101 Zen Story Discussion Thread

Discussion in 'Eastern Philosophy' started by EvilPoet, Jan 20, 2003.

  1. Dave the Druid Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    136
    Evilpoet,

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!


    Peace and harmony to you

    Dave The Druid

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

     
  2. Google AdSense Guest Advertisement



    to hide all adverts.
  3. EvilPoet I am what I am Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    2,007
    What is Zen?

    Robert Wilson: What is Zen?

    Alan Watts: [Soft chuckling.]

    Robert Wilson: Would you care to enlarge on that?

    Alan Watts: [Loud laughing.]

    -Zen and the Beat Way
     
  4. Google AdSense Guest Advertisement



    to hide all adverts.
  5. Dave the Druid Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    136
    Constantly moving

    Hi Evilpoet!

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!




    The body is the tree of enlightenment
    the mind like a clear mirror stand
    time and gain wipe it diligently
    don't let it gather dust
    Shenxiu

    This seems a good one.
    Dave the Druid

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

     
  6. Google AdSense Guest Advertisement



    to hide all adverts.
  7. EvilPoet I am what I am Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    2,007
    Hi Dave

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!



    Yes, I agree it is a good one. Thanks for posting it. I think movement in general is a good thing. You know, so things don't stagnate. Allow me to quote Confused Dish:

    "Movement is a good thing. It keeps things ebbing and flowing as they supposed to. No movement, stagnation, only brings a lot of pain and misery in the long run. Not to mention, a horrible case of fungus that is very difficult to get rid of. As Publilius Syrus once said, 'A rolling stone gathers no moss.' "
     
  8. Dave the Druid Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    136
    Confused Dish = Buddah?

    Hi Evilpoet

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!


    Move with the purposefulness of water as it runs to the sea

    Dave the Druid

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

     
  9. EvilPoet I am what I am Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    2,007
    "Confused Dish = Buddha?"

    I don't know, you will have to ask Confused Dish.

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!



    "Eventually, all things merge into one, and a river runs through it."
    -A River Runs Through it
     
  10. EvilPoet I am what I am Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    2,007
    Some food for thought ...

    The Inner Gaze

    "You should turn your attention within---don't memorize
    my words. You have been turning from light to darkness
    since before you can remember, so the roots of your
    subjective ideas are deep and hard to uproot all at once.
    This is why I temporarily use expedients to take away your
    coarse perceptions." -Zen Master Yangshan

    Moon and Clouds

    "The original Buddha-nature of all living beings is like the bright
    moon in the sky---it is only because it is covered by floating
    clouds that it cannot appear." -Zen master Fenyang
     
  11. Dave the Druid Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    136
    A quibble?

    Are all the quotes we study just so much noise? Are they not instructive? Do they not show ways to the Path?

    Perhaps the words are as fleeting as clouds over the face of the moon, as we understand the words they part and all that remains is the illumination of the moon.

    Dave the Druid

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

     
  12. EvilPoet I am what I am Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    2,007
    Some food for thought ...

    "As soon as you try to chase and grab Zen, you've
    already stumbled past it." -Zen Master Yuanwu
     
  13. Dave the Druid Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    136
    What is is, what isn't isn't

    Hi Evilpoet!

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!



    The very nature of Zen is to grasp at clouds. It both attainable and unatinable. The closer to the path we are the farther we are from it.

    Dave the Druid


    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

     
  14. EvilPoet I am what I am Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    2,007
    Seek Without Seeking

    "If you seek, how is that different from pursuing
    sound and form? If you don't seek, how are you
    different from earth, wood, or stone? You must
    seek without seeking." -Zen Master Foyan
     
  15. Dave the Druid Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    136
    What of the Way?

    Hi Evilpoet
    If in seeking we can't find and if in not seeking we won't find; then what is the Way? They Way is all around us and in each of us seek within yourself first then the look beyond you may see it.

    Dave the Druid

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

     
  16. EvilPoet I am what I am Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    2,007
    We are fish in the ocean of Tao.

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!



    Tao and the Ocean

    Once upon a time, a young fish asked an old fish: "Everyone talks
    about this thing they call 'ocean.' What the heck is it?"

    The older and wiser fish answered: "The ocean is this thing that
    surrounds you on all sides."

    The younger fish didn't understand: "There's nothing around me!
    Why can I not see this 'ocean?'"

    "Of course you cannot," the old fish was patient. "The ocean is
    both inside and outside of you. You were born in the ocean and
    chances are you will die in it. The ocean flows around you, just as
    your own skin does."

    Confucius once said, "Fish forget they live in water; people forget
    they live in the Tao." We all live in the ocean of Tao. It flows over
    us; it is within us and all around us. It enfolds us like our own
    skin, and yet we cannot perceive it... indeed, most of us have no
    idea what it is. Let us think of Tao as the universal flow of reality.
    This will take us another step toward true understanding of Tao.

    Source: Tao Stories
     
  17. EvilPoet I am what I am Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    2,007
    Some food for thought ...

    Looking For The Shortcut

    When you have even a single thought of looking for
    a shortcut in Zen, you have already stuck your head
    in a bowl of glue." -Zen Master Dahui, Zen Essence


    Artificial Zen

    "You are luckily all right by yourself, yet you struggle
    artificially. Why do you want to put on fetters and go
    to prison? You are busy every day claiming to study
    Zen, learn the Way, and interpret Buddhism, but this
    alienates you even further. It is just chasing sound
    and form. When will you ever stop?"
    -Zen Master Dazhu, Zen Essence
     
  18. Dave the Druid Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    136
    Sophistry

    Hi Evil poet

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!


    I am begining to think that all this quoting is detracting from the true Zen.


    Without going outside, you may know the whole world.
    Without looking through the window, you may see the ways of heaven.
    The farther you go, the less you know.

    Thus the sage knows without traveling;
    He sees without looking;
    He works without doing.
    -Lao Tzu

    Dave the Druid

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

     
  19. EvilPoet I am what I am Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    2,007
    What is true Zen?

    "True Zen consists of sitting quietly in the correct posture. It is not a special state, it is the normal state: silent, peaceful, without agitation. Zen means to put the mind at rest and to concentrate the mind and body. In zazen there is no purpose, no seeking to gain something, no special effort or imagination. It is not knowledge to be grasped by the brain. It is solely a practice, a practice which is the true gate to happiness, peace and freedom."
    -Taisen Deshimaru Roshi
     
  20. EvilPoet I am what I am Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    2,007
    Some (more) food for thought ...

    Avoiding Foxes and Dogs

    "The basic essential nature inherent in all people is clearly evident when you constantly percieve it within yourself; if you pursue external objects, then it becomes obscured; you get confused and are not awake. That is why people of old would look into a saying --- immediately attention is gathered on one point, and you are not drawn by the external world. Eventually the world is forgotten and objects disappear; then the original inherent light naturally comes through revealed.

    If you arbitrarily start trying to figure the saying out, you immediately enter a mistaken path. If you want to ask other people, that too increases your confusion and distress. Therefore the method of looking into a saying is just to keep your mind on it, with a feeling of doubt that does not dissipate. Great doubt results in great enlightenment, small doubt results in smaller enlightenment. This is an established fact.

    People nowadays are unwilling to look into sayings; they just get together in groups to discuss this and that saying as being thus and so, calling it great enlightenment when they've managed to explain them clearly. Since the teachers have no true insight, when they see a resemblance in the words of others, they give them useless stamps of approval, saying they are people of attainment. The teachers and their followers are engaging in a mutual deception, defrauding each other.

    This is why the way of Zen today has deteriorated and died out, while gangs of foxes and packs of dogs claim honor everywhere, fooling the whole world. They will go to hell like an arrow shot. If you want to study Zen, be sure not to fall into the company of those gangs of devils."

    -Yuan-hsien, Teachings of Zen
     

Share This Page