I am proud to taste the truth of the Tathagata's words. Good evening. We have some more copies of Fukanza Zengi. For those of you who didn't get one, I'll just pass them out. And Matt, where's Matt? Oh, so Matt will pass around the attendance list to just check off your name or add it if you're... And we also have the comparative translations. So I don't... we didn't have these last week, so... I hope there's enough of those. This comparative translation is in the back of the Carol Bielfeld book,

[01:15]

so if you own the book, you don't really need that. You can take one if you want, so you can write on it. So let's please go around and say our names, and then... Is Kevin here? Kevin was going to recite the Fukanza Zengi tonight, but I don't see him. Maybe he's practicing somewhere. Make an entrance here. Well, is anyone else ready to recite the Fukanza Zengi? No? Okay. Well, let's recite our names. We can do that, I think. And then we'll chant it together. Linda. Martha. Margaret. Molly. John. Matt. Gary. Gwen. Laura. Greg. Liz.

[02:17]

Susan. Evelyn. Judy. Julia. Michael. Carol. Rita. Amy. Ben. Barbara. David. Gregory. Krista. Ramesh. Mia. Erin. Alyssa. Dennis. Sarah. Maddie. Donna. Lance. Lynn. Is there another one? So let's chant it. Lynn, would you mind introducing it for us? Oh, how's your throat? It's okay. I just had a cough. Okay. I don't know if I'm going to be the right key, but we'll see.

[03:23]

Fukanza Zengi The way is originally perfect and all-pervading. How could it be contingent on practice and realization? The truth, the artful is self-sufficient. What need is there for special effort? Indeed, the whole body is free from dust. Who could believe in a means to brush it clean? It is never apart from this very place. What is the use of traveling around to practice? And yet if there is a hair's breadth deviation, it is like the gap between heaven and earth. If the least like or dislike arises, the mind is lost in confusion. Suppose you are confident in your understanding and rich in enlightenment, gaining the wisdom that knows at a glance, obtaining a way and clarifying the mind, arousing an aspiration to reach for the heavens. You are playing in the entranceway, but you still are short of the vital path of emancipation.

[04:26]

Consider the Buddha, although he was wise at birth, the traces of his six years of upright sitting can yet be seen. As for Bodhidharma, although he had received the mind skill, his nine years of facing the wall are celebrated still. If even the ancient sages were like this, how can we today dispense with wholehearted practice, therefore put aside the intellectual practice of investigating words and chasing phrases in order to take the backward step that turns the light and shines the inward? Body and mind of themselves will drop away and your original face will manifest. If you want such a thing, get to work on such a thing immediately. For practicing Zen, a quiet room is suitable. Eat and drink moderately. Put aside all involvements and suspend all affairs. Do not think good or bad. Do not judge true or false. Give up the operations of mind, intellect, and consciousness. Stop measuring with thoughts, ideas, and views. Have no designs on becoming a Buddha.

[05:28]

How could that be limited to sitting or lying down? At your sitting place, grab a thick mat and put a cushion on it. Sit either in the full lotus or half lotus position. In the full lotus position, first place your right foot on your left thigh, then your left foot on your right thigh. In the half lotus, simply place your left foot on your right thigh. Tie your robes loosely and arrange them neatly, then place your right hand on your left leg and your left hand on your right palm. Thumb tips lightly touching. Straighten your body and sit upright, leaning neither left nor right, neither forward nor backward. Align your ears with your shoulders and your nose with your navel. Rest the tip of your tongue against the front of the roof of your mouth. With teeth and nose together, both shut, always keep your eyes open and breathe softly through your nose. Once you have adjusted your posture, take a breath and exhale fully. Rock your body right and left and settle into steady and movable sitting. Think about thinking, not thinking.

[06:30]

What kind of thinking is that? Non-thinking. This is the essential art of zazen. The zazen I speak of is not meditation practice. It is simply the Dharma gate of joyful ease. It is the practice realization of totally culminated enlightenment. It is the koan realized. Traps and stairs can never reach it if you grasp the point. You are like a dragon gaining the water, like a tiger taking to the mountains. For you must know that the true Dharma appears of itself, so that from the start, dullness and distraction are struck aside. When you arise from sitting, move slowly and quietly, calmly and deliberately. Do not rise suddenly or abruptly in surveying the past. We find that transcendence arose mundane and sacred, and dying while either sitting or standing have all depended entirely on the power of zazen. In addition, triggering awakening with a finger, a hammer, a needle, or a mallet, and effecting realization with a wrist, a fist, a staff, or a shawl, these cannot be understood by discriminative thinking,

[07:32]

much less can they be known through the practice of supernatural power. They must represent conduct beyond seeing and hearing, guiding the standard prior to knowledge and views. This being the case, intelligence or lack of it is not an issue. Make no distinction between the dull and the sharp-witted. If you concentrate your efforts single-mindedly, that in itself is wholeheartedly engaging the way practiced. Realization is naturally undefiled. Going forward is, after all, an everyday affair. In general, in our world and others in both India and China, all equally hold the Buddha seal. While each lineage expresses its own style, they are all simply devoted to seeing, totally blocked in resonant stability. Although they say that there are 10,000 distinctions and 1,000 variations, they just wholeheartedly engage the way in zazen, quietly behind the seat in your own bones, to wander in vain through the dusty realms of other lands. If you make one misstep, you stumble past what is directly in front of you.

[08:33]

You have gained the pivotal opportunity of human form. Do not pass your days and nights in vain. You are taking care of the essential activity of the Buddha way. Who would take wasteful delight in the spark from a footstone? Besides, form and substance are like the dew on the grass. The portions of life, like a dart of lightning, emptied in an instant and vanished in a flash. Please, honored followers of Zen, long accustomed to groping for the elephant, do not doubt the true dragon. Devote your energies to the way that points directly to the real thing. Revere the one who has gone beyond learning and is free from effort. Accord with the enlightenment of all the Buddhas. Succeed to the samadhi of all the ancestors. Continue to live in such a way and you will be such a person. The treasure store will open up itself and you may enjoy it freely. So those of us who are in the practice period are chanting this every day for noon service, and it just occurred to me while we were chanting it

[09:35]

that those of you who aren't in a practice period might take some time every day to chant it at home, have your own little service. There is something... Those of you who are doing this every day, are you finding that it's coming back to you? It's coming in and certain phrases are lodging in your... You could close your eyes and do whole parts of it along with everybody. So it will just come in that way by just repeating over and over. Is there anyone who would like to recite it next week? Anyone want to give it a try? Kevin, right, Kevin. No volunteers. What do you mean by reciting, from heart? Yes, by heart. Okay, well... You're not volunteering, are you? No. Okay, well, we'll see if Kevin does next week.

[10:40]

I'd like to have someone try it as we go along. So we've got... After this week we have four more weeks. So you might be ready if we're doing this every day. You know what? Yes. In reciting this, I can do a lot of it, but I get confused between this translation and the last one. Yes, I know. And I keep on... My impulse is to kind of... The phrases from the last one are still kind of more... Yes. I think for those of us who knew the last one, in memorization it's kind of hard. So for those of you for whom this is fresh, I think it might come easier. There are a few phrases in this one that I don't like as well. Right, of course. So what I wanted to do in this class was do a little bit of review of what we talked about last week,

[11:44]

and then the fukan zazen can be basically divided, or kind of loosely divided into an introduction, a middle section that's really about the nuts and bolts of zazen, you know, what kind of room, how do you eat, the posture itself, and then the kind of conclusion. And each of those three parts is a little bit different, and I was hoping tonight if we could get through the first, second, and third paragraph, perhaps. The first three paragraphs. We'll give it a try. So I just wanted to, in going through those first three, just to review a little bit, will help us to look at this first part of the fukan zazen.

[12:48]

So Dogen, as you recall, had this question that he had unanswered. As a pretty young guy, he was 13 when he was in the monastery, very bright, and at that time, the Tendai, I wanted to kind of paint a picture of what was going on at that time in Japan, in the Buddhist world, and the Tendai establishment was very connected up with the government. They were also armed. There were armies of monks, there were armed monks. You've probably heard of this. It was a kind of, one might say, a kind of degenerate time in many ways, and this went along with this kind of prediction that there would be soon after, the first 500 years after the Buddha lived, the teaching would degenerate over time, and this time was the end of the teaching where the teaching was lost and people were going through the motions.

[13:50]

It's called mapo. So there was some feeling that that, among the reformers, that this was this degenerate time. So Dogen's question, his big question, his burning question was, based on the teaching that he had heard, which is a Mahayana teaching, which is we are all originally enlightened, so how is it that we have to practice so hard or make this big effort if, or another way to put it is, if there's this unconditioned, the unconditioned, why do we have to do these conditioned things in order to realize that? So this teaching that we're all originally, we all are originally enlightened, or Buddha nature is our birthright, there's a kind of doctrine that goes along with that

[14:56]

which we've been talking about, which is this very mind is Buddha, which is, this is what we sometimes call sudden enlightenment as opposed to gradual enlightenment where you do all these practices and then you become enlightened. This is you already are if you just can realize it. So this very mind is Buddha is a kind of companion doctrine or teaching that you might say. So what happened during this time is that a kind of, those teachings were kind of brought to their logical lowest common denominator, which is similar to what you might say happened in the 60s too. It's like we heard these teachings about everything's one and we're already enlightened. So we used to call it, it's all one man, that kind of attitude, well, it's all one, everything's okay,

[15:56]

I can do whatever I want, which is a kind of perversion really of the Dharma. What I talked about on one of these talks that I gave recently was really about Dogen saying, because practice realization are not separate, Buddha ancestors always say you should not be slack in your practice. You have to make exertion to realize this rather than this other kind of lazy way of thinking, which is if everything's Buddha nature, then anything I do is fine. And you could go underneath that and say, yes, that's true, anything you do is fine, but this was used as an excuse to not practice, not make any efforts and just to basically justify selfish concerns

[16:59]

or sort of degenerate practices. So this was the kind of milieu that Dogen found himself in. And he was this bright young kid and his teachers basically taught him, he said later they taught him to be famous, to become famous in the nation and be honored in the world. And he began to feel like that these teachers were despicable. This is the translation. His despicable contemporaries and the title of great master in this country seemed to me worthless. So he had this feeling that what he was being taught and what was being touted as the way to go and how he should accomplish the way was meaningless and worthless, and he had to find a true teacher,

[18:00]

which is why he went to China. So he did practice with this Rinzai teacher who was the chief disciple of Eisai. His chief disciple was Myosan, and he felt he was a wonderful teacher for him, but it didn't satisfy this basic longing of if we're already enlightened, why do we have to practice? So that's this kind of dangerous interpretation or perversion of those very old Mahayana teachings. It's something to watch, watching our own mind kind of go there too. So faith, this kind of faith that we're already Buddha became very kind of this exclusive, or maybe not exclusive, but the faith, it seemed like,

[19:02]

well, you just have to have faith in that and you don't have to make any effort to practice. That was what he saw. So it was a kind of crisis during this time in Buddhism, actually, is what the reformers felt, a crisis in moral and intellectual and religious, that age was this crisis going on. So to understand Dogen's burning desire, it's in this context that we can understand how he really felt he needed to find a teacher. So at 14, he left Mount Hiei, went to study with Eisai for a year and then wandered a bit and then went back when he was 17 to study with Myosan. And then he stayed with him from, let's see how many years, about seven years, and then the two of them,

[20:02]

they were very close, teacher and disciple, and they were doing a Rinzai study together and they went together to China. And Myosan died while he was in China and Dogen found his teacher there, Rujing. And then he received the certificate from Rujing and felt he had to bring this back to Japan, to this place where he felt Buddhism had come but the true teaching had not gotten there. And in the context of this kind of degenerate age, he felt this burning desire to bring the true way back. And so he wrote the Fukanza Zengi. Now, I wanted to read this. There's an original manuscript, this is in one of the appendixes of the book,

[21:03]

where he says, he basically talks about why he wanted to write this book. Why he wanted to write the Fukanza Zengi. And it's just a note in Dogen's own hand, this note that we actually have at Eiheiji, I think. So he says, The treasury of the eye of true Dharma separately transmitted outside scripture has never been heard of in our kingdom, much less has any principles of seated meditation been transmitted to us. Basically, there's been no Fukanza Zengi that we've gotten. When I returned to my country from the land of the Sung during the Karoka era, that's 1225 to 1227, there were students of the Dharma who asked me to compose such a principles of seated meditation. And so I felt obliged to go ahead and compose one. In ancient days, the Chan master Bo Zhang, that's Hyakujo,

[22:04]

who, you know, a day of no work is a day of no eating, if you're familiar with him, built a long hall with extended dioceses like our Tan, the raised platforms that we sit, for seated meditation and transmitted the style of Shaolin. That's where Bodhidharma sat. This style is not the same as the preceding vines and creepers and old nests, then in brackets of scholastic Buddhism. So he's pointing to this Tendai style. And students should realize this and not confuse them. In the Chan-Wan Jing-Gui, there is a So Chan-Yi. Chan-Wan Jing-Gui are the monastic, it's kind of the code of monastic living, and within that is a Zazen-Gi, is a Zazen rules. So Chan is Zazen in Chinese. So Chan-Yi is a Zazen-Gi. So in the Chan-Wan Jing-Gui, there's a So Chan-Yi.

[23:05]

Though it follows Bo Zhang's original intention, it adds several new clauses by Master Yi. For this reason, it is filled with many mistakes and misunderstandings. Its author knows nothing of the understanding beyond words. Who could fail to realize this? Now I gather the true arcana I have myself seen and heard, offering them merely as a substitute for what is received in the mind's expression. So this is this little note in his... It's undated, I think, in his hand, about why it is that he wanted to write the Fu-Kan-Zi Zazen-Gi. Now he references Bo Zhang, Hyakujo, and I wanted to say something about him. He's traditionally thought of as kind of a legendary character, that he was the one who kind of pulled Zen out from the other monastic practices

[24:10]

and made a separate Zen practice. And supposedly there's these rules that he wrote that codified monastic living and so forth. And it's kind of a legendary thing, and it's referred to all the time, but the scholars have found that there probably wasn't such a body of rules of monastic living, but maybe some brief things that he wrote, and in his biography there's little brief things. But it's constantly referred to, and it's kind of one of those legendary things. This other thing that he refers to that he felt was not good enough, this So Cha Ni, was written by a Chinese person named Sun Tzu, and he wrote a monastic code that was supposedly based on Bo Zhang also, but there is no such thing as this earliest monastic code.

[25:16]

So the Chan Wang Jing Wei was from the 1100s, and that was very widely distributed. That was in monasteries all over, and Dogen probably did see that one while he was in China, so he was familiar with it. And the So Cha Ni part of it, so it's a big monastic code, and then there's this part about Zazen, and that part is in this comparative thing that I just set forth for you, the Chan Wang Jing, I think it's CKKG. So he's not happy with that, but he also, you'll see when we compare them, uses an enormous amount from it. So the So Cha Ni is probably the earliest monastic,

[26:20]

earliest Zazen instructions that were written down, earliest one we have is So Cha Ni. That's T-S-O, Chan, I, So Cha Ni. And it probably was written as a separate tract, sort of like the Fukan Zazenki was written as a separate little manual, and then tacked on to this bigger monastic code. So that's kind of some background for what these things are that we're comparing. So a little bit about Dogen's language, that the So Cha Ni, Sung says So Cha Ni is very, when I say manual, it's written kind of like a manual. It doesn't have kind of a literary flourish to it. Dogen used for this Fukan Zazenki a particular poetic, a prose style, but very poetic, style that was used by the aristocrats,

[27:25]

that he was part of the aristocratic class, and so he was familiar with this kind of writing, which was very dense with allusions to other works and so forth, and that's what the Fukan Zazenki is. In fact, it's just chock full of stock Zen phrases and allusions to things, and that's what we'll, hopefully we can go through those first three paragraphs. So sometimes people feel that the Fukan Zazenki is a big innovation on the So Cha Ni, but he takes what is in the So Cha Ni and just gives it this literary turns of phrase and so forth. So the innovations, there may be less innovations than just making it a real literary piece of literature rather than a manual. Why don't we start out with just, let's see,

[28:42]

get our comparisons and start. Now, of course, Karl Bielefeld's translation is different from this one that we've got, so we're kind of dealing with two different translations here. Oh, one thing is, does anyone else need a comparative thing? Let's see. One thing, right at the beginning, there's a word that's not translated. Nobody translates it. It's an untranslatable part of the Fukan Zazenki, and it's the first words, if we were to do this in Japanese, it is Tazunu,

[29:52]

and it's just two words that are put at the beginning of Chinese treatises, and they say it's untranslatable, but they have down here, seeking the source. So it's something that at the beginning of a formal piece of writing, you start out by saying, seeking the source, which kind of sets the tone for the whole piece. So that's not translated in any of these, but it's there in the Japanese. Excuse me, what did you say it was in Japanese? Taku, let's see. Tazunu, Tazunuru, means source seeking, seeking the source, and then it's a formal opening to a piece.

[30:56]

Is that where they have fundamentally speaking? No, because that actually is a different part of the translation, is the fundamentally speaking. Why is it just the way it's originally perfect? Yeah. Actually, I've got several translations here. The way is basically perfect and all-pervading. The true way is universal. Another person says, why are training and enlightenment differentiated? The way is essentially perfect and exists everywhere. Truth is perfect. To begin with, the truth is everywhere, so there's different translations. So in this first part, when Dogen starts out saying

[32:00]

the way is originally perfect and all-pervading, well, I'm looking at this now, how could it be contingent on practice and realization? That is his, there's his question right there, his burning question. Let's see. The Changwan Jingwei starts out with, the bodhisattva who studies prajna should first arouse the thought of great compassion. So they set the stage by, before you should, they bring up the bodhisattva vow in this other manual, and Dogen just jumps to the, he doesn't put any emphasis on the kind of background, the kind of state of mind that one should have before. He just starts out with his big question. This brings up that the proper mind for doing meditation is the bodhisattva vow,

[33:07]

and vowing to save sentient beings, not seeking liberation for himself alone, is this other manual. But Dogen doesn't bring that up. So the way is basically perfect and all-pervading. How could it be contingent on practice and realization? So there's his question. The true vehicle is self-sufficient. What need is there for special effort? Which is the same thing, just said a little bit differently. And then the next part, indeed the whole body is free from dust. Who could believe in a means to brush it clean? Now that's a reference. Does everyone know what that reference is too? It's a kind of famous reference, and I thought we could just look at that. I know some of you are familiar with it. In terms of literary references,

[34:12]

this goes back to the 5th and the 6th Ancestor, and it's from the Platform Sutra of the 6th Patriarch. And this whole story of the 5th and the 6th Patriarch, or Ancestor, I should say, is apocryphal, probably, in all. I mean, according to the scholars, it couldn't have happened like that. It's more of a legendary thing. But it's one of those legends in Zen that is alluded to all the time. Southern and Northern Ancestors, you know, we have in the Sandokai, in the merging of difference and equality, the way is not different between Southern and Northern Ancestors. That also refers to the same story. So I'll just briefly go over that, which is the 5th Ancestor, Daimon Konin Daisho,

[35:17]

was wanting to have Dharma transmission, pass on the teaching. And his shuso, like Wendy is our shuso, his shuso was a very good student named Shen Xu. And Shen Xu is afterwards associated with the Northern School of Zen in China. But the 6th Ancestor said, I want to transmit the robe and bowl to my successor, and each one of you write a poem expressing your understanding. And the one who shows their understanding most thoroughly through their poem, they will be the successor. So everybody knew that the shuso would probably win the contest. And so he wrote this poem. And his poem, the head monk wrote, The body is the Bodhi tree. The mind is like a clear mirror. At all times we must strive to polish it

[36:22]

and must not let the dust collect. So that was his poem. Now, some people feel it was a very bad poem. And that proves that it didn't really come from this particular teacher. So the 6th Ancestor, Hui Neng, was in the monastery, and he was a very kind of a rough guy. He was uneducated. He couldn't read or write. And he had been put to work in the rice threshing room of the monastery and had been threshing away for about 8 months by then, kind of an unknown person, kind of like a new guest student who just showed up, and you put him to work in the kitchen, and they're just working away, chopping, washing lettuce. So he heard that there was this contest going on, and the poem was written on the wall, on the monastery wall, and he asked one of his fellow monks, he said, Could you read that to me? Because he couldn't even read.

[37:22]

So the monk read it to him, and then he made his own poem, and he asked the monk if he would write it on the wall for him. So he did, and that poem was, Bodhi originally has no tree. Bodhi is awakening. The mirror also has no stand. Buddha nature is always clean and pure. Where is there room for dust? That's one translation of it. So the 5th ancestor found out it was Hui Nang who had done this, but he knew his monks pretty well, and he figured if this, you know, this Johnny come lately who had just been working in the kitchen during the rice were to receive the Roman bowl, there might be trouble. And so he said that the other one won, and then in the night, at midnight,

[38:26]

he called Hui Nang to his room and preached the Diamond Sutra to him and acknowledged him, and Hui Nang had a realization, further realization with his teacher, and received the Roman bowl, and he said, robe and bowl, and then the 6th ancestor said, you know, you better leave fast, and keep yourself hidden. Don't start teaching right away. So he did for about 3 years or so, and he asked him not to expound the Dharma for a while for his own safekeeping. And people were angry, and anyway, the Platform Sutra talks about all these things, and the 5th ancestor told him to go to the south, so the 6th ancestor is associated with the southern school, and the northern school ends up being associated with Shenshu.

[39:27]

Is that story sort of familiar to you? It's one of those very famous ones. So Dogen alludes to it right here in the beginning. Indeed, the whole body is free from dust. Who could believe in a means to brush it clean? Let's see. Let's see, in this, the first Fukanza Zengi No. 1 is that earlier version, the Tenpuku version, the autographed version. So it's basically the same, right? The translation is just a little different. Surely the whole being is far beyond defilement. Who could believe in a method to polish it? Is the 5th ancestor, The Fukanza Zengi No. 2, is that the one we have here? Yes, the No. 2 is what they call the Vulgate or popular version,

[40:31]

which is the one that all the commentaries are on and that they chant, and the Tenpuku was more recently discovered. So let's see. Are there any questions on what the allusions are and what he's pointing to? The second verse? Yeah. Bodhi doesn't have a tree, does he? Bodhi originally has no tree. The mirror also has no stand. Buddha nature is always clean and pure. Where is there room for dust?

[41:31]

So Dogen is, even though this is kind of the intro, he's also pointing to the kind of right kind of mind that's neither... this zazen mind by these questions, that's not stuck in one way or the other, not stuck in... doing these self-improvement things. Like this earlier, at all times we must strive to polish it and must not let the dust collect, is a kind of gradual practice you might think of, keeping polishing in order to become, kind of self-improvement, you might say, which he's pointing at as not the right understanding of zazen. Yes?

[42:45]

In our translation, whenever we come to whole body, I always have this association with the three bodies, the nirmanakaya and the dharmakaya. In this case, the whole body is a word that really... Let's see, it's sentai, I think. Let me see. Whole body is sentai, and it means... It's the whole body of reality, so it's the totality of things in their suchness, or Tathagata, or Buddha nature. It's similar to the earlier part where it says the way is originally perfect and all-pervading. It's now using the image of the whole body, but in the same way, it's that body. So it could be like nirmanakaya? More like dharmakaya, I think. Yes. So the whole body... is free from dust. I feel like we're kind of skating,

[44:01]

or maybe I'm skating, kind of skating over the top, and I have this kind of longing to kind of drop down into it. Maybe you know what I mean. I feel like there's a way of studying these things that are kind of looking at the words and the translations, and yet, what is the kind of... How does the text actually live? So I think we'll just proceed, but I just wanted to dip, as we say in communication workshops, dip to how I'm feeling about this, which is I feel we're kind of around the edges still. Do you know what I mean? You're feeling that too? Okay, well, we'll see what we can do. Playing in the entryway, right, right. Um... I don't know if there's... It's this right understanding of zazen,

[45:04]

which, you know, it's inconceivable, I think, is why it's difficult here, because it's hard to talk about, and yet we have to use these words to point ourselves. So this... I think there's a tendency to fall into how do we do zazen when you actually can't do zazen. It's more like zazen does you, if you understand it. So maybe that's what the difficulty is, but we'll just keep going. So let's see. Where do we go next here? So the next part... So, indeed, the whole body is free from dust. Who could believe in a means to brush it clean? When you hear that, when you chant it now, it will call up the ancestors and this whole gradual and sudden enlightenment...

[46:08]

..supposed dichotomy, although if you look more carefully, it looks like there wasn't that big a schism between the two. But it's kind of what scholars are finding out now, that there are things written, but it wasn't this giant big fight between the two, northern and southern. But anyway, it alludes to that, so that will come to mind. And yet... Let's see. It is never apart from this very place. What is the use of travelling around to practice? And yet if there is a hair's breadth deviation, it is like the gap between heaven and earth. Now, that's an allusion to... In Chinese, it's xinxinming, and in Japanese, it's shinjinmei. And this was one of these poems that was very well known,

[47:13]

and people would know the reference probably. So I just wanted to read you from On Believing in Mind. This is Niti Suzuki's translation. I think there's been other translations, but it starts out, The perfect way knows no difficulties, except that it refuses to make preferences. I think sometimes it's translated, just avoid picking and choosing. Maybe you've heard that translation. Only when freed from hate and love, it reveals itself fully and without disguise. A tenth of an inch's difference, and heaven and earth are set apart. If you wish to see it before your own eyes, have no fixed thoughts either for or against it. So that's this allusion to On Believing in Mind. And yet if there's...

[48:15]

It is never apart from this very place. What is the use of going off here and there to practice? So it's pointing to... And yet if there's a hair's breadth deviation, it is like the gap between heaven and earth. If the least like or dislike arises, the mind is lost in confusion. This is the same as the shin-shin-ming. If the slightest like or dislikes, if any preferences come in, that will disturb your samadhi, basically, I think they say. So... So this is a hard one. I think this is... You mean we're not allowed to have any preferences? I happen to like oatmeal, but I don't like rice cream? And is that... You know... Does that mean that I can't sit dazen or something like that?

[49:16]

So... But I think you can watch in your own practice, or maybe you know already that you can be sitting and... and allowing that which is happening to arise and come forth and meet it, you know, moment after moment. But if you begin to... If the mind goes into, I can't stand this, when is the bell going to ring? My knees are killing me, I've got to move, or... That kind of mind, you feel very disturbed, right? Your calm, settled, ready, pliant, soft mind, flexible mind that's ready for whatever, it gets kind of obliterated into, well, a very jagged kind of grasping, pushing away, want this, don't want that, you know? So... So it says, it's never apart from us...

[50:22]

It is never apart from this very place, this is the way, right? It's never apart from us. What is the use of traveling around to practice? So why do we go here and there looking for teachers if it's right here? And yet, if there's a hair's breadth deviation, it's like the gap between heaven and earth. So if there's the slightest preference for anything, we get thrown. The mind is basically lost in confusion, right? So does anyone have anything they want to say about that? Yes? It does seem like as preferences arise, there's so much self-involvement that comes up that very rarely do they arise in me just as something arising or falling away,

[51:26]

but all of a sudden something becomes a story or center stage, and then I tend to get involved in that thinking, and then the mind isn't fresh and aware of the next thing happening. It's stuck on its opinion. It stays with the opinion for longer than something quick stays. Yes. Yes. Do you know, I was thinking when I first read this that it might be more, let's see, if the like or dislike arises, the mind is lost in confusion, and I think of confusion coming with the attachment and grasping part. So I was a little bit confused by that, thinking that it would be more like it's grasped, then you go into confusion. Well, I think you're right.

[52:27]

I think, you know, if we go further, it's like the path or the way is made up of the dusty realm, right? I guess that's later on, the dusty realms of other lands. But anyway, like a lotus in muddy water, right? It's the actual, if you understand the true nature of your likes and dislikes, meaning dependently co-arisen, there's no problem, right, which is what you were thinking originally, and that's why that threw you, right? So I think he's not going that far right here. He's really talking about regular old grasping and pushing away, attaching to and grasping and averting from and so forth, likes and dislikes in that way. But yes, if you actually understand the true nature of likes and dislikes, the way is basically perfect and all-pervading, right?

[53:30]

So you're right about that. Did everyone understand what we were just talking about? Was that clear? Yeah. So whatever arises in the mind, if we understand the nature of it, the true nature of conditioned things is that they are empty of inherent nature, right, which is the unconditioned. But at this point, I think it's really talking about the least like or dislike of a mind that's leaning into things, leaning away from things, grasping and averting. And confusion, that's like being blown around by the wind, the confusion of wanting this and that and not being able to...

[54:36]

What does it say here? It is never apart from one. It is never apart from this very place. That's the truth. And yet if you begin to feel like you want this and you don't want that and you're moving back and forth, you lose it. You lose this very place in being blown around by the eight winds. The eight winds are things like like and dislike or profit and loss and pain and pleasure. You're just blown by them. You're running from pain and running to pleasure and criticism and praise. It's like whatever happens, you're just thrown and tossed and turned. So that's this kind of confusion, I think. I remember being told something specifically about physical pain during zazen

[55:39]

that kind of seemed to me to apply in this kind of more broader sense. I think it was Blanche who told me early on that nine-tenths of the energy spent on pain is actually dealing with the aversion to pain rather than the sensation itself. And that was so helpful. And it also seems to apply to grasping as well. So there can be a pleasurable experience and yet that most of the energy around that experience is involved in the grasping it rather than the actual thing itself. So I found that very kind of helpful in putting things into proportion and helping to recognize it's not that these sensations disappear

[56:43]

or it's not that they should be suppressed. It's more about keeping them in perspective. Exactly. You know, Maya, if you don't mind, I was going to tell this story that Maya once told in a lecture which I found it was just very helpful. I've told it before, but it's about in tea ceremony when you're offered the tea treat, you take the one that's closest to you and as a general sort of admonition for living a happy life when something's offered you, to take the one closest to you. Otherwise, you know, you look at it. We talked about this somewhere, didn't we, in tea or something. You look at the plate and you think, Oh, I like the one with the big chocolate chips. No, I hate nuts. That one's a little too crispy. How about that one? That one looks a little undone. Just the way I like it. I'll take that one. You kind of lift it. That's samsara. That's pain. That's lost in confusion.

[57:44]

And what Maya said in this lecture was the plate of cookies or the treats comes and you take the one closest to you even though you prefer the crispy one or whatever. And she said, and that's enlightenment. And it was like I got this wonderful feeling like to be that free, that's like likes and dislikes arise and fall and arise and fall and yet you're free of them, meaning you just take the one closest to you and that's fine, even though you love the crispy ones. You know what I mean? So as a practice, I offer that as buffets are very hard going through the buffet. Scooping in, looking for the tofu. So in our meal practice, when we do formal meals and we are served by other people, you get to practice this likes and dislikes arise.

[58:45]

I remember once, excuse me, going off here, but anyway, we're at Tassajar where you have all your meals in the zendo. People would sometimes whisper things to you like more tofu. Or we used to have these stewed apricots and people would say juice, juice. They'd whisper their preferences. So to actually be able to sit there practicing zazen, basically putting out your bowl, and this is preference too. You want a little bit, you're enough, but that to me is, it's based on, it's not based on self-clinging or grasping, it's based on you know how much you can eat and you can't eat more than a half bowl or this doesn't sit right in your stomach so you only have a little taste or whatever, but for health reasons or whatever the reasons are,

[59:49]

yes, there are preferences in this. You have to choose an outfit to put on in the morning or you'll be in trouble, right? So I think this can be taken too far, but that's just another kind of preference that you're caught in, that I have no preferences, anything is okay. That's kind of too much. It's this middle where it's kind of free, you freely respond to whatever it is that thus comes, rather than caught. So, yes? Could you, if it doesn't take too much time, just briefly tell us how this fits with the Hokyo Zangai and the Shinshin-Ni in terms of, isn't the Hokyo Zangai an elaboration of the Sandokai? I believe it is, yes. Let's see, the Sandokai was written by the

[60:51]

Sekitoki-Sendai Osho, so where does he come from? What is he, fourth, fifth, third, second? Who's on first? What? Yeah, who's on first? Let's see. I'm not sure I can do it well. There are these poems, you know, that... Where does Sekitoki-Sendai come from? Yaku-san, Igen, Dai-Osho, Tung-Tung. What? Seigen, Gyoshu. Yeah. Well, I have to start from the top. Dai-Osho, [...] Seigen, Gyoshu, Dai-Osho, so that's, so he's Hui-Nung's, Dai-Osho is Hui-Nung, and Seigen, Gyoshu is the seventh, so he's right, the sixth ancestor's disciple. Anyway, those were all, I think those were

[61:54]

available for, I think people knew of them, and the Shin-Shin-Ming, I think they all allude to, they're all, you know, enlightened people's songs, really, you know, song about reality. I mean, that's one way of putting them all together is how they fit. But do you mean sort of all the different ways that they allude to each other and are... Well, time-wise, I was thinking... Time-wise? Well, the Shin-Shin-Ming is the third ancestor, Sandokai is the seventh, and Hokyo-Zanmai is later than that, I think, must be. Sorry, I can't tell you.

[62:55]

Because to me they all have a lot of the same, it's like the same thing. Yeah, I think that's true. Well, they're all encouraging us to study the way, you know, and using their poems, you know, so they share this poetic, in some cases ornate kind of language and kind of esoteric allusions, I think, in the Sandokai and the Hokyo-Zanmai, alluding to the 5 Rakes and, you know, other things that are in Zen literature and koans, so they're pretty dense in that way. But I can look, I can study that a little bit this week and see if I can have a more finished... You won't, or will you? Yes? I find it interesting that in two places he talks about

[63:57]

what's the use of traveling around, you know, this and then towards the end. Right. But yet, he had to make his pilgrimage. Exactly. And we have lots of stories and koans in the literature about different masters going around to different monasteries. Well, I think he's sort of saying, so this is the truth, that this original awakening is the truth, so what's the use? And yet, I hadn't settled it yet, and I had to go. I mean, I think... But he's, you know, he's turning that, he's looking at that. What are we going off doing? Where are we going off? What are we doing? It might have a bit of the sense of, you know, we were talking about if you see the true nature of like and dislike, it's not a problem. If you really see, if you understand that it's never apart from this very place, then you can go roam around to different monasteries. Yes. It's not a problem. It's just, it all has to do with your understanding.

[64:59]

Right, and I think he's pointing to, what are you going off and seeking for and trying to get? Is this grasping mine or not? And yet, he had to settle it for himself. So, yeah. But I think it's like admonitions, right? Sometimes it's called the admonitions for Zazen. You know, it's like he's pointing out pitfalls of where are people trying to get to, where are they going? You know, gaining ideas. You know, Suzuki Roshi talked about gaining idea, and I think it's pointing to that. You know, if you have any kind of gaining idea whatsoever, you're far from the truth. Even a hair's breadth deviation, you know. So it's pointing to that. And yet, how are you going to settle it? You know, yeah. Some of us were talking about the idea of no gaining mind, no gaining idea, or goallessness,

[66:01]

and it's related to the fact that probably just about all of us do have goals and have things that we're looking for. So I was thinking that it's similar to how you described talking about likes and dislikes, that it's perfectly fine to have goals and things that we do want, but it's the attachment that causes the real suffering, the thinking of wanting. I want to get this out of it, and if I don't see that happening, then something is really wrong. Yeah, I think the attachment. Yeah, exactly. And the belief that, you know, if kind of inherent in the goal is that then I'll be complete or something, is a kind of false way to think. It's fine to have goals, but to believe or be attached that then somehow you'll be whole again or something

[67:08]

is going too far, maybe, you know, in terms of goals. Let's see if we can... Shall we move? Shall we go on to the next one? Now, suppose you are confident in your understanding and rich in enlightenment, gaining the wisdom that knows at a glance, attaining the way and clarifying the mind, arousing an aspiration to reach for the heavens. You're playing in the entranceway, but you still are short of the vital path of emancipation. Now, let's see how they translated it in these guys. Actually, here's this part in the first, in the Fukanza Zengi 1, that it's in italics, and that's not in the second one. That got dropped out of his second version. You should know that repeated migrations through eons of time

[68:08]

depend on a single moment's reflection. Losing the way in this world of defilement derives from the failure to stop deliberation. If you wish to transcend to the extreme beyond, just directly accede to the way. So this is pointing to this deliberation or discriminative thinking and so forth. Let's see, did they do it up above? No. But anyway, he dropped that in the second one completely. He comes up with it later in little different ways where he talks about chasing words and following after speech, but it's a little bit different here. So let's go to the next page where it says, Though you are proud of your understanding and complete with insight. When I read that at first, I thought, well, gee, here's this person. They're confident in their understanding. They're rich in enlightenment. You know, what's the problem? They've got the wisdom that knows at a glance.

[69:10]

They've attained the way and clarified the mind. I thought, why is he talking to them, kind of admonishing them? They seem like they're doing all right. But then he says, You're playing in the entranceway. In a couple of these other translations, I got a better sense of... This one says, they called it pride of understanding. Suppose one gains pride of understanding rather than confident. Pride is, you know, someone's confident in their understanding. You feel like that's a good thing. But pride in their understanding, maybe that's a little too much, right? And this one says, Even though you are proud of your understanding and have enough enlightenment. Oh, suppose one gains pride of understanding and inflates one's own enlightenment. So that seems off, right? To have an inflated sense of what your practice is. Another translation,

[70:11]

However much you may be proud of your understanding, however much you may be enlightened. And this one, for instance, you may feel proud in your comprehension or you may feel prosperous in achieving satori. And then this one is very short. Those who talk much about realization are usually wandering outside its gates. Who's that one? Let's see. That's Nyogen Senzaki. And then the last one, Some people are proud of their understanding and think that they're enlightened and are pleased that they have glimpsed the truth. So those all gave me a little better sense of this seems pretty positive, this just being confident. But I think it points to maybe a... Maybe you know people like this who have had some kind of insight

[71:12]

into the nature of reality, and yet, you know, there's a glimpse into the selflessness of self and other or the nature of reality, let's say, and yet there's enormous amount of karma and habitual way of thinking, routinized ways you are with people and so forth. So you don't have the kind of body-mind established to bring that forth, to bring the Dharma forth. And this happened. This is not unusual where someone... In fact, that may be why you came to practice. You had some insight of some sort, and yet you didn't know where to... You had no reference. You had no... Your body, your Buddha body, was kind of untrained, you know.

[72:15]

So maybe it's something like this, but some people do... I remember there were people, this is kind of a 70s story, where they were called sashin hoppers, where they basically would have kind of intense experiences during sashins, and then, you know, the end of sashin, and it's time to, for everyday mind, right, face the dishes, do your laundry, and they'd kind of find out where else the sashin was happening in New York, and then they'd go to New York and sit a 10-day, and then there was the 49-day one they did. So not actually have... being kind of attached maybe to certain states of mind or not bringing... grounding themselves, grounding in everyday life, bringing forth the teaching in that way, like the 10th ox herding picture, where it's the guy going into the marketplace, that's the 10th.

[73:17]

Are you familiar with the 10 ox herding pictures? Some of you are. It's a pictorial study of the way, basically the path may be in it. The last picture, after sort of the, you know, the sumi circle, is this fat guy heading off into the marketplace, you know, to kind of be with the folks, and just no difference, you know, no smell of confidence. Maybe that's what it is. There's no sense of confidence in your understanding and rich enlightenment. No, you're just a fat guy going to the marketplace and hanging out with the folks and responding to life just as it comes. So maybe that's what it is. Ooh, it's not exciting to have something sort of arise like that. That's what I think it is. If you have confidence in your understanding and you're rich in enlightenment, if you even say that, it's too much. You're already, what they say, you smell, you know, you have the stink of enlightenment.

[74:21]

It's too much. It's no trace. That's what fully enlightenment is, no trace. You don't necessarily pick someone out. They're just completely themselves, right, and completely there for you. Yeah, so gaining the wisdom, that nose at a glance, hey, look, you know, I know what it is. That's what it is. Attaining the way and clarifying the mind, arousing an aspiration to reach for the heavens. And then you're playing in the entranceway, but you still are short of the vital path of emancipation. So that's it. You're like, yes, you have some understanding, you're practicing and all, but you're in the environs of, or you're not, it's not complete. That was a double. You guys decide who goes first. Does the wisdom, the nose at a glance,

[75:22]

also refer to Mahakasyapa and the transmission outside of the scriptures? Oh, it may, it may. Does it say, is there anything in there about Mahakasyapa? No, I just always thought there would be chanting. Lance is referring to when the Buddha raised a flower and Mahakasyapa saw it and smiled, and that was their dharma transmission. So you knew at a glance. Maybe it's referring to that. I don't know. Well, it's sort of like the discussion about whether a flash of insight, the flash of insights that sometimes comes up during meditation, whether that's sort of like somebody's goal and that means that they understand, or whether that is kind of a starting point for understanding to deepen. In other words, that's the place where you start.

[76:27]

Yes. And I think I remember reading the beginning of Transmission of Light that there was a whole discussion about this idea of satori, because these were all stories about satori experience, but it was kind of framed as that that experience was where you begin. Not, you know, that wasn't a goal. Yes. And there's big discussions about this, especially about Soto Zen, not valuing or talking about enlightenment experience or satori or kensho. And there's this supposed big difference between Rinzai really pushing for having kensho and Soto Zen more just sitting. But just like Southern and Northern, I'm not sure that they're as far apart as we sometimes think. But this glimpse, Darjana Marga,

[77:28]

there's five paths, and the Darjana Marga is the path of seeing, where you see the non-inherentness of self, non-inherent existence of self. And that is thought of as like now you can really start practicing, you know, the paths before that are preparation and something. I can't remember. Accumulation. Accumulation and preparation. And then you actually see. But you're not done then. And then after the seeing, there's more work to do. So and this is not uncommon. Just maybe you know this to have some kind of insight and have that be maybe a destabilizing thing for you. It can be a big encouragement for your practice and really turn you around in that way, or it can be a scary thing, destabilizing, because your body, as I said,

[78:34]

is not calm enough in some way to withstand sometimes a strong insight like that. So but yes, that's why we sit, you know, before we understand and we sit after we understand, you know. Gary, you had your hand up. I just keep, what keeps coming up for me is hair, breath, deviation through the whole part. It's like all of these examples. There's a like or dislike becomes confusion in the hair, breath, deviation, as opposed to just arising and arousing aspiration. Well, when you start to, it just arises aspiration, but when you start. Yes. And it's almost like just my feeling of this, I'm thinking of my own practice, is that Dogen's making an argument here for wholehearted practice

[79:39]

by pointing out again and again there's a hair, breath, deviation from being off the path, being on the path, feeling contented and being distracted. It's just that's why wholehearted practice is a necessity. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's, you know, Suzuki Roshi, there's this quote in Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind, the difficulty in Zazen is not crossing your legs and sitting in the posture. It's keeping your mind pure, right? And this pure means this dualistic thinking, even the tiniest. And, you know, you can feel in sitting sometimes it is down to a hair's breadth. I mean, it's the slightest inclination to want to have anything different than just what is, then suchness is off and you can feel it.

[80:39]

And, you know, when we first start practicing, it's like big, you know, like big pendulum swings. You know, it's like when you're off, it's like, you know, you're way off, but, you know, it's sort of all the same, you know. And then the more you practice, you see, whoa, you know, especially when you take up the precepts and then it comes down to, and then it's like, ooh, you know, and you can feel the slightest when you're out of alignment from your own bow. And so it gets down to this, you know. So I'm sorry, folks, but the more you practice, the more you see that you have no wiggle room, you know, actually. And, of course, you have all the wiggle room in the world at the same time. How are we doing here? Ten minutes. Let's see. So you are playing in the entranceway. Okay. So then the next reference, shall we go on? Was there anybody else with their hand up? Consider the Buddha.

[81:41]

Actually, in the actual translation, it says, Consider Jetavana, the one of Jetavana, which is, it doesn't say the Buddha, but Jetavana was the name of the monastery in Shravasti that the Buddha sat in. So they said, Consider the one of Jetavana. So it's just a little more poetic way of saying that. But anyway, this is Shakyamuni Buddha. Although he was wise at birth, the traces of his six years of upright sitting can yet be seen. This is, let's see, even in the case of that old one, Shakyamuni, innately wise. Yeah. Oh, here it does say the one of Jetavana in his translation of Fukanza Zangi, too. And in the case of the one of Shaolin, that's Bodhidharma, who went to sit for nine years at Shaolin Temple. So the traces of his six years of upright sitting can yet be seen. As for Bodhidharma, although he had received the mind seal, the mind seal is sometimes called Buddha's seal,

[82:46]

and it's the mind of enlightenment, is the mind seal or Buddha's seal, which cannot be altered. And then the recognition of someone with the mind seal, when you entrust them, someone with the Buddha mind, then they're entrusted with the mind seal. So Bodhidharma, although he had received the mind seal, his nine years of facing the walls celebrated still. If even the ancient sages were like this, how can we today dispense with wholehearted practice? Now, the people he's speaking to, if you look at Bendo Wa, it's probably earlier than the Tempuku Fukanza Zangi. If there was an earlier Fukanza Zangi that's lost, that he wrote when he first came, we don't have it. The first thing was Bendo Wa, in that he's talking about,

[83:50]

it's very wide, he's talking to a group, many people who don't sit, who don't feel like sitting, is really the main thing. So he's bringing up these Buddha and Bodhidharma. If they sat, this is the real practice that he wants to bring through that goes back all the way to Shakyamuni Buddha. Don't dispense with this one. I think we received that in the West. That's what came to us first. We got Zazen rather than scholastic study, and precept study wasn't brought up, chanting and bowing. It was Zazen. That's what the teachers came with, Suzuki Roshi and the other Japanese teachers. They brought Zazen, but in this time, this group of people he's speaking with, Zazen was not the main practice, necessarily.

[84:53]

There was other kinds of practice, and there was a syncretization, and there was meditation, always there was meditation, but when he says, how can we dispense with this? Because I think it was not top priority, main, center. Therefore... Shall we go on? Put aside the intellectual practice of investigating words and chasing phrases. Let's see. Therefore stop the intellectual practice. Therefore reverse the intellectual practice of investigating words and chasing after talk. It's funny because here we are reading this and investigating intellectually and investigating words and chasing phrases. Well, I don't know if we're chasing them, but we're trying to get at them, and he's saying put aside that.

[85:55]

So it's a way, I feel like this is pointing to a way to do this kind of study, which is without gaining mind, actually, which is, we talked about it last week, you know, when you study this way, take your posture. That's not chasing after. It's relating to the words in an upright manner. So put aside intellectual practice and investigating words, and I think he's speaking to the scholastic community of Tendai monks mostly, probably, chasing phrases, and learn to take the backward step that turns the light and shines it inward. This is a meditation instruction right there. Body and mind of themselves will drop away. That's shinjin datsuraku. That was what Rujing, his teacher, that was his enlightenment experience

[86:58]

when Rujing said in the night, yelled at the monk who was sleepy and said, you know, you're supposed to be dropping body and mind. What are you doing sleeping? And at that point, Dogen dropped body and mind. So take the backward step that turns the light and shines it inward. Body and mind of themselves will drop away and your original face will be manifest. If you want such a thing, get to work on such a thing immediately, meaning now, turn the light back now. While you're reading this, turn the light back. That phrase, and learn to take the backward step, that turns the light and shines it inward, that always strikes me very strongly. Does it have any kind of ancestry? Well, yes, it does. It does. And we're not going to have time to do it. It's got a whole history. Turning the light back is called eikohensho in Japanese. Eikohensho.

[87:59]

E-K-O is light. E is return or turn back. It's the letter E, but it's pronounced A. Return, turn back. Ko is light. And then hen is return. And sho is shine or illuminate. So return the light back or turn the light back and shine it inwardly. Return the shine. Eikohensho. And then the backward step is taiho. So learning this backward step. So these are particular meditation instructions that we will take up next week because it's 9 o'clock. And they turn up during various koans and as a meditation instruction to think. And it also refers to think of the mind that thinks, which we'll come up to later.

[88:59]

Think of not thinking. That will be what we'll come to. But this turning the light back is an important point. Okay. May our attention...

[89:42]

@Text_v004
@Score_JJ