This podcast is offered by the San Francisco Zen Center on the web at www.sfzc.org. Our public programs are made possible by donations from people like you. Good evening. Can you hear me? How many of you are new to Tassahara? That's quite a few. Well, welcome. I am down here also leading a study week for my sangha in Mill Valley. It's called Vimala Sangha. Although I came to Tasara for the first time 44 years ago, I'm seeing Tasara through the new eyes of five or six people that have never been here before.

[01:09]

Like when I'm over here, I'm not amplified. Can you still hear me? Yeah? Okay. So it reminded me of how unusual a place this is. how special a place Vasari is. So, you know, in the morning we chant various sutras and poems, and a very famous poem that we chant is called the Sandokai. It's called the Harmony of Difference and Equality. And the first line of that poem is, the mind of the great sage of India is intimately transmitted from west to east. The mind of the great sage of India is intimately transmitted from west to east. So this poem was written by a very famous Zen master in the 8th century in China, and he's talking about the fact that the great sage of India is Shakyamuni Buddha, and that the mind of Buddha was intimately transmitted from India, which is to the west of China, to the east in China.

[02:22]

And then the mind of the great sage of India was transmitted from the west of China to Japan. And then 50 years ago, the mind of the great sage of India was transmitted from the west of Japan to the east of California. Even though we think of ourselves as being in the west, We're actually east if you go from India. But of course, by the time it's gotten here, we could have gone the other way. And the mind of the great sage of India could have been transmitted from west to east. I mean, from east to west. In any event, what does this mean that the mind of the great sage of India is transmitted to us here in America? So one way you would think of it is the true teaching of Buddha has been transmitted from India all the way here to America.

[03:27]

And that's been one of the really amazing events that's been happening over the last 50 years in America is that Buddhism has come to America in many different ways. It's come to America through Zen. Zen was actually the first type of Zen that was brought to America, and then it came with Vipassana, and then it came in Tibetan versions. But as you may or may not know, this monastery here was the first Zen monastery ever established outside of the Orient. And Suzuki Roshi was kind enough to bring us this marvelous practice of Zazen. So getting back to that sentence is the mind of the great sage of India is intimately transmitted here.

[04:29]

What do you think the mind of Buddha is that's been intimately transmitted here? Suzuki Roshi used to say it's what happens when you sit zazen. When you sit zazen and your mind is big, when your mind can accept anything that's happening, that's the mind of Buddha that's been transmitted here. And he used a wonderful metaphor, a sky. He says, it's like the great sky. Whatever kind of bird flies through it, the sky doesn't care. So whatever kind of thought goes through your head, whatever kind of emotion goes through you, whatever kind of experience is going through you when you're sitting zazen, if you can take that, if you can absorb that, if you can be with that, that's the mind of the great sage of India.

[05:36]

And intimately transmitted means that it didn't come through a book. I mean, there's 10,000 books written in English on Zen now in America, probably at least. When I came here 44 years ago, there were probably only about 10. But anyway, at that time, when I first walked through the doors and was asking about Zen, they said, oh, you could stay here and practice for us a week, and you would learn more about Zen than if you read all the books in English on Zen, because you learn Zen by sitting zazen and getting to know the mind of the great sage of India, Buddha's mind. So Suzuki Roshi came here and he taught us zazen, but part of what he also taught us was the way of Zen and intimately transmitted me. The other thing we do on the mornings when we chant sutras is we chant all of the ancestors.

[06:40]

We have a... long line of ancestors that go from Buddha through all the Indian Zen teachers, all the Indian teachers into China and then in China all the Zen teachers that go through China and then into Japan. How many of them are there? Maybe Artanto could tell me what the exact number is. Ninety. We count the ones that happened before Buddha, we get ninety. 96. It's the advantage of having a tanto in the house. So this idea, it's not exactly a historical fact, but the idea is that you can only transmit intimately the mind of one teacher to another teacher by meeting them face to face, hand to hand, warm hand to warm hand. It's a personal transmission because it's not enough just to even teach them how to siddhaza and you have to actually have some kind of deep connection with them.

[07:44]

So I thought I would sort of bring this forward by telling a famous Zen story of one teacher's transmitting the Dharma to his student. And this famous teacher is Daizhan, Daizhan. And he wasn't a teacher that was big in the Buddhist hierarchy in China, but he was kind of known as a pretty important figure and was well known for his depth of knowledge. I thought I'd just tell one little story that was written up about him. A monk came up to him and Dajan held up his staff and said, do you understand? This is a kind of classic Chinese Zen thing to do. The student said, Thank you very much for your teaching. And Dajan said, I want to get exactly what Dajan said here.

[08:58]

Dajan said, you see me raise my stick and you say I am instructing you. When you see the mountains and rivers each day, Do they instruct you? Isn't that a nice thing to say? Nice question to ask. When you see the mountains and rivers, do they instruct you? So here we live in the most incredible setting of mountains and rivers. Are they instructing you every day when you're walking along, listening to the stream? So I thought that was a good question. was another monk. I'm giving you the names of the two monks that are in this story. Almost all the Zen koans are usually one monk in some kind of conversation with another monk. So Feiyan was a young kind of quick study. He went to the monastery when he was seven. He was ordained when he was 20. He studied all the Confucian texts and went and studied under several famous Zen masters, and now he was on pilgrimage.

[10:05]

And this was very common in China for Zen teachers to go on pilgrimage before they finally were complete enough in their studies to settle down. And he was on pilgrimage to probably a fairly famous monastery to study under a famous teacher, and he was sidetracked by a snowstorm. And so he had to retreat. to the monastery that Dajan was heading up. And so this is the interchange that happened between them. So Dajan probably met with Fayan because he had just arrived in the monastery and he said, where are you going? And Fayan said, around on pilgrimage. And Dijan said, what is the purpose of pilgrimage? And Fayan said, I don't know.

[11:10]

And Dijan said, not knowing is most intimate. So you get it? That's what's so wonderful about these koans. You get four sentences, and it's describing some deep features. So I thought I would like, first of all, one way to practice with koans is you wander around in your mind for a month or two saying, not knowing is most intimate. Not knowing is most intimate. Not knowing, what's not knowing? What's being intimate? How is not knowing connected to most intimate? Or maybe you wander around like that for two or three years. I don't know, it depends on whether you really like the koan or not. So I'm going to say some things about this call and it's not going to explain any of it to you and you'll still have to wander around for a couple of months going, what's intimate about not knowing?

[12:13]

Not knowing is most intimate. Well, first of all, let's talk about what a pilgrimage is. A pilgrim is somebody who's going in search of something. But when I was 25 years old, I was a graduate student in mathematics and I went and searched for the meaning of life. And since you didn't walk in those days, I bought a VW van and I drove out to California because I was in New Mexico and California is where the meaning of life was in 1970. And somebody told me there was this Zen master and I was very intrigued with Zen master because I'd heard about enlightenment. So I drove in here in search of the meaning of life, and I landed here. So I know what a pilgrim is. I know what a pilgrimage is. I was on a pilgrimage. And I've met several other of you here in the past few days that are on a pilgrimage too, out in search of what makes sense in life.

[13:24]

Why am I suffering? Why are other people suffering? What's life about? In fact, I would bet if I took a survey, 90% of you are in some search for the meaning of your life. I mean, this is a pretty unusual place to end up. You got to go down a long dirt road to get here. And even if you're a guest, you had to come into this room at night. when you could be off in the bath. So I think actually being on a search for meaning is pretty much a part of what our life is about. So we can relate to Feyyan, off on a pilgrimage. And this question that Dijon asks, okay, he's just testing the ground. You're on a pilgrimage, I get that. What's the purpose of this pilgrimage?

[14:25]

And Fayon, because I've told you he'd been studying for about 20 years, could have come up with some fast, easy Zen answer, something odd. But instead, for some reason, I think he was probably either struck by who Dijon was or kind of just thought, well, maybe I'll just tell him I don't know what I'm doing, which is a pretty honest answer in a lot of cases. I don't know what I'm doing. Maybe you can give me some insight into what this thing about life is. And then Dijon's answer, which of course is the key to this little interchange, not knowing is most intimate. So what is this not knowing that is he talking about here? First of all, we all know a lot of stuff.

[15:27]

grown-ups here. I mean, we know a lot. We know so much. We have mathematicians that tell us when the Big Bang happened, you know. What is it, 13 billion years ago? We can send people to the moon. I mean, you have to know a lot to be a human being and live here. When I lived here, I was head of the shop, and I was treasurer, and I was director. I had to know a lot of stuff to run this place, and I... I've met all the staff people that are running Tassara. I mean, to make sure that the water that we're drinking is there and actually is, you know, clean and the food that's cooked is good and the garden grows flowers. I mean, you have to know a lot. And you've got to be learning stuff all the time. I mean, we know an enormous amount of stuff. So what are they talking about not knowing, right? I mean, isn't our whole life about knowing more stuff? I mean, that's our whole thing. We go to college, we learn more, we know more, knowing lots of stuff.

[16:30]

But, you know, what do we actually know? I mean, we have no, I mean, even the scientists, even our best neuroscientists, I mean, they'll tell us about mirror imaging, mirror neurons, my neurons are talking to your neurons, there's all kinds of stuff. But we have no idea what's actually going on here, do we? Why are we here? How did this happen? These are all deep mysteries which won't be solved in our lifetime. But even more important than that, at any given moment when you're confronted with a new situation, do you really know what's going on? I mean, what is going on when you meet a new person? Or when you're in a crisis. Recently, I've been talking to several friends that were in crisis. Someone you love is sick. Someone is dying.

[17:37]

When you walk into that situation and you meet that person, what does all the... I mean, we have a lot of experience. We've done a lot of things. But still, in that moment, what is the kind of mind that you need to have to meet that moment. And the point of this story is you need a mind that is a mind that isn't full of all kinds of ideas about what's going on, that isn't full of a lot of preconceived ideas about how you handle this. Sukiroshi used to call it a beginner's mind. He says, if your mind is filled with dualistic ideas, it's limiting you beautifully put it limits your capacity to see what's going on in the moment if you've got a bunch of dualistic ideas in your head so they're not knowing we're talking about here is not being stupid and not knowing how to drive a car and not knowing we're talking about here is being open to a new experience that's going to happen being open in the moment

[18:54]

to meeting a new experience. If you advance yourself with all of your experience into the moment, you will lose the opportunity for the moment to advance itself and tell you what's going on. So this not knowing is beyond regular knowing and not knowing. So I wanted to talk a little bit about intimacy. So how does this not knowing lead to intimacy?

[19:56]

What does it mean to be intimate? First of all, you came to a Zen lecture, so you probably thought I was going to talk about enlightenment. And I'm sorry, but we're going to talk about intimacy. But in Zen, intimacy and enlightenment are the same thing. Intimacy is the same word as enlightenment, but it's, I think, better. Enlightenment, awakening, these are all words that sound like some big altered state of mind has occurred. You've had some magic stroke of mental clarity that is going to take care of all your problems for the rest of your life. I'm sorry. I wish it was so. I mean, you may have a nice big experience that clarifies things for a moment and might encourage your practice down the road.

[20:57]

But our practice is how to be intimate with every moment that you live in and not just intimate with other things, other people, trees, rivers, mountains, but yourself. How to actually be intimate with the moment. And the trouble with life is that every moment changes. So whatever technique you came up with to be intimate to the last moment doesn't really work in the next moment. And that's why you have to really be radically open to not attaching yourself to your preconceived ideas about how this works, this living thing.

[22:00]

So hence the not knowing. Can I actually let go, not be so attached to all the things I've learned and bring a fresh, new, awake mind to the current moment? Now this is not new news to you, right? This is pretty common knowledge, right? open mind, ready mind, beginner's mind, not knowing mind, right? So it's not that the idea is, so how do you do it? Is the question that comes up in these cases. How do you actually do it? You can't think your way there. And the way you do it is you go looking for the mind of the great sage of India.

[23:02]

And you find that by sitting zazen. And I found this wonderful quote in Zen Mind Beginner's Mind. No, I found it not always so from Suzuki Roshi. He's talking about zazen. This is called I don't know zazen. Our zazen is called I don't know zazen. We don't know what zazen is anymore. I don't know who I am. To find complete composure when you don't know who you are or where you are, that is to accept things as it is. That was one of his favorite expressions, things as it is. Things, all the different things in the world. As it is, one thing. Even though you don't know who you are, you accept yourself. That is you in its true sense. When you know who you are, that you will not be the real you.

[24:05]

You may overestimate yourself quite easily, but when you say, oh, I don't know, then you are you and you know yourself completely. Isn't that wonderful? This is I don't know zazen. So down here, this is the kind of zazen we do, the I don't know zazen. As soon as you think you know what zazen is, you're not doing zazen anymore. One of my good friends went up to Suzuki Roshi at one time and said, Suzuki Roshi, I'm so good. I can follow each breath. In zazen, the beginning instruction is you follow each breath, either by counting one. Every time I point in this direction, It doesn't seem like it's as loud. Is it as loud over there? Can you hear him? I think the microphone is not just as great.

[25:08]

It's okay? Maybe I'm not hearing it well. Anyway, so this friend was feeling quite proud of himself because he could follow every breath for 40 straight minutes without losing a bit of concentration and upon reporting this to us as a yours is a gracious says don't ever think you understand Zazen and you could take that metaphor forward don't ever think you understand life the better the less you understand life and the more willing you're to be open to figuring out what's going on in the moment, and falling back on your natural resources, the better off you are. And by the way, who is this you that's not knowing?

[26:12]

I've always thought that was an interesting question, too. That's another one that Zen ponders about. we were in the group that I was studying with, we came across this marvelous passage where Suzuki Roshi said, when you're struck by the practice of one of the students, let's say you see a student practicing marvelously and you think, wow, that person's practice is so great. Who's the you that's being struck by their practice. Is her practice good over there? So he says, no, the fact that you could see and feel her practice, that's your practice that's so good. And the you that you're talking about there is that connection between the two of you that's feeling that pure practice, that marvelous practice.

[27:17]

So in our way, you is always created in connection with whatever it is you're relating to. There is no you other than you in connection to something. And connection is intimacy. That's that intimate way of being with the world. So I'm supposed to end in five minutes, and I'm going to tell. The way koans are structured is they have this little four-sentence thing, and then in the book they have commentary by lots of other people, and there's lots of interesting commentary. And then I give a lecture where I have commentary on that commentary. So here's some of that commentary. So in this not knowing koan commentary, this is a little story about the conversation between the parts of the the face. So you got to stay with me.

[28:19]

It gets a little complicated. The mouth says to the nose, I do the eating, I do the talking. What could be more important than that? So why are you above me? The nose is above me. The nose says, quoting an old Chinese proverb, among the five mountains, the central one occupies the honorable position. So why? The nose goes on, addressing the eyes. are you above me? Because the nose is in the central position. And the eyes reply, we are like the sun and the moon. We have the power of illumination and reflection. But the question is, eyebrows, why are you above me? The eyebrows don't know anything. They have no powers whatsoever. They cannot eat. speak, smell, see, hear, and yet they are highest. And they reply, we are embarrassed to be above all of you, and we have no idea why.

[29:24]

Another master commenting on this commentary said, in the eyes it is called seeing, in the ears it is called hearing, but what is it called in the eyebrows? And after a long silence he says, In sorrow we grieve together, in happiness we rejoice together. In sorrow we grieve together, in happiness we rejoice together. Everyone knows the useful function, but no one appreciates the supreme power of the useless. So, of course we have to have all of our useful functions. We have to run this place. We have to run our lives and all those useful functions. But it's the not knowing that is the door that opens us up to connection.

[30:29]

It's the not knowing that opens our heart to the world. It's the not knowing that opens us up to the grieving and suffering and joy of the world. And in the end, that is the most important part. It's wonderful that we can run efficient organizations and this marvelous monastery. But in the end, it's the intimate, heartfelt relationship we have to our fellow members of the species. And that's maybe all there is. We don't know very much, but when our friends grieve over sorrow, we grieve with them. And when they're joyous, we're joyous with them. So not knowing is most intimate.

[31:31]

We have time for maybe one question or two. No brave souls here? Everyone knows? Or everybody is not knowing right now? Is everyone not knowing right now? Okay. Thank you for listening to this podcast offered by the San Francisco Zen Center. Our Dharma Talks are offered free of charge, and this is made possible by the donations we receive. Your financial support helps us to continue to offer the Dharma. For more information, visit sfcc.org and click giving.

[32:28]

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