"If I were to save only two books from the whole world of the mystics, one would be Sosan's Hsin Hsin Ming," Osho says. "It contains the quintessence of Zen, the path of awareness and meditation. . .the very soul of Zen."

The Hsin Hsin Ming, Verses on the Faith-Mind by Sosan is considered to be the first Chinese Zen document. As such, it is extraordinarily straightforward in its message, cutting straight to the point of what Zen practice really means and where it aims to take the practitioner – to a state of thought-free awareness in the present moment, without judgment or attachment: “If you wish to see the truth,” these verses begin, “then hold no opinion for or against… The struggle of what one likes and what one dislikes is the disease of the mind.”