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 morning. How nice to see you all here. Sunday morning. It's getting more normal. Welcoming you back to the Zendo. So for those of us who are just joining now for the Sunday program, we are on the final morning of a three-and-a-half-day Sashin meditation retreat. And I have been talking these few days about a set of drawings from the Zen tradition called the Ten Oxherding Pictures. These Oxherding Pictures have been used as teaching devices in the Zen tradition for hundreds of years based on a set of illustrations from the 12th century. by a Zen master by the name of Kakuen Zenji.

[01:01]

So along with each illustration, the Zen master added a poetic verse describing the journey to enlightenment. So I thought I would give a brief overview of the first seven pictures for those of you who are joining this morning, and then go on to finish the last three drawings that are depicting the final stages of the ox herder's search for his true home. So in the first drawing of the series, the ox herder represents the human mind that's believed that something is missing, something without which the young ox herder, the child, feels lost and alone in the dark forest of their own imagination. So the ox represents that thing that we believe will complete us, the possibility of wholeness at a time when all we can see is is the missing piece. Although the first of these images of the journey to wholesomeness sound somewhat bleak, as you can see in the drawing, the boy, meaning all of us, is already riding on the back of his beloved ox.

[02:15]

So here's drawing number one, which I probably can't see in the back, but I'll tell you what's here. It says, the boy or girl, the ox rider, is riding backwards. on the ox, looking for the ox. Sound familiar? Does that show okay in the... Yeah. Okay, great. Good. All alone, something missing, everything shifting, and unsteady. So the good news is that at this time in our life, we have become determined... in our quest for both understanding and for relieving the pain of our isolation. So this aspect of Buddhist practice is called way-seeking mind or way-seeking heart. In Sanskrit, bodhicitta, the thought of enlightenment. At the beginning of the seshin, which seems like a very long time ago, but it's only a few days, I offered the people here a simple proposition.

[03:24]

If you are not in awe, you are distracted. And then I suggested other words for both of these terms, for awe, awakened or illuminated, and for distraction, deluded or sleeping, dreaming. The dynamic relationship between these two aspects of our human life, between awe and distraction, or awakening and dreaming, are what the ox hurting pictures are helping us to see. I also mentioned that it's important in our understanding of these drawings not to think of them as a sequence, such as a start to finish or a beginning to an ending, but rather as a circle of perspectives, ten points of view through which we can better understand our relationship to the ox, better known as reality itself, the one that always wins. A relationship, as we know, that can go from disturbed and irritated to intrigued and elated in a matter of minutes.

[04:29]

In this teaching, each perspective is an aid to understanding our fundamental wholeness, although it is not something that we may ever really see. And that's because, no matter how hard we try, we can't step out of reality in order to get a better view. We are reality. And that's what makes these drawings so reassuring. From the very first picture, the ox-herder is in an intimate relationship with his missing piece, which makes his journey home a guaranteed success. So for me, these drawings give us a big clue about what happens to us humans as we search for liberation from our own suffering. The very thing the Buddha was seeking on the day that he ran away from home. And as you saw in this first drawing, the oxherder truly believes he has lost his ox and is seeking it everywhere, not realizing that he is riding on its back.

[05:31]

So here's the poetic verse that Kakouin wrote to accompany the first drawing. Searching for the ox. Never lost from the beginning what need to seek and to search. Yet the child has turned their back on awakening, so estrangement is born. There the boy, fixed on the dust, until finally the ox is gone. Home on the hill ever farther and farther away. Where the trail forks, the child instantly errs. Gain or loss smoldered into flames. Right or wrong is a lance's thrust. Aimlessly, endlessly, the child parts the grasses, seeking. Waters widen, mountains loom far off. The path goes deeper. At strength's end, weary at heart, with nowhere to begin to search, the child hears amid ghostly maples the cries of the late autumn cicadas. So in the second drawing, called Seeing the Traces, the child sees some tracks of the great beast that they have been aching to find, and in this illustration, the trace is shown as a sudden flick of the ox's tail in the young child's face.

[06:50]

Again, in the back, he's on the ox, facing backwards, and the ox's tail has suddenly clipped up. And he says, what is this? Something flashes, startling, right under his nose. So suddenly, right before the eyes, the child discovers here and there, beneath the trees and along the river, the tracks of the ox. And with a dancing heart, heads deeper and deeper into the forest of his own imagination. In these drawings, these tracks signify our first encounter with the Buddha's teaching. So here are the verses for picture number two. Through the sutras, she catches the drift. Looking into the teachings, she discovers the tracks. She realizes that all vessels are of a single gold. She experiences all things. as the self. But if she cannot even distinguish right from wrong, how can she know truth from falsity?

[08:00]

She has not yet learned to enter the gate. This is tentatively called seeing the traces. Near the brook, under shadows in the woods, many the scattered tracks, fragrant grasses in luxuriant growth. Doubtless the ox has also seen them. be it deep in the mountains and the deepest recesses still, how could such nostrils raised to the heavens ever have been hidden in the first place? So as we each begin our own spiritual quest, we have no choice but to bring our pain and our doubt into view. The questions that we need to ask ourselves have to be real ones about the dissatisfactions and the fears that we feel in our everyday life. This aspiration for clarity allows us to deal with the many layers of our conditioning as they arise, what I've heard called our intersectionality, the intersection of all of our multiple identities, our gender, our class, our age, and so on, that seem to separate us from one another.

[09:10]

And this is what we are here to study, to learn from, and then to watch as they simply float away. It's in the midst of this self-study that we empower ourselves, and it's in the midst of the silence and stillness that emerges within self-study that we may come to trust ourselves completely. And yet, given that self-study is undertaken in the near darkness of the mystic woods, the sound of the cicada signals that night is approaching, and for a while anyway, things may only seem to be getting worse. While we wait for those powerful forces that are still dominating our lives to come forth and reveal themselves, we need to be extra careful in establishing and maintaining healthy boundaries. And if it's not possible as yet, then to pull back from the intensity of it all until we feel safe enough to continue the search.

[10:12]

In the verses for picture number three called Seeing the Ox, we catch a first glimpse of reality itself. In Japanese, it's called Kensho, meaning to see our true nature. Picture number three, seeing the ox. The beast is licking the ox litter in the face. Sudden insight, overwhelming, unexpected in his face. Here are the verses for picture number three. Following its bellowing, the oxard gains entrance. Wherever he looks, he encounters the source. None of the six senses diverges from it. In each daily act, it is plainly manifest. It's like the salty taste of brine, like the adhesive and paint. Suddenly the eyebrows go up and there is nothing other.

[11:17]

A yellow warbler trills on and on in the branches. The sun is warm, the breeze is calm, willows on the bank are green. Just this place, there is nowhere at all that it can flee, those majestic horns impossible to portray. So in a very down-to-earth explanation about Kensho, an experience that will have taken place within the wholehearted activities of our daily life, a gateway suddenly opens. a gateway through which one of our six senses opens into what in Japanese is called chin, meaning our heart-mind. Sometimes the gateway is a sound, sometimes an odor or a touch or a taste, sometimes the sight of a flowering tree, or at other times some intellectual clarity about the meaning of words. And at such a time as these, as I've said, if you are not in awe,

[12:18]

you are distracted. And yet in this initial experience of awakening, if we haven't gotten caught by some self-centered story about what an amazing person we have become, that initial astonishment may simply wear off, as it did when we were children, through familiarity, in which case we may need some encouragement to continue toward a more complete liberation from the trickster of our own imagination. Once we've had enough of transmigrating through what the Buddha called the six realms, the heavenly realm, the realm of worldly ambition, the animal realm, the human realm, the realm of the hungry ghosts, and the hell realm, each a product of our vivid imagination, we encounter the perspective shown in picture number four, Catching the Ox. Again, for you in the back, the boy, the girl, the ox-sitter has captured the ox by its horn and is hanging on for dear life.

[13:33]

Chaos, nowhere to stand, attachment, aversion, clinging in fear. So here the verses are taking hold of the underlying reality that supports our life, if we dare. Long hidden in the distant meadows finally met with today, and yet, because that realm was so pleasing, the ox can scarcely be restrained. It longs for the sweet grasses ceaselessly, its obdurate heart yet stalwart, its wild nature remains. If the oxard wants it tractable, she's got to use the whip. Pushing all of her powers to the brink, she takes hold of the ox. But its will is strong, its sinews undaunted. it won't be easily broken. One moment it's suddenly clamoring up into the highlands and the next settling deep into the cloudy mists of the valley again. So at this point in our practice, the majestic beast that we've been seeking is now seeking us.

[14:44]

It's lowered its massive head and at full speed is heading our way. And it's no coincidence that this portrait of our practice, picture number four, has been called the great death. And yet the great death of the falsely imagined and isolated self is the only means through which a new life can flourish. And in picture number five, called herding the ox or taming the ox, we are being called to reenter the world of our delusional thinking in order to see just how useless and even harmful our imaginary version of reality truly can be. So here's picture number six, herding the ox. On this picture, the ox is contented, chewing on the grass in the meadow, and the young ox herd is hiding behind a tree.

[15:50]

Dropped away, too much to handle, just observing looks okay. Through our continuing meditation practice and our Dharma study, we come to see clearly, if even for just a moment, the moon of reality peeking out from behind the clouds of our dreams as the clouds peek back. And we begin to see how things in themselves are neither true or false, sad or happy, so that no matter how hard we search, as I said yesterday, there is no truth to be found. And that is the truth. A truth that simply arises from one's own mind, moment after moment, just as it's doing right now. So here's the verse for picture number five. Whip and tether moment by moment must never be let go of, or else the ox will wander off where it pleases, drawn by the dusty objects of the world. If the ox herd always leads firmly, the ox will grow serene and good-tempered.

[16:55]

Even unfettered by rope or chain, It will naturally follow after the Oxford. So although we can control animals and humans with brute force and terror until they no longer resist us, in the end of such treatment, they neither love us or wish to be around us. In the tradition of Zen training right here in this temple, we hope to teach and to learn both by example and by an ongoing reflection of our own and others' virtues. Many years ago, I lived out at Jamesburg, which is the gateway to Tassahara, a Zen mountain monastery. And one of the people I met there from the village was a woman who trained horses. Having spent a good number of years myself living in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, I was used to the cowboys on the ranches. I lived on ranches as well, and how they treated animals, which for the most part didn't seem very nice.

[17:58]

So when I went to visit the ranch where this woman trainer was living, and I watched her go out into the pasture with a couple of carrots in her back pocket and some sugar cubes in her hand, the horses came running. She went on to snuggle them, praise them, and show them just how much she loved them. For us human animals, I think we already know which style of training. gives the best outcome that we most wish for ourselves. When we are kind and patient in how we train ourselves and how we train each other, we reduce the harm that's being done in this world. This is our faith, our effort, our intention, and our Bodhisattva vow. This vow is articulated in the Zen tradition as the 16 Bodhisattva precepts. with each precept serving as a promise that we make from ourselves to each other and to the entire world.

[19:01]

I promise not to kill you, to steal from you, sexualize you, lie, poison, slander, brag, hoard, hate, or disrespect you. By enacting these precepts, our intention becomes visible as the body and the shape and the activities of an awakening being. Through the precepts, we begin to conform ourselves with reality and thereby to take our places on the back of the ox, the very place where we have been sitting all along. Drawing number six, coming home on the ox's back. So here he is. Young ox heard, content and smiling. holding on to the giant beast who is also seems to be smiling and content. Walking along the path, strong and steady, marching homeward, now is found what was not lost.

[20:09]

The verses for drawing number six. Shields and spears are gone. Winning and losing are nothing again. You sing woodsman's village songs and play children's country tunes. Stretched out on the back of your ox, you gaze at the sky. We call you, but you won't turn around. We catch at you, but you won't be tied down. Mounting the ox, slowly I return homeward. The voice of my flute intones through the evening. Measuring with handbeats the pulsating harmony, I direct the endless rhythm. Whoever hears this melody... will join me. As we continue cultivating concentration through sitting meditation and walking meditation and mindfulness practices, we may naturally begin to slow down, to slow way down. And we begin to notice the colored lights and shadows that are making up the textures of what we have been calling the world. Number seven, the ox forgotten.

[21:20]

Though this one's a little hard to see, I know. The dark room, the moonlight is shining in through the window. The young oxer is snuggled in bed. A little smile on the face. The dream is over, but something lingers. Safe, content, she floats. in picture seven the buddha is gone and the ox is gone and the way is gone and the child is lying in bed or sitting upright in their hut contented and at ease the urge to find the ox is completely dissolved nothing is fixed nothing is extra nothing is lacking the tether with which she had firmly grasped the ox hangs idly under the eaves which sounds an awful lot what we have been seeking And maybe some of you have found such a spot for yourselves right here on your cushion.

[22:29]

Every now and then, or perhaps lying on the beach. And yet right there in the center of this idyllic scene lies yet another danger on the spiritual journey. The danger of neglecting the importance of practice and wholehearted effort. Only this time, it's not for ourselves or our own liberation, but for the sake of others. who have only just begun the search. And so we are nudged along yet again, like the ox, to the drawing that appears in number eight. The ox and the boy are both gone. So what you're seeing is basically a full moon through the window. Through the window, moonlight streaming floods everything. All dissolves. So this is as far as I'd gotten yesterday during the talks for the Sashin.

[23:37]

But hopefully by the end of the day, I will finish all ten of the ox-herding pictures. In picture eight, the gap between the boy and reality itself has vanished. The ox and the ox-herder are both completely forgotten. This is the view of no view, where all dualities are merged as if into one view, a view in which no one thing stands alone without everything else tagging along. No eyes all alone, no ears all alone, no nose, no tongue, no body, no mind all alone, no suffering alone, no cause of suffering alone. No cessation of suffering alone and certainly no path all alone. As we all know and chant daily by heart. At this stage, the medicine of the Heart Sutra begins taking hold. And standing at the very summit of existence, there is nothing left of a boy or an ox or a summit.

[24:38]

Just the shadow of a dead person breathing. And maybe not even that. The image is of an empty circle filled with light. The danger here may be too obvious even to say. Not even your grandmother would fail to tell you what's wrong with this picture. And that's simply that it's time for you to come home again. There is still something that remains in saying there is nothing. As it says in this poem by one of our women ancestors, the bucket held by Chiyono has lost its bottom. If it doesn't even hold water, how will it hold the moon? I once described to my therapist an image that I had in my early years of practicing down at Tassajara, especially during the Oriyaki meals when the servers are bringing food into the Zendo. This image of myself perched up here on the Tan as though I were on the edge of the Grand Canyon like a giant bird of prey, sadly unable to open my wings.

[25:47]

So I thought it could help. My therapist might help to get my wings open at last. One of the main reasons I had gone to see a therapist in the first place. And it's all I thought I ever wanted was to fly. But he said to me instead, maybe you're standing on a curb and you can try just stepping down. And although it seemed kind of mean, popping my dream bubble like that, he was right. I and all of you are much more like penguins than we are like eagles, even in the way we dress around here. And yet the eyes gaze skyward toward the light, somehow still longing to fly. And yet having finally given up trying to get something or somewhere by ourselves, a self that no longer appears as separate from the world through which we travel, our steady practice allows us to recognize who we truly are. to draw back from our amazement with the products of creation, from the sunsets and the warblers and the baby lettuces, in order to take a closer look at the luminous pearl of our own imagination, the very mind itself, the mistress of our dreams, and the dream that has been dreaming us.

[27:06]

In other words, we turn the light around, and then we turn it around again and again, until only the vastness of the light remains. Juan Huayca said to Bodhidharma, our first Chinese Zen ancestor, My mind is restless. Please help settle it for me. Bodhidharma replied, Bring me your mind and I will settle it for you. Huayca says after some time, When I look for it, I can't find it. Bodhidharma then said, There, I have settled it for you. So here's the verse for picture number eight. The ox and the boy... both gone. Whip, rope, person, and ox all merge in no thing. This heaven is so vast, no message can stain it. How may a snowflake exist in a raging fire? Here are the footprints of the ancestors. There was a time in the history of Zen that these drawings ended here at number eight, nirvana as a wish for extinction, to be blown out.

[28:16]

And what might be wrong with that? Well, maybe we know from the earlier brush we had with the dangers of Kensho, the danger that we might actually forget the Buddha's awakened insight that the world and I are one, that your suffering and mine can never be extinguished until everyone is free. And that's a big job. And even the Buddha said it's a tiresome job. And therefore, we will be needing a lot of help. And as I said earlier, this practice is not done by our self alone. There is no self alone. In fact, at this very moment, literally millions upon millions of people are needing food and water and shelter and vaccines and test kits, kind voices and kind faces. Lots of them. So as we return to the source, just as the Buddha did at the end of his long journey to freedom, he went home.

[29:18]

kapalivastu to his parents and to his wife and his child and he shared his practice and his love with not only them but with all the other parents wives and children of the world the world and i are one picture number nine returning to the origin this picture. Yaksurda is reaching his arms up. It's morning and there's his mom reading him. Morning sunlight restores the world so familiar, ever new. Too many steps have been taken returning to the root and the source. better to have been blind and deaf from the beginning.

[30:19]

Dwelling in one's true abode, unconcern with and without, the river flows tranquilly on and the flowers are red. So the world is now visible and tangible and lovable again. Our time out in the desert or up on the mountain is finally over. Having gone over to the side to see that it's there, we come back to this side to practice. And what a lovely view. Out there from my window up in Spring Valley. What a lovely garden. And a lovely floor. And what a lovely room full of lovely people. How wonderful. What could be better than this? In an early stage of practice on seeing the ox, capturing it and taming it, we came to appreciate emptiness and dependent core rising as the fundamental underlying condition of all differences. how emptiness relates to form, and form relates to emptiness. At this stage, we see how the relationship of form and emptiness is the basis of the reality that we experience in our everyday life and our everyday activities, like washing the dishes and cleaning our rooms, sitting zazen, and speaking kind words to everyone.

[31:37]

As it says on the drawing for number nine, done in recent years by one of our good friends, Morning sunlight restores the world, so familiar and ever new. We have gotten to the peak of the mountain of our endeavors in this lifetime. We've chewed them up, fully digested them, and let them go, again and again, endlessly. These final three pictures of this set of ten are very much in the spirit of contentment, of utter contentment, the reward for which is picture number ten. entering the marketplace with bliss-bearing hands, or as we say in our departing student ceremony here at Zen Center, entering the marketplace with gift-bestowing hands. In this picture, our young ox-herder is in the shopping cart.

[32:40]

probably moving through Whole Foods, and he's got in his arms his stuffy little ox. Life goes on, moment by moment, his delight shows the way. Here's the verse for number 10. Barefooted and naked abreast, I mingle with the people of the world. My clothes are ragged and dust-laden, and I am ever blissful. I use no magic to extend my life. now before me the dead trees become alive again so now we are old and utterly goofy we play with children and we grieve at the sad news of the world and there we have it the journey from home to home just like frodo baggins bearing the ring of power which must by right be tossed into the fiery furnace of the non-dual nature of reality in which power and rings and persons and oxen have all, in an instant, melted away.

[33:45]

And like this insubstantial pageant faded, leave not a rack behind. Through one word or seven words or three times five, even if you thoroughly investigate myriad forms, nothing can be depended upon. Night advances, the moon glows and falls into the ocean. The black dragon jewel you have been searching for is everywhere. Thank you very much. Thank you for listening to this podcast offered by the San Francisco Zen Center. Our Dharma talks are offered at no cost 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. May we fully enjoy the Dorma.

[34:42]

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