The Fractal Mind by Source Potential

A poet-monk sits with an old friend in the shade of a temple gate. The friend mentions a simple pleasure. Finding coins on the road, he says, brings a particular kind of delight. Ryōkan takes this observation to heart. He tries to recreate the experience by scattering his own coins and picking them back up. Nothing happens. No delight arrives. Confused but undeterred, he keeps trying until he lose...

A young monk walks beside his elder through the hills of old Japan. They come to a stream where a woman stands at the water's edge, unable to cross. The elder monk lifts her without a word, carries her to the other side, sets her down, and continues walking. An hour passes in silence. The young monk's mind will not rest. Finally he speaks his objection. The elder's response has echo...

A Zen master in T'ang dynasty China tells his monks about an old man who attended his teachings for months without anyone knowing who he was. The old man reveals he was once a priest on this same mountain, centuries ago, who answered a student's question wrongly and spent five hundred lives as a fox because of it. The question was simple. Does an enlightened person fall under the law of...

The second in a weekly series of ancient koans retold. In T'ang dynasty China, the master Joshu lived to 121 years old. Where other teachers shouted or struck their students, he preferred conversation. One morning he addressed his monks with the Third Patriarch's famous verse about avoiding picking and choosing. Then he added something unexpected. "This old monk does not abide withi...

The first in a weekly series of ancient koans retold in Zen Bedtime Stories. In sixth-century China, Emperor Wu had built hundreds of temples and ordained thousands of monks. When the Indian master Bodhidharma arrived at his court, the Emperor asked what merit he had accumulated. Bodhidharma's answer was two words: "No merit." This is the story of their encounter. Part of The Fracta...