Zenrin Kushu

Zenrin kushu is ”a text of Japanese zen, the title of which means ‘Anthology of Passages from the Forests of Zen’. This two-fascicle work was first assembled in the medieval period by the Rinzai monk Tōyō Eichi (1428-1504), but did not see publication until the 1680s. It consists of a collection of quotations from Buddhist scriptures, Zen literature such as recorded sayings of past masters, Confucian, Taoist, and other sources. Altogether, it contains some 5,000 passages, and was probably used as a study aid.”

 EXTRACTS…

Nothing whatever is hidden 
From of old, all is clear as daylight 

 
There is no place to seek the mind 
It is like the footprints of the birds in the sky

Sitting quietly, doing nothing 
Spring comes, and the grass grows by itself

If you do not get it from yourself 
Where will you go for it?

The wild geese do not intend to cast their reflection 
The water has no mind to receive their image

Mountains and rivers, the whole earth, – 
All manifest forth the essence of being

 (Awakening by Sharon Cummings ~ http://fineartamerica.com/featured/awakening-zen-landscape-art-sharon-cummings.html )

In the vast inane there is no back and front 
The path of the bird annihilates East and West

From of old there were not two paths 

“Those who have arrived” all walked the same road 

The mouth desires to speak, but the words disappear; 
The heart desires to associate itself, but the thoughts fade away.

Shouldering the plank

—till death.

Cry

after cry

after cry of joy —

Not minding

the hair

turning white

To save life it must be destroyed [illusory ego] 
When utterly destroyed, one dwells for the first time in peace 

Entering the forest he moves not the grass 
Entering the water he makes not a ripple

If you meet an enlightened man in the street 
Do not greet him with words, nor with silence

Every voice

Buddha’s;

Every form

Buddha’s.

We sleep with both legs outstretched 
Free of the true, free of the false

A void sky laughs

and bows.

A recent great success

in transmitting this Dharma

of freedom—

Listen to the pine winds

from ten thousand valleys

on your pillow.

Watch it and take it

right now,

Or it’s gone

for a thousand years.

Three thousand miles away—

another one

who knows.

To a man of satori

nothing happens.

One book of different possible translations of these verses is this one ~ http://terebess.hu/zen/ZenForest.pdf

About A.D.

Generally just Being. Nothing in particular, no claims to fame. I like gardening and the sea, nature, art in all forms from poetry to films and everything in between, and being in the company of my family.