Questions to Master Deshimaru

Question

Can you say that tigers or cats, animals in general, live true Zen?

Answer

Yes, animals live true Zen. And because animals are that way, humans must represent a further development from them. Pigeons are extremely simple, very peaceable, not at all complicated. Sometimes you should follow the animals' way of life, but you must also make use of your human fore-brain. Westerners like to be on one side or the other; either they are all for religion or they detest it - always the same old story of oppositions. What we must do is harmonize religion with communism, American assets with the Arab spirit. If you are always in conflict and battle you can never find true peace. So there needs to be a theory in between. Nobody has found it yet. Only Zen can do it. That is the principle of the five propositions of Buddhism: there are thesis, antithesis, and synthesis, but not only them. There are also the harmonization of the whole and the embracing and transcending of all contradictions.