Every day, Zen, we like that phrase. It's an attractive phrase. And it gives us the feeling that, as I've said, that Zen is not in special circumstances. It's everywhere. And that it's in ordinary circumstances. not limited to church or Sundays or something like that. And that it implies that Zen is throughout the day or in every circumstance. And of course that means that this is also everyday Zen. I mean if Zen is everywhere, Or in ordinary circumstances, this is also ordinary circumstances.

[01:02]

But what turns ordinary circumstances? The Sixth Patriarch the legend is, was delivering firewood. He was selling firewood to support his mother, supposedly. And while he was delivering some firewood, he heard, let the mind flow freely, not dwelling on anything. Let the mind, just supposedly a young person delivering this firewood, and he heard somebody chanting from the Diamond Sutra. Let the mind flow freely, not dwelling on anything.

[02:14]

And he was, had some enlightenment experience hearing these words in completely everyday circumstances. And then he heard that this person who had been chanting from the Diamond Sutra had, I wish we actually could chant in the mornings. We recite the Diamond Sutra, everybody reading different places, just it's a nice mountain stream medley But we don't have enough copies. There's more available, but I can't get them here quick enough. Have Federal Express deliver them to the monastery. Unfortunately, Federal Express doesn't come to Cresto. Except once or twice a week from Colorado Springs or something. So, anyway, he heard from this guy, he was reciting the Diamond Sutra, that

[03:17]

He'd been practicing with Hung Jen, who was the so-called Fifth Patriarch. A lot of this is apocryphal, but this happens in life. This is true, even if the story's a little, you know, made up for political, unfortunately political, Buddhist reasons. Any case, so he went to the Fifth Patriarch's place and the Fifth Patriarch, as is not unlikely, recognized his potential and thought he should just be there in the most ordinary way. So he was chopping firewood and working in the kitchen, grinding rice in the back shed. But this is also, being at Hung Jeng Sangha monastery, is also ordinary circumstances. And many of you, you know, you're helping in the kitchen and some of you are chopping wood and some of you are delivering wood up to my back door there, front door, whatever door it is.

[04:31]

I thought maybe I should put a little tape recorder there that every time somebody puts down some wood They hear, let the mind flow freely. Not dwelling on anything. I don't know, maybe you'd all become enlightened. Maybe it wouldn't work, but, you know, it's worth a try. You'd be quite surprised, I'm sure. Put the wood down. Let the mind flow freely. Not dwelling on anything. We have to be sometimes, in everyday mind, in everyday circumstances, caught unawares. Hongji says, famous Zen teacher, says, the place of illumination is the clear dome, heavenly dome of autumn.

[05:35]

What's here, we got it right here. We couldn't have a more heavenly, clear dome. So, you know, don't miss your chance. It's everyday circumstances. And he says the mountain, the sound of the mountain stream, something like he says, carries the reflection of the moon. And we can, if it's not too windy, we can hear a nearby stream, which is also the stream that runs in our water pipes and toilets. He says, Hongzhi says, all Buddhas and ancestors, without exception, take refuge in the place where the three times cease, where past, present and future cease, and where the ten thousand changes are silent.

[06:44]

He says, observe the gleaming. Everything flows out, manifesting a single mind. So again, you can have this sense of, maybe you'll catch it, right in this particular situation, taking refuge and finding There's no age to anything. No history. We can start. I mean, you actually, if you want, within history and free of history, can re-speak, re-start your life right now. Internalize the language and make it your own and start speaking your life in a language that doesn't control you, but you now, that's your own possessions.

[07:58]

And that's what happened to the sixth patriarch when he heard, let your mind flow freely, not dwelling anywhere. So to take a phrase like this is very characteristic of Zen practice and what differentiates it really from all the other schools of Buddhism in India and China and Japan is this emphasis on taking a phrase and turning it. in your ordinary circumstances let the mind flow freely. So you could take this phrase and maybe at some point your mind hearing that phrase silently repeated would suddenly let loose its bonds stuck in this you know, mental space that our thoughts create.

[09:11]

Not dwelling on anything. This is also uncorrected mind or unfabricated mind, the basic posture of zazen. We sit here so still and for so long and, you know, following the schedule so that Everything is taken care of so if... So everything is an opportunity for your mind to suddenly to find out what, you know, to flow freely, to not be corrected, to not be fabricated. Zen Buddhism is called the teaching outside the scriptures.

[10:18]

And there's a number of reasons for that. And one is, you know, what are the circumstances in which the scriptures were realized, created, written down? And what is the Buddha's own life? His own life was ordinary circumstances of seeing a beggar, seeing a dying person. And, you know, after Sashin, this Sashin is the most classic Sashin of Zen, Japanese Zen at least, the Rohatsu Sashin that ends with Buddha's Enlightenment Day. And as you know, I hope you can all stay for, for me, part of the Sashin for the Buddha's Enlightenment Day ceremony we'll do after breakfast.

[11:21]

Always, some of you have other things more important than Buddha's Enlightenment. You have to leave. I can understand that. I have more important things in Buddhism than I do. But in any case, Atmar is leaving on the 10th, I believe. And he's going to, he's made a soda, Raksu, and going to take the precepts. So I'd like to do, if it's okay with you, Atmar, do the precept ceremony as part of Buddha's Enlightenment Day ceremony to put a little pressure on you. It's okay, good. And, uh, If anyone else wants to take the precepts, even if you don't have a Raksu, it's okay. You can either take them, you can either just be there and supporting Atmar, or you can, and the Buddha, or you can silently take the precepts with him, or some of you ask me, you can take the precepts personally.

[12:40]

Together in the ceremony. And there's some reason for doing it in the ceremony because it's part of the Enlightenment Day because it's considered in our lineage that the decision to take the precepts, the intuitive recognition of that, or the decision to just say, hey, what's going on with my life? and coming to something like, okay, I'll just do the precept, I'll just do this practice. When you make that decision, that's considered initial enlightenment. Though it may not be some big, glorious experience with colored lights, still, sort of jukebox enlightenment. It happens. But, the metanoia of an invisible, you can't see where it happened in time and space, an invisible moment that from then on your life is different.

[13:50]

That metanoia, that occurrence outside of ordinary time and space, but from then on your life has changed, is also, when unpacked and matured, is also enlightenment. So something like that happens when this expatriate hears, this young man hears. Let the mind flow freely, not dwelling on anything. Or Buddha, the historical Buddha sees a beggar or a dying person or a sick person. And something settles in you. It's waiting to settle. It's sometimes hung by a frayed thread, but we're always holding it up, keeping something from falling in us, from falling into the present, like you perhaps fall into love.

[15:00]

You know, yesterday I wasn't, it's kind of hard to make clear what I was trying to talk about yesterday, but this sense that in your sufferings, instead of just getting over it or getting around it or getting more skillful at zazen so it doesn't happen, In your sufferings you see the path and you see cessations and you see the subtle mind. Particularly suffering can lead you to see the subtle mind from which suffering arises and which can also transform suffering. And that subtle mind is what the patriarch... like an artesian well surfaced in him and his mind flowed freely without dwelling on anything. His mind flowed freely without dwelling on anything. The sutras were written in everyday circumstances.

[16:17]

Somebody sat at a desk, somebody went out walking and smiled at children, came in out of the rain, you know, and so forth. The source of the sutras has to be our everyday circumstances. John Wheeler was a quite famous physicist, says, The universe, the cosmos, the world doesn't exist without an observer. And from the point of view of Zen, I mean, there's no meaning to talk about anything without this mind being present. And you are this mind being, this present. You are really the world-honored one, honoring the world, and the world honors you. This is the Buddha position. And so also one reason Zen doesn't depend on any one sutra is because on the one hand we're listeners of the teachings, but realization occurs when you take the Buddha position, which is the Buddha is not the listener, he's the creator of sutras.

[17:39]

he or she, and he or she listens to everyday circumstances, discovers the sutras and the teachings in everyday circumstances. So it means also to discover that feeling where you really have such faith in yourself and in the situation that the sutras manifest from everyday circumstances. This is really the Research Institute in Consciousness and Awareness. Everyday circumstances, you know, we practice it here, we try to deepen our sense, we remind ourselves, we meet with others, which encourages us to practice with others. But every day, every circumstance is this Research Institute where sutras arise, where realization arise, where all Buddhas and ancestors, without exception, take refuge in everyday circumstances where, in the most fundamental sense, past, present and future cease and the 10,000 things, the 10,000 changes are silent.

[18:59]

So one reason, again, among the reasons why Zen is emphasized as having no particular sutra is because any particular sutra has a certain point of view or points of view, which means some points of view are left out. But in everyday circumstances, nothing is left out. Because it's the source of the sutras. So everyday circumstances are the main sutra of Zen practice. From which all other sutras, which we study, also arise. Now Juji's one-finger Zen is such an interesting koan. It's certainly one of the most classic koans. So I should tell you the story a little bit.

[20:11]

You know? Juju was a guy, a Zen adept of some sort, and he was living on Mount Kien Dung in a hermitage. And I want to call this place, this is called, this building, Zen does call it the Hall of the Bright Moon, but the whole place I... want to call Shoboan because I like the name and also because I was given a temple called Shoboan in Japan and I moved it to California and rebuilt it in the Sierras and some of you have seen it I believe and I gave it sold it to Gary Snyder and his new wife a few years ago because I never used it much Didn't have time to go there, but it's a beautiful little temple. And it's called Shoboan. So I want to transfer the name.

[21:15]

I feel that the name came with it. It was a temple outside of Kyoto originally. And so I want to bring that name here, Shoboan, which means true Dharma hermitage. Anyway, he lived in a hermitage on Chendai. And one day a nun came to see him. And she had the auspicious name of true reality. And she was a bit intimidating, this lady. And she came in to see him. And I don't know why she came, you know, but anyway. It was the custom then, before Federal Express and all, to travel around and visit places. And mature your practice. It was partly looking for a teacher, but mostly it was after realization, developing and maturing your practice. So she went in and she had a rain hat on and a staff.

[22:23]

And I have this formidable picture of her because When this koan was first presented to me, it was presented to me by Suzuki Roshi and Yamada Reiren Roshi. And Yamada Roshi, who was actually one of the teachers, too, of Deshimaru Roshi, was at that time the Bishop of Los Angeles, or the Bishop of America. And when he left and went back to Japan, they asked Suzuki Roshi to be the Bishop of America, Archbishop of America. And Sukershi said, no, I don't want to meet people at the airport. That's what archbishops have to do. But anyway, when I went back to, when I went back to, when I lived at a heiji, Yamada Revan Roshi was the kind of abbot above the abbot there. He was pretty old at that time. And in his 80s, hardly remembered me, I think.

[23:28]

Even though my first lineage papers in ordination go through Yamada Roshi, because Sukershi thought it would be the right thing to do, to have Yamada Roshi do. So he's my first teacher, in a sense. He was great, though. He used to come and do sesshins with us, and it was great to practice with him. He was a scholar, very smart and very solid guy. But at a heiji, during the services, he would come down and sit on a brocade cushion over the side. He was too old to do the bows and all, but he'd always be sitting there. It was quite wonderful. So Yamada Roshi was there for the Sashin and Yamada Roshi and Sukhi Roshi decided to act out this story. So Sukhi Roshi got, no Yamada Roshi, I don't remember who took which role.

[24:30]

I think Yamada Roshi, I actually don't remember now. I can see it, but I can't see... Yeah, I think Yamada Roshi took a zafu and he put the zafu on his head like it was a rain hat. And he was quite the big guy, as I said, for a Japanese person. And Suzuki Roshi was pretty frail for any person. And so Suzuki Roshi stood in the middle like he was Jiu-Jie. And he stood on the mat. And Madalushi put the zafu on his head. I don't remember how he balanced it, but he walked around Sukhya Rishi three times and said, I'll take off my hat if you can say something. Sukhya Rishi. So anyway, that's the story, isn't it?

[25:35]

this formidable nun named Shi Ji, true reality, came and visited poor Zhu Ji. He was trying to just have a quiet evening and circled his cushion three times and said, I'll take off my rain hat if you can say something. He didn't know what to say. So she, in her formidableness and compassion, circled him three more times, and each time asked, three times asked, say something. He was nonplussed. So she said, he said to her, well, it's getting late and dark. Why don't you spend the night? He was trying to do his best. And she said, if you can say something, I'll spend the night. He didn't know what to say. So she left. Afterwards, he felt quite humiliated, as you can imagine.

[26:38]

He said, I have the body of a man, but I don't have the spirit of a man. And this can happen. I mean, in a sense, I can remember 20 or so years ago, I was giving lectures in Green Gulch, and then afterwards we'd have discussion in the Wheelwright Center, and people were asking me questions. And there was a Chinese man who'd studied in Taiwan or someplace, and he was quite adept. And we'd begun to have a nice relationship. And he'd come to lectures and some seminar-type things. And he was clearly, you know, an adept person and a good practitioner. He was quite amazed to find a Westerner who was practicing. So he came to Greenhouse Lectures two or three times and once in the middle of this group of people asking me questions, he asked me a very straight, real question.

[27:43]

And I can't remember what the question was, but it was carried, as I've been talking about, you know, carried his presence with it. And it was like being struck by something, you know. And I recognized immediately, what a wonderful question. But I was actually quite startled. It was so different than what was happening. So instead of answering directly, I said, well, that was a real question. I'm very grateful to get a real question. And then I sort of answered it. He never came back. And I felt quite humiliated. I realized, you know, I just wasn't present. He could have been a little kinder and given me a second chance. He didn't ask three times. But anyway, these things happen. So, so anyway, Jiji was quite humiliated and he decided to put on his traveling gear and go and

[28:54]

visit teachers and study more but that night he had a dream which and in the dream it was conveyed that a great bodhisattva would come he should not leave and a great bodhisattva would come and teach him so he put away his gear and waited And you don't have to make this too magical. We all have dreams sometimes where the dream clearly suggests to us, don't do this or do this or wait, something will happen. So it was like that kind of dream. And when you are practicing, nothing is fantasy. I mean, imagination is real, and dreams are real experience. And you sleep often, and you may discover it in Sashin. You sleep often. in something that is a third state, that's neither waking nor sleeping. It's light and deep and refreshing all at the same time.

[30:04]

So he had this dream. So ten days later, this guy, Jianlong, Tenryu, showed up. So Zhu Ji very modestly, humbly, explained everything that happened and was so full of gratitude for this guy coming. I mean, the guy may have just been happened by, you know. But anyway, he came and he'd had this dream, so he had an aroused state of mind. And he told this guy everything and Qianlong, at the end of the story, simply raised one finger and pointed to him. And this caused Jiu-Jitsu to come to enlightenment. And I've practiced with this koan quite a bit with Suzuki Roshi and I've told the story a number of times and how they say

[31:23]

famous phrase is, Jiu-ji's one finger for 30 years, used for 30 years without exhausting its resources. And there's other stories, I won't tell you all. But anyway, but Tsukiyoshi knew I'd locked in on this story and he used his one finger and didn't exhaust its resources. over some time, I would find him. Anyway, but I'll tell you another story, which is there was a quite wonderful man who had practiced Zen for a long time, and he was one of the pioneers of Zen in America, but hadn't really fulfilled his practice, but he practiced and it actually, of course, he was quite developed by practicing.

[32:27]

But he came to, one time he came to Zen Center and he told me this story, Suzuki Roshi's He was in the hallway insecure. She pulled him aside for no reason. He came out from giving a lecture or a ceremony, I can't remember, and just suddenly took this man and took him into the hallway, which led to the restrooms beside the office, and pointed right at his forehead, like that, three times, and then turned and walked away. And this man said to me, I don't know what he did that for. But what's interesting, quite interesting, is when Sukhya Rishi was dying, this person came to see Sukhya Rishi. And it was a few weeks before Rishi died. Many people were coming to visit him. He went in and talked to Sukershi.

[33:32]

And Sukershi said to him, you know, I've had a wonderful life practicing here and being with everyone in America and I'm happy to die in America. Not Japan, he wanted to die in America. But he said, it's unfortunate I never realized enlightenment until now. What's interesting about this koan is it really is outside the scriptures. There's nothing in the story about the sutras. And Tenryu or Qianlong and Jiuji didn't, you know, they just raised one finger.

[34:37]

They used the everyday situation, whatever it was, pointing at the everyday situation, pointing at the one mind. The one finger changes, everything changes. Something arises, acts, kills and causes grief. Something rises and acts and realizes and causes societies to change. Of course, much Buddhist teaching is behind this raising one finger, but it's clearly outside the scriptures.

[35:40]

Just the finger is raised. And it uses the very structure of the mind-body itself. So it uses the situation, the immediate situation, and the mind-being observer, and how our habits work and what our tendencies are, how we look at things, our perceptual feels, all of it just through the one finger is reversed and the structure of mind-being itself realizes itself. So it's not using the sutras, it's using the very structure of how we exist in everyday circumstances. And those everyday circumstances and how you exist are your own treasure. You always are in possession of it. Thank you.

[36:39]

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