Dream2be

'Ideas act like screens which obscure that which has to be seen; therefore ideation hinders understanding, perception and reality. This is the reason why in Zen, and in the statements of nearly all religious thinkers, so much emphasis is placed on the emptying of the mind.' (Powell, 1977, p39)

'When we observe impartially the process of ideation taking place in ourselves we find that this is a secondary process, a process that comes at a stage subsequent to perception... ideation is the process of naming, classifying, and correlating that which has been perceived - it is the process of a mind that can only 'see' things in a particular way, according to the pattern of its conditioning. Therefore, if we try to perceive reality and intermingle this activity with that of ideation, we are confounding two different levels of reality. The result is that instead of 'understanding' we come to some 'interpretation' (which is something totally different) of an incompletely understood objective reality.' (ibid, p40)

'The most poisonous concept of all is probably the teleological one, that of purpose, which all the time presupposes something over and beyond life, as though life by itelf with its infinite variety of phenomena were of insufficient interest. It is insidious because it binds the person who holds it to the concepts of past and future, and blinds him to the only Reality, that which exists here and now. Such a person would suggest, for instance, that the birds sing because they want to communicate with each other in the bird language. Well, maybe they do communicate, but that is not the point.

'Basically, however, all ideation is harmful because concepts hypnotize us into faulty perception and wrongful thinking. It divides the individual against himself and separates him from the rest of creation.' (ibid p41)

'Buddhist psychology has much in common with Western phenomenology and its introspective approach to the study of the human mind; in fact, Buddhist psychology,... is a system of phenomenology... there are points of contact between the Vajrayana and existentialism, between Tantric symbolism and Jungian psychology, between Tibetan medicine and the emerging disciplines of holistic health, between Buddhist cosmology and the frontiers of modern theoretical physics, between Buddhist attitudes toward life and the values of the environmental movement.' (Anderson, 1979, p16)

'Scriptures... devotion... and all alike are scorned as having no essential value. So fierce, indeed, is the Zen technique, and so scornful of the usual apparatus of religion... the Zen technique... is no less than the breaking down of the bars of the intellect, that the mind may be freed for the light of enlightenment... In Zen the familiar props of religion are cast away.' (Humphries, 1951, p179)

'The purpose of Zen is to pass beyond the intellect...Zen weraies of learning about it and about; and strives to knw. For this a new faculty is needed, the power of im-mediate perception, the intuitive awareness which comes when the perceiver and the perceived are merged into one.' (ibid, p180)

'The intellect is itself a device or means, and Zen is the way of direct enlightenment.' (ibid, p181)

'The intellect is a developed instrument for for the use of knowledge, but only the senses and the intuition acquire knowledge at first hand. the thought-machine, therefore, too easily becomes a cage, a workshop for the handling of second-hand material... Hence Zen is largely a breaking into the closed doors of the mind to let the light without flood in...' (ibid, p183)

'All objects of thought or emotion, whether things we touch or the things which stand in our mental way, must sooner or later be smashed and removed. As the Master Rinzai himself proclaimed, 'Do not get yourself entangled with any object, but stand above, pass on and be free.' All phrases, dogmas, formulas; all schools and codes; all systems of throught and philosophy, all 'isms' including Buddhism, all these are means to the end of knowledge, and easily become and are not perceived as obstacles in the way.' (ibid, p185)

'Zen has nothing to teach us in the way of intellectual analysis; nor has it any set doctrines which are to be imposed on its followers for acceptance... there are no Zen sacred books or dogmatic tenets, nor are there any symbolic formulae through which an access might be gained into the signification of Zen... Zen teaches nothing. Whatever teachings are in Zen, they come out of one's own mind. We teach ourselves; Zen merely points the way.' (Suzuki, 1969a, p38)

Zen wants to rise above logic, Zen wants to find a higher affirmation where there are no antitheses... for the same reason that Zen is not a philosophy, Zen is not a religion.' (ibid, p39)

'Zen purposes to discipline the mind itself, to make it its own master, through an insight into its proper nature. This getting into the real nature of one's mind or soul is the fundamental object of Zen Buddhism... the discipline... consists in opening the mental eye in order to look into the very reason of existence.' (ibid, p40)

'The basic idea of Zen is to come in touch with the inner workings of our being, and to do this in the most direct way possible, without resorting to anything external or superadded. Therefore anyhthing that has the semblence of an external authority is rejected by Zen. Absolute faith is placed in a manb's own inner being. For whatever authority there is in Zen, all comes from within. This is true in the strictest sense of the word. Even the reasoning faculty is noit consiudered final or absolute. On the contrary, it hinders the mind from coming into the directest communication with itself.' (ibid, p44)

''...the reason we cannot attain to a thoroughgoing comprehension of the truth is due to our unreasonable adherence to a 'logical' interpretation of things. If we really want to get to the bottom of life, we must abandon our cherished syllogisms, we must acquire a new way of observation whereby we can escape the tyranny of logic and the one-sidedness of our everyday phraseology.' (ibid, p58)

'Erudition always tends to abstraction and conceptualism, obscuring the light of intuition...the spirit of Zen abhors all forms of intellectualism...it is a well-established fact that the Chinese mind prefers to deal with concrete realities and actual experiences...the religious genius does not need so much help from knowledge as from the richness of the inner life.' (Suzuki, 1969b, p14)

'The great fault with us all is that we force logic on facts wheresas it is facts themselves that create logic.' (ibid, p138)