Well, we—Suzanne? We have the most perfect spring day today. Thank you, yeah. And for the children, there's—I'm not sure if the parents know that there's a children's program going on out there and they're reading a story and all. Did you know that? I did. You did, but you chose to be here. Okay. So if any of the children would like to go out or go with their parents to join the—I'm not sure where they are exactly. By the flowers next to the TV wall. Across the lawn this way. So please, you're welcome to go now if you'd like to. Thank you.

[01:21]

Oh, sorry. So today is the day that we celebrate Buddha's birthday, the birthday of Shakyamuni Buddha. Now, the actual date of the birthday varies in different countries, and in the tradition of Zen from Japan, the birth date is April 8th. But at Green Gulch, since we want to have a big celebration and picnic and pageant, we choose the Sunday closest to the 8th, so it's today. Okay. Factoring in other things. So how many of you know the story of the Buddha's birth?

[02:24]

Or maybe I should ask, how many of you do not know the story of the Buddha's birth? Okay. How many of you have never heard of the Buddha before? Okay. So about 2,583 years ago, the birth, there was a wonderful occurrence in India where a baby was born. Now, we often celebrate the births of babies. All over the world, when a baby comes, there is celebration. I should say not every single time a baby comes, but all over the world, when babies come, there are celebrations.

[03:27]

And this baby came in an unusual way. And I wanted to read from a book called the Buddhakarita, which is the Acts of the Buddha, which is written by Ashvagosa, and it was written on palm leaves. There were 55 palm leaves that were found, and the story was pieced together. And it's a poem. It's a long poem. And the pageant today, which enacts these very things that I'm going to read about, you see them in living color out on the lawn, come from, I believe, Norman's, former abbot Norman Fisher's poem that will be read today as the narrative for the pageant, I believe comes from the Buddhakarita. So I thought I'd read a little bit. It's called The Birth of the Holy One. There was a king of the unconquerable Shakyas.

[04:30]

The Buddha came from a clan called the Shakyas, and he was also called Shakya Muni. And his father's name was, his father legendarily was a king of the Shakyas or head of the clan. So there was a king of the unconquerable Shakyas, Suddhodana by name, of the race of the Ikshvaku and the peer of Ikshvaku in might. Pure he was in conduct and beloved of his people as the moon in autumn. That counterpart of Indra had a queen, a very Sachi, whose splendor corresponded to his might. In beauty like Padma, in steadfastness like the earth, she was called Mahamaya from her resemblance to the incomparable Maya. This ruler of men, dallying with his queen,

[05:33]

enjoyed, as it were, the sovereign glory of Vaisravana. Then without defilement, she received the fruit of the womb, just as knowledge united with mental concentration bears fruit. Laughter Before she conceived, she saw in her sleep a white lord of elephants entering her body, yet she felt thereby no pain. So Maya had a dream of this big white elephant, and we today will see this white elephant come to visit Maya in all its glory on the lawn. So she saw in her sleep a white lord of elephants entering her body,

[06:36]

yet she felt thereby no pain. Maya, the queen of that godlike king, bore in her womb the glory of her race, and being in her purity, free from weariness, sorrow, and illusion, she set her mind on the sin-free forest. She wanted to go into the forest to have the baby. In her longing for the lonely forest as suited to trance, she asked the king to go and stay in the grove called Lumbini, which was gay like the gardens of Chaitra Rathya, with trees of every kind. The lord of the earth, full of wonder and joy, recognized that her disposition was noble from her possession of piety, and left the fortunate city in order to gratify her, not for a pleasure excursion. In that glorious grove, the queen perceived that the time of her delivery was at hand, and amidst the welcome of thousands of waiting women,

[07:38]

proceeded to a couch overspread with an awning. We have that couch here today. Then, as soon as Pushya became propitious, not exactly sure who Pushya is, from the side of the queen, who was hallowed by her vows, a son was born for the wheel of the world. Without her suffering, either pain or illness. And then they liken this to the birth of another legendary figure, as was the birth of Aurva from the thigh of Prithu, from the hand of the lord of the forest, the peer of Indra from the head of Kakshivat, from the armpit.

[08:40]

On such wise was his birth. So this was a miraculous birth that came from Queen Maya's side. When in due course he had issued from the womb, he appeared as if he had descended from the sky, for he did not come into the world through the portal of life, and since he had purified his being through many eons, he was born not ignorant, but fully conscious. And then this is the description of the baby Shakyamuni. With his luster and steadfastness, he appeared like the young sun come down to earth, and despite this, his dazzling brilliance, when gazed at, he held all eyes like the moon. So he was like the sun, but you could actually gaze on him like the moon. For with the glowing radiance of his limbs, he eclipsed like the sun the radiance of the lamps, and, beauteous with the hue of precious gold,

[09:43]

he illumined all the quarters of space. He who was like the constellation of the seven seers walked seven steps with such firmness that the feet were lifted up, unwavering and straight, and that the strides were long and set down firmly. And we today will see the baby Buddha take these very seven steps, very strong and steadfast and firm, lifted up unwaveringly. And looking to the four quarters, with the bearing of a lion, he uttered a speech proclaiming the truth, I am born for enlightenment, for the good of the world. This is my last birth in the world of phenomena. And then two streams of water, clear as the rays of the moon, and having the virtue one of heat, one of cold,

[10:44]

poured forth from the sky and fell on his gracious head to give his body refreshment by their contact. He lay on a couch with a gorgeous canopy, feet of barrel and framework glistening with gold, and round him the Yaksha Lord stood reverently on guard with golden lotuses in their hands. The dwellers in heaven themselves remained invisible, held up in the sky a white umbrella, and bowing their heads in obeisance before his majesty, muttered the highest blessings that he might obtain enlightenment. The mighty snakes, in their thirst for the most excellent law, fanned him, and with eyes shining with devotion, bestrewed him with mandarva flowers, offices they had performed for the Buddhas of the past, and so on and so forth.

[11:45]

And then wonderful things happened. Delightful breezes blow, and clear water comes, and troops of heavenly beings come, and birds and deer did not call aloud, and the rivers flowed with calm waters, and all these wonderful things happened in the world in all four quarters, and we'll also see that enacted, all the wonderful things happened during the pageant. So when Shakyamuni Buddha appeared in the world, you know, it's said that it doesn't matter so much Shakyamuni Buddha per se, himself, his personality or his human existence, the most important thing is that he brought the Dharma,

[12:46]

or the truth, or the law, the Dharma is translated as truth or law, or the teachings to bestow, or that he discovered himself, he didn't create it himself, he discovered the truth that was already there, that's discoverable by all beings. So the fact that this being lived and died in the world, as long as the truth was brought forth and is passed on, that's maybe the most important thing. But still, it comes up in the human heart some feeling of gratitude and thankfulness and happiness and joy that this teaching was brought forth, that is available to us, and that we've been exposed to it in this life. So this is the earliest moments that I was talking about

[13:52]

of the Buddha coming into the world, and like all legends, there are miraculous things that happen. Now, we have in this hall, this zendo, this room is called a zendo, where we do meditation, and it's also called the Buddha Hall, and in a different kind of monastery or temple there would be separate buildings for the meditation hall and for the Buddha Hall, where there would be lectures and ceremonies and services and chanting and so forth, they would be separated, but we have just one place, so we have the traditional figures of the meditation hall, the Manjushri, which is the large figure on that altar, and the Manjushri figure is the figure of wisdom, and then right in front is Shakyamuni Buddha,

[14:52]

sitting right in front of Manjushri, and Shakyamuni Buddha is in the gesture of touching the earth, calling the earth to witness, and then on this side of the zendo, we have the big statue is Jizo Bodhisattva, or the Bodhisattva or enlightenment being of compassion, and then right in front, the smaller figure is Tara Buddha, or the female emanation, or the female form of enlightenment, or the awakened one, so the room is balanced with wisdom and compassion and male and female energies, which is what our practice is balanced, a balance of wisdom and compassion, and male and female energies, you might say, the balance of our, the wholeness of our life. So when I first came to Zen Center,

[15:58]

the San Francisco Zen Center has two rooms, they have a zendo in the downstairs floor, and then we come up to go to the Buddha Hall for service, and I just followed along with everybody, it was pretty interesting to me what was going on, and I came into the Buddha Hall, and all of a sudden there were bells going, and everybody turned, went, turned to one direction, so I did that too, and then all of a sudden, everybody dropped down, the whole room sort of dropped to their knees, and I panicked slightly and thought, well, went in Rome and just went down on my knees too, and then I got up and then it happened again, and again, and again, and over and over there was, I wasn't counting, but there were nine full prostrations down to the ground with heads touching the ground, and well, I had never done such a thing, in fact, I had been taught very strongly in my religion of origin to not bow down to graven images or idols,

[16:59]

and I was pretty concerned about what I had gotten myself into. Now another friend of mine, when this happened, same thing kind of happened, she was surprised, but then she thought, oh good, calisthenics, I like to do this. So I asked somebody after the service, I went right up to the head of the practice and said, what is this bowing down to these images? I don't know if I can do that. And they said, oh, that's just honoring your own true Self. And I thought, oh, well, that's what I'm here for, that's what I want to do, fine, that's okay with me. I can do that. And ever since, in bowing, which comes up in many ceremonies, regular everyday daily services and other kinds of ceremonies, and today before the pageant we'll have a traditional ceremony

[18:05]

marking the birth of the Buddha, and in that ceremony there'll be, there's an altar set up with offerings of light and fruit, and there'll be food offerings and sweet tea and water and incense and our voices in chanting, and there'll also be full bows that will be made by the leader of the ceremony, the officiating priest, which will be me. So don't concern yourself about a thing, don't worry about a thing. The whole, this elaborate, someone recently said they were a little embarrassed that we do this ceremony in front of all these people that don't necessarily know what it's about and don't actually care and maybe misunderstand what it is.

[19:07]

It's an uninitiated group, you might say, or it's a combination of tadpoles and frogs, meaning people new to practice and new to this kind of ceremony or service and people who have been doing these kinds of ceremonies for many, many years and appreciate this expression of gratitude and devotion. So it's a very, it's a combined group today. So when you see full bows to these figures, you may just call up a mind, this is a way of expressing our gratitude for our own true nature, which is not different than Buddha nature, which is in fact sentient beings or human beings, sentient beings, and Buddha's, the teaching is that they're not two. So what the Buddha discovered through his life,

[20:11]

and we just are celebrating the birth, but there followed many years of being very well taken care of as a young man, baby and a young man. Very good mothering from his, his mother died, actually Queen Maya died about seven days after he was born and his foster mother, who was also his father's second wife, so it was a combination of his and his mother's sister, so it was foster mother and aunt and stepmother all rolled into one. He was very carefully taken care of, very well mothered and fathered and parented and saw, even though he was so well taken care of, he actually realized there was something missing, there was something left that he needed to settle for himself. He had everything materially that one could want

[21:14]

and still there was a vague unrest and that grew to realizing that if there's old age and sickness and death and lamentation and grief in the world, it's not going to help me to have material goods only and even though I have a wonderful family and wife and child and still I have to settle something deep inside, which is why he set off eventually on his quest of the truth and he practiced austerities and found out that those were not, those wouldn't take care of this longing and so he had both full material sensual exploration and the exploration of austerities

[22:16]

and then decided on practicing in a balanced way, the middle way, and began to take good care of himself again, ate some good food and then sat in meditation and that statue of him shows him after he'd been sitting for quite a while and had made a vow to not get up until he understood in a very simple way what needs to be understood and once he understood and was enlightened, then after some encouragement went on to teach for 40 years or so other people. So what he found out was that marvelous, marvelous all beings throughout the entire universe are completely and thoroughly enlightened, completely and thoroughly are awakened.

[23:17]

The word Buddha, the root of the word Buddha means to awaken, so Buddha is the awakened one and his awakening was that all beings are also thoroughly awakened except for the clouds and the coverings of our delusions. We usually don't understand this, so this was one of his most basic teachings. So when we do this vow, when we do these vows and make these offerings and celebrate the birth, the celebration is our celebration too, the celebration of our own birthright, which is to be the awakened one. And I think this celebration, it's our celebration. Now the translation of the word Buddha in Tibetan means purified and fulfilled,

[24:25]

a term that means purified and fulfilled, so it's a little bit different from that Sanskrit, awakened. So what does that mean to be purified and fulfilled? Purified from what and fulfilled how? So the purification has to do with being purified of our ignorance or delusion about the way things are, about the actual way life is and through wisdom, which is Manjushri sitting on the altar over there, the Bodhisattva of Wisdom, the ignorance was dispelled, but that's not enough. The fulfilling of that wisdom is to help other beings, to have compassion for other beings and help them to understand as well.

[25:27]

This is fulfilling that, because one doesn't feel filled or fulfilled to just understand all by yourself alone. We actually want to have those that we love and care about understand as well and be free from our suffering and lamentation and grief and pain. So wisdom and compassion is being fulfilled and purified, purified and fulfilled is wisdom and compassion. Now I wanted to mention the three bodies of Buddha. So we have this Shakyamuni Buddha that we've been talking about and that we're celebrating today and sometimes there's a teaching

[26:29]

called the Three Bodies of Buddha or the word for body is kaya. So there's the Dharmakaya or the truth body and the Sambhogakaya or the enjoyment body and the Nirmanakaya or the emanation body or the transformational body. So the Dharmakaya is this truth body, the law or the truth of the way things are is Dharmakaya and the Buddha can be understood as not just Shakyamuni Buddha, son of Suddhodana and Mahamaya, but the truth body. By understanding the truth you become purified of ignorance and operate in the world or act in the world based on the truth rather than based on delusion or misconception or ignorance.

[27:33]

So one becomes truth body, but it's also the Dharma itself, the teachings themselves as the truth body of the Buddha. When someone is born into the world as an emanation of truth body they're called the Nirmanakaya and that's the ordinary person that appears is the Nirmanakaya and myriads of Nirmanakayas have come down through the ages, all the different teachers and Zen masters and enlightened beings of the world are thought of as Nirmanakaya or emanation bodies having the Dharmakaya or truth body actually come forth in form. And another of the form bodies, the word for form is Rupa or Rupakaya,

[28:40]

so you have Dharmakaya and Rupakaya and the two kinds of Rupakaya, two form bodies are this Nirmanakaya and Sambhogakaya. So the Sambhogakaya is enjoyment body and maybe this one is sometimes harder to understand, but when we make figures like these figures that are here, Jizo Bodhisattva and Tara Buddha and Shakyamuni Buddha and Manjushri, these are thought of as Sambhogakaya or enjoyment bodies, they're like idealized, it would be hard perhaps to see a being that looks like these particular figures, they're idealized and they contain what are called the 32 marks of a Buddha, there's wheels of the law on their hands and feet and their ears, they have all these different marks, their earlobes are very, very long and they have, like Manjushri has, or the Buddha has this top knot

[29:44]

on top of his head and sometimes a circle of hair that twirls clockwise in the center of the forehead, all these various particulars that are used in icons or used in making figures, these are part of the Sambhogakaya or enjoyment body or idealized, it's a collective understanding of the enjoyment body, but you wouldn't see someone walking around necessarily with a bump on the top of their head like that or you might be very worried about them. So this is a way that artists and people all through the ages have depicted these energies of compassion and wisdom and awakenedness. So the three bodies of Buddha, Dharmakaya, Sambhogakaya and Nirmanakaya,

[30:50]

and they're all one really, they're all one, these are different aspects of Buddha body. So the Sambhogakaya is also sometimes expressed as embodied in speech, in words and thoughts and on the level of ideas. So I feel like the pageant that we're about to see and the ceremony that we're about to do is part of our celebration of Sambhogakaya Buddha as well, as well as the Nirmanakaya Buddha, the actual birth of Buddha and the birth then of all the teachings that have come down to us and that we can partake of. So it's the triple body of Buddha that's being celebrated.

[31:55]

So traditionally we talk a little bit about what the ceremony is and what your participation is, so I'd like to do that now. After we leave the Zendo, we'll go out on the lawn and there's a circle, a designated circle, and people can take their place around the circle and once everyone is settled, then the children will start the ceremony by circumambulating the Buddha and setting up big parasols that delineate the space further and will strew flowers from a little cart and then the procession will come in and go to the altar and chant cards will be passed out. We'll be chanting the Heart Sutra, the Heart of Perfect Wisdom Sutra and before that sutra is chanted, we will make offerings of incense and light and flowers

[33:05]

and offering cups of sweet water, sweet tea and rice and there's also food offerings on the altar already and bows will be made and then we'll chant the Heart Sutra and everyone please join in and the traditional chanting is done with your ears. We say chant with your ears. Now usually we chant and we know that we chant using our mouths but listen to the people next to you and across the circle from you. Try to listen to each other so that we can all stay together. It's hard to chant outside because we lose each other but chant using your ears and then after the chant is completed, we will circumambulate which is a traditional practice keeping our right shoulders towards the Buddha. So that's a clockwise motion going around the altar

[34:05]

and this is a very old practice keeping in the Buddha's time and in hot countries the Buddhist monks and nuns wear their right shoulders bare and just like our robes are not over the right shoulder but we don't in Northern California especially we don't have bare shouldered robes. We wear under robes for warmth and in other countries as well the arms are covered but the robe is over the left shoulder so the right shoulder stays towards the Buddha and you will be circling around doing this chant which is Om Namo Shakyamuni Buddha and Om is kind of like homage. So do you want to say that after me? Om Namo Shakyamuni Buddha

[35:06]

Om Namo Shakyamuni Buddha and there will be a drum that will keep the beat and so it's difficult sometimes to circumambulate with such a large group of people but if everyone just turns and begins walking all at once we can do that. So we'll circumambulate however many times it takes and I'm not exactly sure if we'll all get around more than once or not depending on how fast we're moving and then it's traditional to bathe the baby Buddha there's another little altar under a pagoda of flowers because these mandarva flowers came floating out of the sky when the baby stood up after he was born and so we have made a pagoda of flowers, a decorated pagoda and the little baby Buddha is standing up with one hand pointing to the heavens and one to the earth

[36:10]

where he stated, I alone in the world honor one and it's traditional to bathe the baby Buddha because this hot and cold water came out of the sky and came down and bathed him so we reenact that and each person can do that but we won't do that during this first part of the ceremony and during the circumambulation. We'll have the pagoda set up to the side so all during the rest of the day it'll be there and you can go over and there's a little scooper there and you can pour the water over the baby Buddha to reenact what happened. And then following the circumambulation with the drum there'll be a dedication dedicating all the awareness and effort and energy that we've gathered together by doing this ceremony and that will be dedicated to all beings in all ten directions.

[37:14]

So we don't keep any of that positive energy for ourselves, we give it away. So always after we do a ceremony we give the merit of it or give this wonderful positive energy, give it away. So we'll be giving it away so you don't have to worry that you're accumulating any merit or something that might then be lost later. You don't have to worry, it's all given away to all beings. And I think following the ceremony then we will settle down on our picnic blankets and the pageant will begin soon thereafter and then hopefully you've brought picnic lunches and there's also birthday cake and lemonade that will be available during the morning and afternoon. And please enjoy yourselves today on this beautiful spring day. And have I left anything out?

[38:21]

Thank you very much. May I?

[38:32]

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