Thank you for being here to translate. You're welcome. And thank you, each of you, for being... You look so different, so much hair. You don't have to translate that. That's just between us. And thank you, each of you, for being here. Thank you very much for being here. What we're trying to develop in the Dharma Sangha, in effect, is a shared mind, a mind that we... recognize in each other.

[01:05]

And that we discover for ourselves in zazen. And we get the feeling of how to... Stay with it in our ordinary, stay with this mind in our ordinary circumstances. And to stay with this mind with others. Even when others aren't in this mind. But with an assumption that this mind is present in everyone, even if they don't act from it.

[02:10]

Now, the statements I've just made are philosophically very controversial. Are they true? But first of all we have to have an agreement of what I mean by this mind. And I think because we're all practicing, we have some idea of the mind that we come to know through meditation and mindfulness practice.

[03:14]

I don't think we necessarily know it, familiar with it as well as we should be. I don't think we necessarily know this mind as well as we could or should. Well, should in what context? Should in the context of being able to understand and practice the Abhidharma. There's no should unless it's in some context. And the should here is the study of the Abhidharma. Now this for me is not a prologue day like we do in some seminars. And then we start the seminar when most people arrived tonight or tomorrow morning.

[04:33]

I'm beginning right now. And the ones who aren't here just miss something. The way it is. Yeah, and... Yeah. Yeah, it's always a problem for me. How do we do this practice as lay people together? I think the first thing I'd like to emphasize and say at least this has to be present which is a decision to study the Abhidharma. as the fundamental reality and as your fundamental reality.

[05:53]

Only with that decision can you really understand and practice the Abhidharma. So probably all of us, including me, are in the wrong place. We shouldn't be studying the Abhidharma. Because it means you have to make a decision that let's say simply the mind of Zazen is the closest we come to fundamental reality. And all other aspects of reality are secondary. Doesn't mean they're unimportant. Or the major part of our life even. But they're essentially a role we're playing.

[07:16]

They're not how we actually exist. But of course we invest in these roles as if they were how we actually exist. Because it's the way we develop psychologically. And now we practically survive with others and financially just survive. Now, if this is your fundamental reality, practical surviving, it's where you really invest your deepest feelings, your identity and so forth. And you're not going to change that.

[08:27]

Your relationships, your work, these are really equally important with practice or more important. Then you can't really practice the Abhidharma. then you can't really practice the Abhidharma. It's said that you have to drive a wedge between ordinary reality and fundamental reality if you're going to practice the Abhidharma. A wedge? Supposedly the Buddha... In the Theravada tradition, not in the Sarvastivada tradition, but in the Theravada tradition, they have what I consider a rather funny story. Is the Buddha, in order to teach the Abhidharma to the world, knew he couldn't teach it to ordinary people.

[09:43]

And the reason he couldn't teach it to ordinary people is they had to be able to sit without moving for three months. And not even our Eno can do that. So Abhidharma had to be presented to people who were able to sit for three months in one single unbroken session of study. So the story, I mean, these stories are like, you know, Mother Goose could do better. Mother Goose was a deva. Yeah, so he ascended to the deva world. Mother Goose, am I translating that correctly?

[10:55]

Mother Goose, yeah. How do you translate Mother Goose? Do you have Mother Goose in German? I just say Mother Goose in German. Mother Goose is the main fairy tale book in English. I don't know, it doesn't exist in German, maybe. The Brothers Grimm? Yeah, but we need a main figure, I think. Okay. I don't know, Mother Goose, is that written by the Grinns? It's not Beatrix Potter? No, Beatrix Potter is somewhere else. Harry Potter. There's Beatrix and Harry and Mother Goose. Anyway, don't worry about it. Mother Goose are children's fables. I forget that we don't have exactly the same culture. My daughter, Sophia, has looked all over America for Pippi Longstockings and she can't find her, only in Germany.

[12:00]

But in Basel, there was one whole band of Pippi Longstockings. During the fast night. Yeah. So, anyway. So he ascended to the deva world. And devas gathered from 10,000 world systems. Plus his mother who'd been reborn as a deva. It's good to always have this little psychological note. Yeah, that you really take over and teach your parents. So while they're sitting for three months in an uninterrupted session of studying the Abhidharma,

[13:11]

Every day the Buddha descends to the human realm to beg so he can sustain his body and eat. All you got here? Hi. Hi. So he would come down while they're all sitting up there for three months without moving. He would come down and walk around and beg and then go sit by the lake and eat. And Shariputra would join him. Then he would give Shariputra a synopsis of what he was teaching that day to the devas.

[14:39]

And then Shariputra would tell his 500 inner circle of disciples. And then the Buddha would go up and visit the 10,000 world systems, devas, while they're all sitting without moving, and give some more teachings. And through the devas and Shariputra's 500 disciples, we are now teaching the Abhidharma today. And it's said that when the Buddha taught Shariputra sitting by the lake it was as if the Buddha extended his hands and pointed to an ocean. I think this is a kind of wonderful image.

[16:00]

I mean, he's sitting by a lake, but pointing to an ocean. It's a little bit like we're sitting by the lake of our life, but do we realize we're really sitting by an ocean? Is it something like us sitting at the sea of our lives, but we can ask ourselves, do we notice, do we understand that we are actually sitting at the sea of our lives, or sitting next to a sea? Well, aside from, you know, the fable, fabulous, no, that's a bad pun, the fable, this fable of how the Buddha taught the Abhidharma.

[17:20]

And the need, well... Aside from this fable, there's some interesting points to the story. The Theravada, which is the only surviving so-called early Buddhist school, the other schools have disappeared. But the others, like the Sarvastavadins, they emphasized this was a teaching of the disciples and of the lineage. Which it pretty obviously is. Yeah. And from our practical point of view, it has to be. But even from the point of view of but also from the point of view of the teaching itself it's clearly a practical teaching for us human beings.

[18:47]

It attempts to be An articulate, comprehensive view of experienced reality. Es hat den Anspruch, eine ausgesprochene oder artikulierte, zusammenfassende, sichtweise view of experienced reality. Unsere erfahrenen Realität zu sein. An articulate, which it is, comprehensive, which it is, view of experienced reality. But for some reason the Theravadan school wanted to make it partially a revealed teaching or authenticated by a greater than human Buddha.

[20:08]

Yeah. Now, But there's a point here. In later Buddhism we would say that the teachings are taught by the Sambhogakaya body. In other words, the teachings don't come from our ordinary experience. Okay. So the teachings, let's say, trying to get ourselves ready for this, these three days, these three days.

[21:22]

is the teaching of our, let's call it, zazen body or zazen mind. Now I can only partially present, of course, in three days. I don't have three months and you're not able to sit that still, nor could I. But I could ask you to sit for three days and then I'd go in the kitchen and eat every now and then. Yeah, okay, but I won't do that. Okay. So since I can only present so much in three days and as this specific person, most of the avidharma you're going to have to discover for yourself in your ordinary activity.

[22:44]

Or rather in the contrast between Zazen mind and your ordinary activity. Now, if you're going to, in a sense, let Zazen mind teach you, then Zazen mind has to have a higher priority for you than your usual mind. And the desires and interests of your ordinary mind have to be secondary to your Zazen mind. And really, how you establish the continuity of the world is crucial. Do you establish the continuity of the world through your usual mind or do you establish its moment-by-moment discontinuity through your zazen mind?

[24:10]

Now, am I trying to make too high standards for us? I hope not. And I'm trying in a way to recreate now the feeling or conceptual background of how the teaching was originally given. What kind of background, sorry? How the teaching was originally given. Which was the sense that it had to be an unbroken continuity of a commitment to an entry into zazen mind Until everything you know is through Zazen mind.

[25:25]

So the Abhidharma is about how to do this and what happens when you achieve this. And it's said to be the comprehensive view of how the world exists by a fully enlightened person. So this teaching is not something you can add to your ordinary way of thinking.

[26:44]

It's a teaching you can only embody by giving up your ordinary way of thinking, changing your ordinary way of thinking. Is this true? Well, I would say in some ways it's not quite true. Yeah, we can learn a lot from the Abhidharma. Yeah, but if you're going to free yourself from suffering, And if you're going to be able to transmit this teaching, continue this teaching with others, then you have to find a way to fully embody it. Mm-hmm. And that your relationships with others are always based on this mind of the Abhidharma or Zazen mind.

[28:04]

Okay, so that's why we try to get together as a Sangha and kind of develop a common feel for this. As it's said, Buddha sat and had lunch by the ocean. Lunch. Brunch, maybe. by the lake with Shariputra, but he pointed to an ocean. Okay, so I'm sitting here with you, and each of you live by a lake, and I hope I'm pointing to an ocean Now let me... We should have a break pretty soon.

[29:21]

Let me say that Zazen mind is, I would call, a generated mind. Or a wisdom mind. It's a mind, as I've said very often, you're not born with. You're born with a mind of waking, dreaming and non-dreaming deep sleep.

[30:25]

And I would say that you're born into consciousness of which the main job is survival. And your parents teach you and your culture teaches you a cultural mind of survival. Survival not of enlightened mind, but survival of the body. So why would this mind that you create, Zazen mind, be the mind with which we can have a comprehensive view of experienced reality? Because I would say, just give us a simple framework, that this wisdom mind we generate through mindfulness and sitting practice

[31:42]

can only be generated mostly in terms of how we actually exist. So there's always this tension or contrast in Buddhism. Between how we think we exist and how we actually exist. And this distinction has to make sense to you. If it doesn't make sense to you and it's not your experience, you don't have the basis to study Buddhism thoroughly. And what makes the Buddhism really work is the thoroughness with which you practice it. So while we have these precious moments of being able to be together,

[32:58]

We together try to establish for the short time we have a mind rooted in how we actually exist individually and together. And we put other minds and attitudes aside for that time. This is taking refuge in Buddha, Dharma and Sangha. As much as possible we establish this Buddha mind As much as possible we establish this Buddha mind. We establish a mind, a Dharma mind, a Dharmic mind. And we establish this mind in the Sangha. And we take refuge nowhere else. And if we do that enough, finally the whole world is a Buddha field.

[34:16]

And that's surprisingly true. Even if the world is, as Philip Weyland says, going to hell in a handbasket. The basket you carry. I don't know where he's got the phrase from. He's going to hell in a handbasket. I guess we've created the basket, we're carrying it, and we're going to hell with it. But on the way, can we practice the Abhidharma?

[35:22]

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