Well, good evening everybody. I would very much like to learn, I know a lot of your names, but I'd like to learn everyone's name, and I would appreciate if everyone, if we could just go around and people say their name, first and last name. And also, would anyone like to be the attendance taker for this class? Would anybody just take that on and set? Yeah? Okay. Let's pass, I have this paper to just pass around, if you could put your name on here and also if you're registered, let's see, name, registered, yeah, this should probably do it. So, do you want to start, Sydney, with just saying your name? Sydney Bryn. Jess Goldfein. Erin. Barbara. Ryan Tishak.

[01:13]

Suzanne Weiner. Hamilton Wrote. Seth Crick. Amy. D. Hawk. Catherine Shields. Sunshine O'Hill. Sweeney Barney. Norah Lockett. Milton Cunningham. Susan Ray. Walt Hoover. Matt Chesky. Pam Holton. Darcy Castaldo. Mary Hess. Kathleen Mawr. Susan Speeds. Jayne Lazar. Viggette Teter. Elin Kamosy. Paul Ablasion. Tova Green. Jennifer Vance. Greg Evans. Kendra Kunop. Jasmine Hicks. Kevin Rowell. Judith McCullum. Alison Bernstein, David Osborne, Lydia Gargant, Joe Trent, Tara Elk, Alicia Stamp, June Berry, John Hayer, Lauren Stark, Jaken McCondrick, Matthew Gramsci, Rick Jones, Ariel DeHavilland, Chessie Whit, Chris Van Vux, Jean Nelson, Helen Joplin, Mary Koopman, Creighton Hulk, Will Rubly,

[02:20]

Samantha Osterbach, Avery Schofield, David Stevens, Katie Boydson, John Schick, Jean Schick, Jeanette Foster. What a beautiful group. So this class is an introduction to the precepts, right? And I don't think I have enough of these. This is a bibliography for a precepts class. This was put together for one of Rev's classes, and it's quite extensive. And there's even more since this was put together of places that you could read about the precepts. There's small articles.

[03:21]

Akin Roshi has a book out. There's in the book Meaningful to Behold. There's a chapter on Going for Refuge. There's just a lot of different places you can find it. And in the library, we have two of these notebooks that are on reserve. And in these notebooks are a lot of those articles already gathered, as well as lectures by Rev, Suzuki Roshi, and other things that have been written about the precepts. There's somebody's paper for a class, a student who was at Berkeley who did a class. Anyway, so this is all gathered together by some wonderful person who put this together. There's two of these, and they're located in this library on top of one of those glass cases, I think. So you're welcome to use these in the library, or for those of you in the practice period, in study hall. I think that's okay to take it to study and put it back.

[04:23]

Does that seem all right? But anyway, there's a lot of material here, more than we'll be getting to. The other book, actually, I guess I didn't bring it, but Akin Roshi's book, Mind of Clover. So let's see. I can Xerox more of these. Actually, those of you who don't live at Green Gulch, why don't you start out taking those, and then we'll see how many are left, and then I'll Xerox more for Green Gulch people. Akin Roshi's book, Mind of Clover, is about the precepts, and it's still in print, and we can order copies. I wanted to get an idea of how many people might want their own copy. How many people would like a copy of Akin Roshi's book, Mind of Clover? Bob, are you counting? Good.

[05:24]

There's a couple down here. And also, Tenshin Rev Anderson is writing a book on the precepts, which isn't out yet, but someday we'll have that book. It's going through editing process now. But there are a lot of unpublished lectures by Suzuki Roshi on the precepts from 1970, 71, there's a lecture from 67, and a lot of those are in here. I think I'll also Xerox one or two, and we'll look at those in class. I've been wanting to teach this class for about a year now. Last year at this time, I was on sabbatical right when the practice period began, and I went down to Tassajara for three weeks right in November, end of November, to do the Dharma Transmission Ceremony with Rev.

[06:30]

And part of that transmission ceremony is transmission of the precepts. The precepts get transmitted so that after the ceremonies are finished, the Dharma transmittee is... Okay, so there's some extras here. So people who are... After that ceremony, the Dharma transmittee is able to give the precepts to others. That's part of what gets transmitted in that ceremony. And so the precepts have really been... I've been feeling very close to them and wanting to study them and have taken them up myself. And when it came time to choose a class to teach,

[07:33]

I thought that's exactly what I want to teach so that I can study myself more about the precepts. So I feel like we're all studying this together, and I just wanted to say a few words about... When I first came to Zen Center, there was nothing really said about the precepts. I don't remember any lecture bringing it up. There was nothing in Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind particularly, which was one of the books that I was reading, and it wasn't emphasized in any way outwardly in a manifested way. And I didn't actually know how one would go about receiving the precepts. We weren't doing the full moon ceremony, which we now do every month, so we weren't reciting them regularly, and they weren't being talked about.

[08:35]

And there were people who wore the raksu, the Buddhist robe, and I remember thinking, gee, I want one of those, whatever they are. Mostly because the people who wore them I was quite drawn to as people. Their practice was something that seemed very amiable, so if they had them, then it probably was something that was pretty good or something. But it wasn't even talked about how one would receive them, or it just was not in the air. I remember when I was down at Tassajara, I think I had been around for about three years, and then someone said, well, there's going to be a lay ordination, you're going to do it, aren't you? And I said, sure, yeah. And that was kind of it. I didn't request to receive the precepts from anybody or really think about whether it was time,

[09:37]

whether this was something I really wanted to take on. It was just kind of like the next thing that you did if you were hanging around for a while. So that practice period, we had a visitor from Japan, Joshin-san, who many of you have heard of. She was a tiny, about four feet tall, literally, Japanese nun who came and taught Raksu sewing. And actually there had been another teacher, Yoshida Roshi, who came to Zen Center and taught Okesa sewing earlier on, but I was so new that I didn't even know that was really happening. But at Tassajara, when Joshin-san came, we really did the practice of sewing together, and we spent a lot of the days sewing. It wasn't a sewing machine, but time was given to working with her,

[10:38]

and she was like a human sewing machine, actually. Her thumbs, well, I don't know if you care about Joshin-san's thumbs, but anyway, they kind of had this flat top, and the way she used her needle, she could go very, very quickly and very accurately. And it was a little bit like the shoemaker and the elf sometimes, where you would have the pieces. Then I began sewing Okesa later and worked with her. You'd have the pieces, and she'd say, Oh, just give them to me, give it to me, and then in the morning you'd come back and they'd all be put together. She would work into the night, very busy. I don't know if any of you have seen her, any Okesas that she's sewn, or Raksus. Somebody recently was wearing one, Blanche. Blanche recently had one on. So the quality of the stitching is the quality of someone's sincerity

[11:44]

and someone's mind as they're working on it. It's very apparent, and you can see, you can tell by looking at these rows, the heart, mind of the person who sewed. And it's not necessarily that the stitches are perfect, that carries that quality, but you can just feel. So as I was saying, not much was said about the precepts or the origin of them or anything, but at Tassajara we began doing in 1972 the Bodhisattva Ceremony, which we now do regularly every full moon, and it was introduced in Japanese. We did it all in Japanese, and it was very powerful. I found the ceremony very powerful.

[12:45]

The melodious chanting, which was so different from the morning chanting, and I would actually, especially when the Kokyo was really strong and had been working on it for a long time, sometimes people would practice for 10 days straight every day and go off into the hills, and they would be given time to chant it, practice it, and then the night of the ceremony, the full moon night, the tradition was to take a plunge bath at Tassajara, then take a steam, and then jump in the creek. Any time of year, whatever, it was freezing or summer or whatever, jump in the creek and then you go and do the ceremony. So the quality of the voice had been really warmed up for doing this, and I would often feel sort of transported on just riding the voice and just in Japanese, and also in English. But we didn't recite the precepts after the full moon ceremony.

[13:51]

We would just do the repentance, bodhisattva vows, and the names of the Buddhist ancestors, and the three refuges at the end. And so then we added just, I'm not sure how long ago, maybe somebody else does, maybe six, eight years ago, adding the recitation of the bodhisattva precepts at the end of the full moon ceremony so that they're recited on a regular basis. So this is kind of a history of my association or... Richard? You mentioned that in Japan. Recite the bodhisattva precepts after? Well, we received the ceremony from Tatsugami Roshi when he was there, just without that. So I think it was added. I think Norman and Rabbaby decided that that would be... In Thich Nhat Hanh's Community of Mindful Living,

[14:54]

when you take precepts, part of what you pledge to do or vow to do is to recite them monthly, and many of these groups get together. The Community of Mindful Living small groups are dotted throughout the country of people who have received the precepts in that lineage and have made this vow to recite them, so they get together to recite them. So all these tiny groups have formed like living room groups that come together at least once a month to do the recitation. So it may have come out of that because a number of people have been involved with Thich Nhat Hanh, and maybe it evolved from that too. I wanted to ask how many people know by heart who could just recite, like right now, the bodhisattva precepts? Okay. I thought one of the things that we could work towards is that everybody would be able to recite them by heart.

[15:57]

I think memorization used to be a very... Well, as you may know, all the sutras for hundreds of years were recited by heart. They were memorized and passed on orally. So the capacity of the human mind to memorize is vast, and we've lost that. We don't do much memorization anymore, but it's almost like an atrophied muscle once you get going. Like many of you now I know can chant some of the chants in the morning and just you know them by heart, and you didn't really try particularly to memorize them. It's just by reciting them over and over, all of a sudden one morning you realize you know the whole thing by heart, whether it's Japanese or not. So I would like everyone to have the opportunity to sort of incorporate the precepts

[17:00]

through memorizing them and having them reside in your body so that you can use them at will. They're right there at your fingertips, at your mind tips. Yes? Yes. Yes, that's a good idea. Yes, I will. And I also thought we could recite, maybe a couple people could recite them at the beginning of class. We have six classes, and there's a lot of people. So let's see, if two people did each class, that wouldn't be very many, would it? Anyway, let's maybe try, it won't take very long I don't think, but to just recite them, it doesn't take that long. So maybe three people each class, what's the math on that? Eighteen. That's it? How do we get it up?

[18:05]

Well, we'll see how long it takes. We'll see how long it takes. So who would like to volunteer to recite next week? Because that would only be five classes. Kevin, Matthew, and Hamilton. And Sydney. Okay, so four. We're going to try four next week, so how will I remember this? What did I do with my pen? Don't tell me I didn't bring it. Oh, here it is. Okay, so Kevin, Matthew, Sydney, and Hamilton. Okay, so what I wanted to do, I don't have my glass, it's ten to eight. What I was hoping we would do for this class, what I wanted to do was go through the history of the Bodhisattva precepts,

[19:07]

how they came down to us in the form that they're in, and so you can get a kind of overview of the precepts that we have now, the Bodhisattva precepts. So... In the Buddhist time, actually predating the Buddhist time, there was a ceremony, or I should say, and people know this from the Bodhisattva ceremony because our Bodhisattva ceremony is what has, in an abbreviated version, is what's come down to us from this oldest of ceremonies that predates Buddhism, where in India there were religious people, ascetics, wandering ascetics, and various religious people who would, on the new moon and the full moon,

[20:13]

would gather together. They would have a solitary practice, but on the new and full moon they would gather together. And out of this practice they began reciting, because they had different teachings, these different groups, they weren't Buddhist necessarily, and they would talk about their teachings from their different teachers, and then the laity, if you want to call it laity, but householders would come and want to hear what these teachings were that they would be reciting. So this kind of tradition was in India, and then when the Buddha came, appeared in the world, and had the order of monks and nuns, the ordained practitioners, they also were solitary, except when they gathered together for the rainy season, and they would come together also on the new and the full moon, and they began the practice, and the laity would come,

[21:15]

but they would just sit together quietly, and the laity wanted to hear teachings, or wanted to hear something from the groups that gathered together, and what evolved was they would recite the precepts, the precepts of the order of the monks and nuns, and they would also at this time take the opportunity to confess in front of their fellow practitioners, if they felt they had not kept the precepts since the last time they had gotten together, so that would have been, it's the lunar calendar, so it would be like two weeks, the full and the new moon, like the first and the fifteenth, I guess, in the lunar calendar. So it began to be a chance to recite the precepts, and also to say and ask for repentance, or also other members of the order,

[22:16]

if they had noticed something or someone breaking the precepts, it would be a chance to bring that up as well. And all these precepts from the Buddha's time, he didn't start out with an order that had a whole bunch of rules that you had to kind of agree to in order to come to be part of that group. He basically said, you know, come and ordain people, or they wanted to join, but there wasn't necessarily from the beginning a lot of rules to start with, but out of living together, through their lives together, something would happen, and someone would bring that to the Buddha and say, so-and-so did thus and so, and so-and-so's feelings were hurt, or this made someone very confused about what our teaching was, or whatever, and then the Buddha would say, well, you know, we do not do this,

[23:19]

and that would then become one of these rules that people would abide by if you were in the order. And that grew and grew and grew to about 250 rules for the monks and more for the nuns. And the nuns also had eight special rules, which I think a lot of you, or many of you may know of, that particularly looked at their relationship to, the nuns' relationship to the monks, and in order to be ordained as nuns, they had to accept those eight, so that was in place when the nuns' order was established. And what Suzuki Roshi said about the fact that the women had more precepts, what he said was, and this is in one of these lectures,

[24:23]

that women's, this is what he said, I'm just passing this, just letting you know, he said women's bodies are more complicated, and so they need more of these rules to meet that, and also he felt men are more simple. It's an interesting quote. So they don't need quite as many. Nice try. So the new and the full moon, these were recited, and there was also, and as they got more complicated, certain ones were major ones, and others were minor, and things were more serious than others, and certain things, if you did them, you would be expelled from the Sangha, or others, there was some kind of repentance you could do,

[25:26]

so they would recite these, and the laity would be present for this. So through the ages, this came, these, so this is the early Buddhist teachings, and I just wanted to, it's so confusing, because there's two sutras that are called the Brahmajala Sutras, this one is the Buddha Speaks the Brahma Net, or the Brahmajala Sutra, and this is the All-Embracing Net of Views, the Brahmajala Sutra, and its commentaries. This is Mahayana, and this is Theravada, and this is from the Pali Canon, and I actually didn't realize that there were two of these sutras, but in this one, which is, I think it's in the, you know, in the Pali Canon there's three baskets, Pitaka or Pitaka, and there's the Suta Pitaka,

[26:31]

the Vinaya, or the Vinaya has all the rules, and the Abhidharma, Abhidharma, these three baskets, and this is in the, I think the collection of sutras called the Digha Nikaya, I think, I believe that's where this is, right at the beginning. Anyway, it has this analysis of virtue, and in it, the Buddha, there's these two people who are walking behind the Buddha, one person who's another kind of teacher, and his student, and one is not exactly disparaging the Buddha, but not praising the Buddha, and the other one is praising the Buddha, so they have these two things, and so the Buddha asks about, he says, If bhikkhus, that's monks, others speak in dispraise of me, or in dispraise of the Dhamma, or in dispraise of the Sangha,

[27:34]

you should not give way to resentment, displeasure, or animosity against them in your heart. For, if you were to become angry or upset in such a situation, you would only be creating an obstacle for yourselves. If you were to become angry or upset when others speak in dispraise of us, would you be able to recognize whether their statements are rightly or wrongly spoken? Certainly not, Lord. If bhikkhus, others speak in dispraise of me, or in dispraise of the Dhamma, or in dispraise of the Sangha, you should unravel what is false, and point it out as false, saying, For such and such a reason, this is false, this is untrue, there is no such thing in us, this is not found among us. So, the Buddha is basically saying, if people disparage the three treasures, meaning the Buddha, the teacher, or the other Sangha, you don't get angry, and don't get all upset about this, just point out what's falsely understood.

[28:37]

We don't do that here, this is not part of, there's no such thing in us, this is not found among us, certain practices. And then he goes on to say that, you know, people may see that there's problems with moral virtue, and what should we look at. So this is kind of before our precepts. He says, It starts out, Having abandoned the destruction of life, the recluse, Gautama abstains from the destruction of life. He has laid aside the rod and the sword, and dwells conscientious, full of kindness, compassionate for the welfare of all living beings. It is in this way, bhikkhus, that the worldling would speak when speaking in praise of the Tathagata. Then it goes on, they would speak in praise about that Gautama has abandoned taking what is not given, he's abandoned unchaste living,

[29:41]

that would be misusing sexuality, he's abandoned false speech, that would be, you know, lying, having abandoned slander, and then it's not exactly the exact same, it goes on to harsh speech, and idle chatter, abstaining from idle chatter, so there's several about right speech. Or he might say, The recluse Gautama abstains from damaging seed and plant life, and he eats only in one part of the day, refraining from food at night, and so forth. And then he lists some of these other things, which did come down through this other Mahayana Sutra, the Brahmajala Sutra, so there is this strong connection between the two, but these are not Bodhisattva precepts, these are kind of pre-Mahayana, and the Bodhisattva ideal came up like about a thousand years,

[30:45]

let's see, is it a thousand years, no, 500 years with the Prajnaparamita and the Bodhisattva ideal. So this predates the Bodhisattva ideal. So some of the other things that they bring up are abstaining from dancing, singing, instrumental music, and witnessing unsuitable shows, abstaining from wearing garlands, embellishing himself with scents, see they had a prohibition against perfumes, or beautifying himself with unguents, these are all these things that people could say in dispraise of the Buddha, abstaining from high and luxurious beds and seats, abstaining from accepting gold and silver, anyway these were all, they're not talked about as precepts per se, but as virtuous activities, and the laity or people could speak

[31:47]

in dispraise of the monks and the Buddha if they found them doing some of these things, these are the things that they're supposed to abstain from, buying and selling, running messages and errands, bribery, deception, fraud, accepting gold and silver, and so forth, accepting uncooked grain, raw meat, male and female slaves, goats and sheep, fowl and swine, elephants, cattle, horses and mares, you weren't allowed to accept these kinds of things if you were a monk, or a nun, because you were living this simple life of the wanderer, you weren't supposed to accept things that you could hoard and then use later, like uncooked meat that you'd save, you couldn't save it too long. So this is an early kind of version of some of these, oh, and then it goes into,

[32:50]

this you'll find interesting, because this is the thing, this is the main point, is that the laity is totally supporting you, they didn't have conference centers and Tassajara and that kind of thing, they begged for their food, they received gifts from the laity, and the laity would receive merit, they understood it as merit, they weren't going to lead the homeless life, because it was very clear there was laity householder and there was monk nun, there wasn't what we'll talk about soon, which is more what we have now, this kind of combination, so the laity would give gifts to the sangha, medicine and robes and food, but they did it believing, or with the understanding that the monks and nuns lived this very simple life and were following the homeless life. So whereas some recluses and brahmins,

[33:54]

while living on food offered by the faithful, enjoy the use of high and luxurious beds and seats such as, and they named them, and you can imagine these were all, this might have been a problem, the reason it was named was because someone was using these kinds of things and it was felt like this is not, we don't do this, such and such does not happen here. So they were using high and luxurious beds and seats such as spacious couches, thrones with animal figures carved on the supports, long-haired coverlets, multi-colored patchwork coverlets, white woolen coverlets, woolen coverlets embroidered with flowers, quilts stuffed with cotton, woolen coverlets embroidered with animal figures, and it goes on, woolen coverlets with hair on both sides or on one side, bedspreads embroidered with gems.

[34:56]

You can imagine that there was the nobility or the wealthy people who would want to bestow these beautiful items to the teachers and the people who were their spiritual teachers, but to accept a coverlet embroidered with gems and then call yourself a home leaver who's renounced the world, it didn't quite match up. Silk coverlets, dance hall carpets, elephant, horse, or chariot rugs, rugs of antelope skins, choice spreads made of cadali deer hides, spreads with red awnings overhead, couches with red cushions for the head and feet. So anyway, it really describes the recluses, who knows how to pronounce that word? Recluse.

[35:57]

Recluse. Recluse. Recluse. Neither of them sound right. Gotama abstains from the use of such high and luxurious beds and seats. And it goes on, rubbing scented powders into the body, massaging with oils, bathing in perfumed water, kneading the limbs, and so forth. So you can imagine, you know, you take these vows and then, you know, how wonderful it is to get a massage with perfumed oil and stuff. But the recluse Gotama abstains from the use of such devices for embellishment and beautification. So anyway, this was all over the years kind of laid out. What is proper to this group, this order of monks and nuns, and what is not considered proper? And this is monastic. We're talking about monastic rules. The monasteries came later, but monastic means monks and nuns. This is not necessarily saying that,

[37:00]

you know, using white woolen coverlet isn't okay, but for the order of monks and nuns. Are there any rules for the laity? Rules for the laity? Well, they could, let's see, those first five precepts of killing and stealing and lying and misuse of sexuality and slander, the laity would take later on. They could take those. But I think, you know, at that time the Buddha was teaching and saying, these are my teachings, you know, and they were taking those on. And asking to be... You know, I don't know if there was any formal kind of lay initiation at that time. It might have come later. Yeah. So,

[38:01]

so that's this early Ramayana Sutra. I was just wondering one thing, because they were sort of talking in specific, if people were to give donations to the monastery, because you said they would give donations like food, but people couldn't take donations like that personally. Well, no, if you went around begging with your begging bowl, which people did, you would go around, the monks and nuns didn't eat after twelve. This was in India and it was hot and they walked around and got their food and then they would eat before twelve and then they would do meditation and so forth for the rest of the day. And then later when there were more and more of them and they would gather together, they would get, like in the rainy season, they would get gifts of vegetarian feasts, you know, or food. But yes, they could get personally, and there was a lot of rules about, we just did orioke practice today, you know, and you have the Buddhist bowl and you were supposed to receive

[39:04]

whatever went into your bowl, whether you liked it or not, and you weren't supposed to go to only certain houses. You know, there were a lot of admonitions about that. The good houses, you know, where the lady always gives you a really nice pudding or something. You had to go just, you decided where to go and then it was house after house after house. So there was a lot of admonitions. You did receive in your bowl just for yourself as well at certain times. And then there was the gathering together during the rainy season where they received. Did that answer your question? Yes. And there's that, I don't know if it's an apocryphal story or not, I think it's in the suttas of the monk who, let's see, do I want to tell you this? Yeah. It's a teaching story where the monk went and was given, went to the next house and there was a leper in the house and he offered something and his thumb fell off into the bowl.

[40:06]

And that was the offering. So that's one of these teaching stories that shows to what extreme this mind of renunciation can go. And this we carry with us through our formal practice of eating with oriyoki. Whatever is offered by the kitchen, you receive that with gratitude and being aware of, our preferences do arise, but to not fall into preferences. You take some of everything, you eat each thing with sincere mind that this is the food, this is dharma that's coming to you. You're being supported to practice and that food nourishes your dharma study and your zazen practice. So that's the same spirit we have now with our oriyoki.

[41:07]

And I would like to have that same spirit when we go through the buffet line for other meals that aren't formal to feel the offering is, just to receive the offering. I mean often people receive the offering and then go get a peanut butter sandwich on the side. But we do supplement our food, more protein, but at least for the formal meals to really practice that way and watch what happens. Anyway, I feel like I'm veering off into an oriyoki bag. So let me see. So the bodhisattva ideal which came later, there's this sutra called the Brahmajala Sutra. The Buddha speaks the Brahma Net Sutra. And the Brahma is like this god,

[42:10]

you know, who's kind of a friend of the Buddha. Often the Brahma will come and ask questions Anyway, this Brahma Net is supposed to be pictured as this huge net, inconceivably huge, and all the holes in the net are world systems. Imagine a net where the holes are like a screen. Those are complete world systems. So it's just enormous, this net. That's the Brahma Net Sutra. So, let's see. So historically in India there were these 250 or more Pratimoksha, they're called precepts, that upon ordination then later on you had to agree to take on these rules that had been kind of built up over time

[43:13]

and they were in place, so then you had to decide to receive those upon ordination. So those 250 plus were the monks and nuns ordination precepts, the Vinaya. And that got passed through Southeast Asia and Sri Lanka and Ceylon and then when those went to China, what happened in China, the Mahayana had come up then and this Brahmajala Sutra takes the Bodhisattva as the ideal and the Bodhisattva takes a different set of precepts and there's 10 major and 48 minor precepts in the Brahmajala Sutra and our Bodhisattva precepts come from that lineage, if you want to think of these as, I mean a lot of these are the same as this other Brahmajala from the earlier thing

[44:16]

but they're two distinct streams, lineages you might say. So the Bodhisattva initiation to be initiated as a Bodhisattva not necessarily as a monk or a nun became something that the laity could do as well as the priests, it became something that laity could take and as we know our Bodhisattva precepts, the 16 of them are taken by both priest and laity they're not two separate sets of precepts that are received. The priest ordination has head shaving and receiving of bowls and robe, the okesa but the precepts are actually the exact same precepts, the Bodhisattva's precepts go to both monks and laity. So that's through Japan so in China there was a syncretic thing that happened where they took

[45:18]

both sets, they took the 250 plus for the women and they took the 58 the 10 major and the 48 minor of the Brahmajala Sutra so they had two sets so in China they had the monk's ordination, full ordination monk or nun and the Bodhisattva initiation those two, it was this double thing that happened in China and still to this day and in Korea. Japan, it changed but I just want to say a little bit about this well let's see partially the reason they added these Bodhisattva precepts is that many of the precepts from India could not be kept in China because of the climate, things about certain kinds of it was much too cold and people would be in big trouble and a certain number of robes you could wear

[46:21]

and various things like that couldn't be carried forth in these colder climates so they would take those Vinaya as well as the Bodhisattva there was these changes, it was syncretic is that the word? Syncretic now this was passed on, this is what came to Japan and in the temple in Nara, the Vinaya school but somehow in Japan it didn't hold these two and the Vinaya began to be dropped and the Bodhisattva initiation began to be more well actually now it's the only pretty much the only initiation that's done is the Bodhisattva precepts but I just wanted to say historically how that happened so this monastic ordination of the Mahayana was this double thing

[47:24]

in China and this combination but Prince, in Japan Prince Shotoku, that's in 574 574 to 622 he felt that the original spirit of these precepts was not this formal discipline but a non-formal Bodhisattva spirit and he wanted to get back to that so he declared Buddhism a state religion, Shotoku and he was a Buddhist himself and one day he was lecturing on the Lion's Roar of Queen Srimala are you familiar with this sutra? Lion's Roar of Queen Srimala and in this, Queen Srimala is being the Buddha is talking to Queen Srimala about, he's kind of predicting that she

[48:28]

in a future time will be a Buddha and various other things about the other people who will be with her and she is so kind of filled with the Dharma that she takes these vows, Queen Srimala spontaneously takes vows she kind of self-vows she takes ten great vows so I hope you're following this Prince Shotoku, this Japanese man in 572 was lecturing on this sutra to the Empress Suiko about Queen Srimala so I just wanted to say what Queen Srimala's ten great vows were just kind of following how these vows kind of show up in different places and precepts so after Queen Srimala Queen Srimala having heard the prophecy about herself directly from the Lord joined her hands in salutation and made ten great vows one, Lord from now on until I attain enlightenment

[49:30]

I hold to this first vow that I shall not permit any thought of violating morality and then it's the same kind of vow, the same formula from now on until I attain enlightenment I hold to the second vow that I shall not allow any thought of disrespect toward the teachers that I shall not allow any thought of anger and ill will toward such beings number four, I shall not allow any thought of jealousy toward the glory of others and the perfection of others I think that one's similar to praising self at the expense of others I will not allow any thought of covetousness no matter how meager the donated food I shall not accumulate wealth for my own use but shall deal with it to assist the poor and friendless and so forth so she kind of spontaneously her last one is, I shall liberate beings from sufferings sentient beings who are friendless, trapped, bound, diseased

[50:33]

troubled and poor and miserable I shall not forsake them for a single moment it's a Bodhisattva vow that she kind of comes up with so she kind of in this sutra does this and while talking about this to the Empress the Empress became so moved by hearing this that she stood up and kind of took vows it was so moving to her that Queen Srimala had done this that the Empress did this as well so there is this kind of self-vowing strand within the Bodhisattva initiation where you can on your own speak before the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas

[51:35]

on your own just say I vow to do thus and so and it can be a kind of binding vow that you make not necessarily with the other ordinations you needed a preceptor and a certain teacher you needed all this stuff in place but in this way you can just from your own heart make these vows and then if you do this sometimes there are auspicious signs like I think with Queen Srimala heavenly flowers came raining down so there may be some auspicious sign that happens if you decide to do that on your own with your serious sincere intent so and this sutra is about 3rd century this is the Mahasanghikas in about the 3rd century and this sutra the main thing about the sutra why it is so important is that it has the Tathagatagarbha theory which is that each person has Buddha nature or the womb of the Tathagatagarbha

[52:39]

you yourself are the womb of the Tathagatagarbha and the sutras that came out of this are the Lankavatara Sutra and Awakening of Faith in the Mahayana which is very important in Kriya so that came out of this so this kind of self-ordination from Queen Srimala kind of just sort of ordaining herself with these vows taking this initiation the Lankavatara what? you mean this one? this is the Brahmajala also so there are two versions of the Brahmajala one is called the Buddha speaks the Brahma net or the Brahmajala and this is called the all-embracing net of views so they are slightly different but they both have Brahmajala in the title

[53:40]

I'm not so interested in the books there are two different sutras two different sutras this is from the Pali Canon and this was a Mahayana sutra two separate strands is that a library book? this one no, I actually bought it at the bookstore Bob was really glad to sell it to me, right Bob? so let's see about my notes I can't see, I have to hold it up is everybody following this? is this boring? why did you bring up the lines from Queen Srimala? well, because I thought it was very interesting that in this Mahayana sutra here is this Queen Srimala who spontaneously takes these vows

[54:43]

and does this self-ordination which is this strand that comes up later there is a description of how to do that for yourself if there is no other teacher around or witnesses, you can on your own she had the Buddha there and you can call forth the presence of the Buddha in your mind and do it on your own do this kind of vowing and have it be sincerely responded to by the universe so it was kind of new to me in my study, so I just found that interesting but it didn't really change the precepts directly, right? no, no but it also shows kind of different forms that the precepts took there's ten, but they're not the ten that we have now they're kind of a different set of ten how are we doing here? ok so

[55:43]

let's see, did I write these down? yep so the difference between the Mahayana and these other monks Vinaya those two strands are very different the Bodhisattva and the Vinaya are more monastic and there's ten precepts for novice monks kind of the first ten that you take and the first five are the same as killing, stealing, misuse sexuality lying and intoxicants, those five it's not slander, it's intoxicants and then the second five for the novice monks are those first five are pretty much universal to all the different precepts those first five and then the second five and lay initiates took those five

[56:48]

the second five are very different now these are for novice novice Vinaya monks but there's ten, so that's why I'm just distinguishing that there's ten, but they're different ten so their last five are don't wear flower garlands and rub fragrant creams on the body do not sing or dance or play musical instruments or watch or listen to such events do not use high, broad or large beds do not eat at improper times do not hold gold, silver or valuable objects so these are all oriented towards monastic life and the ten Bodhisattva precepts they don't have a monastic kind of cast to them the last five for those are slander praising self, possessiveness, ill will harboring ill will and abusing the three treasures so it doesn't have any monastic you know like monastic house rules

[57:51]

so the Bodhisattva precepts those ten and the novice monk ten are different although the first five are the same so they kind of come together so so in Japan they got those two strands but after Prince Shotoku they began to drop the monastic side and that began to just kind of wither away now there was a teacher he's from 764 to 822 and he really felt that this ordination with all those precepts the 250 and the ten novice ones he felt they were Hinayana rather than Mahayana and he basically did away with them he totally rejected it and the Nara school where they were were very upset it was a big departure

[58:54]

he said no more and he felt the true Mahayana tradition was the Bodhisattva precepts and not these 250 so he completely simplified the ordination down to these 16 that we have now so was that for all sects of Buddhism in Japan? pretty much all sects well actually since that time since Saicho he established Mount Hiei a whole ordination platform on Mount Hiei which did the Bodhisattva initiation and it was kind of in competition maybe with Nara but meanwhile Mount Hiei got stronger and stronger and they had in fact Dogen and Shinran and all these different teachers were all ordained at Mount Hiei with these Bodhisattva precepts and also there was to go into the monastery at Mount Hiei

[59:56]

there were these monastic house rules that were more than 250 like we have here various guidelines for how you take care of yourself in a monastic situation so they actually received those as well but like Shinran they were all reformers and he had no precepts he said in this time in this time of kind of a decline of Buddhism we can't keep these precepts anymore so there's only one precept which is to accept Amida's mercy and be born in the western paradise so you just took like one which is just faith in Amida so he did away with all those and Dogen had the 16 Bodhisattva precepts is Soto school and Rinzai also so let's see, Pure Land Jodo Shinshu Nichiren, I don't know about Nichiren but in Japan right now these 250

[60:59]

that strand is not functioning so to get that kind of full ordination if you wanted to be ordained in that full old style you can go to places in China Taiwan does them and I think they're trying to reestablish ordination platforms of that kind in Thailand perhaps does somebody know? Indonesia did you say? Malaysia and for women it died away even in India this full ordination of this old way although you can receive it in Taiwan now and in Malaysia too for women and certain people have gone like Pema Chodron and I don't know who else Geo Kennet received but it's not like it's not just the regular easy to do thing

[62:01]

in Japan at all even you have to go to these other places where the lineage has been unbroken from supposedly the Buddhist time so let's see so what changed in Japan was that there was no hard and fast line between lay and priest anymore because one of the most important thing that happened was that is receiving the precepts was taken by both lay and priest and no distinction made now in Japan and also for example in Japan there's the tradition the lineages of the married priesthood now in the rest of the Buddhist world a married priesthood is like an oxymoron to be ordained means celibacy

[63:02]

and being a monk or nun there's no such thing as a married monk but in Japan this Shinranai actually got married was married and so that's the lineage that we inherited at Zen Center and in a lot of the West that includes this possibility of a married priesthood or nation whereby you can be married so you probably heard this story when there was a big Vinaya conference here about precepts and so forth at Green Gulch and there were many monks and nuns that came and then our teachers Norman and Rev and Mel and they realized that it's really an anomaly it's very unusual they actually felt more lay

[64:04]

Norman said he felt like he was a lay practitioner rather than a priest in juxtaposition to people who are keeping these precepts not eating after noon and the celibacy and so and Suzuki Roshi said about the West even more so than in Japan where you have this married priesthood you have people who are practicing like the monks and nuns do or the priests do in Japan where people who sit zazen every day have a very full practice life live in practice centers for long periods of time but they're not priest ordained and he didn't know what we were we're not lay because lay people in Japan supported the temple came to memorial services it was more like going to church on Sunday kind of feeling some people did zazen but it was not a main

[65:07]

the congregation did not all come to do zazen on a regular basis let alone sashins so then when he came to the West and here are all these people completely doing these things full tilt and devoting their lives to it but not ordained so what is it exactly so this is now even further a new it's the new Buddhism that we have here yes I have a question you were talking about monks and nuns but in the Soto Zen men or women are both priests well let's see I would say that in the West or in America maybe I don't know about Europe men and women are both priests although some are living as nuns and some are living as monks meaning celibate but in Japan the nuns

[66:12]

they are nuns, they don't marry there aren't married women priests so there's a kind of double standard in Japan so yes excuse me for not actually when I say priest marry I mean male priest marry in Japan and the women, it's the same ordination and they run their own temples and they are called priests they can be called priests or nuns but I think nun denotes celibacy connotes yes so that's a completely new development in this country to have married female priests it is and I think I remember when Oksan, Suzuki Roshi's wife my husband is also a priest and when we had our first child she came over and saw this baby and she was just

[67:13]

mother priest, father priest she had really never seen such thing she saw this beautiful little this little white juban you know the under row all little tiny stitches, this little teeny white thing she said this baby this was her first child of two priests she had never experienced such thing so she was really bowled over by that and of course for us there was Kathy and Norman have kids and Layla and Jim it wasn't that unusual in this sangha anyway to have two priests married with children it was it happened you know it's not that common but still it did happen it wasn't totally unheard of so yes it is a new development

[68:16]

there's a hand up here is there another question? the people who live at monasteries are they celibate men and women probably not men but people who you consider monks are they celibate? you mean in Japan? like if you're at a heiji monastery if you're in a training temple I think so, I think they probably are men and women are separate pretty much and there's the visitors who come have you been in Japanese monasteries? it's pretty celibate right? the training monasteries but they don't stay there for all that they go for one or two years maybe and then they often go to their family temple and then they're temple priests and they marry and their wife is this is for the men it's a full job being the wife of a temple priest it's like being a parish priest

[69:18]

that kind of thing and the nuns have temples hereditary temples I imagine stay in monasteries I don't think the temple masters well this woman who's coming this coming week Aoyama Roshi had her own temple so I know there are some this Sunday by the way we have a woman Aoyama Roshi who's written a book that's translated into English and she'll be giving the talk on Sunday but it's few, it's much less than the males having their own temples but I think that is the practice so in Rinzai Zen the precepts

[70:19]

are the subject of the highest level of koans meditation practice the precepts, this is a quote from Meizumi Roshi, the precepts as koan subjects are the kind of later subjects that are taken up I wanted to read what Dogen says about receiving the precepts and there are a few fascicles that he has one called Jukai, receiving the precepts and then in this fascicle called The Meaning of Practice Enlightenment Shushogi he talks about the precepts and repentance and ordination and so forth so I wanted to read well maybe I should say this first and we'll be studying this

[71:22]

the way Dogen talks about the precepts and the way Suzuki Roshi talks about the precepts is that the Zazen mind and precepts are synonymous and so we may have the idea that the precepts are these lists of these rules and things that we have to not do in order to be considered part of a group or so on and so forth but the Bodhisattva precepts are understood from from Dogen and our lineage as Zazen mind or Zazen minds and precepts cannot be really distinguished so this is another way to think about it

[72:24]

that's kind of an inconceivable way you might say and so I remember recently when Reb took up the precepts actually I don't know how long ago this was four or five years ago maybe he started lecturing a lot on them and talking at Tassara and one of the things he said which caused a big uproar because I was there for the aftermath of the uproar maybe some of you were there he said something like you can't sit Zazen unless you receive the precepts Katie were you at Tassara then? No. And of course people have been sitting Zazen quite nicely without having received the precepts one person in particular was like really what do you mean and who are you to say that I can't I mean it got to be kind of an issue a big issue and I think it was pointing to something saying that and I think Eiken Roshi says it too

[73:25]

that to sit Zazen without also receiving the precepts is just like a hobby it's more like improving yourself and that kind of thing but he also talks about equating receiving the precepts with the actual Zazen mind so we'll look at this because it's not necessarily self-evident when you read the lists of these things so I wanted to read what Dogen said about it and then I just thought maybe somebody might want to recite the precepts who's ready tonight I just thought we might as well do it tonight too so so this is Dogen the various Buddhas have all received and observed the three refuges the three pure precepts and the ten grave prohibitions that's the sixteen, three, three and ten

[74:27]

by receiving these precepts one realizes the supreme Bodhi wisdom the adamantine indestructible enlightenment of the various Buddhas in the three stages of time is there any wise person who would not gladly seek this goal the Bhagavat, that's the Buddha has clearly shown to all sentient beings that when they receive the Buddhist precepts they enter into the realm of the various Buddhas truly becoming their children and realizing the same great enlightenment all the Buddhas dwell in this realm perceiving everything clearly without leaving any traces when ordinary beings make this their dwelling place they no longer distinguish between subject and object at that time everything in the universe whether earth, grass, tree, fence, tile or pebble functions as a manifestation of enlightenment and those who receive the effects of this manifestation

[75:30]

realize enlightenment without being aware of it this is the merit of non-doing and non-striving awakening to the Bodhi mind so this equating receiving the precepts with truly becoming Buddha's child by receiving these precepts one realizes the supreme Bodhi Bodhi wisdom the adamantine indestructible enlightenment of the various Buddhas in the three stages of time, that's past, present and future so by receiving the precepts you realize this without being aware of it so the importance of the precepts

[76:37]

when I say introduction I feel like the precepts are deep and wide and ever like a source or fountain of inspiration so I hope our study sort of kindles this spirit in all of us I know that many of you have asked to receive the precepts or have already received the precepts and are actively studying them on your own and taking them up and also have begun sewing your raksu, this baby robe so I would really hope, and I did a lot of talking tonight that those of you who are

[77:44]

I would hope that all of us would become really actively engaged in taking these up and especially those of you who have already decided to receive the precepts to be actively engaged in learning them turning them over as soon as you take one up they're all connected and as soon as you just decide well I'll take up one and really look at it they all come up with it and shed light on various activities from various points of view so I'd like to encourage us all to take them up and I know some of you have and see what happens I choose one Is there anyone? Breck wanted to have a list of them but I can just say them or we can all say them those of you who know them and you can write them down in your notebook and then we don't have to zero in on some pages so the

[78:46]

you all have it on you so those of you who've gotten the guest student material are they written here? in the practice period full pamphlet so you have them so the first that are called the three precepts but we also call them the refuges which we're going to do tonight after class so let's see if you were to recite them you would say I take refuge in Buddha I take refuge in Dharma I take refuge in Sangha and then in a ceremony those are repeated three times for thorough entry but in terms of sixteen you don't that's not like nine that's just refuge in the three treasures so that's the first three

[79:52]

and then the next are the three pure precepts and those have been translated in various ways and we can look at different translations but the way I'm saying them now are I vow to embrace and sustain right conduct I vow to embrace and sustain all good I vow to embrace and sustain all beings and those are the pure ones and we'll talk about other translations and where those came from and then the ten prohibitory or grave heavy, sometimes called, the word translates, grave, prohibitory, are a disciple of the Buddha does not kill, the disciple of the Buddha does not steal, disciple of the Buddha

[80:56]

does not misuse sexuality, a disciple of the Buddha does not lie, a disciple of the Buddha does not intoxicate mind or body of self or others, a disciple of the Buddha does not slander, a disciple of the Buddha does not praise self at the expense of others, a disciple of the Buddha is not possessive of anything, a disciple of the Buddha does not harbor ill will, a disciple of the Buddha does not abuse the three treasures, so those are the 16,

[82:10]

is there anyone who would like to recite those, who knows them? We can start next week with the fourth volume, so, you want to try, close your book, should I do it one more time, I take refuge in Buddha. Let me just mention something, just for everybody, you don't have to chant it, you can just say it if you don't want to, for those of you who are thinking about doing this. I take refuge in Dharma. I take refuge in Sangha. I vow to do no evil. I vow to do

[83:38]

all good. I vow to save all beings. A disciple of Buddha does not kill. A disciple of Buddha does not steal. A disciple of Buddha does not lie. A disciple of Buddha does not misuse sexuality. A disciple of Buddha does not intoxicate the mind or body of self or others. A disciple of Buddha... I don't know what you want. I don't know what you want. Just keep going.

[84:38]

A disciple of Buddha is not possessive or avaricious. Is that what that means? Avaricious means possessive. Okay, I'm going to quit channeling. It's a little pressure. A disciple of Buddha does not slander. I know the last one, but I'm not sure I'm there yet. You've got three to go. Including the last one? Including the last one. Do you want any hints? You left out one of the speech ones. Oh, wrong speech. Praise self at the expense of others.

[85:42]

Protect three treasures. I'll tell you because it's nine o'clock. Thank you very much. Okay, let's do the closing chant and dedicate the merit of our time together.

[86:16]

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