from LinJi
Just This One-Mind
The Master told Prime Minister Pei, “Each being, whether a Buddha or an ordinary sentient being, is just this One-Mind, there is nothing else. Since beginningless time, this mind is neither created nor will it perish, it is neither blue nor yellow, having no forms or features, neither existing nor non-existing, neither new nor old, long nor short, large nor small; it transcends all limits, words, expressions, traces, marks and opposites. This very essence is it; as soon as thought arises it is not. Like the empty space, it has no boundaries and is immeasurable. This One-Mind alone is the Buddha."
You'll hear that of Tao, you'll hear it of Buddha Mind, You'll hear it of Brahman but not of God.
If anyone does describe God in that way then they are not using God in the modern vernacular and will likely qualify that point as they write.
After all, God is a word.
ReplyDeleteOnce used by prophets to refer to The Nameless others in East would call Tao, or Brahman.
But then misused by their followers, who, then, trapped eternal wisdom into rigid belief. God, as a word then, unlike Tao or Brahman, was diminished; now as the imaginary spoiled king who throws unbelievers to hell.
But even Tao, even Brahman, is just a word. So it is kind of funny to say it is Tao, it is Brahman, but it is not God. For three of them are just the same; a word, a name, a label of reference to All That is (and here I go using another word).