This podcast is offered by the San Francisco Zen Center on the web at www.sfcc.org. Our public programs are made possible by donations from people like you. Good evening, friends. This is my last public Dharma talk of this intensive. And this is... The first evening Dharma talk I've given with the sun setting at about 716, I believe. So until just a few minutes ago, there was light in the sky. That always cheers me up. So. If you are coming to this public talk without having been involved in the intensive, then I'll say that this intensive has been on the text of Dogen's called the Zui Monki, which was written, actually was written by Ejo, was recorded by Ejo, spoken by Dogen in...

[01:25]

a relatively informal setting to monks and visitors. And for that reason, the instructions are simple and straightforward and completely understandable. Sometimes they're a little mystifying, but we understand what Dogen is saying. So tonight, I'm taking a look at sharing with you some talks from Book 5. And I have three talks from Book 5 that I'm going to speak from. Book 5, Talk 14, Book 5, Talk 15, and Book 5, Talk 17. I think that Book 5 has what I think is really helpful information and interesting instructions regarding the nature of mind, the nature of good and bad, and the importance of Dharma friends in our practice.

[02:37]

So tonight I'd like to really talk about Dogen's discussion of mind and of good and bad, especially. So let me read... of 14 verse. Dogen says, Originally, there is no good or evil in the human mind. Good and evil depend on the situation. For example, when we arouse Bodhi mind and enter some mountain or forest, we think that staying in the mountains is good. and living in human society is bad. But then we get bored and leave the mountain thinking it bad. This is because the mind has no fixed characteristics. It changes in various ways depending on the circumstances.

[03:46]

Therefore, if you encounter good circumstances, your mind becomes good. If you encounter bad circumstances, your mind becomes bad. Do not think that your mind is bad by nature. Just follow good circumstances. So that's what the passage by Dogen is. So, first of all, mind... There is no inherent good or evil in the human mind. What we call good and bad arise from the interaction of mind and the situation. And then, if we take the words mountain and forest, not so much to mean places that we can walk to or drive to,

[04:48]

as the sublime experiences that we might have when we arouse Bodhi mind. Then that sentence becomes kind of clear and helpful. When we have experiences like that, better not to hold on to them. Better not to judge them as good or bad. if we hold onto them, Dogen suggests, that we'll get bored and then think it better to go back to our cell phones, our Netflix series, our Zoom meetings, back to human society, where we will in turn become bored and long for the mountains and forests. So once again, Dogen seems to be saying that our practice is to stay with mind as mind without fixed characteristics.

[05:59]

Be careful not to become confused between the dynamic function of mind and objects of mind. When we head off for the objects of mind, thinking they are real and fixed, losing ourselves in the objects of mind, expecting something like happiness from these objects, leaving behind our dynamic functioning mind as mind, we will probably feel disappointed, frustrated, angry, sad, depleted. The second point that looms large to me is that Dogen does seem to be saying there is good and bad to be distinguished and acted upon. The last line of this talk is just follow good circumstances.

[07:11]

So the question may arise, how can we follow good circumstances without passing judgment? What mind do we use to determine good and bad circumstances if there is no good or evil in the human mind? I think it is important to understand that Dogen is not being a moralist here. For Dogen, good means the circumstances most supportive for arousing Bodhi mind. He's just talking about what supports, what does not support practice. And that's all Dogen ever talks about. So what is good or bad for practice? When we are new to practice, like for the first hundred or so years of our practice, we pay attention to the lives of

[08:23]

and words and customs given us by the ancestors, by our Dharma friends, including teachers, Sangha members, and by the way, everyone else. In other words, we don't just follow the whims generated by our own constantly changing mind. We follow tradition. And the tradition we follow we follow together. Of course, the interesting thing about following tradition is that we must constantly recreate it. It is a creative endeavor that we do together. Tradition is not something that faraway people of the past followed. It is the craft of our practice. that we bring alive here today, completely new, with resonance through thousands of years of human history and human lives.

[09:36]

Because we are alive today, we can do this. We have inherited practice like we have inherited our bodies, and it is our turn our responsibility to take care. In Book 5, Talk 15, there's a passage. When you follow something good or bad, this is Dogen speaking, when you follow something good or bad, your mind is pulled by goodness or badness. Therefore, no matter how evil your mind may be, when you follow a good teacher and become intimate with good people, your mind will naturally become good. If you associate with bad people, even though in the beginning you may think they are bad, eventually you will follow such people's minds, you will get used to being with them, and finally become really bad without realizing it.

[10:50]

For me, this passage rings both objectionable and so true. Parents make a Herculean effort to follow this advice for their children. I remember when our twin sons were babies, someone said to us, raise your children among the tall trees so they will grow up. thinking of themselves as tall trees. That is a beautiful image among the tall trees. Tall trees are not sneaky or furtive. They are patient and quiet. They hold their ground for their own and the whole forest's benefit. They provide shelter and sustenance for others. and they are very, very old.

[11:57]

That is kind of our myth of tall trees. And to our eyes, It seems to be pretty true. So to grow up embodying those qualities would be beneficial. But I don't know. I think we are re-examining our assumptions about good and bad in the light of economic and racial disparities, among other things. What comes to my mind on this point is the famous marshmallow experiment. I have thought about this. I have spoken about it in Dharma talks. I taught it to my seventh grade science student through years. In case you don't know, the experiment is to take a child into a room, sit the child down at a table where there is a plate with one marshmallow.

[13:20]

The instructions to the child are, you can eat this marshmallow now, or if you can wait here without eating the marshmallow, I will bring you a second marshmallow when I return in 15 minutes. Then the child is observed. So this was a study in delayed gratification. The children were then followed through their lives into adulthood. And it was found that all kinds of success in life, from academic, professional, economic, to personal relationships and lifestyle, correlated strongly with the little child's ability to wait for 15 minutes to get a second marshmallow. All kinds of follow-up studies and applications of these findings, for example, in understanding addiction, continued for decades.

[14:31]

At some point in the last 10 or 15 years, some of the assumptions of this experiment were questioned. The assumption that was questioned was, is delayed gratification? the secret of success for everyone? The original experiment was done at Stanford in the 60s with, I think, faculty children. So when the experiment was repeated more recently and on a very large scale, economic and racial and gender, etc. factors were figured in. And the results were very different. It turned out that being able to delay gratification is not the key to success for all children in all circumstances.

[15:40]

That for some kids, delaying gratification for a second marshmallow is likely to result in having no marshmallow at all. children develop skills that are likely to succeed, to lead to success according to their circumstances. And the fact is, that is how a tree handles life too. We may think of a tree as old and wise and patient and whatnot, but a tree will do what it can do and needs to do to stay alive. It will grow taller than the other trees, so it can have more sunlight for photosynthesis. It will fill in space with its roots, possibly resulting in other trees having less access to water and nutrients. Trees, plants just grow according to their circumstances, and they're really good at it.

[16:51]

That's it. Having a fixed idea, like a human idea of tree, or a fixed idea of what success is and how do we get it for ourselves and our loved ones and communities, is what Dogen is addressing. Drop the fixed idea of tree, of self, of success. Just follow the Buddha way. arouse Bodhi mind, awaken to our birthright. It is not a matter of good and bad, right or wrong. It is a matter of just showing up, following through, being true to our own destiny once we perceive it.

[17:56]

good and bad, as generalizations, as fixed principles, are not very helpful. But our minds are tricky and changeable. Our hearts are distractible and fickle. We really need each other to show up and follow through ourselves. Dogen, in Talk 15, again brings up how we accompany each other in this endeavor. He says, Moreover, even if you still lack Bodhi mind and don't find it interesting the first or second time, if you listen to a good person's words again and again, just like walking through the mist or dew, Your clothing naturally gets wet without noticing it.

[19:10]

You will feel, naturally, you will feel ashamed. And true Bodhi mind will arise. He used this walking through the mist and dew in talk four, in book four. that I talked about a couple of days ago. And I think we can take this to heart, this image, walking through the mist. What about, you will naturally feel ashamed and Bodhi mind will arise. I want to talk about this mysterious sentence in connection with talk number 17. You will cry. It reads. Dogen instructed.

[20:14]

There is a proverb. Unless you are deaf and dumb, you cannot become the head of a family. In other words, if you do not listen to the slander of others and do not speak ill of others, you will succeed. in your own work. Only a person like this is qualified to be the head of a family. Dogen goes on, although this is a worldly proverb, we must apply it to our own way, to our own way of life as monks. How do we practice the way without being disturbed by the slandering remarks of others, and without reacting to the resentment of others, or speaking of the right or wrong of others. Only those who thoroughly devote even their bones and marrow to the practice can do it.

[21:24]

Dogen is telling us here how difficult it is to practice being so-called deaf and dumb. With the final sentence, only those who thoroughly devote even their bones and marrow to the practice can do it. The bones and marrow image also comes up in the Shogo Genso fascicle called Twining Vines. in which Dogen tells us that Bodhidharma, in speaking to his four senior disciples, to determine who would be his successor. In that conversation, he answers each in turn with, You have attained my skin. You have attained my flesh. You have attained my bones. You have attained my marrow. And by the way, Dogen then adds to the story that we are not to think that these four attainments are ranked.

[22:49]

They are not ranked. They are all fully attained. So I think Dogen is telling us that the practice of refraining from gossip and slander is not only difficult, requiring great effort, It is a core practice, an essential practice for us. It is also a practice that is difficult to do alone, without Dharma friends, at least at first, that is those first hundred years. We slander and gossip before we even notice, and it is compelling So most others are happy to hop into the conversation. I want to tell you about Norman's mother. Because she came to mind with this story, these instructions of dogens.

[23:56]

So I remember Norman's mother. Norman's parents were not happy that Norman was marrying a young California hippie, Zen Buddhist, who is not Jewish, listed in order of their objections, lesser to greater. It helped a bit that I quickly produced two sons. But even so, she could not reconcile with our lives. And she was not all that kind to me. She died when our sons were eight years old and I was 32. I have always regretted that she didn't live longer because I know we would have grown to understand and love each other. I did not have the wherewithal to reach out beyond my own feelings at that time, for which I now feel ashamed.

[25:01]

And now... I feel that shame as a gift. It's a gift. After she died, I remembered Norman and I were thinking and talking about her, remembering her good qualities. And Norman told me his mother never gossiped. The whole family really gossiped, as most families do. But his mother refrained. And he told me that when he was a boy, when Norman was a boy, he was going to a new school and was afraid. He told his mother and she gave him this advice. Don't gossip. Don't slander others. And he also told me that his mother and his father were known in their community as trustworthy, kind, and fair people who are refraining from unhelpful speech.

[26:17]

So when I catch myself engaging in unhelpful speech, her advice often comes to mind, along with the poignancy of her memory, and our missed opportunity. So, I pass Dogen's and Norman's mother's advice on to you. So, the nature of our minds is changeable, dynamic, responsive, imaginative. Good and bad cannot be found in the human mind. Yet, good and bad are apparent in our lives, in our world. Since we do not live as monks in a monastery, as in Dogen's time, we must find our way right here. We must learn to discern what is the functioning mind and what is the object of mind.

[27:28]

then refrain from attaching to the object of mind again and again. We do this again and again. Continuously returning to the dynamic, functioning mind as mind, just as we continuously return to this breath, this body, this rare moment of human life together. Thank you very much.

[28:25]

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