deny the reality of things
is to miss their reality;
to assert the emptiness of things
is to miss their reality.
The more you talk and think about it,
the further astray you wander from the truth.
Stop talking and thinking,
and there is nothing you will not be able to know.
To return to the root is to find the meaning,
but to pursue appearances is to miss the source.
At the moment of inner enlightenment
there is a going beyond appearance and emptiness.
The changes that appear to occur in the empty world
we call real only because of our ignorance.
Do not search for the truth;
only cease to cherish opinions.
Do not remain in the dualistic state
avoid such pursuits carefully.
If there is even a trace
of this and that, right and wrong,
the Mind-essence will be lost in confusion.
Although all dualities come from the One,
do not be attached even to this One.
When the mind exists undisturbed in the Way,
nothing in the world can offend,
and when a thing can no longer offend,
it ceases to exist in the old way.
When no discriminating thoughts arise,
the old mind ceases to exist.
When thought objects vanish,
the thinking-subject vanishes,
as when the mind vanishes, objects vanish.
Things are objects because of the mind;
the mind is such because of things.
Understand the relativity of these two
and the basic reality: the unity of emptiness.
In this Emptiness the two are indistinguishable
and each contains in itself the whole world.
If you do not discriminate between coarse and fine
you will not be tempted to prejudice and opinion.
To live in the Great Way
is neither easy nor difficult,
but those with limited views
are fearful and irresolute:
the faster they hurry, the slower they go,
and clinging cannot be limited;
even to be attached to the idea of enlightenment
is to go astray.
Just let things be in their own way
and there will be neither coming nor going.
Obey the nature of things, your own nature,
and you will walk freely and undisturbed.
When thought is in bondage the truth is hidden,
for everything is murky and unclear,
and the burdensome practice of judging
brings annoyance and weariness.
What benefit can be derived
from distinctions and separations ?
If you wish to move in the One Way
do not dislike even the world of senses and ideas.
Indeed, to accept them fully
is identical with true Enlightenment.
The wise man strives to no goals
but the foolish man fetters himself.
There is one Dharma, not many;
distinctions arise
from the clinging needs of the ignorant.
To seek Mind with the discriminating mind
is the greatest of all mistakes.
Rest and unrest derive from illusion;
with enlightenment there is no liking and disliking.
All dualities come from ignorant inference.
They are like dreams of flowers in air:
foolish to try to grasp them.
Gain and loss, right and wrong:
such thoughts must finally be abolished at once.
If the eye never sleeps,
all dreams will naturally cease.
If the mind makes no discriminations,
the ten thousand things
are as they are, of single essence.
To understand the mystery of this One-essence
is to be released from all entanglements.
When all things are seen equally
the timeless Self-essence is reached.
No comparisons or analogies are possible
in this causeless, relationless state.
Consider movement stationery
and the stationery in motion,
both movement and rest disappear.
When such dualities cease to exist
Oneness itself cannot exist.
To this ultimate finality
no law or description applies.
For the unified mind in accord with the Way
all self-centered striving ceases.
Doubts and irresolutions vanish
and life in true faith is possible.
With a single stroke we are freed from bondage;
nothing clings to us and we hold to nothing.
All is empty, clear, self-illuminating,
with no exertion of the mind’s power.
Here thought, feeling, knowledge and imagination
are of no value.
In this world of Suchness
there is neither self nor other-than-self.
To come directly into harmony with this reality
just simply say when doubt arises, ‘Not two.’
In this ‘not two’ nothing is separate,
nothing is excluded.
No matter when or where,
enlightenment means entering this truth.
And this truth is beyond extension or
diminution in time or space;
in it a single thought is ten thousand years.
Emptiness here, Emptiness there,
but the infinite universe stands
always before your eyes.
Infinitely large and infinitely small;
no difference, for definitions have vanished
and no boundaries are seen.
So too with Being and non-Being.
Don’t waste time in doubts and arguments
that have nothing to do with this.
One thing, all things:
move among and intermingle,
without distinction.
To live in this realization
is to be without anxiety about non-perfection.
To live in this faith is the road to non-duality.
Because the non-dual is one with the trusting mind.
Words !
The Way is beyond language,
for in it there is
no yesterday
no tomorrow
no today.
Translated by Richard B. Clark
Three Verses by Han-shan Te-ch’ing
by Han-shan Te-ch’ing (1546-1623)
Translated by Red Pine
1.
Snow besieges my plank door I crowd the stove at night
although this form exists it seems as if it doesn’t
I have no idea where the months have gone
every time I turn around another year on earth is over [1]
2.
Bone-chilling snow on a thousand peaks
wild raging wind from ten thousand hollows
when I first awake deep beneath my blanket
I forget my body is in a silent void [2]
3.
The mountains stand unmoving just the way they are
all day they let the clouds roll out and roll back in
even though red dust is countless layers deep
not a single speck reaches my thatched hut [3]
Notes by the translator
[1] “Plank door” is literary shorthand for the home of someone who has retired from active involvement in government service or politics into anonymity. Buddhists view our existence on Earth as humans as but one of a series of stops on the Wheel of Karma.
[2] The image and wording of the second line is indebted to Chuangtzu: 2.1, where Chuang-tzu traces the origin of wind to hollows in the earth and likens these to our sense organs.
[3] As with the flowers in verse 19, the red dust of illusion only settles on those who remain convinced that it is real and worthy of consideration. The color red is the color of heat, life, and attraction.
We asked our teacher,
“What is the nature of the mind?”
This is how he replied.
“At your heart, imagine your mind as a drop of light which is the color of the sky and the size of a mustard seed. Imagine that this luminous drop of mind expands as far as it can. Follow it and discover which is larger, the fully expanded mind of the vast space of the sky.” For fifteen minutes we sat absorbed in this reflection, at which time he smiled, and said, “This is the nature and expanse of the mind.”
— Excerpted from Joel & Michelle Leveys’ book Luminous Mind
From a Tibetan view, here’s a Jewel:
The Prayer of the Ground, Path & Fruition
From the Heart Essence of the Vast Expanse
Homage to glorious Samantabhadra!
The true nature of things is naturally free of conceptual projections.
It does not exist, since even the victorious ones do not see it.
Yet neither is it non-existent, as it is the ground of all samsara and nirvana.
There is no contradiction here, for it lies beyond the realm of expression.
May all realize this Great Perfection, the true nature of the ground!
In essence it is empty, hence free from the limitations of permanence.
By nature it is clear, and free from the limitations of nihilism.
Its capacity unobstructed, it is the ground of manifold emanations.
It is divided into three, yet in truth there are no such differentiations.
May all realize this Great Perfection, the true nature of the ground!
Inconceivable and free of all superimposition, one-sided fixation
On things being either existent or non-existent completely dissolves.
The full import of this turns back even the tongue of the victors.
Without beginning, middle, or end, it is a great expanse of deep clarity.
May all realize this Great Perfection, the true nature of the ground!
Its essence is pristine, unoriginated, and primordially pure.
Whatever manifests is the expression of this unconditioned spontaneous presence.
Without perceiving them as other, realizing the great unity of awareness-emptiness,
One’s understanding of the ground will reach a point of culmination.
May there be no deviations and mistakes concerning this key point of the path!
Pure from the beginning, even the term “view” does not exist.
Aware of the original state, the sheath of meditation falls away.
There are no reference points, hence no need to restrain one’s conduct.
In the spontaneously present nature, this state of naked simplicity,
May there be no deviations and mistakes concerning this key point of the path!
Not falling into partiality towards positive thoughts or negative ones,
And without giving free rein to a state of indifferent neutrality,
Manifestation and liberation—an expanse unrestricted, unbridled, and spontaneously free.
Understanding that the nature is inherently devoid of needing to accept and reject,
May there be no deviations and mistakes concerning this key point of the path!
Like space, awareness is the universal ground and starting point.
Manifest ground spontaneously present, yet vanishing like clouds in the sky,
The mind radiates out, projecting outwards and then returning within
To the youthful vase body’s inner space, possessing six unique characteristics–
May all seize the throne of this majestic fruition!
From the very beginning, awareness itself is Samantabhadra.
Within it, all hoping for attainments dissolves into the sphere of reality,
The true character of the Great Perfection, beyond intentional effort;
The sphere of reality and awareness, the inner space of Samantabhadri–
May all seize the throne of this majestic fruition!
Utterly non-abiding–the nature of the Great Middle Way;
All-embracing and spontaneously vast–the state of Mahamudra;
Freed from limitations and wide open–the key point of the Great Perfection.
The virtues of the levels and paths fundamentally complete–spontaneously present inner space.
May all seize the throne of this majestic fruition!
This profound prayer, a summation of the seal
Of the quintessential vast expanse,
Was set down at the behest of the protector of the teachings,
The Rishi Rahula, who took the form of a monk.
To make meaningful the spread of the profound reality
And bring to perfection this prayer of interdependence,
I let loose this profound seal to the mad yogi of Kong.
Entrusting it to this hidden master of awareness
Who himself has been blessed by Akashagarbha.
May its benefit for beings equal the extent of space!
Translated by Cortland Dahl