I have new glasses, which I'm not quite used to, so you're kind of going in and out of focus, depending on... Maybe you have that experience also, I don't know. But from this side of these lenses, I'm kind of seeing you all very sharply and then kind of blurry if I don't look in exactly the right place. It's kind of interesting, you're kind of coming in, you know, being very sharp and then blurry. And so I'm kind of feeling sharp and then blurry myself as well. I wanted to acknowledge, in sitting with you here today,

[01:01]

something about our life together as a sangha in the past month or so, and somehow it seems totally different. Things seem totally different than when we were last here sitting for a day or a week. And again, I want to acknowledge and honor Michael's passing on, and the feeling of being here with this one less person is part of our community. Although he is still with us, his presence is still here, and also Grace is being in a coma, and we dedicated the merit of our chanting this morning to her recovery.

[02:15]

So both Grace and Michael are still very much with us, but in a somewhat different way than in the past. I know many of you are feeling this very strongly, and others of you are maybe not aware, or this hasn't been part of your life, but I don't think there's anyone's life that is apart from birth and death and suffering. I'm sure that many of you have similar relationships and circumstances in your lives that other of us don't know about. So in any case, I think today is a good day just to sit with this question of life and death.

[03:25]

I'm very happy myself to be here and just have this opportunity to stop and breathe and be aware of where I am. This past week somehow has seemed for me, I don't know about you, but for me it's been very busy and feeling that I was involved in a multitude of... things simultaneously and finding it very difficult to just pay attention to one of them at a time. And at some point realizing that this kind of scattering effect had completely taken over my body and that I had to just stop and be with where I was, no matter what it was, remembering that the future pretty much generally takes care of itself and that worrying about it beforehand generally isn't so helpful.

[04:42]

So I'd like to encourage all of you to do that today, to just stop. and no matter what is going on in your life, to just take this chance to just find this empty space today. I happened to see an article recently that really caught my eye about an artist by the name of Paul Chan who used a term I found interesting, articulate speechlessness, and it seemed very reminiscent of many koans, this question of can we express our deepest intention, our feeling, deepest intention and feeling or not, and how do we share that with others

[05:48]

And he said that what he wanted to express in his art was articulate speechlessness. And his description of this was that some works of art resist our attempts to interpret or explain them. And that it's that resistance that he calls articulate speechlessness. that that's what their power comes from, is maybe the attempt to explain them and that they defy that. And I think we find that in our practice also. If we think that we can put something into words, we bring it down to... a kind of level of understanding that robs it of something, that the deepest meaning is something that can't be put into words.

[06:58]

And also maybe it really expresses that point where we're not trying to get anything out of life any longer. that that kind of tension that he's talking about is similar to the point at which we're willing to just be with things as they are without trying to make them better, without trying to imagine them differently. Just being willing to be with a difficult situation, not trying to make it go away. And he also described his experience of this as like the clearing of a space. He said, my mind was cleared for something else to happen. And so that's what I would wish for us today, that we find this clearing of a space where we don't know what will happen in that space and that we can be okay with that.

[08:11]

we can just be in that space of where we can actually realize who we are. So today I wanted to talk about a case in the Denko Roku, the record of the transmission of the lamp. And as some of you know, this past week we had a sewing retreat here, a retreat in which Many people came together to sew Buddha's robe. Some people were sewing a robe that's been made for Blanche Hartman, former abbess, now at City Center. And some people were sewing their own rakasu or okesa in preparation for ordination. So this is a, what I'm wearing now is a nine panel The one that was being made for Blanche is a 21 panel.

[09:16]

So it's basically the same size as this one, but each of the pieces is much, much smaller. So this has nine vertical panels. That one has 21, so they're much narrower. And the ones that were being sewn, that some other people were sewing, This week were seven-panel robes for new priests. And also the five-panel rakasu for people preparing for the bodhisattva initiation ceremony. And during this retreat, Diane Riggs gave a talk on the yokesa. I think quite a few of you were there. And one of the things she mentioned was a case that brings up the robe in the transmission of the lamp. And I wanted to talk a little bit more about that case.

[10:18]

So this is the case about our 42nd ancestors. So this morning we chanted our lineage of ancestors. And the 40, so it's a little confusing because the Japanese pronunciation and the Chinese name and so forth. The 41st ancestor in our lineage is Doan Kanshi, and his disciple, the 42nd ancestor, was Ryozan Enkan. These are how we refer to them. Ryozan Enkan, or Liangshan Yuanquan, Chinese. And So the case reads, the 42nd ancestor was Ryozan Enkan. He studied with Doan Kanshi and served him.

[11:22]

Doan Kanshi asked Ryozan, what is the business beneath the patched robe? The master, Ryozan, had no answer. Doan said, studying the Buddha way and still not reaching this realm is the most painful thing. Now you ask me. Ryozan asked, what is the business beneath the patched robe? Doan said, intimacy. Ryozan was greatly awakened. So, first the the teacher asked the student, what is the business beneath the patched robe? And the student had no answer. He couldn't reply. So the teacher told him his understanding and then said to the student, now you ask the question.

[12:32]

Since you can't answer it, you ask me. And he repeated the question, what is the business beneath the patched robe? And Doan said intimacy. The teacher said intimacy. And the student Ryozan was greatly awakened. And then the case goes on to describe the situation in which this dialogue came up. And in this translation, Ryozan is referred to as the master, which is a little confusing because in the story he's the student. Later he becomes the master. So the master is Ryozan.

[13:35]

No one knows where the master was from. His name was Ryozan. He studied with Doan Kanchi and as his attendant was responsible for his robes and bowl. Once Doan entered the hall and was supposed to be wearing his robe. So when it was time, the master, Ryozan, brought the patchwork Dharma robe to him. As he took the robe, Doan asked, What is the business beneath the patched robe? The master had no answer. But at the conclusion of this dialogue, he was greatly awakened. He made full bows and tears of gratitude wet his robe. Doan said, Now that you have had a great awakening, can you express it?

[14:36]

Ryozan said that he could. Doan asked, what is the business beneath the patched robe? The master, Ryozan, said, intimacy. The teacher, Doan, said, intimacy, intimacy. So what What is this question that he's asking? What is really going on beneath this patched robe? Maybe another way of asking the question would be simply, what's happening? Or what am I doing? Or what's the most important thing? What is the great matter of birth and death? What is my relationship?

[15:41]

Birth and death is happening. There is birth. There is life. There is death. What is that for me? What is going on right now? So he's asking in a form that's about something that seems hidden or covered, not what is apparent, not what do I look like, but what is happening beneath this patched robe? What is it that cannot be seen? What is it that perhaps cannot even be expressed? And the robe that he's talking about is not just his robe, but it's Buddha's robe.

[16:44]

As one of the people who was here sewing all week said at the end, when he came, he thought that he was coming to sew his own robe. He brought a robe with him and his intention was to sew it for himself. And when he left, he left with the feeling that we were all sewing Buddha's robe together. He had a very different feeling about it than at the beginning. Sometimes this robe is called a field of merit. So in the morning before putting it on, we put it on our heads and chant Buddha's robe. a field of merit far beyond form and emptiness. And as Diane talked about, it's the field of practicing Buddhist precepts.

[17:50]

So wearing the robe, the precepts are practiced. It's the embodiment of taking refuge in Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. It's the robe of the pure precepts, of following the monastic rules, of not harming others, of acting for the benefit of all beings. And Joshin-san, who helped transmit the sewing of the robe from Japan, said the Kesa is the body of Buddha. And I've been thinking about this quite a bit. Is the robe the body of Buddha? Is it not the body of Buddha? Do I believe that it's the body of Buddha?

[18:52]

So Joshin-san seemed to really have faith that the robe was the body of Buddha. And... Something that was helpful to me was an interview I heard recently with Karen Armstrong, who's a scholar of many religions, and she was talking about the term credo, which I guess is quite important in Catholicism and generally is taken to mean, I believe. And she said, it doesn't actually mean I believe, but it means I give my heart. And I really like that phrase of I give my heart, that it's not a question of believing or not believing, but I give my heart. And what happens when I say or when I have that attitude of I give my heart

[20:00]

toward the robe as the body of Buddha, that for me there's some opening there, some embracing of the robe and the whole world as the body of Buddha. The robe is covering the world. as the body of Buddha. So it's not a question of do I believe that it is or that it isn't, but it's a devotion that I can actually practice with. So I think that the way to realize this intimacy that Ryozan and Doan were talking about is through taking up devotion, through taking up devotion to form, through the forms of practice such as sewing the robe, wearing the robe, bowing together, eating together, making offerings together.

[21:27]

So in the case, the teacher could have picked any time to ask this question. It sounds like he had some sense that his disciple was very close to realization and just needed some little nudge, some kind of spark to help him drop everything. And the moment he chose was a moment of dealing with this particular object that was very close to them both. So as the attendant, Ryozan would have been responsible for taking care of the robe, for folding it up, putting it away, bringing it out at the proper time. And this was the moment that the teacher chose to have some interaction with the student.

[22:34]

I also find it interesting that he had him ask the question himself, just in repeating the question, keeping the question in front of him, that the form really came to life. And in the story, it sounds like it was all one dialogue, that it just happened very fast, but we don't really know that this is how it happened. It could have been that this went on for years, this kind of back and forth between the student and the teacher. The case then goes on to say, Later, the master, Ryozan, often spoke of intimacy in his teaching. After he settled on Mount Liang, many students asked him about what was beneath the patched robe.

[23:40]

So they asked him the same question again that his teacher had asked him. Once a student asked, what is the business beneath the patched robe? And the master replied, Not even all the holy ones reveal it. Another student asked, what about when it's hard to protect the house against thieves? The master replied, if you are aware of them, they won't trouble you. So again, the question was, what about when it's hard to protect the house against thieves? Ryozan replied, if you are aware of them, they will not trouble you. The monk asked, after you recognize them, what then? The master said, you can banish them to the land of no birth.

[24:50]

So I think these thieves are the thoughts of that we're not intimate with, and the ones that we don't like, the painful ones, the ones that we want to push away. And when I was thinking about what to talk about today, I've been thinking a lot, not only about Michael and Grace, but... also about my Dharma sister Fu and how her life has been. And I asked her, what should I talk about today? And she said, not surprisingly, suffering. Suffering and the causes of suffering. And I think that the...

[25:51]

I think that suffering is the turning away. We think that there are thieves out there, that there are things happening that we don't like and that we suffer because of them. But I think that actually the suffering is the turning away from them. The suffering is when we can't be intimate, when we're not able to bring forth the devotion. The word that's used in this case, I think the Japanese word is mitsu, which also means... secrecy or it's like minute, minute attention, minute detail.

[26:58]

So when we don't have minute detailed attention to something, but we want to push it away, that's suffering. So in the midst of suffering, In the midst of devastation, how do we turn toward it? The artist who I mentioned earlier said that he came to this understanding about his art some years ago when he saw some plays by Samuel Beckett. And more recently, he decided to stage Waiting for Godot in New Orleans. So in the midst of the devastation, there still are cats.

[28:04]

In the midst of the devastation, they staged Waiting for Godot. So rather than turning away, they faced this the great questions of life and death. And he quoted Beckett as saying, at this place, at this moment in time, all mankind is us. Let us make the most of it. While we have a chance, let us do something before it's too late. So that's my wish for us today, that while we have a chance, let us do nothing or something here together. And I would like to invite your comments or questions, your thoughts.

[29:30]

are stealthy. Thieves usually don't linger. How can you keep them near enough to reveal themselves? Seth said that these thieves are stealthy and they don't linger long enough to reveal themselves. Is that... Yeah, sometimes they're very tricky. And they don't always reveal themselves so clearly. But sometimes they leave traces, right? If they didn't leave a trace, you wouldn't even be bringing it up. So there is something fleeting.

[31:12]

And I think it's in the willingness. I think when we're willing and have the energy to meet them, then we come. face to face. Sometimes there's some, we don't see them till later, and it's very difficult. But then there's a new one, and we just do it over, over and over again. They don't actually look like what we think they look like.

[32:18]

I think that's part of the trick, that we think we know what we're looking for, but it comes up as something else. You're wondering about the relationship of secrets, suffering, and attention to detail? I think the secret part is the hidden minute aspect that it's

[33:29]

when we're willing to stay with the minute bits, what may seem like the minute bits of our life, that we experience intimacy. That often, at least my experience is that of rushing on to the next big thing, what we think of as the next big thing, the big important thing that we need to take care of. And in doing so, we miss just the, we miss out on where we are, that there's something coming up. This is the imagination. Imagination is that there's something about to happen that's more important than what's happening right now.

[34:40]

And that, of course, that big thing never actually arrives because it's an imagination. It's not our actual life. So, There actually aren't any secrets. But when we pay attention, then it's revealed. But it seems to be a secret. It seems to be something beneath the robe. And I think it's a useful... It's like if something is hidden, then we look at it. Otherwise, we may ignore it. And I think suffering is that which we ignore, what we turn away from.

[35:58]

That when we actually... It's kind of like, I think we define suffering as something out there that's paining us. But it's actually the process of turning away that's the pain. Something like that. you know, what's the immediate response when you hear about someone having a terrible accident?

[37:03]

Generally, the first response is no. Right? It's like, no, this can't be This can't be happening. I don't believe it. Last week, Fu was telling me that someone was talking that, I guess this was a week or so ago in the hospital, that someone went in to see Grace.

[38:23]

This person was someone very close to her, who is also a physician, and he spoke very strongly to her. I don't know if he was like yelling or just speaking loudly, but like really firmly and like, Grace, open your eyes. If you can hear me, open your eyes. You have to do this. And, you know, in a sense, like really very, very powerfully instructing her to turn toward the pain, like knowing that she was in tremendous pain and, you know, saying, if you're in pain, you need to let us know. Give us, you know, open your eyes and that

[39:28]

She can't deal with the pain by turning away from it. That there's no place to go. There's no other place to go. That the pain is part of the... Particularly for her right now, that is part of her being alive. In order to be alive, she has to be willing to be there. with it. Yeah, she opened her eyes. I don't understand this realm, but it seems really important to look at it. Yeah.

[40:40]

Well, again, it just seemed to me that it was like really not turning away. not turning away from what was happening. This artist took a series of photographs. I think part of advertising that they were going to do this play, they did it outdoors. It was free. Hundreds and hundreds of people came, and there was a series of photographs. Evidently, the instructions at the beginning of Waiting for Godot, the instructions that Beckett wrote say, or the description of setting the stage were, a country road, a tree, evening.

[41:53]

And he took a series of photographs in different places in New Orleans showing that. And they're with a sign saying, a country road, a tree evening. And so there's a series of photographs, some One of the actors holding this sign, just like on a desolate stretch of road. One photograph, the sign is tacked up on a tree. Again, just kind of this devastated area. In another one, it's on a devastated house.

[42:57]

So this was two and a half years after the hurricane, and he went there, and the place still was looking like that. And so they did this event and it brought the people of the community together. And it just seemed like a tremendous energizing and bringing together of that group of people who were facing what was happening in their lives and really articulating it and finding this space in which then you don't know what will come out of it, you don't know what will happen, but you start with clearing a space and then you see what will happen.

[44:05]

to the intensity and holding family, one loses the, actually, a certain awareness. So I just wanted to mention that there's to me a balancing place for turning forward. Can't everyone hear that? So Jane is bringing up the point of being relaxed with facing intensity. And I think that our forms can help us

[45:42]

to do that. It's also possible to get all tensed up around the forms. Practicing with the forms can show us that. They can give us some indication of how loose or tight we are and can help reveal that. And they're there to play with. it helps to have something to play with.

[46:45]

So you might also think of the robe as Buddha's plaything. Not usually described in that way, but I think Buddhists can have something to play with also. balance. To me, if I had nothing but that, it would get really tiring after a while. And I might decide that's too much, I can't do it. It's a song. It might match me or hoping that if the song and all her friends are there to support her, that that's kind of a balance for her, how

[47:56]

I do. I think that's what our friends are doing. I think that's what sangha is for, to help us all, not just grace, but also like Seth was bringing up, how do you see these thieves before they melt away? I think we all need, we do need each other to help us to to remind us when we're getting too tense around them. Anything else? Thank you very much.

[48:55]

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