If, at the end of our journev There be no final resting place, How can there be A way to loose ourselves in?
Shakamuni, That mischievious creature Having appeared in the world Mislead, alas, how many people
The mind, what shall we call it? It is the sound of the breeze hat blows through the pines In the indian-ink picture
The vast flood Rolls onwards But yield yourself, And it floats you upon it.
The mind remaining Just as it was born - Without any praver It becomes the Buddha
On the sea of death and life, The diver’s boat is freighted With ”Is’ and ’Is not’. But if the bottom is broken through
’Is’ and ”Is not’ disappear.
My abiding place has no pillars, It is roofless Yet the rain does not wet it,
Nor the wind strike it.
When it blows The mountain wind is boisterous But when it blows not, It simply blows not.
Though it has no bridge, The cloud climbs up to heaven It does not ask aid Of Gautamas Sutras.
Ripples appear On the unaccumulated water Of the undug well As the formless, bodiless man Draws water from it.
The mind: Since there is really No such thing as mind With what enlightenement Shall it be enlightened ?
The moon is in the house, The mind is the master in it: When we understand this, It is only a transitory world We live in here
If we say, ”There is”, People think, ”There is”: But though it answers It is not, This mountain echo
If we say, ”There is not”, People think, ”There is not”, Though it answers. The mountain echo
Of heaven or hell we have No recollection, no knowledge We must become, what we were Before we were born
My self of long ago In nature non-existent, Nowhere to go when dead Nothing at all.
Our mind - Without end, without beginning, Though it is born, though it dies - The essence of emptiness.
All sins committed In the Three Worlds Will fade and disappear Together with myself.
’We come into this world alone, we depart alone’ – This also is illusion. I will teach you the way Not to come, not to go!
We eat, excrete, sleep and get up; This is our world All we have to do after that Is to die.
More frail and illusory Than numbers written on water Our seeking from the Buddha Felicity in the after world.
Already, over the heart Not a cloud is hanging And no mountain is there For the moon to hide behind.
I shan’t die, I shan’t go anywhere I’ll be here; But don’t ask me anything I shan”t answer.
Tell a lie, And fall into hell, Then what will happen to Buddha who contrived Things, that do not exist?
Rain. hail, snow and ice Are divided from one another But after they fall, They are the same water Of the stream in the valley
Should you seek the way of the Buddha All night long, searching You will enter Into your own mind
When they ask you, ’Where is your’ country? what is your native place? Answer, ’I am a man of Original Inactivity”
The figure of the real man Standing there Just a glimpse of him And we are in love.
The mind cannot become the Buddha. The body cannot become the Buddha, Only what cannot become the Buddha, Can become the Buddha.
As lightning Which disappears like dew, Which vanishes like a phantom Thus think of youself.
A mind to search elsewhere For the Buddha Is the foolishness In the very center of foolishness.
As Ikku does not think of his body As if it were his body, He lives in the same place, Whether it is town or country.
The mind of man is without sound Without odour: He who answers when called Is nothing but a thief.
When there are not two things, They are not one thing, And the wind in the Indian-Ink picture Is cool indeed.
The dew on the lotus leaf Undyed by it’s color, Just as it is, Is the real form of the Buddha
A rest on the way back From the Leaky Road To then Never-Leaking Road; If it rains, let it rain: If it blows, let it blow.
When asked, he aswered No question, no answer; Then master Daruma must have had Nothing in his mind.
Whatsoever it may be, It is all part of the world of illusion, Death itself Not being a real thing.
Should you wish to know the way In both this world, And that other. Ask a man of mercy and sincerity.
Pitiful People, who do not know Nirvana and it’s eternal felicity! How they grieve At life, death and mutability!
Shaka and Amida too, Were originally human beings; Have I not also The form of a man?
Wonderful indeed The Lotus Flower of the Law! However many ages may pass Still the same color.
The crescent moon becomes full and wanes. And nothing is left, But still, there in the dawn The crescent moon!
Whenever we see them, all are Just as they are: The willow is green, The flower is red.
Since the journey of our life Is little but grief and pain Why should we be so reluctant To return to the sky of our native place?
Though we do not preach the doctrine, Unasked the flowers bloom in spring, They fall and scatter They turn to dust.
We are born, we die. All are the same Shakamuni, Daruma The cat and the ladle
To write something and leave it behind us Is but a dream When we awake we know There is not even anyone to read it.
To harden into a buddha is wrong All the more I think so When I look At a stone buddha.
The mind which is unattached To all things in the world, Does not think, does not feel Is fluid and flexible.
All Buddhas and Bodhisattvas Achieve Buddhahood and Nirvana As a result Of the Merciful Vow.
The Buddha – Nature Means non-birth, non-extinction, Then know that illusion Is birth, death, reincarnation.
Though you practise virtue, Do not grieve that misfortune arises; The guilty Karma Of the previous world Is vanishing away
Deeply thinking of it. I and other people – there is no difference, As there is no mind Beyond this mind.
Every spring, when you see The cherry blossoms bloom Feel with pain The brevity of life!
The original man Must return to his original place; Why seek then The needless Buddha?
If it rain, let it rain If it rain not, let it not rain But even should it not rain You must travel with wet, sleeves
Look at the cherry blossoms! Their colour and scent fall with them, Are gone forever Yet mindless the spring comes again
BUDDHISM Is the shaved part of the saucepan The whiskers of the pebble The sound that accompanies The bamboo in the picture
The puppet player hangs them round his neck, Not his heart He can take out a devil, He can take out a buddha.
If he says, ’There is nothing special about it’ Already he has transgressed And can say nothing else This Daruma Ikku.
Whatever runs counter To the mind and will of ordinary people Hinders the law of men and the law of Buddha
I would like To offer you something, But in the Daruma Sect We have nothing at all
Why are people called Buddhas After they die? Because they don’t grumble any more, Because they don”t make a nuisance Of themselves anymore.
ln our way through this world Of birth and death, We have no companion; Lonely we die, Alone we are born.
Who sees naught, says naught, Hears naught, Simply surpasses The Buddha
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