Category: Meditation

Buddha, Buddhism, Enlightenment, final goal, Meditation, Photography, Practice, root, self, Truth, Uncategorized, Zen

Q355. If everything is the true-self, even birds, are they nearer to enlightenment than humans because they kill only for food, not for pleasure?

Zen Fools

A. In fact, whether we do good conduct or bad conduct is one thing and attaining enlightenment is another. You can make good karma by doing good conduct, but you can’t attain enlightenment by doing it. In other words, you might enjoy a temporarily better life as a result of good conduct, but you can’t get eternal happiness, or solve the matter of life and death.

According to the Sutras, one of Buddha’s students attained enlightenment although he had killed 99 people before becoming Buddha’s student.

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Doing good conduct, or making good karma, is compared to banking money little by little, and attaining enlightenment is likened to attaining eternal life and inexhaustible wealth. However how much money you may put aside in the bank, the money will run out some day. Above all, your wealth, no matter how great it is, becomes of no use to you once you pass away.

 

However, we become eternity itself by transcending life and death through enlightenment, which is called eternal life in Christianity. Christianity also says that we can’t enter heaven unless we believe in God, no matter how much good conduct we may do. ‘Believe in God’ here means to see God, which means to see everything as it is. This is to attain enlightenment in Buddhism.

 

Student: “Can I attain enlightenment by doing good things?”

Master: “No, not at all.”

Student: “Should I do bad things?”

Master: “Of course not.”

Student: “Then, what shall I do?”

Master: “Do nothing.”

Student: “How can we live without doing anything?”

Master: “Do good things, but don’t let even your right hand know what it does.”

 

©Boo Ahm

 

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

Buddha, Buddhism, Enlightenment, final goal, master, Meditation, One, Photography, root, self, student, true self, Truth, Uncategorized, Zen

Q354. What is the best wine in the world?

Zen Fools

A. A monk named John said to a master, “I am alone and poor. I beg my teacher to bestow upon me the alms of salvation.” The master said, “John.” “Yes, Sir?” replied John. The master said, “You have drunk three bowls of the best wine in the world, but say that you have not yet even moistened your lips.”

 

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Student: “What is the best wine in the world?”

Master: “That is what you are drinking now.”

Student: “I don’t know what you mean.”

Master: “Now you are swimming in the vat.”

Student: “I am still lost.”

Master: “You are vomiting the wine now.”

 

Commentary:

The foolish, sensitive to others’ smell, don’t realise that their own dung stinks.

 

©Boo Ahm

 

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

Buddha, Buddhism, emptiness, empty, Enlightenment, final goal, illusion, master, Meditation, Photography, Practice, root, self, student, sutras, true self, Truth, Uncategorized, Zen

Q353. I have read the Diamond Sutra every morning for over 20 years. Is reading the Sutra helpful?

Zen Fools

A. Reading thousands of books and the Sutras is not as good as grasping a single word out of the books you read. Trying to realise the true meaning of a single word of the Sutra is much more beneficial than reading the Sutra a thousand times.

 

You should know that all books including the Sutras are not the essence of the true-self but only a kind of manual that describes the true-self. In other words, the core of what the Sutra says is not in the Sutra but in you who are reading the Sutra. You should know that the true Sutra is not the one made of paper put before you, but your true-self that is making your body read it.

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You should also know that each word of the Sutra contains all the contents of the Sutra. So, if you can grasp only a single word from the Sutra, you can know the rest of the Sutra, which is enlightenment. You should think that each word is the gate to enlightenment, and try to understand it clearly rather than read many books, or read a book many times. Then it takes longer to read the Sutra than before. It may take more than a year to read the Sutra that you could previously read in two hours. Then your reading is not reading any more but practice. This is the way of reading the Sutra that I’d love to recommend.

 

Master: “What did you do last night?”

Student: “I read the Diamond Sutra.”

Master: “What does it say?”

Student: “It says that everything is empty.”

Master: “Did you read only that one sentence?”

Student: “I read many other sentences as well, but I don’t remember all of them.”

Master: “Don’t say that you read the Sutra after picking up and eating black beans.”

 

©Boo Ahm

 

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

Buddha, Buddhism, Enlightenment, final goal, illusion, master, Meditation, Photography, Practice, self, student, sutras, true self, Truth, Uncategorized, Zen

Q352. If hand-copying the Sutras is meditation, can anything be regarded as meditation?

Zen Fools

A. Hand-copying the Sutras itself is not meditation just like wheat flour itself is not bread. It can be meditation only when you keep the question, ‘Who or what is making my body copy this Sutra?’ just as wheat flour becomes bread only when you knead the flour and bake it.

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If you can keep such curiosity, all of your acts, whatever you may do, can be meditation. During a walk, you can practice walking meditation. When drinking tea, you can practice tea meditation. When talking with others, you practice talking meditation. If you can turn all your acts into meditation like this, you can be said to have become one with your practice. This means that you are very near the final goal. However, hand-copying the Sutras without such a question may enhance your penmanship, but it has nothing to do with enlightenment.

 

Master: “How do you practice these days in order to attain enlightenment?”

Student: “I hand-copy the Diamond Sutra.”

Master: “How long does it take to hand-copy the Sutra?”

Student: “It takes almost a day.”

Master: “You still don’t know how to copy the Sutras. You should be able to do it in a second.”

Student: “How can you do that in a second?”

Master: “Shall I show you how?”

Student: “Of course, Sir.”

Master: (slapping the student in the face) “Do you see the Sutra?”

 

©Boo Ahm

 

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

Buddha, Buddhism, Enlightenment, master, Meditation, Photography, student, true self, Truth, Uncategorized, Zen

Q351. Why did Joshu rate the same actions of the two hermits differently?

Zen Fools

A. Joshu went to a hermit’s place and said, “Hello, anybody in?” The hermit lifted up his fist. Joshu said, “The water is too shallow to anchor here,” and went away. Joshu visited another hermit a few days later and said, “Hello, anybody in?” The hermit raised his fist too. Then Joshu said, “You know how to release and how to catch, and how to kill and how to save.” And he bowed to the hermit.

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Student: “Why did Joshu rate the same actions of the two hermits differently?”

Master: “Why do you blame Joshu for your fault?”

 

Commentary:

Who releases and catches whom?

Who kills and saves whom?

Don’t blame Joshu.

It was only for the sake of sentient beings

that Joshu soiled himself with mud and jumped into water.

 

©Boo Ahm

 

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

Buddha, Buddhism, desire, emptiness, empty, Meditation, Photography, suffering, true self, Truth, Uncategorized, Zen

Q350. My grandmother, a Buddhist, always says that our greed is the main root of our unhappiness. Is she right?

Zen Fools

A. She is not wrong, but in order not to have greed we should know why we have greed. The reason that we have greed is that we can’t see things as they are. For example, when we mistake a piece of broken glass for a piece of diamond, we come to have greed and strive to attain it. When we fail to attain it, we feel disappointed and even frustrated. Even when we succeed in attaining it, we often hurt our hands in the middle of grasping it. After getting it, we are disappointed to find that it is not diamond but glass, or we keep hurting our hands while playing with it.

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In conclusion, we come to have greed because we can’t see things as they are, and we try to satisfy our greed only to fail. As a result of this failure, we become unhappy. So, the main root of our unhappiness is not greed itself, but rather our foolishness in that we can’t see things as they are.

 

©Boo Ahm

 

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

Buddha, Buddhism, emptiness, empty, illusion, Meditation, One, Photography, root, self, true self, Truth, Uncategorized, Zen

Q349. If bubbles in a bottle of water are the true Self, as well as the bottle itself and its surroundings, how can the true Self contain the true Self? Which of these elements represents the true Self? Or is it everything?

Zen Fools

A. The true-self is non-duality, oneness. There is nothing that is not the true-self, which is often compared to the universe. Bubbles, bottle, water and surroundings are all part of the universe. Which of them doesn’t belong to the universe? It is because you separate them from the universe by putting labels or drawing imaginary lines on them that you think that the universe contains them. In fact, it is impossible to break or tear the universe whatever we may do, because even we who try to break it are the universe itself. Even when things change or are changed into other forms whether visible or invisible, their changes are part of the universe as well.

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To conclude, there is nothing that is not the true-self. The reason why you think that a bottle contains water is that you put different labels on them. I’d like to recommend that you think over the phrase ‘You should be able to put Mt. Everest into a grain of mustard seed’.

©Boo Ahm

 

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

Buddha, Buddhism, emptiness, empty, Enlightenment, final goal, Koan, master, Meditation, One, Photography, Practice, student, true self, Truth, Uncategorized, Zen

Q348. Kyogen said, “Let’s suppose a man is hanging by his teeth from a branch of a tree that is leaning over a precipice. His hands grasp no branch, his feet rest on no limb, and under the tree another man asks him, ‘Why did Bodhidharma come to China from the West (India)?’ If the man in the tree does not answer, he misses the question, and if he answers, he falls and loses his life. Now what shall he do?”

Zen Fools

A. Student: “How can you both answer the question and save your life?”

Master: “In danger.”

Student: “Who is in danger?”

Master: “You are in danger.”

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Commentary:

Don’t stumble over the lines drawn on flat land by you.

They can’t catch your feet however tangled they are.

Don’t be scared of your shadow.

It can’t harm you however horrible it may look.

©Boo Ahm

 

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

Buddha, Buddhism, emptiness, empty, Enlightenment, final goal, illusion, Meditation, Photography, Practice, suffering, true self, Truth, Uncategorized, Zen

Q347. My thoughts of doom and the resultant feelings of fear or terror have become almost constant. I am trying to overcome it in many ways, but the fear is too strong to overcome. What more can I do? Please tell me there’s nothing to fear.

Zen Fools

A You are showing a good example of being deluded by illusions. You say that you are overwhelmed by the fear of doom. What is doom? The key problem here is that you don’t know what doom is even while suffering from the fear of it. You are being harassed by something imaginary drawn by you. Being pleased or troubled with imaginary figures, like this, is said to be being deluded by illusions, which can be compared to a dream. You are dreaming of being chased by the fear of doom. In fact, not only you but also all of us are dreaming in that we are being deluded by illusions. The reason why others don’t have such feelings of fear as yours is that each of us is dreaming a different dream. The best way to overcome the fear is to wake up from your dream, that is, to realise what you fear is.

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You seem likely to become a good Zen student because curiosity about the doom of death and illness was the starting point of Buddhism. Buddha, when young, had such strong curiosity concerning the doom of birth, ageing, illness and death that he gave up even his succession to the throne. His strong curiosity led him to enlightenment, which is to know clearly what the essence of these is. After enlightenment, he said that our life is like a dream and that we should wake up from the dream in order to attain eternal happiness.

 

What matters is not for me to tell you that there is nothing to fear but for you to realise it in person. I’d like to tell you to wake up from your nightmare instead of telling you that there is nothing to fear.

©Boo Ahm

 

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

Bible, Buddha, Buddhism, emptiness, empty, Enlightenment, final goal, God, illusion, master, Meditation, One, Photography, Practice, Religion, true self, Truth, Uncategorized, Zen

Q346. The Bible says that it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. How can the rich enter the kingdom of God?

Zen Fools

A. A rich man here means a man with a lot of illusions, rather than a man with a lot of knowledge or a lot of wealth. ‘Enter the kingdom of God’ means to attain eternal life in Christianity, or enlightenment in Buddhism. Only people who can see things as they are, may enter the kingdom of God. Seeing things as they are means not being deluded by illusions, which is to be able to see things as empty. In brief, only people who are free from illusions by seeing things as empty can enter the kingdom.

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My answer to your question is: ‘They can enter the kingdom of God if they realise how to put Mount Everest into a grain of a mustard seed’. To realise how to put Mount Everest into a grain of a mustard seed means to realise that everything is empty. When everything is empty, Both Mount Everest and a mustard seed are empty. When they are empty, there is no ‘large’ and ‘small’ in them. Then, each of them can enter each other freely.

 

To conclude, rich people, whether rich with illusions or rich with money and knowledge, can enter the kingdom when they can see everything, including all their possessions, as empty. When everything is empty, a camel and the eye of a needle are also empty just like Mount Everest and a mustard seed are. Then, it will be a piece of cake for the rich to pass through the eye of a needle.

 

©Boo Ahm

 

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway