Joseph Burgess

“Impermanence is itself Buddha Nature.”

Rather than accusing others of sin, Jesus instead “became sin” (2 Corinthians 5:21). He stood in solidarity with the problem itself, and his compassion and solidarity were themselves the healing.

Six rooms in an elegant Victorian or Edwardian house built after the earthquake rented for $120.

“The only way to live in any true security is to live so close to the bottom that when you fall you do not have far to drop, you do not have much to lose.”

And what Zen proposes to do is to give us training in the practice of spontaneous action.

Because the question comes from the order of words, the answer comes from the order of nature; from lǐ .

Impermanence is the path. Practice isn’t the way to cope with or overcome impermanence. It is the way to fully appreciate and live it.

When you practice, “the time becomes ripe.” While this phrase naturally implies a “later” (something unripe ripens in time), Dogen understands it is the opposite way: Time is always ripe. Buddha Nature always manifests in time, because time is always impermanence.

Chinese language has another word for the actual order of nature, and this word is lǐ . This is a peculiarly interesting term, because its original meaning is “the markings in jade,” or “the grain in wood,” or “the fiber in muscle.” And it has been translated by the great student of Chinese thought, Joseph Needham, as “organic pattern.” But it refe... See more