Teachings From Ancient Vietnamese Zen Masters – 128
51 Manifesting
Appearing clearly all day and night,
the self nature manifests suitably.
Seeing the true eternity acting through the six senses,
you will move across, up and down
among all phenomena with complete enlightenment.
CHAN NGUYEN (1647 – 1726)
(COMMENT: Many Zen masters believe that koan meditation solely
might not be helpful. While reviving the 700-year-old Truc Lam Zen
School to become the largest Zen school in Vietnam now, the well-
known Zen Master Thanh Tu gave his dozens of Zen monasteries a new
curriculum in which the koan study is only a part.
This Zen master emphasizes mindfulness of the mind with an approach
he called Tri Vong, meaning Knowing the False – urging meditator to
watch the mind, to be mindful of the false thoughts, and not to wander
with them. While the false thinning out, the emptiness, or the True
Mind, would be realized. Then meditator should live with this realization
all day and night; this stage is called Song Voi Ong Chu, meaning Living
With The Chief.)
