The Sandokai
Harmony of Difference and Equality

Oneness of One and Many

The mind of the great sage of India was handed down closely from west to east.
People may discriminate the dull from the keen, but in the true way there is no Ancestor of North or South. The true source is pure and stainless.
The branch streams flow in the dark.
Clutching at things is delusion.
To recognize the truth is not always enlightenment either. The five sense gates and the five sense objects are interdependent and absolutely independent; interrelated endlessly, yet each stays in its own position.
Things have various natures, various forms.
There is good and bad taste, sound, and feeling.
In darkness, superior and inferior cannot be distinguished; in brightness, the duality of pure and impure is apparent.
The four elements resume their nature as a child has its mother.
Fire is hot, wind blows, water wets, and earth is solid.
For eyes there is color and form, for ears there is sound, for the nose there is smell, and for the tongue there is taste; Each being comes out from the root as branches and leaves come out from the trunk.
But both root and end should return to their original nature. 

The words we use are different - good and bad, respectful and mean - but through these words we should understand the absolute being or source of the teaching. Within brightness actually there is utter darkness; but you should not meet someone just with darkness. 

Within darkness there is brightness but you should not see others only with the eyes of brightness. Darkness and brightness stand with each other like one foot forward and the other behind in walking. Everything—all beings—have their own virtue. You should know how to apply this truth. Things and emptiness are like a container and its cover fitting together, like two arrows meeting head-on.

When you listen to the words, you should understand the source of the teaching. Don’t establish your own rules. If you don’t practice in your everyday life as you walk, how can you know the way? The goal is neither far nor near. If you stick to the idea of good or bad, you will be separated from the way by high mountains or big rivers. 

Seekers of the truth, don’t spend your time in vain.

Compilation from talks from “Branching Streams Flow in the Darkness’ and from private discussions with Suzuki Roshi

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