I would like to hear something from each of your four small groups. Yes. I want you to be faster than Andrea. You got it. We need a little competition of this kind. What do I want to say? You're falling behind. We realized that this text confronts us with the unpredictability of life. Wir stellen uns vor, dass jetzt der nächste Satz so lauten könnte, und dann ist er doch ganz anders, sodass wir ihn gar nicht verstehen.

[01:00]

We assume the next sentence should be like this and this, but then we notice it's completely different, so that we don't understand. Und dann haben wir uns gefragt, wieso können wir nicht so offen durch das Leben gehen und das akzeptieren, was eben gerade auf uns zukommt? And then we were wondering why can we not just go open like this through life and accept whatever comes towards us. And we came to the idea that we don't want to be hurt anymore. That it is a blessing from us not to be hurt anymore. and we came up with the idea that we do not want to be hurt anymore and that this is one of our basic vows to not be hurt. And this is also the reason for our funny posture. But at the same time we need to accept ourselves as we are and start from there.

[02:10]

That's good. That's Buddhism in a nutshell. Now you just dissolve that in a glass of water and drink. And you get bigger or smaller. Your chest becomes more open. It's interesting that you said you don't want to be hurt anymore because it implies that part of our experience is growing up being hurt. I said this morning that we... A text like this gives us nothing unless we bring questions to it, real existential questions.

[03:23]

But it also helps to have some experience with koans and know what kind of questions to bring to it. The koan also tells you what kind of questions it's implicitly or underneath explicitly responding to. Of course, in the original, these are written in a kind of... I mean, as Chinese itself always tries to be poetic. So it's written in a beautiful, literate, poetic Chinese.

[04:25]

But to be translated into English or German, it gets kind of jerky sometimes. Yeah. Or more awkward English. Even the kind of discontinuity from line to line is even more pronounced in English. Yeah, and just before I forget, let me say that when you read a koan, generally it's good to skim some of it. If it's a long koan, I wouldn't skim the whole thing.

[05:51]

I'd skim the first page or two pages or something. If it's a long koan, just skim the first part, whatever holds your interest. And then you go back and you read really just maybe one phrase of a sentence. And you kind of let that sink in, you know, maybe for a few days. And I would say that even adept long-term practitioners understand really well, if at all, three or four cons.

[06:56]

Sorry to disappoint you. Maybe they understand pretty well 20 or 30 or 50. And can, you know, probably if they're, you know, practicing mature enough, can really deal with any koan, but they haven't necessarily worked with all the koans. And because they don't have a specific meaning, and often people say, oh, there's a secret meaning, you have to go to the lineage. They're a kind of hermeneutic insider understandings.

[07:59]

Particularly in... particularly in particular teaching lineages. And they do have a general framework of meaning, of course. Well, meaning isn't exactly the right word. A general framework in which they may precipitate recognitions or realizations or understandings. But since they are context-dependent, one of the things we're finding out reading this, They're different when you read them at a different point in your life.

[09:21]

So it's a very interesting form of literature. I mean, I don't know anything else quite like it in the world. But it's not like looking for a needle in a Chinese haystack. Do you have that expression, to hunt for a needle in a... Not in Chinese. Oh, I wouldn't have guessed that. Because surprisingly, somehow, the mind and, as I've said before, the mind view, intelligence of urban people, China and the Tang and Song dynasties is somehow very close to our own.

[10:23]

But most of you have read more poems from those periods than you've read from 14th century Germany or France. Ich nehme an, dass die meisten von euch mehr Gedichte schon aus dieser Zeit gelesen haben, als ihr Gedichte aus dem 14. Jahrhundert. Or 8th or 9th century. Well, I've read some English poetry. Some it's good, but anyway, yeah, okay, someone else. Okay. Thanks. What? Thank you. Okay. We were the English-speaking people. Yeah, I can imagine. You guess. So there was a lot of English.

[11:27]

Yeah. To start off with, there was a lot of English, and then... Well, I think the main thing people were wondering is how to enter, how to enter into co-ops. And there was stuff said about hints within them. Hints. What? Oh, sorry. The first thing we talked about was how to get into koans, how to find a connection to them. And then we talked about how there are hints in the koans. And one person talked about when we read it, the Quran through today as opposed to yesterday. The people's voices sounded different today.

[12:28]

The deeper people's voices. And one person pointed out that when we read the Quran again today compared to yesterday, that the voices sounded different. So today the voices sounded deeper while reading. That's an interesting observation. Yeah. And one person was talking about how, you know, if everything is, you know, like, present right now, why can't we see it? And was there a question? Mm-hmm. And we talked some about not really trying to figure the koan out, but just getting into the territory of the koan. And we talked about the Jushri psalm and the whole leaking thing and whether that, you know,

[13:32]

what that is exactly and the translation to whether that's negative. What conclusions did you come up with about leaking? Oh, well, we were talking about, some about, like, gathering in and letting go and that idea, and... Yeah, okay. Okay. So, good, thank you. Someone else? the question that we had, which practice allows the realization of the teaching, and we had

[15:12]

Then Dieter was asked how we would have come to such a question. And I don't think that was the case for anyone. But I found it interesting that the question itself, when it was asked, other things emerged from the Koran. So first of all, the question was, what kind of practice allows us to realize this teaching? And then Dieter asked in our group whether any one of us would have come up with this question, first of all. And that was not the case for any one of us. And then... But by this question being posed, different phrases within the koan arose for us and made sense in a different way. And one person clearly pointed out that

[16:29]

with thoughts, there's no way to deal with the koan, but there are certain images and formations, emotions that really are powerful. Yes, that came to me when we were talking about the Liken. We were also at some point in the conversation and we thought, yes, there are deep and sincere reasons why we practice. And one principle of practice, or perhaps a practice of all of us, is that we deal with the past very intensively, but also not only intellectually, but that we often really feel and feel the past.

[17:51]

And talking about leaking, we all have very deep reasons for practicing. And one of them is the confrontation with impermanence. And that... Not only in the way of thinking, but also on the level of perception, to really feel it, a kind of feeling that comes in through the door. Yeah, and it was not only confronting impermanence on a thought level, on a mental level, but really on an experiential level and impermanence having a feeling of really coming into the door, being present. And that through practice a different kind of nourishment can be felt. I would like to add that it is important to be able to allow pain, to feel the pain first.

[19:23]

And I would like to add that it's also very important to accept pain and first of all sense pain. And that a lot of times there's no way to protect oneself to be hurt. From being hurt, yeah. But practice and zazen provides us with a different way of dealing with that. So it's very different to go to a therapist and talk about everything

[20:40]

making the experience during Zazen to really be able to sit through everything and at the same time to not feel being left alone because the group is there. Thanks. Someone else? Yeah. I have experienced our group very close and very fruitful. I found our group to be very dense and very fruitful. yet we did not come up with a mutual conclusion, but the different views stood next to each other equally.

[22:08]

So I want to talk only about my experience. Okay. My practice has appeared. My practice has to be to go home and live everyday life and not lose mindfulness for even a second.

[23:32]

and also to accept when you lose mindfulness for many seconds. It will be joy to sense different seconds. It's true. But that's at least four people, so it must be four groups. Frank? I... Yeah, but add some. Okay. That's fine. Yeah, I will do it in English and German, maybe. Because, I mean, I like chords. I almost never read them. This is why you like them.

[24:41]

This is a comedy routine. People also ask me how I can like them when I don't read them. I mean, of course I read them. That's a cool one in itself. For me, maybe it's more the feeling that they exist. There's something in this vivid or alive lifestyle way there. And what I try is to live with them, to find a way to live with such a thing together. and to find myself in this living together with the koan, to find the questions then that arise out of this relationship, kind of friendship, strange friendship.

[25:51]

In German, I like koans very much, although I don't read them very often. And I read them, of course, because I haven't read any of them in a long time. And when I read them again, it was as if I were meeting an old friend again, a strange friend. And this coexistence is important because it creates a closeness or an encounter that then raises questions, or hints, or suggestions, or commonalities, or surprises, or just the unforeseen. I think I experience that with many things that are important to me and that I don't understand. I experience that with many things that are important to me and that I don't understand them. And that it's a way to deal with them, to live with them, to see what happens.

[26:59]

I added that I have experienced that things that are important for me that I don't understand them. And that I not try to understand them in the usual way but to live with them like with koans. Difficult things or important things or existential things. And so find a relationship with them and find myself and my questions in this relationship. And this is one of the biggest things I got from koans, that they show me a way to live. Thank you. Markus? What struck me was that each one of us

[28:10]

got stuck with a different point in the text. Thank you. Yes, and the others often said interesting things with their own words. And then I understood it a little better, I have to say. And others also pointed out interesting things in their words, and that helped me to understand that much better than I did from only reading it. What's the word I've used in the past? Paratactic. Is that right? Meaning things stand side by side without a relationship. And filmmakers use it as a technique. I think Eisenstein pioneered it by showing one situation and another situation that are unrelated but if you're watching it you immediately make a relationship.

[29:32]

But some of the, we could say that some of the skill of reading a koan is to let these things side by side without making a relationship. And even in each situation to allow things to be side by side without forcing a relationship. In an ordinary situation. Mm-hmm. Thank you, Marcus.

[30:48]

Dieter? What struck me in our group was that people started off with the notion that they wouldn't have come from themselves to the question of what allows what practice allows this to realize the teaching. But when they described how the quotation was failed with that question, it became very clear that they were moved by different phrases, points, which they have no...

[31:54]

intellectual or conceptual means to express, and there's a kind of gap between their being moved and their way of expression, between the sitting of the World Honored One and the Majesties saying something. So, the Buddha is clear that there is a gap between the movement and all needs. And out of that, being moved came came the question about the motivation of practice.

[32:57]

And it was said that that is also true. or to deal in a new way with suffering, and that on the background of accepting suffering and being in an existential situation, that from that background the teachings really speak much more. clearly or more felt than being in an ordinary situation, where you just deal with things conceptually. And from this touch, the question came up, what was the motivation for the practice? And one answer to that was the involuntary suffering. and to find a new companion, and that from this touch the teachings speak differently.

[34:14]

People from existential situations simply report that in this situation text stars really spoke to them in a completely different way than in normal situations. Thanks. I read the other day that a photo negative has more information in it, way more information in it, than you can get onto the paper when you print it. So if you're a person whose skill is printing photographs, you're chosen for a skill to bring out certain kinds of information which other people might not bring out of the so-called negative. Yeah, and this analogy applies to situations like this.

[35:17]

I mean, right now, there's much more information in this situation than I can... bring into myself or notice. Okay, now there's three ideas that are part of this Taoist Confucian, well, mostly Taoist Buddhist thinking. One is the middle, the source, and connectedness or one, some kind of unity, let's say. Now, if you practice in yourself with a sense of the middle or finding the source, or realizing the unity or connectedness, now those three approaches as practices, I may or may not talk about.

[36:51]

But all three of them are characterized by the word, I think it's like a cat, meow, meaning mysterious. Because even if we assume this is some kind of moment-by-moment unity, In other words, the dynamic of my attitude here is to feel there's a unity or potential connectedness. I can only know part of it. So even though I know more in a way by assuming connectedness than I would if I didn't assume connectedness, it's still going to be mysterious.

[38:16]

Okay. Now this is a very subtle idea. And it's rooted in not believing in God. I mean, let's take as a kind of sad and dangerous example. the President of the United States. Now, as I've often said recently, if I ask you who are the two most famous enlightened people in the world, it's His Holiness the Dalai Lama, we could say, and George Bush. And it shows the danger of enlightenment experiences. Phenomenologically, Christian conversion experiences, rebirth experiences, are very similar to enlightenment experiences. So Bush is a kind of, you know,

[39:43]

rich, stupid playboy. He drinks too much. And he drinks too much and his wife gets on his case and he has an enlightenment experience or rebirth experience. And he assumes it's an experience of oneness with God. So the conception he brings to it is this shows the connectedness with God. Now, if you don't believe in God, if you're in an atheistic tradition, you can't turn this experience of connectedness into a connection with God.

[41:01]

You turn it into a mystery because you can't fully experience it. So in whatever way you have realization experiences which tend to make everything clear, everything is in its place, Everything is as it is. However we talk about it, still there's an overarching quality of mystery. Peter? Or Elsa? One question I had was the discomfort I and not only me feel by reading a Quran.

[42:20]

It's very clear. It's because the text is so different from the usual things I read and so far from my normal experience. Let me think of a phrase I just read from Walter Benjamin. We modern people, we have to learn to get lost in the forest, to be able to be open for new experiences. So I guess the method of Koan is maybe to let us go lost in this territory. That means I... maybe I have something to do as to shut, to close the door and to come to a state of mind where this new experience can

[43:37]

In this context, I'm always thinking about your phrase this morning, what is in front of me and I can't see it. And my question is, why can't I see it? And does the koan help me to not only have no discomfort with the situation, but to accept it. And, well, sometimes I have the feeling as There is something in front of me, but it's, yeah, maybe it's the old fashion of trying to grasp it. It's the only way, and I don't know how to make this experience without grasping it. Yeah, thank you.

[44:45]

I understand. German, please. Yes, one of the questions that preoccupied me was why Pappi feels his discomfort when I read a choir. It's clear, it's all so strange. And yes, I don't understand it. And of course that releases the feeling of, well, somehow I don't understand it. And that made me think of a sentence by Walter Benjamin, who I recently read, who said, we should learn to get lost in the forest again, so to speak, to lose our orientation. in order to be open to new experiences, and this, in turn, confronted me with the sentence that Roger brought to me this morning, that what you want may be right in front of you, but you don't see it, and, well, sometimes you feel it or think you feel it, and you want to grasp it, and, of course, it is gone, and somehow this

[46:00]

Walter Benjamin is a long time presence in my life and his thinking has helped me a lot. Okay, so let me say a few things before we stop. Oh, yes, excuse me. Go ahead, please. I forgot. Almost forgot. We have plenty of time. There's no schedule. I have the authority to change the schedule. Thank you. I want to add on connectedness in regard to the core. in relation to the poem?

[47:05]

Apart from the fascinating metaphorical and poetic language. I was very moved by... By the connectedness of people who have lived a hundred years before myself. A thousand years. Yeah, a long time ago. It's amazing. What does modern mean? That there is nothing old-fashioned and nothing modern? And how modern, or what does that mean, modern?

[48:09]

There's no old-fashioned and no modern. Because it's still about the same questions that we are ourselves still holding. And when Frank spoke, I thought, the same goes for me with coins. I don't understand them, and I think I don't know any of them, but of course I do know some. And I feel like Frank already pointed out with koans, because I don't understand them, and I usually think I don't even know any, but of course I do know some, but this living with something that I do not understand. And what is this? Then I think, The Koan, the real Koan, is this phenomenon that we live and at some point no longer live. It is easy to say, but if I am honest and think of myself,

[49:13]

It's easy to say, but when I just think of myself, I can neither accept nor believe it. Every day lots of people die, and we ourselves, we will also die. That's almost obvious, but yet it's a riddle or a core. That's enough. Okay, yeah, I understand. Danke. You know, it says in this text here, even up till now, at the conclusion of the opening of the teaching hall.

[50:45]

Just before the poem. We strike the gavel on the sounding board, just like our Han, and we say, clearly observe the Dharma, etc. Now, I think we should do that at Crestone, at the end of the practice period. Because Crestone, when we open the practice period, is like ascending the seat. And when we end the practice period after three months, we can hit the thing and say, the Dharma of the Dharma King is thus. Which will refer to the three months of practice and teaching that just occurred. But it will also refer to the months of silence that follow the practice period.

[52:03]

How is that also practice? So we can say that The practice period is leaking. Now, if I have a perfect understanding here with each of you, I don't have to say anything. When I try to say something and I'm using words, I'm leaking. So one of the things this koan is saying, it's opening the book, right? It's starting the book. It's saying, you should know this entire book is leaking.

[53:09]

Manjushri speaking and saying, oh, this is the Dharma, that's leaking. Already it's a mistake. And Dogen says life is one continuous mistake. In this sense, yes. So maybe closing the door and sleeping It's the way to receive those of highest potential. You don't have to say anything to them. You tell them to practice mindfulness, to analyze things, to do yogic practice. This is okay. But it's a roundabout way. So it's a form of leaking.

[54:29]

So you should know it's a form of leaking, which means you look at it carefully and you yourself are completing it in its incompletion. Right now I'm leaking because I can't really say what I mean. I can only approximate what I mean. And then, if you want to have power, you have a teaching process, and you think the power of being... This is just sitting on a carved wooden seat sporting devil eyes. I love the image. There was some guy, he was kind of great, smart, pain in the ass. And he was, he'd been all over the world and he was had a whole bunch of fake names and, you know, he was, but he was interesting.

[55:37]

But he used to cause a problem all the time. He was just troublesome to have around. He used to come to Sukershi's lectures. He was actually real smart, but clearly a con man. A confidence man who gets your confidence, but it's not true. And I was sitting about where Peter is sitting here. And this guy was in the back, behind where you are, and he was doing something. I don't know what. I can't remember what now. And honest to God, no, honest to Buddha, suddenly I felt something pass over my head.

[57:06]

And Sukhiroshi's eyes were really like, whoa, and it was like a force field over my head. And this guy just went... Then he shut up, and he stood there, and he didn't know quite what had happened to him, and he got left. I'm trying, it was, no, you know. So in this culture, they assume that there is such a thing like sporting double eyes, the double whammy of Mammy Yoakum. We've got pop culture in here. In this culture, you assume that there is something like looking into the eyes of the devil. Wasn't it Nanny Yochan who had the double whammy? Yeah. I'm sorry. Paul and I are leaving you behind a little esoteric. Okay. So they say, you know, you don't try to attain this kind of power.

[58:24]

This is not the way to discover the situation. Okay, now, what are we talking about here? Okay, this koan is presenting the book, first of all. It's also presenting with a surprisingly, which I never noticed before in this way, surprisingly parallel riff with the opening of the Lotus Sutra. And it's also presenting the world. And the question you brought, that Atmar brought into the discussion today, What world do we live in where we can have some experience of this great intact potential?

[59:51]

If it's the case and if you're willing to entertain that it's the case And explore that it might be the case. How do we see the situation? Well, first of all, this whole thing of... If there had been someone there who could understand the multiplicity of meanings according to situations such as in the Sanskrit word Saindhava, what would have been the need for Manjushri to strike a beat? No, again. If there had been someone there. The multiplicity of meanings. Yeah.

[60:56]

Don't you have quotations? Oh, there we go. Okay. Okay. She went as fast as me. The multiplicity of meanings according to the situations. So it's pointing out, see the world as a multiplicity of meanings according to the situation. Okay, now this means to see the world as a context. Not a generalization, but always a specific context. And you can hear a lot of my teachings coming in here were like pause for the particular. To develop the yogic practice of seeing particulars and then an all-at-onceness and then particulars in the field.

[62:06]

Yeah, so to know it as a context. That's already a practice. And to know it as a context which is always unique. Yeah. Each moment is particular and not repeatable. And to know it as dynamically interdependent. Like chaos theory, the butterfly that causes a typhoon. Or if I do this, it could be measured on the other side of the planet, if you had enough sensitive instruments. We're not sensitive enough, but we can know that that's the case.

[63:18]

And fourth, so that's maybe three things, I guess. Unique context, unique and dynamically interdependent context. Which can be penetrated. Okay. And you're part of the context. Okay, and fourth, to know, have the double perception that whatever the situation is, it's simultaneously mind. So this koan is asking you to notice this. Now, this is already a fairly developed practice to get in the habitation, not just the habit, the habitation of this way to be in each context.

[64:45]

Habitation. Habitation, to live within. Ein Bewohnen. Ein Bewohnen, okay. Also, das zu bewohnen. It's like the word alive means the a part needs to live within living. So each context is alive to you. And then what do you bring to the context in addition to seeing it this way? What is the catalyst you bring to the situation? And in Chinese they have words that mean tap, strike, fasten. How do you fasten, attach? How do you take hold of the situation?

[66:06]

How do you strike the situation or tap it? We say a mother chick pecks in when the chick is pecking out. So when is each situation a pecking in and a pecking out? What do you bring to this situation? You bring the vow to realize with everyone. And you bring the view that this is a great intact or intacting, if there's no such word, potential.

[67:10]

That's a big part of the teaching of this koan. How we enter this book, how we enter the teaching, how we enter the world, The world which is simultaneously the potential of enlightenment. And also, historically, a way of bringing into Zen practice the vision of the Lotus Sutra. Oh, I'm two minutes late. But I can change the schedule.

[68:15]

Let's sit for a moment. We can change the schedule. I can't change it unless you all agree. We can change the schedule. I can't change it. Unless you all agree with me.

[68:33]

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