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Hsin Hsin Ming - Verses on Faith Mind
by Seng-Tsan, Third Zen Patriarch - Translated by Richard
Clarke
The Great
Way is not difficult for those not attached to preferences.
When neither love nor hate arises, all is clear and
undisguised. Separate by the smallest amount, however, and
you are as far from it as heaven is from earth.
If you
wish to know the truth, then hold to no opinions for or
against anything. To set up what you like against what you
dislike is the disease of the mind.
When the
fundamental nature of things is not recognized, the mind's
essential peace is disturbed to no avail. The Way is perfect
as vast space is perfect, where nothing is lacking and
nothing is in excess.
Indeed,
it is due to our grasping and rejecting that we do not know
the true nature of things. Live neither in the entanglements
of outer things, nor in ideas or feelings of emptiness. Be
serene and at one with things and erroneous views will
disappear by themselves.
When you
try to stop activity to achieve quietude, your very effort
fills you with activity. As long as you remain attached to
one extreme or another you will never know Oneness. Those
who do not live in the Single Way cannot be free in either
activity or quietude, in assertion or denial.
Deny the
reality of things and you miss their reality; assert the
emptiness of things and you miss their reality. The more you
talk and think about it the further you wander from the
truth. So cease attachment to talking and thinking, and
there is nothing you will not be able to know.
To return
to the root is to find the essence, but to pursue
appearances or "enlightenment" is to miss the source. To
awaken even for a moment is to go beyond appearance and
emptiness.
Changes
that seem to occur in the empty world we make real only
because of our ignorance.
Do not
seek for the truth; Only cease to cherish opinions.
Do not
remain in a dualistic state; avoid such easy habits
carefully. If you attach even to a trace of this and that,
of right and wrong, the Mind-essence will be lost in
confusion. Although all dualities arise from the One, do not
be attached even to ideas of this One.
When the
mind exists undisturbed in the Way, there is no objection to
anything in the world; and when there is no objection to
anything, things cease to be in the old way. When no
discriminating attachment arises, the old mind ceases to
exist. Let go of things as separate existences, and mind too
vanishes. Likewise when the thinking subject vanishes so too
do the objects created by mind.
The
arising of other gives rise to self; giving rise to self
generates others. Know these seeming two as facets of the
One Fundamental Reality. In this Emptiness, these two are
really one, and each contains all phenomena. If not
comparing, nor attached to "refined" and "vulgar"—you will
not fall into judgment and opinion.
The Great
Way is embracing and spacious—to live in it is neither easy
nor difficult. Those who rely on limited views are fearful
and irresolute: The faster they hurry, the slower they go.
To have a narrow mind, and to be attached to getting
enlightenment is to lose one's center and go astray. When
one is free from attachment, all things are as they are, and
there is neither coming nor going.
When in
harmony with the nature of things, your own fundamental
nature, and you will walk freely and undisturbed. However,
when mind is in bondage, the truth is hidden, everything is
murky and unclear, and the burdensome practice of judging
brings annoyance and weariness. What benefit can be derived
from attachment to distinctions and separations?
If you
wish to move in the One Way, do not dislike the worlds of
senses and ideas. Indeed, to embrace them fully is identical
with true Enlightenment. The wise person attaches to no
goals but the foolish person fetters himself or herself.
There is one Dharma, without differentiation. Distinctions
arise from the clinging needs of the ignorant. To seek Mind
with the discriminating mind is the greatest of mistakes.
Rest and
unrest derive from illusion; with enlightenment, attachment
to liking and disliking ceases. All dualities come from
ignorant inference. They are like dreams, phantoms,
hallucinations—it is foolish to try to grasp them. Gain and
loss, right and wrong; finally abandon all such thoughts at
once.
If the
eye never sleeps, all dreams will naturally cease. If the
mind makes no discriminations, the ten thousand things are
as they are, of single essence. To realize the mystery of
this One-essence is to be released from all entanglements.
When all things are seen without differentiation, the One
Self-essence is everywhere revealed. No comparisons or
analogies are possible in this causeless, relation-less
state of just this One.
When
movement stops, there is no movement—and when no movement,
there is no stopping. When such dualities cease to exist,
Oneness itself cannot exist. To this ultimate state no law
or description applies.
For the
Realized mind at one with the Way, all self-centered
striving ceases. Doubts and irresolutions vanish, and the
Truth is confirmed in you. With a single stroke you are
freed from bondage; nothing clings to you and you hold to
nothing. All is empty, clear, self-illuminating, with no
need to exert the mind. Here, thinking, feeling,
understanding, and imagination are of no value. In this
world "as it really is" there is neither self nor
other-than-self.
To know
this Reality directly is possible only through practicing
non-duality. When you live this non-separation, all things
manifest the One, and nothing is excluded. Whoever comes to
enlightenment, no matter when or where, Realizes personally
this fundamental Source.
This
Dharma-truth has nothing to do with big or small, with time
and space. Here a single thought is as ten thousand years.
Not here, not there—but everywhere always right before your
eyes. Infinitely large and infinitely small: no difference,
for definitions are irrelevant and no boundaries can be
discerned. So likewise with "existence" and "non-existence."
Don't
waste your time in arguments and discussion attempting to
grasp the ungraspable.
Each
thing reveals the One, the One manifests as all things. To
live in this Realization is not to worry about perfection or
non-perfection. To put your trust in the Heart-Mind is to
live without separation, and in this non-duality you are one
with your Life-Source.
Words!
Words! The Way is beyond language, for in it there is no
yesterday, no
tomorrow, no today.
