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Chapter 29 - The Truth Of Salvation Often someone has said to me, the Guru's merits must be boundless since so many sentient beings have been salvaged by him. I just smile. Other persons have said, since the Guru has cured so many people's sicknesses through his transcendental power, his merits must be truly immeasurable, like the countless grains of sands found in the Ganges. Again I just smile. I took a look at the water in the lake, and asked that body of water: what merits are there by doing these things? A mountain is still a mountain, a lake is still a lake, but, once time slips by, it will never return again. People are born again after they die, and die again after they are born. And what is "merit"? A doctor might cure an illness in a patient, but other illnesses will come. One patient is cured, but another patient will come. Can a doctor cure the disease "death"? When one has been cured, one must still wait for the arrival of the next disease, one still has to die. And what merits are there [in rescuing people]? The Guru has taught many, many ways of practicing the Buddha Dharma. Some people have come to realize the truth and taken a refuge in Buddhism. These people actually have always possessed their Buddha Nature and they are just learning to realize their innate Self-Nature. Thus the delivered ones are supposedly destined to be delivered, and the non-delivered ones will be destined to be delivered in the future. And this all follows a very spontaneous course of its own. The master's smile has its own meaning, which means there is really no merit at all. Thus, merits accumulated as many as the Ganges sands are actually no merit. It is because no merit exists that there is merit. There is an old quotation:
Thus, my life is a wandering at the lakeside. I have gone far away from the tracks of my past, from the place where I grew up. The tasting of all life's experiences have become history. All have changed, which means the past is not able to come back. In this mundane world, there are many happenings that could upset the heart. All these have died, I myself have also died, and my merits have also died, like the water in the lake that has flowed away. Merits are like water that has flowed away; Sheng-yen Lu is also like water that has flowed away. Much happiness and sadness are like water that has flowed away. This is not despair. There are people who, upon reaching this stage, consider that everything is nothing and that, in this world, there is no human being worthy of cherishing, no more happenings worthy of celebrating, nothing worthy of pursuing. Some people would become nihilistically empty, believing that it is best to sleep [die] in the lake, to be run over by a train, to be enveloped by gas, or to ingest an overdose of sleeping pills. They believe that, after they fall asleep, they will never reawaken, and so everything is empty. Actually, when the true realm of Emptiness (Sunyata) is reached, there is no despair. It is not the emptiness of vacuum. It is not nihilistic emptiness. Instead, in this realm of Emptiness, the Self is revealed, the Buddha Nature is revealed. The real purpose of life is to identify one's Buddha Nature with the Universe's Consciousness. Both of those are actually the true identity of one's Self, which is holy, truly liberated, eternal, completely absolute, and transcendental. Such absolute bliss cannot be described by speeches or with languages. It is as if one can walk on water, soar in space, have one's wishes materialize, transform according to one's thoughts, understand thoroughly all kinds of problems, penetrate in a flash the past, the present, and the future. A hundred thousand years equals one day and one day equals a hundred thousand years; one can be anywhere in one's thought and in possession of all the transcendental power. This is the ideal of highest excellence. This is perfection. Sometimes I walk over to view the lake, to look at the beauty of its emerald water, and I become totally enthralled. As in a dreamless sleep, I completely forget where I am, where I have come from, or where I will be going. Time becomes insignificant and very, very far away, to the point of being frozen, immobile, and totally irrelevant. Many people say that the merits of the Holy-Red-Crown-Vajra-Master rank first but, actually, I don't think I have any merits. My merits have turned into the evergreen hills, the evergreen Lake Sammamish, and the water that has flowed away. Looking at the lake, I seem to have turned into a newborn infant, pure and innocent. There is no merit associated with spiritual healing and there is no merit associated with salvation. Only when one understands this does one become liberated. And how can I be bound by merits? One has to awaken to one's Original Nature and be liberated from births and deaths. It is like a newborn which is of the highest excellence; the totally perfect Holy-Red-Crown-Vajra-Master, the Illustrious Tantrika, is a perfect master. I realize that I am the lake water, the lake water of Lake Sammamish, always flowing and never turning back.
Let me write a modern poem:
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