To find a Buddha, you have to see your nature."
Whoever sees his nature is a Buddha. If you don’t see your nature,
invoking Buddhas, reciting sutras, making offerings, and keeping
precepts are all useless. Invoking Buddhas results in good karma,
reciting sutras results in a good memory; keeping precepts results
in a good rebirth, and making offerings results in future
blessings-but no buddha. If you don’t understand by yourself,
you’ll have to find a teacher to get to the bottom of life and
death. But unless he sees his nature, such a person isn’t a tea6er.
Even if he can recite the Twelvefold Canon he can’t escape the
Wheel of Birth and Death. He suffers in the three realms without
hope of release. Long ago, the monk Good Star was able to recite
the entire Canon. But he didn’t escape the Wheel, because he didn’t
see his nature. If this was the case with Good Star, then people
nowadays who recite a few sutras or shastras and think it’s the
Dharma are fools. Unless you see your mind, reciting so much prose
is useless.
To find a Buddha all you have to do is see your nature. Your nature
is the Buddha. And the Buddha is the person who’s free: free of
plans, free of cares. If you don’t see your nature and run around
all day looking somewhere else, you’ll never find a buddha. The
truth is there’s nothing to find. But to reach such an
understanding you need a teacher and you need to struggle to make
yourself understand. Life and death are important. Don’t suffer
them in vain.
There’s no advantage in deceiving yourself. Even if you have
mountains of jewels and as many servants as there are grains of
sand along the Ganges, you see them when your eyes are open. But
what about when your eyes are shut? You should realize then that
everything you see is like a dream or illusion.
If you don’t find a teacher soon, you’ll live this life in vain.
It’s true, you have the buddha-nature. But the help of a teacher
you’ll never know it. Only one person in a million becomes
enlightened without a teacher’s help. If, though, by the
conjunction of conditions, someone understands what the Buddha
meant, that person doesn’t need a teacher. Such a person has a
natural awareness superior to anything taught. But unless you’re so
blessed, study hard, and by means of instruction you’ll
understand.
~ 1st Ch'an Patriarch Bodhidharma
