ZEN FLESH, ZEN BONES Compiled by Paul Reps Foreword This book includes four books: 101 Zen Stones was first published in 1919 by Rider and Company, London, and David McKay Company, Philadelphia. These stories recount actual experiences of Chinese and Japanese Zen teachers over a period of more than five centuries. Gasan was sitting at the bedside of Tekisui three days before his teacher's passing. Tekisui had already chosen him as his successor. A temple recently had burned and Gasan was busy rebuilding the structure. Tekisui asked him: 'What are you going to do when you get the temple rebuilt?' 'When your sickness is over we want you to speak there,' said Gasan. 'Suppose I do not live until then?'
These koans, or parables, were translated into English from a book called the Shaseki-shu (Collection of Stone and Sand), written late in the thirteenth century by the Japanese Zen teacher Muju (the 'non-dweller'), and from anecdotes of Zen monks taken from various books published in Japan around the turn of the 20th century. 101 Zen stories Abraham Lincoln once asked one of his secretaries, 'If you call a tail a leg, how many legs does a horse have?' 'Five,' replied the secretary. 'No,' said the President, 'The answer is four. Calling a tail a leg doesn't make it a leg.'
Overview
6 Awesome Zen Stories That Will Teach You Important Life Lessons 1. Everything changes 'Suzuki Roshi, I've been listening to your lectures for years,' a student said during the question and answer time following a lecture, 'but I just don't understand.
Zen Buddhist Stories
To find out, she obtained the help of a girl rich in desire. 'Go and embrace him,' she told her, 'and then ask him suddenly: 'What now?'
The girl called upon the monk and without much ado caressed him, asking him what he was going to do about it.
'An old tree grows on a cold rock in winter,' replied the monk somewhat poetically. 'Nowhere is there any warmth.'
The girl returned and related what he had said.
'To think I fed that fellow for twenty years!' exclaimed the old woman in anger. 'He showed no consideration for your need, no disposition to explain your condition. He need not have responded to passion, but at least he could have evidenced some compassion.'
She at once went to the hut of the monk and burned it down.
This Zen classic includes the following stories:
1. A Cup of Tea
2. Finding a Diamond on a Muddy Road
3. Is That So?
4. Obedience
5. If You Love, Love Openly
6. No Loving-Kindness
7. Annoucement
8. Great Waves
9. The Moon Cannot Be Stolen
10. The Last Poem of Hoshin
11. The Story of Shunkai
12. Happy Chinaman
13. A Buddha
14. Muddy Road
15. Shoan and His Mother
16. Not Far From Buddhahood
17. Stingy in Teaching
18. A Parable
19. The First Principle
20. A Mother's Advice
21. The Sound of One Hand
22. My Heart Burns Like Fire
23. Eshun's Departure
24. Reciting Sutras
25. Three Days More
26. Trading Dialogue For Lodging
27. The Voice of Happiness
28. Open Your Own Treasure House
29. No Water, No Moon
30. Calling Card
31. Everything is Best
32. Inch Time Foot Gem
33. Mokusen's Hand
34. A Smile in His Lifetime
35. Every-Minute Zen
36. Flower Shower
37. Publishing the Sutras
38. Gisho's Work
39. Sleeping in the Daytime
40. In Dreamland
41. Joshu's Zen
42. The Dead Man's Answer
43. Zen in a Beggar's Life
44. The Thief Who Became a Disciple
45. Right and Wrong
46. How Grass and Trees Become Enlightened
47. The Stingy Artist
48. Accurate Proportion
49. Black-Nosed Buddha
50. Ryonen's Clear Realization
51. Sour Miso
52. Your Light May Go Out
53. The Giver Should Be Thankful
54. The Last Will and Testament
55. The Tea-Master and The Assassin
56. The True Path
57. The Gates of Paradise
58. Arresting the Stone Buddha
59. Soldiers of Humanity
60. The Tunnel
61. Gudo and the Emperor
62. In the Hands of Destiny
63. Killing
64. Kasan Sweat
65. The Subjugation of a Ghost
66. Children of His Majesty
67. What Are You Doing! What Are You Saying!
68. One Note of Zen
69. Eating the Blame
70. The Most Valuable Thing in the World
71. Learning to Be Silent
72. The Blockhead Lord
73. Ten Successors
74. True Reformation
75. Temper
76. The Stone Mind
77. No Attachment to Dust
78. Real Prosperity
79. Incense Burner
80. The Real Miracle
81. Just Go to Sleep
82. Nothing Exists
83. No Work, No Food
84. True Friends
85. Time to Die
86. The Living Buddha and the Tubmaker
87. Three Kinds of Disciples
88. How to Write a Chinese Poem
89. Zen Dialogue
90. The Last Rap
91. The Taste of Banzo's Sword
92. Fire-Poker Zen
93. Storyteller's Zen
94. Midnight Excursion
95. A Letter to a Dying Man
96. A Drop of Water
97. Teaching the Ultimate
98. Non-Attachment
99. Tosui's Vinegar
100. The Silent Temple
101. Buddha's Zen