I take it that many of you already know Hans-Jürgen Oschi. Shall I translate that? Yeah, I think most of you know already Hans Joachim. Roshi introduced him a little bit a couple of hours ago. Roshi introduced him a couple of hours ago. Roshi introduced him a couple of hours ago. So we came to a seminar in March. I think it was a practice week, and we did. And all I saw in the first place was a monk even taller than I was.

[01:01]

I am. And I like to look up to someone at least once in a while. So he was here a couple more times since then, including your session. After he had studied in France for a few years, and later had his own group in Munich or Göttingen for a while, he stopped practicing in 1989. After he had studied with Deshimaru for some years, he had his little own group, I think, in Göttingen and later in Munich.

[02:07]

Then he stopped completely practicing around 1939. And then exactly ten years later he showed up here. So I would like to welcome you into our little sangha. Thank you very much. The welcome was very friendly from the beginning, even when I first drove here to the farm and met Gisela there on the farm. Without knowing who Gisela was, I was immediately welcome here and have always felt comfortable since then. And when I drove up here again in the broad afternoon, The welcome here was very friendly already when I arrived here for the first time and when I met Gisela here and I didn't know who Gisela was, so I was welcomed very friendly.

[03:10]

Yes, and when I came back here on Friday, it was already something like going home, going to a place where I And when I came on Friday and drove up the hill here, it was somehow again like coming home here already. And I was looking forward and longing to sit in the Sendoh and to sit with all the people who would participate in the seminar. And today in the morning at Sazen and at the day show I had already settled in quite well with not having any life time.

[04:13]

And today during morning Sazen and during day show I already accommodated very well with the idea of having no life span, no life time. And I was very far away from continuity and individuality. And after Teisho, Roshi asked me whether I would like to tell something this evening. And very quickly I realized that I need something like a biography now. An autobiography. And also a biography of something like an inner process.

[05:16]

And I realized a certain resistance in me against this. In the sense that, what does it matter for what has been 20 years ago? But I also had the feeling that it might not necessarily deal with my own individuality or my history as an individual. But maybe that it might be already some kind of zen historical interest what happened here in Europe 20 years ago.

[06:27]

And for myself it was like this, that I, 1979 or 1980, relatively young, I was 21 at the time, came into contact with a group in Hamburg who called out to Deshimaru Roshi. And I myself came into contact in 1979 or 1980 when I was quite young, 20 or 21 years old. I came in contact with a group in Hamburg, which was connected to Deshimaru Oshii. And I didn't know anything about the background, but it was for the first time for me the possibility to really practice and not only to study and to read something. And step by step I learned more about this Master Deshimaru and what was happening in Europe.

[08:07]

And I can paint a cross picture of that, but many of you will know it anyway. And in many ways it was somehow a parallel development to the development in San Francisco and the United States. The main difference between the United States and Europe was that in Europe this process started 10 years later. Master Teshimaru came to Europe in 1976. And he taught in Europe for 15 years and died in 1982. And he wasn't in any way authorized to teach in Europe by a Japanese organization.

[09:28]

So that the whole development of the first 10 years Therefore, the development in the first 10 years was completely based on his ability to teach students. And the students who came when they were quite young, mainly, had no idea of Zen in Japan and of Japanese monastery traditions or rituals, etc. They didn't have any image about traditional Zen practice in Japan or about monastic life or whatsoever.

[10:53]

And Master Dishinaru put great importance on establishing no Japanese relations in Europe. And what Master Deshimaro emphasized very much was not to have Japanese kind of Japanese situation here in Europe. So the main thing in my understanding was to have the quintessence of Zen practice. That means sasen practice as core, as the base of everything. Nevertheless, it was then hardly to be avoided that on the one hand there was also a need of the students to perform rituals, to perform clothing arrangements and to perform ordinations.

[12:08]

Nevertheless, it seemed unavoidable, particularly because of the wishes of students that certain rituals, a certain way of dressing and also ordination was also started here in Europe. So by the end of the 70s and the start of the 80s, the Sangha around Master Deshimaro became quite big. And there were something like, I would call it, mass events, maybe one shouldn't call it like that, but there were hundreds of people at Sechins.

[13:13]

And during the lifetime of Master Teshimaru, Master Teshimaru was able to hold this big organization. And what happened after his death was heavily or was criticized from people outside the Sangha. And that's something I also heard here, but also in other places which are outside the Sangha of Master Deshimaru. So I'm not able to make any judgement about the historical accomplishment of Master Teshimaru. can only make him very deliberately responsible for what his students have developed after his death in the last 17 years as supposed consequences.

[14:47]

But on the other hand, I think one cannot make Master Teshimaru responsible for what his students did after his death in the last 17 years. So you can make them only conditional responsible? Partly responsible, yeah. Okay. In contrast to San Francisco, in Europe, Master Deshimaro didn't appoint any successor who could continue the teaching here in Europe. Insofar, the two or three years after his death, the Sangha immediately fell into groups that no longer communicated with each other.

[16:01]

So in these two or three years, the sangha separated in several groups which did not communicate with each other. And... Wie heute im Detail der Stand der Dinge ist, weiß ich gar nicht zu sagen. And what the state of affairs is today, I don't know exactly. Aber das ist also mehr so der äußere Rahmen, die Facts dazu. But that's more the outer frame, the facts of the outer frame? Für mich persönlich, auf meinem Weg, hat... For me personally it was quite a different story. I was never personally close to Master Teshimaru.

[17:14]

I was very young and the Sangha was very big. But I do not regret that from the hindsight. But it's more the feeling that that what I experienced in this time. So that was the amount of process or change I could deal with at that time. So looking back from the hindsight, I also feel that maybe the decisive element at that time was to meet someone who could open a possibility for me

[18:25]

That I could meet somebody who gave me the possibility to develop trust in my own potential. And when Master Deshimaro died in 1982, only after a few years it became clear to me step by step what that meant to me. And when I was here at the session, I said to Roshi, you can't practice with a dead master.

[19:58]

And when I was here at the Sesshin, I said to Roshi, you cannot practice with the dead master. And he answered, in a certain way, one can practice with the dead master. But my feeling is that there is a big difference whether you practice with your master for 10 or 15 years or only, as it was in my case, only for a short period of time. And in the process of further orientation during the 80s, I raised a certain question which came up for me. So when I remember it correctly, Master Togen says, So if you don't have the possibility to practice with an authentic master, you should quit practice completely.

[21:40]

So what can one do then? My experience was that I was able to look for years, but several times and very massively, But many times and very strongly. So I experienced my own practice as a way of, as a kind of failure, yes. And it was not the case that I was doubting the way.

[23:08]

But more that I thought maybe I'm not strong enough or maybe I'm not good enough to be in what is necessary for this way. And in the end this experience was so strong and so impressive. that at a certain point I no longer felt able to move and practice in any Buddhist context. At a certain point I felt unable to practice in any Buddhist context.

[24:28]

But what was clear during all this time was that my way was not at the end. But that I had to be patient and that I had to wait and that I had to endure. And I didn't know how long that will take. And now I am able to say that during the last one and a half year or during the last year, step by step a certain space opened. and I can for myself very carefully and very cautiously, I again could re-enter in a certain kind of public practice.

[25:56]

And when I came for the first time here in March and met Pekka Roshi for the first time, I thought it seems to be too simple. I participated in the session in May and then I stopped thinking it's too simple but I thought it's a great luck to be here Es ist mir bei dem Session schwer geworden.

[27:17]

Und ich habe erlebt, dass ich quasi durch das auch nochmal hindurch musste, was 10, 15 Jahre vorher diese Punkte ausgemacht hat, die ich als scheitern bezeichnet habe. So this machine was hard for me and I had to go through the difficulties which I named 15 years ago a certain kind of failure. But it was no repetition, it was somehow a transformation. And from outside it may look as if it took damn long, but for me it went quite quickly, this process.

[28:38]

And... Yeah. It's quite common for me to think about it. It took so long. But it's more or less arbitrary what I think about it. That's how long it lasted or how long it took. And this afternoon, when we talked about the heart of the practice, first in the group and then here afterwards, And this afternoon, when we talked about the Heart of Practice first in the group and then here in this room, I expressed myself in the group by saying that the core, the heart of my practice

[29:48]

is the zazen exercise, that is the posture, that is the core. When I said in the group the heart of practice, the core of practice is zazen, is posture, is zazen. But I know for myself that I But from my own experience, I know that I profited a lot from the three jewels which were talked about this afternoon, Buddha, Dharma and Sangha. And that sounds maybe too reduced, but I would say

[31:07]

that it is not really possible to estimate how much the effect is created here in this place by the presence of Roshi and by the presence of this Sangha for each of us. I think you cannot really estimate how strongly practice is influenced by the presence of Roshi and the presence of the Sangha which is practicing here.

[32:36]

And in this respect I would like to say that And insofar I would like to say, from my own way, I would like to emphasize how much one should estimate the possibility to come here and to practice here. And everybody understands that as long as he or she is here. And nevertheless one doesn't take so much with you.

[33:57]

That means we have to be determined. And we have to understand that we don't have much time. And that we have to develop clarity in our goals. And that we can have trust in what we experience here. And that we have to develop a kind of habit out of this confidence.

[35:26]

And that we have to nourish and to take care of this confidence. Thank you. Thank you very much. Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia. There is a great responsibility for us to achieve this goal.

[36:56]

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