Surangama Sutra: Neither Empty nor Not Empty
Neither empty nor not empty.
If ore is mined and made into gold, can that gold then be turned back into its original ore?
If wood is burned into ash, can that ash be turned back into its original wood?
When one awakens from a dream half-asleep, can the vague relationships and objects from that dream be grasped again?
Do not remain bound to past mistakes. Instead, turn them into a blessing in disguise and use them as an opportunity for practice.
Do not make the foolish mistake of a fish leaving the water in search of water. Water must be sought within the water itself.
I, each of us in ourselves, am light and life. Where does the light of the lamp in front end, and where does the light of the lamp behind begin? Between the monk and me, where does the monk's place end and where does mine begin? It is the same with the distinction between life and death, or between awakening and not awakening. It cannot be known.
The mind that says it can know what cannot be known, the very form of that thinking, is defiled dust.
Imokgeo silshina. "The wise person is the one who sees the self." One must be able to realize that the original self is clear and pure.
Birth and death are but a dream. There are no flowers in empty space; only the disease in my own eyes is there. Why, then, long for fruit to appear in the empty sky? If one has been struck by an arrow, one should quickly pull it out and seek treatment. Why only worry over whether there is poison, whether there is none, how long one will live, or when one will die?
One must live an ecological life. It is not something to be obtained outside, nor in a dream.
* Scriptures move from the place where there are words to the place where there are no words.
* Seon meditation is a means for moving from the wordless place to the wordless place.
* Originally there is nowhere to abide, so attachments such as "our monk," "our temple," and "our temple" must also be let go.
* A hwadu has no answer. Do not try to find an answer in it. It is only a matter of defining and settling it for oneself, solely in order for the self to awaken to itself.
(p. 128) If you simply stop discriminating in worldly life according to the three kinds of continuity, karmic obstacles and karmic results, sentient beings, and these three continuing in mutual sequence, then because the three conditions are cut off, the three causes will no longer arise. Then the false nature within your mind will naturally disappear. When ignorance disappears, the supremely pure and lucid mind of bodhi will spread throughout the universe as it originally does. It is not obtained from another person, so why would you labor to cultivate it and attain it?
It is like a person who carries a wish-fulfilling jewel in his own garment without knowing it, wandering in poverty through a foreign land and begging for food. Though poor, he has not lost the jewel. If a wise person suddenly points it out to him, he will become greatly wealthy according to the wish in his heart, and only then will he realize that the wondrous jewel was never obtained from outside.
(p. 151) All sentient beings, from beginningless time in the past, have followed every light and sound, drifted after thoughts, and never awakened to the pure, wondrous, constant nature. Because they do not follow what is constant and only chase what is born and perishes, they drift through life after life in scattered thoughts. But if one abandons birth and death and guards what is true and constant, then the constant light will appear before one, and the sense faculties, their objects, and the conscious mind will disappear in time. The forms created by thought are illusory dust, and the conscious mind becomes filthy stain. If both are completely left behind, then the eye of dharma will in time become clear and bright. How could supreme awakening then fail to be achieved?
(Minjoksa, Surangama Sutra)
