Little bit of Zen?

[Guest guest]

Hello Everyone,

I haven't posted here before but have been moved to do so by a

beautiful text I have just read. It's a bit long, sorry!

 

 

hsin hsin ming

verses on the faith-mind

by Sengtsan, the third Zen Patriarch

 

Note: The title's first character Hsin shows a man standing by his

words, and is often translated as faith or trust. The second Hsin

depicts heart and has come to mean heart, mind, soul, etc. and

sometimes Buddha-nature

So..

 

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 and reject that we do 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 their source.

At the moment of inner enlightenment there is a going beyond

appearances 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, of right and wrong

the mind essence will be lost in confusion.

Although all dualities come from the One, do not be attracted 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 distinguishing 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 subject [mind].

the mind [subject] is such because of things [object].

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 course 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 [attachment]

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

becomes 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 full

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

need 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 no disliking.

All dualities come from ignorant inference.

They are like dreams or 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 stationary and the stationary in motion,

both movement and rest disappear.

When such dualities cease to exist, Oneness itself cannot exist.

To this ultimate finality no laws or description applies.

 

For the unified mind in accordance 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 and self-illuminating, with no exertion of the

mind's power.

Here thoughts, feelings, 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

doubts arise,

`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 and 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.