Your mind, your body, both need certain things. You cannot renounce the world, you can only become a beggar. But to become a beggar is not to become a saint. My understanding is clear, that you should be in the world. There is nothing to be afraid of; you should just concentrate your life energy within yourself and that makes all the difference. You remain in the world and yet you are not in the world. You are in the world but the world is not in you. And to me, that is the true definition of a sannyasin: remaining in the world, just like a lotus flower, remaining in the water but untouched by it.

A universal master knows what it comes to, the moment it is raised. How will beginners and latecomers come to grips with it?
If you don’t get it yet, for the time being we open up a pathway in the gateway of the secondary truth.

I don’t agree on that point. Shoitsu is saying that if you cannot understand the direct pointing to your heart, then we have to descend a little lower – but that will be “secondary truth.” That will be just like the moon reflected in water; it will not be the true moon. It will be only a reflected moon. In language, truth at the most can be just a reflection. So he is saying that if you cannot get it directly, instantly, then we will have to come down to language.

I don’t agree with the statement because my understanding is that you have to begin with language. You have to begin with the reflection of the moon in the water. And if you have seen the reflection in the water you can be told to look up a little: “It is only a reflection; the reality is there high up in the sky.” Language is not a secondary thing to be used when the first has failed. Language is the primary thing, to create the background for pointing directly to your innermost heart.

Speak out where there is nothing to say; manifest form in the midst of formlessness.
During your daily activities responding to circumstances in the realm of distinctions, don’t think of getting rid of anything.

On that point I am in agreement with him.

…don’t think of getting rid of anything. Don’t understand it as a hidden marvel – with no road of reason, no flavor, day and night, forgetting sleep and food, keep those sayings in mind.
If you still don’t get it, we go on to speak of the tertiary,

The third step, if you don’t understand the language, he says then we will have to descend even a little lower. I think that I not only disagree with him, but it is humiliating to the disciples to say, “We will have to speak on a third level.”

…expounding mind and nature, speaking of mystery and marvel. One atom contains the cosmos, one thought pervades everywhere. Thus an ancient said:

“Infinite lands and worlds
with no distinctions between self and others,
ten ages past and present
are never apart from this moment of thought.”