Su Shi' s Deep Meditation and His Ideas on Zen

Su Shi visited a lot of places, associated with numerous Buddhist monks of different sects in his life,but he never thought of being an ascetic. His purpose to study Buddhism is to treat the frustration and tribulation in life Buddistically, that is, to see through the suffering in life. On the basis of absorbing the theories of HuaYan Sect and Zen,Su Shi developed a Zen thought characterized of emptiness,quietness and flexibility,emphasizing the equalness of all living creatures,pursuing the freedom and detachedness of disposition,so as to oppose the realistic unfreedom as a matter of fact. Su Shi accepted Zen from the point of view that Zhuang and Zen are unanimous. The Zen ideas of emptiness and quietness directly caused his outlook on life to be flexible and broad - minded, and it also permeated through his literary works as a result.