We met a man who handed us a card with the words of the heart sutra. I asked him to chant it and he did. The Heart Sutra essentially is translated to "Form is emptiness; emptiness is form; form is not other than emptiness; emptiness is not other than form." Oh, and when Buddhists talk about emptiness, it isn't the void, it is the field, the same field that Einstein was in search of. The field from which all thing arise.
The Heart Sutra, in its Japanese form (the Hannya Shingyo), is often chanted by Zen groups before and/or after a meditation sitting, and you don't need to understand the words in order to derive benefit from it, simply allowing yourself to become absorbed in the act of chanting. So just listening to it is good for the soul. Listening to this man chant for me was a sweet experience that reminded me of my life at Zen Mountain Center... Chanting, sitting, incense and all. And the Jizo garden too.
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