D.T. Suzuki Quotes

On this page you can find the TOP of D.T. Suzuki's best quotes! We hope you will find some sayings from Author D.T. Suzuki's in our collection, which will inspire you to new achievements! There are currently 79 quotes on this page collected since October 18, 1870! Share our collection of quotes with your friends on social media so that they can find something to inspire them!
  • Fundamentally the marksman aims at himself.

  • Personal experience, therefore, is everything in Zen. No ideas are intelligible to those who have no backing of experience.

    D.T. Suzuki (2007). “An Introduction to Zen Buddhism”, p.24, Grove/Atlantic, Inc.
  • When we start to feel anxious or depressed, instead of asking, "What do I need to get to be happy?" The question becomes, "What am I doing to disturb the inner peace that I already have?"

  • Art always has something of the unconscious about it.

  • The greatest productions of art, whether painting, music, sculpture or poetry, have invariably this quality-something approaching the work of God.

  • Great works are done when one is not calculating and thinking.

  • In the spiritual world there are no time divisions such as the past, present and future; for they have contracted themselves into a single moment of the present where life quivers in its true sense. The past and the future are both rolled up in this present moment of illumination, and this present moment is not something standing still with all its contents, for it ceaselessly moves on.

  • The intuitive recognition of the instant, thus reality is the highest act of wisdom.

  • The claim of the Zen followers that they are transmitting the essence of Buddhism is based on their belief that Zen takes hold of the enlivening spirit of the Buddha, stripped of all its historical and doctrinal garments.

    D.T. Suzuki (2011). “Essays in Zen Buddhism”, p.42, Souvenir Press
  • The meaning of service is to do the work assigned ungrudgingly and without thought of personal reward material or moral.

  • Let the intellect alone, it has its usefulness in its proper sphere, but let it not interfere with the flowing of the life-stream.

    D.T. Suzuki (2007). “Essays in Zen Buddhism”, p.26, Grove/Atlantic, Inc.
  • Suzuki's works on Zen Buddhism are among the best contributions to the knowledge of living Buddhism... We cannot be sufficiently grateful to the author, first for the fact of his having brought Zen closer to Western understanding, and secondly for the manner in which he has achieved this task.

    D.T. Suzuki (2007). “An Introduction to Zen Buddhism”, p.7, Grove/Atlantic, Inc.
  • The mistake consists in our splitting into two what is really and absolutely one. Is not life one as we live it, which we cut to pieces by recklessly applying the murderous knife of intellectual surgery?

    D.T. Suzuki (2011). “Essays in Zen Buddhism”, p.19, Souvenir Press
  • One has not understood until one has forgotten it.

  • To point at the moon a finger is needed, but woe to those who take the finger for the moon.

    D.T. Suzuki (2011). “Essays in Zen Buddhism”, p.13, Souvenir Press
  • To be a good Zen Buddhist it is not enough to follow the teaching of its founder; we have to experience the Buddha's experience.

  • I am an artist at living - my work of art is my life.

  • The rocks are where they are- and this is their will. The rivers flow- and this is their will. The birds fly- this is their will. Human beings talk- this is their will. The seasons change, heaven sends down rain or snow, the earth occasionally shakes, the waves roll, the stars shine- each of them follows its own will. To be is to will and so is to become.

  • The waters are in motion, but the moon retains its serenity.

    Heart  
  • Implicity, there should be something mysterious in every day.

  • Zen has no business with ideas.

    D.T. Suzuki (2007). “An Introduction to Zen Buddhism”, p.72, Grove/Atlantic, Inc.
  • The truth of Zen, just a little bit of it, is what turns one's humdrum life, a life of monotonous, uninspiring commonplaceness, into one of art, full of genuine inner creativity.

  • The mind has first to be attuned to the Unconscious.

  • Copying is slavery. The letter must never be followed, only the spirit is to be grasped. Higher affirmations live in the spirit. And where is the spirit? Seek it in your everyday experience, and therein lies abundance of proof for all you need.

    D.T. Suzuki (2007). “An Introduction to Zen Buddhism”, p.55, Grove/Atlantic, Inc.
  • The fighter is to be always single-minded with one object in view: to fight, looking neither backward nor sidewise. To go straight forward in order to crush the enemy is all that is necessary for him.

  • Zen teaches nothing; it merely enables us to wake up and become aware. It does not teach, it points.

  • Zen is the spirit of a man. Zen believes in his inner purity and goodness. Whatever is superadded or violently torn away, injures the wholesomeness of the spirit. Zen, therefore, is emphatically against all religious conventionalism.

    D.T. Suzuki (2007). “An Introduction to Zen Buddhism”, p.29, Grove/Atlantic, Inc.
  • Enlightenment is like everyday consciousness but two inches above the ground.

  • To live - is that not enough?

    D.T. Suzuki (2007). “An Introduction to Zen Buddhism”, p.54, Grove/Atlantic, Inc.
  • The contradiction so puzzling to the ordinary way of thinking comes from the fact that we have to use language to communicate our inner experience, which in its very nature transcends linguistics.

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  • We hope you have found the saying you were looking for in our collection! At the moment, we have collected 79 quotes from the Author D.T. Suzuki, starting from October 18, 1870! We periodically replenish our collection so that visitors of our website can always find inspirational quotes by authors from all over the world! Come back to us again!