“Leave the outward expression, the doctrine, the dogma and the form and behold the unity and oneness of spirit. . .Then there will be no need to divide this universe of ours between heaven and hell, no need to divide fellow-beings into virtuous and vicious, the eternally damned and the eternally saved.” ~ Gandhi, Young India, February 9, 1928

The Third Patriarch of Ch’an Buddhism, Seng Ts’an, wrote:

    Make a thousandth of an inch distinction,

    Heaven and Earth swing apart.

    If you want to see (the Great Way’s) unity,

    Cherish neither for nor against.

If we want to see the unity of life, and help the fractured world see it, we have to first of all believe in it (Ts’an’s work is called “Believing in Mind”), and second of all learn to see beneath the surface appearances of everything and everyone, which are and will always be, appropriately, the abode of diversity. It’s also a help to “fake it ‘til you make it;” to act on the assumption of unity even where you’ve not yet seen it.

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About Daily Metta

Stephanie Van Hook, the Metta Center’s executive director, launched Daily Metta in 2015 as a way to share Gandhi’s spiritual wisdom and experiments with nonviolence.

Our 2016 Daily Metta continues with Gandhi on weekdays. On weekends, we share videos that complement Michael Nagler’s award-winning book, The Search for a Nonviolent Future: A Promise of Peace for Ourselves, Our Families, and Our World. To help readers engage with the book more deeply, the Metta Center offers a free PDF study guide.

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