Zen's own rationality

Students should begin their inquiry into Zen by asking this question, “What kind of rationality is proper to Zen Buddhism?”  In other words, upon what condition or explanation is Zen based? 

Before this question is answered, it should be brought to our attention that Zen Buddhism minus its proper rationality ends up as nihilism.  But Zen literature is not gibberish, i.e., minus reason.  

Zen’s rationality, by which it is correctly explained, rests upon the direct intuition of absolute Mind.  Nothing else.  Mind, directly intuited, is the reason, in other words.  A spiritual, intuitive rationality is therefore proper to Zen.  For those who have seen Mind Zen’s literature is never foggy but straightforward and clear.  But for those who have not intuited Mind; who rely on Western rationality which is always conceptual and intellectual, Zen’s gate cannot be opened.  It seems irrational.

 

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[Tortoise of Achilles]

"One thought contains three thousand worlds."

[minx]

My master told me;

" Illusion, thinking its reality, takes reality for illusion. For the deeply deluded, drawn to an everchanging stream of images, like a moth to a flame, the price of promoting the dialectic mind is heavy. Although most Masters during the golden era were immensly sharp minded, with exceptional spiritual gifts, the singular entrance into the undivided principle of their Buddha nature, demanded something profoundly simple and direct."