4. A Beardless Foreigner

Wakun complained when he saw a picture of the bearded Bodhidharma:
  `Why hasn't that fellow a beard?'

Mumon's comment:

If you want to study Zen, you must do it with your heart. When you attain realization, it must be true realization. You yourself must have the face of the great Bodhidharma to see him. Just once such glimpse will be enough. But if you say you met him, you never saw him at all.

   One should not discuss a dream
   In front of a simpleton.
   Why has Bodhidharma no beard?
   What an absurd question!