A ZEN STUDENT CAME TO BANKEI AND SAID汇总.docVIP

A ZEN STUDENT CAME TO BANKEI AND SAID: MASTER, I HAVE AN UNGOVERNABLE TEMPER -- HOW CAN I CURE IT? SHOW ME THIS TEMPER, SAID BANKEI, IT SOUNDS FASCINATING. I HAVENT GOT IT RIGHT NOW, SAID THE STUDENT, SO I CANT SHOW IT TO YOU. WELL THEN, SAID BANKEI, BRING IT TO ME WHEN YOU HAVE IT. BUT I CANT BRING IT JUST WHEN I HAPPEN TO HAVE IT, PROTESTED THE STUDENT. IT ARISES UNEXPECTEDLY, AND I WOULD SURELY LOSE IT BEFORE I GOT IT TO YOU. IN THAT CASE, SAID BANKEI, IT CANNOT BE PART OF YOUR TRUE NATURE. IF IT WERE, YOU COULD SHOW IT TO ME AT ANY TIME. WHEN YOU WERE BORN YOU DID NOT HAVE IT, AND YOUR PARENTS DID NOT GIVE IT TO YOU -- SO IT MUST COME INTO YOU FROM THE OUTSIDE. I SUGGEST THAT WHENEVER IT GETS INTO YOU, YOU BEAT YOURSELF WITH A STICK UNTIL THE TEMPER CANT STAND IT, AND RUNS AWAY. THE TRUE NATURE IS your eternal nature. You cannot have it and not have it, it is not something that comes and goes -- it is you. How can it come and go? It is your BEING. It is your very foundation. It cannot BE sometimes, and NOT BE sometimes; it is always there. So this should be the criterion for a seeker of truth, nature, tao: that we have to come to the point in our being which remains always and always -- even before you were born it was there, and even when you are dead it will be there. It is the center. The circumference changes, the center remains absolutely eternal; it is beyond time. Nothing can affect it, nothing can modify it, nothing really ever touches it; it remains beyond all reach of the outside world. Go to the sea, and watch the sea. Millions of waves are there, but deep in its depth the sea remains calm and quiet, deep in meditation; the turmoil is just on the surface, just on the surface where the sea meets the outside world, the winds. Otherwise, in itself, it always remains the same, not even a ripple; nothing changes. It is the same with you. Just on the surface where you meet others there is turmoil, anxiety, anger, attachment, greed, lust -- just on the surfa