How To Cook Your Life : from the Zen kitchen to Enlightenment.

[Bion]

“There is no way to
gain emancipation through another.” (Suttanipāta: 773) “There
is no way I can emancipate people suffering in this world. " p. 102.

Could anyone help me with understanding of how this quote relates to Bodhisattva Path?
I found variations of Bodhisattva vows, most saying :" However innumerable all beings are, I vow to save them all/ liberate them all."



However one variation struck me:

"Sentient beings are infinite, they will save themselves.
Desires are infinite, they will reach an end by themselves.
Dharmas are infinite, so there is learning, study.
Buddha's way is not above, so it is always accomplished."

https://terebess.hu/zen/szoto/vows.html

Gassho
Sat

If I may, even ancient zen masters said the same with different words. It is as much a truth as it is a half-truth. Of course no one can possibly be enlightened because of someone else’s realizations. It is a personal experience. You can teach me, guide me, assist me in my practice, talk to me in detail about your realizations but you can never transfer them to me. They will become my own when they come from myself. So in that sense, our work is to strive for the salvation of all beings - we assist and help, we guide and work alongside each and every one until on their own they manage to realize the Buddha way.

Sorry for running long

[emoji1374] SatToday

[gaurdianaq]

“There is no way to
gain emancipation through another.” (Suttanipāta: 773) “There
is no way I can emancipate people suffering in this world. " p. 102.

Could anyone help me with understanding of how this quote relates to Bodhisattva Path?
I found variations of Bodhisattva vows, most saying :" However innumerable all beings are, I vow to save them all/ liberate them all."

Gassho
Sat

I always interpreted this as "I can show you where the door is, but you have to open it and walk through."


Evan,
Sat today

[Kokuu]

“There is no way to gain emancipation through another.” (Suttanipāta: 773)
“There is no way I can emancipate people suffering in this world. "

Hi Ania

I just finished reading the Sutta Nipāta and found that, like many Theravadin texts, the overall emphasis is on moral conduct and self-responsibility. So I agree with Jundo that the verse is reminding people of their own responsibility for their actions and kamma/karma.

There is a definite shift of focus in the Mahāyāna approach to practicing for the sake of all beings, recognising that we are not separate and our practice expresses the totality of existence throughout space and time. As Dōgen says in Bendōwa:

If a human being, even for a single moment, manifests the Buddha's posture in the three forms of conduct, while that person sits-up straight in samādhi, the entire world of Dharma assumes the Buddha's posture and the whole of space becomes the state of realization.

However, The Diamond Sutra points out there are ultimately no sentient beings to save and no one to emancipate.

Subhūti, what do you think? You should not claim that the Tathāgata thinks 'I will save sentient beings.' Subhūti, do not think such a thing. Why? There are in fact no sentient beings for the Tathāgata to save. If there were sentient beings for the Tathāgata to save, it would mean that the Tathāgata holds the notions of self, person, sentient being, and life span.

So, what does this mean in practice? Well, firstly we practice for ourselves, keeping our conduct and karma pure in line with Theravadin principles. But as Mahāyāna Buddhists we do not stop there and recognise our place in the interpenetrating web of dependent-arising. Practice does not stop where our body ends and, even while it is true that there are no inherently existing sentient beings in the world, each person in the world, and each creature, is like each of the ingredients that the tenzo uses to make the food for the Zen community. We treat each with reverence based on the fact they exist and are expressions of the totality of existence, just as we are.

Apologies for going over length.

Gassho
Kokuu
-sattoday-

[Risho]

Practice does not stop where our body ends and, even while it is true that there are no inherently existing sentient beings in the world, each person in the world, and each creature, is like each of the ingredients that the tenzo uses to make the food for the Zen community. We treat each with reverence based on the fact they exist and are expressions of the totality of existence, just as we are.

ooo very well said! keeping the one eye transcendent wisdom and the two eyes on discrimination

Your excessive posting length has been reported to management

gassho

Risho
-stlah

[Inshin]

Gassho Sat

[Jundo]

Lovely, Kokuu.

Kokuu said what I wanted to say, but clearer.

Gassho, J

STLah

[Jundo]

By the way, I used "eccentric" for the late Kobun Chino. I think that was too strong. Maybe "creative" or "inventive" would be better adjectives. He famously translated the Gatha of the Heart Sutra, which is more often rendered as something like this:

Gate! Gate! (Gone, Gone)
Paragate! (Gone Beyond)
Parasamgate! (Gone Fully Beyond)
Bodhi! Svaha! * (Awakening, Rejoice)

as ...

Falling apart, falling apart.
Everything is falling apart.
Everything is always falling apart.
Nothing to do.



Here is a wonderful essay about him by David Chadwick, who is Suzuki Roshi's biographer ...

http://www.cuke.com/dchad-writ/kobun-great-friend.htm

Gassho, J

STLah

[Inshin]

By the way, I used "eccentric" for the late Kobun Chino. I think that was too strong. Maybe "creative" or "inventive" would be better adjectives. He famously translated the Gatha of the Heart Sutra, which is more often rendered as something like this:

Gate! Gate! (Gone, Gone)
Paragate! (Gone Beyond)
Parasamgate! (Gone Fully Beyond)
Bodhi! Svaha! * (Awakening, Rejoice)

as ...

Falling apart, falling apart.
Everything is falling apart.
Everything is always falling apart.
Nothing to do.



Here is a wonderful essay about him by David Chadwick, who is Suzuki Roshi's biographer ...

http://www.cuke.com/dchad-writ/kobun-great-friend.htm

Gassho, J

STLah

I wondered. From the very little of his writings I read, he reminded me a bit of you

"Sitting on your cushion is not relaxation, it is the result of all your knowledge. Every experience you have come through sits there each time. It is very serious. Otherwise, you sit because it feels good, and you are comfortable, and once in a while you feel an ecstatic sensation in your body. You feel calmness, stillness, clarity, and forget there are hungry people on this earth. You forget there are lots of diseases which are killing people. If you do not observe that in your sitting, you are just escaping into your desire. It happens if you mistake or limit the focus of your sitting practice.

Sitting shikan taza is the place itself, and things. The dynamics of all Buddhas are in it. When you sit, the cushion sits with you. If you wear glasses, the glasses sit with you. Clothing sits with you. House sits with you. People who are moving around outside all sit with you. They don't take the sitting posture!"

http://www.kobun.jikoji.org/shikantaza.php

Gassho
Sat

[Jundo]

I wondered. From the very little of his writings I read, he reminded me a bit of you

Yes, I must admit to being a bit "eccentric" myself, as are 99.9% of western Buddhist teachers I know, and perhaps western convert Buddhists in general ... one of the character traits leading us to be western convert Buddhists!

It is true!

The late great Kobun Chino's writings are pretty wild sometimes, though, that is for sure.

Gassho, J

STLah