Wakuan’s No Beard
Wakuan’s said, “Why has the Western Barbarian no beard?”

The Commentary
If you study Zen, you must really study it. If you become enlightened it must be the real enlightenment. If you once see the barbarian’s real face intimately, then you have at last got “it”. But when you explain what you saw, you have already fallen into relativity.

The Verse
Before a fool,
Do not expound your dream.
The beardless barbarian, –
It is adding obscurity to clarity!

As translated by R.H. Blyth