This podcast is offered by the San Francisco Zen Center on the web at www.sfcc.org. Our public programs are made possible by donations from people like you. So I'd like to start with a poem by Thich Nhat Hanh. It says, Call me by my true names. Ryushin Roshi was talking about this poem the other day. Don't say that I will depart tomorrow because even today I am still arriving. Look deeply every second I'm arriving to be a bud on a spring branch, to be a tiny bird. with still fragile wings, learning to sing in my new nest, to be a caterpillar in the heart of a flower, to be a jewel hiding itself in a stone.

[01:12]

I still arrive in order to laugh and to cry, to fear and to hope. The rhythm of my heart is the birth and death of all that are alive. I am the mayflower metamorphosing on the surface of the river, and I am the bird that swoops down to swallow the mayfly. I am a frog swimming happily in the clear water of a pond, and I am also the grass snake that silently feeds itself on the frog. I am the child in Uganda, all skin and bones. my legs as thin as bamboo sticks, and I am the arms merchant selling deadly weapons to Uganda. I am the 12-year-old girl, refugee on a small boat, who throws herself into the ocean after being raped by a sea pirate.

[02:21]

And I am the pirate, my heart not yet capable of seeing and loving. I am a member of the Politburo with plenty of power in my hands, and I am the man who has to pay his debt of blood to my people, dying slowly in a forced labor camp. My joy is like spring, so warm. It makes flowers bloom all over the earth. My pain is like a river of tears. so vast it fills the four oceans. Please call me by my true names so I can hear all my cries and laughter at once, so I can see that my joy and pain are one. Please call me by my true names so I can wake up and the door of my heart could be left open, the door of compassion.

[03:28]

So during the last talk, the tanto, David Zimmerman, he asked me a beautiful question. He talked about diversity and oneness, and he said, there is diversity all around us. How do we practice with it? So that's been going in my head, and so today I'm going to talk about diversity, and I thought this poem would very rightly speaks about diversity, the completion of holding it all together. So when we say, let us sit together, let us do zazen together, we are actually referring to all of us in this hall, in the Buddha hall.

[04:34]

we're referring to either all of us here or we are referring to everyone in the world. So there is an all-inclusiveness when we say, let us sit together. The us refers to all the people in the room or all the people in the world. So furthermore, there is a sense of meditative awareness when we say, sitting together. There is a value in sitting together. Somehow we recognize that value and that value is unifying. It gives us a sense of oneness. And then if someone says, okay, I'm going to give you Zazen instruction. So That has a different connotation. The reference to I is very specific.

[05:38]

I am going to give you zazen instruction. So in this context, I am going to give you zazen instruction and let us sit together in this hall is not contradictory. It's very complimentary. It makes sense. So in this particular context, the specificity and the generality are complementary. But there can be occasions when they're not held in a place of value. And then that can be disharmonious. And there is something Something that's not fitting together. There is not a kind of fitting together. The integration is not okay.

[06:43]

So, similarly on the larger picture, when we talk of all-inclusiveness, there is a kind of regimentation. If we're saying we and they, then there is a problem there too. So, you know, I'm just remembering when I was working in the front office, 911 came to the door and rang the doorbell. So when I got the door, there was this woman cop who just jumped out of the vehicle and, you know, she came charging inside. And she said, we got a call from this building. So, you know, I don't know how it is now, but previously we had to dial 9 to get out of the Zen Center system. And sometimes when we had new guests staying over, they would like, you know, by mistake, if they were calling a 1-800 number, they would dial 1-9-1, and then by mistake they'd dial another 1.

[07:55]

So 9-9-1-1 is at the door. So it happened several times. And so at that time, there was this woman who came charging in. And she was in her cop's uniform with all those patches and things. And then, you know, so I told her it's probably a mistake. But she had to do her job, so she sent somebody upstairs and checked in all the rooms. So in the meantime, she was hanging out here in the hallway. People were going about their jobs, and she was standing there by herself. And after this person came back, came down, there was no real need. I mean, it was a mistake, though. And then she asked me, she said, what is this place? So I said, this is a Zen center.

[08:56]

She said, why do I not want to leave? She got the smell of the incense from the Buddha hall, and then nobody was... She was just by herself, and she felt comfortable. Nobody was making her feel that she needed to leave or anything. So she came like a cop, and she returned like a person. That was very interesting, and nobody said anything to her. It's just this practice place. which gave her this feeling which she just connected. And that, without words, there was a sense of all-inclusiveness in that interaction with her. So, in Sandokai, Sekito Kisen, the Zen master who wrote this wonderful poem, he says, each of the myriad things has its merit.

[10:01]

expressed according to function and place, phenomena exists, box and lid fit, principle responds, arrow points meet. Everything has its own function, virtue, or value. So Suzuki Roshi was giving a lecture on the Sandokai. And he said, everything has its own function, virtue, or value. And then he said... Function of what? Just then the sound system suddenly turned up. And then Suzuki Roshi could hear his own voice. It just went up. And then he started laughing. From the speakers he could hear himself. So he started to laugh. And everyone else laughed too. And he said, I'll read to you in his own words. he said, you hear my voice.

[11:03]

You think you are listening to me. You are listening to maybe my voice. But actually, you are listening to the function of some universal entity called electricity that covers the whole world, the whole universe. This is one understanding. Another would be that you are listening to my nature as well as the nature of electricity. So when you see or listen to something, the whole universe is included. When we understand things in this way, we call it the understanding of tai. Tai means body. It is a big ontological body that includes everything. And we call the nature of that body shu, the basic nature of everything. When we grasp that which is beyond words, we call that understanding, re or truth.

[12:08]

Re is something beyond our idea of good and bad, long and short, right and wrong. So he was talking about the basic nature of everything, touching upon that which is beyond words. something which is universal. So it is different. Everything is different. But at the same time, there is a sense of universality. And where does that come from? So when we do a full prostration, we touch our forehead to the ground. And then we have both our palms open on either side. It's such a beautiful gesture. So we touch our head on the ground and we have both our palms and we're lifting it up. So we have the absolute on one hand and we have the relative on the other hand.

[13:17]

And we're touching our head to the ground. So it's like our head is grounded in the Dharma and we're lifting the absolute and the relative. So there is a sense of balance when we do the prostration. So when we are touching our head to the ground and lifting both hands, at least at that moment, everything peripheral seems to dissolve. So it doesn't matter who we are bowing to. We're just bowing to the Buddha in everyone. So, you know, last week on Saturday, I was walking down the street with a friend, and there was this beautiful church. It was a small church, blue color.

[14:19]

I think it's on Fel and Go. It just stood out like a painting. And the priest was... You could see the robes of the priest with the cross. You could see the back of the priest. And so it was raining, and so we decided to just go in. So we went into the church. And they were so warm. There was somebody by the door, and he kept looking at us through the window and inviting us in. So we went in and joined them, and the Mass was in Latin. So they were... beautiful songs being sung, and they gave us the chant book, and we were chanting with them. It was very interesting. The service was over, and after that, they give the bread and blood of Christ. So someone said to me, cross your hands. So I thought you have to cross your hand when you receive the bread.

[15:22]

I didn't know that it's meant to be it's like gesturing and saying that, you know, I'm not a Christian. So I held my hands like this and went to the front. And then the priest, he walked, and he came back, and he gave me the bread. I thought that's normal, you know, that's how it's supposed to be. But then when his jisha came behind, you know, the... The assistant, she, he, you know, I thought he's going to give me the wine, but he didn't give me the wine. He just walked past. And then later, you know, they had a reception and then we shook hands. I shook hands with the priest. I told him who I was and where I'm coming from. And he said, oh, San Francisco's end center. I used to live there. And he said, we said a lot of Dazen.

[16:26]

It is so beautiful. I thought this place is touching a lot of people. And he said, come again. And I said, sure. Every Saturday if you like to go. That's a beautiful place to go to. So again, there I felt the priest. He had no discrimination, you know. He was just accepting diversity. He could very clearly say that I'm not from here, from this country, and I look different. And he could, I mean, even in spite of, I crossed my hand, and he probably recognized the right way that I'm not supposed to be Christian. But he did feel some kind of a connection, and he... He made very beautiful eye contact, and there was something in him that recognized something in me.

[17:30]

There was a practitioner in him that could see the practitioner in me, maybe. I don't know. But that was beyond Christianity or Buddhism. There's no discrimination there. So Thich Nhat Hanh, in his poem, he says, My joy is like spring. So warm, it makes flowers bloom all over the earth. My pain is like a river of tears, so vast it fills the four oceans. So in the beginning of the poem, he talked about the bud on a spring branch, tiny bird with fragile wings, caterpillar in the heart of a flower, jewel hiding itself in a stone, So he points out all these diverse things. And then he comes to, my joy is like spring, so warm it makes flowers bloom all over the earth.

[18:37]

My pain is like a river of tears, so vast it fills the four oceans. So, you know, come to think of it, even in our body, like everything is so different. The head and the trunk is different. The hands are not like the legs. Even the fingers are so different. Each finger is different from the other. But if we look at the fingers, we forget the hand. If you look at the hand, we forget the fingers. So when we hold all these different sizes and shapes together, there is a very, very powerful strength In the hand, it's functionally very effective. If we have to lift something up, we use all these diverse fingers or holding it together. So, you know, even though it's specific and generic, they have their own functional dynamism.

[19:45]

So all these unite. So when we talk of the head and the body and the trunk and the legs and the hands, when we say I, I includes the head and the hand and the heart and everything, the person, the whole person. It's all different. But still, we are functional only when we are whole. So there is a need. If I don't think of myself as a separate individual with an I, I will not be able to function efficiently. So I have to be separate in order to function. But if I get stuck in the I, the notion of I will isolate me from the rest of the world. So it's my choice whether I want to be isolated or whether I want to be included. Anais Nin says, we don't see things as they are, we see things as we are.

[20:51]

So, like Suzuki Roshi pointed out earlier in that Sandokai, so there is this universal acceptance, and that happens in the mind, in the mind of each individual person. Even though externally we are separate and different, There is an internal sense of unity. And I would say that sense of unity that binds us together is a sense of values that we uphold. So other than the peripheral differences that we see. So the other day at the class, Rishin Roshi said, listen to not only what you say, but what makes you say it. So he puts us in dyads and triads, and he says, ask this question or that question. So when he said, listen to not only what you say, but what makes you say it, so there's something beyond the question or beyond the answer.

[22:00]

So what is it? What is that? So in Latin... Persona means mask. So when we talk about personality, so what is it that's getting developed? The persona, the mask. So when personality is emphasized, universality is hidden. When universality is emphasized, personality is hidden. So it's like a pendulum, just keeps going back and forth. between the absolute, between the relative. Our consciousness is constantly engaging, going back and forth. So we are surrounded with diversity. Everything is different. So what? So when we're all sitting here and we're all talking together, we don't experience somebody's different when they're sitting with us.

[23:08]

But then if you pick out everyone that's looking different and say, you're going to be included here, then that inclusiveness has an exclusiveness there. So I think diversity is something that is in the mind. So anyhow, we are limited human beings, and so to verify our understanding, we entrust ourselves to the Sangha. So the Sangha is so structured that we are constantly in the realm of Dharma and we keep making mistakes in that. We step on each other's toes or whatever. So we are entrusting ourselves to the Sangha. So in that realm, you know, scriptural certitude is so essential.

[24:19]

So it brings us to a neutral stand. It's not our opinionated ideas. The scriptures are validating, or it's like a measuring rod, brings us time and again to a neutral point. And so they're called the Dharma Shastras. In India, the scriptural validity goes alongside with practice. So we're practicing and at the same time we're studying the scriptures. So study is very important. And so the study and the practice together, it's like a measuring rod to verify our understanding time and again, time and again. So there are two types of, the scriptures are divided into two types. like the shruti and smriti. So shruti will be something that's coming from the source of wisdom. It's not conditioned by the mind. Smriti comes from the memory.

[25:24]

Smarana means memory in Sanskrit. So it's coming from memory. So there are texts which are smriti and there are texts which are shruti. So smriti would be something like instructions, prohibitions, directives, giving ethical code of conduct, things like that. So most people don't really accept smriti as something which is very authentic because it's subject to the conditioned mind of the person that wrote it. or presented it. And it's also historically relevant because the social situations keep changing according to the historic time. So, you know, like even the teacher can have a conditioned mind.

[26:27]

So there is a story in the epic of Mahabharata that talks of Ekalavya. Like you must have heard of Arjuna and Krishna in the Mahabharata. It's a very famous epic. So Arjuna was this famous archer. And his teacher, the best teacher of that time was Dronacharya. So even now in India, there's a school of archery called Dronacharya School of Archery. So this young person came to him and asked him for... So the teacher refused. Because the teacher was very partial to his student, Arjuna, who was the archer, the best archer of that time. So he said he refused to take this person, this youngster who came and requested for the teaching. But he didn't give up.

[27:29]

The young person went to the forest. He made a statue of the teacher. put it there, and he started practicing. He kept practicing and practicing and practicing until he became very good at it. But he didn't demonstrate his skill until there was an event, a general event. I think there was like a fish, which was like the image of a fish which is going round and round. So the archer had to look at the water the reflection of that, and then shoot the arrow on the eye of the fish. So this person, Ekalavya, he did it. And the teacher was surprised. He said, who are you? And he said, I'm Ekalavya. And he said, who is your teacher? So he took him to the forest and he showed him the statue. And the statue was of this same teacher.

[28:32]

And the teacher did not want another archer who is even better than his favorite disciple. So immediately Ekalavya fell at his feet and he said, ask whatever you want, I'll give it to you. You know, Guru Dakshina is like giving the teacher an offering. So he said, give me your right thumb. he instantly cut his right thumb. Then he could never do it again. So that was just a story about how the conditioned mind can still function. So that's, you know, like, not just because of this, but, I mean, there is always this thing in smritis where there is an interpretation of the conditioned mind. So when we are constantly in the study of texts and scriptures alongside the practice, something develops in us, a sense of humility, a sense of surrender, a sense of gratitude, a sense of devotion, and a sense of wonder.

[29:47]

So how do we get that? It's very clearly laid out. The right view, the right intention, right speech. right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, right concentration. So the right view and right intention is kind of paired together in the wisdom frame of reference. Right speech, right action, and right livelihood is in the ethical frame of reference. And right effort, right mindfulness, and right concentration is in the contemplative or samadhi state of reference. So sama-adhi in Sanskrit actually means, sama means balance. Adhi means light or wisdom. So when there is balance in our understanding, then we are in yoga. Yoga means complete union of body, mind, and spirit.

[30:52]

It comes together. So... The first ever teacher was known as Dakshina Murthy. So every time people went to him, he would just do a gesture like this. He never spoke. He was the teacher of silence. He kept doing this. All that he would do is this. Anybody went to him, he would do this. So it was... And then later, when there was a need, they had to write more. So this was like... getting out of dullness, torpor, overly stimulated, overstimulation of joy, whatever, even seeking for wisdom. So to move out of all these three, the ego bends down and touches the absolute. And then there is a beginningless, endless Zen Enzo. So then the energy flows.

[31:56]

There is a free flow of energy. So Thich Nhat Hanh in this poem, he says, so I can wake up and the door of my heart could be left open, the door of compassion. So compassion is an outcome of disciplined life. So when we are in practice... Only compassion can flow from us. We cannot pretend. Dalai Lama says, if you don't have compassion, pretend you have compassion. That's also fine. So, you know, there was a friend of mine who was a scientist, and so she was talking about a test that they did. They were trying to grow cells. And so they put... in all these, what are they called, the small little dishes?

[32:58]

Petri dishes. Petri dishes, yeah, the Petri dishes. So they put one cell with other feeding cells in a dish. And then in the second one, they put like two cells with the same character, same function in another one. And then the third one had different cells, assorted. They were like diverse. So the first one, after a few days, so there was one cell with a lot of feeding cells. So it kept eating, eating, eating, but then it got duller and duller and duller and duller. And the second one had two cells of the same type. And then they started to stagnate and they started to quarrel. There was some kind of friction there. And there was no growth. in the second one. And the third one, where there were different cells of different functions, there were different types of cells.

[34:02]

It was an assorted variety of cells. They were put together and they were all qualitative cells. They started to thrive. They were doing very well. So diversity is a good thing. It's good to have diversity. It's not a problem. So when a person, when he interacts in just one... he starts to get dull, but if he's engaged and gets his creativity going and he does this and that and that and that, he's an active and live person. So that is about the cells. So in the end, Thich Nhat Hanh, in this poem, he says, please, Call me by my true names so I can hear all my cries and laughter at once, so I can see that my joy and pain are one.

[35:05]

Please call me by my true names so I can wake up and the door of my heart could be left open, the door of compassion. So anybody has any questions? Anything? We have five minutes, seven minutes. Yes, San Francisco. Yes. No, I don't know the name of the church. I would like to know, actually. Because, you know, it's a very beautiful church. It's painted blue on the outside. I think it's on Phel and Goph. It's very beautiful. It's not far from Zen Center.

[36:06]

We were walking back from the Asian Art Museum, somewhere in that direction. You know, the... What's it called? The Vietnamese place, Saigon? Yeah, somewhere, somewhere. that side, I think. Yeah. It's a beautiful church. You should go. The priest is very sweet. Yes. Okay. So in Sanskrit, it's called sattva, rajas, and tamas. Sattva is, no, the tamas is torpor, laziness, dullness, you know, being not in a mood to do anything, and Rajas is like when we are highly stimulated. I want to do this very highly patriotic, very passionate about this, passionate about that, full of energy. And then sattva is seeking for wisdom, wanting to know.

[37:09]

So even seeking for wisdom, the teacher said, is move out of all that. So bend down. The ego has to bend down and touch the absolute. And that's the Zen Enzo. Yes? Theosophical. What did you say? I guess this means like being in tune with the Dharma. It's not like being in an absolute realm.

[38:12]

It's like the Dharma wheel is turning and then we fall into place with the Dharma. Otherwise we're... in friction or suffering, because we are either in our thoughts or minds, we're alienated from the Dharma wheel that's turning. We're not aligned to it. So like in Sanskrit, the word dukkha, dukkha, kam means sky, du means constricted. So constricted sky, when we are constricted, we suffer. And sukha, su means expansive. So expansive sky is like we enjoy ananda. Yes. Yeah, so long as you don't call them them and us.

[39:25]

If we're cooking together, if we're cooking together or we're dancing together or singing together, there's no them and us. There's only... You don't have to... You're practicing diversity without calling it diverse. You're practicing diversity without separating it and saying it's diverse. You're cooking together, you're cleaning together, you're sitting together. It doesn't matter whether you look different or whether you talk different or whether you are different. Diversity is being addressed in all these actions without being called diversity. Thank you, David, for asking this question.

[40:30]

That helped me to work around this. Thank you, everybody. Thank you for listening to this podcast offered by the San Francisco Zen Center. Our Dharma talks are offered at no cost and this is made possible by the donations we receive. Your financial support helps us to continue to offer the Dharma. For more information, visit sfcc.org and click giving. May we fully enjoy the Dharma.

[41:05]

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