GREAT TRANSCENDING WISDOM HEART SUTRA

Thus have I heard. The noble Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara, flowing in the course of profound Transcending Wisdom, saw the world encompassing view, saw the essential emptiness of the five branches of being, and allayed every passion.

Here Sariputra! Form is emptiness; emptiness itself is form; form is not other than emptiness; emptiness is not other than form; what is form, that is emptiness; what is emptiness, that is form; thus also for feelings, perceptions, complexes, and consciousness.

Here Sariputra! Everything has these aspects of emptiness: not arising, not ceasing, not stained, not immaculate, not deficient, not excessive.

Therefore Sariputra, within emptiness there is no form, no feelings, no perceptions, no complexes, no consciousness; no eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, mind; no forms, sounds, smells, tastes, touches, things; no eye-field coming to no mind-consciousness-field; no ignorance, no extinction of ignorance, coming to no ageing and dying, no extinction of ageing and dying; no passion-cause-cessation-path; no higher-knowledge; no attainment, no non-attainment.

Therefore Sariputra, because there is no state of attainment, Bodhisattvas rely on Transcending Wisdom to dwell serenely without resistances to attention; absent resistances to attention, they are fearless, overcoming topsy-turvy views, finally attaining Nirvana.

Manifesting in the three cycles of time, all Buddhas rely on Transcending Wisdom to dwell fully awakened in unsurpassed complete perfect enlightenment.

Thus know Transcending Wisdom, this great mantra, this great knowledge mantra, this unsurpassed mantra, this unparalleled mantra, allays every passion, truly without going astray.

So he delivered this Transcending Wisdom mantra, thus proclaiming:

“Gone, gone, gone beyond, gone completely beyond, enlightened, amen.”

“Gate, gate, paragate, parasamgate, bodhi, svaha.”

– Wisdom Heart Sutra.

The Third Ancestor Great Master Sengcan’s Inscription on Faith in Mind

三祖僧璨大師信心銘

By Jianzhi Sengcan, "The 3rd Ancestor" of Chinese Zen (d. 606 C.E)

Translated by Gregory Wonderwheel

~~~

Reaching the Way is without difficulty, only refrain from picking and choosing.

Merely do not hate or love, and penetrate like this to realization.

A thousandth of a foot discrepancy, and heaven and earth hang divided.

Wanting to be able to manifest and progress, do not live by obeying or disobeying.

“To defy” or “to obey” is a reciprocal struggle and is an active disease of the mind.

Not knowing the profound purpose, one labors in vain thinking of tranquility.

Complete equality and vast emptiness, without lack, without excess.

“The Good” causes grasping and casting away; location and instrumentality are not Suchness.

Do not pursue the whence of existence, do not dwell in enduring emptiness.

Embrace even oneness, and submerging like this the self is extinguished.

Stopping activity comes back to stopping; (such) stopping still is filled with activity.

Only by blocking both sides, would you rather know oneness.

(If) oneness is not passed through, paired positions lose merit.

To banish existence is to drown in existence; to accord with emptiness is to betray emptiness.

Many words and many strategies spin around irrelevantly.

Cutting off words and cutting off strategies, there is no position that is not passed through.

Returning to the root gains the purpose; following after the light loses the lineage.

Instantly revert the light, then victory and retreat are the primary emptiness.

The transformations of primary emptiness are all because of false views.

It isn’t useful to seek truth, it’s only necessary to put an end to views.

Do not dwell in dualistic views; scrupulously do not pursue or search for them.

The first time there exists right and wrong, just like that the heart-mind is lost in entanglements.

The two exist because of the One; and likewise do not guard the one.

The One Mind is not born; the ten thousand things are without fault.

Without fault without things, it is not born, it is not mind

When power submits to the environment it is extinguished; when the environment pursues power it is submerged.

Environment is the environment because of power; power is power because of the environment.

Wanting to know both parts, their origin is the emptiness of the One.

The emptiness of the One is the same as both; equally containing the ten thousand outward appearances.

Do not view fine or coarse, or would (you) rather have one-sided associations?

The essence of the Great Way is broad, without ease, without difficulty.

The fox doubts of small views spin quickly and spin slowly.

Grasping leads to losing salvation and necessarily entering the evil paths.

Releasing leads to naturalness and to the essence without leaving (one’s) abode.

Allow (your) nature to unite with the Way, and ramble carefree with vexations cut off.

Attached thoughts oppose the True, dully sinking to no good.

(When) “no good” belabors the spirit, what use are “unfamiliar” and “intimate”?

Wanting to choose the One Vehicle (Ekayana), do not hate the six dusts (of the senses).

The six dusts do not hate and, besides, are identical with right awakening.

Those who are wise are non-doing. Monkey-minded people are tied up by themselves.

The Dharma is without an opposing Dharma; the false self loves attachments.

To use the mind by commanding the mind, how can it not be a great mistake?

Delusion gives birth to stillness and chaos; awakening is without good and evil.

With two sides to everything, the false self deliberates.

Dreams and illusions, flowers in the sky; why labor to grasp them?

Gain and loss, right and wrong, in one moment release them and withdraw.

If the eyes are not asleep, the various dreams are by themselves wiped away.

If mind does not discriminate, the ten thousand things are One Suchness.

In the profound essence of One Suchness, you look ignorant and forget the secondary causes.

The insight that the ten thousand things are on the same level is returning home and restoring naturalness.

Destroying that place of instrumentality it is not possible to go in the direction of comparisons.

By stopping activity without activity, activity is stopped without stopping.

Pairs are de facto not complete; the One, how does that exist?

In the end, impoverished to the utmost, do not live by (following) tracks and rules.

The harmonious mind is equality, where actions all cease.

(When) fox doubts are entirely purified right faith harmonizes directly.

Everything does not remain, unable to remember.

The clear light shines by itself and does not belabor the mind’s strength.

Do not consider the amount or location; knowledge and feelings are difficult to measure.

The Dharma realm of True Suchness is without other and without self.

(When) it is vital to quickly be relevant, only say, “Non-dual.”

In the non-dual all is equal, without exclusion.

In the ten directions, those who are wise all enter this lineage.

The lineage does not hurry or delay, a single moment--ten thousand years.

Without being present or absent, the ten directions are in front of the eyes.

The utmost small is the same as the large, forget to cut off the bounded realms.

The utmost large is the same as the small, do not view outside of the boundaries.

Existence is, in fact, nonexistence; nonexistence is, in fact, existence.

If “is not Suchness” is the case, necessarily it need not be guarded.

One is, in fact, everything; everything is, in fact, One.

(When) there is merely empowering Suchness, what concerns are not concluded?

Faith in mind is non-dual; non-dual is faith in mind.

The way of spoken language is severed; there is neither the gone, nor the coming, nor the present.

AN AGREEMENT FOR PARTICIPATING TOGETHER

– CAN TONG QI (TS’AN-T’UNG-CH’I) (J. SANDOKAI)

By Shitou Xiqian (Shih-t’ou Hsi-ch’ien, J. Sekito Kisen)

(b.700 - d.790)

The mind of the great sage of the land of India

has been intimately and mutually handed down from west to east.

A person's roots are sharp or dull;

the Way has no Northern or Southern ancestors.

The mysterious source is shining and clean in the light;

the branching streams are flowing and pouring in the dark.

Grasping at primary phenomena is bewilderment;

agreeing with Principle is still not enlightenment.

Each and every gate corresponds to circumstances,

revolving with each other and not revolving with each other.

Revolving and alternating are mutually entangled,

they do not rely on remaining in place.

The root of form is distinguished by substance and appearance;

the primal sound is differentiated as joyful or painful.

High and middle words unite in the dark,

clean and dirty sentences, in the brightness.

The four great elements return to their natures

like a child to its mother.

The heat of the fire; the waving of the wind;

the wet of the water; the solidity of the earth.

The colors of the eye; the sounds of the ear;

the fragrances of the nose; the salt and sour of the tongue.

This is the way with each and every thing;

according to the roots the leaves separate and spread out.

Roots and branches necessarily return to the ancestral origin;

venerated and vulgar, these are used in speech.

Right in the middle of the light there is dark;

don’t use the mutuality of darkness to meet it.

Right in the middle of the dark there is light;

don’t use the mutuality of the light to see it.

Light and dark are mutual polarities,

for example, like front and back steps.

The ten thousand things naturally have their function,

and are regarded in the use and placement of words.

Phenomena exist like the joining of a box and lid.

Principle responds like the support of the sharp point of an arrow.

In receiving words you should meet the ancestors,

and not establish rules by yourself.

If your contacting eye does not meet the Way,

how do you know the path by using your feet?

Progress is not near or far;

bewilderment causes the distance from mountains and rivers.

Sincerely, I say to people who participate in the profound depths,

from brightness and shadow, there are none who have ferried across in vain.

SONG OF THE STRAW THATCHED HUT

-- 艸庵歌 Caoan Ge (J. Soanka)

By Shitou Xiqian (Shih-t’ou Hsi-ch’ien, J. Sekito Kisen)

(b.700 - d.790)

I tied up the straw thatched hut without precious objects.

With the cooked rice finished, I followed the aim of appearances and soon slept.

As the first season was accomplished, I saw the thatch was new.

Later when it is worn out, I will repay my debt and reconstruct the thatch.

The resident hermit -- subdues permanent residency,

And does not categorize the middle space with inside or outside.

A worldly person resides in a place; I do not reside.

A worldly person has affection for a place; I do not have affection.

Although the thatched hut is small -- it contains the Dharma-realm (Dharmadhatu).

In a square ten feet, an old man studies liberation of the essential body.

A bodhisattva of the Supreme Vehicle trusts without doubt.

The middle and inferior hear it and surely give rise to (a sense of) strangeness.

Asking about this thatched hut -- poor or not poor?

Poor and not poor: the original master is present.

Not dwelling south or north and east or west

A foundation on top of "the firm and stable" therefore becomes superlative.

Green pines below -- light inside of the window.

The Jade Palace (of Heaven) and the Vermilion Tower (of Hell) do not compare.

With a patched cape covering the head, the 10,000 affairs come to rest.

Here and now, this mountain monk already does not meet (anyone).

Residing in this thatched hut -- ceasing to work on liberation.

Who boastfully spreads out a mat aiming for customers?

Revolve the light and turn back your illumination, then you come back to the origin point,

Breaking through to the boundless root of the spirit, you do not face backwards.

Meet the ancestral masters -- be intimate with the teachings.

Tie straw for a thatched hut; do not create backsliding.

Abandon your 100 years (of lifespan), yet be alive vertically and sideways.

Wave a hand, then do, just without doing wrong.

One thousand kinds of words -- ten thousand categories of liberation,

Are only necessary not to obscure the teaching for long.

If you desire to know the undying person inside the thatched hut,

How can it be separate, and yet right now be covered by the skin bag?

ZAZEN WASAN –

"ODE TO SITTING-MEDITATION"

By Hakuin Ekaku Zenji

(b. 12/25/1685 - d. 1/18/1769)

Living beings originally are Buddha.

It is the same with water and ice.

There is no ice separate from water;

Outside of living beings, no Buddha.

Because living beings are unconscious of the intimate,

They seek it far away. Alas how pitiful!

It is like the examples of someone sitting in the middle of water

But crying out in thirst; and,

While still being the son of a millionaire's family,

As a strange good-for-nothing he loses his way in the countryside living in poverty.

The causes and conditions of the revolving wheel of the six appearances

Are but one's own road through the darkness of ignorance;

Walking down dark roads to dark roads,

Someday you should abandon birth and death.

As to the zen meditation (dhyana-samadhi) of the Mahayana,

There is just too much to praise.

The several perfections such as charity, morality, and such;

Chanting Buddha's name, confession and repentance, austerities, and the like;

The many good deeds and various virtuous pilgrimages;

All these are coming from within it.

Also, a person succeeds by the merit of a single sitting

To destroy one's immeasurably accumulated crimes.

Where then should the evil appearances exist?

The Pure Land is then not far away.

One, who by this Dharma graciously

Has the occasion to hear it announced even one time,

Who is a person extolling it with deep gratitude,

Receives supreme blessings without limits.

Much more, to personally turn around to face inward and,

In that case, directly confirm by one's own nature,

That here, one's own nature is neither more nor less than no-nature.

And afterwards leave off from silly debate;

Then opens the gate of the oneness of cause and effect;

The Way of not-two and not-three is straightened.

When form is the form of non-form,

One's going and one's returning are not someplace else.

When thought is the thought of no-thought,

One's singing and one's dancing are the voice of Dharma.

The sky of boundless Samadhi is wide!

The moon of the Four Wisdoms' round brilliance is transparent!

At this time what more should you want?

Consequently, Nirvana appears before you.

This place is neither more nor less than the Lotus Country.

As it is, this body is neither more nor less than the Buddha.

Notes on Translations of Verse Works:

Great Transcending Wisdom Heart Sutra

For translation notes on the Heart Sutra see Heart Sutra Page

The Third Ancestor Great Master Sengcan’s Inscription on Faith in Mind

Notes and translation comments on Faith in Mind Page.

An Agreement for Participating Together

For translation notes and variations see An Agreement for Participating Together Page

Ode to Sitting Meditation

For my (work in progress) commentary on Hakuin’s “Ode to Sitting Meditation” and various translations see Zazen Wasen Page

Prose Translations:

Bodhidharma's "Outline of Four Practices and Contemplation"

Koan Collection Translations:

For my translation of the Wumen Guan see “The Gateless Checkpoint” page.

For my translation (work in progress) of the Bìyán Lù see The Blue Cliff Record page.

Index of Gregory's Buddhist Writings

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This page last edited April 22, 2009.