Sublime
An inspiration engine for ideas
Rinzai Roku (a celebrated Zen text of the T’ang dynasty) and the teachings of Bankei, the seventeenth-century Japanese master who, for me, represents Zen at its best.
Alan Watts • In My Own Way: An Autobiography
Bankei (1622–1693) was a contemporary of Hakuin and for some time roshi at the Myoshinji monastery in Kyoto. Translations of his informal talks on Zen, directed especially to lay people, may be found in D. T. Suzuki’s Living by Zen (Pasadena, Calif.: P. D. and Ione Perkins, 1949), and in Lucien Stryk, ed., World of the Buddha (New York: Doubleday &
... See moreAlan Watts • In My Own Way: An Autobiography
If you think Zen is something lofty and esoteric, the master will give you a shout or slap for an answer. If you think it is abstract, you’ll be told it’s three pounds of flax or the oak tree in the garden. If you think it is beyond words and abstractions, the master may quote the sutras or a poem by Han Shan. If you think Zen is nothing but our ev
... See moreBarry Magid • Ending the Pursuit of Happiness: A Zen Guide
both the tea ceremony and Zen share the basic philosophy that all extraneous or redundant activities should be removed and in spirit and action the whole environment should reflect economy and minimalism.
Sato,Shozo • Shodo: The Quiet Art of Japanese Zen Calligraphy, Learn the Wisdom of Zen Through Traditional Brush Painting
—Charlotte Joko Beck, Nothing Special: Living Zen
Jack Kornfield • The Buddha Is Still Teaching: Contemporary Buddhist Wisdom
In other schools of Buddhism, awakening or bodhi seems remote and almost superhuman, something to be reached only after many lives of patient effort. But in Zen there is always the feeling that awakening is something quite natural, something startlingly obvious, which may occur at any moment. If it involves
Alan W. Watts • The Way of Zen
The goal of Zen is to awaken to life as it is, rather than stay in the comparative dream world of our ideas about it.