This podcast is offered by the San Francisco Zen Center on the web at www.sfzc.org. Our public programs are made possible by donations from people like you. Good morning, everyone, and happy Mother's Day to all the mothers. and grandmothers and mothers-to-be. Today, on this beautiful, beautiful spring day at Green Gulch, we'll be having, after this lecture, a ceremony that completes the the year-long or school year-long coming-of-age program, the completion ceremony for the young people who have been making an effort since September, I think, in this Green Gulch coming-of-age program, San Francisco Zen Center's coming-of-age program.

[01:22]

And this ceremony is a kind of initiation, not an intense initiation the way some other groups or tribes have. But still, it's an initiation. I'm not crying about this. Although I could and will later today. Those of you who have been to this ceremony, it's a tearjerker. It can be. My eyes water, so I'll be mopping during the lecture. So, as I said, it isn't a kind of intense initiation ceremony like other groups might have. But it has a meaning. I hope it will have meaning.

[02:27]

I know it has meaning for everyone who watches and everyone who speaks. The parents speak and the young people speak. Thinking about this program, my son was in the program years ago. He turns 28 this month, so at about your age he was in the program, and it was a two-year program. every other week. So we met with the group, a smaller group, I think there were seven young men and they met in San Francisco and they did a lot of different things over those two years and got to know each other really well. So my hope is that coming out of this year together, school year together, you will have a love of Green Gulch feel good when you come to Green Gulch and have a lifelong relationship with Green Gulch Farm and Zen Center, this land, and the people you've met here, as well as good relationships with each other, that you've made good friends, that you've learned about yourselves, learned about other people, learned about, you know, the program is coming of age, coming into maturity.

[03:51]

taking your place in this world. So this is, it's an initiation ceremony today, meaning just the beginning, really. It's an ending, but all endings are beginnings. So hopefully this is a beginning for you. All initiation ceremonies kind of worldwide have four The first is sequestering or setting oneself apart. And I think during this year, coming once a month, having the overnights, meeting together, not being able to use cell phones and all, coming to Green Gulch, setting yourselves apart for that time in a new way, in a quiet way. Also in this setting itself apart, there's teachings that are given and hopefully there are things you learned and more to learn and hopefully it whetted your appetite, learning more about yourself, what meditation is, how to take care of yourself and the world.

[05:09]

And also part of this initiation ceremonies is an ordeal. In some cultures, it's very strenuous, very difficult, very painful. And we didn't really have that aspect in our coming-of-age program. But maybe just making the commitment for these nine months has been an ordeal. What you've had to give up and what your parents have had to give up to get you here for your meetings. And also today, speaking for yourself and coming forward, the ceremony itself is a mini ordeal. Maybe. And the last element of the four elements, so there's sequestering, teaching, and learning, an ordeal. And the last is emergence, where you come forth as a new person and able to...

[06:12]

take your place in a new way and take responsibility in a new way. Like a butterfly that emerges from inside the cocoon. Inside the cocoon, it is an ordeal. Because what happens to that pupa, that larva, is that they kind of melt down into broth. They kind of disintegrate. And then these cells find each other again in a new way from this broth and then emerge as a new being, this butterfly. So these are the four elements of initiation and hopefully some of these elements are present for you and will be present as you take on more responsibility and have more ceremonies of initiation. So for Mother's Day, in Buddhism, in our teachings and in the sutras, there's the mind of a mother, or parental mind, the mind of mothers and fathers, is lauded, is held up as an example of the kind of mind

[07:41]

that a bodhisattva, or one who lives for the benefit of others, understands, just like it says in the Sutra of Meditation on Loving Kindness, even as a mother, at the risk of her life, watches over and protects her only child, so, with a boundless mind, should one cherish all living beings, suffusing love over the entire world. This is, in trying to explain or trying to pass on an understanding of what this mind is of loving kindness, the example that's used is the mind of a mother and... protecting and looking out for, watching over her only child. That kind of mind is the mind that we all need to enter to be able to suffuse, to cover the earth, to cover beings with our love, and I would say patience and generosity and joyful effort.

[09:05]

So this is one instance where the mind of a mother is brought forth as the example. And also our ancestor Dogen brings up equating what is a Buddha's mind, three minds. And this is also the mind that the head cook, who's cooking for the monastery and cooking food for the practitioners so that they can practice meditation and take care of one another in the earth. The mind, there's three minds that Dogen Zenji, this ancestor, suggests are the mind, like the mind of a Buddha. And the one is called Daishin. This mind, by the way, is... Mind-heart, the character for mind, is not like brain-mind, but heart-mind. The mind and heart together as one phenomena, one phenomena that can't be divided up into mind and heart, but mind-heart.

[10:21]

So there's three of these mind-hearts, The first is a joyful mind, ki-shin. And this is a mind that realizes how precious this human body is and finds joy not only when there's pleasurable things and fun things and things that we like, but also is in a quiet, joyful way willing to to walk through and learn from the difficult things, the things that don't go the way we want them, the failures. There's some joy in continuing to practice no matter what, knowing how precious this life is and that it's over in a blink. You know, thinking about my son in the coming-of-age program, and now he turns 28. This is, it's a blink. So this joyful mind that no matter what's happening finds joy in practice.

[11:30]

The other mind is, or the next of the three is great mind or daishin, great heart mind. And this great is a big, great magnanimous. Do you know the word magnanimous? It's got room for everyone. There's nobody left out. It doesn't matter if you like someone or dislike them. There's room in your heart for that person. You don't abandon anyone. And any person, any animal, any plant, the earth itself, the air and water and the biggest, widest heart, mind. is daishin, and there's love in that heart as well, heart-mind. The last of these three minds is called heart-minds, is roishin, and that's been translated, this character for ro can be translated as the mind of a grandmother, grandmotherly mind, or

[12:49]

the mind of a mother and father, or parental mind. And that's this mind that I mentioned before that's watching over, caring for, protecting, loving, would sacrifice. Sacrifice, and maybe you know people, maybe this is in your family where someone has really sacrificed to make a space for you to get you into the school you want to get into, to maybe move in order to be in a neighborhood where there's good schools, or a town where there's good schools. And I know people whose parents work two or three jobs in order that they might be educated. And this kind of, this is the Rosh and this really whatever it takes to care for a child or a being. But it comes from the mind of parents. and grandmothers and grandfathers that is aroused.

[13:53]

You can't make it happen necessarily, but it can be aroused and nurtured and discovered. So... So on Mother's Day, we honor our mothers and grandmothers. And this holiday, by the way, started from a woman in West Virginia in 1908. She wanted to honor her mother. And this woman, her name was Anna Jarvis. And she, during the Civil War, was a peace activist. And she... She took care, kind of as a nurse, she took care of soldiers who were wounded, but not one side or the other. She took care of both sides. Just wounded soldiers, didn't matter Confederacy or Union side, she took care of wounded soldiers.

[15:01]

And she wanted to start someday to honor her. mothers and it was in 1908 she did it just by herself and then the state of western virginia in 1910 designated that as a day and then in 1914 the president woodrow wilson proclaimed it a national holiday so it's as a hundred years ago right 1914 that we've been cooking breakfast for our mothers and honoring our mothers in some way. I found, this is something that I really got a kick out of, I found a little invitation to a brunch that my daughter cooked for me when she was about four. And there was a little menu for Mother's Day, and this was the menu. On the menu was toast, T-O-S-T, toast, yellow cheese,

[16:05]

And orange cheese. Butter. Water. I think that was breakfast. And I love that she had on the menu water. Which it should be on the menu. It shouldn't be just coming to the tables. You need to order it instead of it gets thrown away in this drought year. Anyway. I just got such a kick out of that yellow and orange jeans. So I wanted to just say about these three minds, mind hearts, joyful mind, magnanimous great big mind, and grandmother mind or parental mind. These are the minds that it takes to enter the bodhisattva mind or the mind of one who's dedicated, who takes up the practice of living for the benefit of beings.

[17:18]

And beings, you know, human beings of course, but beings in the widest sense, you know, this great earth, this being of this great earth and the plants and animals on this great earth So I wanted to tell a story of initiation that's in the Buddhist teaching from the Lotus Sutra. And this is a story that's a parable, meaning all the characters in the story are... They are who they are in the story, like a fairy tale, but also you can see it as a teaching, a teaching tale. So this story, I'm going to change it just a little bit for Mother's Day.

[18:21]

This is called, usually it's called The Poor Son, or The Destitute Son. And this is from a... or a teaching of the Buddha called the Lotus Sutra, or the Dharma flower of the lotus, the great vehicle Dharma flower, lotus flower. And this story, you can study it as an initiation story for a person. So I thought it was really perfect for the day. of this ceremony for you all, for the young people who are sitting in the front. So in the fourth chapter of the Lotus Sutra, and for those of you who don't know about the Lotus Sutra, it's seen or understood as a flowering kind of culmination, a further teaching

[19:28]

that's very, very wide, very inclusive, magnanimous in its scope. And everybody, whether they have been introduced to Buddhism or meditation or not, are included in the teaching of love, basically in the Lotus Sutra, loving care for everyone, and that everyone is... join together in one awakened heart, body, mind, whether they know it or not. And what flows from that is everyone is worthy of our respect, our attention, our care, and our love. And this is the Lotus Sutra. And that teaching then, you skillfully bring out that teaching. as someone who's practicing the Lotus Sutra.

[20:30]

So in Chapter 4, this was written thousands of years ago, this sutra, probably maybe 200 years B.C. or so, and it was added over time, up until after, about 100 A.D., So in this chapter four, four of these, they're called hearers. These were students of the Buddha who sat at the Buddha's feet and listened to the Buddha's teaching. And they followed a particular path. They were called hearers. And in Pali, it's shravakas, these particular... And they traveled a particular path and thought... that they could never be on the Buddha's path or the same as the Buddha. They thought they couldn't possibly enter the Buddha's way and they were satisfied to do what they did, their path.

[21:35]

And then the Lotus Sutra was being taught and they heard that they too, whether they knew it or not, were on the Buddha's path of wisdom and compassion for all beings. And they were... It says in the Lotus Sutra, they were ecstatic with joy. They jumped for joy. They danced for joy to think that they were Buddhist children, really, and on the Buddhist path. So these four students said, it's like this, and then they told this parable. This is the parable of the destitute, called the destitute son. And it's a kind of initiation for this person in the story, and for all of us, if we listen carefully to this story. So once upon a time, there was a family, and the young son, and could be a young daughter too, but in this story it was the young son,

[22:41]

We don't know why. It doesn't say why, but he ran away from home when he was really young. And maybe you know some people who've run away, tried to run away, and dissatisfied, unhappy, felt misunderstood, all the reasons why somebody would want to run away from home. And his mother tried to find him. and searched and searched and couldn't find him, and gave up. This was thousands of years ago, right? There was no, you know, electronic way of tracking or anything. He was gone, and she was very, very sad, never forgot this son, but couldn't find him. And he was always in her heart, like a hole in her heart, that her son was gone. She did very well in her, she was a businesswoman and had really good connections and she made, she became very well-to-do and had moved towns and moved into a great big house and she was very well thought of by the government

[24:06]

the king and queen of that country. She had servants. She had huge estates. She was just doing it monetarily very, very well. But in her heart, she was always very sad because her son, her only son, was gone. And she had lots of assistants and, you know, people working for her and friends and all. But, you know, this was... So a hole in her heart. Well, one day she was sitting out on her lion's throne, this very beautiful decorated throne with different servants around, and she noticed this very poor man. This was years and years later. In the sutra it says 50 years later, but a long time. And she noticed this kind of raggedy fellow He looked like he might be homeless or something, kind of peeking around on the grounds and looking in.

[25:13]

He had thought, well, maybe he was wandering. He had come upon this town and thought, well, maybe there's some work here. It looks like a pretty big estate. They'll probably hire me. So he was kind of coming around to see if there was some work. She, on her lion's throne... immediately recognized him, even though it had been years and years and years, and thought, that's my son. He's come home, you know. And she sent her assistant to go and get him and bring him. So her assistant goes, or it was a kind of, he might have been wearing some kind of uniform or something, and the son thought, oh my gosh, this security guard is coming, and they think I'm a some kind of a thief or something, or that I'm casing the joint, I'm going to steal something from the house, and they're going to arrest me. And he got very, very frightened and started to run away. And the security guard went after him, and he got so full of fear and anxiety that he fainted.

[26:19]

And he was kind of dragged into the lady of the house. And she immediately thought, oh, that was a mistake. I frightened the poor guy. So they sprinkled water all over him. Wake up, wake up. And he woke up and they said, oh no, I made a mistake. It's okay, you can go. Don't worry about it, you can go. He was so relieved. They're not gonna arrest me and throw me in jail, which he had been in over the years. He had really been like a vagrant, just hand to mouth, taking menial jobs wherever he could. just making ends meet. So he was so relieved. Oh, thank goodness. And he scooted away and went into the town to see what he could find there. He was free. Close call, he thought. So then the lady of the house, his mother, thought, okay, this is skillful means.

[27:23]

That didn't work. I made a big mistake. I shouldn't have come straight at him. Too strong. So she sent one of her gardeners, kind of dressed in overalls, and said, go and tell him. We've got some work for him. He looks like a strong fellow. We'll hire him. So the gardener came, and he wasn't afraid of the gardener, and the gardener said, we've got some work. Would you be willing to muck out the stalls? We've got a lot of animals here, lots of animals, big elephants and different animals. Come and muck out the stalls, and he thought, Fine, that's a perfect job for me. Great, I've got work. So he was brought onto the estate. They showed him where he was living with the other different workers, and he happily worked in the stalls and was content, had good food to eat. Okay, so far so good, thought his mother.

[28:24]

He's close. He's close to me doing his work. Then, after a few weeks, he was doing well. She, instead of wearing her beautiful outfits and jewels and being attended by her ladies-in-waiting and so forth, she got dressed in kind of more casual clothes. work clothes and kind of disguised yourself a little bit and went to see him and said, you know, I'm one of the head groundskeepers and you look like you're a really sturdy fellow. How would you like to work for me? I can see you're, you know, worthy of training and I can trust you. It looks like you're doing your job well and you'll get a little bit better housing here. We've got another little cottage and pay and you'll work closely with me because I'm one of the land stewards here and I know a lot and I'll work with you.

[29:27]

And he said, oh, what luck. This is great. They're giving me a little more respect here and I can do the job. I'm up for it. So slowly, slowly they worked together and he thought that she was kind of his boss, you know, and He took on more and more responsibility as the years went. And she is getting older. She finally said, you know, my treasury and the accounting and all the, I really need somebody to take care of that. So here are the keys to the treasure house and the storage. And this was a big, big responsibility, like being the butler at Downton Abbey or something. You know, you've got the keys. You've got a lot of responsibility and you need to be trusted completely. And the more he was trusted, the more he trusted himself. I am worthy. I am a valuable part of this outfit here, this place, and I do care about these people and I know what to do.

[30:34]

This went on. He took more and more responsibility until he knew actually everything. Everything that she knew about the land and the taking care of the people who worked for her and her wishes, and he knew everything. At this point, she was pretty old by now, and she got ill. And she knew, and she was longing all these years to tell him, this is your inheritance, this is yours, really. But he didn't know it, and he couldn't have heard it at first. Finally, she said, I'm gathering some people. I have some news. And she gathered all the workers and this man, her son, all different relatives she had, and also government people and the king and queen. She gathered them all, and she said, I have something I'd like to say. And what she said is, this person right here

[31:39]

who's been taking care of all these things for these years, and who I trust completely, is not just a worker here on the estate. He's my son. My true son. And he said, Mother! Mother! And they hugged each other at long last. They... They were free to really recognize each other as mother and son. And he was completely ready and understood, and she had taken care of him for all these years, gradually, slowly, slowly, bringing him to the point where he could accept his true nature, his true inheritance, as her son. So that's the story from the Lotus Sutra called the Destitute Son.

[32:46]

And all of us, it's a parable, meaning in the story, the mother is a stand-in for the awakened one, or the Buddha. And the son is... this baby bodhisattva, this baby Buddha's child who doesn't even know it. And if you were in the story when he was, you know, too quickly told that he was actually the son of an awakened one, that his own nature was awakened nature, it was just too much. He fainted away, you know. And that's it. In the Lotus Sutra, skill and means means skillfully, appropriately, at the right time, in the right way, in the right place, you reveal the teachings. You can't give the teachings to someone who's not ready or someone who's basically hungry and just needs to be fed.

[33:53]

They can't hear teachings. They need to be fed. You have to skillfully be able to... know when it's time to give teachings so that the Buddha or the mother, who is the Buddha, went too fast at this point, wasn't skillful. And then slowly, slowly starting with mucking out the stalls or in the Lotus Sutra, it's these teachings, this first group of teachings. will offer to you. And then we'll add more teachings and more teachings until the final teaching is you, yourself, are completely, your nature is completely awakened along with the great earth and all beings in the ten directions. That's the kind of full teaching. Slowly, slowly we open to that and are stable enough and ready enough to take that in.

[34:56]

Usually we think, no, no, you've got to be, you made a mistake. Somebody else, not me, I'm sure it's this person over here, I'm not a fully awakened being. So these teachings are hard to hear, hard to accept, hard to listen to. And they're offered in the Lotus Sutra slowly, slowly in this story. So the initiation of just doing your work, doing that which is before you, whatever the work is, with energy and effort, without too much discrimination, I like this, I don't like this. When we discriminate too much, we actually get sadder and sadder. when we just accept our life and do our best, whatever's offered to us, asking for help, asking for the support we need, we become more and more joyful, actually.

[36:02]

Suzuki Roshi says, before we're 25, we have the faces from our parents. That's what our face looks like. And as we get older, we take on the face of our practice, meaning the face of how we live our life. And after age 40, Suzuki Roshi says, we have the face of our practice. And the more we practice, when I say practice, I mean pay attention to our life, take good care of ourselves, our bodies, take good care of one another. make an effort to see who needs help and address that, respond to that, find our compassion which is there, which is our nature. When we practice like that, our face becomes, he says, that our countenance is joyful and happy.

[37:14]

I thought that was interesting. after 40, many of us in the room are over 40, the faces of practice, how we've lived our life. So, in that story of the initiation of the destitute son, underlying teaching, the secret teaching is that all of us are children of riches. That is our inheritance. We don't have to go seeking it. We already have it. That's our birthright. The riches, we lack nothing. And how we uncover that or discover that is up to us. If we're constantly seeking, seeking, seeking for the family jewels outside, we will get

[38:17]

But when we discover who we are and see the abundant jewels and riches, riches in this case is not wealthy in the usual sense. It's the wealth of compassion and wisdom. That's the wealth I'm talking about. That's the Buddha's wealth. That's the Buddha's inheritance is wisdom and compassion. And along with that is joyful mind, great, big, magnanimous mind, and nurturing, grandmotherly, caring mind. Those are our riches. So thank you all very much for coming out here on a Mother's Day. And our ceremony will take place, I think, after tea. So each one of you, I wish you all the best.

[39:20]

Thank you for listening to this podcast offered by the San Francisco Zen Center. Our programs are made possible by the donations we receive. Thank you very much. Please help us to continue to realize and actualize the practice of giving by offering your financial support. For more information, visit sfzc.org and click giving. May we fully enjoy the Dharma.

[39:46]

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