Religious Leaders From Japan

"The asshole doesn’t need to be ashamed of being the asshole. The feet don’t have any reason to go on strike just because they’re only feet. The head isn’t the most important of all, and the navel doesn’t need to imagine he’s the father of all things. It’s strange though that people look at the prime minister as an especially important person. The nose can’t replace the eyes, and the mouth can’t replace the ears. Everything has its own identity, which is unsurpassable in the whole universe."

"Hey! What are you looking at? Don’t you see that it’s about you?"

"You can’t even trade a single fart with the next guy. Each and every one of us has to live out his own life. Don’t waste time thinking about who’s most talented."

"Keep your hands open, and all the sands of the desert can pass through them. Close them, and all you can feel is a bit of grit."

"Religions remain what they are. Zen is meditation. Meditation is the foundation of every religion. People today feel an intense need to go back to the source of religious life, to the pure essence in the depths of themselves which they can discover only through actually experiencing it. They also need to be able to concentrate their minds in order to find the highest wisdom and freedom, which is spiritual in nature, in their efforts to deal with the influences of every description imposed upon them by their environment. Human wisdom alone is not enough, it is not complete. Only universal truth can provide the highest wisdom. Take away the word Zen and put Truth or Order of the Universe in its place."

"We should learn to think with our fingers."

"Think with your whole body."

"If you are not happy here and now, you never will be."

"To receive everything, one must open one's hands and give."

"You are the strongest and the others keep their distance. It is no longer necessary to win victories over them."

"You must not take out your sword because if you try to kill someone, you must die for it yourself. What you must do instead is kill yourself, kill your own mind."

"We feel our shell keeps us safe, but it crushes us and others, and keeps out light and sun."

"Harmonizing opposites by going back to their source is the distinctive quality of the Zen attitude, the Middle Way: embracing contradictions, making a synthesis of them, achieving balance."

"If you have a glass full of liquid you can discourse forever on its qualities, discuss whether it is cold, warm, whether it is really and truly composed of H-2-O, or even mineral water, or saki. Meditation is Drinking it!"

"Zen is not a particular state but the normal state: silent, peaceful, unagitated. In Zazen neither intention, analysis, specific effort nor imagination take place. It's enough just to be without hypocrisy, dogmatism, arrogance — embracing all opposites."

"You have to practice until you die."

"You must concentrate upon and consecrate yourself wholly to each day, as though a fire were raging in your hair."

"Train the body and develop stamina and endurance. But the spirit of competition and power that presides over them is not good, it reflects a distorted vision of life. The root of the martial arts is not there."

"All beings are by nature are Buddhas, as ice by nature is water. Apart from water there is no ice; apart from beings, no Buddhas. How sad that people ignore the near and search the truth afar: like someone in the midst of water crying out in thirst: like a child of a wealthy home wandering among the poor."

"If you forget yourself, you become the universe."

"Should you desire the great tranquility prepare to sweat white beads."

"From far, far in the distant past, Down to this day, this very instant, Those things we have longed for most Have not been attained, and we sorrow."

"Food, clothing, and shelter are the three evil paths. To desire and make a display of clothing is karma for the path of beasts. To greedily crave food is karma for the path of famished ghosts. To set up a shelter is karma for the path of hell. Hence, if you aspire to part from the three evil paths, you must free yourself from food, clothing, and shelter."

"To become solitary and simple in utter aloneness -- living wholly unconcerned about the multitude of worldly affairs, and abandoning and disentangling yourself from all things -- is to die. We are born alone; we die alone."

"In the Buddha’s teaching, unless you cast away body and life, there can be no realization of benefit."

"With aversion for sect superiors and their pomp, I have no wish for monk disciples; Not in search of lay supporters, I court the favor of no one."

"In this brief span this body exists, Clothing and food are of course indispensable; But knowing them to be fruits of former lives, I make no effort at all to obtain them."

"To reach the borders of the uncreated, Just let go! This is genuine gratitude."

"Once our false thinking has completely ceasedThere is neither start nor conclusion, beginning nor endIn the oneness of Buddha and sentient beingsSay Namu-amida-butsu."

"The purpose of studying Buddhism is not to study Buddhism but to study ourselves. You are not your body. You are the Big Activity. You are just expressing the smallest particle of the Big Activity. That is all. But when you become attached to a temporal expression of the Big Activity, it is time to talk about Buddhism."

"Nothing we see or hear is perfect. But right there in the imperfection is perfect reality."

"Real Freedom is to not feel limited when wearing this Zen robe, this troublesome formal robe. Similarly, in our busy life we should wear this civilization without being bothered by it, without ignoring it, without being caught by it."

"Instead of respecting things, we want to use them for ourselves and if it is difficult to use them, we want to conquer them."

"All descriptions of reality are limited expressions of the world of emptiness. Yet we attach to the descriptions and think they are reality. That is a mistake."

"It is a big mistake to think that the best way to express yourself is to do whatever you want, acting as you please. This is not expressing yourself. If you know what to do exactly, and you do it, then you can express yourself fully."

"When we do not expect anything we can be ourselves. That is our way, to live fully in each moment of time."

"We must have beginner's mind, free from possessing anything, a mind that knows everything is in flowing change. Nothing exists but momentarily in its present form and color. One thing flows into another and cannot be grasped."

"Eyes only see things outside, objective things. If you reflect on yourself, that self is not your true self any more. You cannot project yourself as some objective thing to think about. The mind which is always on your side is not just your mind, it is universal mind, always the same, not different from another's mind. It is Zen mind. It is big, big mind."

"If you take pride in your attainment or become discouraged because of your idealistic effort, your practice will confine you by a thick wall."

"Without accepting the fact that everything changes, we cannot find perfect composure."

"The basic teaching of Buddhism is the teaching of transiency or change. That everything changes is the basic truth for each existence. No one can deny this truth and all teaching of Buddhism is condensed within it. This is the teaching for all of us. Wherever we go this teaching is true. This teaching is also understood as the teaching of selflessness. Because each existence is in constant change, there is no abiding self."

"It is all right to talk about ourselves, but actually there is no need to do so. Before we open our mouths, we are already expressing the big existence, including ourselves. So the purpose of talking about ourselves is to correct the misunderstanding we have when we are attached to any particular temporal form or color of the big activity."

"Once I had left Eiheiji and been away for some time, coming back was different. I heard the various sounds of practice—the bells and the monks reciting the sutra—and I had a deep feeling. There were tears flowing out of my eyes, nose, and mouth! It is the people who are outside of the monastery who feel its atmosphere. Those who are practicing actually do not feel anything. I think this is true for everything. When we hear the sound of the pine trees on a windy day, perhaps the wind is just blowing, and the pine tree is just standing in the wind. That is all that they are doing. But the people who listen to the wind in the tree will write a poem, or will feel something unusual. That is, I think, the way everything is."

"After you have practiced for a while, you will realize that it is not possible to make rapid, extraordinary progress. Even though you try very hard, the progress you make is always little by little. It is not like going out in a shower in which you know when you get wet. In a fog, you do not know you are getting wet, but as you keep walking you get wet little by little. If your mind has ideas of progress, you may say, "Oh, this pace is terrible!" But actually it is not. When you get wet in a fog it is very difficult to dry yourself. So there is no need to worry about progress."

"Practice does not mean that whatever you do, even lying down, is zazen. When the restrictions you have do not limit you, this is what we mean by practice…. When you sit, you will sit. When you eat, you will eat…. If you say,”It doesn’t matter,” it means that you are making some excuse to do something in your own way with your small mind. It means that you are to some particular thing or way. That is not what we mean when we say, “Just to sit is enough,” or “Whatever you do is zazen.” Of course, everything you do is zazen, but if so, there is no need to say it."

"Bowing is a very serious practice. You should be prepared to bow, even in your last moment. Even though it is impossible to get rid of our self-centered desires, we have to do it. Our true nature wants us to. After we bow to the floor nine times. By bowing we are giving up ourselves. To give up ourselves means to give up our dualistic ideas. So there is no difference between zazen practice and bowing. …, the founder of the , committed (ritual suicide by disembowelment) in 1591 at the order of his lord, Hideyoshi. Just before Rikyu took his own life he said, "When I have this sword there is no Buddha and no Patriarchs." He meant that when we have the sword of big mind, there is no dualistic world. The only thing which exists is this spirit. This kind of imperturbable spirit was always present in Rikyu’s tea ceremony. He never did anything in just a dualistic way; he was ready to die in each moment. In ceremony after ceremony he died, and he renewed himself. This is the spirit of the tea ceremony. This is how we bow."

"Zazen practice is the direct expression of our true nature. Strictly speaking, for a human being, there is no other practice than this practice; there is no other way of life than this way of life."

"You should rather be grateful for the weeds you have in your mind, because eventually they will enrich your practice."

"Doing something is expressing our own nature. We do not exist for the sake of something else. We exist for the sake of ourselves. This is the fundamental teaching expressed in the forms we observe."

"The true purpose of Zen is to see things as they are, to observe things as they are, and to let everything go as it goes. Zen practice is to open up our small mind."