The Spiritual Teaching About Heart

 The Spiritual Teaching About Heart

Spiritual wisdom from many different traditions teaches us our heart is essential for manifesting our reality. Let us share with you a beautiful story, which shows the great insight of Chan (also called Zen) Buddhism about the function of our heart in manifesting our physical reality. This story relates to Chan Buddhism’s sixth and last patriarch, Huineng (638–713 AD).  Huineng is the antagonist of the quintessential Platform Sutra. He is also the first Chinese Buddhism monk whose body was found not decayed till this day, 1300 years after his death.

After the fifth patriarch, Daman Hongren (601–674 AD) transmitted the title of patriarch to him, Huineng had to flee and hid for fifteen years to avoid persecution. One day, realizing the time was ready for him to come out, Huineng appeared at a temple gathering. At the time, no one in the temple knew who he was. Monks were listening to a head monk’s teaching. The wind flew and the flags were flapping. Some said the wind was moving. Others said the flags were moving. They started to argue. The dispute couldn’t be settled. Huineng told them: “It is not the wind moving. It is not the flag moving. It is your heart moving.” Everyone was shocked about his answer. The leading monk invited Huineng to come up to the stage and asked him more questions. Huineng answered them with great wisdom. The monks were convinced that Huineng was their long-anticipated-for sixth patriarch.

This story teaches us Chan Buddhism’s wisdom that whatever we see, whatever we hear, whatever we think, feel, all come from our own heart.

The Bible also teaches this wisdom. Proverbs 4:23–26 says “above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.”  Our heart creates the phenomena we see, hear, feel, taste, and experience. There is no reality we experience that is separated from the heart.

Heart and Measurement Problem 

As it turns out, the power of our heart relates to a very important debate in quantum physics, the measurement problem. To understand the power of our heart holds the key to solve the measurement problem and to understand quantum physics. 

Excerpt from "Tao Science" to be published in 2016.  

Thank you Thank you Thank you

Master Rulin