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certainly responsible for India's slavery, poverty, by giving such a teaching of adapting to the conditions, that whatsoever the conditions are -- it is our fate. And even suffering injustice you are not supposed to complain. This kills the very rebel in your being and without a rebel you are almost dead.
Your rebelliousness is your very life stream.
I cannot think that a man like Bodhidharma, so outrageous in his statements, can make these two things significant practices. Yet the third thing certainly comes from him:
SEEKING NOTHING AND PRACTICING THE DHARMA. You have to understand the word DHARMA. It has not been translated but it can be translated very easily. Dharma means self-nature. For example, to be hot is the dharma of fire; to be cold is the dharma of ice, the self-nature. What is the self-nature of man? No-selfness, silence, and suddenly an upsurge of compassion. This can be said by Bodhidharma, it must have been said. And before it, is a condition: seeking nothing. Every seeking is going to take you away from yourself, so non-seeking is one of the essentials of Bodhidharma's teaching.
Don't go anywhere. Pull all your energy inwards. Close all your petals and just be in. And you will experience what dharma is, what self-nature is. Then practice it. Then act as if you are nobody. Then act with great compassion. Then let your whole life be simply a presence, but not a person because there is no self inside you.
FIRST, SUFFERING INJUSTICE. WHEN THOSE WHO SEARCH FOR THE PATH ENCOUNTER ADVERSITY, THEY SHOULD THINK TO THEMSELVES, "IN COUNTLESS AGES GONE BY, I HAVE TURNED FROM THE ESSENTIAL TO THE TRIVIAL AND WANDERED THROUGH ALL MANNER OF EXISTENCE, OFTEN ANGRY WITHOUT CAUSE AND GUILTY OF NUMBERLESS TRANSGRESSIONS. NOW, THOUGH I DO NO WRONG, I AM PUNISHED BY MY PAST.
These words are from the person who is writing the notes.
NEITHER GODS NOR MEN CAN FORESEE WHEN AN EVIL DEED WILL BEAR ITS FRUIT. I ACCEPT IT WITH AN OPEN HEART AND WITHOUT COMPLAINT OF INJUSTICE."
These words certainly are not from Bodhidharma.
THE SUTRAS SAY, "WHEN YOU MEET WITH ADVERSITY, DON'T BE UPSET. BECAUSE IT MAKES SENSE."
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