Zen Battles: Modern Commentary on the Teachings of Master Linji

You should be sovereign according to where you find yourself; be the true person wherever you are, not allowing the conditions around you to pull you away.

Venerable monks, time is very precious. You should stop the mind, which is always wandering around, running to the neighbor’s house to study Zen, to learn the Way, looking for a sentence, looking for words, seeking the masters, seeking the Buddha, seeking a good spiritual friend. Do not take this mistaken direction.

The practitioner who does not have enough self-confidence will always direct his attention to what is external and wander around and around looking for something.

Master Linji wasn’t trying to defeat his students in these battles; he was trying to defeat their tendency to engage in excessive thinking and rationalizing.

The purpose of Master Linji’s work is to help us cease all our seeking and come back to ourselves in the present moment. That’s where we can find everything we’re looking for, whether it’s Buddha, perfect understanding, peace, or liberation.

The true person is an active participant, engaged in her environment while remaining unoppressed by it.

Even though the true person is the person with nothing to do and nowhere to go, doing nothing and going nowhere takes a lot of joyful practice!

Buddhist teachings are skillful means to cure our ignorance, craving, and anger, as well as our habit of seeking things outside and not having confidence in ourselves.

True monks must have right view in their daily life, which is the ability to distinguish Buddha from Mara, true from false, sacred from profane.