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 |   As the first blog entry got exhausted. My second book |
| Evolution of Love Part 2 |
| The Making of the Saranagati Song: The Life of Manavasi Ramaswami Iyer Native to Manavasi Village of Trichy Dist, in 1907 Saranagati Ramaswami Iyer was transferred to Villupuram just 60 kms from Tiruvannamalai. Now that he was near Bhagavan, he set off for Tiruvannamalai one day during the Kartigai Deepam Festival with a view to meet Bhagavan for the first time. Having for a long time suffered sleepless nights caused by chronic dyspepsia and unable to digest normal food, Ramaswami Iyer’s life had been ‘hell on earth with no peace of mind’. So when at last he found Bhagavan at Virupaksha Cave, the poor man cried out in desperation: “I am suffering from a number of ills and diseases. Pray, have mercy on me!” Bhagavan simply said, “I am neither a doctor nor a magician. What can I do?” Then waving his hand in a casual manner, Bhagavan said, “Go home with the courage that nothing will affect you”. Ramaswami Iyer saw in this gesture a ray of hope and took Bhagavan’s words to heart. Deeply impressed by Arunachala, he made up his mind to shift to Tiruvannamalai. For the time being, however, he would have to make short journeys from Villupuram to Tiruvannamalai by train. Beggar at Station One day as he approached Tiruvannamalai Station, he decided to seek out Seshadri Swami whom he had only heard about. As he got down from the train, a feisty, brawny beggar approached him for a coin but the visitor angrily refused him saying that he could not encourage lazy, able-bodied men who were perfectly capable of work to take up a life of begging. He then set about the town searching for Seshadri Swami. When somebody pointed him out, Ramaswami Iyer was bewildered and dismayed to see that Seshadri Swami was none other than the very beggar on whom he had hurled abuses just an hour earlier. Demurely, he approached the Swami with apologies but could immediately see the Swami was not bothered by such things. After settling down in Tiruvannamalai, Seshadri showed Ramaswami Iyer great kindness and regularly took him to visit Bhagavan. Hope in Bhagavan Once settled in Tiruvannamalai, Ramaswami Iyer visited Bhagavan as often as possible. His physical ailments continued unabated and Bhagavan, it seemed, was his only hope of deliverance. One day Ramaswami Iyer found Bhagavan sitting alone in front of Virupaksha Cave: “Swami! Jesus and other great souls have come down to earth to save sinners. Have I any hope?’’ When Bhagavan heard this cry of distress coming forth from the depths of the heart, Bhagavan moved close to the man and said tenderly, “There is hope. Yes. There is hope.” First Song After this incident, though still in despair, Ramaswami Iyer found himself composing a song, the first in his life. It came of its own. Never having been a poet, when he sang the song to Bhagavan, Bhagavan gave him tips in prosody. And thus began Ramaswami’s song-writing which would last up till Bhagavan’s Mahanirvana. In the Dewy Grass One festival day Echammal brought tiffin up to Virupaksha. Ramaswami Iyer sat dejectedly as Bhagavan and the others made ready to eat the special food befitting a feast day. He excused himself saying that the rich food would not suit his weak stomach. But when he turned in Bhagavan’s direction, the latter beckoned him to join them and Ramaswami Iyer felt an irresistible pull. When he was served like the others, Bhagavan ordered him, saying “Eat!” At that moment Ramaswami Iyer lost all fear and ate his fill. He did not neglect any of the dishes, even the richest. For one who theretofore would have had no hope of sleeping after violating his strict dietary regimen, it was nothing short of a miracle when he discovered that he slept soundly that whole night at Virupaksha Cave. When he awoke at day-break, he felt ‘fresh like a flower in the dewy grass’. It was then that he knew, beyond any doubt, that his disease had left him once for all. Promotions from Bhagavan Meanwhile, Ramaswami Iyer’s supervisor at work continually ridiculed him about his monthly salary of Rs. 150 per month. “Why so much?” the superior would probe tauntingly. When Bhagavan heard about it, he said, “How would he feel if you got Rs. 200?” The next Government gazette brought news of Ramaswami Iyer’s promotion and salary increase to Rs. 200. Departing from Bhagavan Later when Ramaswami Iyer was transferred to Shiyali, he left Tiruvannamalai weeping at the thought of being separated from Bhagavan. The distance was intolerable and Ramaswami Iyer made up his mind to leave his family and take sannyasa in order to be with Bhagavan. But Bhagavan would hear nothing of it. Dowries and Such Ramaswami Iyer continued his trips to Tiruvannamalai to see Bhagavan. Once at Skandasramam with his eldest daughter, Bhagavan asked why he had not yet gotten her married. “I would like to but I don’t have the money for a dowry, nor even enough for the marriage ceremony. Echammal happened to be there and hearing the discussion, suggested one Nilakantha, a school teacher known to her. Bhagavan endorsed the idea. When Ramaswami Iyer went down the hill to catch the evening train, he passed Echammal’s house en route and found Nilakantha’s father there. Even before Ramaswami Iyer could make his proposal, the boy’s father volunteered to take the girl as his daughter-in-law. Once back in Shiyali, as Ramaswami Iyer worried about how to raise money for the ceremony, a neighbor just opposite him came over. “I hear your daughter’s marriage is to take place. But where will you find the money?” When Ramaswami Iyer could give no satisfactory answer, the neighbor admonished him, “Could you not have asked me? Would I not have given it cheerfully?” He then gave Ramaswami Iyer a thousand rupees and the marriage was duly performed. Messengers from Bhagavan One day years later after Ramaswami Iyer had been transferred to Berhampore, Orissa, several boils appeared on his leg. Besieged with pain, he could hardly walk but only meditated on Arunachala. No treatment whatsoever proved of any use. But then came a knock at the door. “Who’s there?” he asked. “Arunachalam!” was the reply. With great surprise, Ramaswami Iyer found two Brahmins standing at the door. Forthwith he fell at their feet. “We are coming from Arunachala on pilgrimage to Kasi. Bhagavan asked us to get down here and meet you.” When the two ‘messengers of Bhagavan’ saw his state, they rifled through their bags and took out herbs of tamarind and fragrant gum powders. Once applied to the affected areas, within twenty hours the boils were gone. It was then that Ramaswami Iyer understood the fullness of Bhagavan’s grace; it was then that he found words and notes pouring forth from within him, forming themselves into a hymn of devotion that would later be sung by devotees everywhere; it was then that he understood true surrender to Bhagavan, and so he sang “Saranagati, Saranagati!”* Saranagati: complete self-surrender; sarana: ‘house’, ‘protection’, ‘refuge’, ‘means to a goal’; + agati: ‘to approach’, ‘to reach’: hence ‘approaching the Lord who is the sole means or refuge’. |
| In my boyhood this question perplexed me: Aside from this physical body, what replies "am so-and-so" when asked, "Who are you?" This perplexity having once arisen, it became deeper year by year, resulting in my desire to become a monk. Then I made this solemn vow: 'Now that I have determined to be a monk, I cannot search for truth for my own sake. Even after winning the supreme Truth I will defer full Buddhahood until I have saved every sentient being. Furthermore, until this perplexity has been dissolved I will not study Buddhism or learn the rituals and practices of a monk. So long as I live in the human world I will stay nowhere except with great Zen masters, and in the mountains.' After I entered a monastery my perplexity increased. At the same time, a strong resolve arose from the bottom of my heart and I thought; Shakyamuni Buddha has passed already and Miroku, the future Buddha, has not yet appeared. During this period when authentic Buddhism had declined to the point where it is about to expire, may my desire for Self-realization be strong enough to save all sentient beings in this Buddha-less world. Even should I suffer the pangs of everlasting hell as a result of this sin of attachment [to saving], so long as I can shoulder the sufferings of sentient beings, I will never become discouraged or forsake this eternal vow. Furthermore, in practicing Zen I will not idle away my time thinking of life and death or waste even a minute in trifling good works. Nor will I blind others to the truth by trying to minister to them so long as my own [spiritual] strength is insufficient to lead them to Self-realization. These resolutions became part and parcel of my thinking, bothering me to some extent in my zazen. But I could not do otherwise. I constantly prayed to Buddha for strength to carry our these resolutions, which I made the standard of my conduct in both favorable and unfavorable circumstances, under the watchful but friendly eyes of heavenly beings. Thus it has been up to the present. It is really pointless to tell you about these delusive states of mine, but as you make bold to ask I write here of my aspirations as a novice. |
In my boyhood this question perplexed me: Aside from this physical body, what replies "am so-and-so" when asked, "Who are you?" This perplexity having once arisen, it became deeper year by year, resulting in my desire to become a monk. Then I made this solemn vow: 'Now that I have determined to be a monk, I cannot search for truth for my own sake. Even after winning the supreme Truth I will defer full Buddhahood until I have saved every sentient being. Furthermore, until this perplexity has been dissolved I will not study Buddhism or learn the rituals and practices of a monk. So long as I live in the human world I will stay nowhere except with great Zen masters, and in the mountains.' After I entered a monastery my perplexity increased. At the same time, a strong resolve arose from the bottom of my heart and I thought; Shakyamuni Buddha has passed already and Miroku, the future Buddha, has not yet appeared. During this period when authentic Buddhism had declined to the point where it is about to expire, may my desire for Self-realization be strong enough to save all sentient beings in this Buddha-less world. Even should I suffer the pangs of everlasting hell as a result of this sin of attachment [to saving], so long as I can shoulder the sufferings of sentient beings, I will never become discouraged or forsake this eternal vow. Furthermore, in practicing Zen I will not idle away my time thinking of life and death or waste even a minute in trifling good works. Nor will I blind others to the truth by trying to minister to them so long as my own [spiritual] strength is insufficient to lead them to Self-realization. These resolutions became part and parcel of my thinking, bothering me to some extent in my zazen. But I could not do otherwise. I constantly prayed to Buddha for strength to carry our these resolutions, which I made the standard of my conduct in both favorable and unfavorable circumstances, under the watchful but friendly eyes of heavenly beings. Thus it has been up to the present. It is really pointless to tell you about these delusive states of mine, but as you make bold to ask I write here of my aspirations as a novice. |
| The planet is getting warmer in catastrophic ways. And fear may be the only thing that saves us. We are living today in a world that has warmed by just one degree Celsius (1.8 degrees Fahrenheit) since the late 1800s, when records began on a global scale. We are adding planet-warming carbon dioxide to the atmosphere at a rate faster than at any point in human history since the beginning of industrialization. ... In 2018, their circumspection began to change, perhaps because all that extreme weather wouldn’t permit it not to. Some scientists even began embracing alarmism — particularly with that United Nations report. The research it summarized was not new, and temperatures beyond two degrees Celsius were not even discussed, though warming on that scale is where we are headed. Though the report — the product of nearly 100 scientists from around the world — did not address any of the scarier possibilities for warming, it did offer a new form of permission to the world’s scientists. The thing that was new was the message: It is O.K., finally, to freak out. Even reasonable. This, to me, is progress. Panic might seem counterproductive, but we’re at a point where alarmism and catastrophic thinking are valuable, for several reasons. At the opening of a major United Nations conference two months later, David Attenborough, the mellifluous voice of the BBC’s “Planet Earth” and now an environmental conscience for the English-speaking world, put it even more bleakly: “If we don’t take action,” he said, “the collapse of our civilizations and the extinction of much of the natural world is on the horizon.”... The first is that climate change is a crisis precisely because it is a looming catastrophe that demands an aggressive global response, now. In other words, it is right to be alarmed. The emissions path we are on today is likely to take us to 1.5 degrees Celsius of warming by 2040, two degrees Celsius within decades after that and perhaps four degrees Celsius by 2100. Buying an electric car is a drop in the bucket compared with raising fuel-efficiency standards sharply. Conscientiously flying less is a lot easier if there’s more high-speed rail around. And if I eat fewer hamburgers a year, so what? But if cattle farmers were required to feed their cattle seaweed, which might reduce methane emissions by nearly 60 percent according to one study, that would make an enormous difference. But perhaps the strongest argument for the wisdom of catastrophic thinking is that all of our mental reflexes run in the opposite direction, toward disbelief about the possibility of very bad outcomes. I know this from personal experience. I have spent the past three years buried in climate science and following the research as it expanded into ever darker territory. I know the science is true, I know the threat is all-encompassing, and I know its effects, should emissions continue unabated, will be terrifying. And yet, when I imagine my life three decades from now, or the life of my daughter five decades from now, I have to admit that I am not imagining a world on fire but one similar to the one we have now. That is how hard it is to shake complacency. We are all living in delusion, unable to really process the news from science that climate change amounts to an all-encompassing threat. Indeed, a threat the size of life itself. How can we be this deluded? One answer comes from behavioral economics. The scroll of cognitive biases identified by psychologists and fellow travelers over the past half-century can seem, like a social media feed, bottomless, and they distort and distend our perception of a changing climate. These optimistic prejudices, prophylactic biases and emotional reflexes form an entire library of climate delusion. We build our view of the universe outward from our own experience, a reflexive tendency that surely shapes our ability to comprehend genuinely existential threats to the species. We have a tendency to wait for others to act, rather than acting ourselves; a preference for the present situation; a disinclination to change things; and an excess of confidence that we can change things easily, should we need to, no matter the scale. We can’t see anything but through cataracts of self-deception. ... But the longer we wait, the worse it will get. Which is one last argument for catastrophic thinking: What creates more sense of urgency than fear? |
| With so many people hitting the streets for climate strike and all the recent attacks on Greta Thunberg, I would like to make a statement. I am a Professor in Climate Sciences, I have been working in this field for over 20 years. 1. Climate change is a fact, based on data and equations. It’s science (not politics). 2. Humans are causing climate change. 3. CO2 concentrations are rising at a rate that is 10 to 100 times faster than any other time in the past (and we are talking millions of years back). 4. CO2 concentrations are now at levels Earth has not seen since 3 Million years. That’s when Lucy was roaming in Africa. 5. Both speed of change and magnitude of change will have catastrophic consequences for the world we know and rely on. 6. Ecosystems will have (and are already having) a hard time to adapt with these fast changes. Current extinction rates are far above the normal background extinction rates. 7. We rely on ecosystems for our survival. We are part of ecosystems. 8. For example, speed of change is important for ocean acidification. With slower rates of CO2 rise there are geochemical feedbacks that kick in and mitigate acidification. This is not the case now. It is also important for adaptation to new living conditions. Coral reefs for example are our canaries in a coal mine. 9. The climate system is mainly water and therefore has a large heat capacity and is slow to react. The climate is not in equilibrium right now, it is still catching up to current CO2 concentrations. Last time the climate was in equilibrium with today’s CO2 concentrations, sea levels were much higher (order of magnitude of 10 meters), temperatures were well beyond the Paris Agreement. This is what the world will look like if we keep CO2 concentrations constant. If we continue to emit at current rates, then: 10. We will end up in a climate last seen 50 Million years ago. No ice, completely different ecosystems. The transition will be fast and deadly. 11. Climate change is the largest threat humanity has ever faced. 12. We need to act now. 13. The question is not “do you believe in climate change?”. The question is “do you understand climate change?”. Greta is just a messenger. Don’t shoot the messenger. It does not matter what you or I think about her. What matters is that we stop wasting time. We need to act now. |
| Happiness can be divided into three categories: *1. Physical happiness;* *2. Mental happiness;* *3. Spiritual happiness.* These are brief summary of steps to take for achieving these in our lives: *For Physical Happiness:* ➡ Regular & proper Diet ➡ Regular & proper Rest ➡ Regular & proper Exercise *For Mental Happiness:* ➡ Minimize Expectations ➡ Minimize Ego & Pride ➡ Minimize Negative Thoughts *For Spiritual Happiness:* ➡ Do not live in the Past. Free yourself of past memories. Do not worry about the Future ➡ Help all living beings without any expectations. ➡ Meditate regularly *Be Happy Always* 😊💐 If you find yourself dwelling on everything but the huatou (inquiry: what is this that sees and hears?’), pause and take in what has happened: the huatou has been evicted by diversions and needless thoughts. Recall the pointlessness and eventual utter boredom of dwelling too much on past and future, then return to nourishing the huatou in the present. Time passes like an arrow, so do not let yourself be upset by worldly cares. Before sitting down once or twice a day, hands folded in the lap and eyes half closed, people assume they can concentrate quite well. With nothing to do but try to meditate, however, they get a slow shock! Churnings of thoughts and constant mental stirring becomes the most obvious fact. It dawns at last that this agitation underlies waking hours. Only then do people realize that ease and freedom is offered by an ancient meditation technique. Toward the end of a meditation course at SongKwarng Monastery, sharp students really begin to meditate! Those who have never once joined a meditation course are very much the poorer. It is a tremendous pity that thousands go through life so often overlooking their minds while absorbed in externals. |
| THE 6 LAYERS............ Many may speak of Vedas but few know what it really is and the many layers it consists of . Discussions are going on about Ayodya and Rama without even knowing the basics. So some elaboration for biginers and explorers. VEDAS..This is the base on which all else stands. It consists of 20,000 odd Mantras which were collected by highly evolved Rishi's Today we know the universe is full of vibrations. The rishi's who heard a mantra would share it as they were heard. There were both male and female Rishis. There were then organised by and put into four lots by Veda Vyasa. The Rig Veda is in metrical form ., The Yajur Veda in prose form and Sam'a Veda in musical form while Atharva Veda was mostly collected by Athwarvaha Rishi and Angnirasa The mantras cannot be understood directly so we come the next layer. The Vedas are considered revelations SUTRAS.... These are ophorisms. The statements are cryptic and ideas are in a capsule form. Like Patajalis Yoga Sutras.Here the Vedic teaching is codified and classified. Topical classification is done say Dharma Sutras or yoga Sutras. These are results of human effort and contain name of Rishi. The content is Vedas but the explanation is of a human. All these can be memorised .as here are many many sutras available as per classification SMIRITI...Further elaboration takes place here. They codified classified and we'll arranged. These are all in form of poems for easy memorization.What is implicit is made explicit. There would be a section on cosmology or goals of life. Etc. Here too content is divine but the composition is human. PURANAS... Means ancient but not obsolete. This is further expanded form. If smritis are 1 is to 10 expansion puranas is one is to 100 or more Here too codification and classification takes place. Just the concept of Truth is expanded into thousands of verses in Haishchanra purana A moving story of how a man stood up for this one value. Bhagavatam is also a purana.. Ramayana can also be considered a purana..These are all worth reading. Villager learn these thousands of verses by heart. There are 18 such puranas in addition to another 18 upa puranas. Each poignant and making the Vedas available to people in a more understandable way ITHIHASA....History based literature ... It means .. In this way it doublesly occurred...Ramayana consisting of 24 thousand verses and Mahabharata consisting of one hundred thousand verses are examples of ithihasas.They cannot be compared with epics of the Greeks. The ithihasa are like a holywood movies who take true stories and add some fiction to it for the audience to enjoy. Similarly ithihasa has history mixed with fiction and symbolism .The main purpose is to expound the Vedas to the masses.. This indians themselves are not aware. BHASYAS... These are commentries on all the above forms of knowledge. A bhasya on one vedanta can run into thousands of verses A commentary may have sun commentary and a sub commentary can can still another. This is vast amount of Vedic literature which cannot be mastered in many lifetimes...... This then is vedic culture. There is no concept of a Hindu culture. There is no concept of India. This is the culture that has sustained years for thousands of years.. It is meant for every human being not just Hindus. |
| One of the five vices. Plants and trees live life as singulars as they grow from seeds. The Earth is playing the role of a Mother. On any piece of land on the Earth, we can dig a hole and put the seeds of vegetation in it. But there are some constrains or limitations in the lives of plants and trees. In case of fire, they can't move, and have to burn in it. Neither they can move in case floods or droughts. Their seeds are carried by natural forces from place to another place. Mother Nature giving more degree of freedom, divided the seeds in two parts. That is sperm and egg. The carriers of sperm are called males or donors. The carriers of egg are called females or receivers. It given rise to some further complications that is the subject matter of today's article. As a being becomes aware of his or her gender, He comes to know that his or her better half is somewhere else in the form of someone else. And the search continues, even in married couple and give rise to extra-martial relationships. Society framed rules and regulations and rituals. But still there were breaches starting from Satyuga till date. I am narrating few incidents which are full of lessons for learning and full of moral of the story. In Satyuga Dev Indra molested the Ahiliya, wife of a saintly personality. Ahiliya was cursed to be a stone and Indra was cursed to have vaginas all over his body, because of his lust for that part of body. Later he was forgiven. In Satyuga, The divine mother fought the battles with demon kings like Maheshasura, Rakatbeez, Chand and Mund, Shumbh and Nishumbh. In Treta yuga, there was a fierce battle between King Ram and King Ravan on the issues like abduction of Mata Sita by the King Ravan and chopping of the Nose of Sawroop Nakha, sister of King Ravan by younger brother of Lord Rama. In Duapar yuga, all the 105 sons of the king Dhritarashtra were killed in the battle of Kurukshetra by the Pandavs, because of insult of Royal Daughter in law of the Pandav family by the Kauravas. This trend is not taking a break in the most civilized habitation of today. Shameful incidents of assaults occurring day by day. Those who are having hold over Power and Money are not ready to accept others as fellow citizens. Secondly those who are having hold over Power and Money are not ready to have their competitors from the masses and general public. True and complete spiritual masters can play an important role in spreading light of knowledge, and dispensing darkness of ignorance. Unfortunately, religion and spirituality is also commercialized to be a trade. Branded masters with branded beej-mantra are having more say and attraction than the true and simple saintly personalities. Sexual desires is one of the five vices. Persons who are inflicted by more than one vice gives more cruel happenings. There is mind to guide our body. There is soul to guide our mind. There are other souls and the Supreme soul to guide our soul. But our mind is ready to be the master of our body but is not ready to accept soul as his master. An unguided mind is like a stag of twelve horns who always find himself trapped in bushes. Aim of life is to be a complete man at the level of body mind and soul by physical growth mental growth and spiritual growth. Recitation of beej-mantra is Bhakti Yoga. The souls are coming in the form of human beings and they are bound by the Law of karma. They have reflections of past life karma and Sanskars in their lives. They need the purification of mind by being baptized in their religion and by recitation of the beej-mantra. The role of the parents is very important in bringing up their children. Jananni janne ta Bhagat jan ya data ya soor ll nahi ta jananni baanjh rahe kahey gawawey noor ll If a female or woman wants to be a mother she must give birth to a saintly personality or a donor or a warrior or soldier who can fight for others, otherwise she is not supposed to lose her glow, love, light and energy. |
_"Blessed are those that can give without remembering, and take without forgetting."_ 👧🏻 One day a florist went to a barber for a haircut. After the cut, he asked about his bill, and the barber replied, 'I cannot accept money from you, I'm doing community service this week.' The florist was pleased and left the shop. When the barber went to open his shop the next morning, there was a 'thank you' card and a dozen roses waiting for him at his door. 🌹💐🌹 👨🏻✈ Later, a cop comes in for a haircut, and when he tries to pay his bill, the barber again replied, 'I cannot accept money from you, I'm doing community service this week.' The cop was happy and left the shop. The next morning when the barber went to open up, there was a 'thank you' card and a dozen donuts waiting for him at his door. 🍩🥐🍩 🙋🏻♂ Then a MP came in for a haircut, and when he went to pay his bill, the barber again replied, 'I cannot accept money from you. I'm doing community service this week.' The MP was very happy and left the shop. The next morning, when the barber went to open up, there were a dozen MPs lined up waiting for a free haircut. 🗣👥👤👥👤 And that, my friends, illustrates the fundamental difference between the citizens of our country and the politicians who run it. As Margaret Thatcher said: _"Both politicians and nappies need to be changed often and for the same reason!"_ |
| You are meeting him face to face, but who is he? Anything you say will be wrong. And if you hold your tongue, you will be equally wrong. Who is he, then? On top of a flagpole, a cow gives birth to a calf. If you come to Self-realization at this point, you need do nothing further. If you cannot, look inward to behold your Buddha-nature. Everyone is perfectly endowed with this Buddha-nature. Its substance is the same in ordinary human beings as in Buddhas, with not the slightest difference in degree. But because man can’t bring himself to believe this, he binds himself to delusion with the rope of unreality by saying: "The realization of my Self-nature is beyond me. It is better that I recite sutras, bow down before Buddhas, and enter the Way gradually through the grace of all Buddhas”. Most of those who hear this accept it as true, it is as though one blind man were leading many blind men in the wrong direction. These people do not really believe sutras and Buddhas - on the contrary, they set no store by them. [For if they truly accepted them, they would know that] merely reciting the sutras is no more than looking at them from the outside, and speaking of "Buddha" but another way of speaking of the essence of Mind. A sutra says: ''Mind, Buddha, and sentient beings, these are not to be discriminated from one another.” Accordingly, a man who does not believe in the reality of his own Mind but says he believes in Buddha is like one who puts trust in a symbol while spurning the real thing. How then can he realize this Mind? One who wants only to recite sutras is like a hungry man who refuses food offered in the belief that he can allay his hunger by merely looking at a menu. Each sutra is but a catalog of the Mind-nature. One of the sutras says: "The teachings of the sutras are like a finger pointing to the moon." Can the Buddha have intended that you acknowledge the finger and not perceive the moon? Everybody contains within himself the (substance of the) sutras. If you catch even a glimpse of your Self-nature, it is the same as reading and understanding all the sutras simultaneously, none excepted, without so much as holding one in your hand and reading a word. Isn't this real sutra -“reading"? Look, that green bamboo grove over yonder is precisely your own Mind, and this mass of yellow flowers is nothing less than the supreme wisdom of the universe! As for the practice of bowing down before Buddhas, this is merely a way of horizontalizing the mast of ego in order to realize the Buddha-nature. To attain Buddhahood one must come to Self-realization through his own efforts no matter what his talents or capabilities may be. Unfortunately, most who understand this and practice zazen begin to dawdle along the way and thus never come to complete realization. Then there are those who take the state of no-thoughts and no awareness, where all reflection and discrimination stop for a time, to be true realization; others think it sufficient Zen practice to remember every single koan; still others insist that the true way of the Zen devotee is not to violate the precepts, or else to dwell in forests to escape from the problem of good and evil in the world; while still others maintain that the right way is to avow that there is no truth to be realized, or that there is no other truth to grasp than that of drinking tea when tea is offered or eating when food is served, or of shouting "Katsu!" when asked about Buddhism, or of leaving suddenly with a flourish of the kimono sleeve, pretending to repudiate everything, while calling anyone who practices zazen seriously and seeks out accomplished Zen masters a bore. If such individuals can be called truth-seekers, then a child of three can be said to understand Zen. Again, there are those who think that when one's mental functions have ceased, leaving one like a decayed tree or cold stone, one has attained no-mindedness; while still others maintain that in the practice of Zen a decisive point has been reached when one feels a deep void with awareness of neither inner nor outer, the entire body having become shining, transparent, and clear like a blue sky on a bright day. This last appears when the True-nature begins to manifest itself, but it cannot be called genuine Self-realization. Zen masters of old would call it the "deep pit of pseudo-emancipation." Those who reach this stage, believing they have no more problems in [the study and practice of] Buddhism, behave haughtily through lack of wisdom; engage eagerly in debates on religion, taking delight in cornering their opponents but becoming angry when cornered themselves; appear perpetually discontented while no longer believing in the law of causation; go about telling jokes in a loud, jabbering voice; deliberately disturb and ridicule those who study and strive earnestly, calling them clods whose practice is not Zen. This is as though a lunatic were to laugh at a sane person. The conceit of these idiots knows no bounds and they fall into hell as quick as an arrow. The first Patriarch, Bodhidharma, said: "One who thinks only that everything is void but is ignorant of the law of causation falls into everlasting, pitch-black hell. These would-be teachers sometimes sound like Zen masters, but they are unable to free themselves from their delusive feelings and perceptions. Most beginners mistake the barest manifestation of truth for Self-realisation. An ancient Zen master [Rinzai] said: “‘The body of the True-nature’ and ‘the ground of the True-nature’," these, I know for certain, are shadows [i.e. concepts]. You must find the subject that casts the shadows. It is the very source of all Buddhas.” |
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