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. Thank you for that vow to taste the truth of the Tathagata's words. It's a great support to me. knowing that I'm offered that benefit of the doubt. If there are some of the Tathagata's words that squeak through here, you will hear them. And please discard the rest. I appreciate all of you being here in person. I know many of you here at Green Lodge.

[01:02]

have the so-called day off and are here anyway. So I'm moved and appreciative of that. And hello to you online, my friends online, probably all of whom have the day off and are here as so, so often, so steady, wonderful sangha. I'm sorry I can't be looking at your faces this morning. So here at Greenville, along with residents at City Center and probably many of you online as well, we've been studying the Diamond Sutra in a class offered by our Abbas Fu. Thank you for opening that gate of the Diamond Sutra for us. So there is a refrain from the Diamond Sutra that has been standing out for me as I read the Sutra again this time. And I wanted to start there and share this refrain with you and explore a little bit what that might mean for us in our practice.

[02:13]

So here's one version of the refrain as it appears early on in the sutra. The Buddha said, Sabuti, what do you think? If there were as many Ganges rivers as there are grains of sand in the Ganges, would the number of grains of sand in all those rivers be many? Sabuti said, very many indeed, world-honored one. Those Ganges rivers would indeed be many, much more so the grains of sand in them. So Bhuti, what do you think? If there were a noble person who filled a billion universes containing as many world systems as there are grains of sand in all of those Ganges rivers, with the seven precious treasures,

[03:31]

and then gave them all away out of generosity, would not this merit be very great? So that's the first part. And I want to just pause and appreciate these amazing wild sutras, the great scope of the great vehicle, the Mahayana. this cosmic vision that completely humbles us at the same time as expanding us. So a billion universes, in the strange English translation convention, the tri-chiliocosm, or the 3,000 chiliocosms, basically inconceivable vastness. So this billion-fold universe, is so immense that it fits as many world systems in it as there are grains of sand in as many Ganges rivers as there are grains of sand in our little local Ganges river.

[04:46]

So the image is to fill all of that, fill all of that space with precious treasure to give to the living beings. It's amazing. That really was a lot of treasure. And I don't know where the beings exactly would be or where they would put all of it, but there's no doubt that it would be exceedingly beneficial. Just what a marvelous, beneficial thing to do. May all of our generosity, spirit of our generosity and the actuality of our generosity be so great. Who reminded us in class of the poet Rio Khan, our Zen friend, saying to the thief, maybe as the thief was running away from his hut, saying, I wish I could give you the moon. You know, that's the same spirit of this generosity, this image of filling up these billions of worlds with precious treasure to give to you is sort of like Ryokan saying, I want to give you the moon.

[06:01]

And we might have that wish or could find that wish. I hope you can find that wish, that compassionate wish in your heart. I wish I could give you the moon. I wish I could give you the whole billion universes full of life-supporting treasure. I would long to support each being in that way. that sort of feeling of boundless compassion. So the Buddha offers this image, and then he asks Sabuti, would not this merit be very great in the merit of giving all of this treasure? So Sabuti says, ever loyal Sabuti here, says very great indeed, world-honored one. Yes, that would be an amazing gift to give.

[07:05]

And then the Buddha says, I declare to you, Subhuti, if a noble person were to accept, practice, and explain even four lines of the sutra to others, such merit would be far greater. So in these lines, the Buddha is asking us to weigh a simple, humble practice of four lines of this sutra alongside this inconceivably, immeasurably valuable and materially helpful gift. So on one side of the scale, if you can picture the balance, there's the beneficial value in this world, Of this immense material gift. And on the other side. Is this simple practice. Or even just.

[08:09]

Accept just a simple openness to. Or acceptance of the teaching. Of the perfection of wisdom. And on this scale. According to the sutra. The simple wisdom. Far outweighs the benefit. In the other basket. To living beings. So this is. crazy thing to say. It's a wild assertion and I hope that when you've read it, you pause and wonder. I think it's designed to invite us to pause and wonder and inspire or inspire us to ask ourselves, is my practice really so beneficial? What is the benefit of my practice? What is the benefit of my practice of Dazen or my study of the Buddha Dharma? Is it really good for anything? Is it really good for much? So I see in this image, in this scale, this invitation to radically revalue and more fully respect, more deeply and completely respect the benefit, the actual benefit in the world of our little practice, the benefit of our efforts in Zazen, and the benefit right now,

[09:32]

for example, in our efforts to understand the teaching. So I want to talk more about that. I'm finding that a rich area of inquiry and exploration in myself. But first, there's sort of an obvious thing happening on the surface of this sutra that maybe impedes many of us from really entering the... the gate, or really entering this question. And that's the sort of bald self-promotion of the sutra. And we find this all over the Mahayana sutras. This sutra is the best thing in the world, according to the sutra. And the sutra, page after page, seems to sometimes be saying nothing other than that this sutra is the best sutra, is the best thing ever. The image is... For me, it's like of a person who's famous not for anything, but they're just so famous.

[10:36]

Because they're famous, there's no content. You can read the Lotus Sutra, and most of the Lotus Sutra talks about how great the Lotus Sutra is. And where is the Lotus Sutra? What is it? And the Diamond Sutra also, it's just the self. And there's literally reasons, there's historical reasons for this. sort of code in the sutra that's getting it to replicate quite successfully throughout history, across continents, by saying, this thing is great, this thing is great, and so it spreads. It's like the like, like, and subscribe. If you like the sutra, tell 10 of your friends, like, and subscribe. So it's a little hard to take. You know, we open the ancient Buddhist texts and we just get all of this self-praise. So I just want to acknowledge that because it's there. And we can think that that's all I know. When I've read these sutras, I tend to just read past that.

[11:38]

But the problem is if you read past that, there's not much else there. So what I'm inviting today is to read. We can kind of stay with that and try to read under the surface of this praise of itself and see what that might be asking of us or saying to us about our own practice. So to return to the image, we have the scale, this great material gift sincerely offered to suffering beings. May you have everything you need. And on the other side of the scale, accepting, practicing, or explaining four lines of the Diamond Sutra, perfect wisdom. So in another section, the sutra makes the point maybe a little bit more clearly as to what that accepting and practicing and explaining those four lines would entail.

[12:48]

So here the sutra says, again, Subhuti, if a noble person were to fill as many world systems as there are grains of sand in the Ganges River... with the seven precious treasures and give them as a gift. And if, on the other hand, a bodhisattva were to gain the insight that all dharmas are empty and have no self-nature or essence of their own, their merit would be immeasurably and incalculably greater. So on one side, this. immeasurably great gift of material, and on the other side, just a taste, just a glimpse or a touch of this insight that all dharmas are empty, have no self-nature or essence of their own.

[13:52]

And the suggestion that just to touch the emptiness of all dharmas, that is the fundamental interconnection, the total inseparability of everything, and the freedom that every single thing has from any fixed identity or position, the freedom that our life has, the freedom that each so-called thing in our life has from any... words or names or views, that that is inconceivably beneficial in the world. So I'm moved by that claim. As I'll say more about later, I feel in that claim a great faith and a great doubt.

[15:00]

Yes, and really? Right next to each other. So that insight into emptiness might come through letting a single line of the sutra into our heart. I like this morning, for example. It could come from hearing the line from the Diamond Sutra. Your past mind cannot be grasped. your future mind cannot be grasped, and your present mind cannot be grasped. Maybe there's some insight possible if you open to that phrase, present mind cannot be grasped. I find that

[16:04]

a great relief to hear that present mind cannot be grasped. You may feel, as I have tended to feel, that I must have some failure of capacity to grasp what is happening, to grasp the present moment, to grasp my mind. So maybe I meditate. I just got to get a handle on this thing for a second. I can't get a grip. So we sit down. But we still can't get a hold of it. This is not because we are insufficiently skilled at getting a handle. It's that it has no handles. Present mind cannot be grasped. Utterly ungraspable. So the teaching is that if we would touch that ungraspability of present mind, that would, at that moment in this life, be of more benefit to suffering beings than this whole universe full of treasure.

[17:17]

Another way many of us touch this insight into emptiness is through a single breath. So if you have a breath now, you could start with this one. Exhaling all the way out. And then a little further still into the stillness and silence. Adjust. past the end of the exhalation, the calmness of mind that Suzuki Roshi talks about right there, that stillness and silence, utterly free of any words or ideas or names.

[18:29]

And we could follow that breath all the way in, bringing our life forward with form and shape and color, light and sound, appearing without foundation. And we could breathe that back out into emptiness, exhaling fully, and then some into that utter stillness and silence. Feeling that freedom from views. And the sutra says, if so, if we could touch that, there would be in the world this great benefit, so much treasure. Yes, really?

[19:34]

The faith and the doubt in that possibility. Or our contact with emptiness, our insight into emptiness, might come from this simple and beautiful practice of opening our eyes and sharing our feeling, the feeling that we have right now for being alive. Sharing that with the people, and the walls and the floor and the birds. Opening our heart in that way. And sharing in the feeling of the birds and the walls and each other. So for some of us, that insight into emptiness comes through really appreciating the interconnection, the profound togetherness between everything, totally inseparable being.

[20:47]

So I think as people who practice Zazen, sitting quietly, we know this kind of feeling, and we appreciate it. But we might not think, that is as valuable as filling a whole billion universes with precious jewels and giving them to suffering beings. I don't tend to think so. But the sutra is challenging me to reconsider that view. So whatever the way that we touch or appreciate emptiness, if it comes through ways we can feel or perceive, or ways that don't appear in consciousness, not acquirable by ourselves. Whatever the way, or even just if we bow to emptiness, if we bow to interdependence, honor it without fully understanding it.

[21:55]

Even that brings this great and benefit to the world. So what if it were so? And what if we knew it were so, or practiced as though it were so? So the term in the sutra that's used to point to this benefit, to ourselves and all beings. The term is merit. How much merit for this? How much merit for that? I want to say a little bit about the term. So merit refers to the value or the benefit of an action, an activity of body, speech, or mind. So merit is the measure that assesses what good is it or what is it good for or how good is it. Merit is the measure of that. the goodness or value or impact in the world of something that we do or say or think.

[23:06]

So in our Mahayana traditions, we have a strong and constant practice of dedicating the merit. Whenever we do something good, we dedicate the merit or offer up that goodness, that value to others. So merit is the calculation of karma. And the principle of the teaching of karma, of course, is that a good thing we do has a good result for ourselves, whether it be right away, a little while later, or a very long time later. So when we dedicate the merit, we're giving away that result of the good karma that we have coming to us for our action. So I sometimes picture dedicating the merit as dodging the good karma. So do some good action, and then through this principle, a good result is coming back at me from that good action.

[24:13]

And to dedicate the merit is to try to dodge out of the way so that it hits somebody else instead. Or to try to deflect it. So the merit is coming at me, and I try to deflect it. The image was like the superhero deflecting the lightning beam. That good result is coming to me, but I want to get it to someone else. Dedicating the merit, turning it over, giving it away, sharing it. And the spirit behind the dedication of merit is that from the beginning, the action that I did, the practice that I did as a bodhisattva, practice that we do, is from the start for others. The good action was not done for a benefit for myself. Already it was coming out of a wish and an intention to benefit others. So by dodging that good result or giving away the benefit of that and fulfilling that intention, that was the ground of the action to begin with.

[25:23]

And of course, we're included. When we dedicate the merit to all beings, we're all included. So maybe dodging isn't quite the right word, because we get to keep a little bit too. All beings. The merit is extended, is offered to all beings. Not all beings minus one. All beings. So this strange principle of karma and dedicating the merit... We don't really need to know how it works in order to do this practice, or if it works, or even if it's a thing. We don't need to buy into some particular cosmology or have an understanding of the mechanism. The tradition isn't super clear on the mechanism of how you could give that karma unit to somebody else. We don't need to know how it works to have that profound and transformative inner orientation, may everything I do somehow, some way, be of benefit to others.

[26:35]

But that's why it's done, and that's my wish on doing it. So this practice of dedicating merit can be deeply meaningful to us, even if we don't have an understanding or much resonance with the idea of giving away karma units to others. Whatever good this breath is, you know, my effort in this outbreath, caring and loving and opening and connecting, that effort is offered to others. That sort of feeling. I come to Green Gulch Dharma Talk, for example. for everyone, that kind of feeling. So we have this practice of dedicating merit, and it's a skill.

[27:40]

I'm heartened to learn that it's a skill. Another one of the sutras, the Brahmanet sutras, lists various kinds of mastery of dharma, and one of the things that there are masters of is dedicating merit. I just think that's so amazing. There's like known in the tradition, there's some people who are really good at dedicating merit that we could get good at that. We could practice giving away the benefit of the things we do to others. So the sutra again. Subuti, if a noble person were to fill as many world systems as there are grains of sand in the Ganges River with the seven precious treasures, and give them as a gift. And if, on the other hand, a bodhisattva were to gain the insight that all dharmas are empty and have no self-nature or essence of their own, their merit would be immeasurably and incalculably greater.

[28:43]

I think that all of us really want to help the world. I really believe that and feel that from all of you. We're trying hard to do the best thing we can for the world. And this question is always, in a way, always in our mind, always in our heart. What's the thing to do that's good for the world? What do we do? What do we give? What do we express? And how do we cope with the difficulties and suffering of ourselves and others in a way that actually brings relief and ease in this world of so much pain? So that we are here practicing opening to the Buddha Dharma means that we've all in some way glimpsed or touched some faith that this practice is something that benefits the world.

[30:01]

And then we doubt it right away. We trust it and we come and then we doubt it. How could this be any use? How could we just sit here while our whole country and our whole world and the whole ecosystem falls apart? How could we just sit here? What good is that? So this faith and this doubt are constant for me and a constant here at Green Gulch. I think every one of us has this faith and this doubt. Every one of you also taking the time to be here online has this faith and I think this doubt. How is this helping? And this also is an ancient question. In an old text, a person asks Nagarjuna, why on earth do bodhisattvas abandon beings to go into the forest to practice meditation?

[31:09]

The bodhisattvas' whole thing is to benefit others, and yet they run away from everybody to go to the forest and sit or go to the temple. So this is our question as well. Our great doubt. next to our great faith. So why would the Bodhisattva give up really good things that we could be doing in the world in order to sit on a cushion and face a wall or to open some ancient text? Why would the Bodhisattva leave behind loved ones to go to a temple and practice? Why would the Zen student put their kids on an iPad so that they can sit and they're off for just a few minutes or log on to a Dharma talk. What is the good and the merit of this practice and how can it compare with the other things we could be doing?

[32:14]

So these lines in the Diamond Sutra are getting right at that point. There's kind of an acupuncture needle right at that point where our faith and our doubt meet. So can we doubt our doubt? What good could this possibly be compared to filling a whole universe with treasure? Of course it can't be any good compared to that. This teaching is for us to doubt that. What if it could? What if it is? How is it so? So we have this great faith that our practice really is transformative in the world. And then we have this great doubt that it's any good at all compared to all of the good things we could be doing.

[33:20]

And then there's the third essential that the Rinzai Zen tradition teaches. We have the great faith and the great doubt. And then there's the great determination, the third essential aspect of practice. The great determination to bridge that gap to be right there in that faith and that doubt, to have that energize our bodhisattva practice, to realize in our bodies, in our heart, this dynamic, this koan. So there's one turn then in the sutra that I want to say a little bit about in closing. So again, we're picturing the scale, which I think maybe all have in us good things and practice, materially good things and our spiritual efforts or spiritual practice.

[34:25]

And our materialistic conditioning is that, of course, the big gift far outweighs our spiritual practice. And then the sutra seems to be saying, no, no, it's the other way. A little bit of spiritual practice far outweighs any material gift that could be given. The benefit of this moment, in this place of you coming to life, is immeasurable. It can't be compared with sleeping gifts. By the end of the sutra, though, the... Deeper meaning has been revealed. Deeper dimension. So the sutra repeats again and again how much better this moment of spiritual practice is over all of this worldly good, material good. First it's a thousand times greater or a million times greater or a billion times greater.

[35:29]

And finally it says, actually, it's so great that no comparison could be made. And that, I think, is the heart of it and brings this teaching into alignment, really, with the whole meaning of the sutra. No comparison could be made. So we picture this scale, my little practice, plus this great good thing in the world, in order to challenge ourselves and reconsider our preconceived way that that scale would balance. But that's just offered as medicine to encourage us. in our practice, not as something to stick to or some new ideology to hold to. Before I had a fixed view that big gifts were the best thing. Now I have a fixed view that my zazen is the best thing. We take the medicine and put it down. Even merit, this merit, this good that we do in the world, the sutra tells us, is at the end of the day just a word.

[36:37]

just a name, but just a kind of calculation. So Bodhidharma, our first ancestor in China, was once asked to calculate some merit. The emperor said, you know, here's this bag of merit I've got. How much does that weigh? How much merit is that? And Bodhidharma said, well, there's nothing holy, no merit, no merit, vast emptiness. No merit. There's no fixed thing that's merit. There's no separate beings. Some producing merit, you know, and some receiving merit. And some helping and some being helped. The sutra insists on that over and over. You think you're helping somebody. So all of those ideas, all of that calculation... All of that faith and all of that doubt are just our view that has no real foundation.

[37:45]

It's our overlay on reality. And I think we know this when we breathe out, we breathe in. Our life cannot be measured. Nothing that's happening here can be measured. All of these views and calculations are like a bubble or a cloud presenting themselves as hard and fast truth. So neither side of the scale has any weight really at all. The scale has no basis because life can't be calculated. Any comparison, the whole scale, any idea of merit are all on the side of the material gift. On the side of the insight into emptiness, touching this moment, this body and breath and sound as it is, there's no one side or the other side on that side.

[39:00]

To be measuring and thinking about the scale is already to be completely mired in the material view. So Suzuki Roshi says, true religion cannot be obtained by seeking for some good. That is only the way to attain something in a material sense. The way to work on spiritual things is quite different. Even to talk about spiritual things is not actually spiritual, but but a kind of substitute. So as soon as we start weighing our practice, it's already not a practice, it's a kind of a substitute. Dogen says our Zazen instruction literally is stop weighing, stop weighing and measuring, cease all the movements of the conscious mind, the gauging, the weighing, the calculating, That is all our thoughts and views do all day long.

[40:08]

Just to stop that. We can't weigh that stopping. We just trust it. Can we trust? And that's really what the sutra is asking of me. Do I trust this practice? Do I trust the benefit of wholehearted engagement with this moment as it is? Or am I holding out for some other thing? So I hope that through this teaching, our faith can grow in appreciation for the quiet. You know, in other places, Ziti Roshi says, spiritual people don't stand a chance. This may be common. It's this quiet value, this subtle value of our practice.

[41:13]

Can we grow in appreciation and respect for that deep, if kind of quiet, benefit and value? But that's not instead of something else. There's not really two sides. The spiritual merit and the material gifts are not really two things. We touch this presence. Thank you, Kitchen, for your gifts of all kinds. We think that your merit is in the meals you serve. But the sutra is saying maybe it's in the way you are in there together. So that's really all I wanted to say this morning.

[42:33]

In our everyday actual life and practice, we're making the effort to connect with what is inconceivable and beyond views, the direct experience of our life, to be with our breath, to open our heart. And we don't stop there. That's the basis. That's the ground. That's the body that we're cultivating. And then that body acts. And we naturally reach out and polish something, carve some gift without worrying too much, whether it's a small little thing or whether it's a gift that will fill the whole world systems with treasure. Connecting with our presence.

[43:44]

Connecting with our life underneath all our views. And then letting this body and mind and heart act and give. Either just giving to a tiny corner of this tiny world or giving in some way that fills all space and time with miraculous. wealth and treasure. So please continue your practice together and all of the merit of that practice we offer to one another and to all suffering beings. May all be free from suffering. Thank you for listening to this podcast. offered by the San Francisco Zen Center. Our programs are made possible by the donations we receive.

[44:47]

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

[45:08]

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