When Buddha stepped from the side of his mother, pointing to heaven with one finger, pointing to earth with the other, he said, "Between heaven above and earth below, only I am holy." Is that equality? If that is equality, why did Buddha say, "Only I am holy"?
Emperor Wu asked Bodhidharma, "Great Patriarch from India, what is the highest of holy truths?" Bodhi-dharma answered, "No holiness is clear like space".
The teaching of the Buddha and Bodhidharma's "No holiness is clear like space" are all teaching the "Primary Point", which means the world before likes and dislikes, the world before you and me. So our School's first teaching means if you attain this point, then how do you use this point to save all beings? If you attain equality, how do you use this equality and help this world?
Even if you understand equality, understanding cannot help this world and cannot help this life. So an old Chinese proverb says, "One action is better than ten thousand words". When you are thinking, your mind and my mind are different. You said good, so I said bad, you said like, I said don't like. Father said "yes", son said "no".
In America, all little children, if you ask them anything, their first response is "No". In Korea, anything you said to a child, he says, "Yes, sir". Which one is correct? Which one is a correct human being? Which country is teaching their children correctly? Korean people say, "Yes. Respect your parents and elders". So we are correct, all our children say, "Yes, sir". But America people say, "We like freedom of speech. We like democracy. We like 'no' ". So half of this world says "yes", half of this world says "no", it is a balance. But that is not equality.
The Buddha's speech is very wonderful, "Between heaven above and earth below, only I am holy." The behind meaning is, "The universe and I are never separate." Between the heaven above and earth below, I am holy. I am tree, I am ocean. So sutra says,
Water, mountain, mountain, water.
Mountain, water, emptiness.
Mountain, water, water, mountain, when did they ever revolve?
Mountain is mountain, water is water;
Each is separate from the other.
This means first attain complete equality - mountain is river, river is mountain. Then next course, both are empty - mountain and river, good, bad, likes, dislikes, really have no meaning. But mountain is mountain, water is water. Each is separate from the other, which means mountain has its job, river has river's job.
Your left eye and your right eye are equal. But each is separate from the other. That's not important. Then what is important about your eyes? The sky is blue and the tree is green. Our eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body, mind - if we return to our original nature, they always do each job correctly. If we don't return to our original job, to the realm of equality, then we don't understand our job. When you are thinking, your mind and my mind are different. If you cut off all thinking, your mind and my mind are the same. If you keep don't know mind 100%, then you return to Primary Point. So don't know is not don't know. "Don't Know" is "Primary Point". The Primary Point's name is "don't know". In other words, the name for equality is "don't know".
