Is there anything you'd like to say or bring up or mention? I guess I have one question. The two terms, nature and Russia, This pair of terms, nature and nurture, does it have also the same Meaning like the other pair of freedom, Freiheit und Identität, oder welches andere? Nein, Erziehung und Angebotung. Does it have the same characteristic as education or genetics?

[01:09]

Well, it's a similar parallel, I mean. I think it's closer to freedom and identity. But, yeah, I mean, if this comes up in your mind, then it's probably for you worth exploring why do you make a connection. Of course, education assumes change. But most education implies addition or development. to draw out education. Literally it means to draw out the etymology. It doesn't mean to transform. So education in genetics, I mean genetics, genetics is certainly a base.

[02:18]

But research in recent years and which I'm convinced by shows that the baby is born with a bunch of genes, of course. But what happens and how those genes develop and actually become the physical structure of the brain, the limbic system and so forth is thoroughly, if not absolutely completely dependent on the relationship with the mother during the first 18 months of life. Okay, so then you're not thinking of genes as nature. You're thinking of genes as ingredients. And ingredients are not deterministic. And usually when we say genes, we imply a kind of determinism.

[03:58]

Okay. Anyone else? Someone else? Pretty please. Yeah. When I say pretty please, he always can't refuse. You talked about the poem which can touch something in you, which can change your life in a different direction. But the base of that is that for one that you somehow know what and who you are and also what you want to be and not yet, which you are not yet.

[05:05]

So there's like a base, a pretty big base of self-consciousness and knowing something about myself which is like which has to be set up before it really touches you. German, please. So, I referred to the poem by Roshi, and the poem can address someone, and then this being addressed can lead to changing one's life in a different direction, but that presupposes, at least two things, that I... So what you're saying is that before the poem, sitting quietly, etc., can touch you, There have to be prior conditions that make it possible for the poem to touch you.

[06:20]

And so then you're asking, what are those prior conditions? You're implying... Well, I think, yeah, these are subtle points we're bringing up. And I think that we can we could come to a fairly clear fairly clear working out of freedom and in the context of the West and in the context of Buddhism.

[07:36]

But it would pretty much require a book to be written. So we can't do that this weekend. Maybe we could do it if we stayed together a week, but not this weekend. I thought you were sitting there, and now you're back there. He was going to take your seat, Diesel. He liked your cushion. He wanted to share the hatching with you.

[08:46]

But we can start the process in ourselves of letting this incubate. And I think the key here is really in the territory of what kind of choice we have. And that's what we want to feel out. What's the territory of choice? What is the territory of the choice? And what allows us to make a choice? What touches me very much was the story about the woman who pushes the accelerator And after this, she really didn't decide how to go.

[09:54]

She drove right into a house. Excuse me for joking. What are you doing in my living room? Go ahead. judges me very much because in my mind is, well, this is how life should be. At least I feel, who is the one who decides, really? Is there something inside of me who decides? Advaita teachers would say, this is the way how life is, like the woman who just drive and just do what she did. So I'm very interested to listen to you when you talk about choices.

[10:58]

So, Deutsch bitte. That's the next choice. Yes. That's the next choice, to listen to that in German. Well, I had the story of a woman who had overcome it at some point, who had to decide forever. She drove and then life decided for her. She then drove to the right or to the left. And I know these conditions too and know that it's very, very true. There are no questions, no problems. Atvaita teachers would say that this is actually life. There is no ego, there is no duo that does something. It is an abstraction, an illusion. And that is why I am very excited about what Roshi will tell us about the choice we have. Well, I tried to deal with what you brought up in a number of seminars.

[12:15]

I don't know how fully we can go in that direction, but, you know, we'll see. That's one of the problems I have in doing so many seminars. Which in each seminar there's always new people. Sometimes completely new. And sometimes I've only been to one seminar or no seminars yet this year. And then we have Andreas, who holds the record so far this year. So then I don't want to bore Andreas by going over something I've... It's very important for me not to bore Andreas. Yes. Let's see.

[13:27]

Yeah, I will certainly touch on it. And it relates to what we're talking about, of course. Someone else. Yeah. Yeah. It is a point where it is about this Buddhist or Western termini. It is a very big problem for me to live a family life or work or everyday life, a friendly life, where words are used that make it almost impossible. It is very difficult for me in my everyday life work with friends, with people around me and with puppets And with puppets.

[14:44]

No, all of us work with puppets as well as friends. To use terms like mind, like experience, like practice. So that these terms are culturally and socially flavored or sort of narrowed down, conditioned, and they don't allow Yes, this incubation maybe. to exchange, that is, to come into conversation, to come into an exchange, perhaps a continuing experience, but that would need a revolution or an evolution of the linguistic use.

[16:05]

That, in such a circle as here, is more comfortable, but for a day-to-day circle it is almost impossible, at least I have failed to do so so far. So far I failed in my everyday life when using these terms to be able to broaden the meaning or to enlarge the territory in which they are used. Used by yourself or used with friends? Used with friends because there is also a fundamental need to exchange about that. And as you mentioned, if I don't get involved in this socially accepted or western use of language and exchange, then I also destroy my inner access, my inner access to this state and to see and experience our existence.

[17:12]

Okay, so this conditioned language sort of if I adapt to the use of it then it narrows down my own experience and I cannot really plunge into into it as easily anymore and if if i succeed in doing so and it broadens again then i have to wish to exchange about it but that it's almost impossible with with the surrounding i mean so i guess let me see if i can say uh what you're saying is that um

[18:34]

you articulate your practice partly through the territory of words. But the territory of words doesn't just belong to you. It belongs to your culture, it also belongs to your friends and so forth. So the usual and, let's say, intersubjective territory of the words with your friends Begins to narrow your experience. Well, that's the story of my life.

[19:41]

I have these same words too, not German ones, obviously, but English ones. And I'm always trying to kind of like jiggle them and stretch them and so forth. And I couldn't do it without the Sangha because I need a context in which the words belong to others. As well as me. And words are not just to be brushed off. Because words are conduits for attention, energy, etc. They're the wiring of our energy. So, for instance, what you said earlier, we could instead of saying who decides, we could say what decides.

[20:56]

And that simple shift of a word changes the way the energy works in you. Yeah, so we do have to pay attention to how we use words. And as someone said to me once, Most German words have Christian squatters living in them. Squatters, you know, somebody who occupies an apartment that doesn't belong to them. Yeah, yeah. Viele deutsche Worte haben Besetzer in sich drin. Yeah. I mean, etymologically the words don't belong probably to Christianity, but for most of their centuries they've had Christian squatters or tenants or leasers in them. Ja, ursprünglich waren sie nicht durch christliche Besetzer quasi besetzt, die Worte, aber mittlerweile schon. And powerfully transformed and made use of the words in ways that make sense in Christianity.

[22:05]

Ja, und sie wurden auf mächtige Weise transformiert und fürs Christentum eingesetzt. But I think... You know, one response to that is, you know, to, you know, is to sometimes be in a sangha-type situation. Or at the seminar. Yeah, and I can, may I say, Andreas? He's thinking of moving to Johanneshof soon. Just so he can give his words Sangha freedom. Okay. I don't know if that's quite what he thought, but anyway, I like that.

[23:09]

Okay. I think one thing is, you know, words have gestural meanings. Words have physical meanings. And it's very clear if you speak to a Chinese or a Japanese person, as I've pointed out very often, Who might, if they're a scholar, know even 20 or 30,000 kanji? And MacArthur, trying to simplify the Japanese brain, insisted the newspapers have 2,000 kanji. Because there's such a strong emphasis on nurture in Asian cultures. They want as complex a language system as possible, not a simple one, because it makes the brain and body complex.

[24:12]

From a Buddhist point of view, it would be considered the height of ignorance to try to simplify your language. The only advantage it has, everything can become an advertising slogan. There was a soap called Does when I was a kid. There was a soap that was called Daz when I was a child. And there was a word game that was related to the foam of the dishes. And the slogan was, Daz does everything. Really?

[25:31]

There was a guy who always talked to his hat. You know those people, sometimes people walk around talking to their hat all the time? They're in their own world, let's put it that way. And this guy, I think, was speaking Italian all the time. And several times a day, he went up and down our street, always in his own world. And so I was opening our garage door. We had a remote and I squirted it and the door opened. He was walking by. And he looked. What did you do, he said. I said, I opened the door. He took the remote out of my hand and the door closed and the door opened.

[26:51]

He said, you mean you can open any door? Does, does everything. Anyway. So if you ask a Japanese or Chinese person for a particular kanji character, they'll often go... Yeah. She knows, right? Why is that? Because the bodily memory is so much bigger than the mental memory. And you can see it in yourself. How many people's phone numbers do you know by dialing them, but you can't think them?

[27:52]

So, if a Japanese or Chinese person has the character in his body. Then it's in his body and his speaking. And when you make kanji, often you speak about the spine of the kanji. And if you're going to write a character, you're going to do calligraphy with a brush full of dripping black ink. Your posture is part of the character.

[28:54]

If you're singing like this, your own posture has to be reflected in the character. What a different world this is. When to write you need a certain posture. Is that a kind of freedom or is that a restriction? Good. No, in English, the conjunctions, however, nevertheless, nonetheless, but, are all translated the same way, pretty much. And all the words in English, like aber and nichtsdestoweniger, and... Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[29:55]

Yeah, yeah, in that style. There's no words really to say what the differences are. You're at the limits of where the words can go. But you know Bodhidharma, mythological, but perhaps to some extent real Bodhidharma, said that where words don't reach, you see the mind. Now, if I say to you, but, but, But. Yeah, but. If I say, however, however, it's a different gesture.

[30:58]

If I say, nevertheless, nonetheless these are different gestures which you can feel in the words however but nonetheless okay those gestures are in the words they can't be put in the dictionary in little drawings you know A computer dictionary, you could push a button, there'd be a little person would be there. But, nonetheless... We could do the filming. What I'm saying is that I find that if you can have a physical sense of the word in your activity and conversations with others, So if I use the word mind or awareness or practice,

[32:18]

If I feel my sense of this word in my body, it does influence the other person who I'm speaking to. Yeah, I might put the mind. Or I might say the word mind differently. Yeah. So anyway, that's my response. I don't know if it's useful. But it ought to be especially useful to you since you can make all those little guys on your hands and things come alive. They're nothing but gestures, isn't that right? Okay, well that was a wandering around somewhere?

[33:50]

Yes, please. Yes, I have a question. I read in Buddhist texts that everything we experience is illusory and dreamlike. Again, about words. What I have read in Buddhist texts is that everything that we experience is illusion and dreamlike. But what I do experience, I experience as real. So, if you could explain something about that. Well, there's another seminar.

[34:53]

See, if I do this three one weeks, presumably I won't have to repeat myself because we'll all get together on these things. I am not complaining about having to do another seminar right at this moment. Because my life is these questions just like you asked right now. How do I respond? How do I work this out? And when I'm asked again, you know, it's new for me. I have to kind of... Because I don't have anything prepared somewhere. I have to... Yeah, what's that like? Yeah, because I haven't prepared anything.

[36:02]

I come here again and again and let it work on me. I mean, I thought these things through often, fairly, for me, thoroughly. But each time it's a kind of discovery at the same time. Okay. So, yes, things appear as real. What do we mean by real? I think mostly we mean predictable. It's still there moment after moment. And it's not an illusion. Okay. Okay, then we can study, observe... What is predictability?

[37:09]

How is that created and is it true? But the short answer, short response to your question is we could say things are an illusion. But it's not correct to say they're an illusion. What would be more accurate is to say they're also an illusion. They're real and also an illusion. But even the word illusion is a problem, so let's make it simpler to work with. Things are seemingly permanent and also impermanent. And that's the crux of Nagarjuna's teachings.

[38:22]

The great philosopher of Buddhism was sometimes called the second Buddha. His insight and practice was that in this territory things are seemingly permanent and also impermanent. And what does that mean in our life? Okay. Okay. Nagarjuna. Do you know how to spell it? In Japanese, Nagaharjuna. But that's because Japanese is a syllabic language. You can't deal with two consonants together. I know a guy in Japan named Stoops. And his name in Japanese was Tsutupu-san.

[39:31]

And the Japanese like to name their cars in unpronounceable English words. Like Cedric, Cedricu. nennen ihre Autos auf fast unaussprechbare Weise. I think the Cedric is a Nissan. Nissan Cedric. It's one of the bigger cars, the Cedric. Anyway, thanks for getting carried away here. Ich schweife hier etwas ab. Nagarjuna. Nagarjuna. So we're going to stop in sort of like 12.30. That's in eight minutes. And then we're going to start again at what time? 3? 2.30? So if we go 12.30 to 2.30, is that time enough to have lunch? What time do we start tonight?

[40:49]

Nine, eight, seven? Seven, no, not seven, eight. You've announced it as seven. I did the same mistake as last year. But we can start, we can sit. No, no, no, no, it's fine. So it's from seven to eight, you can sit, no. Is this a, you know, what is making this mistake every year? You just punch in last year's schedule and it appears. So it's scheduled for seven this evening. So then 2.30 to 3.30 to 4.00 to 4.30. We can start at 3.00. 3.00 to 4.00 to 4.30. 4.30 to 5.30. 2.15. Okay. I mean at 2.45.

[42:08]

We'll start. Huey Newton, who was the founder of the Black Panthers, was a close friend of mine. That's how I know about the kids and the Panthers and stuff. I eventually had to stop singing because it got too wild, too many drugs and stuff. But for a lot of years we were close friends and saw each other even once a week or so. And he once asked me, what would you do if you had been a slave?

[43:09]

Because as I see in Sartre and others the presence of the Second World War, and even in myself as an American, my childhood was dominated by the Second World War. Well, black people in America at least are dominated by the idea we were slaves. And I read a piece the other day about a quite famous and influential black journalist and art museum director or something other in England. And he had continual, despite his big success in England, he had continual nightmares about his past, what happened to his father in Africa and his mother and so forth.

[44:32]

So he went back, maybe to Angola, I don't remember what country, to look at his roots. And he discovered one of his ancestors, several grandfathers earlier, Was a Dutch slave trader. Yeah, what does this really mean genetically? Not much, but for him it was, in my own ancestry, are slave traders. How do we deal with this? Anyway, so he said to me, what would you do if you'd been a slave? And knowing there's no answer that's not insensitive to such a question. I still found, I said, I would free the owners.

[45:49]

Now, you know, kind of superficial response. But At the same time, I did feel I would have to start with freeing those who were enslaving me from a slavery within myself. And I think I actually have ancestors who in New England who were involved in some of the slave trade.

[46:57]

They had ships. So how do you not hate somebody or accept somehow they're also humanity who's enslaving you? Yeah, I'm just bringing up problems with this, what we mean by freedom. Even if you're enslaved, is it possible to have an inner freedom? And wouldn't you have to start there as well as maybe try to escape? And, you know, there's a flurry of books, flurry?

[48:01]

Kind of lots of them. About the so-called founding fathers of America. Since I have three daughters, I'm hoping in the future there will be founding mothers. Anyway, I think there's a synchronicity in the... outrageously undemocratic Bush preaching democracy to the world. There is a synchronicity between these books coming out examining freedom at the beginning of the United States. Yes, and there is also a synchronicity that these books are published about these founding fathers of America and Bush.

[49:05]

Not yet. Outrageous? Duplicitous? Duplicitous means of the undemocratic bush or shrub of the undemocratic bush of the A shrubby, a real small bush. The undemocratic bush preaching democracy to the world. Because whatever you think of America, it was an extraordinary experiment in what is freedom. And if you know something about these founding fathers, They were more British than the British.

[50:25]

George Washington had his carriage made in England. All his clothes were made in England. And he had some hundreds of slaves. Which he did free when his wife died. But still, he was thoroughly, in terms of his education, his athleticism, etc., British. Why would they go against England because despite most of them despite their privilege and great wealth they believed in freedom and were willing to sacrifice their wealth and their life to it and after George, he's such a kind of mythic figure, it's hard to say, but after George Washington anyway won the, by luck and help of the French, the revolution.

[51:56]

He was such an imposing and courageous figure. that the Americans offered, said, hey, to heck with freedom, be our king. And he said, I will not be king. That's not what we fought for. And George III of England, who caused all the problems in the first place, when hearing that George Washington refused to accept the position of king, George III, King of Great Britain, King of Ireland, and King of Hanover.

[53:04]

a distant relative of Heinrich of Hanover, when this British king heard of George Washington's decision, he said, he must be the most extraordinary person who's ever lived if he will turn down being king. Okay, now I'm responding partly to Gerald's question when I'm telling this story. My eight minutes are over. Because if we look at King George's statement, it's interesting that he didn't say, well, of course George Washington couldn't be king because he doesn't have divine right.

[54:38]

And he doesn't have the right blood. Okay, so what I would say is that King George was reflecting his inner request, his innermost belief. If he meant it, he probably did, that George Washington must be an extraordinary person. Then King George must have recognized that this is just a role, it's not divine right or special blood. And the selflessness of recognizing the quality of others is higher than being a king.

[55:39]

So he put ethics above being the king. So we could say King George's inner request or inner belief was there was something false about his being king. Now, then we can ask, what were the prior conditions that let him like this poem, sitting quietly doing nothing, or let him appreciate George Washington? Is this genetics or is this culture? Or are there prior conditions? Or how should we conceive of the prior conditions? Let's conceive of them as ingredients and not conditions.

[57:12]

I think this morning we have two important ideas. One is choice. And what is the realm we're making choice in? The realm of ingredients. I don't know if you would have picked that out as the two important points for this morning. But I'll try to explain or say something about what I mean after lunch. If you'd like. Unless your, whatever you say, your discussion leads me in another direction.

[58:13]

And I am easily led. Thank you very much.

[58:17]

@Transcribed_UNK
@Text_v005
@Score_75.37