Zen · Chan · 9th century · Tang
Huangbo
Hongzhou school · Mazu's line · On the Transmission of Mind
The most uncompromising voice of Chan: with one blow it knocks away every reliance on words.
The essence of the teaching: Mind is Buddha, and there is no difference between Emptiness and the Dharma-body. Enlightenment is not an acquisition but the ceasing of conceptual thought and the recognition that your true nature is already whole, formless, and unborn. To seek mind with mind is already the error.
Transmission
Huangbo taught sharply, leaving the student not a single crack to stand on. This one Mind, he said, is the only Buddha, and between it and all beings there is not the slightest difference. But the moment people begin to seek it, they have already missed – for they seek with mind the very thing that is mind itself. Stop building concepts of a Buddha and of beings to be saved. Do not cling to emptiness any more than you cling to form. When all conceptual movement ceases, what remains is that which can neither be added to by effort nor diminished by delusion. This is your original mind.
The full transmission — for members of the School. Here is its essence and its taste.
The tradition
Zen · Chan
This wisdom is one voice within a living world of tradition. Enter it whole: the images, the lineage, the practices.
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