Bodhidharma

 

THE OPEN ROAD

peace, love, happiness & understanding

 

February 5, 2026

 

The Infinite a sudden Guest

Has been assumed to be—

But how can that stupendous come

Which never went away?

 

—Emily Dickinson

*

 

Beginning My Studies

 

Beginning my studies the first step pleas’d me so much,

The mere fact consciousness, these forms, the power of motion,

The least insect or animal, the senses, eyesight, love,

The first step I say awed me and pleas’d me so much,

I have hardly gone and hardly wish’d to go any farther,

But stop and loiter all the time to sing it in ecstatic songs.

 

—Walt Whitman

*

 

Yes

 

It could happen any time, tornado,

earthquake, Armageddon. It could happen.

Or sunshine, love, salvation.

 

It could, you know. That’s why we wake

and look out—no guarantees

in this life.

 

But some bonuses, like morning,

like right now, like noon,

like evening.

 

—William Stafford

*

 

“…I believe there is a limit to the number of times a man can profitably inform his neighbor, or be informed by him, that the inexpressible cannot be expressed.”

 

—Owen Barfield, from the essay “Imagination and Inspiration” in The Rediscovery of Meaning and Other Essays, p. 180

*

 

A man who encountered the Buddha for the first time was impressed by his radiance.

He asked: “Are you a man or a god?”

Buddha replied: “I’m awake.”

*

 

some thoughts on Zen

 

According to legend, one day many people had gathered to hear the Buddha speak. Instead of speaking, he held up a flower. One man, Kasyapa, smiled, and realized enlightenment. Zen Buddhism traces it’s origin to this “Flower Sermon.”

 

That just about sums it up.

 

A thousand years later, Bodhidharma traveled from India to China, and sat for nine years facing the wall of a cave. Buddhism had been in China for many centuries by this time, but this emphasis on sitting in silence was what launched the Zen tradition of Buddhism. Bodhidharma is known as the “First Zen Patriarch.” 

 

The Third Zen Patriarch, Seng Ts’an, produced the first Zen text—Hsin Hsin Ming. As an account of what the Zen way of experiencing the world, it is unsurpassed. Here are 28 of the 73 couplets:

 

the great way (Tao) is not difficult

it has no preferences

 

make the smallest distinction

and heaven and earth are far apart

 

conflict between liking and not liking

is the disease of the mind

 

if its deep meaning is not understood

we strive in vain to quiet the mind

 

it is perfect like vast space 

nothing lacking, nothing left over

 

don’t get entangled in outer things

or abide in inner emptiness

 

when the mind is still

all views disappear

 

trying to quiet the mind

is just more activity

 

the more talking and thinking

the farther you go from what is

 

look within for just a moment

and go beyond appearance and emptiness

 

don’t seek truth

just let go of your views

 

when the mind is still

the ten thousand things do not offend

 

without an object of thought, there can be no thinking subject

without a thinker, there are no things

 

the great way is vast

to live in accord with it is neither easy nor hard

 

following our nature, we are in harmony with the way

wandering freely, without a care

 

fixed ideas can’t encompass what is true

they sink into darkness, become unhealthy

 

if you want to take the one vehicle

don’t reject mental or sensory experience

 

to accept everything 

is to be enlightened

 

seeking the mind with the mind

isn’t that a big mistake?

 

profit and loss, right and wrong

get rid of them once and for all

 

understanding the mystery of one suchness

difficulties are forgotten

 

no descriptions or analogies are possible

of this state where relations have come to an end

 

empty, clear, your light shines

without mental effort

 

thought can’t reach this

beyond knowing, imagining, feeling

 

in the realm of things as they are

there is no self or other

 

no here, no there

the whole world right before our eyes

 

the tiny is as large as the vast

when boundaries are gone

 

beyond words

no past, no future, no now

 

Lao Tzu’s advice in the Tao Te Ching to do nothing (wu wei), and the Zen practice of sitting in silence had a big influence on Chinese and Japanese culture, and, more recently, on the lives of many people in the rest of the world.

 

The idea of sitting in silence seems to many people like a big waste of time. The practice goes back to before the time of the Buddha in India. The Japanese word “zen” is a translation of the Sanskrit word dhyāna, which means “meditation,” or sitting silently. Sometimes, in the quiet, thought and language fall away.

 

I came upon this idea of blissful silence in Paramahansa Yogananda’s book Autobiography of a Yogi when I was 19 years old. He called it samādhi. I wanted to get that!

 

The Zen texts which are dearest to my heart, and to which I’ve returned again and again are: the Hsin Hsin Ming of Seng Ts’an, Cold Mountain: 100 Poems of Han Shan, translated by Burton Watson, Unborn: The Life and Teachings of Zen Master Bankei, 1622-1693, translated by Norman Waddell, “Song of Myself” by Walt Whitman, Zen in English Literature and Oriental Classics by R.H. Blyth, Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind by Shunryu Suzuki & the writings of Thich Nhat Hanh.

 

Han Shan lived in China sometime during the Tang Dynasty (618-907). He spent the last part of his life living the simple life of a hermit in the mountains, writing poems like these:

 

Among a thousand clouds and ten thousand streams,

Here lives an idle man,

In the daytime wandering over green mountains,

At night coming home to sleep by the cliff.

Swiftly the springs and autumns pass,

But my mind is at peace, free from dust or delusion.

How pleasant, to know I need nothing to lean on,

To be as still as the waters of the autumn river!

 

 

The clear water sparkles like crystal,

You can see through it easily, right to the bottom.

Mind free from every thought,

Nothing in the myriad realms can move it.

Since it can not be wantonly roused,

Forever and forever it will stay unchanged.

When you have learned to know in this way,

You will know there is no inside or out!

 

Bankei gave talks to large groups of people. He said we all have unborn Buddha-mind. He said: “Don’t exchange your unborn Buddha-mind for the mind of a hungry ghost!”

 

Many of the things Walt Whitman says in “Song of Myself” express what to me is the essence of Zen. Here are a few examples: 

 

This minute that comes to me over the past decillions, 

There is no better than it or now.

 

A morning-glory at my window satisfies me more than the metaphysics of books.

 

All truths wait in all things.

 

I believe a leaf of grass is no less than the journey-work of the stars…

And a mouse is miracle enough to stagger sextillions of infidels.

 

…to glance with an eye, or show a bean in its pod confounds the learning of all times…

 

Zen in English Literature and Oriental Classics is one of my favorite books. I read it slowly. When I get to the end, I start at the beginning again. Blyth explores the Zen way of seeing and being in the world. We come to see beauty and perfection in ordinary things.

 

For many people of my generation, Shunryu Suzuki served as a contemporary exemplar of the Zen way. He taught us how to sit.

 

Thich Nhat Hanh is the most congenial Zen teacher to me. I love his friendliness, his gentleness, his sweetness, his joy. He seems to radiate deep peace and love. His book Your True Home has been for me the most useful guide for how to live my human life on Earth. I’ve given away dozens of copies to my friends.

 

peace & love

Johnny

*

 

If you want peace love happiness and understanding NOW, RIGHT NOW, all I can say, my friends, is watch (google, facebook, instagram, etc.) the 18 Buddhist monks as they walk for peace. They are walking 2300 (!) miles from their monastery in Fort Worth, Texas to Washington, D.C. They cover approximately 20 miles per day, and have walked between 1900-2000 miles from October 26th when they began.

 

Their leader is 44 yr old Venerable Bhikkhu Pannakara, and he began this journey in an attempt to foster and promote peace in his fellow man, in a troubled world. When they began there were a few curious onlookers—a very few. Most just curious to see these burnt-orange robed men walking, mostly barefoot, (but booted and bundled when heavy snow began to fall), along the roadways, first through Texas, then Louisiana, Alabama, Georgia… Soon, however, there were hundreds, and then thousands, tens of thousands followers, the monks now with multiple police escorts to manage the crowds. Men, women, children all lining the roads, bowing their heads offering prayers and heartfelt thank yous, shedding tears, tears of relief, and peace and joy to witness this moment of beauty, this moment of peace in a fractured world. This respite from pain.

 

The Venerable Bhikkhu says he has been overwhelmed at the response; he never expected this  tremendous show of peace, love, happiness and understanding. Now millions are watching, witnessing their progress towards Washington, DC.

 

The peace which passeth all understanding. This is it.

 

—Jude Russell