On Strict Practice

Text

Daisetsu told his monks: 'Do not think that because Gasan's line has spread to many provinces, the practice has become easier. Numbers do not dilute the dharma. But laziness does. If you rise from sitting and do not know whether you were awake or asleep, that is not samādhi — that is exhaustion with pretensions. Come back to the breath. Come back to the upright spine. The ancestors are not impressed by volume; they are moved by precision.'

license: public_domain

Attribution

• Speaker
  Daitetsu Sōrei

Lineage: Sōtō

By Daitetsu Sōrei

• Death Verse of Daisetsu Sōreiverse

From Denpōan Records

• Death Verse of Daisetsu Sōrei

Sources

• contentSōtō Zen in Medieval Japan

  William M. Bodiford

  Cf. Bodiford, Sōtō Zen in Medieval Japan, pp. 104–106; Denpōan monastic regulations

  Denpōan Records: On Strict Practice