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  • A mother’s advice

    Jiun, a Shingon master, was a well-known Sanskrit scholar of the Tokugawa era. When he was young, he used to deliver lectures to his brother students. His mother heard about this and…

  • Inch time foot gem

    A lord asked Takuan, a Zen teacher, to suggest how he might pass the time. He felt his days very long attending his office and sitting stiffly to receive the homage of…

  • Mokusen’s hand

    Mokusen Hiki was living in a temple in the province of Tamba, Japan. One of his adherents complained of the stinginess of his wife. Mokusen visited the adherent’s wife and showed her…

  • Sleeping in the daytime

    The zen master Soyen Shaku passed from this world when he was sixty-one years of age. Fulfilling his life’s work, he left a great teaching, far richer than that of most Zen…

  • Ashtavakra, the pre-born genius

    The story of Ashtavakra is from the great Indian epic, the Mahabharata. It is the story of a young boy who was born deformed but whose intellect and wisdom surpassed many learned…

  • The holy shadow

    Let me tell you a very famous Sufi story, “The Holy Shadow.” There once lived a saint so good that the angels came from heaven to see how a man could be…