Tag Archives: Seng Ts

Perhaps the tale that intrigues me the most about Seng Ts’an was his early encounter with his Lankavatarian teacher, Huike, who exclaimed to him, “You are riddled with leprosy, and yet you come to me?” Seng Ts’an’s classic response was, “Well, maybe my body is sick. But the internal heart-mind of a diseased one is still the same as the internal heart-mind of a whole man; how, then, is my heart different from your heart-mind?” Huike was struck by his insight and took him on as a student. I guess it strikes home for me since I’m riddled with psoriatic-arthritis accompanied with acute eczema; in particular with this intense January cold my body is like a dried-out Lizard lying in a frozen-wasteland in some isolated corner of the planet Pluto. So, in my daily meditations I’m reminded of Seng’Ts’an’s response to Huike, as the inner-Mind takes precedence over all external pain. read more