Episode
Accumulating knowledge versus attaining true wisdom. June 22, 1986
- Published
- Apr 11, 2026
- Duration seconds
- 3638
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- https://rss.com/podcasts/ing-publishing/2687317
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Summary
Zen Roshi, Lola McDowell Lee, Lola discusses the distinction between accumulating knowledge and attaining true wisdom. Lola shares the koan about a monk who asked his teacher, “Is there a teaching no master ever preached before?” And the teacher said, yes, there is. What is it, asked the monk. And the teacher replied, it is not mind, it is not Buddha, it is not things.. We require a different kind of perception—what Lola calls "listening with your eyes". She draws a sharp contrast between linear, "horizontal" learning—where teachers and students simply build upon accumulated information—and "vertical" spiritual growth. Vertical growth is an ascent of transcending conditioning, memorization, and ego to simply achieve a state of pure being. Many of us treat happiness like a math problem, mistakenly believing that putting two and two together through specific activities will consistently yield joy. True bliss, ananda , is an unpredictable consequence that arrives "like a thief in the night" only when the mind is unoccupied by expectation and anticipation. Lola recalls the famous story of the Buddha holding up a single flower before his congregation, speaking not a word, and transmitting the highest teaching only to Mahakasyapa, who simply smiled in understanding. A flower does not articulate beauty; it simply is beauty, blooming into the void without caring who notices. If the eye or the ear were not functionally empty, they would be incapable of receiving new images or sounds. We must empty the mind of preconceived notions. This necessity of an empty mind is brought to life through two pivotal Zen narratives. The first involves Huineng, the Sixth Patriarch, who achieved enlightenment and inherited the robe of transmission through the simple, mindful act of pounding rice…