20241001 Trust In Mind
October 1, 2024•243 words
This page is part of my exploration of the origins of Zen:
https://listed.valdelane.net/55456/20241004-zen
« Trust in Mind (Hsin Shin Ming) by the 3rd patriarch of the Zen Dhyana Sect, Jianzhi Sengcan (Seng T'san), is probably the first Chinese Zen document (6th century) … a creation arising from the blending of Indian Buddhist, Chinese Taoist, and Chinese Chan doctrine. » —Jan Chozen Bays
« … when the traditions of Buddha’s teachings, Taoist naturalism, and Chan come together in Trust in Mind as three intimately interlinked strands, we find a shared commonality of perceiving the self and the world in a certain way. This shared commonality sees that:
- “Self” and “things” are processes and are characterized by an ever-changing coreless open-endedness.
- “Reality” is not substance but a network of causal happenings that create different manifestations in each moment.
- Hence the issue is existential, not ontological.
- The deeper issue is our distorted perception of self and the world.
- Liberation is cleansing the lens of perception, not accumulation of speculative views.
- Language itself has only a conditional value and its meaning is always tied to the context in which it appears. »
—Mu Soeng
There are many translations of Trust in Mind:
https://terebess.hu/english/hsin.html
Here is a superb commentary including ten translations:
Trust in Mind: The Rebellion of Chinese Zen by Mu Soeng (2004)
https://terebess.hu/zen/rebell.pdf or
https://web.archive.org/web/20230514194626/https://terebess.hu/zen/rebell.pdf
This page is part of my exploration of the origins of Zen: