The Teaching of Zen Master Seung Sahn. Compiled and edited by Stephen Mitchell
Dropping Ashes on the Buddha by Zen Master Seung Sahn. Welcome to part Two of this three-part series.
We’ll simply pick up from where we left off in part one, as we draw back the curtains on the teaching of Zen Master Seung Sahn and help you find peace amidst life’s chaos.
Without further ado, please enjoy part two of this three-part series.
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What is Freedom?
True freedom is freedom from thinking, freedom from all attachments, freedom even from life and death. If I want life, I have life; if I want death, I have death.”
If you are really free, then dirty is good, and clean is good. It doesn’t matter. Not changing my shirt is good; changing my shirt is good.
If my parents want me to change, then I change. I don’t do it for my own sake, only for theirs. This is freedom. No desire for myself, only for all people.
The Great Treasure
- You are the master of everything. Why, then, are you running away from yourself and seeking for things outside?
The Moon of Clear Mind
- Clear mind is before thinking. If you experience this mind, you have already attained enlightenment.
- Clear mind is like the full moon in the sky. Sometimes clouds come and cover it, but the moon is always behind them. Clouds go away, then the moon shines brightly. So don’t worry about clear mind: it is always there. When thinking comes, behind it is clear mind. When thinking goes, there is only clear mind. Thinking comes and goes, comes and goes. You must not be attached to the coming or the going.
Enlightened and Unenlightened Are Empty Names
- A true mind is an empty mind. An empty mind is before thinking. before thinking there are no words and no speech.
- Mind is only a name; it is made by thinking.
- Opposites words are dead words. Absolute words are live words.
- All things have Buddha-nature. Some people know they have Buddha-nature, and some people don’t know they have Buddha-nature. Maybe the dog doesn’t know.
- If you have not attained enlightenment, everything is different. If you attain enlightenment, all things become one. You must understand this.
Why We Chant
- When we bow together and chant together, and eat together, our minds become one mind.
- When we have many desires and many opinions, there are many big waves. But after we sit Zen and act together for some time, our opinions and desires disappear. The waves become smaller and smaller. Then our mind is like a clear mirror, and everything we see or hear or smell or taste or touch or think is the truth.
- We are not bowing to Buddha; we are bowing to ourselves. Small I is bowing to Big I. Then Small I disappears and becomes Big I. This is true bowing.
Porcupines in Rat-Holes
- Drinking, sex, drugs—these actions are neither good nor bad. But people get attached to these actions very easily. Being involved with sex is like a porcupine who crawls into a rat’s hole: easy to go in, but impossible to back out, no matter how hard he tries.
- People make new karma through their attachment actions.
- Karma means hindrance. Hindrance is suffering. If someone is not attached to sex, drinking, etc., then there is no hindrance. No hindrance is freedom. Freedom means Big I.
It is Your Mind That Is Moving
- Long ago in China, the Sixth Patriarch once passed two monks who were arguing about a flag blowing in the wind. One monk said, “It is the flag that is moving.” The second monk said, “it is the wind that is moving.” The Sixth Patriarch said, “You are both wrong. It is not the flag, it is not the wind: it is your mind that is moving.
- When your mind is moving, actions appear. But when your mind is not moving, the truth is just like this.
- If your mind is moving, you can’t understand the truth.
- You must first understand that form is emptiness, emptiness is form. Next, no form, no emptiness. Then you will understand that form is form, emptiness is emptiness.
- If you do not dwell in emptiness, you will get freedom and no hindrance. (Thinking is no good. Put I all down. Only “What am I?” This don’t-know mind is very important.
Bodhisattva Attachment
- The universe is infinite; all people are infinite. So the Bodhisattva’s attachment is infinite. No attachment.
- The Bodhisattva is your true self. Your true self is Big I. Big I is all people. All people and I become one mind. So Bodhisattva action is always for all people.
Don’t-Know Mind, Continued
- The name we give to clear mind, explains the Master, is don’t-know mind.
- When you were born, you had no name.
- Your mind’s name is don’t-know. If you’re not attached to don’t-know, there is only don’t-know.
- attachment to words is no good. Only don’t-know.
- If you keep this mind, and you are not attached to the words ‘don’t-know,’ you will soon understand.
Zen and Tantra
- when you are thinking, your mind and my mind are different. when you are not thinking. your mind and my mind are the same.
- in original mind, there is no color, no black and white, no words, no Buddha, no Zen, no Tibetan Buddhism.
The 10,000 questions are one question.
- the true you are without the six senses. but the six senses use you, so you ask ten thousand questions. you must return to your true self. then you will understand.
Buddha is Grass shoes.
- three things are important: first, your reason for doing the mantra; second, strong faith that the mantra works; and third, constant practice.
Testing the Mind
- As soon as you say ‘mind,’ you create ‘not-mind’; as soon as you say ‘Buddha’, you create ‘not-Buddha.’ said the Zen master. Even mentioning Buddha is like dumping shit on your head.
- The true Buddha cannot be expressed in words.
What is Death?
- When you think death, you make death. When you think about life, you make life.
- when you are not thinking, there is no life and no death.
- this is true emptiness. true emptiness is before thinking. before thinking is just like this.
- you must not be attached to names and forms.
- In a clear mirror, all is nothing; there is only a clear mirror. Blue comes, and the mirror is blue. Red comes, there is red. The mirror does not hold on to anything. There is only the coming and the going.
Continue to Part Three