Not far from Buddhahood

                                                 (excerpt from 101 Zen stories)

            A university student while visiting Gasan asked him: “Have you ever read the Chritian Bible?”

          ‘No, read it to me,” said Gasan.

          The student opened the Bible and read from St. Matthew: “And why take ye thought for rainment?  Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow.  They toil not, neither do they spin, and yet I say unto you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these . . .  Take therefore no thought for the morrow, for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself.”

          Gasan said: “Whoever uttered those words I consider an enlightened man.”

          The student continued reading: “Ask and it shall be given you, seek and ye shall find, knock and it shall be opened unto you.  For everyone that asketh receiveth, and he that seekth findeth, and to him that knocketh, it shall be opened.”