信心銘(Verses on the Faith Mind)

信心銘

三祖僧璨

至道無難，唯嫌揀擇。但莫憎愛，洞然明白。
毫釐有差，天地懸隔。欲得現前，莫存順逆。
違順相爭，是為心病。不識玄旨，徒勞念靜。
圓同太虛，無欠無餘。良由取捨，所以不如。
莫逐有緣，勿住空忍。一種平懷，泯然自盡。
止動歸止，止更彌動。唯滯兩邊，寧知一種。
一種不通，兩處失功。遣有沒有，從空背空。
多言多慮，轉不相應。絕言絕慮，無處不通。
歸根得旨，隨照失宗。須臾返照，勝卻前空。
前空轉變，皆由妄見。不用求真，唯須息見。
二見不住，慎莫追尋。纔有是非，紛然失心。
二由一有，一亦莫守。一心不生，萬法無咎。
無咎無法，不生不心。能由境滅，境逐能沉。
境由能境，能由境能。欲知兩段，元是一空。
一空同兩，齊含萬象。不見精粗。寧有偏黨。
大道體寬，無易無難。小見狐疑，轉急轉遲。
執之失度，必入邪路。放之自然，體無去住。
任性合道，逍遙絕惱。繫念乖真，昏沉不好。
不好勞神，何用疏親。欲趣一乘，勿惡六塵。
六塵不惡，還同正覺。智者無為，愚人自縛。
法無異法，妄自愛著。將心用心，豈非大錯？
迷生寂亂，悟無好惡，一切二邊，良由斟酌。
夢幻空花，何勞把捉。得失是非，一時放卻。
眼若不睡，諸夢自除。心若不異，萬法一如。
一如體玄，兀爾忘緣。萬法齊觀，歸復自然。
泯其所以，不可方比。止動無動，動止無止。
兩既不成，一何有爾。究竟窮極，不存軌則。
契心平等，所作俱息。狐疑盡凈，正信調直。
一切不留，無可記憶。虛明自照，不勞心力。
非思量處，識情難測。真如法界，無他無自。
要急相應，唯言不二。不二皆同，無不包容。
十方智者，皆入此宗。宗非促延，一念萬年。
無在不在，十方目前。極小同大，忘絕境界。
極大同小，不見邊表。有即是無，無即是有。
若不如是，必不須守。一即一切，一切即一。
但能如是，何慮不畢。信心不二，不二信心。
言語道斷，非去來今。

若想深入信心銘的白話涵意
請連結:
聖嚴法師說

Verses on the Faith Mind
by Chien-chih Seng-ts'an
Third Zen Patriarch (606AD)
translated by Richard B. Clarke

The Great Way is not difficult

for those who have no preferences.

When love and hate are both absent

everything becomes clear and undisguised.

Make the smallest distinction, however

and heaven and earth are set infinitely apart.

If you wish to see the truth

then hold no opinions for or against anything.

To set up what you like against what you dislike

is the disease of the mind.

When the deep meaning of things is not understood

the mind's essential peace is disturbed to no avail.



The Way is perfect like vast space

where nothing is lacking and nothing is in excess.

Indeed, it is due to our choosing to accept or reject

that we do not see the true nature of things.

Live neither in the entanglements of outer things,

nor in inner feelings of emptiness.

Be serene in the oneness of things

and such erroneous views will disappear by themselves.

When you try to stop activity to achieve passivity

your very effort fills you with activity.

As long as you remain in one extreme or the other

you will never know Oneness.



Those who do not live in the single Way

fail in both activity and passivity,

assertion and denial.

To deny the reality of things

is to miss their reality;

to assert the emptiness of things

is to miss their reality.

The more you talk and think about it,

the further astray you wander from the truth.

Stop talking and thinking,

and there is nothing you will not be able to know.

To return to the root is to find the meaning,

but to pursue appearances is to miss the source.

At the moment of inner enlightenment

there is a going beyond appearance and emptiness.

The changes that appear to occur in the empty world

we call real only because of our ignorance.

Do not search for the truth;

only cease to cherish opinions.



Do not remain in the dualistic state

avoid such pursuits carefully.

If there is even a trace

of this and that, of right and wrong,

the Mind-essence will be lost in confusion.

Although all dualities come from the One,

do not be attached even to this One.

When the mind exists undisturbed in the Way,

nothing in the world can offend,

and when a thing can no longer offend,

it ceases to exist in the old way.



When no discriminating thoughts arise,

the old mind ceases to exist.

When thought objects vanish,

the thinking-subject vanishes,

as when the mind vanishes, objects vanish.

Things are objects because of the subject (mind);

the mind (subject) is such because of things (object).

Understand the relativity of these two

and the basic reality: the unity of emptiness.

In this Emptiness the two are indistinguishable

and each contains in itself the whole world.

If you do not discriminate between coarse and fine

you will not be tempted to prejudice and opinion.



To live in the Great Way

is neither easy nor difficult,

but those with limited views

and fearful and irresolute:

the faster they hurry, the slower they go,

and clinging (attachment) cannot be limited;

even to be attached to the idea of enlightenment

is to go astray.

Just let things be in their own way

and there will be neither coming nor going.



Obey the nature of things (your own nature),

and you will walk freely and undisturbed.

When thought is in bondage the truth is hidden,

for everything is murky and unclear,

and the burdensome practice of judging

brings annoyance and weariness.

What benefit can be derived

from distinctions and separations?



If you wish to move in the One Way

do not dislike even the world of senses and ideas.

Indeed, to accept them fully

is identical with true Enlightenment.

The wise man strives to no goals

but the foolish man fetters himself.

This is one Dharma, not many:

distinctions arise

from the clinging needs of the ignorant.

To seek Mind with the (discriminating) mind

is the greatest of all mistakes.



Rest and unrest derive from illusion;

with enlightenment there is no liking and disliking.

All dualities come from ignorant inference.

The are like dreams of flowers in the air:

foolish to try to grasp them.

Gain and loss, right and wrong:

such thoughts must finally be abolished 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 understand the mystery of this On -essence

is to be release from all entanglements.

When all things are seen equally

the timeless Self-essence is reached.

No comparisons or analogies are possible

in this causeless, relationless state.



Consider movement stationary

and the stationary in motion,

both movement and rest disappear.

When such dualities cease to exist

Oneness itself cannot exist.

To this ultimate finality

no law or description applies.



For the unified mind in accord with the Way

all self-centered straining ceases.

Doubles and irresolution's vanish

and life in true faith is possible.

With a single stroke we are freed from bondage;

nothing clings to us and we hold to nothing.

All is empty , clear, self-illuminating,

with no exertion of the mind's power.

Here thought, feeling, knowledge, and imagination

are of no value.

In this world of Suchness

there is neither self nor other-than-self.



To come directly into harmony with this reality

just simply say when doubt arises, `Not two.'

In this `no two' nothing is separate,

nothing excluded.

No matter when or where,

enlightenment means entering this truth.

And this truth is beyond extension or

diminution in time or space;

in it a single thought is ten thousand years.



Emptiness here, Emptiness there,

but the infinite universe stands

always before your eyes.

Infinitely large and infinitely small;

no difference, for definitions have vanished

and no boundaries are seen.

So too with Being and non-Being.

Don't waste time in doubts and arguments

that have nothing to do with this.



One thing, all things:

move among and intermingle,

without distinction.

To live in this realization

is to be without anxiety about non-perfection.

To live in this faith is the road to non-duality,

Because the non-dual is one with the trusting mind.



Words!

The Way is beyond language,

for in it there is

no yesterday

no tomorrow

no today.
Verses on the Faith Mind

Vipassana – Insight Meditation ( Words from Osho)

Vipassana – Insight Meditation

Find a comfortable place to sit for 45 to 60 minutes. It helps to sit at the same time and in the same place every day, and it doesn’t have to be a silent place. Experiment until you find the situation you feel best in. You can sit once or twice a day, but don’t sit for at least an hour after eating or before sleeping.

It’s important to sit with your back and head straight. Your eyes should be closed and the body as still as possible. A meditation bench can help, or a straight-backed chair or any arrangement of cushions.

There is no special breathing technique; ordinary, natural breathing is fine. Vipassana is based on the awareness of the breath, so the rise and fall of each breath should be watched, wherever the sensation is felt most clearly – at the nose or in the area of the stomach or solar plexus.

Vipassana is not concentration and it is not an objective to remain watching the breathing for a whole hour. When thoughts, feelings or sensations arise, or when you become aware of sound, smells and breezes from outside, simply allow the attention to go to them. Whatever comes up can be watched as clouds passing in the sky – you neither cling nor reject. Whenever there is a choice of what to watch, return to awareness of breathing.

Remember, nothing special is meant to happen. There is neither success nor failure – nor is there any improvement. There is nothing to figure out or analyse, but insights may come about anything. Questions and problems may just be seen as mysteries to be enjoyed.

There are daily Vipassana sittings during the monthly meditation camps at the ashram.
Osho talks about the upsurge of energy often felt by people starting Vipassana.

In Vipassana it can happen sometimes that one feels very sensual, because you are so silent and energy is not dissipated. Ordinarily much energy is dissipated and you are exhausted. When you simply sit, not doing anything, you become a silent pool of energy, and the pool goes on becoming bigger and bigger and bigger. It almost comes to a point where it is overflowing ... and then you feel sensuous. You feel a new sensitivity, sensualness, even sexuality – as if all the senses have become fresh, younger, alive, as if the dust has fallen from you and you have taken a bath, and are being cleansed with the shower. That happens.

That's why people – particularly Buddhist monks who have been doing Vipassana for centuries – don't eat much. They don't need to. They eat once – and that too a very meagre meal, very small you may call it almost a breakfast ... and once a day. They don't sleep much but they are full of energy. And they are not escapists – they work hard. It is not that they are not working. They will chop wood and work in the garden, in the field, on the farm; they will work the whole day. But something has happened to them, and now the energy is no more being dissipated.

And the posture of sitting is very very energy-conserving. The lotus position in which Buddhists sit is such that all the ends of the body are meeting – feet upon feet, hands upon hands. These are the points from where the energy moves and flows out, because for the energy to flow out, something pointed is needed. Hence the male sexual organ is a pointed thing because it has to leak much energy. It is almost a safety-valve. When the energy is too much inside you and you cannot do anything, you release it sexually.

In the sexual act a woman never releases any energy. So a woman can make love to many persons in one, night but a man cannot. A woman can even conserve energy if she knows how; she can even get energy.

From your head no energy is released outside. It has been made by nature in a round shape. So the brain never loses any energy; it conserves – because that is the most important, the central management of your body. It has to be protected – so it is protected by a round skull.

Energy cannot leak out from any round thing. That’s why all the planets – earth and sun and moon and the stars – are all round. Otherwise they will leak energy and will die.

When you sit, you become rounded; hands touching hands. So if this hand releases energy, it moves into another hand. Feet touching feet... and the way you sit becomes almost a circle. Energy moves within you. It is not going out. One conserves it; one becomes by and by a pool. By and by you will feel almost a fullness in your belly. You may be empty, you may not have eaten, but you feel a certain fullness. And then the onrush of sensuality. But it is a good sign, a very very good sign. So enjoy it.

Becoming an astronaut of the inner space

Many times in deep meditation, you will suddenly become aware as if the gravitation has disappeared. That now nothing holds you down, that it is now up to you to decide whether to fly or not, That now it is up to you, if you want you can simply fly up to the sky. The whole sky is yours. But when you open the eyes, suddenly the body is there, the earth is there, the gravitation is there. When you were with closed eyes meditating you forgot your body, you moved to a different dimension; the dimension of grace.

Enjoy it, allow it, because once you start thinking it is crazy, you will stop it and that stopping will disturb your meditation. Enjoy it as in a dream you fly. Close your eyes. In meditation go wherever you want, rise higher and higher into the sky, and many more things soon will become available to you. And don’t be afraid. It is the greatest adventure, greater than going to the moon; becoming an astronaut of the inner space is the greatest adventure.

Osho suggests this beautiful technique for those who are disturbed by sensations of physical instability and flying.

Just sit in your bed for five or ten minutes and visualise with closed eyes... feel that your body is becoming bigger, bigger, bigger, bigger. Make it as big as possible – so big that it almost starts touching the walls of the room.

You will start feeling that now you cannot move your hands – it is difficult... your head is touching the roof. First for two, three days just feel this; then start spreading out of the room. Fill the whole house, and you will feel that the room is inside you. Then spread outside the house – fill the whole neighbourhood, and feel the whole neighbourhood inside you. And then fill the whole sky, and feel the sun and the moon and the stars moving inside you.

This you continue for ten, twelve days. By and by, slowly, fill the whole sky. The day you have filled the whole sky, start the reverse process. For two days again, become small. In the reverse process, sit and then start imagining you are becoming very small. Just move the other way. Your body is not as big as it appears – it has become one foot high. You are just like a tiny toy – and you will feel it. If you can imagine the hugeness, you can imagine the smallness. Then even smaller – so small that you can hold yourself in your hand. Then even smaller... then even smaller. And within twelve days bring it to such a point that you cannot find yourself. You have become so atomically small that it is impossible to find where you are.

Make yourself as huge as the whole space and then make yourself as small as an invisible atom – twelve days one, then twelve days the other. You will feel so beautiful, so happy and so centered that you cannot imagine it.

Meditation can give you the greatest glimpses, because it is the most useless thing in the world. You simply move into silence. It is greater than sleep because in sleep you are unconscious, whatsoever happens, happens unconsciously. You may be in paradise, but you don't know. In meditation you move knowingly, then you become aware of the path: how to move from the useful world of the without to the useless world within. And once you know the path, any moment you can simply move inwards.

Sitting in a bus you are not needed to do anything, you are simply sitting; travelling in a car or train or an aeroplane, you are not doing anything, everything is being done by other's; you can close your eyes and move into the useless, the inner. And suddenly everything becomes silent, and suddenly everything is cool, and suddenly you are at the source of all life.
But it has no value on the market. You cannot go and sell it, you cannot say: I have great meditation. Is anybody ready to buy it? Nobody will be ready to buy it. It is not a commodity. It is useless.

From the Orange book...

2010年夜飯--除夕.Happy Chinese New Year !! (虎虎生風 吉祥如意) .

Chinese (Lunar) New Year's Eve.
今年很特別.
美式作風的"公公"竟email提醍我們虎年來到.
看完email當天趕快衝到Asia Market買年菜.
嫁做人婦六年,第一次做年夜飯,且人在異鄉.
去年除夕人在Toyko.
前年和大前年在台灣,
雖然已出嫁卻和外子,
回娘家吃"團圓飯",享受合家歡和拿紅包的樂趣.
接著就是"守歲".
"除夕夜,圍爐而坐,達旦不寐,謂之守歲."
除夕夜-意指農曆的最後一天"歲除"的晚上.
守歲意味著辭舊迎新，萬事吉祥如意.
在古代，老年人守歲有「辭舊歲」之意，年輕人守歲幫助長者添壽.
是中國人很重視的風俗，要在大年三十趕回家團圓.
守歲的詩句不勝枚舉
孟浩然寫道:“續明催畫燭，守歲接長筵。”
蘇軾：“兒童強不睡，相守夜歡樂."
除夕夜的確是充滿歡樂和喜慶的闔家聚首好日子.

上菜啦!
 
 

除夕年夜飯-New Year's Eve Dinner.

上菜啦!

Shabu Shabu 圍爐湯底(北海道昆布+ 蘿蔔+ 排骨)
Fish+Shrimp+Meat Ball 魚丸+蝦丸+福州丸=圍爐料
Squid 花枝.芋頭 Taro. 栗子chestnut.

金元寶-- 3 Ways Golden Dumplings.

蝦肉+豬肉+韭菜餡(Shrimp + pork+Chive Dumplings Filling.)
素菜豆腐元寶餡 (Vegetarian Tofu Dumplings Filling.)
蝦肉+豬肉+白菜餡((Shrimp + pork+Cabbage Dumpling Filling.)

年年有餘(魚). Abundance every Year.

Apple Tart 蘋果派(Husband's hand made with Love)

Merry Xmas & Happy new Year!!

Hoilday meals.