Person of No Rank
One day Zen Master Rinzai (Ch. Lin-chi) said, “There is a true man of no rank (ç„¡ä½çœžäºº) in the mass of naked flesh , who goes in and out from your facial features. Those who have not yet testified, look, look!” A monk came forward and said, “Who is this true man of no rank?” Master […]
Money
A reader recently asked me to write about money. Since I just finished doing my taxes a couple days ago it seemed like a reasonable theme to write about. I’ve written about topics involving money before, quite recently even. But I’m not sure I’ve written a whole lot about money itself. Talking about the Buddhist attitude […]
THANK YOU!
It’s April 15th and, as usual, I waited till the last possible day to do my taxes. For the last few years, ever since I added the donation button to this blog, I have had to go to my PayPal account at tax time and figure out how much I received in the previous year […]
Racism and Letting Go
There’s an old Buddhist poem called Shin Jin Mei (信心銘), which means “Faith Mind Inscription.” It starts off, 至é“無難 唯嫌æ€æŠž. This means, “To follow (至) the Way (é“) is not (ç„¡) difficult (難). Just (唯) avoid (å«Œ) picking (æ€) and choosing (択).” The “picking and choosing” the author of this poem is referring to isn’t choosing […]
The Crucifixion Was Only the Beginning!
On Easter Sunday I watched the first episode of A.D.: The Bible Continues. I’d been seeing posters and billboards for it all over Los Angeles. The slogan “the crucifixion was only the beginning” was too hilarious to resist. As many of you must know by now, I’m a bit of an amateur scholar of the […]