While the founder [of any religious or spiritual system] was still walking among his followers and disciples, the latter did not distinguish between the person of their leader and his teaching; for the teaching was realized in the person and the person was livingly explained in the teaching. To embrace the teaching was to follow his steps - that is, to believe in him. His presence among them was enough to inspire them and convince them of the truth of his teaching.. So long as he lived among them and spoke to them his teaching and his person appealed to them as an individual unity. But things went differently when his stately and inspiring personality was no more seen in the flesh.. The similarities that were, either consciously or unconsciously, recognized as existing in various forms between leader and disciple gradually vanished, and as they vanished, the other side - that is, that which made him so distinctly different from his followers - came to assert itself all the more emphatically and irresistibly. The result was the conviction that he must have come from quite a unique spiritual source. The process of deification thus constantly went on until, some centuries after the death of the Master, he became a direct manifestation of the Supreme Being himself - in fact, he was the Highest One in the flesh, in him there was a divine humanity in perfect realization.. Indeed, the teaching is to be interpreted in the light of the teacher's divine personality. The latter now predominates over the whole system; he is the centre whence radiate the rays of Enlightenment, salvation is only possible in believing in him as saviour. . D.T. Suzuki
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More Quotes By D.T. Suzuki
  1. Modern life seems to recede further and further away from nature, and closely connected with this fact we seem to be losing the feeling of reverence towards nature. It is probably inevitable when science and machinery, capitalism and materialism go hand in hand so far...
  2. The idea of Zen is to catch life as it flows. There is nothing extraordinary or mysterious about Zen. I raise my hand ; I take a book from the other side of the desk ; I hear the boys playing ball outside my window;...
  3. To speak conventionally - and I think it is easier for the general reader to see Zen thus presented - there are unknown recesses in our minds which lie beyond the threshold of the relatively constructed consciousness. To designate them as “sub-conciousness” or “supra-consciousness” is...
  4. Who would then deny that when I am sipping tea in my tearoom I am swallowing the whole universe with it and that this very moment of my lifting the bowl to my lips is eternity itself transcending time and space?
  5. When mountain-climbing is made too easy, the spiritual effect the mountain exercises vanishes into the air.
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