This podcast is offered by the San Francisco Zen Center on the web at sfzc.org. Our public programs are made possible by donations from people like you. Good morning, everyone. A warm welcome to you all, whether or not you are here in the Green College Zendo or the online Zendo. It's a... It's an honor to be with all of you. Is the sound okay? No? Okay. So for those of you who may not know me, my name is Tenzin David Zimmerman, and I am a resident of San Francisco Zen Center. I live currently at City Center, Beginner's Mind Temple, and I also serve as the Central Abbot for San Francisco Zen Center. And you know, I don't get to get over here very often. So it's always a treat to come visit, and I even less frequently give a Dharma talk.

[01:04]

So, again, thank you for welcoming me here into the heart, body, and mind of the Green Dragon. So, and thank you to Patanto for the invitation. Good to see you. Always good to see you, Kokyo. So if you attended the Dharma talk that I gave yesterday at City Center, whether you were there in person or online, I have a confession to make. I'm going to basically give the same talk, the same topic. And, you know, I would have wished that I had time and the energy to offer something else. But I'll be honest, it's been a tough couple of weeks. particularly at city center, we had a long-term resident who died. And so navigating this beloved member's death and what it is to hold a community in a time of mourning and transition and all the wider the family and all the other wider concerns, it's taken a lot of energy and attention.

[02:12]

So I figured I'm going to try to keep things simple and direct. So this is my offering today. I hope it will. be sufficient. So, I'd like to begin my talk by sharing with you a short Zen story, or koan, entailing the interaction between two renowned and beloved 8th and 9th century Chan, or Zen, masters. So, this is Nanquan Huyuan, in Japanese. You might know him as Nansen Fugan, and then his pupil, Jaojo Sungshen. who in Japanese is known as Joshu Jushin. And each of these men appear quite frequently in the various koan collections. And this following case is number six from a collection of koans titled The Recorded Sayings of Zen Master Joshu. So I'm going to, in this case, use the Japanese names. So Jaojo will be the name of the character rather than Joshu.

[03:16]

Here it is. Once, when Zhao Zhao was drawing water from a well, he saw his teacher, Nanjuan, passing by. Then, hanging on to a pillar, he extended his legs down into the well and shouted, Save me! Save me! Nanjuan held up a ladder that was nearby and, counting the rungs of the ladder, cried out, One, two, three, four, Master Zhajo immediately got up and gave his thanks to Nan Chuan, saying, just now, thanks to you, I was saved. So perhaps you've had moments in your life when you found yourself in a somewhat precarious situation, like dangling over a well of sorts, barely holding on. and seemingly about to fall at any moment into a dark hole of some kind, and wondering whether, if you called out, someone will notice and come save you.

[04:31]

And maybe sometimes, like Zhao Zhou in the Quran, you're in such a predicament due to your own foolish actions. Anyone here ever done that? No? Could I listen to the only one? Or worse, You're simply playing at crying wolf to see if anyone actually cares enough to come to your aid. Of course, it's also very possible that you are genuinely in need of rescue from a difficult situation, even a perilous one, one that's due to causes and conditions beyond your control. Regardless of who or what's to blame, there often seems to be something potentially threatening, our safety, our well-being, our happiness, or the safety and well-being and happiness of those we love. I would venture to say that at some fundamental level, one of the most prevailing desires or longings of human beings is to be saved.

[05:38]

Of course, what exactly means to be saved largely depends on each person's particular purpose worldview, their afflictions, their experiences, their fears. The first time I recall feeling the strong wish for someone to come save me was when I was six years old and knew me placed into a children's home along with my brother due to a difficult family situation. And during my first few weeks there, I would spend many times during the day sitting next to a window, looking out at the long driveway, hoping that perhaps I would see my father's car pulling up, or hoping that anyone would come and save me, taking me back home once again. You might have had similar times in your life when the hope arose that someone or something would save you.

[06:43]

And if that's not the case for you, I think it's safe to say most of all that for most of us, what we would like to be saved from are the general banes or sufferings that come with human existence, including old age, sickness, and death, as well as pain, loss, blame, and failure. In other words, what the Buddha identified as dukkha. dissatisfaction, dis-ease. I also think there's a common human desire to be saved from experiencing a loveless, lonely, or meaningless life. A life that somehow feels empty, unlived, or insignificant. But perhaps what we want to be saved from most of all is ourselves. I want to be saved for myself because I sense, with some measure of chagrin, that it's me that's invariably the primary instigator of much of my suffering.

[07:56]

And with each of these longings, there's the question of who or what can ultimately save you. For those of you that have spent any time at Zen centers, just like this one, you've probably heard chanted four seemingly self-contradictory lines known as the great bodhisattva vows, which we will, in fact, at the end of this talk, be chanting. And they go like this. Beings are numberless. I vow to save them. Delusions are inexhaustible. I vow to end them. Dharma gates. are boundless. I vow to enter them. Buddha's way is unsurpassable. I vow to become it. And maybe upon hearing these four great vows for the first time, we might be struck by the impossibility of them, particularly the first line, beings are anomalous, and yet I vow to save them, meaning all of them, every single one of them, right?

[09:07]

You might be thinking, uh-huh, really? Well, I think that in most cases there's a natural desire to want to be of help to others when we see them suffering or in need in some form, even if we don't necessarily know about how to go about doing it. Taking a vow to save everyone seems overwhelming, even a little bit insane. Why would anyone make such a vow in which you're almost certain to fail? Nonetheless, if we're formally taking the Bodhisattva precepts as done in the Jukai ceremony, we've made a public commitment to make good on this promise. So we have to do something. However, if we don't have a sufficient understanding of the teachings of the Buddhadharma when we embark on the effort to save all beings, we risk developing a savior complex, becoming, you know, egotistical rescuers, some kind of self-snug do-gooders, kind of blur responsibility, you know, by taking responsibility for another person in some other way that's inappropriate and maybe overzillious.

[10:29]

And such rescuers frequently actually do more harm than good for others. And they end up just creating as many problems for themselves in the end. So the question remains, how exactly do I go about saving all beings? In the Quran, Zhao Zhou and Nanquan are obviously joking around, having a bit of fun. While drawing water from the well, Zhao Zhou sees his teacher, Nanquan, and decides to put on a little show. He pretends he's about to fall into the well. and calls out to Nanquan to save him. And Nanquan is willing to play along. However, he doesn't respond with a superhero or saint-like salvation act. He's not like, don't worry, dear disciple, I've got you. Instead, he grabs a ladder that's close at hand, and rather than explaining it out towards Zhao Zhou to use,

[11:33]

Instead, dramatically, he holds it up and counts. One, two, three, four, five. And with that, apparently Zhao Zhao is saved. And so he steps away from the edge of the well and then thanks this teacher for saving him. Now, one commentary on this coin notes that Nanchuan is not in any rush to save Zhaozhou, not only because Zhaozhou's call for help is obviously a playful use, but because from a Zen perspective, even where there is a real need for rescue, save from the bonds of karma, all one can do for the other and for oneself is to walk step by step one's own path. Manchuan pretend saves Chaozhou, who in turn thanks his teacher for helping him realize he never really needed saving to begin with.

[12:42]

So while this koan offers an example of some of the fun that two seasoned and devoted Buddhist practitioners can have playing in the fields of the Dharma, There is, of course, a deeper teaching to be found here, one involving what it might mean from a Buddhist perspective to attain or offer some form of salvation for ourselves and others. majority of spiritual traditions have some concept of salvation, a version of a sovereign narrative that carries with it a particular potency for the practitioners of that faith. And for many religions, the concept of salvation entails winning, for example, the struggle against some form of evil in one's life, or eliminating some form of sin

[13:57]

or impurity within ourselves. For others, it's a matter of receiving some reward, for example, eternal life, based on how we've lived, or what we've accomplished, or the degree to which we've heeded some universal law or showed devotion to a particular almighty deity. For example, according to the Christian Mennonite and Brethren traditions in which I was raised, the necessity of being absolved of original sin by accepting the eternal salvation offered by God's absolute love and through his son Jesus was a driving narrative. And alas, such a narrative didn't resonate with me. The more I thought about it and checked in with my own experience, internal compass, it didn't ring true to me. In my bones, I could feel there's something not right here.

[15:00]

It's not my path. This is not how reality is for me. And so I had to find another way. However, Buddhism and Zen differ markedly from other religions on the point of the view of human salvation. I remember the first time I read what are said to be the last words of Shakyamuni Buddha as he was on his deathbed about to pass into Paranirvana. In the translation that I had, the Buddha counsels his disciples to work hard for their own salvation. He says, Behold, O monks, this is my last advice to you. All component things in the world are changeable. They are not lasting. Work out your salvation with diligence. And I've since read other translations and commentaries that question the use of this word salvation.

[16:07]

But the use of the word at the time when I first read it peaked my curiosity as someone who grew up in a Judean Christian culture. In order to understand the principle of salvation in Zen Buddhism, we must turn not to a transcendent power of a god, but to the basic question of the nature of reality, as well as our own identity. It's only through understanding our human identity and awakening to our self-nature, our true nature, our Buddha nature, that is inherently pure, boundless, and free from suffering. that we can ultimately find liberation. And yet we are so often blinded to our true nature and fundamental goodness by ignorance, attachment, and delusion, what are otherwise known as the three poisons.

[17:11]

It's these obscurations of our naturally awake mind They're the basis for all the myriad forms of harm and suffering we see in the world perpetuated by humans. Because we are commonly in bondage to and driven by our egoic, karmic consciousness, we are prone to engage in thinking and actions that are unwholesome, unbeneficial. Accordingly, then, salvation in Buddhism, is liberation from the bondage of our egoic mind, if you will, and our karma through the transformation of our consciousness and our awakening to our true nature, again, our Buddha nature. It's the awareness that we are more than we appear, that we all possess the potential to express wisdom and compassion,

[18:17]

rather than afflicting harm on ourselves and others. While egoic consciousness isn't abolished in this transformation, its condition, its nature is made clear, and therefore it has less authority in our lives. It's no longer in the driver's seat. By becoming aware of the source of our actions, we gain power to choose more fruitful, and beneficial actions. Now to mention another important aspect here. According to Zen and the Mahayana tradition, our fate as human beings is inextricably tied to the fate of all beings. Your fate, every one of you, is tied to each and every one in this room and to everyone outside this room and throughout the whole world. They're linked together. profoundly intimately.

[19:19]

So, in other words, our fate is tied up with the fate of all being. Zen teaches that we are dependently co-arisen with everything else in the universe. And as such, our very being is a reflection of all our relationships. Not only with other humans, past, present, and future, but also with all of nature, right? Plants, animals, the mountains, the rivers, as well as the sun, the moon, the stars. We only exist as we do in relation to everything else. Alas, we all too often don't recognize the truth of our interdependency. Instead, we labor under the delusion that we have an inherent, enduring, independent self-nature.

[20:23]

In reality, that sense of a separate self is just a fabrication. It's just something that we dreamed up and then we added it to our experience. Awakening entails recognizing our self-delusion, recognizing that we're in a dream, that we're acting out a fabrication of some sort, and seeing then in what way we are not separate from the rest of the universe. And when we have an understanding of our profound intimacy and interdependence, it naturally leads us to want to act in such a way that we want to help others to be free of suffering, just as we want to be free of suffering. It's this understanding that gives rise to the bodhisattva, a being who is on the path towards liberation, towards nirvana, and understands that ultimately their liberation, their salvation, if you will, is bound up with the salvation of all beings.

[21:39]

However, while a bodhisattva wants to support all beings in a direction away from suffering or liberation, toward greater happiness and wisdom, they must be careful not to have an idea about what kind of assistance another being might need in their own path of liberation. Rather than having an attitude of, I know what's best for you, a Bodhisattva remains open to responding to providing whatever is actually needed in the moment. Even if it's not something as grand as complete liberation. For example, while offering our Dharma teaching might be a benefit, sometimes that's what's really needed to alleviate suffering is something as simple and straightforward as a smile, a kind word, a receptive ear, or maybe something more practical like food or shelter or just a band-aid.

[22:48]

And even if someone is so entrenched in their own suffering, totally identified with it to the degree that they refuse to let it go, it's my suffering, it's mine, it's precious, right? It's who I am. Then, in a sense, this is perhaps all a bodhisattva can do is stand by as a witnessing, compassionate companion. While the person... works through whatever it is they need to work through on their own. We can't fix others. We can't do it for them. We never know what others truly need or where their journey to liberation needs to take them or how it's going to unfold. Well, bodhisattvas, they have many vital and inspirational virtues that we could explore together. I'm just going to briefly touch upon one of them right now, which is the virtue of identity action, Japanese rikyo.

[23:56]

As Oudogan, the founder of our school of Zen, describes it in his classical, which translate as the four all-embracing methods of a bodhisattva, he says, identity action means non-difference. It is non-difference from self, non-difference from others. When we know identity action, self and others are one. The translators Nishijima and Krauss have offered a colloquial expression to describing identity action. It's like all of us being in the same boat together. In other words, liberation is impossible. for an individual in isolation. It needs to be understood as a collective endeavor. We're all in the same boat, rowing together to the shore of liberation.

[24:59]

Even if we personally attain some great spiritual awakening or insight, good for you, our spiritual development is incomplete if we turn our backs on others. suffering beings. In fact, I would say it's pointless. Dogen also says in the same fascicle that foolish people think that if they help others first, their own benefit will be lost. But this is not so. Beneficial action is an act of oneness, benefiting self and others together. So then according to Dogen, you could say, such action is in fact enlightened activity. Beneficial action, helpful action, is, in other words, the whole of the Dharma. However, as we endeavor to enact the Bodhisattva Vows in service of saving all beings, what is particularly emphasized in Zen training,

[26:10]

is the need to cultivate an understanding of emptiness, shunyata. With a correct understanding of emptiness, we then have the power, we then have the proper perspective with which to approach our wish to be of service to others. And this is important because we might otherwise take up the bodhisattva bow to save all beings from a place of ego. falling into the trap of becoming godlike saviors or a rescuer, right? Out to free those other poor unfortunate souls, right? Though through my own awesome and heroic enlightened activity, right? See me, see how compassionate I am. See what a great bodhisattva I am, right? Of course, we want to be compassionate and beneficial, but if we're attached to ideas about who it is we're trying to help, and what we think they need, and what's going to ultimately be beneficial for them, then the whole endeavor just becomes another exercise in self-conscious aggrandizement.

[27:26]

But when grounded in the inside of emptiness and interbeing, then compassion for suffering beings arises spontaneously, without thought. without preconception. It's like, if you've heard this koan, a hand reaching back in the night for a pillow. Without thought, just wanting naturally to offer comfort and ease. Again, it's an unselfconscious movement done from a profound sense of interconnectedness. There were two seminal texts in the Mahayana Zen tradition that are particularly helpful in cultivating an understanding of emptiness while in service of the Bodhisattva vows, including that of saving all beings. The first is, of course, the Heart of Great Perfect Wisdom Sutra. So in the Heart Sutra, we are presented with a path of liberation that sees the nature of all phenomenon as empty of own being.

[28:31]

Now, I'm not going to say more about the Heart Sutra today, other than to note that we could describe the focus of the Heart Sutra as one of personal emancipation. The other text that offers us a supportive understanding of emptiness is the Diamond Sutra. In the Diamond Sutra, while sharing the same orientation as the Heart Sutra to emptiness as being the true nature of reality, we see that the central theme is one of universal, not just personal. So in the Diamond Sutra, Sabuti, who's a senior disciple of the Buddha, approaches the Buddha and asks him what a person on the path like himself should do to further their understanding of the Dharma. And so the Buddha replies saying, Sabuti, those who would now set forth on the Bodhisattva path should give rise to this thought.

[29:33]

However many beings there are, and I'm shortening this, however many beings there are, in whatever realms they might exist, in the realm of complete nirvana, I should liberate them all. Again, here's this impossible vow to save all beings. Every one of them, every speck, every organism, everything is my focus. The Buddha goes on to say, And though I thus liberate countless beings, not a single being is liberated. And why not? Sabuti, a bodhisattva who creates a perception of a being, cannot be called a bodhisattva. And why not? Sabuti, no one can be called a bodhisattva who creates a perception of the self. who creates a perception of a being, a life, or a soul.

[30:35]

So here the Buddha shines the light of prajna, the wisdom that sees the emptiness of all beings and phenomena, onto the great thought of liberating all sentient beings itself. Even the thought, the concept, that I can save other beings must be seen through, must be seen as empty. Now, of course, we have to be careful here. Otherwise, we might mistakenly think that the Buddha is suggesting in the Diamond Sutra that beings don't exist. When he says that a Bodhisattva shouldn't create the perception of being, then therefore that we shouldn't have to worry about their welfare. There's often a common misunderstanding around the Buddhist teachings of emptiness that because all things and all beings are empty, empty of own being, that they don't really exist. And because they don't really exist, we don't need to make a sincere, tangible effort to save them from suffering.

[31:41]

But the teachings of emptiness aren't saying beings, oh, sorry, we have this understanding that the teachings of emptiness aren't saying beings don't exist, nor that they don't need to make any effort to aid them, because whatever suffering their experiences is simply a matter of their own delusion. But what the Buddha is saying in the Diamond Sutra is that beings, all phenomena, including ourselves, don't really exist the way that we perceive them, the way that we think they exist. Beings obviously and definitely exist. I'm here. Hello. This is meeting. And I know you're there. We all exist. project something extra onto existence, onto other beings, right? A whole bunch of stories and ideas that are not necessary, right?

[32:46]

And these stories and the projections, all they do is restrict the manifestation of wisdom and compassion. They restrict our natural care that we might feel for others. And subsequently, it causes suffering. What we're to understand then, and as the hearts which are underlines for us, is that despite the truth of emptiness, bodhisattvas engender in themselves a great compassion. So all this is to say that while we must all pass through the stage in our Zen training where there are no beings to save, if we remain stuck in that emptiness, enjoying some form of solitary bliss, then the profound desire to save all beings will never truly arise. So it's in this way that prajna, the wisdom of emptiness that we find in the Heart Sutra and the Diamond Sutra, serves as an antidote to egotism, as well as to the trap of becoming a rescuer.

[33:54]

Okay, so returning once again to our koan with Zhao Zhao and Nanquan before closing. Putting himself seemingly and purposely at risk of falling into the well, Zhao Zhao calls out to his teacher, Save me! Save me! Now, interesting, there's another translation of this koan which actually has him calling out, Save us both! Save us both! And then once saved, thanking his teacher for saving them both. It's important to note that Zhao Zhou and Nanjuan created their situation together. And they got out of it together. Like all reality, theirs is independently co-arisen events. So given this, you might ask the question, who is saving who? Now, it's not that Nanjuan doesn't want to help Zhajo when he grabs the ladder and starts counting, but then actually running to and grabbing on to his student.

[35:09]

As a committed bodhisattva, he really does want to help. And he's naturally and spontaneously responding. He didn't hesitate at all. Right? And his response is one step, one rung, one breath at a time. One. Two. Three. Four. But ultimately, he can't save Zhaozhou from being Zhaozhou. Zhaozhou is Zhaozhou and Nanquan is Nanquan. Each of them is fully engaged in acting out their parts. Each of them have the respective karma for which they have to take responsibility. Neither can save the other from being themselves, nor from having to bear the realities and consequences of their particular Dharma positions and the karma that they've accumulated by the choices they made in their life up until this point.

[36:15]

And I often have this image of each of us is a nexus of the universe, coming together all time and space, coming together in this really moment, and we are one point of that coming together. We are essential. We hold the whole universe together by our Dharma position. Without us, the universe would not exist the way that it exists. So we are essential for this fabric, but we have to own our Dharma position. We have to own the way that we have lived out this expression of the universe here and now. While the same, the teaching of dependent origination reminds us that relations between human beings are a complicated matter of each person creating and being created by their engagement with others and the world. Therefore, by acting for oneself, one involves the other. By acting upon the other, one finds oneself involved.

[37:18]

So Zhao Zhou is quickly saved, and then he says to his teacher, thank you, venerable, for saving us both. Now in his commentary on this koan, Chan Master Zhu Tang Zhirju, I may have that wrong, but says on Nang Zhuang's behalf, venerable donk, already no need. In other words, there's no need to thank him because I didn't save anybody. And commenting on this case, Pacquen says, I feel ashamed, I feel ashamed. All the same, Jiaojo offers his gratitude on behalf of all of our efforts to save both ourselves and each other from the dark well of ignorance and dualistic perception. So perhaps we can say something like this. I can't save you, much less all beings. And you, can't save me. Why?

[38:21]

Because I, the I, the I of the delusory separate self, can't save a you that's a fabricated separate self. The moment we start talking about you and I, we fall into a well of dualism and conceptualizations. With a me over here trying to save a you over there. As such, it's just an egoic endeavor which will leave everyone further endangered. We can't save other beings because fundamentally there are no other beings. There is only just this one life. And so we make our best effort to bring as much care and attention and love to this life as we can and as is within our means. We take care of this one life in all of its multiplicity and diversity, all of its ugliness and heartache, its profound tenderness and beauty.

[39:29]

But ultimately, the only way this one can truly help is by doing away with the notion of you and I to begin with, to go beyond our dualistic perceptions of the world. When we can do this, then our endeavor becomes Buddha saving Buddha, the world saving the world, the universe saving the universe. Furthermore, the truth is that we are already saved. We are already saved because we are already and have always been free. Our Buddha nature is already pure, free, and boundless. So there is nothing that otherwise binds us except for our own minds and the karmic obscurations and entanglements they create for us.

[40:37]

This is the essential teaching of the Buddha's Four Noble Truth. Yes, there is suffering. But there is also an end to suffering. when we realize that suffering is a matter of the way that we perceive, think about, and relate to reality, to each other, and to ourselves. And the path Buddha recommended for how we might recognize and actualize this truth is the Eightfold Path and the Precepts. So in closing, I'll offer you a little secret. If we try to act like a Bodhisattva, even when we don't feel like one. It goes a long way toward challenging our attachment to our sense of a self, our separate self, while also at the same time teaching us about the truth of our interbeing. Over time, we sense that we might actually be going in a correct direction, following a beneficial path, because we begin to recognize that each and every one of us

[41:47]

is making our best effort to understand and live from our true nature. The wish to be of assistance to others to engage in beneficial action and help others then just arises spontaneously. And we simply jump into action to assist others when they need assistance, not knowing whether our actions will be of true benefit or not, or what it might actually require of us. One, two, three, four, five. Step by step, we walk the path of liberation, of salvation, together. Thank you very much for your kind attention and patience and presence. Thank you for listening to this podcast offered by the San Francisco Zen Center. Our programs are made possible by the donations we receive.

[42:49]

Please help us to continue to realize and actualize the practice of giving by offering your financial support. For more information, visit sfcc.org and click Giving. May we fully enjoy the Dharma.

[43:09]

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