CASE #43:    Jōshū’s “Mu” A monk asked Jōshū, “Has a dog the Buddha Nature?” Jōshū answered, “Mu.” BACKGROUND: Jōshū     (Ch. Zhàozhōu) lived from 778 to 897 C.E. and is often said to be the greatest Ch’an…

CASE #42:    Hui-ke Offers His Arm Bodhidharma sat in a cave for nine years gazing at the wall. Hui-ke arrived to inquire about the dharma, but Bodhidharma refused to teach him. Finally, taking a knife, Hui-ke…

CASE #41:    The Meaning of Suffering Shakyamuni asked, “What is wisdom?” and when no one could answer, added: “It is the ability to perfectly understand and patiently accept the truth of suffering.” BACKGROUND: Perfectly understand        To…

CASE #40:    The Gift of Rice In a letter to a follower, Nichiren Daishonin wrote: The essence of the sutras preached before the Lotus Sutra is that all phenomena arise from the mind. To illustrate, they…

CASE #39:    The Great Natural Way Masanobu Fukuoka once wrote: “The more the farmer increases the scale of his operation, the more his body and spirit are dissipated and the further he falls away from a…

Case 38: Ajaan Lee Refuses to Bow     Phra Ajaan Lee once passed the rainy season among the remote hill tribes of central Thailand. One night when he was feeling ill, he dozed off for a…