The Zen Teaching of Bodhidharma
Not an easy text as introduction to Zen teachings but definitely recommended. Like other old text, additional readings clarify concepts, inspire more and improve your understanding. You always find something to learn from them.
The teachings are essential and there are not useless words. Insights bring the reader to deeply understand sacred text and Sutra, in my humble opinion.
Often you must read carefully and you must pay attention and put lots of effort in order to get the idea.
Bodhidharma explains in the last few chapters the real meaning behind sages teachings. In order to reach enlightenment you do not focus on external practices. Sages use metaphors to facilitate beginners mind to understand the Way. Bodhidharma says that you must focus on your perceptions and your inner grow.
As others before me said, disciple must not be a repeater. He must renew the teachings and find new formulations that are right at the moment and in such new conditions. He must accomplish much more. Bodhidharma succeed on it and the reader must do the same.
Highlights
I accept it with an open heart and without complaint of injustice.” The sutras say, “When you meet with adversity don’t be upset,
we’re ruled by conditions, not by ourselves. All the suffering and joy we experience depend on conditions. If we should be blessed by some great reward, such as fame or fortune, it’s the fruit of a seed planted by us in the past. When conditions change, it ends. Why delight in its existence? But while success and failure depend on conditions, the mind neither waxes nor wanes. Those who remain unmoved by the wind of joy silently follow the Path.
To have a body is to suffer. Does anyone with a body know peace? Those who understand this detach themselves from all that exists and stop imagining or seeking anything. The sutras say, “To seek is to suffer.
To seek nothing is bliss.” When you seek nothing, you’re on the Path.
Six virtues. The paramitas, or means to the other shore: charity, morality, patience, devotion, meditation, and wisdom. All six must be practiced with detachment from the concepts of actor, action, and beneficiary. Feeding Your Demons: Ancient Wisdom for Resolving Inner Conflict (Allione, Tsultrim)
all humans, each of us, must come to terms with the demons of fear, aggression, temptation, ignorance, and their cohorts if we are to live a free and sacred life. They cannot be neglected.
Trying to find a buddha or enlightenment is like trying to grab space. Space has a name but no form. It’s not something you can pick up or put down. And you certainly can’t grab it. Beyond this mind you’ll never see a buddha. The buddha is a product of your mind. Why look for a buddha beyond this mind?
As long as you look for a buddha somewhere else, you’ll never see that your own mind is the buddha. Don’t use a buddha to worship a buddha. And don’t use the mind to invoke a buddha.16 Buddhas don’t recite sutras.17 Buddhas don’t keep precepts.18 And buddhas don’t break precepts. Buddhas don’t keep or break anything. Buddhas don’t do good or evil. To find a buddha, you have to see your nature.19 Whoever sees his nature is a buddha. If you don’t
Suzuki’s Zen Doctrine of No Mind.
Invoking buddhas results in good karma, reciting sutras results in a good memory; keeping precepts results in a good rebirth, and making offerings results in future blessings—but no buddha.
“Nothing is more important than life and death. But instead of looking for a way out of the Sea of Life and Death, you spend all your time looking for ways to earn merit. If you’re blind to your own nature, what good is merit? Use your wisdom, the prajna-nature of your own mind. All of you, go write me a poem.” (Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch, Chapter One)
The truth is, there’s nothing to find.
without the help of a teacher you’ll never know it. Only one person in a million becomes enlightened without a teacher’s help.
Those who worship don’t know, and those who know don’t worship.
Don’t cling to appearances, and you’ll break through all barriers.
To understand this mind you have to act without acting. Only then will you see things from a tathagata’s perspective.
If, as in a dream, you see a light brighter than the sun, your remaining attachments will suddenly come to an end and the nature of reality will be revealed. Such an occurrence serves as the basis for enlightenment. But this is something only you know. You can’t explain it to others. Or if, while you’re walking, standing, sitting, or lying in a quiet grove, you see a light, regardless of whether it’s bright or dim, don’t tell others and don’t focus on it. It’s the light of your own nature.
If you see your nature, you don’t need to read sutras or invoke buddhas. Erudition and knowledge are not only useless but also cloud your awareness.
Unless you see your nature, you shouldn’t go around criticizing the goodness of others. There’s no advantage in deceiving yourself.
I only talk about seeing your nature. I don’t talk about sex simply because you don’t see your nature. Once you see your nature, sex is basically immaterial. It ends along with your delight in it. Even if some habits remain, they can’t harm you, because your nature is essentially pure. Despite dwelling in a material body of four elements, your nature is basically pure. It can’t be corrupted. Your real body is basically pure. It can’t be corrupted.
It’s only because you cling to this material body that things like hunger and thirst, warmth and cold, and sickness appear. Once you stop clinging and let things be, you’ll be free, even of birth and death.
It’s only because you cling to this material body that things like hunger and thirst, warmth and cold, and sickness appear.
Once you stop clinging and let things be, you’ll be free,
I don’t talk about precepts, devotions or ascetic practices such as immersing yourself in water and fire, treading a wheel of knives, eating one meal a day, or never lying down.
It’s like space. You can’t hold it.
Using the mind to look for reality is delusion. Not using the mind to look for reality is awareness. Freeing oneself from words is liberation. Remaining unblemished by the dust of sensation is guarding the Dharma. Transcending life and death is leaving home.58 Not suffering another existence is reaching the Way. Not creating delusions is enlightenment. Not engaging in ignorance is wisdom. No affliction is nirvana. And no appearance of the mind is the other shore.
Keep your every thought free of delusion, and in life you’ll witness the beginning of nirvana,
Every suffering is a buddha-seed, because suffering impels mortals to seek wisdom. But you can only say that suffering gives rise to buddhahood. You can’t say that suffering is buddhahood. Your body and mind are the field. Suffering is the seed, wisdom the sprout, and buddhahood the grain.
whoever wants to see a buddha sees the mind before he sees the buddha.
sages don’t consider the past. And they don’t worry about the future. Nor do they cling to the present. And from moment to moment they follow the Way.
Three sets of precepts. There are five for ordinary lay Buddhists, eight for the more devout members of the laity, and ten for novice monks and nuns. The first five are injunctions against murder, theft, adultery, falsehood, and intoxication. To these five are added injunctions against bodily adornment (garlands, jewelry, and perfume), bodily comfort (soft beds), and overeating (eating after the noon meal). And to these eight are added injunctions against the enjoyment of entertainment and the possession of wealth. These three sets are summarized by the three vows. The vow to avoid evil is made by all believers. The vow to cultivate virtue is made by the more devout lay believers. And the vow to liberate all beings is nade by all monks and nuns.
people today don’t understand the Tathagata’s real meaning. They use an ordinary flame to light material incense of sandalwood or frankincense and pray for some future blessing that never comes.
Those who observe the precepts don’t injure any of the myriad life forms of heaven and earth.