Ο ΙΗΣΟΥΣ ΤΗΣ ΝIΝΕΥH

- Was koan 49 of the book ''Zen Flesh, Zen Bones'', written by Mumon? Did it even belong to the Mumonkan?

- YES. 

 

This is how ''The Gateless Gate''(Mumonkan), enters one into Zen Buddhism, as a koan even, and not through the Mu. 

THE CUP OF HUMANITY

''The philosophy of tea is not mere aestheticism

in the ordinary acceptance of the term, for it expresses

conjointly with ethics and religion our whole point of view

about man and nature. It is hygiene, for it enforces

cleanliness; it is economics, for it shows comfort in simplicity

rather than in the complex and costly; it is moral geometry,

inasmuch as it defines our sense of proportion to the universe.

It represents the true spirit of eastern democracy by making

its votaries aristocrats in taste.''

('' The Book of Tea'' by Okakura Kakuzo)