Tweet The tenth Zen Ox-herding picture or the tenth stage on the road to enlightenment in Zen Buddhism is called “Entering the Marketplace with Helping Hands.” Hixon writes: “Carrying a gourd, he strolls into the market. He leads innkeepers and fishmongers in the Way of the Buddha. Bare-chested, barefooted, he comes into the marketplace. Muddied…
Tweet The ninth Zen Ox-herding picture or the ninth stage on the road to enlightenment in Zen Buddhism is called “Return to the Source.” Hixon writes: “This waxing and waning of life is no phantom or illusion but a manifestation of the Source. Why, then, is there a need to strive for anything? The waters…
Tweet The eighth Zen Ox-herding picture or the eighth stage on the road to enlightenment in Zen Buddhism is called “Both Ox and Self Forgotten.” Hixon writes: “The final illusory barrier has evaporated: All delusive feelings have perished, and ideas of holiness, too, have vanished” (Coming Home: The Experience of Enlightenment in Sacred Traditions by…
Tweet The seventh Zen Ox-herding picture or the seventh stage on the road to enlightenment in Zen Buddhism is called “Ox Forgotten, Self Alone.” Note that the phrase “Self Alone” refers to the seeker as self or himself (herself) and not to the seeker’s deeper Self. Hixon writes: “There is no twoness. The Ox is…
Tweet The sixth Zen Ox-herding picture or the sixth stage on the road to enlightenment in Zen Buddhism is called “Riding the Ox Home.” Hixon writes: “The Struggle is over. Gain and loss no longer affect him. He hums the rustic tune of the woodsman and plays the simple songs of the village children. Astride…
Tweet The fifth Zen Ox-herding picture or the fifth stage on the road to enlightenment in Zen Buddhism is called “Taming the Ox.” Hixon writes: “With the rising of one thought, another and another are born. Enlightenment brings the realization that such thoughts are not unreal, since even they arise from our True Nature” (Coming…
Tweet The fourth Zen Ox-herding picture or the fourth stage on the road to enlightenment in Zen Buddhism is called “Catching the Ox.” Hixon writes: “Today he encountered the Ox, which has long been cavorting in the wild fields, and actually grasped it. For so long a time it has reveled in these surroundings that…
Tweet The third Zen Ox-herding picture or the third stage on the road to enlightenment in Zen Buddhism is called “First Glimpse of the Ox.” Hixon writes: “In every activity, the Source is manifestly present. When the inner vision is properly focused, one comes to realize that which is seen as identical with the true…
Tweet The second Zen Ox-herding picture or the second stage on the road to enlightenment in Zen Buddhism is called “Finding the Tracks.” Hixon writes: “Through the Sutras and teachings he discerns the tracks of the Ox. He has been informed that, just as differently shaped golden vessels are all basically the same gold, so…
Tweet Hixon writes, “… Desolate through forests and fearful in jungles he is seeking an Ox which he does not find. Up and down dark, nameless, wide-flowing rivers in deep mountain thickets he treads many bypaths” (p.62, Coming Home: The Experience of Enlightenment in Sacred Traditions by Lex Hixon). Still no Ox. Just unending searching….
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