OPEN SECRET : 21




Hommage à Hui Neng

Replacement of Responsibility



The usual displacement of responsibility is on to the object! But objects have none whatever: total responsibility lies with their subject.
Bring it home! Keep it at home!

Where is the flag flapping, and what causes it to flap?
Where is the cow-bell ringing, and what causes it to ring?
Where is the shoe pinching, and what causes it to pinch?
Where is the odour of the rose, and what causes it to smell so sweet?
Where is the flavour of the wine, and what gives it that flavour?
Where is the knowledge of these phenomena, and what causes them to be known?

Re-establish responsibility where it belongs. Return it to its source (which it has never left).
Return every thing to its source, to which it belongs, and which it has never left!

That is the practice of non-practice.



(© HKU Press, 1965)
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