Teachings From Ancient Vietnamese Zen Masters – 56
22 The Way of Patriarchs
Clinging to existence and emptiness only wastes your efforts.
Buddhist learners should ask for the best – the Way of Patriarchs.
It’s really hard if you search for the mind outwardly;
Planting a cinnamon tree cannot make it become a cypress tree.
The tip of a hair contains the whole universe;
A grain of rice, the sun and moon.
When the great usefulness unveils, just hold at hands firmly.
Who would distinguish anymore
between the holy and the unenlightened,
between the west and the east?
KHANH HY (1066 – 1142)
(COMMENT: How can the tip of a hair contain the whole universe? How
can a grain of rice contain the sun and the moon? Just close your eyes
and then open again. How can the whole sky fit into your eyes? Did you
dream last night? How can all the universe fit into your dream, an
illusion playing in your mind? Do you recall the story of “not the flag
moving, not the wind moving, just the mind moving”? How can all
things fit into your mind? And how can your mind carry all the huge
boulders? Too heavy. But feel it. Look at it. Buddha said that you are
what you think, that your mind makes this world. Look at the boulders,
and see you are the boulders you see. In this realization, all things are
equal.)
