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Oh, on brain-mind lines you can trace no connexion; but then the plane of causes lies deeper than the brain-mind. But to Bodhidharma again. H. P. Blavatsky affirmed that Buddhism had an esoteric as well as an exoteric side: an affirmation that was of course disputed. But here is this from a Chinese writer quoted by Edkins: "Tathagata taught great truths and the causes of things.
After the fourth century many of these religious journeys were made by sea and it was thus that Bodhidharma landed at Canton in 520 . A third stream of Buddhism, namely Lamaism, came into China from Tibet under the Mongol dynasty . Khubilai considered this the best religion for his Mongols and numerous Lamaist temples and convents were established and still exist in northern China.
Thus regarded it is a guiding and stimulating principle somewhat analogous to the Holy Spirit in Christianity. It is developed in many works still popular in the Far East and was the fundamental thesis of Bodhidharma, the founder of the Zen school.
It must have been about this time that Bodhidharma left India for he arrived in Canton about 520. According to the Chinese he was the son of a king of a country called Hsiang-Chih in southern India and the twenty-eighth patriarch and he became an important figure in the religion and art of the Far East.
Now that Doctrine of the Heart had always been in existence; it does not mean that Bodhidharma invented anything. But in a line of Teachers, each will have its own methods, and, if there is progress, there will be new and deeper revelations.
So, having beckoned you last week to the edge of the world and the fountain of dawn, and to see Bodhidharma standing there and evoking out of the deep a new order of ages, I find myself now lured by a westward trail, and must jump the width of two continents with you, and follow this track whither it leads: into the heart and flame of mysterious sunset.
He can perform miracles which astound the world. But if he allow his mind to inquire, for instance, why it should have been necessary for Elijah to part the waters of the Jordan with his garment in order that he and Elisha might pass over dryshod, or for Bodhidharma to stand on a reed to cross the great Yangtzu River, or for innumerable Immortals to sit on 'favourable clouds' to make their journeys through space, he spoils myth his child is stillborn or does not survive to maturity.
His school remained esoteric; but it was established, not among the secret mountains, nor in far unvisited regions; but there in the midst of imperial China: an extension of the Lodge, you may say, visible among men. Bodhidharma are you to call him a Messenger at all? He hardly came out into the world.
Now Ta-mo, this Bodhidharma, breathed on it; and it glowed, and flame shot up from it, and grew, and foamed up beautiful, till it was a steady fountain of wonder-fire spraying the far stars.
It must also be remembered that according to Chinese accounts Bodhidharma preached at Nanking in 520 a doctrine very similar to the advaita of Śaṅkara though expressed in Buddhist phraseology. Of other forms of Vedântism, the best known is the system of Râmânuja generally called Viśishṭâdvaita.
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