Philip Kapleau Quotes

• A Zen master, when asked where he would go after he died, replied, 'To Hell, for that's where help is needed most.'

  Philip Kapleau

  Fun, Earth Day, Helping

  Philip Kapleau (1980). “Zen: dawn in the West”, Doubleday

  28 Copy quote

• To suppress the grief, the pain, is to condemn oneself to a living death. Living fully means feeling fully; it means becoming completely one with what you are experiencing and not holding it at arm's length.

  Philip Kapleau

  Pain, Grief, Mean

  Philip Kapleau (1990). “The Wheel of Life and Death: A Practical and Spiritual Guide”

  24 Copy quote

• Zen Master Dogen has pointed out that anxiety, when accepted, is the driving force to enlightenment in that it lays bare the human dilemma at the same time that it ignites our desire to break out of it.

  Philip Kapleau

  Anxiety, Desire, Enlightenment

  Philip Kapleau (1997). “Awakening to Zen: The Teachings of Roshi Philip Kapleau”, Scribner Book Company

  18 Copy quote

• Every individual who eats flesh food, whether an animal is killed expressely for him or not, is supporting the trade of slaughtering and contributing to the violent deaths of harmless animals.

  Philip Kapleau

  Buddhist, Animal, Flesh

  Philip Kapleau (1982). “To Cherish All Life: A Buddhist Case for Becoming Vegetarian”, Harper San Francisco

  50 Copy quote

• To be reborn hourly and daily in this life, we need to die — to give of ourselves wholly to the demands of the moment, so that we utterly "disappear." Thoughts of past, present, or future, of life and death, of this world and the next, are transcended in the superabundance of the now. Time and timelessness coalesce: this is the moment of eternity.

  Philip Kapleau

  Past, Life And Death, Giving

  "The Zen of Living and Dying: A Practical and Spiritual Guide".

  17 Copy quote

• You yourself are time- your body, your mind, the objects around you. Plunge into the river of time and swim, instead of standing on the banks and noting the course of the currents.

  Philip Kapleau

  Rivers, Swim, Mind

  Philip Kapleau (1989). “Zen: Merging of East and West”, Anchor

  23 Copy quote

• For the ordinary man, whose mind is a checkerboard of crisscrossing reflections, opinions, and prejudices, bare attention is virtually impossible; his life is thus centered not in reality itself but in his ideas of it. By focusing the mind wholly on each objects and every action, zazen strips it of extraneous thoughts and allows us to enter into a full rapport with life.

  Philip Kapleau

  Reflection, Reality, Men

  Philip Kapleau (1970). “The three pillars of Zen: teaching, practice, and enlightenment”, Beacon Press (MA)

  16 Copy quote

• The uniqueness of zazen lies in this: that the mind is freed from bondage to all thought forms, visions, objects, and imaginings, however sacred or elevating, and brought to a state of absolute emptiness, from which alone it may one day perceive its own true nature, or the nature of the universe.

  Philip Kapleau

  Lying, Mind, Vision

  18 Copy quote

• The truth is that everything is One, and this of course is not a numerical one.

  Philip Kapleau

  Truth Is, Courses

  Philip Kapleau (1970). “The three pillars of Zen: teaching, practice, and enlightenment”, Beacon Press (MA)

  20 Copy quote

• Mindfulness is a state wherein one is totally aware in any situation and so always able to respond appropriately. Yet one is aware of being aware. Mindlessness, on the other hand, or "no-mindness" as it has been called, is a condition of such complete absorption that there is not vestige of self-awareness.

  Philip Kapleau

  Self, Hands, Able

  19 Copy quote

• If you fall into poverty, live that way without grumbling - then your poverty will not burden you. Likewise, if you are rich, live with your riches. All this is the functioning of Buddha-nature. In short, Buddha-nature has the quality of infinite adaptability.

  Philip Kapleau

  Fall, Quality, Riches

  14 Copy quote

• Die while alive
  And be thoroughly dead.
  Then do what you will,
  All is good.

  Philip Kapleau

  Death, Acceptance, Alive

  "The Zen of Living and Dying: A Practical and Spiritual Guide".

  9 Copy quote

• For the ordinary man, whose mind is a checkerboard of criss-crossing reflections, opinions, and prejudices, bare attention is virtually impossible.

  Philip Kapleau

  Reflection, Men, Mind

  Philip Kapleau (1970). “The three pillars of Zen: teaching, practice, and enlightenment”, Beacon Press (MA)

  10 Copy quote

• Ultimately the case for shunning animal flesh does not rest on what the Buddha allegedly said or didn't say. What is does rest on is our innate moral goodness, compassion, and pity which, when liberated, lead us to value all forms of life. It is obvious, then, that willfully to take life, or through the eating of meat indirectly to cause others to kill, runs counter to the deepest instincts of human beings.

  Philip Kapleau

  Running, Buddhist, Animal

  Philip Kapleau (1982). “To Cherish All Life: A Buddhist Case for Becoming Vegetarian”, Harper San Francisco

  12 Copy quote

• To put the flesh of an animal into one's belly makes one an accessory after the fact of its slaughter, simply because if cows, pigs, sheep, fowl, and fish, to mention the most common, were not eaten they would not be killed.

  Philip Kapleau

  Buddhist, Animal, Sheep

  Philip Kapleau (1982). “To Cherish All Life: A Buddhist Case for Becoming Vegetarian”, Harper San Francisco

  15 Copy quote

• Many have come to realization simply by listening to the tinkling of a bell or some other sound

  Philip Kapleau

  Listening, Bells, Sound

  Philip Kapleau (1970). “The three pillars of Zen: teaching, practice, and enlightenment”, Beacon Press (MA)

  11 Copy quote

• Although we all possess the seeds of great love and compassion, without the light of the enlightened one's wisdom and the waters of their compassion these seeds would never spout.

  Philip Kapleau

  Wisdom, Compassion, Light

  10 Copy quote

• Anyone familiar with the numerous accounts of the Buddha's extraordinary compassion and reverence for living beings - for example his insistence that his monks strain the water they drink lest they inadvertently cause the death of any micro-organisms - could never believe that he would be indifferent to the sufferings of domestic animals caused by their slaughter of food

  Philip Kapleau

  Believe, Animal, Compassion

  Philip Kapleau (1982). “To Cherish All Life: A Buddhist Case for Becoming Vegetarian”, Harper San Francisco

  8 Copy quote

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