It is nonsense to insist that we cannot achieve enlightenment without learned and pious teachers. Because wisdom is innate, we can all enlighten ourselves.

* * *

For someone with a special gift or a certain sharpness of mind, a gesture or a word is all that is needed to impart an immediate perception of Truth.

* * *

– What method must we practice in order to attain deliverance?
– It can be attained only through a sudden illumination.
– What is a sudden illumination?
– "Sudden" means ridding yourselves of deluded thoughts instantaneously.
– "Illumination" means the realization that illumination is not something to be attained.

* * *

We are like someone immersed in water, who complains of nothing to drink.

* * *

Speech is blasphemy; Silence is deception.
Beyond both is a way up, but my mouth is not wide enough to point to it.

* * *

Those who are content to be nothing special are noble people.
Don't strive. Be ordinary.

* * *

Student: "What is the path to liberation?"
Seng-T'san: "Who binds you?"
Student: "No one binds me."
Seng-T'san: "Why then do you want to be liberated?"

* * *

"All this Zen stuff is nonsense", said the skeptic.
"You are perfectly correct", responded the master,
"But this is a teaching I normally reserve only
for my most advanced students."

* * *

When the curious ask you what It is,
Don't affirm or deny anything.
Anything affirmed is not true,
Anything denied is not true.
How can someone say what It is,
When he hasn't fully known It?
And, knowing, what letters can be sent
From a land where words find no road to travel?
To their questions, therefore, offer silence.
Only silence and a pointing finger.