History
The Xinxin Ming has been much beloved by Chan (Zen) practitioners for over a thousand years. It is still studied in Western Zen circles.
As an early expression of Chan Buddhism, the Inscription on Faith in Mind reveals the Buddhist missionary use of expedient means (upaya) in China by adapting Taoist terminology to the Buddhist context of awakening. It also draws on the Wisdom sutras as well as the Avatamsaka Sutra and Lankavatara Sutra to express the essential unity of opposites and the basic nature of emptiness (śūnyatā)
The poem professes the need to take pleasant and unpleasant life experiences with a sense of equanimity. Broadly speaking, the Xinxin Ming deals with the principles and practice of non-duality, that is, with the application of nonduality and the results of its practice.
Read more about this topic: Xinxin Ming
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“Every library should try to be complete on something, if it were only the history of pinheads.”
—Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809–1894)
“The history of the world is the record of the weakness, frailty and death of public opinion.”
—Samuel Butler (1835–1902)
“Social history might be defined negatively as the history of a people with the politics left out.”
—G.M. (George Macaulay)