So today I would like to talk about home leaving. Can everybody hear me? Okay. As most of you know, for the last three months, I was at Tassahara in the Ventana wilderness and participated in the practice period in a 90-day retreat over there. And to participate in a practice spirit at Tazahara, as many of you know very well, means to completely follow the schedule. To sit zazen, eat formally in the zendo, and do all the scheduled events. And everybody is wearing robes most of the time, and priests shave their heads. And it is kind of a leaving home time.

[01:06]

It is leaving familiar patterns and rhythms of everyday life behind. And it is leaving familiarity on many levels to open up to what can't be known by the way we usually know things. So it is actually a wonderful opportunity of waking up together. And I would say learning a different body and the mind will follow and learning a different mind and the body will follow both ways. So before I go further into talking about leaving and saying goodbye and leaving home, I would like to just quote a poem by Naomi Shiabnai, Adios.

[02:11]

Adios. Adios is a good word, rolling off the tongue, no matter what language you were born with. Use it. Learn where it begins, the small alphabet of departure. How long it takes to think of it, then say it, then be heard. Think of things that disappear. Think of what you love best, what brings tears into your eyes. that said ideas to you before you knew what it meant or how long it was for something that said ideas to you before you knew what it meant and or how long it was for so leaving home

[03:22]

is practicing to let go of how we learn to live, how we learn to experience the world, how we learn to love, how we learn to see things. It is also leaving the material home and our attachments to our lifestyle. So leaving home is not to run away from the shadows of our past, or escape the painful family history that we carry with us, but rather shifting to a perspective where we can see the formations of this history, where we can see how we hold on to our own suffering because this is what we know best, and it seems to be uncomfortable to be in the unknown. It is going nowhere. Leaving home has many levels and feels like an ongoing process.

[04:27]

Every period of zazen and... I can't look to that side. Every period of zazen and every moment of presence can be leaving home. And when I say a moment of presence, I mean a moment where we don't carry anything with us from the last one, but just be with what we experience. And to make a strong or a radical physical change is a great opportunity or a skillful meaning to leave home. or to facilitate home leaving. When I first decided to leave Germany, to leave my family, my friends, my language, my job, to participate in the first practice period at Green Gulch, which means in a life that I had no idea about, I felt actually quite heroic.

[05:49]

And it gave me, it supported some enthusiasm and courage to just jump into the so-called new life. To sell most of my belongings and quit my job and to say goodbye to everybody was like I was losing some weight. throwing off the ballast when you go with a hot air balloon. You have to throw out the ballast to be able to leave the ground. So when I first left, my questions were around, do I really need this to live with for my life? Can I leave this behind? And then it it turned more to the question what is actually really important in this life.

[06:57]

And when I left for Tassahara at the beginning of this year to become the Shuso, which means the head monk for the practice spirit, my idea was actually that I would rather come home because I thought I was quite familiar with the practice. and the life at Tassajara because I'd done eight practice spirits before. But then it turned out that I had actually no idea and that I was really frightened when I first came because I just didn't know what I was supposed to be, what this Chisot thing meant. Actually, I didn't know really what to do, so the only thing that came to mind, well, follow the schedule. And so that's what I did.

[08:02]

And on the first morning, I had to ring the wake-up bell. And on the second day, I started to clean the toilets. And then my Benji started to kind of herd me into the ceremonies and things that I had to do during the day. Pretty soon I had my entering ceremony, and then people started to call out, and they would see me. So it was kind of unavoidable to just become more and more this kind of public case. which actually the Chisot, there's no hiding. It's just be who you are. Everybody knows it anyway. You're kind of up front there. And everybody interacts with you and calls you forth and supports you.

[09:09]

And it's an enormous flood of goodwill and well-wishing and supporting what the Chisot is doing. So... to this Chusot place brought up another kind of questions more like what is it to meet everybody and meet everybody without having an idea or know who you're meeting and also what is it to support everybody's practice and What is it to be home with everybody? What is kindness? Maybe I have to make a little break.

[10:09]

I have to excuse myself that I'm reading so much because this afternoon I didn't have much time to really get ready for this talk. So please bear with me. I would like to bring in the story of Shakyamuni Buddha. I think the home reading of Shakyamuni Buddha is one of the archetypal stories that have impregnated the different lineages of Buddhism for the last 2,600 years. So I will just briefly summarize the story. Siddhartha Gautama grew up as a son of the Shakyat clan, one of the noble families around Kapila Vastu in the footholds of the Himalayas. He grew up with the education of a noble son and his father tried to shelter him from the experience of human suffering and distract him

[11:23]

with the comfort of the pleasure palace. Despite all precautions, Siddhartha would leave the palace several times and discovered old age, sickness and death as the predicaments of life that nobody is able to evade. He also encountered a monk who seemed to be peaceful and free from worldly clutter. So he left the family, his wife and son, at the dark of night, they say. And at this historical moment in India, it was quite common for people, for young men mostly, and for a few women who wished to live the life of a homeless person, that they would leave the family and status and become mendicants.

[12:25]

They would shave their head and wear robes out of rags and have a bagging bowl to bag for their food. Now we live in a very different socio-historical context and cultural tradition. Family lifestyle in the Western... society has become fragmented, and many of us have long left our home when we decide to shift our life and make a commitment to practice and to follow the precepts. We also don't live in a caste system, but our hierarchical system of social separation of race, gender, or class or sexual orientation, I think has certainly an influence in our definition of home leaving, or each one's home leaving.

[13:32]

Also, homelessness in our society has a different symbolic meaning and is mostly not associated with a decision. to live the life of an ascetic or choose homelessness to let go of attachments. So that is one kind of difference. Then our understanding in this particular tradition of the Sotizen lineage, I would bring up in the Soto Zen lineage, we have a distinction between lay initiation and priest initiation. And the ceremony for the priest initiation is actually called Shukatakudo, which means leaving family life, attain the way.

[14:41]

which in a strict sense is actually the ordination of a monk who lives without a family. And certainly at Dogen's times in the 13th century, most Buddhist monks in Japan and monks ordained in this lineage were not married. Dogen, the founder of our lineage, wrote a farcical called Shukukukuro. I don't know if I pronounce this right. It could be translated the merit of leaving family life or the merit of leaving home. In this classical, Dogen quotes a discussion between the Brahmins of the Yambu Kadaka world and Shariputra, the wise disciple of the Buddha. And the question is around, What is most difficult or what is the most difficult thing in the Buddha Dharma?

[15:49]

And Shariputra answers. And it is interesting, I found two completely different translations of the answer. One translation says, leaving family is most difficult. Leaving family is most difficult. And the other translation says, being a householder is most difficult. So the difficulty in both cases is to have inner comfort or to enjoy the very life that we find ourselves in. Leaving home and being a householder are two different stories to practice with. Our stories to imagine, our stories and images around home leaving and being a householder are influenced by our Japanese heritage as much as our own cultural background.

[16:59]

And just briefly around the change of the Japanese situation. At the end of the 19th century, during the Meiji era, the Japanese government withdrew from enforcement of the precepts. So before that, it was actually part of the government's power to enforce the Buddhist precepts. And they... came up with a law that is quoted under Eat Meat and Marry, which obviously had the trajectory of this was somehow to weaken the power of the Buddhist temples. And then along very controversial process between

[18:08]

both sides, or however you want to frame it, or actually several different sides in this development, the clergy actually slowly adjusted or assimilated to the lifestyle of their congregations. And today the vast majority of Buddhist priests in Japan live a householder life. And often the temple is passed on from father to son. I cannot go into further intricacies on this kind of ordination situation. And I think that we are still a very young offspring of the long Japanese tradition. And that we have to define and develop our way of understanding and honoring the distinction between householder and home leaver or the distinction between lay and priest ordination.

[19:24]

I only can say that presently at San Francisco Zen Center, most priests seem to be. both in one person. So to understand the dimension of the change in the tradition, I wanted to just bring a few more words in from the Dogen fascicle. Or it could also be from his editor, Kuan Ejo. This fascicle is actually dated... 1255. And as we know, Dogen died in 53, but it is known as a fascicle by Dogen. But there might be some editing have been going on. So Dogen points out in this way, know that those who have left the household,

[20:36]

Even if they break the precepts, excel householders who maintain the precepts. And following Dogen's comments there, it is clear that there is an advantage in leaving home to attain the way. He says, not even one of the Buddhas of past, present and future in the Ten Directions became a Buddha as a householder. Because there were Buddhas in the past, there is merit of leaving the household and receiving the precepts. The attainment of the way by saints and beings invariably depends on their leaving the household and receiving the precepts. Although there is a teaching of a lay person becoming a Buddha in scriptures, It is not an authentic transmission.

[21:38]

Although there is a teaching of a woman becoming a Buddha without leaving the household, it is not an authentic transmission. What is authentically transmitted by Buddha ancestors is leaving the household and becoming a Buddha. It seems I find myself in a difficult situation here, trying to give a dharma talk with the confused mind and body of a woman householder and priest. I read this text as a story. The story is about many things, and it is also about an authentic transmission of the teaching of the Buddha that defines... its authenticity by excluding women and lay people. What is the intention of a definition like this? What is the karmic effect of a text like this?

[22:42]

What is my experience reading this text? My experience reading this is disappointment. Same old story. Why should he, whoever he was, think outside his cultural heritage? Second feeling is insecurity. Can this tradition be right? Can this translation be right? Can I quote it? This experience is part of my home leaving in trying to understand my vows and the tradition I'm practicing in. As a priest, we make the vow to give up our nest, our delusion of home, to live and be lived for the benefit of all beings. It is at the same time a vow to come home with everybody.

[23:45]

Home can only be home if it is shared with all living beings. Right now, this seems to be a tall order at a time of accelerated extinction of species on this planet and the perspective of devastating consequences of change in climate caused mostly by the way of life of a minority of people in the richest countries of the world. I consider the metaphor of leaving home, or home leaving, have a skillful device to look at what we imagine as our home, the elaborate narrative about our place in this world, our idea of security, of identity, the brand names that we think are not suspendable. And the only possibility to come home with everybody is to be here in this body now.

[24:53]

If that is possible, every spot can be home and a sanctuary. And I'm coming to the end of my talk, and I would like to read the case four of the Book of Serenity. As the World Honored One was walking with a congregation, he pointed to the ground with his finger and said, This spot is good to build a sanctuary. Indra, emperor of the gods, took a blade of grass, stuck it in the ground and said, the sanctuary is built. The world on it won, smiled. The boundless spring of the hundred plants, picking up what comes to hand, he uses it knowingly. the 16-foot-tall golden body, a collection of virtuous qualities, casually leads him by the hand into the red dust.

[26:04]

Able to be master in the dusts, from outside creation, a guest shows up. Everywhere, life is sufficient in its way, no matter if one is not as clever as others. Thank you for listening. And now you can ask questions. Yes, Michael. So you talk about home leaving and coming home. What's the difference between leaving home and coming home? Leaving home in the way I try to unfold it a little bit.

[27:18]

Unraveling our regular karmic patterns and being. And just coming to this right here. It's coming home. Yes, Trevor. What if you leave home and then where you end up, say a particular practice or a particular temple, but that place then becomes home, do you have to leave again? I think so. Yeah, I think that's very... Kind of good reminder to keep in mind. There's not.

[28:20]

How would you tell? Maybe when I want something harder. Maybe when. When I want something harder. I think it's a good sign when you feel too comfortable. Yes? What happens when a way of thinking or a certain approach to life becomes your home? You have to do that. Well, your way of thinking usually changes, right? And then it changes again. I mean, I think it is important to look at it again and again.

[29:32]

Do you have a particular? Yeah, I think it's the path of home-leaving. You know, it's not going to a particular place, but it is to be with the permanent changing of conditions and being awake to right where you are again and again.

[30:33]

It's not, you know, you achieve a goal and then you're there, and that's home. I mean, I think that kind of shuts you down. Does that make sense? This kind of idea that you would stop waking up to the moment, you know, that this could end, this process, or that you would have an aim or, you know, a place, a defined place to go to. Yes, Molly? What if you've never had a feeling for what home is? What home means? What if you've never had a feeling for what home is?

[31:40]

Is it still meaningful then to talk about living? It seems to be quite difficult. Yeah. Yeah, I think there are certain limits too. I think you have to somehow experience, have experienced home or have some feeling about it. It's like when I think it's very difficult to practice, for example, when you are psychotic. As an example of that. Yeah.

[32:45]

Yes. Yeah, I have to think about that. Yes? No? Someone? Oh, OK. Yeah. I'm connected to my family not so closely because you know when I left I was already 40 and I

[33:52]

was kind of like it had come to a closure the big drama so um for me that that part was not so strongly family leaving it was family leaving and there is another connection now or another relationship and yeah And also from another understanding, maybe. Before I got ordained, like in 2003, I actually went home to be with my mother for six weeks. And it was quite interesting to be with her. And of course, after a very short time, we were about to kind of like get into the same kind of system of...

[34:54]

Working at each other. And then we didn't. It was very relaxing and very helpful experience for me to see that there was actually a totally different person that I actually didn't know yet. And a much older person that I also hadn't seen for a long time. So there's a connection there. Yes. I don't know where the question is in this, but sometimes it feels like we talk about, we use the word home, there's like two different connotations or something. It's like something that's like feeling at home, so like feeling in your skin, you know? And there's this freedom in that. It's like feeling in your skin, and then there's the freedom of movement, you know? And then there's this other connotation that's like

[35:55]

in habit or something that feels stuck or something. And it feels like when we talk about leaving home, it's like maybe that's the kind of home we're talking about leaving or something. But some of them feel sort of confused. It feels like there's these two connotations. And maybe one is a coming home, and one is a leaving home. Or one is the home you leave, and one is the home you come to, or something like that. But I wonder if there's And I think in some ways you cannot really separate them. And that's the difficult part. I mean, if you kind of own It's kind of an organism, you know, it's like a life situation.

[37:03]

So there is a positive experience in everything. I mean, you know, even if in a home that's completely crusted and burdened with. Dead structures, you know, it's... It brings me to the question of the beginning. I mean, home leaving and home coming is one process. And that's what I also would apply to what you said about the two... Feelings or ideas or connotations of home? Stephen?

[38:08]

When I hear home coming, it seems like ease, like finding ease where you are. And when I think of home leaving, it seems like stepping out into the unknown. Well, you could see them as movements and as, you know, like you can see I think most situations from these two perspectives, you can see a half a glass of water as half full and half empty. And that kind of like shifting.

[39:12]

And I think home leaving has something forward, moving forward or moving. out of a shell or moving out of a safe place. And coming home is also something of relaxing and giving up, which could also be open the shell. Does that make sense? Thank you. Okay. Thank you very much.

[40:06]

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