Verses on the Faith Mind
(Seng-Tsan, the third Ch’an patriarch)
(underlined words are spoken by the service leader)
The Great Way is not difficult for those that have no preferences.
When love and hate are both absent everything becomes clear and undisguised.
Make the smallest distinction however, and heaven and earth are set infinitely
apart.
If you wish to see the truth, then hold no opinions for or against anything.
To set up what you like against what you dislike is the disease of the mind.
When the deep meaning of things is not understood, the mind’s peace is
disturbed to no avail.
The Way is perfect like vast space where nothing is lacking and nothing is in
excess.
Indeed, it is due to our choosing to accept or reject that we do not see the true nature of things.
Live neither in the entanglements of outer things, nor in the inner feelings of
emptiness.
Be serene in the oneness of things and such erroneous views will disappear by themselves.
When you try to stop activity to achieve passivity, your very effort fills you with
activity.
As long as you remain in one extreme or the other, you will never know Oneness.
Those who do not live in the single Way fail in both activity and passivity,
assertion and denial.
To deny the reality of things is to miss their reality; to assert the emptiness of
things is to miss their reality.
The more you talk and think about it, the further astray you wonder from the truth.
Stop talking and thinking, and there is nothing you will not be able to know.
To return to the root is to find the meaning, but to pursue appearances is to miss
the source.
At the moment of inner enlightenment there is a going beyond appearances and
emptiness.
The changes that appear to occur in the empty world we call “real” only because
of our ignorance.
Do not search for the truth; only cease to cherish opinions.
Do not remain in the dualistic state, avoid such pursuits carefully.
If there is even a trace of “this” and “that”, “right” or “wrong”, the Mind-essence
will be lost in confusion.
Although all dualities come from the One, do not be attached to even this One.
When the mind exists undisturbed in the Way, nothing in the world can offend,
and when a thing can no longer offend, it ceases to exist in the old way.
When no discriminating thoughts arise, the old mind ceases to exist.
When thought objects vanish, the thinking-subject vanishes, as when the mind
vanishes, objects vanish.
Things are objects because of the subject; the mind is such because of things.
Understand the relativity of these two and the basic reality: the unity of
emptiness.
In this Emptiness the two are indistinguishable and each contains in itself the
whole world.
If you do not discriminate between coarse and fine, you will not be tempted to
prejudice and opinion.
To live in the Great Way is neither easy nor difficult, but those with limited views
are fearful and irresolute: the faster they hurry, the slower they go, and
clinging cannot be limited: even to be attached to the idea of
enlightenment is to go astray.
Just let things be in their own way and there will be neither coming nor going.
Obey the nature of things, and you will walk freely and undisturbed.
When thought is in bondage the truth is hidden, for everything is murky and
unclear and the burdensome practice of judging brings annoyance
and weariness.
What benefit can be derived from distinctions and separations?
If you wish to move in the One Way do not dislike even the world of senses and
ideas.
Indeed, to accept them fully is identical with true Enlightenment.
The wise one strives to no goals but the foolish one fetters himself.
There is one Dharma, not many; distinctions arise from the clinging needs of the
ignorant.
To seek the Mind with the mind is the greatest of all mistakes.
Rest and unrest derive from passion; with enlightenment there is no liking and
disliking.
All dualities come from ignorant inference.
They are like dreams or flowers in the air; the foolish try to grasp them.
Gains and loss, right and wrong: such thoughts must finally be abolished at once.
If the eye never sleeps, all dreams will naturally cease.
If the mind makes no discriminations, the ten thousand things are as they are –
of single essence.
To understand the mystery of this One essence is to be released from all
entanglements.
When all things are seen equally, the timeless Self-essence is reached.
No comparisons or analogies are possible in the causeless, relation less state.
Consider movement stationary and the stationary in motion, both movement and
rest disappear.
When such dualities cease to exist, Oneness itself cannot exist.
To this ultimate finality, no law or description applies.
For the unified mind in accord with the Way, all self-centred striving ceases.
Doubts and irresolution vanish and life in true faith is possible.
With a single stroke we are free from bondage; nothing clings to us and we hold
to nothing.
All is empty, clear, self-illuminating, with no exertion of the mind’s power.
Here thought, feeling, knowledge, and imagination are of no value.
In this world of Suchness there is neither self nor other-than-self.
To come directly into harmony with this reality, just simply say when doubt
arises “Not two.”
In this “not two” nothing is separate, nothing is excluded.
No matter when or where, enlightenment means entering this truth.
And this truth is beyond all extension or diminution in time or space; in it, a single
thought is ten thousand years.
Emptiness here, Emptiness there, but the infinite universe stands always before
your eyes.
Infinitely large and infinitely small; no difference, for definitions have vanished
and no boundaries are seen.
So too with Being and Non-Being.
Don’t waste time in doubts and arguments that have nothing to do with this.
One thing, all things: move among and intermingle without distinction.
To live in this realization is to be without anxiety about non-perfection.
To live in this faith is the road to non-duality.
Because the non-dual is one with the trusting mind.
Words!
The Way is beyond language, for in it there is
No yesterday
No tomorrow
No today.
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