Daily Zen Quote - May 31, 2013

You monks, straining day after day to understand what Zen might be, are barking up the wrong tree! what you can't seem to see is that all is beyond understanding, not just one thing or many things. Every single thing is fundamentally beyond our understanding. The Really Real in its Suchness is beyond our understanding. Just see it in this light.

~Butsugen

Daily Zen Quote - May 30, 2013

I owe everything to my teacher because he never told me a thing nor explained anything to me.

~Zen Master

Daily Zen Quote - May 29, 2013

When the Ten Thousand
   things are seen
in their Oneness
we return to the Origins
where we have always been.

~Seng-Ts'an

Daily Zen Quote - May 28, 2013

When you are convinced that all the exits are blocked, either you take to believing in miracles or you stand still like the hummingbird. The miracle is that the honey is always there, right under your nose, only you were too busy searching elsewhere to realize it. The worst is not death but being blind, blind to the fact that everything about life is in the nature of the miraculous.

~Henry Miller

Daily Zen Quote - May 27, 2013

Not last night,
   not this morning,
      melon flowers bloomed.

~Basho

Daily Zen Quote - May 26, 2013

God made the senses turn outwards, man therefore looks outwards, not into himself. But occasionally a daring soul, desiring immortality, has looked back and found himself.

~The Upanishads

Daily Zen Quote - May 25, 2013

If you have attained something, this is the surest proof that you have gone astray. Therefore, not to have is to have, silence is thunder, ignorance is enlightenment.
~D.T. Suzuki

Daily Zen Quote - May 24, 2013

The first problem for all of us, men and women, is not to learn, but to unlearn.

~Gloria Steinem

Daily Zen Quote - May 23, 2013

For years the great master-to-be, Rinzai, studied under Obaku. One day he asked:
 "What is the fundamental teaching of Buddhism?"
        Obaku struck him with a stick. Three times Rinzai asked, and three time was struck, and so he decided to leave Obaku, and, at his master's suggestion, went to study with Taigu. When Taigu asked why, Rinzai told him the story, and Taigu said: "How kind he was to you!"
        All at once Rinzai had a great understanding and said: "I see now, Obaku's Zen is nothing special."
     "What?" demanded Taigu. With that, Rinzai struck him three times and went back to Obaku. When he explained everything that happened, Obaku said: "What a talkative man that Taigu is. If he were to come here, he shall be severely beaten."
      "Why wait?" Rinzai said, and walked up to Obaku and gave him a slap on the cheek.

~Zen Mondo

Daily Zen Quote - May 22, 2013

Stop your wandering, look penetratingly into your inherent nature, concentrate your spiritual energy, sit in zazen, and break through.
~Bassui's Zen

Daily Zen Quote - May 21, 2013

When clouded, the pearl is taken to be a piece of
      earth ware;
But suddenly self-conscious, it becomes the perfect
      pearl.
Ignorance and wisdom are one.
Remember that all things are mere appearances.
Seeing that yourself differs not from the Buddha,
why then seek elsewhere for that which is the ideal?
~Tao-Hsuan

Daily Zen Quote - May 20, 2013

Modern men are mistaking the means of life for its purpose. In order to possess the means, they are sacrificing the goal.
~Reikichi Kita and Kiichi Nagaya

Daily Zen Quote - May 19, 2013

One inch sitting, one inch Buddha.
~Zen Saying

Daily Zen Quote - May 18, 2013

Monk: What is the meaning of Zen?
Master: My dear monk, how fine are the peach blossoms today!
~Zen Mondo

Daily Zen Quote - May 17, 2013

Yet another elder said: If you see a young monk by his own will climbing up to heaven, take him by the foot and throw him to the ground, because what he is doing is not good for him.
~Zen Instruction

Daily Zen Quote - May 16, 2013

These are the thoughts of all men in all ages and lands,
     they are not original with me.
If they are not yours as much as mine they are nothing
     or next to nothing.
If they do not enclose everything they are next to
     nothing.
If they are not the riddle and the untying of the riddle
     they are nothing.
If they are not just as close as they are different
     they are nothing.
~Walt Whitman

Daily Zen Quote - May 15, 2013

All deeds ultimately bring one back to the impermanent, because their forces all have their final day. They are like a dart discharged through the air: when its strength is exhausted, it turns and falls to the ground. Thus do they all revert to the wheel of life and death.
~Hsi-yun

Daily Zen Quote - May 14, 2013

Many Japanese use the word Zen, but very few understand what it really is. Zen sees the whole universe as one's own true self. It says that heaven, earth, and man grew from the same root and everything in this world is interrelated.
~Nyogen Senzaki

Daily Zen Quote - May 13, 2013

Socrates used to walk through the streets and marketplaces of Athens, teaching his students, "You must understand yourself. You must understand yourself. You must understand yourself."
    One day a student asked, "Sir, you always say that we must understand ourselves. But do you understand yourself?"
    "No, I don't know myself," Socrates replied. "But I understand this 'don't know.'"

~Western Mondo

Daily Zen Quote - May 12, 2013

On the mountain road
         the sun arose -
    suddenly
         the fragrance of plum
             flowers.
~Basho

Daily Zen Quote - May 11, 2013

That land of Bliss and Glory exists above us, under us, around us, within us, without us, if we open our eyes to see.
~Kaiten Nukariya

Daily Zen Quote - May 10, 2013

When you try hard to make your own way, you will help others...Before you make your own way you cannot help anyone, and no one can help you.
~Shunryu Suzuki

Daily Zen Quote - May 9, 2013

The little things in life are as interesting as the big ones.
~Henry David Thoreau

Daily Zen Quote - May 8, 2013

It is held that Zazen and enlightenment are different things. This opinion is wrong. Zazen is the full expression of Real Enlightenment.
~Dogen

Daily Zen Quote - May 7, 2013

Shui-lao was a student of the great master Ma-tsu when he asked the classic question of Zen students: "What is the meaning of the Boddhidharma coming from the West?"
     Ma-tsu immediately kicked him in the chest, knocking him down.
     The kick enlightened Shui-lao instantly, and he got to his feet, clapping his hands and unable to stop laughing. Later when Shui-lao was asked about his enlightenment, he answered: "Ever since the Master kicked me I've not been able to stop laughing."
~Zen Story

Daily Zen Quote - May 6, 2013

Having penetrated through the cloud-barrier once
     and for all,
The way is open in all directions;
Day in, day out, I am free from the distinction of
     host or guest,
With a fresh breeze rising at each of my steps.
~Daito Kokushi's Enlightenment Poem

Daily Zen Quote - May 5, 2013

Divinity lies all about us, and culture is too hidebound to even suspect the fact.
~William James

Daily Zen Quote - May 4, 2013

The stillness in stillness is not the real stillness;
only when there is stillness in movement can the spiritual rhythm appear which pervades heaven and earth.
~Saikontan

Daily Zen Quote - May 3, 2013

"Who were the sages who taught the Buddha?" the Master was asked.
     He replied, "The dog and the cat."
~Zen Mondo

Daily Zen Quote - May 2, 2013

A young monk came to study with Sho Zenji.
      "Where shall I enter the novitiate?"
the monk asked.
      "Do you hear the mountain stream?"
Sho Zenji asked.
      "Yes," answered the monk.
      "Then enter there."
~Zen Saying

Daily Zen Quote - May 1, 2013

It is just as is and ain't no is-er.
~Rural American Zen