1. "The mind that plays across objects" (shôkyô shin) refers to ordinary experience; "the samâdhi of personal enjoyment" (jijuyû zanmai) is a technical term for the state in which a buddha experiences his enlightenment.

2. The subject of the phrase "he is completely unaware" is unstated but is most likely to be understood as Zhaozhou.

3. It is unclear who has been defeated; some commentators take it to be the Tripitaka Master; others, Xuansha.

4. This passage is usually interpreted to mean that someone like Daer who attributes mental telepathy to the buddha dharma is likely to have nothing significant to say. Here and below Dôgen will use the term "statement" in the sense "having something significant to say".

5. The expression "ten holy and three wise" refers to the stages of the bodhisattva path; "virtually enlightened and heir apparent" refers to the final stage of the path; "commoner" refers to one who has not yet reached the advanced stages of the "noble" path.

6. Alternatively, the text could be punctuated to read here, "They do not rely on the production of the thought of bodhi; they do not rely on the right view of the Greater Vehicle. We have never yet heard of edifying examples of the types who attain the penetration of other minds having verified the buddha dharma on the strength of the penetration of other minds."

7. From the old Chinese saying, "The sage does not value a one-foot jewel but gives weight to an inch of shadow [i.e. a moment of time]."

8. Both "crown of the head" and "nose" are commonly used to indicate the person, especially the "true" person.

9. The point here seems to be that, just as Xuansha is wrong in implying that the Tripitaka Master might actually have seen anything, so Zhongxian is wrong in assuming that Xuansha actually said anything worth criticizing.

10. This sentence is usually taken to mean that each realization is a complete expression of realization. At issue here is the traditional question of how there could be more than one buddha in a single buddha land.

11. "You got my marrow" is the comment by Bodhidharma to Huike when the latter expressed his understanding of the First Ancestor's teaching by a bow.