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#1791 - Saturday, May 8, 2004 - Editor: michael
Zen & Other Spiritual Cliches
Dear Friends,
Cliches, we've all used them. They come in handy. They irritate. They're everywhere.
They are Zen. No doubt about it, 'cause I'm as honest as the day is long. And I wouldn't
pull the wool over your eyes. Even Zen itself is a cliche. You know, like everybody says
'Zen' as if they used thier heads for nothing but hatracks.
Whatever.
In this edition I've provided some cliches and set them against Zen poems or quotes.
May you be amused,
michael
All Zen quotes used in this edition were found starting at this web page. http://www.gardendigest.com/zen/quotes.htm
The cliches were just lying around like old dogs.
Love thy neighbor as thyself.
In
the morning, bowing to all;
In the evening,
bowing to all.
Respecting others
is my only duty--
Hail to the
Never-despising Bodhisattva.
In heaven and
earth he stands alone.
A real monk
Needs
Only one thing--
a heart like
Never-despising
Buddha.
- Ryokan
Translated by John Stevens
Three Zen Masters, p. 128
Never put off until tomorrow what you can do today.
We pray for our
life of tomorrow,
Ephemeral life though it be;
This is the habit
of our mind
That passed away yesterday.
- Ikkyu
Zen and Zen Classics: Selections from R. H.
Blyth, p. 111
If it was a snake, it would have bit you.
Above, below and around you, all is
Spontaneously exisitng, for
There is nowhere which is
Outside Buddha-Mind.
- Huang Po
God works in mysterious ways.
I asked a child,
walking with a candle,
"From where comes
that light?"
Instantly he blew it out.
"Tell me where
it is gone --
then I
will tell you where it came from."
- Hasan of
Basra
No man is an island.
An
explosive shout cracks the great empty sky.
Immediately clear
self-understanding.
Swallow up buddhas
and ancestors of the past.
Without following
others, realize complete penetration.
- Dogen, 1200 - 1253
Moon in a Dewdrop, p,
218
Translated by Kazuaki Tanahashi
If you meet the Buddha on the path, kill him.
Why are
people called Buddhas
After they die?
Because they don't grumble any more,
Because they don't
make a nuisance
Of themselves any
more.
- Ikkyu
Zen and Zen Classics: Selections from R.
H. Blyth, p. 112
shit happens
Fishermen
by a rocky shore,
winds blowing
wildly,
in a boat
unmoored--
such is our
condition.
-
Saigyo, 1118 - 1190 Saigyo:
Poems of a Mountain Home, p.
137
Translated by Burton Watson
The path is narrow...
Mind, mind, mind
-- above the Path.
Here on my
mountain, gray hair down,
I cherish bamboo
sprouts, brush carefully
By pine
twigs. Burning incense,
I open a book:
mist over flagstones.
Rolling the blind,
I contemplate:
Moon in the
pond. Of my old friends
How many know the
Way.
- Zengetsu
Zen Poems of China and Japan, p. 42
Translated by Lucien
Stryk and Takashi Ikemoto
Life is but a dream.
The Perfect Way
knows no difficulties
Except that it refuses to make preferences;
Only when freed from hate and love,
It reveals itself fully and without disguise;
A tenth of an inch's difference,
And heaven and earth are set apart;
If you wish to see it before your own eyes,
Have no fixed thoughts either for or against it.
- On Believing in Mind, Sosan Canchi Zenji
Honor among thieves.
The thief
Left it behind -
The moon at the window.
-
Ryokan, 1758-1831
Dewdrops on a Lotus Leaf,
Translated by John Stevens
It's all an illusion.
To what
shall
I liken the world?
Moonlight, reflected
In dewdrops.
Shaken from a
crane's bill.
- Dogen, 1200 - 1253
The Zen Poetry of Dogen
Translated by Steven Heine
Earth,
mountains, rivers - hidden in this nothingness.
In this nothingness - earth, mountains, rivers
revealed.
Spring flowers, winter snows:
There's no being or non-being, nor denial itself.
-
Saisho (? - 1506)
Zen Poetry: Let the Spring Breeze Enter, p.32
Translated by Lucien Stryk and Takashi Ikemoto
Chop wood, carry water.
My daily
activities are not unusual,
I'm just naturally in harmony with them.
Grasping nothing, discarding nothing...
Supernatural power and marvelous activity -
Drawing water and carrying firewood.
- Layman Pang-yun (740-808)
I think, therefore, I am.
The mind of the past is ungraspable;
the mind of
the future is ungraspable;
the mind of
the present is ungraspable.
- Diamond Sutra
Nobody lives forever.
Nothing in the
cry
of cicadas suggests they
are about to die
- Basho
The kingdom of heaven is within.
It is too clear
and so it is hard to see.
A dunce once searched for a fire with a
lighted lantern.
Had he known what fire was,
He could have cooked his rice much sooner.
- Joshu Washes
the Bowl, The Gateless Gate #7
Zen Flesh, Zen Bones, p. 176
Translated by Paul Reps and Nyogen Senzaki
Don't put new wine into old wineskins.
In this way and
that I have tried to save
the old pail
Since the bamboo strip was weakening and
about to break
Until at last the bottom fell out.
No more water in the pail!
No more moon in the water!
- Chiyono's enlightenment poem,
Zen Flesh, Zen Bones,
1957, p. 31
Translated by Paul Reps and Nyogen Zenzaki
If it's not one thing, it's another.
Before I had
studied Zen for thirty years, I saw mountains as
mountains,
and waters as waters.
When I arrived at a more intimate knowledge, I came to
the point
where I saw that mountains are not mountains,
and waters are not waters.
But now that I have got its very substance I am at rest.
For it's just that I see mountains once again as
mountains,
and waters once again as waters.
- Ching-yuan
Everything is energy.
Shariputra,
Form does not differ from emptiness;
Emptiness does not differ from form.
Form itself is emptiness;
Emptiness itself is form.
So too are feeling, cognition, formation, and
consciousness.
Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.
As flowing
waters disappear into the mist
We lose all track of their passage.
Every heart is its own Buddha.
Ease off ... become immortal.
Wake up! The world's a mote of dust.
Behold heaven's round mirror.
Turn loose! Slip past shape and shadow,
Sit side by side with nothing, save Tao.
- Shih-shu, 1703
Stones and
Trees; The Poetry of Shih-Shu
Translation by
James H. Sanford
The Clouds Should Know Me By Now, 1998, p. 153
Leave well enough alone.
Everything
just as it is,
as it is,
as is.
Flowers in bloom.
Nothing to add.
- Robert
Aitken, Roshi, As it Is
If thine eye be single...
Fathomed at
last!
Ocean's dried. Void burst.
Without an obstacle in sight,
It's everywhere!
-
Joho, 12th Century
Zen Poems of China and Japan, 1973, p. 15
Translated by Lucien Stryk, Takashi Ikemoto and Taigan
Takayama