“Zen is to religion what a Japanese “rock garden” is to a garden. Zen knows no god, no afterlife, no good and no evil, as the rock-garden knows no flowers, herbs or shrubs. It has no doctrine or holy writ: its teaching is transmitted mainly in the form of parables as ambiguous as the pebbles in the rock-garden which symbolise now a mountain, now a fleeting tiger. When a disciple asks “What is Zen?”, the master’s traditional answer is “Three pounds of flax” or “A decaying noodle” or “A toilet stick” or a whack on the pupil’s head.”
Arthur Koestler
Submitted by Quonation |Category: Religion
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“The ultimate truth is penultimately always a falsehood. He who will be proved right in the end appears to be wrong and harmful before it.”
Arthur Koestler
Submitted by Quonation |Category: Truth
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“True creativity often starts where language ends.”
Arthur Koestler
Submitted by Quonation |Category: Creativity
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“The most persistent sound which reverberates through man’s history is the beating of war drums.”
Arthur Koestler
Submitted by Quonation |Category: War
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“Prometheus is reaching out for the stars with an empty grin on his face.”
Arthur Koestler
Submitted by Quonation |Category: General
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“Scientists are peeping toms at the keyhole of eternity.”
Arthur Koestler
Submitted by Quonation |Category: Science
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“If the creator had a purpose in equipping us with a neck, he surely meant us to stick it out.”
Arthur Koestler
Submitted by Quonation |Category: Risk
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“The more original a discovery, the more obvious it seems afterwards.”
Arthur Koestler
Submitted by Quonation |Category: Originality
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“The definition of the individual was: a multitude of one million divided by one million.”
Arthur Koestler
Submitted by Quonation |Category: Individuality
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“Nothing is more sad than the death of an illusion.”
Arthur Koestler
Submitted by Quonation |Category: Illusion
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“The principal mark of genius is not perfection but originality, the opening of new frontiers.”
Arthur Koestler
Submitted by Quonation |Category: Genius