Okay, good evening everyone. Guten Abend. Guten Abend. I don't know why I chose this title, being a water buffalo. No, I guess it must have been on my mind at the time of when I was asked to do this lecture. I don't know exactly why, but I always enjoy my once a year talks here in Hamburg in this little room. So driving here from Kassel, I was just in Kassel doing a seminar. I, of course, wondered what I should say this evening.

[01:04]

So I said to Ulrike, what's the title? She said, Being a... I said, oh, my God. So I thought, you know, my feeling often is I should just give a nice, easy, kind of calming lecture. about the joys of sitting zazen sounds good actually but somehow I always feel I shouldn't there's a dimension to the teaching that's not so easy to access. So I think, well, maybe I should try to speak about this water buffalo and the ways it appears in the koans.

[02:12]

Now many of you will know the ten ox herding pictures. And this sweet little guy is looking for his ox or water buffalo. And eventually he, nowadays it should be a she, finds her water buffalo. And then she lets it go and she goes in to do some shopping in the marketplace. And then usually the last picture is a big empty circle. Which is good as a description of practice and the goal and kind of development of practice.

[03:34]

But a person practicing doesn't just live in the marketplace and doesn't just live in an empty circle. But you live with this water buffalo you've been looking for. So Nanchuan was famous for supposedly killing a cat. Intentionally. It wasn't by accident. If he did it. But in any case, Nanshan was one of the great teachers and this story of the way Nanshan talked about his water buffalo certainly brings, you can see the side of Nanshan that's not so obvious in the story about the cat.

[04:51]

He said, since I was young, I brought up a water buffalo. When I let it graze west of the valley, I didn't let it eat the water plants of that country. And when I let it graze east of the valley, I didn't let it eat the water plants in that country. Now it takes a little bit here and there, and you can't see it at all. Now, what could Nanchuan be talking about? What is this water buffalo that he's been bringing up?

[05:55]

Daowu and Yunyan were were brother monks, actual brother monks and Dharma brothers. And Da Wu was, at least it looks like from all the stories, a lot sharper than Yun Yan. And I think he was younger, and he kind of took care of his older brother. He was a little stupid. His older brother, it's interesting because they make a point in the stories of the kind of stupidity of Yunyan and yet he's my Dharma ancestor and the Dharma ancestor of Dungsan, the founder of the Dungsan school.

[07:06]

Nun, es ist wirklich interessant. Er war einfach nicht so gescheit und darauf wird immer hingewiesen. Und trotz allem ist er doch der Vorfahre von Dungschan, der Begründer unserer Richtung ist. But maybe Yunyan gives us all, at least me, some hope. Ja, vielleicht gibt er auf diese Weise, Yunyan, also uns oder wenigstens mir etwas Hoffnung. That somehow, if we take care of our water buffalo, we can carry the teaching in our way of being. Now, having a water buffalo might not be so different from having a teddy bear. There was a movie years ago when I was a kid called Harvey, and Jimmy Stewart had an invisible six-foot rabbit named Harvey.

[08:15]

And this whole movie was about how Jimmy Stewart took care of Harvey and people would never could see Harvey. They'd say, Harvey, would you sit over there and look for us? And by the end of the movie you loved Harvey even more than Jimmy Stewart. And... And I think Nunchon probably had some kind of Teddy Bear Harvey love affair going on with his water buffalo. Ja, und Nanjuan hatte wahrscheinlich wirklich so eine Art Liebesgeschichte laufen mit diesem Harvey Wasserbüffel.

[09:24]

So, Daowu's name, the characters for Daowu's name in Chinese means source knowledge. Nun, die Schriftzeichen für Daowu's name sind auf Chinesisch lauten die source knowledge. Source knowledge. So Dao and Yunyan left Yaoshan for some time, their teacher, and went to study with Nanchuan. Yes, Dao and Yunyan, so at some point they left their teacher Yaoshan and went to Dunchan. And when they came to meet him, Nanchuan said to Dao, what is your name? And Nanchuan said, what is your name?

[10:37]

And Daowu said, Daowu, source knowledge. And Nanchuan said to him, what about the source where knowledge doesn't reach? Now he didn't say, What about where knowledge doesn't reach, which already is a pretty subtle question? But he said, what about the source where knowledge doesn't reach? Now maybe, you know, you've got enough to do in Hamburg and with your regular life and whatever you're going to do after this lecture and you really don't want to worry about the source where knowledge doesn't reach.

[11:42]

Yes, you are probably busy enough with your life in Hamburg and what you will do after the lecture tonight. So you don't need to think about what the source is, where the knowledge is not enough. And, you know, if you feel that way, I completely understand it. That's how I felt before I knew I had to give this lecture. But if you sit Zazen a lot, if you meditate a lot in this joy and calm of Zazen, Nuances of experience and awareness that you couldn't describe to a friend usually begin to happen if you happen to be the kind of person who sits enough and sits with awareness. And you can't have a conversation about it with almost anyone.

[12:59]

And there's no language for it because knowledge and language don't reach to it, don't touch it. Well, only touch it if you speak language in a funny way. Now these stories are presented not just for people who already know the source where knowledge doesn't reach. It's presented for each of us who might meditate and find ourselves in a kind of funny territory or something and then suddenly Nanchuan's white buffalo might appear. Or the phrase, like a song, a phrase from a song that appears sometimes.

[14:02]

A phrase suddenly pops up in your zazen or during the day. What about the source where knowledge doesn't reach? So I'm giving you these phrases sort of not so that you try to understand them, but so that they float maybe a bit in your background mind and maybe they'll be like fish hooks waiting for a strange fish. That may swim through the conversation sometime. So Da Wu said, source knowledge or Daowu, and Nanchuan said, what about the source where knowledge doesn't reach?

[15:29]

And Daowu was quite sharp, said, only don't speak of it. Now there's a lot, you know, so Nanchuan's feeling is, hmm, Could he be that sharp? Could he take this the next step? What does he mean, where knowledge only don't speak of it? So he, later in the, day, I believe, that they arrived even, he walked by Daowu and Yunyan. And as he went by, he said, what about the source where knowledge doesn't reach?

[16:35]

If you speak of it, horns grow on your head. So, what about the source where knowledge doesn't reach? If you speak of it, horns grow on your head. How do you act in different kinds? And Da Wu walked away and went to the meditation hall. And Yun Yan Later in the day, he said to Son Nanshuan and said, why didn't my brother say anything?

[17:59]

Don't you know you should act in different kinds, said Nanshuan. And Yunyan said, what does that mean? And he said, oh, I have a headache this evening. I can't talk to you now. And then... Dawu, who had been overheard this conversation, so wanted his brother to say something pretty good that he was biting his finger, hoping he would do well, and he bit his finger so blood was coming out of his finger, worrying about his brother. So then Dao Wu, Yun Yan says to Dao Wu, what does Nanshuang mean?

[19:11]

He said he wouldn't answer me. And Yun Yan said, and Dao Wu said, sorry, Dao Wu said, geez, I have a headache too today. I'll talk to you later. Yun Yan said to Dao, why didn't Nanshuang say anything? Who said what? Yunyan asked Daowu what Nanchuan meant, and Daowu said he had a headache. Okay, well, the other guy had a headache, too. I'm getting headaches, too. See, this is how Yunyan was feeling. What are all these people talking about? They have headaches. But this is... an attempt to talk about this, and they were trying to talk about it among the three of them, so maybe Yunyan would understand.

[20:11]

Okay, now in the same, in the koans that refer to this water buffalo, it says the wonder, the wonder, of the body of subject and object. The wonder of the... This is even more peculiar than the other statement. The wonder of the body of subject and object. Maybe we should go to the movies or something. Okay, so, but this is what, you know, this is about this water buffalo, you know.

[21:13]

So I'm trying to give you a feeling for it. Because like Harvey, none of us can see the water buffalo. But I know the water buffalo is right here. You can feel very tender toward this water buffalo. So in this teaching from a sutra, which is also quoted in a koan, of the wonder of the body of subject and object, It says the entry is non-attachment. The emerging is subtlety. Now here's more of this talk, which you sort of have to really not try to understand, just sort of let be.

[22:22]

The entry is non-attachment. And the emerging is subtlety. Okay. Maybe you need a break. Okay. Hmm

[23:32]

Now, a bodhisattva is defined, I pointed out in Kassel, as one who has attained not just non-attachment, but the dharani of non-attachment. Now, The dharani of non-attachment and to practice non-attachment are two different things. To practice non-attachment would be to remind yourself to be non-attached, and when an opportunity comes up to not be attached, you find a way to feel free of attachment. Now, the Dharani of non-attachment would mean you realized a state of mind that in itself practices non-attachment.

[24:47]

You don't have to practice it. This means you can have states of mind where you feel greedy and attached. You can also have states of mind where you feel unattached or non-attached. Now, the dharani of non-attachment also would mean not only have you realized the state of mind of non-attachment, but your body remembers, has a constant memory of the state of non-attachment. And this arises through practice.

[25:48]

And to try to give you an example of what it might be like in ordinary circumstances, I suppose if a singer knew a note C or F or something, and her body just knew that note, that would be like having a Durrani of that note. And that note would just arise from the body in certain circumstances, or if you wanted to sing, or you could hear the sound and your body would resonate with another sound. It reminds me, the other day in Crestone, I was talking to Ulrike in Colorado, and I could hear my heart beating. But I wasn't sure, and so I felt my pulse.

[27:13]

And yes, it was my heart beating. And Ulrike said, well, I can hear my heart beating, too. And then we realized that somebody, a bunch of people were out in the mountains near us who have a kind of summer Indian camp and they're all beating a drum. And you couldn't hear them, but you could feel them and they were all beating according to their heartbeat. And their heartbeat happened to be very close to ours. So in that sense, as you begin to practice, you begin to hear or feel certain resonances in the world that aren't perceptual. Like there's a certain tone in this room which I can't, if I point it out or try to grasp it, I can't, but there's a certain tone in this room that we're all singing or our bodies are playing.

[28:37]

And that tone would be pretty close to what is meant by the phrase the wonder of the body of subject and object. Now, if you have your body, it looks like you have a body and I have a body. But when a sense of our separate bodies disappears and there's a feeling of a common body, that somehow we create by both being in the same space. Now, that's a specific experience that we all have, but we don't notice it very often. Das ist eine ganz spezifische Erfahrung, die wir alle machen, aber wir bemerken sie nicht sehr oft.

[30:08]

If you're feeling in love maybe or extremely relaxed, sometimes you can feel things as if they were in you or passing through you. To know this kind of experience as an everyday matter is the reality of adept practice. Now, it's said the entry is non-attachment. Or we can say the Dharani of non-attachment. You've begun to practice a state of mind or realize a state of mind where you really don't feel attached.

[31:14]

You actually, I mean, you care about the world and care about people, but at the same time, in a way, you don't care what happens. And you're not attached to any result or outcome. And your body feels extremely relaxed. You almost feel as if you're in the center of a bright circle. And this experience is sometimes in the koans described as a white ox on the open ground. Now, it's interesting that they call it an ox. Because on the one hand it's a kind of religious animal from India that, you know, can't be eaten.

[32:30]

And the Chinese didn't share that, but they had a feeling of this buffalo from India. But also to be an animal is to be in a kind of lower realm. So even in cultures where animals and humans aren't considered to be so different, animals are usually considered a lower incarnation if you believe in reincarnation. So when he says, horns grow on your head, if you speak of it, horns grow on your head, he means you become more of an animal. So it's very curious and instructive that this ox as a teaching device is both a falling into a lower realm and also represents the Dharmakaya or the realized body.

[34:03]

And as Nanchuan says, I took care of this, I brought up this water buffalo, but I didn't let it eat the water plants. It means he practiced, he disciplined himself, and yet at the same time indulged this water buffalo. And... And he said, now it takes a bit here and there and you hardly see it at all.

[35:07]

Even just before he died, a monk asked him, where will you go? And he said, if you want to see me, I'll be a water buffalo at the farmer down at the bottom of the hill. But if you come to see me, bring a blade of grass. So again, there's this same kind of idea of... somehow your true nature will continue and yet it needs to be indulged a little, be given at least one blade of grass. It needs to be, it's your true nature or Buddha nature and yet it still needs a blade of grass.

[36:11]

Now the teaching only don't speak of it that Dao Ru was so astute to come up with. means as you build a body of energy or a body of subtlety, if you speak of it directly or you lose it, If you do something too directly to, you lose it. You kind of have to take care of it. And maybe take care of it almost if it was like Harvey at your side.

[37:14]

Or a water buffalo that followed you around that no one could see. Now I hope none of you take this too literally and end up hospitalized. This is a kind of feeling of how you take care of subtlety. The entry is non-attachment. In other words, The body of subject and object or a more undivided way of perceiving won't occur if you have a mind of attachment of likes and dislikes. Okay, sorry. Okay. If you have a mind of likes and dislikes. Now, what is the quality of likes and dislikes? It's either this way or it's that way.

[38:23]

It's true or it's false. There's existence or there's non-existence. But there's a whole world of in-betweenness that doesn't fall into categories of likes and dislikes. And as long as your perceptions always move toward a like or a dislike, you can't see in-betweenness. So the entry is non-attachment. Or only don't speak of it means don't fall into the alternatives of like or dislike. When you don't fall into likes and dislikes, then The emerging is subtlety, it says.

[39:30]

It means that there's a subtle quality to the world that you can't interfere with but is present. And sometimes it grows horns and sometimes it needs a little grass. And sometimes you let it graze. But mostly you take care of it and it can't be seen. So this sensible ox becomes in the koans Not just your true nature that you're looking for, but your true nature that you live with and take care of. And that true nature emerges from a mind of non-attachment. From a mind that's free of likes and dislikes.

[40:57]

Again, sometimes you like things and sometimes you dislike things. That's natural. But also you know within that a mind free of likes and dislikes. Such a mind is very responsive and yet simultaneously unmovable. But it's not just a philosophical fact. Or it's not just an enlightenment experience that happens once. It's an experience you actually have to nourish. Sometimes it needs a little grass. Sometimes it grows very big horns. Anyway, you take care of the subtlety in your life, you know, is what this means, this water buffalo.

[42:08]

But it's so hard to talk about, as you can see right this evening, it's quite hard to talk about. So a teacher and disciple living together and other students begin to develop some kind of way, some way to talk about it. And different teachers had different ways. Baizhang said that there was a fox who used to come to his lectures. Nanshan felt he had this water buffalo. So he might say to a student, how do you take care of your water buffalo? And if you were Yunyan, you'd say, I don't have a water buffalo. If you were Dao Wu, you'd say, I only don't speak of it.

[43:21]

And to act in different kinds, why it's called the source creation or the source where knowledge doesn't reach, is because it acts in different kinds. If you take care of it, it animates or brings alive everything in your life, inanimate and inanimate. So I'll tell you one last little story about... Nanchuan asked about... had talked about this, acting in different kinds.

[44:38]

So standing in front of the monks' hall, Zhaozhou, his famous disciple, said, I don't ask about different, but what about kind? And this is one of those meaningless distinctions, you know. But this is a kind of playfulness, a loving playfulness between people trying to realize this deep mutual identity we share. So Nanchuan didn't say anything about the water buffalo. He just got down on all fours and started walking around. So Zhao Zhou kicked him.

[45:47]

He fell over. And then he went running into the infirmary, the monastery hospital, saying, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. So Nanshuan sent his attendant and said, what do you mean you're sorry? And Jaja said, I should have kicked him again. Now, I hope none of you kicked me at the break. But I hope I wanted to show you a little bit of this kind of interaction between practitioners in Zen to try to share something, this mutual identity of realization.

[46:47]

This water buffalo we all take care of. So that's why I thought tonight you should all be a water buffalo. Maybe next year I'll give a simple lecture about zazen and the joys of practice. Let's take a break of a little while, 10 or 15 minutes, and then if there's anybody left afterwards, we can have some discussion. Okay, thank you. All the people who want to ask questions left.

[48:07]

I have a question. I didn't quite understand what it means to act in different kind. Can you explain it once more? asking the relationship to practice in trying to... actually trying to attain a relatively stable state of mind? Well, it's hard to... Actually, it means to act in different kinds. But how to make that make sense, that's the question. You want to say that in German? The assumption here is that you're in a state of mind... Well, first of all, everything is unique.

[49:36]

One of the phrases in this we talked about in Kassel that relates to this is each meeting occurs only once in a lifetime. Now you can take a phrase like that and stay with it. Each meeting occurs only once in a lifetime. Or one moment, one meeting. Dogen speaks about something, the entire movement of each meeting, of each moment.

[51:06]

Again, I'm just trying to give you a sense here. He says, he means something like each thing is, has, how can I put it? There's a thrust or movement in each thing which is fully 100% of itself. So if each meeting occurs only once in a lifetime, everything is a different kind. There's nothing of the same kind. So when you act What's the assumption in this state of mind of free of likes and dislikes?

[52:11]

Is that when A happens, you don't necessarily have to respond with an explanation of A. When A happens you immediately do B. When B happens you immediately do E. When E happens you immediately do M or B or whatever. So there's a kind of a creativity in it which doesn't follow a logical explanation but follows from the energy of the situation. And I suppose it's most illustrated when you're having a good time with friends and you start fooling around. And you do something and then your friend does something you didn't expect at all and then pretty soon everybody's laughing.

[53:14]

There's a quality to life like that. And that's taking care of your water buffalo. It's not clear what you're doing, but at least you're taking care of the water buffalo. And when you say, if you feel an urge to speak, but you only don't speak of it, but you don't repress that feeling, then you do something else. So in such a person, there's an unpredictable aliveness. Such a person like Nanchuan is fully alive, but you never know quite what they're going to do.

[54:29]

Like that. Does that answer your question, Soda? Thank you. And, you know... Some of these things, and I'm talking about these things, you know, are genuinely not understandable. But they're realizable. It's like I said in a castle the other day, enlightenment or realization doesn't fall into any of the categories of the rest of the teachings. Because it's not an understanding. And it's not an experience. The simplest way we could say about it is a change of direction. In that sense, realization, we say, is a deep A deep turning around in the seat of being.

[55:47]

But to say enlightened doesn't make sense because it's in the past. He is enlightened, like he's in some fixed state of enlightenment. In English it would be much better to say he or she is enlightening. Because they're in the process in each situation of the situations enlightening them and they're enlightening the people around them and the situation and so forth. So it's like that fluidity of being able to change direction is always present. And you can feel yourself getting stuck and then you don't change direction and then you start feeling depressed or I've got so much to do, you know, like I feel all the time.

[56:58]

And then you say, oh, where's my water buffalo? He's wandered so far away. And then the water buffalo comes back and you start feeling quite free again. And then he comes back and you start feeling quite free again. So Ulrike herself has noticed that there's things she experiences in Zazen which she couldn't explain, but now she feels certain things that she couldn't have even told herself were possible before. So you have to leave yourself open to this kind of thing like to be a water buffalo. So when you go to Zazen next, if you're a meditator, just sort of see a water buffalo.

[58:08]

Sort of grazing in the big pasture inside you. And then become the water buffalo yourself. You're sitting there kind of munch on the grass and You know, I don't know what to say. I mean, in fact, I feel a little funny giving this lecture because it's such a traditional Zen lecture I just gave. And it's really... I don't know why I did it. I'm sorry. I apologize. But... It's really intended for monks who are studying koan. And I don't know what's possessed me tonight, I guess.

[59:08]

So I'd love it if you'd tell me that it was okay, a few words made sense or something like that. I do. My water buffalo needs a little support. So, as I said, all the people who left, who wanted to ask questions left, I can see. Anybody want to say something? You presumably all waited for some discussion. Yes. Does that make me most happy? The sound of your voice makes me happy. I already said that.

[60:10]

But it's just a way of having fun together to discuss something. It's a good phrase though, where knowledge doesn't reach. And it's a tradition of Zen to use phrases like that, which are words, and yet they say they're, they point to where there's no words. So if you walk around for a few days with a phrase where knowledge doesn't reach, if you're relaxed enough, free enough, Lucky enough, it may create a mind where knowledge doesn't reach.

[61:39]

And you'll begin to feel the in-betweenness of the world. Where knowledge doesn't reach. Anything? You want to tell us the story? Well, Sufi stories are often quite like Zen stories. There's a lot of similarity. And Rumi is, of course, at least I only know him in English translation, but he's the poet, I think, the only non-Buddhist poet I know who three quarters of what he writes about is

[62:58]

very, very similar to or could be Buddhist as well. He's a little more passionate than most Zen people sound. And Zen could use a little Rumi spirit, I think. Maybe... Rumi would say, instead of saying the entry is non-attachment, he'd say entry is being overcome by passion. It's actually nearly the same. In both cases you feel completely free. In both cases you feel completely free.

[64:03]

Off and on. Yes. To be overwhelmed by passion or to be non-attached, are those two different things which lead to the same? Or is it the same to be overcome by passion or to be non-attached? It's a question I wanted to ask myself, actually. Don't get yourself in trouble. Same, same, same, different, different, different.

[65:15]

Well, I feel you all have your water buffalo. So, thank you very much.

[65:24]

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