Welcome, everyone. Thank you for joining us this morning. We will now chant the opening verse, which should appear on your screen now. An unsurpassed, penetrating and perfect dharma is rarely met with, even in a hundred thousand million kalpas, having it to see and listen to. To remember and accept, I vow to taste the truth of the Tathagata's words. I'm at Green Gulch Farm and we have a Dharma talk now.

[14:07]

And the speakers are two of my oldest and dearest friends. People who practiced at the very beginning of Tassajara and before. We have a limited amount of time, so I can't say too much about them. I'm sorry. But it will be a joy for me and all of us to see them and listen to them and remember what they say. When I first went to Tassajara, shortly after it opened in the summer of 1967, I drove in over the mountain road in a Volkswagen Bug. And on the way, I picked up a young hitchhiker, a man with dark hair, the long dark hair.

[15:19]

And when we got to Tassajara, I don't remember exactly how it happened, but one of the first people to greet us and talk to us was Peter Schneider. We sat down on some rocks overlooking the construction of the new Zendo. And Peter asked some good questions. He said to the young man who I brought in, he said, if you hadn't gotten a ride, would you have walked in all the way? A great Buddhist scholar once said to me, yeah, Peter Schneider, he asks questions that nobody else asks. And it's true.

[16:24]

And after my visit to Tassajara, I came back to Zen Center later that year and became a member. And then in the following spring, I moved to San Francisco. And... lived in a flat across the street from Sokoji Temple, where Zen Center was located. And one of my flatmates was Jane. She wasn't yet married to Peter. She was living not with him yet, but she was my dear flatmate. And we practiced together in San Francisco. And then she went back to Tassajara again. And I remember one time... during a break between the practice periods at Tassajara, she came back to San Francisco and she said to me, I want to go back to Tassajara where I have my little room and my desk and my sutras and I can just concentrate.

[17:33]

She loved to practice and study the Dharma and she still does. And all these years, Peter and Jane have continued to study and to practice their devotion to the Dharma and to their great teacher, Suzuki Roshi. He loved them very much. And we have the great honor of hearing them this morning. Thank you for offering your teaching to us, Jane and Peter. If you can't hear me, please let me know. I frequently get accused of too soft talking. So let me know. Today I wanted to talk about the rogue chant. Oh, first, tell me again what it is.

[18:37]

Oh, I'll commit. One second. Peter has something to say. Here I am, yeah. So first, Jane is going to talk about her talk, of course. And then we're going to have Q&A for Jane. And then after that, I will talk about Suzuki Roshi. That's my talk. I hope everybody is here and will ask questions and then we'll have Q and A for that. Jane will join that part and hopefully Red Bull and other people who have met Suzuki Roshi will be able to help us too. So Jane first. Okay. Sorry for interrupting. This is Kogetsu. We're having some comments from the chat to the volumes a little bit low from your mic again, so might need to just speak a little louder if you can. Okay. Can you hear me now? I can hear you. I'll see if anybody from the chat, there is one person.

[19:39]

Okay. Let's go from there. Okay. Today, I'd like to talk. I'm going to read part of mine and talk for part of it. So if you do have any questions before I even finish, I'm open to answering at that point if I can. So please let it be as informal as you wish it to be. I'd like to talk about the chant, the rogue chant, which has always meant a great deal to me. And the first time I heard it, I was really amazed to hear it. So it's one of those things that when you hear something very beautiful, all of your body tingles with it. And it's hard to say, it's almost like all of you is listening to it. So I think it's one of the things that all Zen students share in common. And although we have differences of words and differences of the times that we say it, for example, in some groups, they say it at the very beginning of the

[20:42]

sitting time, some in the middle and some like us at the very end. So all these things are different, but the meaning of the same rogue chant, the meaning of the rogue chant is exactly the same. It's an honoring of this practice that we all share together. So we chanted in the morning and then we put on Roxus and Ocasas, if you have them. And we I think we have a connection like a string of beads to every zendo just by this simple act of chanting a little four-line gata. We chant together and we connect through those things, through those simple things. So the first time I heard the Heart Sutra, I was in Sakoji Temple. And I had never heard it before. I was just very new to the practice. And when everyone began to chant the words, I had this curious physical reaction of the hair felt like it was standing up on the back of my neck.

[21:48]

And I tingled all over as if someone had thrown cold water on me. So that was my first experience to hear everyone standing and chanting this Heart Sutra. And all of my body felt like I was chanting it with them. So before the chanting had begun, I was standing there debating. about whether we should do all the nine bows or not and whether it was really necessary to bow to the floor and why we had to bow all the way to the floor. This was my first experience with it. And so I was debating to myself and then they started to chant. Everyone in the room was chanting and my debate stopped. I found myself listening with this pinpoint concentration from beginning to end. And all I did was marvel at how beautiful this chant was. And then the first time I heard the rogue chant, I had a similar situation. Again, it made the feeling of the hair standing up on my head as if this was a marvelous saying, a marvelous thing.

[22:54]

So I like it very much because through the chanting of it every day, we affirm our practice, not just our individual practice, but our practice together. And the words were amazing to me, and I felt as if I understood them, but if I ever tried to explain them, I couldn't begin to. I couldn't begin to put into words what the sutra or the gata meant to me. And even to this day, I still feel that I'm studying the words of both the rogue chant and the Heart Sutra because I think it's like a lifelong study that will never stop. So I'll probably continue the rest of my life. When I first wrote this, I wrote, I will probably continue this throughout my life. And then I looked at it afterwards and thought, wait a minute, I'm 84. I have to edit that a little bit for the rest of my life.

[23:58]

At the time, I was chanting this heart sutra and the rogue chant. I didn't understand that it had such power over us when we chanted. I didn't understand that just saying the words brought the sutra into life through us. And that was a complete misunderstanding, even though my body tingled with it. I knew something was happening when I was chanting. And when I pay attention to it, I still feel that wondrous feeling of, this is a marvelous chant. These are marvelous words. And yet, if I had to put them into distinct words, I would still stumble over various ones here and there. Anyway, I think that with a long time of chanting, the words actually become our flesh and blood. And we don't even notice it. We hardly notice it, but we keep on chanting.

[25:02]

And we begin to actualize the words of this chant in the smallest acts that we do, like holding our teacup or coffee cup, or smelling, just smelling the aroma of food, or just sitting outside on a bench or somewhere, walking somewhere, sweeping, talking to anybody. We start putting the words of this chant into... actuality, we begin to live it and we don't even notice it at the time. But other people notice it when they meet us, they tell us, you seem different or you feel different. And I think it's because they sense the living quality that happens with a chant, a small one of just four lines that we chant every day. We chant the words with body, speech and mind and i think our body actually understands the words better than our mind does and i think it does it just because it breathes and is present every minute and so there's no need to even think about the words because when we chant them they're already inseparable from us if we've been chanting them even for like a day they become inseparable from our lives

[26:22]

and we don't have to really ponder on the words because our body begins to study them when we begin to chant them. We distill these words into body and mind with our chanting every day, and it's actualized in our lives through the simple acts of eating, shopping, cleaning, talking, friendships, or such. I think the words of the chant are very beautiful Like musendos, we do a mixture of Japanese and English. We say, And we also say, Those are big words, and their meaning is profound, and we can't guess them with our thoughts because the thoughts can't even begin to go into the meaning of them.

[27:26]

But our body can. And the more we chant them, the more our body will bring them to the fore, the more our body will begin to live them. So whatever differences we say in this chant, the meaning comes through and it's very beautiful. People don't understand why it has that beauty, but it does. So we chant with body, speech, and mind. and we work for the benefit of all beings. That's what we chant. So we say, field far beyond form and emptiness, wearing the Tathagata's teaching, saving all beings. And we mean, this teaching of liberation is beyond any conditioned thought. And wearing this teaching in the form of a robe, a rock suit, I will learn with body, speech, and mind the meaning of Buddha's teaching, and live my life for the benefit of all beings. This robe that we've made, stitch by stitch, as we chanted, I take refuge in Buddha, or Namokie Butsu, is our practice, and it is embodied in cloth.

[28:39]

It is a small thing, either a raksu or an okesa, such as we wear, is embodied in cloth. and we hold it with respect and we wear it with devotion. Field far beyond form and emptiness or beyond conditioned thought, that is silence. Silence is beyond thought. If we're immersed in thought, thought appears to us to be existence. Experiences like aversion or desire seem to be the experience itself. But if we look at aversion and desire from the perspective of silence, we can see that the experience itself comes before the emotional connection. We can see that we are being moved by something we haven't really looked at or paid attention to.

[29:41]

So if we experience any kind of activity, and we feel aversion to it or anger at it or something, we look first very carefully and see that the action came before the arising of anger or aversion to it. So we can understand then that we've clothed the experience in an appealing or an appalling way in order that we can manage it. Once we have a label on it, then we can put it wherever we choose to put it. inside, outside, anywhere, and enclosed it in some form that makes us in charge. And to leave the experience unclothed with emotion then leaves us open to touch that experience directly without evasion or deceit.

[30:41]

And the experiences we touch directly also become our flesh and blood. So it's better not to be deceived with thinking when we become immersed in our experiences. It's better to meet them with our eyes open, always. The last line, wearing the Tathagata's teaching, saving all beings, is like saying, wearing the embodiment of Buddha's profound teaching of liberation, this robe, I pledge my life to helping others. So this pledge is to lift one's life in service to others. This doesn't mean to do special work of helping special people in special times. It means to help everyone. Those we like, those we don't like, those we think deserve our help, those we think don't deserve our help. We help everyone and we don't put up any walls that say this group is okay, this group is not okay.

[31:45]

This teaching is okay. That teaching is not okay. We open the doors, throw them wide open and say, everyone is welcome. This teaching is for everyone. This service in our hearts is for everyone. So we offer, in that case, a genuine relationship with whoever is with us, whoever we meet. whoever we talk to, even on the telephone, anywhere, whoever we meet, we offer direct relationship, honest relationship. And we offer this genuine relationship with whoever it is we meet, whether we like them or not, whether we admire them or not, whether we think they're up very high religious status up in our minds, like, you know, the Pope or whatever, we offer exactly the same to everybody. And to meet the experience of others in direct relationship is to meet them in the midst of silence of our thinking mind, rather than pouring out one condition response after another or mentally running through ideas and expectations.

[33:03]

To change the way we meet anyone can change our whole being at the same time, since without the incessant thinking mind that we have, without that thinking mind to build on when we're talking to others, we can relax instead into a quieter mind. And this leaves space open for the other to change as they wish. Everything slows down. Meeting others without getting lost in their expectations or ideas about us is like going through a forest without getting lost in the trees. We can appreciate what we meet, but we pass them by without forgetting our direction. Thank you. Do you have any questions at all? Please feel free to raise your virtual hand.

[34:11]

The function is under the reactions. button on the bottom toolbar of your Zoom window. It's the smiley face with a plus sign. And if you click on that, there's a raise hand button. You can also send me, the host, a direct chat, and I can pose the question for you. And I can also scan the video feeds to see if anybody's waving their actual hand. Well, I see three hands waving here. Yep. So I see three virtual hands at the moment. We'll start there. Looks like we have an offering from Severine. Hi, Jane. This was just wonderful. Great to see you guys. That was a wonderful talk. I have a story I just heard, which I had never heard before. Maybe some of you know it. Of course, there's the famous story where a student, I just found out it was Mel, asked Suzuki Roshi, what's the meaning of the rope chant?

[35:13]

And Kadgeri went and looked through something and Suzuki just said, love, which is so beautiful and which I've loved forever. And I think it was Hosan said, there was someone approached a Buddhist scholar about this. And he laughed and he says, you know, in Japanese, the L and the R are kind of indistinguishable. Japanese people have a lot of trouble you know, saying them clearly and that the V and the B are in a similar situation so that Mel heard Suzuki Roshi say the word love, but it's possible that Suzuki Roshi intended to say the word robe. And so I just think that's so cute. I would agree with the word love because that's definitely what it is about, you know, is profound compassion that we draw up and from the interior and let it pour out to everywhere.

[36:16]

So that's, I would totally agree with that. Yeah, absolutely. Well, if Mel, if Mel, quote unquote, misunderstood, he utterly understood, of course. He got the deeper question in. Yes, he did. But the robe is also true. The robe is the embodiment of love. Right. It's the embodiment of love and compassion, of how we touch every person, everyone, without any kind of discrimination. Yes. So either one is fine. Yeah, they are the same thing. The robe of love. The robe, love, no distinction. Yeah, exactly. Thank you. Great to see you. Good to see you. Yes. Looks like our next offering is from Carol. Hello, Carol. Jane, it's good to see you again.

[37:16]

This is a personal offering. After my, Galen helped me with my first Strakosu at Tassahara. which sadly, mysteriously vanished into the ether at one point. And you helped me with my second one. We sewed it at your lovely home near LA. And I'm very, very grateful for your help, which Reb then later wrote on. So it was wonderful that I was able to accomplish that while living in Los Angeles. And... And then again, so what you just said about either one is fine, about the robe and love. At a Zen center where I lived for a long time, the second line of the robe chant is said, a formless field of benefaction, which also has a lovely feeling to it. And to me, it is exactly the same thing as a field far beyond form and emptiness.

[38:16]

So I just wanted to thank you again. It's lovely to see you and Peter again today. Good to see you. Yes. Thank you. Our next offering is from Terry. Hello, Terry. Hi. I just I was deeply moved by what you said. I think my heart opened when you talked about your feelings. in hearing things for the first time and it was just very moving and I wanted to thank you. Oh, you're welcome. That looks like it might be it for the questions for people with their virtual hands raised. I'm gonna look through the video feeds and just see if anybody's waving or wants to raise their hand to hand. Right now, I think we can pass it over to Peter.

[39:28]

Okay. Thank you, everybody. This is a very quick, very simple pass. Oh, it doesn't look that way. You take that. Take this one for your glass. Okay. Okay. Okay. I'm going to, of course, tell you about Suzuki Roshi. I think I'll start with the story first. This is my favorite Suzuki Roshi story, but mostly I'm going to talk about his life before he came to San Francisco. But that was his jisha. Jane had been his jisha beforehand. You all know what a jisha is, mostly, I think.

[40:33]

who takes care of carrying the incense, but also being the personal attendant during the time that you're Jisha. It's a wonderful job, and it's kind of like a lifetime experience for people who are able to have that one in it with any teacher, actually, because you really feel close to the teacher. Anyways, so I was at Jisha, and at Tassahara, as many of you have been there, probably we get up early, they got up early, So I'd go over and there was a stove now in his cabin, which is now the Kaisando, but that was Sigur Roshi's cabin. And he had a stove in there and the Jishi would light the stove and make some tea and then he'd get ready and then you'd walk over to the Zendo, which is where the kitchen is now, behind the kitchen. So one day I walked in and he said, you were cold.

[41:36]

I said, yeah, I don't feel as well. He said, sit down. This is unusual for me to be sitting down. He should be sitting down. But okay, sit down. And then he put a bowl, a small bowl, on top of his stove, because the stove was kind of like, not a kerosene stove, but it was an actual wood stove. And then he brought out a bottle of sake. Now, Sugiyoshi didn't drink. He was well-known, not just because he thought it was bad for you. He didn't like it. And the Japanese people often say, well, you're either a sake person, you see a sake in American, a sake person, or you're a sweets person. And he was a sweets person. And I'll tell you a little story about that in a minute. Anyway, so he took the sake and he put it in the bowl, right? And... And then as it was heating, then he went over and he also had, for some reason, some raw eggs.

[42:39]

I was also surprised by that too. And he took out a raw egg and he broke it into the sake. And then he had a little spoon or something. He turned it around and around and around and around and around and around. And it was hot. And he said, okay, drink this. And I drank it. pretty quickly. It's about eight ounces, perhaps. And he said, okay, go back to bed. And my Jisha responsibility for the day was being in bed. And by the time night came, I was well. So that's my favorite story, at least today's favorite story. But I'm going to tell you about his life. I'll read a little bit towards the end my impression. But before that, it's going to be about his life. And I won't be seeing you up. I'll be seeing my notes. When Suzuki Roshi, when I was the Windbell editor, we were a small group back then.

[43:45]

And so I wanted to write an article about Suzuki Roshi's life before Zen Center. And so I asked him if I could do an interview. And that interview ended up taking several hours. He was not very happy with doing it, but he prepared, or mostly the preparation was by Chino, at that time, Sensei. And I sat down and I asked him questions. And so that became one of the resources for David Chadwick's, of course, wonderful Crooked Cucumber. which I went back to look at in preparation for this talk today, and it was quite wonderful, more than I remembered. It really was accurate and good. But anyway, so therefore, what I'm talking about today, part of the things you all have heard or read, if you have read Cucumber.

[44:48]

If you haven't, I certainly recommend it. It's a very nice read. And there's some sad parts in it too. But anyway, but when I sat down to talk to him and we talked, at one point he said to me, he really didn't want to do this, but I was pushy. And I was the editor, you know, and I was a reporter as it were. And he said, if... If my life is understood in this way, all will be lost. My life is understood in this way, all will be lost. So take that into consideration when you hear what I'm saying right now, because this is not Suzuki Roshi. Suzuki Roshi is what James was talking about. But anyway, I'm going to tell you his story, and particularly about with respect to when he...

[45:49]

came to the U.S. and why he came. We have a feeling of, we may not anymore, but the feeling was back when I was a student, was that it was a Buddhist country. But in fact, politically, it is stopping a Buddhist country in the 1860s or 1850s. Mostly, I guess, 1860s. The government had been forced to open up their their ports, which had been closed for 400 years, to trade, in fact, by the U.S. Navy. And they were afraid, and they noticed how many people, or they knew how many countries had been colonized by the Western countries around all of Southeast Asia, Philippines, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And so they were afraid of that.

[46:51]

So they thought the best thing to do is to make them understand us so they won't think of us as outsiders. And so therefore they noticed that they all were Christians. And at that point, other than the U.S., they mostly were kingdoms. The Japanese had been run for 400 years by by a military family, the shogun. It's called shogun to us. And they'd be modernized, but they made a much bigger deal of it, of making Shinto be similar to Christianity on the surface. It never was, but on the surface. And they put down Buddhism. And they had a government slogan to destroy Buddhism. Fifty years later, Suzuki Roshi was... was still very much 40, 50 years. He was born in 1904, influenced by this. And when he was young, the kids, he lived in a temple family.

[47:57]

His parents, his father was a priest. His mother was the wife of the temple, which is a very important task. And they were very poor because all the land... was taken away from them by the government and actually given to the Shinto. And so his poor father who was, you know, had to raise pigs to support them. And he, when he went to school, but he made him shave his head and the students would rub his hair and, you know, and they were, they would criticize Buddhism. And they also criticized his clothes. And at that point, Sugimoshi had a very strong feeling about how Buddhism wasn't appreciated. And he promised to himself, kind of, that this was going to be his life project. It wasn't quite that strong. But he had that feeling as a young man. So when he turned 13, he decided that he was going to be a monk and that his father was too easy on him.

[49:06]

He loved him too much, and he could not practice in his temple. So he asked permission and was able to go to one of his father's disciples and live in his temple. It was very, very strict. He stopped going to school. This is when he had just finished grammar school. And there were eight other students there, all of them older, but still high school students probably. And a year later, Only Suzuki Roshi was left because it was so difficult. But he said, you know, he maybe, if he hadn't have been afraid of telling his parents that he's going to stay there, he probably would have gone home, but he didn't. There are some nice stories from this time, a few only actually. One story is that one time, oh yes, so one time, you know, everything in the wintertime in the temple, It's very, very simple food. Not like, I mean, even Tasahara is quite elaborate compared to a Japanese temple.

[50:15]

Breakfast is always the same. Lunch is always the same. Dinner is, they change one dish, and then it's the same. So every meal is the same, except there's no miso soup in the morning, just two bowls. So the students were, of course, hungry. But anyway, they ate just pickles. And one time, they had a batch of daikon, you know, daikon pickles, that hadn't been salted enough, and they were rotten. But the teacher insisted that they eat the pickles. So every day, they'd have to get down these literally rotten pickles. I don't know how to do it. They're rotten, but they were spoiled. And after several days, the students got really, they just couldn't believe, really. And late at night, they waited until the teacher was asleep. They all lived in the same temple.

[51:17]

Not the same room with the teacher, but the same temple. And they went out into the garden. They took the pickles from wherever they were stored, and they buried them. And they were very pleased on themselves. My God, we got rid of those pickles. And then they went to Zaza the next morning, and then at lunch the next day when food was served, oh my goodness, there were the pickles again. The teacher had found the pickles in the garden and brought them back. And so the students, however, got up another night and they boiled the pickles. And they served those pickles the next day, that daikon, boiled daikon now. And the teacher said, wow, what have you done? How did you make the daikon this way? Of course, he knew what had happened to the pickles, but they all ate that.

[52:18]

Anyway, Sikuchi lived there until he would buddy. In Japan, much like the US actually in some cases now, you had to take an exam to go to the next level. or to see where you could go in the next level, which high school you could, middle school in his case. And he failed the exam because he wasn't studying. He actually was in middle school and he failed the exam for the high school. And so his parents got very upset and they came and brought him home so he would get educated. And when he was in high school, his favorite subject, of course, was English. Then he went to the university. He went to the Buddhist, the Soto Zen University, Komozawa University. And he also studied English there. And his English teacher, and he had a conversation teacher. Jane and I were conversation teachers in Japan, so we kind of understand about how she was.

[53:22]

She was a very unique woman. Her father was an admiral in the British Navy. She'd gotten a job as a conversation teacher in northern China. And then she lost her job. And then she got the job also, that was her high school, then she got the job teaching English to the last emperor and his wife. He actually was not interested, but his wife was. And she taught there for a couple years. And then the Japanese, and then she somehow lost the job. And through the person that had gotten her job was the Japanese ambassador to China. She got to come to, she moved to Tokyo and became the tutor for the emperor and empress of China, of Japan, and also for several universities.

[54:26]

And one was Tsukiroshi was in. And he was in her class. Once a week only, I put class in Japanese universities. And one day, he happened to realize that he was near where she lived. It was very hot. And he'd heard that when you went there, she would serve you a cold watermelon. And once he got in the door, And he sat down and he did get a watermelon. And she asked him to become her third houseboy. She had students who shopped for her. So he did that. And they became close friends. And the other two boys disappeared. They're 18, 19. Suki, of course, got to the university when he was started because of his late high school entrance. He got there... he was 22 or 21 i think university was five years back then and he and so therefore he moved in with mrs ransom miss ransom not mrs at all i'll think uh miss ransom she's very difficult lady uh but he got along with her uh and uh but she had and there are more stories there but i'm gonna probably not tell those right now but they're in the book these stories are in the book

[55:50]

She told these stories at various times during lectures, too. But the most important story is she had a Buddha, probably a Buddha about maybe a little taller than a foot, but it was given to her by the Empress of China. And she put it in the tokonomo, in the main guest room. For a Japanese house, there's a little alcove where they put scrolls, things like that. But she put the Buddha in one part of the alcove, and then she put her shoes in the other. Now, of course, in Japan, you put your shoes before you literally step it up into the house. But she didn't do that. She put her shoes next to the Buddha. Suki Roshi was quite distressed by that, but he didn't say anything. But one day... when he was having tea with her during the afternoon, he took his tea cup and he put it in front of the Buddha.

[56:52]

And she didn't say anything. But when guests would come, and he kept doing it day after day, he'd put tea in front of the Buddha. And guests would come, and the guests would sometimes put matches in the hands of the Buddha, sometimes even ashes from their cigarettes. But he kept... cleaning it and putting tea out every morning. And he called this, it was the start of a cold war with Mrs. Ransom. And it went on for a bit and a while, for several weeks, certainly. And finally, one day, she said to him, why do you believe in that stuff? Why do you put tea there? What is that? That's kind of a, what's, what is that? That's adultery. I mean, I mean, not adultery, believing in idols, idolatry. And he had prepared. He'd made a speech.

[57:56]

And the speech was about the three bodies of Buddha. And he'd had his teachers help him write the English for it. And he gave her the speech. And she was amazed. And she said, I had no idea. And from that time, one day he noticed rather quickly, her shoes were gone. And time went past, and she started doing zazen with him. And then they went out, and they bought tea, not tea, they bought, pardon me, an incense bowl, And they bought incense. And then fun. And then she began to study. He was in a Buddhist university. And they had many teachers who could speak English also. Professors. And she learned about Buddhism from them as well. As well as from Suzuki Roshi.

[58:59]

So in the end, she... She... She became his student. And she would go to his home temple, Rinzoin, in the summer times. They even bought a chair for her that was just for her there. And then afterwards, he went to Ahayji, which is the main temple for his temple, for studying... for practicing just as a monk. And she came for one month for the summer. And lived in her own room. And I think, perhaps, most likely, this is, of course, back in the early 30s, late 20s, that she may have been the first foreigner ever to study at Eheji. But then, and they would send letters back and forth, but then,

[60:07]

she went back to China and then she lived there again in the same situation. But then, of course, then Japan formally attacked and took over the area and she had to leave and go back home. But Sikiroshi later said that at that time, it was there that he decided that foreigners, it would be good to teach English, good to teach Buddhism and Zazen to other people. And so when he graduated from a Heiji, he went to his teacher and said, can I go to another place and teach? Can I go to Hokkaido, which was a new land opening up the Northern Islands in Japan or the U.S. and teach Buddhism? And the teacher said, no. because he didn't want to go, but he said, you cannot go until you completely rebuild this temple.

[61:12]

And that took another 20 years. But anyway, so there, but then when he went back from his training, he was now in his late 20s, early, late 20s, his teacher died. And then there was a kind of struggle that went on. He didn't want to take over that temple, the main temple, as it were. It had a zendo in it. It had been for teaching students. But he didn't want to do that. He wanted to keep continuing to study. But he worked out that the people who wanted to take over at that temple were doing it for ambition, not to really be Buddhist priests. And so he stayed there. He didn't leave. And although 80 of his members left, and they used that as a reason to try to get him to leave, finally he said, give me three years.

[62:17]

If the members don't come back, I will resign. But of course, they all came back. But at that period of time, his teacher had died. He had gotten married. There's another story there. Not to the wife that people who know who were in San Francisco with us, Oksan. That was his third wife. But anyway, let me go back to my notes here quickly. I haven't looked at them at all. So anyway, this was in the 30s. And during that time, much like, in a sense, although this is not a very fair analogy, but anyway, nationalism, to the experience we've had in the past four or five years, nationalism became very, very important in Japan. And the Japanese had a false sense, he said, a false sense of security.

[63:21]

And And so he began, he opened up a club called the High Mountain Grass Ceremony, the High Grass Mountain Group for high school students and young people. They'd have guest speakers come and just talk about what was wrong with nationalism, with that way of thinking. Suzuki Roshi didn't say he was against war. But he didn't say he was against war. He said that he was against the thinking. Of course, in Buddhism, what is the source of all problems? It's thinking. And therefore, you know, when we do Zazen, we are either thinking unintentionally, or we are not thinking. We've studied those two states when we do Zazen. And so therefore, he was quite interested in

[64:24]

talking about thinking so that the people around him, the students he know, the people who are in, you know, would not be influenced by this bad way of thinking. And this became rather popular, his groups. Later on after the war, some of the people who had been in the groups were in place in a way, but not without being planned that way, to help out with, Japan change over to the post-war age. But anyway, so he went on like this. Other people didn't do that kind of thing. Most people always just supported that, the way the country was going. Finally, the army took over, and then he no longer, he kept his group going, but it no longer had any real say. At one time, uh he uh now he said david said in his book it was the sodo shoe in his paper he said to me he said to in the the interview he said the government but one of the two they they they appointed him to be the head of the country uh maybe with the soda shoe the question that's what he's what david said it was um to um

[65:50]

to lead a national group. And so he said yes, and he resigned the next day. This is a very Japanese way of doing things. There's a famous teacher that many of you know the name of, who is Ikkyu. And Ikkyu was very well known as a teacher. I don't know what his generation was, but in feudal Japan. He belonged to Daikokuji, which is one of the three, five big Rinzai temples in and around Kyoto. Not five or not, but anyway. Four or five anyway. And so he was so famous, they made him the abbot of the temple. And he accepted it.

[66:51]

And then he resigned the next day. So that's how things were done in Japan. So, however, during the war, it turns out that this is now 1945. Bombing had, this was in the summer, late spring of 1945, May. The bombing had taken over Japan completely. There were airplanes in the air. being raided. But in the era when Japan was controlling Manchuria, many farming families had left where Suzuki Roshi lived. And Shizuoka was the prefecture, but Yaizu was the name of the city. And they were stranded there. And there was no teacher for them. And they couldn't find anybody to go.

[67:53]

And Suzuki Roshi, with the help of one of his lay people who was involved in the government there, volunteered to go. And so they went across Japan over to cross. They had to go to Korea. It's not very far, apparently. It's an eight-hour ride, I think, on a ferry. But they had to wait one week because the bombing was taking place every day and the boat couldn't leave. But one day it stopped. Maybe it was Sunday or something. Anyway, and he'd get in the boat and go to Korea. And he went through what we call now south of North Korea up to Manchuria. And he went to all the various families who were Japanese families who had settled in land that hadn't been used by the Chinese, actually. and were farmers, but they hadn't had any services for their dead.

[68:53]

And so he went around house to house, farm to farm, doing this for several weeks. And then, I just read this this morning, by the way, I hadn't missed it before. He went to the main capital, which is uh which is now called well in english called harbin is now china and he went to harbin and he said he wanted to set up a a um a a a temple a sub-temple of rinzowin in manchuria And so he went north on a railway, looked at a lot of land, and about 80 miles from Harwin, they picked out a piece of land to build a temple on. And then they went back to the main city. But by that time, it was one month later, so it was July 14th, and history had changed.

[70:05]

And so everything was being bombed. And two of the three boats that went from Korea to Japan had been destroyed. Just one was left at that point. And then that one also got destroyed. So there was no way to leave. You couldn't get back home. But Suzuki Roshi said, well, Sell me a ticket anyway. And so then he actually was traveling with the son of the man who would take them over there. And he had to leave back to Japan early by airplane, of all things. Apparently a smoking airplane. And so they just took the train south. And every time they went, they got back into Korea. They stopped here and there. And they kept going. They get off the train. They go to see if there's any boat.

[71:06]

There was no boat. They go to the next place that might have a boat. They kept doing this for at least a week. The time is not clear. And then one day they were on the train and they were headed for the far south is where people, where they come into the second major city in South Korea. And then the conductor said, all people who are going to Japan, get off here. So they got off the boat, after the train, they walked down to the harbor, and there was no boat there. But they waited a day, and they waited another day, and suddenly a big troop ship came in. And it was escorted by two cruisers. And it was there to pick up Japanese wounded and soldiers to bring home. So Suzuki Roshi somehow got to talk to the captain, and he let them come on also.

[72:11]

And so they just, without being bombed, they got back to a small port. They had to leave the boat. There was no dock, but they were able to harbor, and they were able to get over and get on the train. And the train from there to Yaizu, which is where he was from, Shizuoka, was actually attacked three times but they made it and they were home and then a week later the war ended. And after the war, I think I forgot to tell you that when Suzuki Roshi graduated he got a certificate that said he was qualified to teach high school students, high school, in this case, wasn't co-ed, of course, and to teach high school boys English, which he had never used. But he had this piece of paper, and they were, and so the, and the Japanese were, they were, they were all extremely worried that they were going to be, I mean, he said when he, Sikiroshi, when he heard about the atomic bomb,

[73:26]

Most of the people weren't worried about it at all. They couldn't believe it. But then they said to themselves, well, if you're going to die, that's a good way to go, I think. That's what he said later. But anyway, all the priests, most of the priests were neutral, but many of them had joined the war. And all the ones who were neutral therefore barred from holding any public office. And that includes Suzuki Roshi. Of course, he had had his group and he had gone to Manchuria. And so they were going to take away his ability to teach English. And he went down to the office and brought along all of his papers, of his talks that he'd given to his group. And he explained what he'd been talking about.

[74:31]

And they let him keep it. Of course, he never did that. But he kept that. And then his life, of course, this is now after the war. I'll let you know the sad parts by reading the book yourself or talking to somebody else. But he had kept working on the temple. And it was a temple that was, the main building was 300 years old. And so he studied all the architecture from 300 years ago to make certain that they didn't change it for modern. Everybody wanted to be modern, but he wanted to get the exact same main building. So finally, the building was finished. And in that exact year, he completed his obligation. And so, one of his friends, who was Niwa Roshi, who came to his funeral ceremony, actually, from Japan, and who later became the abbot of Eheiji, was in charge of

[75:49]

international affairs for Soto Zen back in 1958. And he was, they were talking and socializing because they were, they were, they were close friends. And he said, and he'd already asked what he wants to do. And he said, no. And he asked, he just, and Suki Roshi said, okay, I'm ready to go. And that is how Suki Roshi came to go to the U.S. Now I'm going to tell you about my, and so other people you can, they can ask about, particularly Reb is there now, of course, and Steve and Linda, and I guess there are some other people too. So Tsukiroshi said, two different quotes, because he really disliked the politics Japanese temples. And he said, if I had known about, when he's in the US, he said, if I had known about life here, I would have said sayonara much sooner.

[77:01]

He was also famous, by the way, that you may be hard to believe, having a bad temper and being forgetful, two things. Jane was involved in his being forgetful one time. She may or may not tell the story when we have the Q&A. But he said, I may be, quote now, quote, I may be patient with American people even before I came here. Recently, I always think very much that way. It may have something to do with past lives. Anyway, now I'm going to read something. I wrote something about my understanding of Suzuki Roshi, which I hadn't thought about until I sat down to do this. So I'm going to read this, though. This will take another five minutes, probably. Many times over the years that I have been asked what Suzuki Roshi was like,

[78:07]

I have struggled with knowing how to answer that question. There was nothing notable about him in the ordinary sense. He was, of course, quite short, maybe 4'11". My mother once referred to him as that nice little man, of all things. My fallback position was to say, when people asked him, I'd be in a group, my fallback was to say that I felt more natural with him than I ever had with anyone else. To me, he wasn't what you would call charismatic. I can't answer for Jane here. Was he charismatic? I think he was. Well, there you go. You couldn't hear her, but she just said, I think he was. But for me, he wasn't. Much, much later, I heard that ordinariness is a characteristic of a mature priest. The first Dharma talk, as I told you, that he gave was about the Buddha, about the Dharmakaya, their Sammugakaya, and their Nimanakaya.

[79:16]

Dharmakaya, roughly translated right now, both Dharmakaya. Kaya means body. A lot of you know this. So Dharmakaya is the body of truth, or the body of Dharma, or the body of the universe, actually. Samogakaya is sometimes called the enjoyment body. It's kind of a strange title, but it's called that. But anyway, it's the person who has practiced a long time. And anyway, and the namanakaya means that, well, the ordinary human body. Many years back, I thought I understood what they referred to. But I was puzzled by the order. I assume that the nirmanakaya should come first, since it was the form body. And that the dharmakaya should be last, as that was the enlightenment body.

[80:20]

But of course, the order that it's given in, nirmanakaya, samugakaya, dharmakaya, is correct. If I use the images of Donshan, or Tozan's five ranks, Many of you know that, who is, of course, the author of the Song of the Jeweled Mirror Samadhi. Using the explanation of Ross, I looked this up this morning, of Ross Ballantur, an Aiken Roshi member from Australia. He wrote about the five ranks. And he said the Dharmakaya represents arriving within the essential. That is, emptiness is emptiness. Samogakaya, which is approaching from the contingent, which is form. Form is form. And the nirmanakaya, which is arriving at concurrence, which is, of course, form is emptiness, but actually beyond form and emptiness.

[81:27]

Or which is actually the body beyond such differentiations as... Form is formed. Emptiness is emptiness. Emptiness is formed. So anyway, it is common to refer to someone who has a spiritual feeling as charismatic. I told you, but I actually didn't, but I recently learned that actually charismatic is in a book, Soto Zen teacher's book, a Japanese man, translation, that It is that actually being charismatic is the representative of someone who has not yet ripened in the practice. It reminds me of the difference between two Tendai priests who Jane and I were friends with in Japan. We introduced Reb to them way back when. They were Kaiho-gyo, which translates as mountain peaks,

[82:32]

practice, uh, Mountain Peaks, uh, [...] Dharma practice. I'm not, pardon me, not correct, not correct. Um, it's, uh, it's walking Mountain Peaks practice. Uh, there's a book about them, uh, in English, uh, by Stevens, it's called, he, he called them mountain warriors. Okay. Well, while both had big temples on Mount Hiei, where Jane and I lived near, on, the bottom of, It was the younger one who was quite, to me anyway, quite charismatic in appearance, who was the disciple. While it was the older one, who outside of ceremonies always wore blue jeans with a denim shirt, and who looked and acted quite ordinary, who was the teacher. Thinking about it now, the younger one seemed to act realized when the older one did not. Rather, he seemed, if anything, to have killed the Buddha.

[83:36]

The younger one lived on top of the mountain that they walked on and did their practice on every day and walked everywhere, while the other lived down on the edge of Kyoto, on the edge of the mountain in Kyoto, the edge of Kyoto, and had a big car. I felt a little ill at ease with the younger one, but not with the older one. Putting it another way, the younger one seemed to have gone beyond form, while the older had gone beyond form and emptiness. I think now that why Suzuki Roshi felt so ordinary is that that was who he was. There was indeed nothing special about him, no smell of enlightenment. When he did zazen, he merely felt peaceful, he said. It wasn't that he had nothing left to attain, but that attainment wasn't the question. Suzuki Roshi was a complete person. Okay, thank you.

[84:42]

Now, there's going to be a Q&A, but I want this to be a little, not quite exactly Q&A, although it can be that. I'm going to change my screen, get back to you, and look at some of your pictures here. I'm going to put it in the gallery. You're going to go to the gallery. There's going to be a lot of you. I only see only about less than half of you. Because I'd like to have questions, of course. But I'd also like to have people who have Suzuki Woshi stories, like, for example, Mel here, at least Mel. But there are others here I'm hoping to, to tell their stories. Jane may tell one, too. Jane will not tell what she just said, but I'll have to tell her story then about his story. No, you won't. You changed the story. Okay, anyway, let me see. Oh, well, I didn't tell the story at all. Anyway, I've just changed to go forward to the other pictures, but mostly I can see faces on this picture.

[85:43]

Okay, so any questions, please? Here's Jane. She knows these stories about Tsukoshi completely. Please feel free to raise your virtual hand if you'd like to offer something. I'm also looking at video feeds to see if anybody has their hand up. Oh, Jeff's there. Jeff can tell us something about Sugimoshi. Hi, Jeff. And Susan also, maybe. Which Jeff would that be? Oh, Jeff Sherman. Okay. But he didn't have his hand up yet. But anyway, he's created a story. Yeah. So I just can say, and someone else had said it before me, that he was a sweet man.

[86:53]

We just all just wanted to be around him. When we were there for practice period at Tassajara and we knew he was coming, it was just kind of like Jane was talking about, the hairs on the back of your neck. It was just pretty exciting to be expecting him. uh so you know i i don't know you know i don't know if he really is you know i don't know for sure i can't remember if what i'm what i might say is i actually heard him say it or i heard somebody else say shizuki roshi always says or somebody wrote about it but um the one thing i i carry with me Well, a lot of things I carry, but one thing he said, you know, we're just here practicing together.

[87:59]

It's not, you know, he's a teacher or whatever. We're practicing together. Another thing I think he said. And I did stub my toe once at Ed Brown's wedding there. But he said, if you stub your toe, that's enough suffering. So I don't know what to say. Again, he was just nice to be around. And I don't think I was as intimate with him as as you two certainly were, and as a lot of other people were. But I was just around him. So lots of memories. Yeah, thank you, Jeff. Thank you. Anybody else has their hand up?

[89:09]

Let's go over and see who else is. She's looking for us. Oh, I just want to see who else is. Oh, here, we just, we always use the name. I'm going to go. I'm going to change our page. There's an arrow. We could just look. Yeah, we'll look. But mostly they're just on telephones. Oh, yeah. You can't see? Let me see. Looks like an offering from Sam. Sam? Hey, I wonder if Suzuki Roshi or anyone knows much information about him and his time at age or. Any thing he may have said about his experience. At age, I know there's a lot of stories and a lot of experiences. In general, maybe sure. Sam, I get kind of gloss over that. There are a couple of stories that they're in David's book also, but I think I heard the stories also when David heard them.

[90:19]

You know, his teacher that he went to join when he was 13 and who died when he was 29 or 30 really didn't teach much. He'd become a priest at 30, but mostly was not an intellectual priest. He was a practice priest, and a, you know, and a local priest. And but there was a but there was a famous scholar that lived in the same area as Suzuki Roshi, who had been a disciple of the most the man who, who reintroduced Dogen to, to the modern as it were modern world back in 19th century, early 20th century. who is in a book with Suzuki Roshi that Mel worked on. His name was Nishi, well, putting it in Japanese style, Nishiari, last name first, Nishiari Bokusan.

[91:26]

And he was Nishiari Bokusan's student. And he was a scholar and he loved books. And he was Suzuki Moshi's teacher after his teacher died. And he actually lived only two miles away from him in his home temple. But when he went to Eiheiji, he became his assistant. He became his Jisha. So he would tell these two stories. One time, he was Jisha. And when you know that Japan have, you know, sliding doors, Shoji they're called. And when you open the door to a room, you open the door in front, I guess, in front. Now, I can't remember which is which, but I'll tell a story. It doesn't really matter to us, actually. So let's say one side. He opened one side, and the teacher said to him, no, no, no.

[92:32]

You always open it on the other side. And then another day, he was bringing tea back. He was also going in to bring something. And he opened the door he was supposed to open. And the teacher said, no, no, no, don't open that door. And he couldn't understand what it was about. And he puzzled about it later. He was scolded in both cases by this, by the teacher, Kichi Zelleroshi, his name was, who was the abbot of, I guess was the abbot of A.H.G. at that time. And later, and then he realized later, oh, he had opened the door the second time where the guest was. And another time, when he first started serving Kichizawa Roshi, Japanese filled a teacup two thirds of the way up often.

[93:47]

And he said, no, no, no, no, more, more. And he said, no, no, it's not right. More, more. So he filled it. He liked to have his green tea very strong and filled to the top of the cup. So some guests came. He had, by this point, I'm making this up right here, but let's say he knew how to open the door for the shoji. He came in and he bought the tea and he served the guests tea in full cups. He said, no, no, no. You can't serve guests that way. And so from this, Suzuki Roshi learned that there's no rules. There's circumstances. This is a very, very important teaching. There's no rules. There's only circumstances. So anyway, that's one story, the two different separate stories that Tsukiroshi liked to tell.

[94:50]

He liked being there very much. And his teacher came up to see him at Aheji, and he told him how much he liked it. And the teacher heard the story, said, I guess it's time for you to come home. That was the end of that. So he left Ahiji. But he said, you know, when later when people would go back to Ahiji, and they'd go in, they were older priests now, and it was a training practice. You know, it held several hundred monks, I guess. And when you went back to it, He said, your eyes would fill full of tears at the feeling of A.H.G. But when you're there, there's no feeling at all. That's where you are. And that's how Tassajara was for us too. Admires don't feel with tears when I go down, go into the gate of Tassajara, I'm afraid, but that's a significant story, not mine, actually.

[95:59]

Yes, Yasser. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Your hand is up. Yes, sir. There you go. Yes. Sorry. Sure. One second. Hi. Hi. My question was about Suzuki Roshi's relationship with Shinto. I know there was mention of how he was bullied for being Buddhist, and I'm curious about what his relationship in general was with Shinto. Okay. You know, it's a little... Well, I have to tell you a little bit of background. When it was during the... There was an emperor in Japan. Then the military, the shogun, took over. And... Because there were temples were growing all over Japan, and so they used the temples as partially part of the government.

[97:09]

But anyway, the Shinto shrines were all, pretty much all, put into the temple property. So Shinto was a part of Buddhism for quite a while, but not really. Shinto, you know, married people. Buddhism buried people. from the ordinary point of view. So, I mean, people could not, did not get married as Buddhists generally, which is not particularly heard of because Shinto married you. But anyway, I don't think Suzuki Roshi, so therefore, when I heard the story of where we lived, and you know, this is the Tendai Monastery was on the mountain above our house, and far above our house, but you know, our way by walking. And they told the story that when they gave the land, Shinto land, back to the Shinto people, that there's a famous story about the man who was in charge of the temple in this town where he lived, but it was still a main shrine, going up and demanding the key from the abbot of Tendai.

[98:31]

They became quite opposite. But I don't think that Sugimoshi really had much feeling for Shinto. But I never heard him talk about it. So even though they were connected, they kind of were in there. And I don't think they actually did Shinto ceremonies. I've never heard him, you know. Other parts of Buddhism were a little closer to Shinto. But... So I don't... Anybody else hear anything? Reb, what do you think about that? I also never heard Zikirashi talk about Shinto. And there is a Shinto shrine at Rinsoen, but I never saw anybody doing any ceremonies at the shrine. So I never heard him say anything bad. or critical of Shinto, or talk about it at all.

[99:32]

Yeah, that's my experience. Thank you. Yes, Miriam? Can you hear me? Yes. Thank you. My question is kind of, A little different because I have also been in another tradition where the teacher died and I came in into that tradition after his death. And so listening to all the stories about Suzuki Roshi and his wisdom and everything, did the Zen center go through where you lost a teacher? And this kind of what to do next, I mean, I think it's really difficult to lose a teacher and then also have new students come in.

[100:38]

I don't know if that makes sense, but I was just curious, how did that all get reconciled? Does it ever get reconciled? Because today I hear we always go back to our root teacher, Suzuki Roshi this, Suzuki Roshi that. And for people who never met Suzuki Roshi, how does that get all transmitted? Because you have not just in the head, you have it in the body and the emotion. And it's very special place. So I hope it makes sense. I'm curious. Well, of course, there are only I don't know how many people left who knew Suzuki Roshi, but certainly less than 100, probably. at least who are in contact, probably even less than that. But anyway, San Francisco Zen Center had its own history. And Suzuki Roshi appointed one person to be his Dharma heir. And just by chance, because of his sudden death, not sudden death, but people thought he lived to be much older.

[101:45]

He died when he was 67. And so that was very young. And so he hadn't planned for that to happen. But one person had become his successor. And he told the board, this is the person that's going to be my successor. Rem was in the board, I think. Jane was in the board. I was in the board back then. And we kind of fought it a little bit. But not very long, because what she said happened. But then Jane and I were there for a year, working with Zen Center. And then we were sent to Zen Center on a scholarship. for six months, but we jumped ship to Japan. And so we only know the history, of course, but it was very different. But Zen Center did have that same problem when that abbot had a lot of trouble and the abbot had to resign or resigned. And then for a short time, they were semi-rutterless.

[102:50]

Reb was... very important within that transition, because within a year after that, Reb became the abbot. So, but during that time, because there was the former abbot who had been appointed, Richard Baker, his name was, was a strong leader, but the seams showed. And then they became a parent. And so there was a split. And it was very, apparently we were not there, of course, so it was easy for us, but it was very, very hard for a lot of people. Because he'd been their teacher for 12, 13 years, and they believed in him, and they lost their belief. And so they suffered that, yeah. But they recovered, and And Rev was part of that.

[103:52]

And also Mel was, and many, many other people. Blanche, you know, many, many more. But it was hard for them. But let me go back to the main thing is, I don't think that people necessarily think that much about Suzuki Roshi. They think about their current teacher right now. Yeah. So it's not like, you know, if Jane would talk, speak up right now. I don't think she will, but I'll speak up for her right now. I will. Don't speak up for me. Then speak up for yourself. I will speak up for me. What I want her to speak up for is she doesn't like deification of Suki Roshi. I don't. I don't think. I mean, it goes against what we were talking about earlier about nothing special. about a really good teacher is they're just very ordinary. And that ordinariness is the extraordinary quality because it's very hard not to try to be special in even the tiniest things. So I think finally, when your teacher dies in a group, it's a great loss, you know.

[105:00]

But I remember a picture of Shakyamuni Buddha's death when they had many of his disciples were in agony. And many of them, they were all surrounding the body. And some of them were in agony, and some of them were in joyful looks, had the opposite expression. And the feeling was that for some, it was a loss, and for others, he didn't ever die. He was still present. And so we forget that this lineage that we belong to is a living lineage. It's not something of names only, and it's not something of papers only. Because those are only very light descriptions of what is like an underground powerful stream or river flowing with this understanding that we learn in Buddhism and we pass person to person. And so it doesn't matter if a person appears to be dead or alive. It matters, as Peter said, that you are studying with your individual teacher, and you're giving great faith in that situation, and you are waiting to connect in a way that keeps that river flowing and does not stop the passage of ancestors and all the way down from Shakyamuni Buddha to us.

[106:21]

And we are all an example of this flowing river, and that's what we can never forget. even with loss of an individual person, which is more personal loss than it is a teaching loss. That's what I think. Good. All right, so that looks like all the hands that are up right now. Should we offer the closing chance? Yes, let me just say, oh, well, I probably should, but let me just say, you know, we're in Los Angeles. We're the... We're the Southern California outpost for San Francisco Center. At this point, anyway, that may change, but that's where we are. We're just a small in-house. Anyway, once COVID is over, if you're in L.A., come and join us. Come see us. We're very easy to get to. We're right off the 405 going south in the San Fernando Valley.

[107:22]

And after a year of nobody at all, it'd be wonderful to see people. I also wanted to say that Jeff said when he was at Tazahar, he felt like he was just around Suzuki Roshi. And that was really nice for him. Right, Jeff? Yeah. And when he said that, I thought, that, you know, Jeff built a stone wall at Tassahara around Suzuki Roshi's memorial site. So there's Suzuki Roshi's memorial stone and memorial tablet, and then around it is a stone retaining wall, which Jeff built. Very fast, by the way. So Jeff, you're still around Suzuki Roshi.

[108:23]

Thank you so much. I always think of you when I'm there. When I look at the wall, I always think of you and all of us being around Suzuki Roshi. And yeah, it's wonderful to all be around the teacher, the ordinary teacher. Now I got my mute back. And you and Mel brought the big stone up. And Dan Welch. And Dan Welch. Okay. Thank you. One time, Suzuki Roshi was with Dan on the side creek at Tassajara. And he pointed out to Dan some really big river rocks in that stream. And he said, that rock would make a good memorial stone for somebody.

[109:25]

I didn't know that's the right word. And then later, we pulled that rock out of the stream and dragged it from the stream over to the mountain and dragged it up the mountain and put it in place. And then you built a beautiful wall around it. Thank you. Thank you, Peter and Jane. Thank you for inviting us. Yes. All right, everyone. Let us chant the closing verse together. May our intention equally extend to every being and place with the true merit of Buddha's way. Beings are numberless.

[110:31]

I vow to save them. Delusions are inexhaustible. I vow to let them. The gates are boundless. I vow to enter them. Well, I want to thank everyone for joining us today. We are having our spring fundraising campaign and it's known as the Zenathon. I'll be posting a link in the chat to the Zenathon website. I encourage everyone to visit the website to read stories from your friends, teachers, and fellow practitioners about the heartbeat of their practice and contribute to the Zenathon on their page. You can also make your own page and become a fundraiser. Your generous support allows San Francisco Zen Center to keep on providing opportunities to practice together and share transformational teachings with thousands of people worldwide through our online programming and residential training.

[111:46]

And the link will appear now. I'm also going to let everyone unmute. So if you'd like to say goodbye, you may do so now. Bye. Bye. Thank you so much. Thank you for coming. Thank you for having us. Thank you so much. Maria, hi. Thank you, guys. It was wonderful. Thank you, Peter. Thank you, Jane. Really wonderful. Thank you. We really enjoyed being here. Great. Bye-bye. Going down, going down.

[112:49]

Bye, thank you. Bye-bye. Thank you, Paul. Marked early. Yeah, mark us or mark, yeah. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you, Chris. Bye-bye. Thank you from Venice Beach. Oh, you're in Venice, huh? That's so close. We'll just see us sometime. Okay. We also have our own schedule. You probably know, actually. But anyway, we have once a month on Zoom. So if you want to join them, of course, come anytime. You look on our website and you'll find the link.

[113:49]

So there's one next Saturday, actually. It's six days. Anyway, if you'd like to do those things. Nice to meet you. Bye-bye. Bye.

[114:03]

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