Hakuin's Song of Zazen

Hakuin’s Song of Zazen

Chant Leader: From the beginning all beings are Buddha …..

All: Like water and ice,

Without water no ice,

Chant Leader: Outside us no Buddhas

All: How near the truth,

Yet how fa-ar we seek//

Being in water//

Crying in thirst//

Being the child//of a rich family

Wandering poor on this earth

Chant Leader: Endlessly circling the six worlds

All: The cause of our sorrow is ego delusion

From dark path to dark path

We’ve wandered in darkness

Chant Leader: How can we be freed from the wheel of samsara?

All: The gateway to freedom is zazen Samadhi

Beyond exaltation

Beyond all our praises

The pure Mahayana

Observing the Precepts, Repentance and Giving

The countless good deeds and the Way of Right Living

Chant Leader: All comes from Zazen

All: Thus one true Samadhi extinguishes evils.

It purifies karma, dissolving obstructions.

Then where are the dark paths to lead us astray?//

The Pure Lotus Land// is not far away//

Hearing this truth,// heart humble and grateful

To praise and embrace it

To practice its Wisdom

Brings unending blessings

Brings mountains of merit

And if we turn inward and prove our True Nature

That True Self is no-self,

Our own self is no-self

We go beyond ego

And past clever words

Then the gate to the oneness of cause-and-effect is thrown open

Not two and not three

Straight ahead runs the Way

Our form now being no-form

In going and coming

Chant Leader: We never leave home

All: Our thought now being no-thought

Our dancing and singing

Chant Leader: Are the Voice of the Dharma

All: How vast is the heaven of boundless Samadhi!

How bright and transparent the moonlight of wisdom!

What is there outside us?

What is there we lack?

Nirvana is openly shown to our eyes

Chant Leader: This earth where we stand is the pure lotus land!

And this very body, the body of Buddha.