The Great Questions of Life and Death in the Depths of the Soul

During the current pandemic, the security guards at the entrance of the residential community ask profound, soul-searching questions about life and death: 1. Who are you? 2. Where do you come from? 3. Where are you going?

Then they take your temperature with a forehead gun. This act is like a Zen kōan—enlightenment strikes instantly, or if not, one must contemplate these three questions. Having lived through countless kalpas, people remain unaware of who they truly are, ignorant of their origins and destination, drifting through life like walking corpses, scarcely different from animals—merely existing. Isn’t it time to wake up?

In the face of life-and-death matters, the guards stand in for Zen patriarchs. The temperature gun resembles the patriarchs’ shout and strike, while the three questions function as Zen huatou—a lever for the mind. Whose intellect is sharp, whose mind awakens first.