Good morning. A central notion of Mahayana Buddhism, central idea of Mahayana Buddhism, is the idea of the way, the Tao, the path. And what I'd like to do today is talk about what the meaning of this is, what the meaning of the way is, and how this is an appropriate metaphor

[01:02]

for actually understanding what our practice is like. And I say Mahayana because there's an older version called Hinayana where the idea is a little bit different. Actually, it's less important whether there's a historical Hinayana and Mahayana, lesser vehicle and greater vehicle, more narrow way and wider way. More, I think, that there's a Hinayana of our mind and a Mahayana of our mind, a more expansive and inclusive way of understanding things that we can have or somewhat more tight way that we have of understanding.

[02:04]

So the classic, just to make this distinction, the classic formula for the way, the old formula is the fourfold noble truth. Suffering and its cause, and then nirodha or extinction, and then marga, the path to extinction. But in Mahayana, the path and the goal are one thing. There isn't this distinction between, well, I'm going to use these methods to get to this end, and then I'll be there. It's more this sense of ongoingness. That's this metaphor of the way. We say the way, the Tao, is kind of the quality of our practice because it's an ongoing event.

[03:09]

It's not some place where we stop. It's not some static idea. And this goes right to another ancient teaching called the twelvefold chain of conditioned co-production. So if you know what these things mean, great. If you don't, don't worry about it. It's not so important. The important thing about the twelvefold chain is where the stopping occurs, where the hang-up occurs, where the blockage happens. Okay? And the blockage happens when we hold on to something.

[04:11]

In this traditional elucidation of it, it's called clinging. It's holding on to. So it's not feeling that's a problem. We feel lots of different ways, good, bad, and indifferent, you know? All kinds of feelings come and go all the time. And even in some sense, even in some sense desire is not a problem. Wanting things naturally arises. Rejecting things naturally arises and goes away. You just give it a chance. The sticking point is when we hold on to it, when we hold on to what we want, when we hold on to what we reject. That's where the Buddhism comes in handy

[05:14]

as a method for letting go of that. I was reminded that Kadagiri Roshi, who used to be a teacher here, main teacher here, had these various expressions that always seemed very peculiar to me for a long time. He said, Zazen is like massaging the mind. He would always say it that very slow way, massaging the mind, okay? In other words, there's some knot, there's some tightness, there's some constriction, and there's some stoppage, just like a muscular knot. And when you massage it, you loosen, you loosen that stopping place, the place where things get stuck. Because it's a way, it's a path, it's not some place to stop.

[06:15]

Wisdom is in some place. Well, you don't exactly stop, but you kind of rest on, you rest in the middle of not resting. Right in the middle of restlessness is resting. You don't find some place called nirodha where restlessness doesn't exist anymore. His other analogy used to be, Zazen is like digestion, he used to say. Oops. Is this doing something dramatically wrong? Zazen is like digestion. It's the same idea. You take something that you think is solid, some idea you have about things,

[07:22]

and then you put it into the Zazen digestion machine, and it breaks apart, it breaks apart, just like when you take food, the enzymes break it up, and then it becomes part of you. So the flavor of the way, the flavor of the path is not stopping someplace, non-static. In the Heart Sutra that we chant, this is addressed, the Heart Sutra says, with nothing to attain, the Bodhisattva depends on Prajnaparamita, and the mind is no hindrance.

[08:23]

Without any hindrance, no fears exist. There's a lot crammed into those few words, but what I want to emphasize is this hindrance idea. Depending on Prajnaparamita, there is no hindrance, and hindrance actually means, in Sanskrit the word is Avarana. It means this kind of a stopping place. It means actually, technically it's called a thought covering. So there are these thought coverings, and there are various types, but I'll tell you about one type. There are these thought coverings, and the purpose of practice is to remove the covering, is to dissolve the covering, just like digestion. And in the teaching there are these various types of covering,

[09:35]

or Avarana, which actually means barricade, partition. So you get this idea that there's a barricade between you and reality, and it elucidates these various types, but the fundamental one is, this is your Saturday morning Sanskrit lesson, okay? The fundamental one is called Neyavarana, J-N-E-Y-A, J-N-E-Y-A, if you said it in English, J-N-E-Y-A-V-A-R-A-N-A, which is known as the obstruction, or the barricade, or the stoppage based on, it's called the obstruction due to cognition, or the cognizable. So what does this mean?

[10:38]

It sounds very esoteric and strange and intellectual, but it's actually very practical, and I think it's actually maybe easier to understand if you think of it not so much as the barrier of cognition as the barrier of conception. Thich Nhat Hanh, in the beginning of one of his books, talks about a piece of paper. He says, it's very direct, he says, this piece of paper that you are looking at right now is composed of millions and billions of elements, but the one thing that it is not composed of is a piece of paper. So this is a pretty common idea, right, that maybe three or four hundred years ago a tree was growing somewhere and the sun shone on the tree,

[11:40]

and that tree got milled and the mill became paper and the paper got into Thich Nhat Hanh's book. So what you're looking at is the tree from two hundred years ago and the sunlight that was on the tree in 1764 on March 12th, at 201, that's what you're looking at. Do you get the idea? We put a label on that. That label is a conception. We put a label on that called a piece of paper. And that's okay because we need to know, we need the conception, but it's also a place where we stop. It's also yine avarana. It's the obstruction due to cognizing. It's the obstruction due to conception. And we can use it, and using it is fine,

[12:47]

but if we stop there, then it doesn't work so well. I'll give you another example from Western psychology. So you may have a conception, a concept called, I am a bad person. And I want to ask you to raise your hand if you have that conception. I am an embarrassed bad person. So many of us have this idea, this concept.

[13:53]

We have a concept called I am a bad person. But what is I am a bad person? Where does this I am a bad person exist? What kind of a thing is this I am a bad person? How did it get there? What made it happen? What made it up? Where did it come from? So if you listen to someone who says I am a bad person, or if you listen to yourself, if you think that, and I realize this is a kind of oversimplification, but just to give you the feeling for it, the sense of it. So I am a bad person is made up of,

[14:58]

that concept is a label, just like piece of paper. Just like piece of paper is a label, a concept, over virtually infinite circumstance. You'd have to really say infinite circumstance. I don't know how trees are pollinated, but if the bee or whatever it was, if it didn't drop the seed at the appropriate time, you wouldn't be looking at that, that piece of paper wouldn't exist. That piece of paper is totally caused by infinite circumstances. And then we put this cover on it called piece of paper. Similarly, I am a bad person is caused by experience. It's caused by circumstance. Do you see how that is? So in a very oversimplified kind of,

[16:06]

well, how can I say it? You may have had or I may have had experiences when we were young, or if you want to be more expansive, you could say in a former life or wherever. And those experiences gather up together, and then we put a concept as an expression of those experiences, and the concept is I am a bad person. But there is no such thing as I am a bad person. There's no stable, static entity called I am a bad person. There's only the infinite circumstances and experiences that go behind it. So what I'm emphasizing about practice today

[17:18]

and what I'm emphasizing about the Buddhist path today is recognizing those infinite circumstances and not getting stopped and stuck and staticized at the concept. We use the concept but not stop there. That's not the whole picture. The whole picture is much, much wider than that, much bigger than that. So Dogen, in the Genjo Koan, addresses this point and says that, very interesting the way he says it. Among other things, he says, when Dharma does not fill your body and mind,

[18:20]

you think it is already sufficient. When Dharma fills your body and mind, you know that something is missing. The opposite of what you'd think, right? You'd think, well, if Dharma fills your body and mind and you're big shots and teachers, such and such and such and so, you know, then you have some place to rest and then you just coast after, you know, after you get to Nirodha, you just coast along and everything is groovy, right? But actually he says it's the opposite way. That's this idea of the path, the way. It's not some place to stop. He says, when Dharma does not fill your body and mind,

[19:25]

that's when you think it's something sufficient. That's when you think, oh yeah, I know what's going on. That's when you think that, you know, there's nothing more to do. When Dharma fills your body and mind, you recognize that there's some insufficiency, always. You recognize that every time you look at a piece of paper, you can't possibly imagine the multitude of circumstances that are behind it. And that makes it a different piece of paper than if you think, oh yeah, I know what this is. This is a piece of paper. Now for some reason, now I'm going to make a political statement here, so I hope that's okay,

[20:25]

but for some reason I believe that part of the malaise and the problems that we have in the world have to do with getting stuck on concepts. Actually, it's not too radical a statement, right? I mean, one of the prominent ones that I think of is the concept, I am an Israeli, you know, I am a Palestinian, I am an Arab, I am a Jew. They're true, just like a piece of paper is true. But it's not true. And if you get stopped there, well, you see what happens. All kinds of things happen. Some people look at a forest and they have a concept called money. They have a concept called money,

[21:26]

I am going to make a lot of money. This is a concept. So they cut all the trees down and they make a lot of money. But they're missing something, I think. Something is missing. But they don't recognize that something is missing because we think it's already sufficient. Oh, I have a lot of money, that's it. That's the end of the road. I'm in nirvana now. I can buy anything, you know. So it's very ironic, kind of, you know. Whoa! It's a funny kind of a turn that things take there. When dharma does not fill your body and mind, you think it is already sufficient. When dharma fills your body and mind, you know that something is missing.

[22:27]

Now, why is that? Why is it that we want something sufficient? We really like concepts, you know. We really like them a lot. Why is it that we want something that's going to stop all the trouble? We want to get to some place where, oh yeah, this is it. Now I know. And there isn't anything more to know. And that's it, you know. I was preparing for my talk last week in this room. It's kind of an office that I use, but other people can come in sometimes at Green Gulch. And I have a... I cannot tell a lie.

[23:44]

I have a laptop computer. Okay. I have an Apple PowerBook. That's it, right? A PowerBook. That's what it's about. That's why they named it that, right? Here, here, here's this thing. It only costs a thousand bucks, you know. Then you can have power, you know. Because then you have a PowerBook. So I was working on this talk on my PowerBook. And I was sitting in a chair and I was leaning back in the chair and my feet were up on the desk that I use. And I like that very much, you know, feet up. Do I like it more than Zazen posture?

[24:47]

Well... Zazen posture is better for you than that. Anyway, I was working on my PowerBook with my feet up and then a friend of mine walked in the door. He said, hey, you look like a commercial for Apple computers, you know. We should call the ad agency, you know. I'll take a picture of you. So we got to talking a little bit and he was saying how, you know, he's become so used to a certain kind of technology that when he gets into an uncomfortable situation, he reaches for the remote. He doesn't really do it, but it's like, oh, where's the remote control, you know. Click. I want a different channel. I don't like this channel that I'm in, you know. I don't like what I'm seeing here.

[25:53]

Click, you know. He reaches for the mouse, right. You can click it away. So, oh, yeah. So why we want something sufficient, why we want some resting spot like that is because we're afraid. That's why. That's the fundamental reason why, I think. And we figure that if we have a remote or a power book or a mouse, then we can deal with, that's how we can deal with the fear that we have. Someone was mentioning to me,

[26:59]

this phrase, this expression came up, I'll cross that bridge when I get to it. We'll cross that bridge when we get to it. I was talking with this person about bridges. They were saying how in Europe, I've never been to Europe, but he was saying that in Europe, by the old bridges is usually a little shrine, a little grotto where you, I don't know. I know the Buddhist stuff so well, but you don't offer incense. No, that's wrong religion. You do something. You say Hail Mary. Would that be an appropriate thing to say in the Christian tradition? Anyway, you do something before you cross the bridge at this little shrine. Maybe there's a statue of the Virgin or someone there who will protect you in this fearful journey. That's what it is. That's why the shrine is there at the bridge

[28:01]

because we're bridging. You're going over the bridge to someplace. Again, to allay our anxiety, we think we know what's at the other end of the bridge. We think we know what's at the other end of the Golden Gate Bridge, but really we don't really know. So we do something to take care of ourselves while we're going through this bridging process, while we're going through this transition. And when are we not going through the transition? Please tell me. Sometimes it seems more intense. The transition seems more intense. I'm going through changes. Isn't that the phrase from when I used to be hip

[29:04]

back in the 60s or something? Man, I'm going through changes. We're always going through changes. We're always in transition. And at the end of it all, well, who knows if it's the end, right? Then there's this big transition which we really don't know what's at the other end of that bridge, right? So it's very understandable that we would want something, some solid piece of knowledge, some solid something, some stable thing that we could hold on to that would help us, like a power book, like a whatever. We would really like something sufficient. But in this way that Duryodhana is talking

[30:07]

and in this way that I'm talking today, if it's sufficient, then that's when Dharma does not fill your body and mind. When Dharma fills your body and mind, you actually know something is missing. There's some other way of dealing with this anxiety, with this fear that we have with us. Whether it's just the fear of getting on the bus or the fear of what am I going to do with my life or, you know, just whatever it may be. The focus in practice, in this way of practice, in the path of practice, is not to come down to, is not to land on some certitude that we can finally rest on. This way is actually to tolerate,

[31:19]

to learn to tolerate the uncertainty, to rest on the non-resting, to rest on the uncertainty that really is the basis of everything. Don't tell anybody. It's really beyond our conception, totally. So, Sanskrit part two here is, now here's another Sanskrit phrase that floats into my consciousness. It's a whopper and it's, you ready for this? It's anupalabdhidharmakashanti. It's four parts, anupalabdhidharmakashanti.

[32:27]

Anu means no, not, you know, negative. Palabdhi is conception, conceivable. Dharma means things, all things. Kshanti means patience. Robert Thurman in the Vimalakirti, when he translated the Vimalakirti Sutra, he translated it as the intuitive tolerance of the inconceivability of all things. The intuitive tolerance for the inconceivability of everything. That's more like, that's the way of the path. Intuitive, it means, intuitive I take to mean

[33:28]

you already have this capacity. We already have the capacity for this kind of tolerance. It's not something we need to import from a power book. It's already in you, in me, in us. It needs to be cultivated rather than the endless and fruitless seeking for the one final answer that will take care of all questions. Ain't no such thing, okay? Now, there's an interesting, I came upon this thing that in, again, in Western psychology, that very interesting kind of resonant quality of this. So this is from an article,

[34:40]

just an essay written by a woman, I think her name is Sorenson, and she's talking about the relationship between mother and child. She's actually talking about the maternal function of the psychotherapist in a psychotherapeutic situation, but the model for that is this relationship between a mother and an infant and the links between the mother and the infant. So I'll read this. Excuse me. So one of these links is, oh, and she refers to a psychologist whose name is Bion, B-I-O-N. One of these links is a K link derived from the first letter of the word knowledge, that is, the link between a subject which tries to know and an object which can be known,

[35:44]

or the infant which can be known. Now she's referring to Bion. However, Bion assumes that the ultimate reality of the infant is unknowable. Don't you think that's true? Don't you think the ultimate reality of you is unknowable? Bion assumes that the ultimate reality of the object is unknowable, and therefore the knowledge link necessarily carries with it some degree of frustration and pain. When dharma fills your body and mind, you know that the ultimate reality is that something is missing, and when you know that something is missing, that necessarily carries with it some degree of frustration and pain.

[36:46]

The question is not, are you going to have that frustration and pain? That's a package deal, okay? You get born with that, okay, that frustration and pain of not being able to finally know it. The question is, what do we do with it? How do we deal with it? Do we lock it up in a concept and think that we have the answer, or not? The knowledge link necessarily carries with it some degree of frustration and pain, and now this is something. Oh, yeah, okay. Where this emotional experience of frustration and pain can be tolerated, interesting, she used the same word as Robert Thurman, a modification occurs in which the imperfect knowledge acquired will be used to make further discoveries. Where the experience of imperfect knowledge

[37:51]

cannot be tolerated, the evasion of pain predominates, and a negative, a minus K, or negative knowledge link is generated in which meaning and emotion, discovery and development become impossible. Beyond says that the negative knowledge link substitutes morality for scientific thought. She adds it substitutes clichés for ideas, and I add it substitutes concepts for experiences. When there is this negative, when this evasion of pain predominates, then we grab a hold, then we hold on to a concept and think that it will answer our question in some final way. So right after Dogen says that

[39:15]

in the Genjo Koan about when Dharma does not fill your body and mind you think it is already sufficient, when Dharma fills your body and mind you know that something is missing. He goes on to talk about this thing of the concept and the experience and says that when you sail out in a boat into the middle of the ocean where no land is in sight and you view the four directions the ocean looks circular and does not look any other way. But the ocean is neither round nor square. Its features are infinite in variety. It is like a palace. It is like a jewel. It only looks circular as far as you can see at that time.

[40:17]

All things are like this. He goes on to say that though the features of the dusty world and the world beyond conditions, though there are many features in the dusty world and the world beyond conditions, you see and understand only as far as your eye of practice can reach. You see and understand only a limited thing. You look around and you think that the ocean is circular because that is what you see and understand at that time. That is okay. That is the concept that we have. And we are always limited in that way. We never get to see what is at the other end of the bridge. There is always some limitation. That in itself is not problematic. It is when we get stuck and think that the ocean is circular and no other way and think that that is our... rest on that knowledge.

[41:20]

Attempt to make that our powerful knowledge. That is where we get caught actually. We get caught in a problematic situation because it is incomplete. Because the features of oceans and mountains are infinite. . Reb, in one of the schedule of events,

[42:25]

he was going to give a class on remembering Suzuki Roshi. Some of you may have attended that class. And at the end of the description, I was reading the brochure and at the end of the description, I can't remember exactly what he said. We'll do this and we'll do this and we'll do this and we'll do this in this course. Then the last thing he said was, maybe so. And he was... Suzuki Roshi often would say, maybe so. You never knew whether it was because he didn't understand what you were talking about. Because his English wasn't so good, you know. Maybe he doesn't know what I'm talking about, you know. Sometimes, he used to give the talks here, you know, right in this room. And they would do question and answer

[43:27]

right in the talk. Somebody would talk about the ultimate nature of reality and such and such and such and such. Maybe so. That maybe so is the quality of the way. Not leaping into, you know, a certainty. In the 8th century, the 8th century Chinese Zen master Bai Zhang, this is my summary statement here, said, and for now, just don't depend on anything, existent, non-existent or whatever. He wasn't sure if existent and non-existent

[44:30]

covered the territory. He wants to be sure we get the idea, you know, cover all of his bases. Don't depend on anything, existent, non-existent or whatever. And, do not dwell in non-depending. Get it? And also, do not make an understanding of not depending or dwelling. Just in case you thought you might want to do that. So don't get stuck in a concept. Don't get stuck in not getting stuck in a concept. And don't get stuck in not getting stuck in getting stuck or not stuck in a concept. This is great knowledge, he said.

[45:33]

This is great knowledge. So it sounds like something is getting taken away from you. I want this concept. So my theme song years ago, not for a long time, but you know that song, I think, you know that song,

[46:02]

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