Core tenet of Zen
Awakening is sudden, not gradual.
Satori breaks in all at once; practice prepares the ground but cannot manufacture it.
Understanding it — context, not catechism: how this passage is held
The sudden-vs-gradual dispute split early Chan, and the sudden school won the story. Awakening, on this account, is not assembled in increments like a wall; it breaks in whole, like recognizing a face. Practice does not manufacture it — practice clears the ground it lands on.
From the sources — the passages this rests on; concise renderings, cited
Originally there is not a single thing — where could dust alight?
Platform Sutra of the Sixth PatriarchHuineng's verse, answering the gradualist poem in the succession contest.
The same ground, other faiths
claims that share this one's ideas
Suffering has a cause, and therefore an end.
Buddhism
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Every soul is already omniscient.
Jainism
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Liberation happens while you are alive.
Sikhism
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Knowledge liberates.
Advaita Vedānta
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The arhat completes the path.
Theravāda
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Buddhahood is reachable in one lifetime.
Vajrayāna
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