Recently, some of you have taken the precepts, sixteen precepts, and a Buddhist name. So I ought to talk about the precepts a little bit. I think it may seem strange to you that Whenever we get down to the nitty-gritty of Buddhism, they say, take the precepts. The precepts are it. This is the true transmission from Buddha to us, these precepts. There's nothing other than these precepts. You know, at the moment you're taking ordination or an initiation of any kind in Buddhism, all those Zen stories and patriots are forgotten and we only take the precepts.

[01:22]

And we say, if you do zazen, you don't need the precepts. You are automatically following all the precepts if you do zazen. This makes sense, sort of, because you're not doing anything. It's pretty hard to break the precepts. But that's not really what is meant. The precepts are useful only if you break the precepts. That also makes sense, sort of. I don't know if you know exactly what I mean. If you need the precepts, it means you've broken the precepts. Precepts are not a method of accumulating merit for eventual attainment of some superior state.

[02:40]

Suzuki Roshi, you know, I've talked about the precepts in some length, and mentioned, I believe, Suzuki Roshi saying the ten prohibitory precepts are like, you're already okay, so don't do that. Don't do this. It's all, don't do this, don't do that. But feeling is, you're already enough. Why add that? So I want to concentrate today on the three pure precepts and the three refuges, making a total of sixteen precepts. But I'll start backwards with the ten... Usually we take the refuges and the three pure precepts and then the ten prohibitory precepts. So ten prohibitory precepts I've already talked about several times. But to give you... I want to give you some more feeling for it.

[04:27]

The Ten Prohibitory Precepts are like the boundary of your self. And they're a description... In Buddhism, they're understood from the point of view of Buddha, not from the point of view of you, conditioned being, trying to practice. From that point of view, there'd be some way of accumulating merit. But say, for example, you have some intuitive feeling. I'm trying to give you a feeling for this. Say that you have some intuitive feeling for someone or something, looking at a spring flower. or driving a car, seeing somebody in the next car.

[05:29]

You don't know who the person is, and yet you feel an intimacy with that, as if the same kind of experience as your own experience of yourself, you experience this other person, or flower, or something. Anyway, we all have that kind of experience sometimes. This is an instance of what we mean by our original nature. But as soon as you have some idea, this flower is not as nice as last year's spring flowers, or this person in the car is such and such a class person, You've lost it. You're instantly on the surface of things when you have that feeling.

[06:35]

So, when you break the precepts, thinking, this person is such and such, criticizing him, you know, or praising him, you've broken a precept and you've lost your experience of that person. from his own point of view. And then you're on the surface of things, and then you need the precepts. You see what I mean? It's more like that. So sudden enlightenment, you can see, makes sense. There's no merit accumulated here. It's your either over that boundary or you're not. And the precepts, you know, we say, don't think or don't discriminate. The precepts are just ten major ways we discriminate.

[07:43]

But if you're Buddha, there's no killing, there's nothing to kill, there's nothing to possess, nothing to steal, nothing to misuse, nothing to abuse, nothing to slander or praise or blame or hide from. So there's no need for the precepts. So to be caught by things means we're breaking the precepts. Usually we're always breaking the precepts. Our basic attitudes are breaking the precepts. We're concerned It's interesting, even if our practice is good, we sometimes seek the rewards of our practice in the surface of things, from other people.

[08:58]

We want other people to acknowledge us or love us so much we'll force them to do it, or hate them for not doing it. Which means we can't be satisfied with our own experience. You know, Suzuki Roshi used to say, how does an eye see an eye? All of Buddha's teaching is a way to have your eye see your eye. Your ear, you know, when you hear something, you're not hearing an airplane or a stream, you're hearing your ear hearing. You're hearing your mind minding. When we have this kind of state of mind, you don't lose your balance.

[10:20]

But as soon as you lose that basic sense that's your ear hearing, that you're hearing, and you characterize the airplane as such and such, or the stream as such and such, you have lost your way. So the three pure precepts then, which are very simply translated as don't do evil, do good, and help others. Or you can translate them as live in enlightenment

[11:25]

live for the benefit of all beings. I don't know. Anyway, the basic idea is you can experience yourself creating yourself. So you refrain from doing evil and you don't refrain from doing good. You don't refrain from doing what occurs to you. And you, the larger sense is you do what works or is good for others.

[12:28]

But however you translate this, you know, these three things, it means what you do on each moment. And three refuges, then, are how to have a stable state of mind. You can't follow the precepts or practice the three pure precepts if your mind is not stable enough. So the idea in the three refuges is you can't take refuge in that which is characterized by self. Anything which has self you can't take refuge in because it's unstable.

[13:34]

So what is not characterized by self is Buddha, Dharma and Sangha. So we take refuge in the Buddha, Dharma and Sangha. And that, of course, has various meanings. But we can say it means to... One way to understand it is it means to take refuge in that which is immediately in front of you, as Buddha, Dharma and Sangha. Not saying, oh, it should be something else or somewhere else. Just what's in front of you. as Buddha, Dharma and Sangha.

[14:34]

And it means to take refuge in a more intuitive or sometimes we say spiritual experience, like I said of the man in the car or somebody you see, that you don't make any qualifications, you actually experience your equality or oneness. When you don't discriminate and you no longer have the attitudes of discrimination built into your activity and perceptions. So to take refuge in what we intuitively experience something... something subtle.

[15:48]

The second of the three gates of umman, which I mentioned yesterday, is what stops the flow of discrimination, what stops the flow of rebirth. That's the precepts. And that's our intuitive perception of things. Intuitive is not such a good word. How we realize. And third is ultimate reality, to take refuge in nothing, not what's just in front of you, even, not some intuitive. Again, this is like nirmanakaya, sambhogakaya, dharmakaya.

[16:52]

So you can stabilize your state of mind in this way. If you feel your mind is searching around, you take refuge in what's right in front of you. You accept things just as they are, quite receptive. And if your mind, it seems dim, You're friendly to your mind. I don't know what to say about that. It's like turning up the juice or turning a light on brighter. Your mind is weak if it's caught by externals. It's also weak if it's dim or your energy is something shaky. So although you may be accepting things, it's quite dim.

[18:10]

So it's like turning up a light or something. I can't explain exactly, but that kind of effort is necessary in practice until your mind is quite stable. If it's quite stable, then we can reverse the order of the three. of the sixteen precepts, and you know what to do on each moment and what not to do, and by that won't create self, won't create karma. And at the instant you lose that stability of mind, you will see what your karma is, what your accumulated karma is, because your attitude is a broken precept.

[19:13]

But basically in this is there is nothing to kill, nothing to possess, nothing to misuse. So it's to get off, out of the surfaces of things. I'm not so interested in talking about the surfaces of things because in this sasheen, I don't think it's our concern.

[20:47]

But actually, usually, we are caught in the surfaces of things, and once we're there, unless we have the precepts to remind ourselves, we try to find an equivalent satisfaction in the surfaces of things. in an objectification of our experience and an objectification of other people. So the precepts are to reverse this objectifying process and it shows you where the objectification begins. It begins when you have some thought of praising or criticizing or possessing, hiding or lying etc. And to do good means to act in accord with big mind or what you intuitively perceive without discrimination.

[21:58]

Perceive without discrimination? Anyway, something like And all of it's based on taking refuge in Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. Because as long as you're taking refuge in things characterized by self, you can never have a stable state of mind. So the three refuges are the basis for practice, the basis for our bodhicitta. for our thought of enlightenment, for our realization of acting for the welfare of all being. Basis for our practicing the six paramitas and ten paramitas and ten bhumis, basis for practicing generosity, etc.

[23:03]

So all Buddhist life is characterized by this initiation of taking the Three Refuges and the Three Pure Precepts and the Ten Prohibitory Precepts. So you can see, have the basis, the stable mind that's necessary for practice, for realization. And so you can see how you create yourself constantly through the three pure precepts. And so you can see how your accumulated effects of breaking the precepts. So you take the 10 prohibitory precepts. So you can free yourself from your accumulated karma and your constantly creating self. by taking the pure precepts and prohibitory precepts.

[24:09]

So we take refuge in Buddha, Dharma and Sangha, making the whole world Buddha, Dharma and Sangha. Everyone takes refuge with you when you take refuge. before you're acknowledging that there is nothing really other than Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha, including all those beings who don't take refuge. So this kind of effort is characterized by rejoicing in the merits of others as if they were your own. Or better, not your own. And accommodating yourself to this being which is manifested in each of us and in you and in everything.

[25:35]

without discriminating between it. This manifestation is preferred to that one. It's killing Buddha nature. Anyway, that's kind of what I just said is kind of mechanical. But when you're trying to practice with each occasion, you need some kind of sense like that. Till you can do things without having to think about what you're doing. Is there anything you'd like to talk about?

[26:42]

I hope you could hear me better than I can hear you. Painful sleep. That seems to be an interesting topic. Don't you think we're getting just about the right amount of sleep? I don't mean for every day, I mean for this session. I'm not suggesting that every day we have this much. But the session seems easier or smoother, don't you think so? This is the first session where we've had this I think in Zen Center this is the first Sashin where there's been this little sleep. But actually this is usual amount in a Sashin.

[28:16]

Our schedule is somewhat more dense. Anyway, our Sashins are certainly as difficult as Sashins in Japan. I'm not saying ours are easier or something like that. There you have a kind of different schedule, usually with less sitting because they have more, I don't know, chanting or something. Only Antaiji has Sashins which are more sitting. There's more sitting than we have, because they don't chant. But it's customary to have about four hours of sleep. And in some sashings, two hours of sleep. I think that don't you find the more you are just sitting and not doing anything else with each day, you're not so sleepy?

[29:42]

Isn't that true? It's our distracted mind which makes us need sleep. So the more stable your mind is, the less sleep you need. And the busier your day is with various kinds of things, the more sleep you need, unless your mind's quite stable. But in any case, a variety of activity makes us need more sleep. So if we have only one thing to do, zazen, to have too much sleep creates problems in But also, you know, your real energy isn't so dependent on sleep. And you, even those of you who sleep a lot, still, it's a different kind of sleeping.

[30:52]

It's quite alert sleeping. When Kiyosaku is coming, you're sitting quite straight. As soon as the Kiyosaku turns around... But somehow, intuitively, the head goes like... I don't know how you know. Your third eye is spying throughout the room, rotating like radar. I watch you. And if I'm talking, if I say something that pertains to you, you suddenly wake up, or might pertain to you. If I don't, it's rather boring. Sometimes I'll say something to see if I can wake you up. Do you want me to say something else about sleeping?

[32:15]

Claude. You know Claude? Claude gets mad at me still. We'll talk about something, about something Suzuki Roshi said in a lecture. But for five years you were asleep in his lectures. I'm not recommending by that you all go to sleep when I'm talking. But I had rather a busy life at that time because Zen Center was quite different and I had a full-time job which took a lot more than 40 hours and I was a full-time graduate student. I came to everything at Zen Center so I was quite out of it a lot of the time.

[33:36]

I still was able to be alert in that way, as I told you. He, at that time, was studying the Blue Cliff Records, which I'm talking about now, and he'd always have me read the book, and I would be going like this. And he'd come to the point and he'd hand me the book and I'd go, and I'd start reading. And I never missed. I don't know how I did it, actually. He would stand, right? I always sat in the middle in the front. So I could help him with things like that. So it's better to be awake, but the kind of sleepiness that occurs in Zen is not the usual kind of sleepiness. So if you can't be completely awake, Zen sleepiness is better. And if you can't be Zen sleepy, I don't know, you should get out.

[34:47]

When you start banging the partition with your head, that's the wrong kind of sleepiness. And pain? I don't know if there's much to say, because you're all so familiar with the subject. It's painful, that's all. And some of you who don't feel much pain are unfortunate, actually. because your practice is actually quite sleepy and dull. And as long as you don't like the pain, it's unbearable.

[36:10]

and you will struggle through it. But if your state of mind is quite stable, pain doesn't go away. It sometimes does. For various people, it's different. It depends on your legs and things. But even if you can't expect it to, and often it doesn't go away, But it's a small problem. It doesn't flood us. If you have that attitude of just accepting, taking refuge in what's in front of you, how can you escape? And if you really know you can't escape, I don't know, it just hurts. But this kind of pain we experience in Zen, which just comes from sitting still in one place for one week, isn't the usual kind of pain.

[37:45]

It's something very characteristic of our being. I think you would agree with me that someone who doesn't know in their life this much pain that you have in a sasheen doesn't know anything. I mean, you don't have any feeling for what characterizes our life together. And you have no ability to withstand our actual encounters. You'll always be ducking and dodging and taking refuge in the surface of things.

[38:50]

So if you don't have that experience of pain in zazen, you'll be a ducker and dodger all your life. So just to sit there is enough and everything. I know how discouraging it can be, even after many years of sitting and many sashins, I sometimes, well I can't say I almost gave up, but you know I, my legs never function very well, they're like they're made of glass and

[39:53]

I have to be very careful with them or I'll damage them. They don't bend very well. None of my joints do. So, you know, when you realize, when I realized I was in this for life, I saw endless sessions stretching into the future. I thought, oh my God, what a career. Every year. Zen is nice, but there must be some easier way. Who cares about the ultimate? I'll take something or less. But I've tried many things and the suffering's the same.

[40:57]

Once you are aware, the suffering's the same. So this gives us some chance to practice together. If you don't discriminate about it, it's not any problem at all. I have to sit six sessions a year. and I don't mind. Yes, Mary? Mary? You can't remember? Oh, good. Yeah.

[41:59]

Taking refuge in Buddha, Dharma and Sangha versus taking refuge in the surface of things? Yeah. I don't know how to express it any better than I've expressed it already. Pardon me?

[43:52]

I just did. Three pure precepts are how to refrain from not doing and how to do what you have to do on each moment. It doesn't mean anything to say, do good and don't do evil. What that points to is how you experience yourself creating yourself on each moment. Yeah. In your own experience. Can you hear what he said? You know, if you can't hear, if you just go like that or something, I'll… He said, asked me to say something about how to know when enough is enough, right?

[45:14]

you can only rely on yourself so you there's no rules so you have to just become more sensitive to that minute the minuteness of our existence and trust your intuition. When you have some feeling that you ought to stop something, even if logically you should continue, just stop at that moment and see what happens. I mean, don't overdo it.

[46:27]

You could get yourself into some funny situations if you follow that too strictly. Anyway, you know what I mean. Anyway, I've talked about all this stuff before, so... Yeah. My own experience with Suzuki Roshi, what? I've been talking about darkness all week.

[47:44]

I don't… you know, I don't like even talking the way I've been talking today so much about and things, because I'm not interested in it. I'm always, if you want to know what my experience is like with Suzuki Roshi, it's the same as my experience with you. So you should look to your experience with us. That's all. Not somewhere else. What are you looking somewhere else for? So I'm, today, you know, it's the fourth day of Sashin, and I've spent three days talking about the group of records. And today I actually feel I just don't want to interrupt your zazen, so I'm talking about the surfaces of things.

[49:07]

Anyway, I'm just having a cup of tea with you. Okay. I can repeat it. You said, I think, what kind of effort we should make during a session? I think we know what to do already, you know, without my saying anything, if you see somebody sitting well, you know, not moving.

[50:24]

You have some feeling of gratitude for that person. You feel glad for that person. And that same kind of feeling you'll give others if you sit, with nothing else to do but just sit. I don't think we have to get involved with me doing it. Anyway, that's enough talking.

[51:42]

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