Good morning. So today we're going to start our study based on Hakuin's Commentary on the five ranks Before I start Can everybody hear me? Now we can. This is the beginning of the third month of practice

[01:03]

period and we just finished our seven day Sashin and during Sashin, Sashin is very intense and our energy is intensely concentrated and after Sashin, there's a day off, personal day, even though there's no person, impersonal day, and then our energy kind of disperses. We feel a kind of let down maybe or change, it's a change. The weather's changing, sometimes it's a little bit hot or clear and then sometimes it's raining, we don't know quite what it's going to be and we've been here for two months so we get a little bit out of tune maybe and

[02:09]

then we start to feel tired, a little sick, these things start happening. So far, practice period has been relatively free of sickness and people have been up mostly for it so that's been very nice. I don't know if that's a record or not but now there's a little bit of falling off and someone, a magician, I'll name him, once wrote down on the, what is it called? Tenken, tired. No, rest. Oh, rest, rest, which no one has ever written that before. There was another one on there that said, don't feel like it. So anarchy is starting to, now one person writes rest and then someone sees it and oh, and then someone else writes rest and pretty soon it becomes a kind of fad, this is how fads begin, so we want to be careful that we don't start a rest fad.

[03:33]

We go to bed pretty early, we get up pretty early and we work pretty hard all day and sleep is one of the deprivations that we often feel. But we have work day when we get up later, we go to bed earlier, and we have personal day where we get up and we can rest. You can sleep all day if you want to, so it's not like we don't have space for rejuvenation, we do. But I'm not totally opposed to rest. I'm not totally opposed to that. I would rather that we take a morning of rest if we have to, rather than get sick or fake it.

[04:38]

You don't have to say, oh, I'm sick, so you feel an excuse to have to take some time off for some reason or another. I think it's good if we have a little bit of a buffer, rather than people getting sick. This is a radical idea, but a little flexibility I think is okay, but if we take advantage of that or misuse it, then it kind of destroys the whole idea. So I would like us to be careful with ourselves. If we need to take a little time called rest, I think it's okay as long as it's within reason, reasonable, and not an indulgence or I don't feel like it or something like that.

[05:44]

If you can't keep your eyes open and you're tired and you're falling all over the place, lay down. But you know what I'm saying. So within reason, I think it's okay to, rather than saying I'm sick, which is an excuse, just say tired, or no, rest, for a period, or something like that. I think that's better. To just be honest about it, you know, I'm tired, I need a little bit of rest. I like that better. Because otherwise, we feel that we have to get sick. And I'd like us to stay pretty much healthy and keep up our energy. Does that sound okay? You can do whatever you like. Within reason. It's very hot in here. And once the doors are open, we'll get used to it. The breeze blowing through the empty hall.

[06:55]

Thanks, everybody, for getting over here. Hi. Thank you. Thank you.

[08:11]

Thank you. practices today. So, in the Rinzai school, there are two studies that are the end of the koan system. One is the precept, which is interesting. Because they usually think of precepts as what you study when you start to practice. But they use the koan, the precepts as the end of study. And also, Hakuin recommends the five ranks as the end of study. Whereas some people think the five ranks are just, you know, a beginner's model for practice, which it is. Hakuin thinks of it as the deepest model for study.

[09:48]

So, within the Zen school, you have many different divergent attitudes and ways of thinking about practice, which is very nice. We should have different ways, even though our way is the best. Okay, so, I'm using a different, I'm using the original, so my page numbers are not your page numbers. And so, I'll try and find your number. If somebody can… Page 89. 89. 89. Okay. So, this is called, this was printed in Zen Dust, which is an out-of-print, wonderful out-of-print text. And it's called, The Five Ranks of the Apparent and the Real.

[11:07]

So, this translation uses the terms apparent for the phenomenal side, and the real for the noumenal side. Right? The orally transmitted secret teachings of the monk who lived on Mount To, that's Tozan, because Zan is mountain. So, the teachers were known by the name of their mountain, often. Tozan is Dungshan, same thing, Liangjie. Tozan Ryokai. But Tozan is his mountain name, the monk who lived on Mount To. So, he says, this is Hakuin, we do not know by whom the Jewel Mirror Samadhi was composed. From Sekito Osho, Yakusan Osho, and Ungan Osho.

[12:14]

So, you're familiar with these names, right? It was transmitted from master to master and handed down within the secret room. Secret room is like the transmitted. Secret is a funny word. Private, I think, is better. Not exactly secret, it's like intimate. When two people get together and act intimately, it's kind of secret, but it's not secret, it's intimate, private. So, it has that feeling. So, it was transmitted from master to master and handed down within the secret room.

[13:20]

Never have its teachings been willingly disclosed until now. This is characteristic of Chinese and Japanese Zan, is that there are some things that are esoteric, that are not public, that are just handed down from one to another and kind of holding your cards to your chest. And Dharma transmission is kind of like that in the schools. This is something that happens between teacher and student, teacher and student, and it's not public. So, there are many things that are public now, everybody knows about, which were very secret before, but nobody knows that. They just think, well, this is a public property.

[14:21]

So, many things are coming out now, which before were very intimate, which are now in the public domain for everybody to chatter about, like the five ranks. Do you think that could be a source of the sort of corruption of true teaching? I'm thinking when Jesus would do a healing, he would say, go and tell no one. And it's like what you're saying, and then telling, it somehow becomes, I don't know, shallower or misunderstood, and then we start acting on that misunderstanding and everything goes haywire. Well, I think that's right, because you want to make sure that something gets done correctly, and with a vessel that understands, a vessel that can contain it. So, dharma transmission is like that, and transmitting these various things is like that.

[15:23]

You want to make sure that it's the right vessel who understands what is being transmitted, and is not just kind of broadcasting it helter-skelter, but using it, in a way, as a source, teaching. You know, it's very interesting, because Suzuki Roshi almost never taught us anything that was a doctrine, or something that was like this. He knew all this, but he didn't talk about it, he just spoke, using this as a source, he just spoke in a very plain, ordinary, everyday language. But when you study what he was talking about, and the way he taught, you trace it back, and you can trace it back to all these teachings. So, in that sense, I think that it's not like one keeps it for themselves, but one has the source, and they use it, and transmit it in their own way.

[16:31]

So, every teacher transmits something in their own way, which is a more intimate way, actually, between the teacher and the student, rather than something in between. So, this is one of the problems with the Five Ranks, is that, originally, it was a transmission document, and when you have transmission from teacher to disciple, there are, in our school, three transmission documents. And... So, those are things that you study, or copy out?

[17:34]

And there are things which the student copies out, and then they study. And this is like, it's private, you don't show those documents around, but they're the source of your teaching. What are those three documents? What are those three documents? Well, there's the Kechamiyaku, which is what you receive when you have lay ordination. You already know what that is. That's one of them. And the other one is called Daiji, which means the great matter, and is a map of practice. And then there's the Shisho, which is the main transmission document, and it's a circular document which includes all the ancestors and how they relate to each other.

[18:43]

It's not so esoteric, but it's a special thing, you know. As a matter of fact, you can look up the Shisho, there's a book called Dogen's Formative Years in China, a book called Dogen's Formative Years in China, and it has a copy of Dogen's Shisho, and it talks a little bit about it. So, there's the Kechamiyaku, the Daiji, the Shisho, but we no longer include the five ranks? No, it's not included as a transmission document. It was at one time, though. It was at one time, but the problem is that it became too intellectualized, and Hakuin talks about that here.

[19:48]

People used it too much, there were a lot of entanglements, and it became a kind of misunderstood, complicated thing. And the reason that Dogen kind of rejected it was because, as Suzuki Roshi says, Dogen wanted something much simpler, like the monk asked the teacher, where do you go where you can escape from cold and heat? And the teacher said, when it's cold, let the cold kill you. When it's hot, let the heat kill you. This is kind of teaching that Dogen liked, very simple, direct. Dogen wouldn't be so into air conditioning?

[20:53]

We don't know. He probably wouldn't. He'd probably get a cold. No, I don't think he would be. That's right. China, when he was in China, and Japan in the summertime, it's very hot, so he got used to that. If you live in Arizona as an Indian, you don't mind the heat, but if you live there as a liquor store salesman, you turn on the air conditioning. So, I think Dogen was probably used to the heat. Be one with the pain in your legs. Let the pain in your legs kill you. What do we do with the pain in our legs? So, I'm going to read this again, because I could just spend the whole time on this one paragraph.

[22:00]

I don't want to do that, but it just keeps getting more interesting. We don't know by whom the Jeweled Mirror Samadhi was composed. So, we say it was composed by maybe Sekito. Sekito actually is credited with the Sandokai. And the Sandokai has all the elements, or most of the elements, of the Hokyo Zamai. And the Hokyo Zamai is a more elaborated version of the Sandokai. And if you read Suzuki Roshi's lectures on the Sandokai, called Branching Streams Flow Out of the Dark, you get a very good understanding of the Hokyo Zamai. For some reason, I didn't lecture on Branching Streams, because I talked about it before a lot.

[23:04]

I hadn't talked about it, but it directly segues into this. Anyway, so from Sekito, who was a disciple of the Sixth Ancestor, and Yakusan, who was Ungo's teacher, and Ungo, who was Tozan's teacher, it was transmitted from master to master and handed down in a secret room. So, even though we say that Tozan composed it, he says he's not sure where it comes from. Never have its teachings been willingly disclosed until now. After it had been transmitted from Tozan Osho, he made clear the gradations of the five ranks within it, and composed a verse for each rank, in order to bring out the main principle of Buddhism. Surely the five ranks is a torch on the midnight road, a ferry boat at the riverside, where one has lost one's way. The nice thing about Hakuin is he's very dramatic. And he uses this kind of dramatic, he's a lot like Dogen, actually.

[24:07]

They both use the same kind of language. And actually, Hakuin liked Dogen, even though he didn't like Soto Zen. But alas! The Zen gardens of recent times are desolate and barren. So this is the time of decline of the Soto Rinzai school in Japan, and, of course, also the Soto school. Directly pointing to the ultimate, Zen is regarded as nothing but benightedness and foolishness. And that supreme treasure of the Mahayana, the jewel mirror Samadhi's five ranks of the apparent and the real, is considered to be only the old and broken vessel of an antiquated house, meaning the Soto school. So there's always been this rivalry between the Soto school and the Rinzai school. And Hakuin is always criticizing the Rinzai school, Soto school, for just sitting around on the cushion.

[25:13]

Lounging around. So no one pays any attention to it. Today's students are like blind men who have thrown away their staffs, calling them useless baggage. Of themselves, they stumble and fall into the mud of heterodox views and cannot get out until death overtakes them. They never know that the five ranks is the ship that carries them across the poisonous sea surrounding the rank of the real, the precious wheel that demolishes the impregnable prison house of the two voids. So, he talks about, he uses this term, they stumble into the mud of heterodox views and cannot get out until death overtakes them and they never know that the five ranks is the ship that carries them across the poisonous sea. This is a kind of quote from the Platform Sutra of the Sixth Ancestor. One of my favorite poems by the Sixth Ancestor is about what a teacher of the Dharma should be like.

[26:25]

I'm going to read it because I really like it a lot. This is my own edition. I edited it myself and I like it better this way. He says, at the end, this stanza is for the Sudden School. It is also called the Big Ship of Dharma for Sailing Across the Ocean of Existence. I've always liked that and I often use it myself. The Big Ship of Dharma for Sailing Across the Ocean of Existence. This is a diversion, I know. Maybe I shouldn't read it. One who is a master of the Buddha Dharma and has realized their essence of mind may be likened to the bright sun in an empty sky. Bright sun is like Vairochana. That's what Vairochana means.

[27:27]

It's like brightness, light. Such a one teaches nothing, and this is the position of Vairochana, actually. Vairochana is the essence. It's like the sun Buddha and the Buddha of infinite light. Such a one teaches nothing but the Dharma for realizing our self-nature, which is their purpose for being in this world. They don't have any other purpose for being in the world. And to make people aware of erroneous views. We can hardly classify realization of the Dharma into sudden and gradual. Remember that? Some will attain enlightenment more quickly than others. This way of realizing the essence of mind is above the comprehension of the ignorant. Ignorant means those who ignore it. We may explain it in 10,000 ways, but all those explanations may be traced back to the one principle.

[28:31]

In order to illuminate the dark dwelling place of the afflictions, we should constantly set up wisdom. Erroneous views keep us in devilement, while right views remove us from it. When we are in a position to let go of both of them, both right and wrong views, our mind is then pure. Purity means non-dual. Bodhi is imminent in our essence of mind. And to attempt to look for it elsewhere is erroneous. Within our impure mind, the pure mind is to be found. And once our mind is set right, we are free from defilements, evil karma, and karmic retribution. If we are treading the path of enlightenment, we need not be worried by stumbling blocks. Provided that we keep a constant eye on our own faults, we will not go astray from the right path. Since every species of life has its own way of salvation,

[29:36]

they will not interfere with or be antagonistic to one another. Therefore, if we leave our own path and seek some other way of salvation, we shall not find it. And if we plot on until death overtakes us, we shall find only regret in the end. That's another quote that Hogwan uses here. If you wish to find the true way, right action will lead it to you directly. But if you do not make effort in the way, you will grope in the dark and never find it. One who treads the path in earnest sees not the faults of the world. If we find fault with others, we ourselves are in the wrong. When others are in the wrong, we should ignore it. For it is wrong for us to find fault. By letting go of the habit of fault-finding, we cut off a source of defilement. When neither hatred nor love disturb our mind, serenely we sleep. Those who intend to be the teachers of others should themselves be skilled in the various expedients which lead others to enlightenment. When the disciple is free from all doubts,

[30:39]

it indicates that their essence of mind has been found. The pure land of Buddha is in this world, within which enlightenment is to be sought. To seek enlightenment by separating from this world is as absurd as to search for the horns of a rabbit. Right views are called transcendental. Erroneous views are called worldly. When all views, right or erroneous, are let go of, then the essence of bodhi appears. This stanza is for the sudden school. It is also called the big ship of dharma for sailing across the ocean of existence. Kalpa after kalpa, a person may be under delusion, but once enlightened, it takes but a moment to realize Buddhahood. So, um, Hakuin says, Of themselves, they stumble and fall into the mud of heterotox views and they cannot get out until death overtakes them. They never know that the five ranks is the ship that carries them across the poisonous sea

[31:41]

surrounding the rank of the real, the precious wheel that demolishes the impregnable prison house of the two voids. What are the two voids? Huh? Well, yes. Two voids are atman, void, the two things that are void are atman and dharmas. Atman means self, and dharmas means things. Dharma? Dharma, dharma and dharmas. Dharma is a word that means the law or the truth or the reality. Dharmas, with a small d, means those things that the law is about. It's spelled the same, but it's a small d? Yes. So, the dharma is about the dharmas. Right? It's about things.

[32:41]

Dharmas, in a wide sense, means things. The differentiated things. The phenomenal? Phenomenal side, basically. But, specifically, it means the psychic, physical constituents, psycho-physical constituents that make up what we call the person. Those are the dharmas. Kushala, akushala and neutral. Wholesome dharmas, unwholesome dharmas and neutral dharmas. Like all feelings, emotions and so forth. Thoughts, feelings and emotions are the dharmas, specifically, that we're concerned with. So, he says,

[33:49]

So, They do not know the important road of progressive practice. So, progressive practice is what Hakuin is interested in. It's Rinzai Zen. Soto Zen is not interested in progressive practice. But, there is always progress. Anyway. They are not versed in the secret meaning within this teaching. Therefore, they sink into the stagnant water of Shravakahood or Prachekabuddhahood. They fall into the black pit of withered sprouts and decayed seeds. Even the hand of Buddha would find it difficult to save them. So, Shravakas are followers of Buddha who listen to the dharma. And, Prachekabuddhas are someone who has realization

[34:53]

but doesn't transmit it. Stephen, the other day, said that, he was reading from Shengyin, he said that a person could be a realized Buddha without having to follow up with practice. Is that right? That's what he said. Yeah. So, this could be a Prachekabuddha. So, one who has enlightenment but doesn't practice or doesn't follow up with practice. This is the kind of Buddha that's always criticized. I wonder if we could back up just a second. I'm still not clear on the prison house of the two voids. Yes. Is it attachment to self and attachment to dharmas? Attachment to self and attachment to dharmas. Okay, and then, what would be this poisonous sea surrounding the real? Is that sort of like

[35:54]

birth and death, creation and delusion? Yeah, right. The poisonous sea surrounding the real is like, it's just a kind of picture. It also sounds like attachment to the, to others. It's attachment, attachment to samsara. Yeah. I was going to say, the poisonous sea surrounding the real would be like your body, in a sense, that your karmic condition at this moment could be kind of the poisonous sea surrounding the real. What do you mean, body? The human body, the form. That's the result of causes and conditions. Thought about by karma. Can you separate that from the mind? No, I can't.

[36:59]

So it's, I think that, you're just talking about, you know, did you ever see a, a Bosch painting, a random Bosch painting? That's the sea that he's talking about. I can't hear, I really can't hear you. He's, What? He said when he, Tea? Extremes of eternalism and nihilism. Oh, extremes of eternalism and nihilism. Yeah, that's, those, eternalism and nihilism, those are two extremes. That's not what the two words are.

[38:00]

It could be, but, eternalism is, what's a good question? That's a good question. I always thought of it as Atman and dharmas, self and ego, self and dharmas, which are devoid of any permanent nature. I don't know. Could be. Could be. But, rather than speculate on that, I think I'd rather go on. So this is Hakuin's presentation. That into which, he starts talking about himself, that into which I was initiated,

[39:09]

40 years ago, in the room of Shouju, that's his, Shouju Rojin, is his teacher. I shall now dispense, as the almsgiving of dharma, when I find a superior person, who is studying the true, and profound teaching, and has experienced the great death, I shall give the secret transmission, to that person, since it was not designed, for those of medium and lesser ability, take heed, and do not treat it lightly. There's a koan, in the Blukiv record, case 41, does a person, who has died the great death, come back to life again? So, this is a kind of term used, in Zen sometimes, to die the great death. And then, in order to, really come back to life. This is also true, in Christianity, isn't it? To be,

[40:09]

born again, we have born again Buddhists. Could be. I don't know about that. Oh, resurrection. Well, now we get into, maybe, resurrection. It's the death of the old man. St. Paul's old man. It's the death of St. Paul's old man. In other words, the death of the person itself. No, it's not the death of the person itself. That's right. Of the personal. Yeah. The death of the ego. I mean, the death of the, you know, of the baggage. The death of the baggage. So that, yeah, the loosening of the luggage. Letting go of the, the luggage. Oh.

[41:11]

Yes. What about, if there's one who died the great death, come back to life again. Well, it's a koan. So I'm not going to, I'm not going to. I understand that, but I wondered if it was one of the koans where the style, where like a student asks a question and the teacher. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Is there an answer given in that, in that koan? Well, the koan never gives you an answer. That's fine. Okay. That's the, the full koan is, the full koan is simply to ask the question. Yeah. Okay. I have to, I have to, you know, present the koan in order to get the full thing, but this is just like the gist of the koan. This is the gist of the koan. Um, uh, I, so then he says, how vast is the expanse of the sea of the doctrine? How many fold are the gates of the teaching? This is like, the third bodhisattva vow,

[42:18]

um, and has experienced, and has experienced the great death. I don't know. I'm sorry. Among those, among these, to be sure, are a number of doctrines and orally transmitted secret teachings. Yet, never have I seen anything to equal the perversion of the five ranks. The carping criticism, the tortuous explanations, the adding of branch to branch, the piling up of entanglement upon entanglement. The truth is that the teachers who are guilty of this do not know for what principle the five ranks was instituted. Hence, they confuse and bewilder their students to the point that even a Shariputra or an Ananda would find it difficult to judge correctly. So, he's, he really comes down on people. Is he criticizing the five ranks? No, no, no. Criticizing the perversion of the five ranks? The perversion, of course. He's upholding the five ranks. Or could it be

[43:22]

that our ancestors delivered themselves of these absurdities in order to harass their posterity unnecessarily? For a long time I wondered about this. But, when I came to end of the room of Shouju, the rhinoceros of my previous doubt suddenly fell down dead. Do not look with suspicion upon the five ranks saying that it is not the directly transmitted oral teaching of the Tozan line. You should know that it was only after he completed his investigation of Tozan's verses that Shouju, Hakuin's teacher, gave his acknowledgement to the five ranks. After I had entered Shouju's room and received the transmission from him, I was quite satisfied. But, though I was satisfied, I still regretted that all teachers had not yet clearly explained the meaning of the reciprocal interpenetration of the apparent

[44:22]

and the real. Do you understand what that is? The reciprocal interpenetration of the apparent and real is what we've been studying all along. The interpenetration the interpenetration of two things. So, we're talking about that spot where they come together and there's wholeness. Yeah. Not the apparent, not the real. Apparent and real together. The interpenetration. The interpenetration. That's one of the five ranks? No, that's the essence. That's what it's about. So, I still regretted that all teachers had not yet clearly explained the meaning of the reciprocal interpenetration of the apparent and the real.

[45:22]

They seemed to have discarded the words reciprocal interpenetration, which is what it's all about, and paid no attention whatsoever to them. So, I wished to hand it on to others. I was ashamed to squeeze out my old woman's stinking milk and soil the monk's mouth with it. What he means is feeding his children. That's his, that's his, you know, his self-deprecation. He's saying, you know, like I'm ashamed of myself for, you know, squeezing, for feeding them this stuff that's poison, you know. So, is the idea that now that he's writing this, he has an understanding? No, what he's saying is even though I have the understanding, I'm still hesitant to, because I don't know how I can do this. You know, I don't know if what I'm going to feed them is really,

[46:22]

yeah, if I can really express it to them. Yes? That's right. He doesn't want to make a mistake. He doesn't want to do what the other people have been doing. Right. Right. What? Form is emptiness and emptiness is form. Say what? Yeah. No separation. That's right. So, all of you who wish to plumb this deep source must make the investigation in secret with your entire body. I don't think secret

[47:25]

is the right word. I think what it means is by yourself. All of you who wish to plumb this deep source must make the investigation by yourself with your entire body. My own toil has extended over these 30 years. Do not take this to be an easy task. Even if you should happen to break up the family and scatter the household, do not consider this enough. You must vow to pass through, I think that means to become a monk. You must vow to pass through seven or eight or even nine thickets of brambles. And when you have passed through the thickets of brambles do not consider this to be enough. Vow to investigate the secret teachings of the five ranks to the end. So he really pushes people. For the past eight or nine years or more I have been trying to incite all of you who boil your daily gruel over the same fire with me to study this great matter

[48:25]

thoroughly. But more often than not you have taken it to be the doctrine of another house, the Soto school, and remained indifferent to it. Only a few among you have attained understanding of it. How deeply this grieves me. Have you never heard the gates of Dharma are manifold? I vow to enter them all. How much more should this be true for the main principle of Buddhism and the essential road of Sanzen? Sanzen can be construed as either Dokusan or Zazen. Dogen uses the term Sanzen in the Fukunzen to mean Zazen. But in Rinzai school it means Dokusan. So here is the first teaching.

[49:26]

The first teaching. Soju Ro Shoju Rojin has said In order to provide a means whereby students might directly experience the four wisdoms, the patriarchs in their compassion and with their skill devised the expedients, first instituted the five ranks. What are the so-called four wisdoms? They are the great perfect mirror wisdom, the universal nature wisdom, the marvelous observing wisdom and the perfecting of action wisdom. Now, this is something that I will present to you as how that relates to the five ranks. Followers of the way, even though you may have pursued your studies in the threefold learning, which is discipline or precepts,

[50:28]

meditation and study, continuously through many kalpas, if you have not directly experienced the four wisdoms, you are not permitted to call yourselves children of Buddha, true children of Buddha. Followers of the way, if your investigation has been correct and complete, at the moment you smash open the dark cave of the eighth or alaya consciousness, the precious light of the great mirror wisdom instantly shines forth, but strange to say the light of the great perfect mirror wisdom is black, like lacquer. This is what is called the mark of the apparent within the real. Okay, so we've come to the first rank, but sometimes the two are reversed, the two first ones are reversed. So he's talking about the first and then he talks about the alaya consciousness. So he's brought in three elements here, four elements. One is the five ranks, the four

[51:29]

wisdoms, and without saying so, the eight levels of consciousness, and which also, and added to this, are the three bodies, dharmakaya, sambhogaya, and namaya. So all of these fit together, or correspond to each other. So what I want to present to you is how these four categories all correspond to each other, and that's a little complex, but I'll have to lay it out for you. So that's what I'm about to do now. I just want to, I can do it without my plan,

[52:31]

but I'll, I don't know what it says in there. Yeah. Now I'm going to go ahead it out for you. And I'm going you sit down I'm going to have you down and I'm going to sit down on my sit on my lap and I'm

[53:32]

on and I'm going sit Okay, so over here, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40,

[54:39]

41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 70, And then, he talks about the four wisdoms, I'll sit down and try to do all this, so this is the mirror, these two, this one is equality, you know, he calls it footnotes, and I believe this is action, action, activity, that's the highest, so this is dharmakaya, and this

[56:27]

is sambhoga, and this is dharmakaya, and this is sambhoga, so this is page 77, so this is sambhoga, and then this is dharmakaya, and this is dharmakaya, and this is dharmakaya, There are eight consciousnesses, if you have, oh there are actually nine, Avala, Siddhartha,

[57:56]

um awaya mana mono and five sections Okay. Alaya. Good. Here.

[58:58]

I may put it. Mana. Ah. So there we. Okay. Here we have the five rank five positions. And then we have the five. The four wisdoms which correspond to. Which were. Yeah. This is wisdom mirror equality.

[60:00]

Observing an action. Those are five wisdoms for wisdom. And the first two are both these are the mirror together. Because they're just opposites. And. Dharmakaya is. Corresponds to. Mirror with them. Sambhogakaya. Corresponds to equality. And. These observing. Correspond to that. I'll explain that later. And Amala is.

[61:01]

Cheetah. Cheetah. Cheetah. It's like Dharmakaya. It's like consciousness which covers everything. Cheetah is used in different ways. Sometimes cheetah means something very specific. Sometimes it means something very general. As far as consciousness goes. A specific. Sometimes it's used in a specific way and sometimes in a general way. But in a general way it's like the ninth consciousness. Which is. Ninth consciousness which is Dharmakaya. Corresponds to Dharmakaya. Because Dharmakaya has no special shape or form. That's the big consciousness. The big consciousness. Divides itself into eight parts. In order to form human beings. Can you see Amala and the cheetah and the alaya all basically one thing that corresponds to Dharmakaya?

[62:09]

I'll just write it down. I'm not explaining it all now. I'm just kind of giving you some hints. So. Alaya corresponds to this. Manas corresponds to this. Madana or Vijnana corresponds to this. And the five sense consciousness corresponds to that. So these are correspondences. That's all I'm giving you now. I'm not explaining it. I'm really sorry. I can't tell what you're saying this and that are. I understand. It's great. Could you say them in numbers? One, two, three, four or five? We'll have something available that people can copy from. Yes. I do have a sheep that has this on it. But it's not Xerox. Do you have a sheep with Xerox on it? Yeah, I do. Could you just remind us of the five sense consciousnesses.

[63:14]

There's a mind consciousness that corresponds to that. That's mano. That's mano. And manas is the one that sometimes is referred to as ego. Yes. And alaya is storehouse. That's right. I'm confused about the ninth consciousness. It doesn't really correspond to the wisdom, does it? No. This is like the source. So it does not correspond to anything here. Directly. Amala is the background. In other words, amala is like, you can think of it in different ways. One way you can think of it is like the screen on which the movie is played. Suzuki Yoshi gave this talk about,

[64:19]

our life is like a movie played out on the screen, the empty screen. So without the screen, there's no movie. But when you look at the screen, there's nothing on it. So you can't really describe the screen because there's nothing to describe. But when you project the movie on the screen, then actually the screen is functioning and the movie is functioning. This is the inner penetration of form and emptiness. You can't have one without the other. But the other way of looking at amala is that amala is dharmakaya. And dharmakaya is the matrix of phenomena.

[65:20]

Everything comes out of dharmakaya. All the forms are forms of dharmakaya, even though you can't describe dharmakaya. So, dharmakaya is characterized by Vairochana, the pure dharmakaya Buddha, right? Vairochana Buddha, pure dharmakaya, which is same as amala, in a way. And pure means non-dual. In the introduction to Zen Mind Beginner's Mind, Suzuki Roshi says, people think that Zen is difficult.

[66:23]

And it is, but it's not difficult because of the pain in your legs. It's difficult because it's hard to maintain the understanding of non-duality, the purity of non-duality. Pure means non-dual. They don't understand what the meaning of pure practice is. Pure practice means non-duality. So, that's kind of what we're studying. The alaya and the amala go together, is that? Alaya? They go together to form the dharmakaya? No. Dharmakaya? Listen carefully. Amala is not involved here. Got it. Listen. I think that maybe pure practice is more like working without guilt,

[67:29]

rather than working with guilt. Pure practice is not... There is no such thing. There's no such thing. Pure practice means non-discrimination on the basis of ego. It's simply Buddhist practice. There's no such thing. As what? Non-duality. Well, non-duality means the oneness of the two-ness, and the two-ness of the one-ness. So, if you only stick to two, that's delusion. If you only stick to subject and object, that's delusion. That's impure. So, two are one, and one is two.

[68:31]

So, we say, not one, not two. Okay. So... This is the gist of what he's talking about. So, you're familiar with dharmakaya and sambhogakaya and nirmanakaya, right? Dharmakaya is your essential nature. That's what dharmakaya is. Dharmakaya is your essential nature, and it's very personal to you. We think of dharmakaya as the great sky out there. It's very personal to you. It's your essential nature.

[69:32]

Sambhogakaya is your non-dual wisdom. Nirmanakaya is your presence right here in this body and mind. As Buddha. Nirmanakaya is the Buddha who walks and talks. That's what... And so, if you read the sutras, it looks like dharmakaya is some big thing out there, and nirmanakaya is the reward body, you know. And nirmanakaya is Buddha. But dharmakaya, sambhogakaya, nirmanakaya are you. If we don't see it as ourself, it's just a bunch of baloney. That's why people say, well, I read the sutras. You know, it's boring, or it's like I don't get it, or it's too hard, or, you know.

[70:38]

The sutras are about you. Not about, you know, some... But the way it's all presented, you know, it sometimes looks like it's about something out there. But it's really about you. All the koans are about you. Yes? Which one? Sambhogakaya is your wisdom. Your non-dual wisdom. Manjushri. Manjushri? You are Manjushri, yes. Manjushri is your non-dual wisdom. That's right. Samantabhadra is your shining practice. The shining practice, Bodhisattva, is what we used to say. And I can't believe that we've eliminated that. In favor of... Great activity. Great activity. So pedestrian. The innumerable Shakyamuni Buddhas all over the world is what we used to say, originally.

[71:49]

That's what the original says. The innumerable Shakyamuni Buddhas all over... That means you yourself are Shakyamuni Buddha. Your practice is Shakyamuni. You represent, or, you know, you are the Shakyamuni Buddha. So it's all about you. All of that stuff is about you. And your practice. That's why we say it. It kind of makes it hard to get rid of the ego. It's all about me. Well, I mean, it's all about your practice. Koans. So... When we look at the five ranks, right, the first rank, according to Hakuin, is... Let's see the terms he uses.

[72:54]

Let's see. Well, it's... The real and the... The rank of the real and the... What? The real... And the seeming. No? The real and the... The apparent and the real. Okay. So... The first rank is... The apparent hidden within the real. There's a potential within the real. But the real, which is this black, is what's... This is emptiness. Right? So... And the... The next one is... The real hidden within... The apparent. So this means, like, everything is...

[74:03]

This is the apparent right here. Right? Everything is apparent. The light side. And the light is shining on everything and reveals all of us. When the light goes out, it doesn't reveal us, right? So that's the first rank. The light is out. Everything is black, like lacquer. That's what I'm talking about. The next rank is when you're in the kitchen chopping vegetables. Or sitting here looking at this. So these are the two sides. Form is emptiness. Emptiness is form. That which is form is emptiness. That which is emptiness is form. Those are the... So these are two... These two balance each other. This is the two sides of how things... of how the... the... apparent and the real inter-convert with each other. Sometimes one is apparent

[75:05]

and sometimes the other is apparent. When we're sitting Zazen, it's this one. When we're going to work, it's this one. That's why I have this arrow. Because these two are connected. So when you look at the five-flavored herbs, the five-pointed thunderbolt, it's written out like this. One, two, three, four, five. Right? And these two are those two. And then you have the coming from within the real. The coming from within the real. That's the third one. The black dot in the middle is the real. That's this one.

[76:06]

So, you know, of the first two, either one by themselves would be ignorance or truth. That's right. And that's exactly what Haakon's talking about. But if you will talk about... Here. What's an image? All those. Form is form and emptiness is emptiness. Yes. Well, I really am kind of drawing a blank on all of this. If there's a... I mean, on the first page. If there's a mirror, let's say the condition of the two mirrors. This is to see if a phenomenon is within you. Right. This is to see if a phenomenon is not apart from you. This is to see things just the way it is.

[77:14]

Just the way it is. Without distortion. OK. So you're not there in a sense. You're seeing as though you are here. It's like two mirrors looking at each other. Well, you can't see me. I can't see how that is dark. I can't see how that is dark. Right. Darkness doesn't mean within the dark there is light, but don't see it as light. Within the light there is darkness, but don't take it as light. So, just be patient. Because all I... In order to explain all that, it'll all become clear as we study. OK? I hope. But anyway, I don't want to go any further,

[78:20]

because otherwise... otherwise we'd get bogged down. So I don't want to get bogged down. I'm just presenting this as a layout now. And as we study it, it'll all start coming together. We haven't really started yet. So, it's 10.30. What do you think? Do you want to continue or do you want to go to Zazen? Continue. Zazen. We'll keep going. Well, let's go to Zazen. Let's stop. And it'll be... Next time we'll just start with Hakuin's teaching. I know Zen students

[79:24]

don't like to study much. I'm going to kill you.

[79:29]

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