I vow to taste the truth about the Tantras first. Good morning. Thank you for the chanting. Sometimes, in Sashin, as the energy of Sashin grows, and as we all come together, sometimes we will hear ourselves chanting as one voice, and we begin to realize that we are one body. And actually, it's easier with the Japanese chanting, even though we don't understand

[01:02]

the meaning, because there are all those nice open vowels. And because we're not caught up in the meaning, we're just chanting as a yogic practice, particularly in service, but throughout Sashin, chanting is a yogic practice. It's a practice of body and breath, only in this case the breath has also sound. And one of the difficulties with English, particularly when we're chanting something unfamiliar, we're very familiar now with the English Heart Sutra, and so we can chant in one continuous breath without stopping for punctuation. But when we're chanting something unfamiliar, like the Genjo Koan, or Fukan Zazen, we tend to fall into reading and stopping at punctuation, or breathing at punctuation. But in order that we can have this one voice and this yogic practice, we don't chant in

[02:12]

that way during service. So for example, Genjo Koan would be chanted more like this. As all things are Buddhadharma, there is delusion and realization, practice and birth and death, and there are myriad Buddhas and sentient beings, as the myriad things are without an abiding self, there is no delusion, no realization, no Buddha, no sentient... and breathing anywhere except at the punctuation or paragraph. I think we have come together enough as Sesshin to be ready to do that now, the Genjo Koan. Let's try. But as you see, we're not having a Shosan ceremony this morning. I think we haven't cooked yet long enough in this pressure cooker that we make for each

[03:15]

other called Sesshin. Some of us have not yet cracked open that hard outer shell of self that is an accumulation of accretions of a lifetime, to open up the heart of our practice, our innermost request, our deepest fears and doubts, the source of our practice. It's this openness that we want to bring to Shosan ceremony and share with one another. This body of Bodhisattvas, which has created the Sesshin for us, we want to share with,

[04:18]

we want to reveal ourselves. And I think we want to cook a while longer in the pressure cooker, you know. Sesshin is a gift that we all give each other. None of us can do Sesshin alone. But using the forms that we have inherited from our ancestors, we come together and recreate a living reenactment of the Buddha's awakening through the ritual of Rohatsu Sesshin. We bring that ritual alive with our breath, with our effort, with our intention, with

[05:32]

our fears, with our longing, with all of who we are we bring to this Sesshin and we open it up for one another and for ourselves. There is a story I heard about Suzuki Roshi in the early years at Tassajara. Someone who had not been practicing so long, someone of the big strong young men, he was surrounded by big strong young men down there. As a matter of fact, once up here there were some visitors from Japan coming and he had about a half a dozen of these six foot plus guys. He said, I want you to put your shoes outside my door. I want them to know I'm teaching giants. So one of these strong young men was invited to come along with Suzuki Roshi to help him

[06:42]

on some project. And he went along and he said most of the other people were his senior students. Anyhow, they went down. There was a time when we were sort of trying to redirect the creek out by the flats, move some rocks out and sort of protect the flats. He had a vision of maybe building a Buddha hall out there one day. And so this guy said, OK, and he went over to Suzuki Roshi's cabin and Suzuki Roshi came out in his baggy work clothes and his zoris and his rock chisel and his hammer and they went off trailing behind him down into the creek. And there was a great big boulder in the creek that had a little, had a crevice in it. And he stuck his chisel in the crevice and he started to pound away at it with the hammer. And then he passed the hammer along to some of the other guys. Everybody was taking whacks at it, trying to crack this rock open.

[07:48]

And they were all having a grand old time there. And he said, you don't think it will crack open, do you? But I know it will crack open. It will crack open. It is cracking open. But we haven't much time. We have to renew our effort. We have to sit harder. We have to take a chance to let it crack open. We have to find a way to expound the Dharma with this body.

[09:01]

We have to find a way to embody the truth. We can find it here, in the Sashin. Kenjo Kohn says, When you find your place, where you are, practice occurs, actualizing the fundamental point. When you find your way, at this moment, practice occurs, actualizing the fundamental point. For the place, the way, is neither large nor small, neither yours nor others. The place, the way, has not carried over from the past, and it is not merely arising now. Accordingly, in the practice enlightenment of the Buddha way, meeting one thing is mastering it.

[10:05]

Doing one practice is practicing completely. Here is the place. Here the way unfolds. The boundary of realization is not distinct, for the realization comes forth simultaneously with the mastery of Buddha Dharma. The boundary of realization is not distinct. We sit and live with our question, and as Rilke says, someday we live into the answer. I think you may expect some 4th of July fireworks, but awakening is not like that. It's little by little, and it's all at once.

[11:06]

It's walking in the fog, and suddenly discovering that you're all wet. We are here together, walking in the fog, and we don't have to worry about whether we're getting wet or not. We're just walking in the fog. Breathing out, just breathing into emptiness, not looking for anything, no seeking or sighing, just breathing in. Breathing in, oh, I'm alive. Lu once gave a sermon at a Christian church where we were members years ago, called, No Resurrection Without Crucifixion.

[12:16]

It was not a popular sermon, nobody... ... People just walked by him on the steps as they left the church and nobody shook his hand. But there's no... There's no inhale without an exhale. There's no... ...birth without death. We swim upstream, like a salmon swimming upstream to spawn, death and birth occurring together at the source. We want to be born-again Buddhists,

[13:19]

and again, and again, and again, with each breath. Dying and coming to life again. Letting it all go and seeing what comes in fresh. What is it? The tree withers and the leaves fall. Body exposed to the golden wind. Our time is short. Can we expose this body to the golden wind? ...

[14:34]

... [...]

[15:38]

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