This podcast is offered by the San Francisco Zen Center on the web at www.sfzc.org. Our public programs are made possible by donations from people like you. Good evening. Hi, my name is Greg Fang, and I'm the Tanto, or head of practice, here at Tazahara. I'm very happy to be talking to you tonight. Welcome, everyone. I'd like to begin by thanking and acknowledging my teacher, Sojin Mel Weitzman, Sojin Roshi, who was just here, just left this morning. It's so lovely to have him here. And to say that My talk is just to encourage you in your practice.

[01:02]

Nothing more. It's not cold. If only we could get the crickets to beat their little wings a little faster. Maybe we get a breeze going in here. I'd like to start with one of those little Zen stories. You might call it a koan. I guess you could. It's one of those Zen stories from the mists of antiquity, from Tang Dynasty China, the early ninth century. Before there were any schools of Zen, there was just monks practicing in the mountains.

[02:05]

Most of them knew each other. So I don't know if you call this a koan or not. Maybe I call it a love story. It's a story about Bai Zhang, Master Bai Zhang, and his student Huang Bo. Huang Bo is an interesting guy. He was Lin Ji's teacher. Lin Ji and... His descendants is where we get the Rinzai school of Zen. It survived today in Japan, the Rinzai school. And this is what we claim to be practicing at Tassahara, is the Soto school. So Huangbo was Baijiang's disciple and Huangbo was Linji's teacher. We don't know a whole lot about him, actually. Except that apparently he was, what's remembered so many centuries later, it's interesting, is he was very physically imposing and he had a huge forehead.

[03:15]

Wombo was famous for having a big, protruding forehead. And they called him Large Pearl because his forehead stuck out like that. And this is a story about what may or may not be Wang Bo's initial encounter with Bai Zhang. Wang Bo asks Bai Zhang a very disingenuous question. He says, how can we explain the teaching that has been handed down? just remained seated in silence. Like that, you know? So maybe Huangbo took a few seconds to take that in, and then he says, if so, what will people in the future receive?

[04:29]

that's it. What will people in the future receive? And Bai Zhang says, they will say that you are a true person. And then Bai Zhang returned to the abbot's room. I'm just going to leave that for now. I'm going to get back to it. It's been a very interesting week at Tassajara. I think we can all agree. Thank you, guests. Thanks for coming back. We missed you.

[05:33]

yeah, we had this little fire in the neighborhood. Did you hear? They named a fire after us. So what's the nearest thing? A Tassajara. Well, we'll call it the Tassajara fire. Huh. A dubious honor. So yeah, that happened. That happened last weekend. Actually, a week ago. Fire started precisely a week ago on a Wednesday. You know, I don't want to talk about the fire tonight. I think we're going to talk about it some in the community meeting we'll be having day after tomorrow for just the residents. We'll probably talk about the fire some. But I will say that for me... I kind of appreciated the fire in one way as a lens through which to see the practice at Tassahara this summer.

[06:49]

And I liked what I saw. All the crews were so well-trained and responded so calmly and appropriately. And the fire marshal put on the fire marshal hat, literally. And our interactions with CAL FIRE and the Forest Service were all friendly and helpful, as far as I could tell. And everyone seemed to me went to a lot of care to be kind to each other and to be kind to and look out for the welfare of the guests. And everyone just did what they were supposed to do, and then some. And they found other ways that maybe weren't in your firefighting crew's description, but were other ways to help.

[07:59]

That happened, too. So it was quite wonderful. So that's my little bit about that. Now I don't have to say it in the community meeting. And then another very unusual occurrence in Tassahara was last Sunday night. We had a priest ordination. We say in the Zen, in the Japanese, the name of that ceremony is Shuke Tokudo. And that means leaving home and attaining the way. A ceremony of home leaving. And that's ordaining someone as a Zen Buddhist priest. We don't usually do that at Tassajara, although it has happened. Usually those happen at Green Gulch or City Center. And it so happens that we did one last Sunday,

[09:04]

I ordained Curtis Favins as a priest in our order, and we're going to do another one three weeks from tonight. We're going to ordain Allison. Allison is going to ordain with her teacher Norman Fisher on August 14th. So I think I'd like to talk a little bit about that. If you were here Sunday night, you might have noticed it's kind of a big deal. There was a lot to it. There was a lot of detail. There was a lot of ceremony. There was a lot of stuff. Yeah. Shakyamuni Buddha said to Mahakasyapa, his erstwhile

[10:06]

wild yogi friend and dharma heir to be. He said, come, monk. And Makshapa's hair and beard fell out. And an okesa came flying out of the sky and wrapped itself around his body. As you can see, it's gotten a lot more complicated since then. Yeah. So I wanted to call my talk, what does it mean to be an American Soto Zen priest, and why the heck would anyone want to do that? Now, a lot of you know, that was the title of Allison's Class. So I stole... title but I liked it so much and she said she didn't mind I can't claim to say I can't claim to have the same command of the material that Allison did but still I really liked that title so what does it mean to be an American Soto Zen priest there's really only one possible answer nobody knows

[11:34]

And my teacher, Sojin Roshi, was ordained by Suzuki Roshi. Actually, Suzuki Roshi invited him. Suzuki Roshi said, I'd like you to join our order. And, of course, Mel loved Suzuki Roshi very much, and he said, yes. And so they had a very... small, intimate tokido ceremony in the attic of the house in Dwight Way, the original Berkeley Zen Center. You can show you a picture sometime if you like. Yeah, it was a very intimate affair. And, you know, after it was over, Mel said to Suzuki Roshi famously, okay, so now I'm a priest, now what do I do? And Sizuki Roshi said, I don't know.

[12:41]

And Kategori Roshi, well, Kategori sensei at the time, Dainian Kategori, another Japanese teacher, was there, you know, and I think just a little while later, Mel asked him. He said, so, I'm a priest now. What does that mean? category says, I don't know. And, you know, I don't think they were kidding. I don't think they were playing with Mel. I think they really didn't know. As Allison pointed out in her class, in Japan, there's very clear social, societal, institutional issues sort of normative kind of expectations and roles for priests, sort of them priests.

[13:48]

It's very clear-cut. Well, it's mostly clear-cut. A lot better than here. So chances are, you know, they really didn't know. I don't know. Kategori Roshi said... on a different occasion, he said that bringing Japanese Soto Zen to America was like holding a cut flower against the side of a rock and expecting it to take root. I have my own story which some of you may have heard before because I really like it but it is relevant to the talk so if you've heard it before please bear with me and it's about my own process of asking to ordain and becoming a priest I think I first

[15:16]

the notion, maybe that was something I wanted to do in the late 90s, and I talked to Mel about that in Dokusan. I remember the conversation very clearly. By the way, if you've never seen Mel's Dokusan hut at Berkeley Zen Center, you owe it to yourself to check it out sometime. Even if you don't have Doka-san with Mel, just ask someone if you can have a peek inside the hut. It's pretty cool. Anyway, I said, I think I'd like to ordain. I think maybe I should be a priest. And he said, what are you talking about? He had this big reaction like, are you nuts? What do you want to do that for? Just put that idea out of your mind.

[16:19]

Forget about it. Your life is really great. At the time, I had a nice career and nice, yeah, everything. My life was quite good. He liked that. I really fit into the kind of Berkeley Zen Center is mostly lay practice, professional people and so forth. Not all professionals. It goes across classes. But anyway, he liked my practice the way it was. He said, what do you want to be a priest for? Anyway, with quite a bit of energy, he totally poo-pooed the notion. Just forget about it. Just put that idea out of your head. Don't go there. So I said, okay. I'm going to be a good student. All right, Mel. Fine. And it wasn't much later.

[17:24]

And I was trying to remember what year it was, but I can't. But it was sometime in the late 90s. And it so happened that Aiken Roshi, Robert Aiken Roshi, came to the Bay Area to give a talk about he gave a talk at Jerry Brown's place. Jerry Brown used to have this place in Oakland. He called We the People. And it was like this big warehouse, live, work, kind of community center slash commune slash political activism. Does anyone know what I'm talking about? Anybody here remember that? No. Jerry Brown, both the youngest, and the oldest governor of California. Anyway, this was between those two sense of being governor. And he, I guess, invited Aiken Roshi, or anyway, it seemed like a good venue for him.

[18:33]

I'd never been there before. I found it interesting. But, of course, I wanted to see Aiken Roshi. And the other thing I'm not clear about, but I think it might have been the last time he came to the mainland. I think it was maybe the last time in Aiken Roshi's life that he had left Hawaii and came to the mainland. And he gave a talk that was kind of a, well, young people today would call it a mash-up. This is kind of a synthesis of five or six talks or essays that he'd written. And part of it was he talked about the irrelevance of the priesthood, how it didn't matter. It had no relevance for modern American society. It was not relevant to modern Zen practice.

[19:33]

It was a vestige from Japan that didn't have any bearing or meaning to real practice in I don't want to put words in Aiken Roshi's mouth, but that was the gist of it. That's what I got out of it. Tear down the monastery walls, I remember him saying. It's not significant. It's not important. So I was like, oh, okay, cool. So then next time I had Dogasan with Mel, I was like, hey, okay, I got it. I understand now. I went to hear Aiken Roshi talk, and he was talking about tear down the monastery walls. Priesthood's not important. We don't need that. It's just a vestige of the past. And Mel's like, what are you talking about? There have to be priests. I didn't know what to make of that. That was a big koan for me. You have the same energy both ways.

[20:36]

So yeah, I practiced with that for a while. I didn't think at the time to ask him why, but it's something I've been thinking about since. When Tia Strozer was here, I had a nice talk with her about it because I was getting ready to ordain Curtis and it was very much on my mind. And Tia said something I liked a lot. which was that for her, the relationship of priest to practice, she sees as relationship to Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha, the triple treasure. Buddha, meaning priest, exemplifies practice.

[21:43]

Priest, Zen priest, Their zazen, Zen practice, is the core of their life. You don't have to be a priest to have that happen, but for a priest, it's paramount. It's absolutely fundamental. And Dharma, the priest teaches the Dharma and upholds the precepts. and practices that. In Sangha, a priest serves. A priest serves the Sangha. A priest embodies the forms of our practice, the ancient forms of our practice, how to sit, stand, walk, and lie down, how to behave. And these forms are...

[22:45]

an expression of presence and a mirror for the self. They're very helpful. At any rate, some people find them very helpful. And more obviously, you know, priests officiate services, takes care of the sangha, performs memorial services and weddings and baby welcoming ceremonies and Similar. So, I mean, anyone can have a commitment to serve Buddha, Dharma and Sangha. I'm not saying you have to be a priest to do that. I am saying that it is a unique and time-honored way of doing that. And maybe a way that's uniquely set up for humility, actually.

[23:51]

A priest never takes authority. Kind of can't. Kind of can't. A Zen priest, at any rate, never says, oh, I'm a teacher now. It doesn't work that way. Or, I'm ordaining myself now. No. Does not work that way. So, priests cannot take authority. They can merely accept it. Accept it with humility. Another thing I did last week was on... Saturday, the 20th, actually the day before Curtis's ordination, Ryan and I went to New Commodity Hermitage with the brothers, and we went there for a special ceremony of installation, their new prior, Father Cyprian.

[25:04]

Father Cyprian became the young prior of New Commodity. He's like... Fifty? Fifty-five. A very young 55. But when you consider the average age of the brothers, the average age is 70. He's their new young prior. A great guy. And his homily was amazing. And in his homily, his sermon that he delivered, he talked about all life being one body. All life is one body. and there are different parts of the body that perform different functions, and that it's actually necessary to have contemplatives. It's necessary to have renunciates, that these people serve a specific function within the great body that we call all humanity.

[26:07]

In the human body, most parts are moving, most things are doing something. It's nice that something is still and quiet. I thought that was a lovely way of expressing how I feel about the practice of a Soto Zen priest or a Soto Zen monk. Again, you don't have to do the ceremony of Shukai Tokudo to do that. But it might be a help. It might be a help. The word shuke meaning home leaving, you know, when a Japanese family sends a young man off to, usually man, it could be woman, but they send them off to the training monastery. Tradition is they say, don't come back.

[27:13]

Now, they're not saying they never want to see their kid again, but they mean don't come back the same person. Don't come back bound by the same karmic conditions, the same relationship to family society that you had before you left. Be changed. Be transformed utterly. Sojan Roshi said, when push comes to shove, you remain a priest. A priest is bound by your vows. So I myself am not a San Francisco Zen Center priest.

[28:28]

It's funny for me to say that because I've been practicing in San Francisco Zen Center for a long time now, 13 years. But I was actually ordained at Berkeley Zen Center. So strictly speaking, I'm not a San Francisco Zen Center priest. And I guess I definitely feel like one now. You know, I live here and I'm a teacher in San Francisco Zen Center and Curtis most definitely is a San Francisco Zen Center priest. And I guess, you know, this is pretty much the largest expression of Soto Zen around in North America, so far as I know. And it's not a huge institution. We're not a megachurch. But it's not so small either.

[29:30]

And I feel like I stepped into this pretty well-established thing. It's pretty well set up. We're not the Sotoshu like they have in Japan, which is like really, really, really big institution. But... I have felt like, well, this is an established thing. I know what the expectations are. I know what the parameters are, I think. And then in April of last year, 2012, Linda and I both did the ceremony of Shiho, Dharma Transmission, with Mel here. And we joined the Soto Zen Buddhist Association, which is not trying to be the Soto Shu of North America, but it is an organization of Soto Zen priests across lineages in North America.

[30:36]

And that was eye-opening for me. Actually, I was already an associate member, but Lynn and I went to the... a meeting that happens every two years. There's a meeting and they do this ceremony called the Dharma Heritage Ceremony which is acknowledgement by your peers for new teachers. So we did that ceremony. It was very moving. It was very meaningful. These are our peers. These are the people that I'm relating to as teachers of Soto Zen in North America and my support my network, my sangha, people that I can rely on to keep me in line, and people that are slowly but surely working on some standards, working on having some agreed-upon basis of practice, ethics, and training.

[31:40]

But boy, did I ever realize at that time it's so not San Francisco's Zen Center. it's really early days. It's really early days. It's a lot like Tang Dynasty China, maybe. Being at Great Vow Monastery in October 2012 with all these people from a lot of small groups all across North America, some lineages that are like, you know, there are so many teachers in Suzuki Roshi lineage, and there's some that are just like, you know, teacher of, teacher of, teacher of, and this person. Very interesting. It's really early days. It's pioneer days. Maybe it's a lot like Tang Dynasty China. So getting back to this koan, Bai Zhang just sitting there. Sure, that's the ultimate.

[32:42]

Maybe he sort of... did this kind of thing that you do when the interval bell rings, you know, kind of like that. You ever notice when you're in a class or you're sitting in a chair in the Dharma talk and it comes to the end and we do, we chant the immeasurable vows and if you're sitting there with your legs crossed, you kind of have to uncross your legs and sit upright. You ever notice that? I have. Bai Zhang just sits there, right? But Huangbo, he's not settling for that. He's like, well, what about? What about? Another translation is, how can I teach the sons and grandsons of disciples in the future? What will people in the future receive? This is an expression of his care, of his concern, of his love.

[33:45]

The ceremony of home leaving is one way of expressing that. One way of saying, this is what I'm doing with my life, this is what I care about. This is the tradition I want to carry forward. And this is how I'm going to express it. So, I thank you for your attention. I spoke longer than I expected to, actually. I was going to try to leave some time for a question or two, well there's time for a question or two maybe more than one or two but I seem to have spoken too long sorry anybody want to ask anything about any of that or the ceremony or anything else well in that case I didn't talk too long oh yeah hi Jared Yeah, sure.

[34:57]

Yeah, I think afraid is an adequate word. There's fear of the unknown, you know? But there's also joy of unknown. I had this quote here from Lou Richman who wrote this article for the Zen Center publication Wind Bell in 2005. And he says, once when Suzuki Roshi was asked what it meant to be a priest in America, he replied, I don't know. We must all concur. At the moment we are, we might say, in the Wild West phase of Soto Zen in America. There is some discomfort in this situation, perhaps, but we also ought to find a way to enjoy it.

[36:00]

So, you know, fear on one hand and enjoyment on the other hand. Woo-hoo! In a hundred years, if Buddhism has survived and prospered here, people will imagine that they do know what it means to be a priest. and then they will have a different kind of problem. Until then, let us, in the spirit of Zen's early Chinese founders, remain flexible, creative, and open-minded. Who knows what might happen? Yes. Okay, there you have it.

[37:26]

I'll invite you, but you all gotta go at once. En masse. Well, I'm out of time. And it's quite hot. So we're gonna call it a night. Thank you very much for your kind attention. May your practice thrive. May we all know peace, love, and contentment. Thank you. Good night. Thank you for listening to this podcast offered by the San Francisco Zen Center. Our Dharma talks are offered free of charge, and this is made possible by the donations we receive. Your financial support helps us to continue to offer the Dharma. For more information, visit SSCC.org and click giving.

[38:25]

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