Good evening. Last time we'll meet here to talk about the Sandokai. And we're closing in on the finish. We're at the end, pretty much. And I wanted to go back to the beginning before doing the ending. You know, Buddhism is often called the Middle Way. Have you ever heard of that? Buddha's in the Middle Way. So, between the extremes. So sometimes they say the Middle Way is, like, one explanation of the Middle Way is that the Buddha at first

[01:14]

was a prince living in glorious wealth and pleasure, and then he became an ascetic living on one rice grain a day. And finally he realized that the Middle Way was the best way, which was in between those extremes. So the Buddha's path wasn't an ascetic path, it was a path of awareness and enjoyment of his life without falling into the extremes of hedonism and excessive wealth or asceticism. So that's one way that they talk about the Middle Way of the Buddha. But also, philosophically, the Middle Way is a middle way between, you know, form and emptiness, or on the other extreme, being stuck in the world of form. So it's a dialectic, a middle way between form and emptiness. Or you could say, in a

[02:18]

way, that it's a middle way between, you could say, the path of religion, an otherworldly religious path, on the one hand, one extreme, and on the other extreme, a worldly path, a path of being involved in attachment to the everyday world. So the path of Buddhism, sometimes in the early days they used to debate whether or not Buddhism was a religion, in a way, because it didn't have a lot of the marks of religion. It didn't have a supreme being, and it didn't have a fixed doctrine, and so forth. So there was, I remember reading about how the first Zen person that ever came to the West, at the end of the 19th century, came to the Parliament of World Religions, and the Parliament of World Religions debated whether or not to include Asians, Buddhists, because they weren't sure. They actually

[03:21]

didn't know whether it made sense to consider Buddhism as a religion for these reasons. But eventually they did include Buddhism, and then, of course, expanded the notion of what religion is. But this is one reason why they wondered about it. So anyway, I'm bringing all this up because the Sandokai is another, in a way, it's another text. We're using different terminology about the middle way. You know, the Sandokai is about the middle way between differentiation and oneness, or form and emptiness, or these extremes. So it's a poem about the delicately balanced view, or non-view, of how to live the middle way, or how to understand the middle way of the Buddha. So that's a kind of, I'm just going back to the beginning and sort of saying over again, in a slightly different way,

[04:25]

what is the thrust or the main point of the Sandokai. So most of the poem that we've read so far discusses this philosophy of the middle way, and talks about the oneness or the non-difference of these two extremes. The trouble is, we fall into extremes when we think that these two extremes are different. So if we fall into the world of emptiness, it's because we really feel that the world of emptiness is different from the world of form. If we become religious fanatics, it's because we feel like the world of religion is really different from the worldly life. So we define them as sharply different, and that's how we get stuck in extremes. Or we say, the world of religion is different from the worldly life, and I'm not interested in religion, so I'm going to plunge myself into the world, and then I get all mixed up. So when we see that these two extremes are, in reality, non-different

[05:31]

from each other, only different views of the same reality, and when we really understand that point, then we don't fall into the extremes. Then we're in the middle way. And so most of the poem, up to now, was a philosophical statement of this truth, and saying, these two extremes are not two different things, they're one, and yet each one has to have its own space in the appropriate situation, in the appropriate time. Sometimes we come from the side of darkness, sometimes we come from the side of light, and when it's time for darkness, it's time for darkness. When it's time for light, it's time for light. Even though we see that in the light there's darkness, and in the darkness there's light, we know that, but when it's time for one, we pick up one. So there are times when, like if I go and do a funeral, then I act like it's a funeral, and like I'm a Buddhist priest

[06:32]

doing a funeral. If I'm at the Little League game, then I don't act the same way I act in the funeral service, right? I mean, that's another thing. Forget about the funeral, that was then, this is now. Even though I know that in the Little League game, which I don't go to Little League games so much, but there was a time when I was a frequent attender of Little League games, then I know that death is present in the Little League game, and in the funeral I know that Little League is there, even though at that time I didn't speak about it much, you know, or refer to it. So this is mostly what the poem was talking about earlier, and now at the end here, you know, we're kind of closing in on it, at the end there's a big emphasis now on just experience this. Just stand on your own two feet and really experience this without prejudice. Experience your life and everything that happens to you, really and truly, without prejudice, without preconceptions,

[07:33]

just directly experience your life. And that's the way to live the Sandokai. That's what all of this nice philosophy that we've been discussing earlier in the poem, and it's been, you know, spoken of earlier in the poem, really is brought home in the radically unprejudiced experience of your own life. So last time we talked about the lines, hearing words you should understand their essence, don't establish your own rules. And I read you a passage from Shengyen, where he says, you know, remember he said, he quoted the Buddha in some sutra, some Mahayana sutra, saying, forty-nine years I preached the Dharma and I never said a single

[08:34]

word, remember that? By which he means, don't set up some teaching outside your own experience, confirm and verify it for yourself. When you hear teachings, and then we talked about these same lines in terms of rules, rules of a temple or ways of doing things, when you see these rules, hear these teachings, make these discriminations, make these discriminations, follow the rules, hear the teachings and understand them, but don't lose sight of the essence, the underlying essence of what these things are, don't get tangled up in the teachings or the rules or whatever. So that's the, what we talked about in terms of those lines. Then I quoted for you Suzuki Roshi when he says, rules are not the point, so by observing rules you will understand what is the real point. From the beginning, this point is missing in all of us. Most of the people start to study Zen to know what Zen is. This is already wrong. It means they

[09:38]

are always trying to provide some understanding or rules for themselves. Then he said the part about the fish, remember that? This is my hope, is that the one thing that you remember in this entire six weeks is about the fish. That's Suzuki Roshi's line about the fish. The way you study Zen should be like a fish picks up food. They do not try to catch anything. This means, they do not try to catch anything means they don't stick to rules, they don't have any understanding, any approach. There's no approach, no preconceptions. They just are ready and they just open their mouth and whatever comes along, you know, if it's something good, terrific. If not, they just keep staying there until whatever comes along, comes along. That's how to practice Zen, he's saying. And that's what he, that's his interpretation of, you know, understanding the words, hearing the words you should understand the essence, don't make up standards on your own. So, that's as far as we got, right?

[10:43]

I think, yeah. I have a thought about that. Uh-huh. The fish seem to pick the cool, quiet, shady places to sit. Uh-huh. Not that they don't have to go into the rushing stream to move around, but that seems to be like a good place to sit and catch and wait for the water, you know. Uh-huh. I thought that was sort of interesting. Yeah. Well, I have a cousin who's a great fisherman and he really understands fish. He knows how fish think. He's really smart about that. I don't know that much about fish, you know. And so, I don't know if that's, I mean, we know that, I know, I do know that fish do spend a certain amount of time, you know, in cool, quiet, shady places. But I don't know if they stay there all the time. I think sometimes they go in, like you say, they go into the open waters. So, just like us.

[11:44]

I don't know. But I'll consult with my cousin and see what he says about that. Thank you. So, the next part is variously given as, If you don't see the path that meets your eye, how will your feet know the way? That's Prasthana Hashi, and this one is, Using your eyes, this is very different. Shen Yen, who's working from the Chinese, has a very different take on these lines. So, clearly, there's some grammatical, some difference in the texts. He says, Using your eyes, the path is lost. Using your feet, how can you know the road? That's a totally different idea. Don't see the path with your eyes, don't walk on the road with your feet. Very Zen kind of thing, right?

[12:47]

But here it's, If you don't see the path, how are you going to know where to go? Very different. And looking at the Japanese text, I kind of made a little translation that's pretty much comes from the characters I interpreted a little bit. See things directly with your own eyes. Don't just cobble together a received path. How else can your feet know the road? See things directly with your own eyes. Don't just cobble together a received path. How else can your feet know the road? So, uh... Cobble? Cobble, yeah, put together. You ever hear that word? Cobble together something? Yeah, that means like, you know, put, but get a bunch of disparate things and sort of put a makeshift thing together. And I have, tonight I'm featuring lots of commentaries from,

[13:51]

because Suzuki Roshi, for some reason I was really got into his commentaries here toward the end. So I'll read it. If you, you know, relax and enjoy this. I'll just read you a pretty long section here, which has one of my favorite things of Suzuki Roshi in it. So the most important thing is not rules, but to find the true source of the teaching with your eyes, with your ears, wherever you are. So literally, in other words, with your senses, just to see something or hear something or touch something without any preconceptions. And this is a, you know, a famous thing in Zen. Like, we don't do it anymore because, I don't know why we don't, but in the days that have gone by, you know,

[14:52]

when Zen center teaching was more dramatic, sometimes there'd be a session, you know, and all of a sudden the teacher would get his stick and go, and everybody could just really hear that, you know. And it would be very thrilling. You could just hear something. And without the stick anyway, you can sit there and hear the bird. Sometimes you actually sit there and you actually hear the bird and it goes right into your heart without passing through the nonsense of your brain. I don't know if that's ever happened to you, but. So hearing sounds, you know, just to hear a sound or just to see something, you can have a profound experience. You know, just, and that's what he's talking about. Don't make up all these ideas about Zen, this, that, and the other thing. Forget about it. Just see something. Just hear something. And the truth is, the same can be with a thought. There's no difference between a sound and a thought except that we're more apt to get at least directly mixed up with a thought. But actually, it's just as amazing that a thought should appear in your mind as that you could hear the sound of a bird. I mean, look at that.

[15:53]

Sometimes it's very quiet, you know, thought goes by. Sometimes I think thought is like if you see, today I was up on top of the hill there and there was a hawk up there. Sometimes the hawks stay in the same place and sometimes they can stay there without moving but every now and then they go, you know, to stay there. So thoughts like that, you know, and then a couple of things come across. Wow, look at that, and then it's gone. So you can just like the same thing. So just find the true source of the teaching with your eyes, with your ears, wherever you are. This is how you understand the source of the teaching. This is a more direct way of knowing the source of the teaching without trying to establish some particular way for yourself. So if you stick to words and if you do not see the true way by your eyes, by your nose, ears or tongue, sticking to some rules or some ideology that you apply to everything that you see or hear

[16:54]

and ignoring actually the direct experience of everyday life, even though you practice zazen, it doesn't work. So without saying, Rinzai or Soto or this way or that way, to have some direct experience of everyday life is the more important thing. And that is how we understand the true source of the teaching transmitted from Buddha. That is the conclusion of the Sandokan. So that's good. So without saying, Rinzai or Soto or this way or that way, to have some direct experience of everyday life is the more important thing. And that is how we understand the true source of the teaching transmitted from Buddha. Just the experience, direct experience of everyday life. That is the conclusion of the Sandokan. So the true way could be a stick. The true way, the original way of Buddha could be a stone. Like Uman said, it may be toilet paper. What is the true way? Or what is Buddha? Buddha is something beyond our understanding. So Buddha could be everything.

[17:55]

Instead of Buddha, we just say toilet paper. Which is, you know, from a koan. What is Buddha? Actually, it's shit stick, which they used to use instead of toilet paper. Instead of Buddha, we just say toilet paper or three pounds of hemp, as Tozan said. So if someone asks you, who is Buddha, the answer may be, you are Buddha too. That will be the answer. Then if someone asks, what is a mountain, the mountain is also Buddha. That will be the answer. So in Japanese, blah, blah, blah, you shouldn't say, this is Buddha. If you say, this is Buddha, that statement will lead to some misunderstanding. So this is also Buddha. If you say also, it is okay. If someone asks, where is Buddha, you may say, here is Buddha too. If you say too, it's okay. It is not so definite. Too. So Buddha may be somewhere else. Too. Then he says, this is my part that I like.

[18:57]

So the secret of the perfect Zen statement is, it is not always so. So I often quote that. Suzuki Roshi says, you know, Soto Zen is not always so. That's the secret of Soto Zen. It's not always so. These are Tassajara rules, but it's not always so. As long as you are a Tassajara, this is our rule, but it is not always so. You shouldn't forget this point. So this is also Buddha's way, Buddha's rule. If you say so, there is no danger or you will not invite any misunderstanding. And this is how you get rid of selfish practice. So on. So that's what he says there in response to this part. Face things directly with your own eyes. Don't cobble together a received path. So this is a really radical thing, you know, just to really and truly,

[20:00]

so that what's standing in our way of just directly experiencing in an intimate way, just a sound, just our own thought, just our own emotion. Another person is all of our complicated habits of thinking and judging and, you know, confusion of various sorts and strategies and preferences and all that stuff, which, you know, we all know how startling it is when you do really hear something or see something, you notice, wow, that's rare. Usually I'm preoccupied with my own stuff. So that's radical. It's saying, you know, forget about religion. Forget about Buddhism. Forget about Zen. Forget about any of this stuff. Just strip away everything and just be there for your life. It's amazing. And I think we get a feeling for how hard that is to do in a way.

[21:02]

And the difference between just living our life and what we usually do. So anyway, that's his take on that. I had a note here. Let's see what... Sheng Yan says something about that too. Let's see what he says. Oh yeah, he has a different one. So let's see what he says about it, given his translation. Oh, never mind. So... So let's do the next part. Next part says... Moving forward... This is Kasta and Asura. Moving forward, isn't a question of near or far. When you are lost, mountains and rivers block your way. And this one says... Moving forward, there is no near or far.

[22:10]

Confusion creates mountains and rivers of obstructions. And maybe, let's do the whole thing. I implore those who investigate the mysterious, do not waste your time. Please let me remind you who studied the inconceivable, your time is running fast. Don't ignore it. Going forward, has nothing to do with near or far. But if you get lost, mountains and rivers block your way. I respectfully say to those who approach the depths, don't waste time. Those are the last lines of the Sannokai. And I have some more wonderful parts of Suzuki Roshi's commentary

[23:13]

to read for you. Both practice and enlightenment are events which we will have with many other events in our life, in our dharma world. When we understand in this way, enlightenment is one of the events which symbolizes our big dharma world, and practice is also an event which symbolizes our big dharma world. So if both symbolize or express or suggest the big dharma world, actually there is no need for us to be discouraged because we do not attain enlightenment or why we should be extremely happy with our enlightenment. Actually there is no difference. Both have equal value. So if enlightenment is important, practice is also important. We cannot evaluate which is good or bad. When we understand in this way, in each step we have enlightenment. Even though we have enlightenment, there will not be any need

[24:13]

to be excited with it. And step by step we will continue endless practice, appreciating the dharma world, the bliss of the dharma world. That is practice based on enlightenment, practice beyond our experience of good and bad, practices which is beyond our selfish practice. In last night's lecture I translated a line of the Sandokai in which Sekhito said, Whatever you see, that is the Tao. Unless you understand in that way, even though you practice, your practice will not work. And tonight in this line he says, If you practice our way in its true sense, there is no problem of whether you are almost there or whether you are far away from the goal. So that is his very discursive translation of it is not a matter of near or far. It is not a problem whether you are almost there or whether you are far away. Beginner's practice and great Zen master's practice are not different. If you practice deluded practice,

[25:14]

if you practice our way in a dualistic sense, separating practice and enlightenment, then there are various difficulties of crossing rivers and mountains. And did I, was it here that I was talking about this passage where he says, I don't know why I am a Tassajara? Did I read it or just refer to it? I read it? I don't know if I read it. I want to read you this part. This is great. If you do things not because of Buddha or because of the truth, or for yourself or for others, if you do things for the things themselves, then that is the true way. I cannot explain it so well. Maybe I shouldn't explain so much. You shouldn't do things just because you feel good or you shouldn't stop doing things just because you don't feel good. Whether you feel good or bad,

[26:15]

there is something which you should do. If you don't have this kind of feeling of doing things, whether it is right or wrong, or good or bad, if you don't understand this kind of feeling, you have not yet started on our way in its true sense. I don't know why I am a Tassajara. It's not for you or for myself or not even for Buddha or for Buddhism. I am just here. When I think I have to leave Tassajara in two or three weeks, I don't feel so good. I don't know why. I don't think that it is just because you are my students. I don't think so. I do not have any particular person whom I love so much. I don't know why I have to be here. I have not much attachment to Tassajara. It is not because I am attached to Tassajara. Anyway, I am not expecting anything in the future in terms of ministry or Buddhism. But I don't want to live in the air.

[27:18]

I want to be right here. I want to stand on my own feet. The only way to stand on my feet is when I am a Tassajara. I sit a Tassajara. That is the reason why I am here. I want to be here. That is the most important thing for me. To stand on my feet and to sit on my black cushion. I don't trust anything but my feet and my black cushion. They are my friends always. My feet and my black cushion. My feet are always my friends. When I am in bed, my bed is my friend. There is no Buddha, or no Buddhism, or no Zazen. Somebody says that. So, I think that is the end, right? So, let's

[28:21]

Now, what do we have here? What is this? Practice period friends. I so enjoyed being with you during my retreat. I wish you happy trails. Pamela? Oh, Pamela. Pamela over there. So, I think that Oh, goodness. I think that the thing to do is pass this around and everybody eats them. Did you go to the store and buy this? Or did you make it? You made it here? You made it at home? Wow. Why don't I pass it around? While it is going around, let's see if there are any topics of discussion that we should take up about the Yes. I have a little something that I read in Zen Mind. Zen Mind. Really. A small quote.

[29:24]

Suzuki Roshi says There is no difference whatsoever between a foolish man and a wise man. It is so. And then later on in the paragraph he says, even though it is so, this is our life. I really felt like that very short, concise three sentences said I think that is a good tapping verse to the Sound of Kai. Yeah, this is one of the things that I probably have said this before, but this is one of the things that I really appreciate about Suzuki Roshi and about our way is that it is very human in that sense. As I understand those lines that you just quoted, it sort of expresses a willingness

[30:27]

to accept the fact that we are human beings. And that even though on one level we can see the trap involved in that, also we accept that that is who we are. Each one of us with our own version of humanness and our own limitation. And that is our life. So I think that is one of the nicest things to me about our path. When we talk about the unknown, darkness, or don't know, could we describe that as will? I mean, will out of natural order of mind or dependent co-arising or whatsoever? As will, as opposed to will of our intellect, will from our own

[31:28]

self, clean self, so could we describe it as a will? Why will? What is behind that? You're wanting to use the word will. Well, I have a strong feeling about it. Sometimes I experience a little of it. A very strong, powerful will behind that screening that I feel as a very strong, powerful will. And also I know that many existential decisions in my life, they have been taken irrationally, as many of us do, actually. Very important decisions, very irrational. We don't really know why we did it. I see, I see. Will in the sense of thy will be done kind of way. Yeah, yeah. I see. Yes, I think I understand what you're saying. Yeah. It's like I was...

[32:30]

I had a wonderful tea today with Ani Tenzing Palmo and we were talking about, we were each telling each other our stories, you know. And she was telling me about her life and she said that she was reading something, a book, and she for the first time saw the word Kagyu, which is the lineage that she belongs to. And she said when she first saw the word she said, ah, that's me. Just, you know what I mean, for no reason. She wasn't looking for that. She didn't even know anything about Tibetan Buddhism particularly, but she said, that's me, right away. Something outside of her preferences and desires came into her, burst into her mind. She knew that something was there. So yeah, I think so. And also I think that when we encounter

[33:33]

our intention to practice, you know, we really see how important it is for us to practice. Even beyond whether we think it's good for us or bad for us, it makes sense or doesn't make sense, we know, I'm given, I really have to do this. Or the intention to benefit others. That kind of powerful thing that takes over our lives, that's not exactly what we would rationally figure out. Then I think we're in the same territory there. So maybe you could say like that. Because in reality we can't know why we call it darkness or the inconceivable as they call it at the end here, or the depths, or the mysterious, is because literally the idea is that the analysis is that our intellectual and sensory apparatus simply are not set up to take in this as an object. Because it's

[34:34]

impossible for us to take it in as an object. So yeah, I see what you're saying. I agree with you. Also because I think many of us really don't know. That is, we don't know. We don't know why. So there's something behind it. There must be. Because why do I start it at all? And why do I sit it through? There must be a powerful will behind it. I don't know my philosophy that well, but it might be kind of confusing. Was it Nietzsche that really will? Yes. That's why I questioned him on the use of the word will. I don't know if it's a good translation or what, but he definitely gave absolute value to some things. In some contrast to what Charlie just quoted from... Well yeah, the word will, in English, in our cultural context, when you hear the word will, and this is exactly why I questioned you,

[35:35]

it sounds a little bit like willpower. Like I'm going to be tough and I'm going to impose my will on you or on the world and so on. But I see that you meant something quite different from that. So that's why, it's interesting, these kind of words, you have to probe a little bit and find out what somebody means, because he says will, and we hear one thing, but he means something entirely different. But it's true that probably if you were going to write something about this in English, you probably would not be well advised to use the word will, because it would suggest the wrong thing, probably. And we have so much, I think, particularly, I think it's a particularly American thing to have such a strong puritanical and judgmental trip going. I was talking with my Canadian friends and European friends last weekend about how Dharma in Europe

[36:36]

and so on, it's a little different. So Americans have this willpower thing going, and it has to do with judgment, morality, puritanism and all this stuff. So for us, it might not be a good word. Kevin. I was reminded while you were speaking there with Raymond, something that you said at the beginning of this practice period last year, which was that we are all here because we have positive roots in Dharma. And I thought that was very refreshing, very simple, very true. I'm also reminded of what Saina Rasa said on this topic, which is that when we encounter the Dharma, it's what's ultimate in us responds to what's ultimate in the universe. And I thought that it really the absolute in us responds to the absolute in the universe. It's a nice way of saying it.

[37:36]

Yeah. Yeah, and a lot of the times we're not in touch with that or aware of that, but there are times when we really feel that. Like when we feel just the rightness of being who we are and where we are right now. That's a wonderful feeling and it feels like that. Then somebody else? Yeah. I find myself sometimes between these two poles of seeing what comes to allow things to be said. Like the fish in the water and this last sentence, don't waste time. And this don't waste time gives me a lot of pressure because I know it's not the same what I do, it makes a difference. I'm glad you said that because that's the best point

[38:37]

in the whole Sandokai and I forgot to mention it. The word time in the literal meaning of the character for time in Chinese is something like light and shadow. Isn't that wonderful? After the whole poem is about this imagery of light and dark. In the last, at the end, the last line says well basically, the reason why light and dark is time is because it's day and night, right? Day and night is time. No day and night, no time. No light and dark, no time. So, at the very last word of the Sandokai we see that time is Sandokai. Time is the merging of difference and unity,

[39:40]

the merging of light and dark. So, don't waste time is one way of translating it. What it means is don't spend your days and nights, don't spend your life and your darkness in vain. So, it's not so much a pressure of don't waste time as it is please, please don't. This time which is Sandokai is given to us. Let's not waste it. Let's not live our lives spending our time in vain. Spending our time without really living it. That's more the sense of it. So, yes, maybe don't waste time is too it gives a wrong feeling because I don't think it's supposed to be an exhortation so much as it is a kind of a wistful wish that we not

[40:40]

waste, you know, not completely live our time, moment after moment. But just this point, light and dark is what time is. And with the whole imagery of that, that's the part that I forgot to mention. We have written on the hand a sentence by a German Christian mystic, what means human being become more essential exclamation mark. And that's more this don't waste time. It reminds me of that. Yeah, that's the traditional Japanese thing that you write on the hand is something very similar to that. Life and death, it's a serious matter. Don't waste your time. Yes? When I hear that sentence, don't waste, to those of you who study the mystery, I humbly say don't waste time. I watch my own reaction to that being

[41:42]

a statement filled with some kind of pressure. And then I stop to think about the early part of it, studying the mystery. And I think my first reaction is, okay, don't waste time when you have to figure out this mystery. And then realize that it's not saying figure out the mystery, but study the mystery. There's no solution, but really throw yourself into it. And also, if you are confused, mountains and rivers block your way. I also watch a dualistic response myself about that. Okay, I don't want that. I have to figure out how to get these things not blocking my way. There's nothing wrong with having mountains and rivers in your way. Right. Yeah, sure. It's interesting. I think the poem has a lot of these images that can bring up very strong dualistic responses. It's telling me not to do this. I better not do that. But I think there's also a level beyond that where you

[42:44]

actually incorporate dualisms and paradoxes into your life and just enjoy them and experience them. Yeah, because non-dualism includes dualism, right? If it didn't include dualism, it would be dualistic. Right? Yeah. Yeah. Going back to the whole thing about light and dark, there's a line earlier in the poem saying, right in light there's darkness, but don't confront it as darkness. Right in darkness there's light, but don't see it as light. You talked about that earlier in the course about how light might be unity, or rather darkness is non-differentiation. Yeah. Which was, you know, before you said that, before we kind of went through this, whenever I heard that, I always took it as kind of good and evil, frankly. Because often in our tradition

[43:47]

that's pretty common, you know, that light would be good and stuff. So I thought that the idea was that writing goodness, writing benefit, writing something beneficial, there's a trap, there's something harmful in writing something difficult or painful, there's a benefit. But don't get hung up on that, but know that that's there. And it sounds like that maybe is pretty different from what the poet intended, but I wondered if there's if it's ever interpreted that way. And if that dualism is ever considered, you know, between good and evil. Well, no. No, because as we found out in some of the Suzuki Roshi commentaries that I read for you, the emphasis here is on

[44:48]

this is the discussion of the nature of reality. Good and evil is in our mind. Good and evil is something that we do. Good and evil is the light. In the world of light, the world of distinction, discrimination, we create good and evil. We distinguish between good and evil. In the world of darkness, there is no discrimination between good and evil. The issue of good and evil and judgment and discrimination is there in the poem, but it's not, it's all on one side of the equation. So the distinction between good and evil, so it's not that good and evil is denied in Sandokai or good and bad or judgment. It's not that judgment is denied as being an aspect of our lives that's crucial. It's just that the dialectic is not between, this is the beauty of it, think about this, right? It's not that the dialectic is between good and evil without anything else there. Dialectic is between

[45:50]

good and evil as one thing, discrimination and all the problems. So the good and evil is there in the poem, but not there in the way, I think that certainly as Westerners we might put it that way, good and evil. And this is in a sense the problem that the Sandokai is addressing, is that kind of way of looking at the world. See? The Soto Zen is good and the non-Soto Zen is evil, or something like that. So, yeah, this is in a way one of the main points of the poem is that it's not so. So, if you set the world up in this

[46:51]

good and evil way, then of course you are giving a tremendous, you are erroneously and foolishly giving a tremendous advantage to evil that it doesn't deserve. Right? I don't get that. You're setting up evil as one pole of a cosmic... Oh, you're like giving it a whole half. Yeah, it's like if the pie could cut in half, you're giving a whole half of the pie to evil and then you have big problems in your life. It's a lot, you know. Really, you're creating a situation in which then you either have to fight against it, in which case you end up eating a lot of it that you don't know you're eating and vomiting it up eventually, or you become it. Either way you become it, if you give it too much strength. So, to return to the world of oneness and the world of acceptance and the world of things are as they are

[47:53]

is to put evil in its proper perspective. See? It's something that we do. Remember what Sukhiro, she says that good and bad is something that we do. It's not the nature of the universe, it's something that we do, so that's not a small thing that we do that, it's not a small thing. But if we understand that it's something that we do, then we have a fighting chance of dealing with these things. See? If we project our good and evil onto the world and we say that good and evil is out there, then we've given it way too much power and we've made it unworkable. This way we can work on these things because we know what they really are and we know who's got the hand on the reins, you know? Otherwise, we're doomed. So, this is a really important point. Thank you for bringing that up. Yeah, you could say almost that's the main point, in a way. Yes?

[48:54]

As we're talking about this thing, I see a lot of... It's self-evident, of course, but I see yin-yang in there without a doubt. Positive and negative and how they depend upon one another. And also along those lines, how ecology fits perfectly into this. To where we as human beings are tampering with delicately balanced ecosystems and we don't know when it comes up. We're not honoring the Sangha guide in nature and we're creating a lot of problems. Sure. Yeah. I think in Berkeley we used to chant, I think the last line was translated, Do not vainly pass through sunlight and shadow. Yeah, that's pretty literal. Yeah, I think maybe don't waste your time by night or day. I've heard it translated that way.

[49:55]

But sunlight and shadow is literally, that's the literal meaning of the word time. It took a while to figure out what that meant. I was outside one day. I really liked how cause used the word ignore instead of waste. Don't ignore. Don't ignore it. Yeah, that's nice. Your time is running fast. Don't ignore it. Be there for your life. Don't ignore it. Yeah.

[51:02]

Yeah, Lee? When you made the distinction between the nature of the universe and what do we do as getting involved in good and evil isn't that also part of the nature of the universe? Is that what you thought? Yeah. But it's cause we are natural, right? We're part of the universe. But when we recognize if we project good and evil onto the world at large and don't realize that that's what we're doing we just don't have an accurate view of how the universe works, right? The good and evil part of the universe works through us. We make that part up. If we project it outside then we're misunderstanding

[52:05]

how things work. So it's not insignificant that we do that. It's not trivial by any means. But it's more workable and we understand it properly if we understand it that way. Sure. And the act of understanding it properly is part of the universe. It's called Buddhadharma. Eightfold path. It's our life. Mm-hmm. The translation of the term Dao

[53:17]

was the first line of the Dao De Ching that the way the path isn't the path you can walk. Mm-hmm. The exact translation. Essentially the teaching that we hear isn't the true teaching. And you might wonder what kind of Zen is like and stuff. It's the idea of development in Chinese philosophy came up, and again, I was just wondering if you could say anything about that development of his next goal. Well, I keep abreast of scholarly developments, but there was a time when I did, and in those days, they used to say, twenty years ago, they used to say that Zen was the encounter

[54:20]

of Buddhism with Taoism and Confucianism. And there certainly was a period in the literal translation of Buddhist texts when there was a certain term for it, I can't remember the name of it now, but where they explicitly and consciously said, let's use Taoist and Confucian, particularly Taoist, technical terms to translate Buddhist terms, and they had a whole system of correspondence, correspondences, so they translated the Sanskrit word marga as Tao, marga means the path, and you know, it's reasonable, right? Tao means the way, it means the same thing, but it had all these Taoist associations along with it, which they did, they wanted, they were happy to include those associations, and in fact, if you look at Zen literature, it's pretty, I mean, see, in the early days of Zen studies in the West, I think people thought that Zen was more Taoist than I think

[55:21]

it is, or than we think it is, because, you know, Zen is, what is Zen anyway? As a teaching, it's always changing, but, and I'm sure that there were various approaches to Zen in China that were quite Taoist, and various teachers that were, you know, there's a lot of variation, right, in any tradition. So in the West, because there's all this scholarship going on and all this, people translate from Sanskrit and all this, all these Buddhist materials, plus all these different schools of Buddhism in one conversation, Zen in the West carries, you know, very little Chinese cultural baggage, because it's not ours, you know what I mean? So we don't, we sort of don't need the Taoist part, but definitely for the Chinese, Taoist part and the Confucian part, and the mixing of those conceptual systems together with Buddhism was a really big part of what created Zen in the first place, and in this particular text, there's a lot of that, I mean, there's a lot of, like we talked about the use of

[56:22]

the terms phenomena and principle, remember that? And those are Taoist and Confucianist philosophical terms that were used to translate Buddhist philosophical terms, so there was a lot of that going on. And after Buddhism came to China, Taoism became a completely different tradition, just as Zen became a completely different tradition, I mean Buddhism became a completely different tradition from the conversation with Taoism, just as Zen in the West is a completely different tradition from Chinese Zen or Japanese Zen, because of the Zen in the West encounter with Christianity and Judaism and psychology and feminism and all these other things, it's really becoming a different religion, you know? I mean, to me, Zen is totally a Western religion, you know, for me. It's completely a Western religion, I mean, I even forgot that it came from Japan, probably

[57:22]

it's a bad thing, but it's true, every now and then, like when I meet Hoitsu Suzuki or Japanese teachers, I remember, oh yeah, that's right, but mostly I forget about that, you know, because it's been going on here a long time and there's been a lot of conversations and a lot of work and scholarship and, you know, especially California, right, it's the Bay Area, the Bay Area is like Nalanda University or something was in India, there's more Buddhists per square inch than anywhere in the world. Like Ani Tenzing Palmo was saying to me, you know, what a terrible thing, if you guys are looking for jobs in the future, you know, she was saying what a terrible thing it is, the Asian people are dying to study Buddhism and there's nobody to teach them. That's what she said. She said because now there's a whole generation of people in Asia who are very acculturated

[58:29]

to world culture and they're finding out the same thing that we're finding out here, which is once you get your car and your automatic can opener, now what? So, but then when they go to the Buddhists and they ask them that question, the Buddhists are saying, you know, we'll offer incense for you and, you know, we'll chant a funeral service and, you know, we'll do an empowerment and a puja and all this stuff. I said, this doesn't do me any good. And the Buddhist teachers don't have anything to say to them because they're too busy doing funerals and pujas and bowing and all, this is what she told me. So she said, she went to, where was she, Singapore or someplace and she said, well, I'm sorry, she said, I can't do initiations and I don't do pujas, but I can give a dharma discourse. And they told her, oh, no, no, nobody's interested in that, nobody will come. So she said she set up a talk and, you know, hundreds and hundreds of people came and filled

[59:30]

this whole place and all they wanted to hear about was they were just starving to hear about this stuff. So then she said, well, maybe I'll have questions and they said, no, [...] you know, Chinese people don't ask questions, you know, that's not how it works. Buddhist people don't do that. They listen politely to the teacher and they don't ask questions. And so she said, well, let's just try it. So she asked them if they had any questions and she said, you know, people were very timid in the first one person, then another person, then another person, then another person. She said two hours later she was still answering questions. And she said there's no teachers there. Plenty of Buddhists and big churches and everything, but no Buddhist teachers. So that's why she's starting a monastery in Asia, a nunnery in Asia, because she wants to train people to teach in Asia. So isn't that interesting? How did we get onto that? Oh, the Chinese, the Dao and all that. Yeah. I thought it was interesting that Srikirosa mentioned in the lectures that this is also

[60:30]

considered a Daoist text, so you can read it from a Daoist standpoint. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it's very, this Sandokai and Hokyo Zen way are very much a Daoist flavor, yeah. Yeah, and the whole emphasis, you know, the whole emphasis on A and B is very much like Charlie said, yin yang, and that whole way of looking at the world, the way of thinking, is very much Daoist and very Chinese way of looking at things, yeah. Well, it wouldn't bother me a whole lot to end the class early, you know, get a little extra sleep here. I haven't been sleeping enough lately, so it'll be okay. I mean, what do you think? Yes. Yes. Good idea. Good idea. Okay. So, anyway, before, we'll chant the text, but before we do that, I would like to actually thank all of you for your attention. You know, you've been very model students.

[61:31]

You've really, you've really, I feel, I really feel that we did a good job here. I mean, we actually went over this and I think that we all learned something here and we understand it better, and I mean, I understand that living it is another thing, and that's the real problem, but still, we kind of got the hang of what, of what this is saying and where it's pointing us and all that, so I feel very satisfied, and I really do appreciate your attention and your kindness to me, listening. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you.

[63:28]

Thank you. We offer the merit of our study, practice, and chanting of the Sandokai to the enlightenment of all beings. Aum. Thank you all again and thank you Pamela for the cake.

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