Coming empty-handed is going empty-handed. Going empty-handed is coming empty-handed.
[Raises Zen stick over head, then hits table with stick.]
Originally — no coming, no going.
[Raises Zen stick over head, then hits table with stick.]
Coming empty-handed is…
Read More...From talks in Cambridge on April 1, 1999 and Providence on April 2, 1999
Question: In your book, Compass of Zen, you say that “Mu practice” is not a correct practice. But Mu is the same as Kwan Seum Bosal, so why is it not correct?
…
Read More...When Buddha was born he said “in the heavens above and the earth below only I am holy.” But William Blake said “Everything that lives is holy.”
[Raises Zen stick over head, then hits table with stick.]
Bodhidharma said…
Read More...The first thing the Buddha said after his great enlightenment was that everything had Buddha nature. The problem is that we don’t know that. Because we are ignorant of our original nature, we use it to produce suffering. Not good, not bad, but…suffering.
Several months ago there was a story…
Read More...When Buddha was born, he sprang out of his mother’s hip, walked seven steps, said, “Heaven above, earth below, only I am holy.”
[hits table with zen stick]
When you and I were born, we sprung from our mother’s uterus, dropped into the doctor’s arms, and screamed, “WAAAAAAAAH!”
[hits table…
Read More...Is this a good place or a bad place?
[Raises Zen stick overhead and hits table]
Is this no place? Is this a magic place? Is this a special place?
[Raises Zen stick overhead and hits table]
If we make any of…
Read More...Zen Master Wu Bong: Yes, we can help. Consider hunger. We have hunger all over this world. Where does this hunger come from? It doesn’t come from economic problems. It doesn’t come because there isn’t enough food…
Read More...Each morning we say the Four Great Vows at the beginning of practice:
Sentient beings are numberless; we vow to save them all.
Passions are endless; we vow to extinguish them all.
The teachings are infinite; we vow to learn them all.
The Buddha
…
Read More...…
Read More...Letter to a student:
Dear Margaret,
Thank you for your beautiful card. You work is very beautiful.
You spoke about losing energy too fast and want to shut it off…. losing energy so you want to plug it up. After a period of long sitting usually we have much energy…
Read More...July 26, 1977
Dear Soen Sa Nim,
I hope you are well. Please, as much as possible, try to take care of your body.
I have not seen you in awhile. I, too have been traveling around teaching the Dharma. How is the family on the East…
Read More...A Dharma Speech given by the Zen Master Seung Sahn at the opening ceremony of the International Zen Center of New York on April 20, 1975
(Holding up his Zen stick and hitting the table, slowly, three times)
Is this closed? Is this open?
If you say…
Read More...One Sunday night at the Providence Zen Center, Seung Sahn Soen-sa told the story of Su Tung-po’s enlightenment. Afterwards he said to his students:
“What do we learn from this story? That Zen teaches us to cut off all discriminating thoughts and to understand that the truth of the universe…
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