Dharma Talk in Celebration of Buddha’s Birthday - Year of the Buddha 2550 (2006 CE) <?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

- Most Venerable Dorim Beopjeon ? Patriarch of the Jogye Order of Korean Buddhism -

Today is the birthday of the Buddha, the one who accomplished the transcendent life of no-birth. Though you may search everywhere and never find the place in this world where it exists, within the truth of “everything is Buddha” the essence of reality is revealed and the infinite light is laid out before us all.

As phenomena are revealed in accordance with the causes and conditions of interbeing that permeate the cosmos, those who see and hear give names to these things in accordance with their spiritual ability, and in every place there is Samantabhadra Bodhisattva, everywhere, there is Maitreya. Those who are opening the sharp eye of discernment within anguish will see the Buddha. Those who are awakening to redemption within love will see Jesus.

Established from the very beginning and never lost, the Dharmakaya resides within the mind of a child, and within each and every mind there is none that is not the Buddha’s mind. Thus, the neighbors that you meet each day are all living Buddhas. When immersed in confusion, the bodhisattva path is transformed into that of the demon, and when reflecting on the origin, all of you are the Buddha.

With neither saint nor commoner

And without practicing even a single dharma,

In one single speck of dust and one ray of light,

There is nothing that is not Buddha.

May 5, 2550

8^th day of the 4^th lunar month

Beopjeon, Patriarch of the Jogye Order of Korean Buddhism