Avalokiteśvara Bodhisattva, when practicing the profound prajñāpāramitā, beheld that the five aggregates of being were all empty and passed beyond all suffering and distress.“Śāriputra! Material form does not differ from emptiness; emptiness does not differ from form. Form is just emptiness; emptiness is just form. The same is true of sensations, perceptions, impulses, and consciousness [the fiv..

Master Chŏngsan1), in his preface of Ch`anggonsa2), wrote "History is the mirror of the world, because all creation and destruction, prosperity and decay appear in this history. One who only memorizes names of places, people, or years is not one who knows the real meaning of history. However, a person who understands the general spirit of the time, the thoughts of the main figures, the organizat..

The Founding Master always warned against extravagance in clothing, food, and shelter: “By living beyond one’s means in clothing, food, and shelter, one can bring about the destruction of one’s family and ruin of oneself. Even though one is rich, ultimately perverse states of mind will flourish and hinder the spirit of cultivation if one is extravagant. Therefore, practitioners must consistently..

Cardinal Dharma Master Chŏngsan admonished ordained devotees and wrote for them a phrase in literary Chinese: ‘Let your vision pervade the universe,/ May your faith and dedication remain consistent from past to present.’ He then explained, “Vision refers to your aspiration and your plans; only when your aspiration and plans are grand will your success also be grand. Faith and dedication refer to..

Since, in all matters, their effects must have a cause and their cause must lead to an effect, the past, present, and future are mutually interconnected through relationships of causes, conditions, and effects, ceaselessly circulating over and over and unfolding this infinite world. If there is a plant here that is thriving, one may surmise that its seed was originally of good quality and it rec..

With this Great Opening of matter, Let there be a Great Opening of spirit.

The Founding Master said, “The truth of the universe originally involves continuous circulation over and over again without either arising or ceasing, so that whatever goes, comes again, and whatever comes, goes again; and a giver becomes a receiver, and a receiver, a giver. This is the constant Way that never changes throughout all eternity.”

The Founding Master said, “When a person whose mind is crooked has a lot of money, knowledge, or power, then those things instead become the basis for transgression and unwholesomeness. Only after one’s mind is upright will money, knowledge, and power be transformed into eternal blessings.”

The Founding Master said, “A practitioner of the Way seeks to know the mind in order to achieve freedom of mind, to understand the principle of birth and death in order to transcend birth and death, and to understand the principle of transgression and blessings in order to control them as one pleases.”

The Founding Master said, “Goodness is fine, but if one becomes tied to a lesser good, that will interfere with an even greater good; wisdom is fine, but if one becomes tied to a lesser wisdom, that will interfere with an even greater wisdom. Thus, one can attain the greater only if one practices not being tied to the lesser.”