Zen in Ten: Trust in Mind

The Wisdom of the Third Ancestor

Jianzhi Sengcan was a sixth-century Chan monk who was a Dharma successor of the second Chan ancestor Dazu Huike. Sengcan is the purported author the Hsin Hsin Ming or Trust in Mind, which is a song or enlightenment.

Sengcan’s “Trust in Mind” poem uses Taoist language to express Buddhist teachings which situates the poem in the tradition of Buddho-Taoism. Not much is known about the Third Ancestor and the only other record of his teaching is from the stone table at his memorial. It says,

Simultaneously practice stillness and illumination. Carefully observe, but see no dharmas, see no body, and see no mind. For the mind is nameless, the body is empty, and the dharmas are a dream. There is nothing to be attained, no enlightenment to be experienced. This is called liberation.¹

“Trust in Mind” has 146 lines of four words each as it’s written in Chinese and has almost no Pali or Sanskrit words. Below are the first ten lines, which give us much to contemplate and sit with.

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1. The Great Way is not difficult for those who have no preferences.

2. When love and hate are both absent everything becomes clear and undisguised.

3. Make the smallest distinction, however, and heaven and earth are set infinitely apart.

4. If you wish to see the truth, then hold no opinions for or against anything.

5. To set up what you like against what you dislike is the disease of the mind.

6. When the deep meaning of things is not understood, the mind’s essential peace is disturbed to no avail.

7. The Way is perfect like vast space where nothing is lacking and nothing is in excess.

8. Indeed, it is due to our choosing to accept or reject that we do not see the true nature of things.

9. Live neither in the entanglements of outer things, nor in inner feelings of emptiness.

10. Be serene in the oneness of things and such erroneous views will disappear by themselves.²

1. Mu Soeng. Trust in Mind. Boston, Wisdom Publications, 2004.

2. This translation is by Richard B. Clark as quoted in Mu Soeng’s book Trust in Mind.