His translation is getting better all the time. And what do I mean by a clear hold? This posture is a clear hold. And all these unclear holes of our homogenized body have to give way. Or your posture is going to collapse. Yes. But at some point you can literally feel these things breaking up in your body. In your body mind. So what helps?

[01:23]

A flexible body helps. Which partly we develop in Sashin practice. But also doing some yoga exercises or something helps. Practical things like that help. And developing a strong, resilient mind that doesn't cave in every time there's a little pain. And Sashin is one of the best ways to develop that. And third, I think one of the secrets is to find a state of mind that doesn't need anything. I think you can feel the difference between a state of mind that needs things and a state of mind that doesn't need anything.

[02:30]

and if you can find get a feeling for I know that you know this state of mind which doesn't need anything if you get a physical feeling for that mind and you can remember it when your legs are hurting the most just about the time they're bringing out seconds in the meal Who wants more food? My ears want to hear the bell. I don't need more food. At that time you create the mind that doesn't need more food. And it doesn't need the bell. It doesn't need anything.

[03:49]

And your legs just disappear. It's great. It's wonderful if you can discover this mind that doesn't need anything. This is studying what's near. We're always studying distant things and where... these extraordinarily important distinctions between a mind that needs and doesn't need. I mean, psychologically, for instance, we're in minds where we're very needy. And we can go through psychological processes to make our mind less needy. But the most powerful way to work on our needy mind

[04:51]

is to be able to reside in a mind that doesn't need anything. And I'm sorry, most of us are too needy to develop that mind unless we really need it. Yeah, like when the afternoon of the third day. Okay. Now this mind doesn't need anything, which we can discover and we can get a feeling for, and we can let it pervade our body and mind, is very close to what we mean by Zen mind.

[06:06]

Now, Suzuki Roshi's favorite koan, or the one he spoke about the most. And the one that Dogen used as the key to sitting practice. We talked about it many times, but not for a while. And Dogen did a funny thing. Matsu was in the koan. In Matsu's biography, Matsu is a young monk. But Dogen changes him into... The colon is one way and the biography is another way.

[07:23]

But in any case, Dogen changes it into Matsu in the story being an already realized and with the seal of his teacher, enlightened person. And I think Dogen is emphasizing here how many small unnoticed things, when we notice them in a certain way, seemingly unimportant things, are enlightenment experiences. And that enlightenment is also something that needs to be continuously matured. So, Matsu, after having received the seal of approval of his teacher, was sitting Zazen.

[08:41]

And he always sat Zazen. And Nanyue, his teacher, who was the disciple supposedly of the Sixth Patriarch, came in and said, what are you figuring to do? If one of you were sitting, say, night sitting, you know. And you're sitting there and I said, what are you figuring to do? Interrupting everything, you know. And you said, I'm figuring to make a Buddha. So then I went out in the garden and I found a little tile or something. And I started rubbing it on that big stone out there. And then the person in here doing night sitting says,

[09:43]

What the hell are you doing out there? Yeah. I say, well, I got this old tile. I'm making it a mirror. And then you say, how can you make a tile into a mirror? Mm-hmm. And then I say, well, how can you make a Buddha by sitting Zazen? And you say, well, if this is wrong, what would be right? And Nanyui says, when you Wenn man möchte, dass der Wagen sich in Bewegung setzt, wem gibt man die Peitsche, dem Wagen oder dem Ochsen?

[11:02]

This was a little too discursive for Matsu, so he didn't know what to say. And so then Nanyue said, are you studying seated meditation or are you studying seated Buddha? So I spoke about this distinction yesterday. And Dogen commenting on this, Nanue's first statement, And Dogen gives a comment on Nanyu's first statement. Namely, what do you think I'm doing here? And then Dogen says, is there some figuring beyond seated meditation? Excuse me, in between question. Figuring, it's a funny word.

[12:11]

It means to think. What are you planning to do? What are you figuring on doing? But it also has this pun of shaping something. It's about what you believe, what you do and at the same time what you present here. And could you repeat the last sentence, please? You think I can remember, huh? I hope you can. Yeah, where is Zurich, did you say? Yeah. Is there some figuring beyond seated meditation? So there is a thinking and shaping beyond the sitting meditation. So Dogen is emphasizing seated meditation is seated meditation. It's the forge, foundry and womb of practice. Of what? Of practice. I'm losing it, huh? No. Just to sit is Buddha.

[13:42]

At least you're not causing much trouble while you're sitting. Okay. Now, So I'll say a couple of other things. And I'll leave you with this koan. This is studying what's near. Are you studying sitting still or are you studying seated? Seated Buddha. So this, well let's say, there's four, there's what's called the four immeasurables in Buddhism.

[14:59]

Joy, joyful mind, compassionate mind. Kind mind. equanimity. And this is teaching within the system of Buddhism. But in Zen practice we discover these things for ourselves. And Dogen talks about it, and Sukhiroshi, both saying it in their own way, as joyful mind, a kind mind, and magnanimous mind. Yes. So I'm talking about this to give you a sense of the practice and expression of Zen mind.

[16:17]

And what are the gates also of these minds? So I'm trying to give you a picture of practice. And I'm saying that we most fully realize Zen mind or big mind through seated Buddha practice. And an expression of this mind is a joyful mind.

[17:28]

And Dogen calls it a volitional mind. We can make a choice to be joyful. Now one of the keys to this is empathetic joy. When you can feel joy in someone else's successes, and genuinely feel joy in other people's successes, This is one of the gates to this joyful mind. And kind mind is just to feel kindly, to express kindness toward people. And this kindness comes from expressing our emotions as kindness.

[18:46]

And it's a practice we do. But the more we know this Zen mind, This mind that doesn't need anything. It's quite easy to express joyful mind or kind of mind. And Sukershi also spoke about what he called magnanimous mind. Both means equanimity and generosity. And magnanimous mind is one of the keys to understanding it, is when you have that mind which can forgive what can't be forgiven. Can your mind be that big?

[19:52]

Now again, this isn't a kind of morality. I mean, it isn't not morality, but it's not where we're coming from. When you feel a big, wide, deep mind in your zazen, it may feel like a very big space. Or it may feel like you couldn't be moved. It may feel solid as a mountain. Sometimes we feel this in practice.

[21:00]

Now this doesn't mean this is just a product of sashimi. It means it's a capacity we have as human beings. But it's a Buddha capacity. Now this magnanimous mind, which the word Suzuki Roshi called it, this forgiving, accepting mind, Which you can come to know through Zen practice, sitting practice. You can discover permeates your body and your space. But you can't discover it when your attention is only in your consciousness. You can't discover it in your habit body.

[22:08]

You can't discover it when you're limited to your body image. Something. You need a crash course. Sashin is a crash course in big mind. Do you have that expression, a crash course? Yeah, we took it and we use it in the same way. Okay. What did you do for the week, crashed? Now, magnanimous mind is the basis of intellect. At least as Buddhism understands intellect. Being able to see both sides of everything. And to think clearly.

[23:20]

And to think generously. So this big accepting mind is also a fruit of Zen mind. And the more you know this Zen mind through sitting, Your emotions start being expressed as kindness and friendliness. Mm-hmm. And you find a joyful mind coming up all the time. So this is a kind of Buddha mind or Buddha activity that arises from Zen mind and that in turn matures and deepens Zen mind. So this womb-like process is going on through just sitting regularly in your life.

[24:37]

Realizing a mind that just rests in the actualization of each moment. Just to finish. Again, I'm speaking about teaching, specific teaching, the way Sukershi put it. And what does this apply to? What does it relate to? One of the basic distinctions in Buddhism is Buddha, Dharma and Sangha. But Buddha, that also means you as a witnessing phenomena. Dharma as objects and Sangha as other people.

[25:54]

So it's a way to divide the world up into other people, phenomena, and yourself. And we can make that even more practical and say how we relate to objects, how we make friends, and how we study the teachings. And if we don't make friends, how are we going to develop our own practice? And how are we going to share the Dharma if we don't make friends? So in a very practical way, this joyful mind is expressing our love for people through the Dharma. and how to relate to objects.

[27:11]

It's interesting to notice how our meal is a series of continuous physical events. And if you study the orioke, it's one continuous physical movement. Each thing you do leads to the next thing. I don't think I should get into this much more. Because it's getting late. But let me say, just to say, it's like saying you're having coffee in the morning in a cafe. You may think you're You're thinking about things and occasionally you punctuate that thinking by having a sip of coffee or putting sugar in your coffee or picking up the newspaper.

[28:22]

And then you go back to your contemplation. And the physical acts are just here and there. But anybody observing you from across the room They see a continuous flow of physical acts. Sitting in the chair, lifting up your cup, reading the newspaper, whatever you're doing. But we don't find our continuity or discontinuity in the physical acts. So what the orioke as a teaching is trying to do, by designed, so it's one continuous physical act with each thing you do, the cloth, etc., leading to the next, is to use this as a ritual which represents the actual fact you're in a continuous physical act all the time.

[29:40]

So let's not, let's maybe, instead of speaking about Taking our sense of continuity away from our mentality may sound too hard to do or strange. Let's talk about widening our sense of continuity. So it is our contemplative mind and also resides contemplatively within the continuous physicality of our life.

[30:41]

And this makes a big change in your life when you do this. And this is this teaching of relating to objects. I didn't speak about studying the teaching but That's enough. Thank you very much. Will unsere Absichten gleichermaßen X Wesen und Jeden Haut durchdringen? Wird dem Ahrenverdienst des Bullerweges Schuld schon ein seligerer Tod? How many beings are there? I think they are endless.

[31:42]

The miracles are indestructible. I praise you for preparing an end. The demons are endless. I praise you for ruling them. The way of the Buddha is unsurpassable. I praise you for reaching it. The unsurpassed, deplorable and perfect drama can only be found in hundreds of thousands of millions of kalpas.

[33:29]

Now that I can remember and accept the evil hearing, I believe I have received the truth of the Tartagetai. It looks like something that could be called winter has arrived. And it looks like all of you are sitting here after seven days, six and a half days of zazen. I am waiting for me to say something verbal about it.

[34:33]

But this is such a real and also enigmatic thing we are doing, that I understand that we are just here now to try to share what we are doing. Last night, sometime after 11 o'clock, a while after I'd gone to sleep, David Chadwick called me up. And so I answered. I don't know why I answered, but hello. He said, oh, I'm so sorry I woke you up. I just wanted to get Mike Murphy's address.

[35:52]

I forgot it was nine hours difference. I said, oh, it's all right. I just gave her a lecture about that. He said, what, a lecture about Mike Murphy's address? I said, no, about you waking me up. Yeah, I tried to hide that I He woke me up, but I was unsuccessful. And you know, what I'd like to speak to you about is like clear, bright ball somewhere in my mind. It's quite small. But as soon as I start talking about it, it expands faster than this Buddha. I wish you could just tell what I meant by the sound of my voice the way David did.

[37:16]

But I'm convinced I have to give us, I have to get find a way to make clear to me as well as you what kind of world this practice occurs in. Now you may think I'm making it kind of mysterious or something. But you know, what could be more mysterious than the world is flat? Or what could be more mysterious than the world is round and floating in space? Or what could be more mysterious than the Big Bang? This was all a tiny thing smaller than this idea in my mind and it expanded, creating, not into space, but creating space as it went.

[38:41]

This is pretty mysterious. And there's nothing that can be said in modern science or philosophy, probably even poetry now, that can ignore this weirdness that we think we live in. So let's try to understand the weirdness that these Tang Dynasty Buddhists thought they lived in. Because it might also just be our world right here, too. Now I said yesterday that, I mean, yesterday I felt that, you know, it was more or less a hodgepodge that I presented.

[39:43]

I didn't feel I could make myself clear. Yeah, and of course I don't have much more confidence today. Why is that funny? It's true. But... Okay, so let's consider this notes toward a common understanding of Zazen. notes notes toward a common understanding of zazen okay

[41:04]

Suzuki Roshi used to say, when is a tree a tree and when is a tree a poem? That's a great question. Sometimes we see a tree, it's a tree, and sometimes it's a poem. And I would say that a tree, when a tree is a poem, a tree is a tree, and you are you. When is a tree a poem? This vision is that we're not talking about some big enlightenment experience.

[42:32]

It's great to have one, you know. And we're not just talking about lots of little experiences that are enlightening. But rather how each moment, every moment, each moment's experience is possibly enlightening or enlightening. Sudden enlightenment means the vision that you live in the potential enlightenment of each moment. And don't be greedy. Don't care whether you experience it or not. Just know the potential enlightenment is all, each moment is potential enlightenment. Okay, I said yesterday, how do we heed Dogen's use of this Chinese proverb?

[43:56]

The proverb being, an ordinary person is one who desires what is distant and despises what is near. Yes. So how do we study what is near? In the Buddhist world, there is only nearness. Essentially, we're talking about a world where everything is present. Sarvastivada School

[45:01]

of which Vasubandhu is the most famous proponent. And to show you how mixed up our Buddhist lineage and background is. Vasubandhu is the purported author of the Abhidharma Kosha. a patriarch worthy of the Sarvastivadin school. He is also a patriarch of the Yogacara school and disciple supposedly of his brother Asanga. a patriarch of the Yogacara school, a sangha, and there's some great stories about them, and a patriarch of the Zen school.

[46:26]

And we chant his name in the morning, Vasubandhu Dayo Shok. And that guy is here. And Sarvastivada, the word means something like in the background of the school is everything that is, is. Now, there probably were maybe two Vasubandhas. We don't know. There's the 4th and 5th century. It's not clear historically. But I think if you don't understand the back, how I would understand the this school.

[47:32]

If you don't understand that everything is, you don't get what the Armidharma is about. As I've been pointing out recently, we've got to practice these things. Now, the Abhidharma is the main thing I studied when I was young and younger in Buddhism. And Abhidharma is the main work that I studied when I was young and also when I was younger in Buddhism. I mean, I studied Koans with Sukhyoshi and studied in general with him and Lankavatara Sutra, but on my own and with him, but... I very much emphasize the Abhidharma. And if any of you want to just study something, I would suggest you all study the Abhidharma.

[48:48]

But the Abhidharma becomes a philosophical school and gets systematized and so forth. But these distinctions, like the five skandhas and the vijnanas and so forth, as briefly summarized in the Heart Sutra. Yes, they're very interesting analysis of how consciousness arises and functions. But we can also understand each one as a pinpoint into things as they actually exist. Now, I don't know if this image is useful to you, but when a baby is born, We can understand, I think, if you've ever been present, especially present when the baby was born.

[50:16]

It's really, if it's not mind-blowing, nothing is. Here from nowhere comes this little creature. And you can perhaps intuitively understand that everything that exists has made this baby possible. We can understand it's the world-honored one. The whole world is honored by the appearance of this baby. No, I've said that before. But what I'd like to add is that we can also understand that the space of this baby Actually includes everything that is.

[51:22]

The Abhidharma of the Prajnaparamita literature emphasizes that everything that is in its all-at-onceness is present as each moment. So everything that went to make that baby, that baby could not exist without, is also somehow magically or implicitly present in that baby. So it's not just that the... How can I say it? It's that we can understand it like knowing that the whole ocean is in each drop.

[52:39]

And maybe if you can analyze totally each drop, you could understand the whole ocean. And I'm not saying this is scientifically true. I'm saying in the midst of this mystery that we inhabit, they are present. predecessors in the Dharma had some such feeling that this is how everything existed. So the Abhidharma is not just some list, but each point in the list is a little window into how things exist.

[53:41]

Everything that is, is past, present and future and the ten directions, As I said, the ten directions point always toward each of us. Okay, so how do we study what's near? So there's this unison. or duality, multiplicity as oneness. So as I said, there's this sort of elasticity between, among differentiation and unison.

[54:49]

To act, but to act or understand, we have to divide. So how are we going to divide this up? Let's divide it up so that we can bring energy to it. And so it returns that energy. And since we don't have a God, but we've got a Buddha. A very nice one, too. Next February, I want to do an opening eye ceremony for the Buddha. It's one of the most ancient ceremonies in Buddhism and probably is pre-Buddhist.

[55:58]

I think we've done a pretty good job, this Sesshin, of opening the receptacle of the Buddha and starting to fill it. You know, often Buddhas... have in them, sometimes these small Buddhas, ashes of previous owners. I have some Buddhas which I could open up and put my own, well not I could ask one of you to put my ashes in it. And then you could have it and then you could pass it to someone who would put your ashes in it. It's this kind of tradition. Yeah. This Buddha is hollow, you know, so we'll all fit in.

[57:26]

Yeah. The time will come. The Dalai Lama, I heard say, that every day, several times a day, he thinks... what it will be like when he dies. And he's very cheerful. It's not gloomy. Keeps us alert. I think some of us have realized this, forgive me, warrior spirit that's necessary to stay within the pain of zazen. Yeah. To find a way to accept it or dissolve it. Now, I suppose since I quoted the Dalai Lama, I can quote Versace.

[58:48]

Versace said, if you're not willing to be on the edge, If you're afraid of the edge, you're probably afraid of life. And if we're afraid of the edge, we start being afraid of the edge in everything in our life. So this edge where we almost give in to the pain and don't is so helpful in our life. So how should we divide this nearness?

[60:08]

And as I started to say, we don't have a God. But we say everything as it is. Space itself is the Dharmakaya, the body of Buddha. So, in the way a believing Christian might look at some beautiful painting from Christ's life or something, Or would feel the presence of Christ. As Buddhists, we need to come into feeling, because, you know, to come into feeling everything that exists has this kind of presence.

[61:12]

I can't say everything is as a god, but We can say everything that is, is Buddha. Okay, so the most traditional way to divide this everything that is, And we take refuge. I take refuge in the Buddha. I take refuge in the Dharma. I take refuge in the Sangha. So let's make it simpler so that we can make it more near. So let's call it witnessing, the witness, the sense of something is here, looking around, feeling, knowing. And then phenomena.

[62:30]

Everything as it appears in our mind. And other people. And then Sukhiroshi simplified it even further, studying our teaching, how to treat things, and making friends. And he means, can we make friends beyond friendship? Can we discover friendship with each other beyond likes and dislikes? This is the vision and and incumbency of the Sangha.

[63:38]

The obligation. But why does he equate studying the teaching with witnessing and the Buddha? Because there's many ways to witness. And in fact, our way of witnessing things serially, in a serial order, And in descriptive categories. It didn't appear when we were first born. It's a learned, it's a teaching. So the pure witnessing isn't pure. It's a culturated function. And if you left a baby with no input,

[64:47]

Its brain doesn't deteriorate. It has to have input. So there's no way out of teaching. There's always teaching. Everything we are is embedded, infused, inseparable from teaching. So how to study? How to study the teachings? How to study what is near? is also Buddha, or is seated Buddha. Practice a view, a vision rooted in seated Buddha zazen. I would say that maybe the three groupings of Buddhism altogether are Indian, Tibetan and Chinese.

[66:12]

Thai Buddhism, for instance, is more Indian. Vietnamese Buddhism is more Chinese. Vietnamese Buddhism is more Chinese. And Japanese and our Buddhism is more Chinese. And I think each has a somewhat different vision of what kind of world this practice is applied in. And if you understand what kind of world we Zen imagines, you can understand Zazen much better. Yeah, now I'm wondering about trying to make this clear, and I will continue until your legs hurt too much.

[67:30]

Oh, you're safe on the chair. You should have brought enough of them for all of us. Or until we've worn out sandals without count. Now, last night, for example, I mentioned nostrils. And like David knowing that I was asleep, to know what that means, you have to hear my voice. There's a... a... a... There's a, I think the botanical term I like is indeterminate...

[68:48]

Fluorescence, inflorescence, something like that. It means it's unpredictable how the stem will flower. In other words, some plants flower in a very predictable way, very predictable patterns. And some stems flower any way they want. And this is more the view, Zen view of the world. Everything flowers pretty much as it wants. And in Chinese poetry you see this reflected. I guess, you know, I don't know Chinese, but I guess my understanding is that Chinese is much more syntactically fluid than English.

[70:05]

Indo-European languages. And in Chinese poetry they especially drop articles and pronouns and so forth. So poems can have various readings depending on various factors. So I'm just saying that that right now anyway in relationship to the word nostril And so I would like to say something about the word Nasenloch.

[71:07]

And so Tetsugen hit him on the head and said, we don't want any rice bags around here. I don't think I could do that to you guys. One of you comes and says, can I see Roshi? Can I have a meeting? And he comes in the room and I say, boom, you rice bag! And I say, boy, that guy in Johanneshof is nuts. Maybe I should say, you potato sack. You kartoffel. And then Ryoan said years later, he snatched away my nostrils and I haven't found them yet.

[72:10]

Now, in those days, not only did they walk 500 kilometers, but they also, even Sukirishi, when you read his biography, he walked. sometimes great distances to go between temples in those days. He in a sense, and particularly in the Buddhist world at the time, and through his teachers, grew up in a kind of medieval Japan. But also fascinated by and feeling he had to go to the West. So what was also common were animals with rings in their nose, like the bull across the street.

[73:22]

It's the most common way to control an animal. So on the one hand, nostrils mean somebody's got you by the nose. Yeah, that's what... You're exaggerating my... Sorry, I just got my hand exaggerated. By the way, I'm only half done. So if you want to change your posture, it's fine, but I won't finish. I'll just talk for a few more minutes. I remember I used to sit in Sukershi's lectures sometimes, and I couldn't hear anything because my legs hurt so much. And he'd say, don't be proud, it's better to hear. Sometimes I was proud, sometimes I heard.

[74:25]

But I never had a chair. I didn't think of it. Yeah, sorry, I didn't. Yeah. Well, we could go an eighth day. Yeah, another day, yeah. Mm-hmm. long lecture or another day. I mean, you have your choice. Or I could just stop at some point and say, to be continued. Then you could all come back sometime. By the way, Sukershi's book, the biography, will come out in... February, probably. So if any of you'd like copies, it'll be in English first and in hardbound first. You could let someone here know and we can try to get you some.

[75:49]

I think we could probably organize getting them at something close to half price or something. Nostrils also is that point at which there's this transition of inside and outside. So to lose your nostrils also means to experience non-duality. And it also means when your body shield, your body image is gone. So it depends on the context what it means.

[77:09]

You have to understand the story to understand which nostrils he's talking about. Yeah. Let's see, what can I do? I told you, it's a little tiny thing and I start talking about it, it expands. You'll never understand Zazen if I don't finish. This is good because not understanding Zazen is important. Gary Snyder says that his understanding of Chinese poetry is an attempt to open a window on a non-human world.

[78:17]

And he means the world of animals, but also the world of of spirit or divine presence. And also this whole thing as a living being. And sometimes, Gary says, the phenomenal world comes into a faint human shape. And sometimes we assume a faint phenomenal shape. So zazen is this kind of practice too.

[79:27]

What kind of witnessing is zazen? It's various kinds of witnessing. And it is itself fully what it is without any experience of it. That's the best I can say right now. In other words, we can grasp at the experience or we can discover the experience of meditation.

[80:30]

But there's also meditation which is deeper than the experience of it, which is already a separation. But then it appears in our, as I suggested, various minds, of compassion, kindness, joy and so forth. So I was going to give you some Dogen's statement. Some explanation or feeling for Dogen's statement.

[81:45]

This truth abides in a state of objective reality. The features of the world are permanent. In spring, the hundred flowers are red. Doves are crying in the willows. Now if you bring Buddhist philosophy to this, it doesn't make sense. If you bring practice to it, it opens up practice. Yeah, so that's all I'll say today. Because the other half of my talk you'll have to discover in Zazen.

[82:48]

I can't do everything in one session, I'm sorry. Please forgive me. I'll try harder next time.

[83:07]

@Transcribed_UNK
@Text_v005
@Score_69.88