Chan Buddhist Quotes

We took a bus to the nearby monastery of one of the last great Tang dynasty Chan masters, Yun-men. Yun-men was known for his pithy “one word” Zen. When asked “What is the highest teaching of the Buddha?” he replied: “An appropriate statement.” On another occasion, he answered: “Cake.” I admired his directness.

Bodhi means “awakening.” Bodhi-mind means the mind that aspires for awakening, not only for ourselves but for everyone. That is, in order to be awakened, you must help others.

To be in accordance with it is to enter the world to roam and play in samadhi, where everything manifests as it is.

Thoughts and passing emotions liberate themselves, moment after moment after moment. We don’t have to do anything to make them disappear. They liberate themselves if we let go of what we’re grasping.

The first encounter with Chan/Zen took place in Japan, where Francis Xavier arrived in August 1549. Xavier's stay in Japan was relatively short, and he had to rely in the beginning on the poor information provided by the Japanese convert Yajirō, who spoke some Portuguese. In contrast to Ricci's, Xavier's judgment reflects the sociopolitical importance of Buddhism in Japanese society prior to the anti-Buddhist repression of 1571, as well as the strong impressions left by his first encounters with Zen masters. Although Xavier and his confreres were puzzled by the many similarities between Buddhism and Christianity and first interpreted them as proof of a past knowledge, obscured in time, of Christian teachings, they eventually attributed them to the work of the devil (Schurhammer 1982, 224).

The Great Way has no gate, there are thousands of paths to it. If you pass through the barrier, you walk the universe alone. Wu-men—Chan Buddhist

He invited the Indian scholar Paramartha to come and set up a Translation Bureau for Buddhist texts, and the scholar stayed for twenty-three years. He invited the great Bodhidharma, the twenty-eighth patriarch after the Shakyamuni Buddha, to come from Kanchipuram in India, near the Temple of the Golden Lizard, but their meeting was disappointing. The Emperor asked Bodhidharma what merit he had accumulated by building monasteries and stupas in his kingdom. “No merit” was the reply. He asked what was the supreme meaning of sacred truth. “The expanse of emptiness. Nothing sacred.” Finally, the Emperor pointed at Bodhidharma and said, “Who is that before Us?” “Don’t know,” said Bodhidharma. The Emperor didn’t understand. So Bodhidharma left Ch’ien-k’ang and wandered until he came to the Shao-lin Monastery, where he sat motionless for nine years facing a wall, and then transmitted his teachings, the origin of Ch’an in China and Japanese Zen.

Zen is a branch of Mahayana Buddhism. It was brought to China roughly 15 centuries ago, in 6 CE. Zen was brought to China by an Indian Buddhist monk, Bodhidharma. There, it was known as “Ch’an,” which is the Chinese interpretation of the Sankrit term “dhyana,” meaning a mind that is immersed in meditation.

While Korean Buddhism did not begin as an exclusively Sŏn tradition, Sŏn was introduced into Korea perhaps as early as the late seventh century during Ch'an's incipiency on the Chinese mainland. By the thirteenth century, Sŏn came to dominate Buddhist doctrine and praxis, virtually eclipsing all other branches of Korean Buddhism after the fifteenth century.

As it is known to us through East Asian sources, Chan/Zen is the product of two traditions that sometimes overlap, sometimes contradict or ignore each other: namely, the Buddhist orthodoxy the Sino-Japanese historiographical tradition.

The mainstream of Chinese Ch'an provided the background tradition for Buddhism in Vietnam, particularly Vietnamese Zen Buddhism. An Indian monk and student of the third patriarch of Chinese Ch'an, Sêng-ts'an, a Chinese monk and disciple of the prominent master Pai-chang, and a second Chinese monk and follower of the famous Hsüeh-t'ou founded the first three schools of Zen Buddhism in Vietnam. Other schools of Buddhist philosophy and practice were also introduced to the country, and various indigenous sects grew up around celebrated Vietnamese masters. In the later development of Vietnamese Zen, the Lâm-Tế (C. Lin-chi, J. Rinzai) branch of practice came to the country and found firm basis for its growth through the innovations of a talented Vietnamese master, so that today most Buddhist monks, nuns, and laymen in Vietnam belong to the Lâm-Tế Zen tradition.

Western attitudes toward Chinese and Japanese religions were formed largely from the descriptions given by Christian missionaries to those countries. Earlier accounts provided by travelers, such as Marco Polo, John of Montecorvino, Odoric of Pordenone, and others, were too vague and never mentioned the Buddhist sects as such (Demiéville 1964). So misleading, for instance, was Marco Polo's description of Cathay that it took some fifteen years for the Jesuit missionary Matteo Ricci (1552–1610) to realize that this empire was none other than China.

The first mention of Chan appears in [Matteo] Ricci's journals, while Japanese Zen is discussed in the letters of Francis Xavier (1506–1552). The images one gets from these accounts are strikingly different; they reflect not only the idiosyncrasies of the two Jesuits but also the different roles played by Buddhism in Chinese and Japanese societies. Whereas the Buddhist tradition in China, and Chan in particular, had been largely assimilated by popular religion, the Zen sect in Japan, under the system of the so-called Five Mountains, remained associated with the ruling class and dominated intellectual discourse.

[D. T.] Suzuki's work is in some ways an attempt at a spiritual reconquista, and his "dialogue" with Christians may have the same motivations as [Francis] Xavier's conversations with Japanese Buddhists.

Although the discussions of quietism and nihilism conveyed by the Jesuits during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries paved the way for Western characterizations of Buddhism, only during the nineteenth century was Buddhism definitively constituted as an obiect of discourse and "reified as a textual object" (Almond 1988, 139). This textualization permitted the emergence of the "historical" Buddha and the convenient opposition between a pure, canonical, early Buddhism and the degenerate Buddhist religion of contemporary Asia (Almond 1988, 25, 37-40).

In some Buddhist sutras, bodhisattvas are said to make buddha realms “magnificent” by their practice of the six paramitas. In the Diamond Sutra, the Buddha denies the possibility of any such magnificence. The Buddha taught on many different levels. If in one sutra he says that the six paramitas are “magnificent” while in another he says that they are not, he is not contradicting himself. He is simply rising to a higher level of truth to suit his audience. We can be certain that the Diamond Sutra teaches a very high level of truth because this discourse is directed at Subhuti, the Buddha’s foremost disciple in wisdom.

Thich Nhat Hanh, a Zen Buddhist monk, once said, “If you look deeply into the palm of your hand, you will see your parents and all generations of your ancestors. All of them are alive in this moment. Each is present in your body. You are the continuation of each of these people.

The Root of Chinese Qigong — The Secrets of Qigong Training 2. Muscle/Tendon Changing and Marrow/Brain Washing Qigong — The Secret of Youth (Yi Jin Jing and Xi Sui Jing)() 3. Chinese Qigong Massage — Qigong Tui Na and Cavity Press for Healing (Qigong An Mo and Qigong Dian Xue)() 4. Qigong and Health — For Healing and Maintaining Health 5. Qigong and Martial Arts — The Key to Advanced Martial Arts Skill (Shaolin, Wudang, Emei, and others) 6. Buddhist Qigong — Chan, The Root of Zen() 7. Daoist Qigong (Dan Ding Dao Gong)() 8. Tibetan Qigong (Mi Zang Shen Gong)()

Dhyan traveled from India to China along with the Buddhist monks, where it was referred to as Ch’an. This yoga traveled through the Southeast Asian countries to Japan and became Zen, and found expression as a whole system of direct insight without an emphasis on doctrine. Zen is a spiritual path that has no scriptures, books, rules, or rigid practices; it is an uncharted path.

Thus, although orthodox Buddhists do believe that the religious value of Buddhism surpasses that of other religions, they do not discriminate against other religions or deny their value. If believers of other religions create the conditions for a fortunate rebirth and act constructively, aren’t these people better qualified to be the friends of Buddhism than those scoundrels who destroy human happiness? Although Buddhists encourage believers of other religions to convert to Buddhism, Buddhists have never ostracized or persecuted other religions. This is clear from the last 2,500-plus years of world history.

When you meet a swordsman, draw your sword: Do not recite poetry to one who is not a poet. FROM A CH’AN BUDDHIST CLASSIC, QUOTED IN THUNDER IN THE SKY, TRANSLATED BY THOMAS CLEARY, 1993

As the controversy between [D. T.] Suzuki and [Chinese historian] Hu Shih suggests, the history of Chan/Zen is the product of two distincts milieux, the Buddhist institutions and the academic world. Serving as relay stations between these two circles are Buddhist institutions such as Komazawa University in Tokyo and Hanazono College in Kyoto, respectively affiliated with the Sōtō and Rinzai sects.