Daily Zen Quote - September 30, 2013

It's not a matter of using fewer things in order to simplify, or more things in order to elaborate, but paying attention to the circumstances of life. How can we respond to our world with respect?

~Jisho Warner

Daily Zen Quote - September 29, 2013

When you want to fool the world, tell the truth.

~Otto Von Bismarck

Daily Zen Quote - September 28, 2013

Religion is a way of walking, not a way of talking.

~William R. Inge

Daily Zen Quote - September 27, 2013

Ting Shang-tso asked Rinzai: "What is the essence of Buddhism?"
Rinzai descended from the master's seat, took the monk by this lapels, shook him, slapped him, and pushed him away. Ting Shang-tso just stood there.
"Why don't you bow?" asked a monk in the assembly.
Just as Ting bowed, he suddenly had a great awakening.

~Zen Story

Daily Zen Quote - September 26, 2013

There is only one marvelous and nothing but the marvelous.

~Henry Miller

Daily Zen Quote - September 25, 2013

Meditation itself is not Zen. Zen is meditation, but it is also thinking, eating, drinking, sitting, standing...all of these things are nothing else but Zen....Zazen is sitting Zen. But this is not the Zen. Don't be mistaken about this point.

~Soen

Daily Zen Quote - September 24, 2013

One time an old monk was staying with one of Ma-tsu's disciples. Clouds broke and the sun shone on the window. "Is that the sunlight that touches the window?" the monk asked,, "or is it the window that touches the sunlight?"
Ma-tsu's disciple looked at him and said: "Brother, there is a visitor in your room. You had better return there."

~Zen Mondo

Daily Zen Quote - September 23, 2013

Hesitate and it's lost.
Waver, and it pulls further and further away.

~Bankei

Daily Zen Quote - September 22, 2013

There is real self in non-self.

~Mahaparinirvana Sutra

Daily Zen Quote - September 21, 2013

When you've got it, there's no place for it but a poem.

~Wu Pen

Daily Zen Quote - September 20, 2013

The main purpose of Buddhism is to form the habit of practice as a vow forever. This is just talking a journey in the universe, day by day, step by step. It is like walking in a mist. We don't know what the mist is, we don't know where we are walking or why; all we have to do is just walk.

~Dainin Katagiri

Daily Zen Quote - September 19, 2013

Seppo and Kin-zan were traveling through the mountains when they saw a leaf of the rape floating down the street. Kin-zan said: "Let us go up, dear brother, along the stream that we may find a safe living up in the mountain. I hope we shall find a good teacher in him."
"No," Seppo said. "He cannot be a sage who wastes even one leaf of the rape."

~Zen Mondo

Daily Zen Quote - September 18, 2013

The bamboo shadows are sweeping the stairs,
But no dust is stirred.
The moonlight penetrates deep into the bottom of the pool,
But no trace is left in the water.

~Zen Poem

Daily Zen Quote - September 17, 2013

I point the man directly to his own mind and let him see his own true nature and become Buddha by himself.

~Bodhidharma

Daily Zen Quote - September 16, 2013

When Zen master Siubi was asked "What is the secret of Zen?" he pointed to a grove of bamboo, saying, "See how long these are! See how short these are!"

~Zen Mondo

Daily Zen Quote - September 15, 2013

If you now comprehend it, where is that which you did not comprehend before?

~Ch'Ing-Yuan

Daily Zen Quote - September 14, 2013

The seeing have the world in common.

~Heraclitus

Daily Zen Quote - September 13, 2013

Sitting alone among secluded bamboos
I play the zither, whistle on and on;
Deep in the woods, unknown to the world,
A bright moon comes and shines on me.

~Wang-Wei

Daily Zen Quote - September 12, 2013

One day Rinzai stood up before the assembled monks and said: "I spent twenty years with my master, Obaku. Three times I ask him about the meaning of Buddhism, and three times he gave me a blow with his stick. It was like being patted by a bunch of mugwort. I'd love another taste of that stick now. Who can give it to me?"
A monk stepped forward: "I can!"
Rinzai held out the stick. The monk tried taking it. Rinzai struck him.

~Zen Mondo

Daily Zen Quote - September 11, 2013

In Zen, there is no such thing as a "mere" drop of water; a "mere" piece of greens, or a "mere" grain of rice. A single drop of water is Buddha, the slightest movement of the mind is the movement of the Buddha-mind.

~Reikichi Kita & Kiichi Nagaya

Daily Zen Quote - September 10, 2013

Self-consciousness is the indispensable means to enlightenment; at the same time it is the greatest obstacle in the way.

~Aldous Huxley

Daily Zen Quote - September 9, 2013

Teng-Yin-feng was about to die, and he said to the mourners at the temple: "I have seen monks die sitting, and I have seen monks die while lying down, but have any ever died while standing up?"
"Yes, some," answered a few of the monks.
"What about upside down?" Teng asked.
"Never heard of such a thing!" they replied.
With that Teng stood on his head and died.

~Zen Story

Daily Zen Quote - September 8, 2013

Acting without acting.

~Taoist Saying

Daily Zen Quote - September 7, 2013

Think the unthinkable. How to think the unthinkable? Be without thoughts.

~The Zazengi

Daily Zen Quote - September 6, 2013

The joy I felt...
With every form of creature, as it looked
Towards the Uncreated with a countenance
Of adoration, with an eye of love.

~William Wordsworth

Daily Zen Quote - September 5, 2013

Rabbi Enoch, a disciple of Rabbi Bunam, longed to enter the house of his teacher and talk with him. For a whole year he tried to approach Rabbi Bunam's house, but each time he got close he lost his nerve. Finally it got so bad that he wound up in a field near the Rabbi's house, and walked through it, weeping, until he finally couldn't resist and knocked on the Rabbi's door.
"Why do you weep?" Rabbi Bunam asked him when he opened the door.
"Am I not a creature in the world, and am I not created with eyes and heart and all limbs, and I do not know for what purpose I was created, and what good I am in the world?"
"Little fool," the Rabbi answered, "I too go about the world so. Tonight you shall dine with me."

~Jewish Mondo

Daily Zen Quote - September 4, 2013

Jot down your haiku before the heat of perception cools.

~Basho

Daily Zen Quote - September 3, 2013

Zen is not a particular state but the normal state: silent, peaceful, un-agitated. In Zazen neither intention, analysis, specific not imagination take place. It's enough just to be without hypocrisy, dogmatism, arrogance - embracing all opposites.

~Taisen Deshimaru

Daily Zen Quote - September 2, 2013

Do you work, then step back. The only path to serenity.

~Lao-Tsu

Daily Zen Quote - September 1, 2013

When I draw a tree I am faced with a mystery. I must enter into this mystery or fail. Whatever I draw confronts me with the mystery of Being.

~Frederick Franck