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. All of you in the green dragon. echo chamber and all of you in Zoom land whom I can't see except there's a little round circle. My name's Kokyo and I'm very happy to be back at displaced with you all.

[01:01]

I last lived at Green Dragon Temple around 14 years ago. It seems like a long time and yet it feels like an old home for sure. Me and my Wife, Shoho, we've been living kind of nomadically for the last couple of years, traveling here and there, responding to invitations at various Zen centers, living at them for a few months at a time, living in the car in between, and so on. It's nice to land at a beautiful place like this and be still for a little while.

[02:07]

There's many things we could talk about and any of them you've probably heard before one way or another but I thought one kind of basic teaching that I thought might be nice to bring up is how this practice of Zen is really just one reality here and now it's just like this and yet in order to talk about it we often divide through words we divide this reality into these kind of two aspects i think very helpful actually to talk about these two sides two aspects of

[03:25]

reality. Even though it's just one reality, it helps clear up a lot of things, I feel like, to temporarily divide it into these two aspects. We call the two truths, the ground of the two truths, and then based on this ground of the two truths, obscurations, Two of these truths arise. Two kinds of obscurations. And then there are two practices for seeing through these two obscurations. And these two practices lead to two fruitions. So this is like a model, a map. A map of reality and a map of practice. All divided into

[04:26]

halves in order to talk about it. Many of our teachings make this temporary division such as the Heart Sutra. Form itself is emptiness. Emptiness itself is form. It's making a division into emptiness and form and then saying that they are not different. It's helpful, I think, when we start to explore these teachings to make these hopefully skillful divisions of reality into two aspects in order to understand. And then we have Zen teachings like the harmony of difference and equality, dividing up reality into difference and equality, and then celebrating how those two are in harmony, not really separate.

[05:47]

And then we have teachings like Suzuki Roshi saying... You're perfect as you are, and you could use some improvement. This is all the Zen style of bringing up two sides of reality to see how they work together. They're not really separate. And yet, yet, we can speak of it this way, as a skillful, So please allow me to bring up these two sides of reality, these two types of obscurations, these two types of practices, and these two types of fruition. And while we're talking about them together, may we remember that they're not really two sides.

[06:57]

This is a map, a conceptual map that we can apply to our own practice. And then after laying out this map, we can look at a classic Zen story that talks about this map in a kind of a Zen-like way. So starting with the ground. the ground of reality, the basis. This ground has these two aspects, or two realities, two aspects of reality, or two realities, they're often called in the tradition, two truths. The ultimate truth, ultimate reality, and then conventional or relative truth or reality.

[08:04]

And they're inseparable. They're not really two. That's how inseparable they are. They're just two ways of looking at the same reality. I recently came across the image, the metaphor of a ruler or a yardstick. Maybe most rulers are like this. On one side of the ruler, there's all these measurements, big measurements of inches or centimeters or little measurements of millimeters. But the other side of the ruler is just blank. There's no measurements on it. I thought that's a pretty good modern metaphor for the unity of these two truths. the unity of the two realities. It's one stick, one ruler.

[09:08]

And one side has this functional purpose of delineating space and measuring things relative to one another. And the other side is just empty wood. Another metaphor is like a vast mirror. The ultimate truth, ultimate reality is like a boundless mirror, perfectly clear and undifferentiated brightness. And then all the images appearing on the mirror, like the relative truth of divided appearances. the world of the of the images on the mirror those images are all in relation to each other and and they're coming and going and changing moment to moment impermanent images and yet the mirror itself is unchanging unchanging brightness

[10:32]

And just like the ruler with one side divided up and the other side black, this one mirror and the myriad images are completely inseparable. Are they not? The images aren't the least bit removed or separate in any way from the mirror. You can't find the images without the mirror. And in this kind of mirror, you can't find a mirror without images. And yet, we can speak of them as these two sides, two aspects of one reality. The unchanging suchness, emptiness, undifferentiated presence.

[11:41]

Timeless, boundless awareness before any division is the ultimate truth. And then the way that that one mirror appears is as myriad images in relationship to each other, impermanent complexity and diversity. So this is a brief description of, I could say, the ground, the ground of reality as these two inseparable aspects. These kind of maps can be helpful because we hear things like, well, everything's empty and there's no distinction. Yes. And now we hear about what there are all these distinctions and ways of being in the world.

[12:49]

Yes. Are those two different realities? In a way, but in another way, they're two aspects of one reality. And the metaphor of the ruler or the mirror is a good way of looking at how they really are inseparable. And they're realities. Even a conventional reality is a kind of reality. Because it is the way the one ultimate mirror reality appears naturally, effortlessly. as a world of you and I. And then these two realities, these two truths of the ground become obscured, become hidden.

[13:53]

This is our dilemma. This is why there's Buddha Dharma. we could say, these two types of obscuration of the ground. The ultimate reality of one suchness is obscured by cognitive obscurations, subtle illusion, created by the mind, dualistic thought and more subtle obscuration of dualistic perception. Dualistic thought is, I think, pretty easy to understand. We think, that's a good thing, that's a bad thing, and this is the way to do it, and that's not the way to do it.

[14:56]

Our thinking, by its very nature, our thinking is is dualistic. Presenting this map with thoughts is a dualistic map, dualistic description of a non-dual reality. And then there's dualistic perception that's born with this way of perceiving a world of that seems to be separate from our self, a world of mind and objects, a world of perceiver and perceived. It seems like I'm over here and you're over there. Deeply conditioned way of perceiving

[15:59]

the buddhas teach us is not quite right it's a it's an obscuration to this ultimate uh reality of non-dual mirror-like suchness so that as you could call it the cognitive obscuration the way the mind uh without any effort on our part just seems to divide itself into subject and object. And then the relative conventional truth seems to be obscured or kind of distorted by what we call emotional obscurations. Like greed, hate, and delusion. Like pride and envy, jealousy, doubt.

[17:06]

These emotional obscurations derive from this basic cognitive obscuration. And they seem to distort the workings of the Interdependent images on the mirror. They seem to start to solidify and squeeze these impermanent images on the mirror. They cause a bunch of trouble and suffering for sentient beings. These emotional obscurations. Can you follow the map so far? The ground. has an ultimate aspect and a relative aspect. And then the obscurations to the ground have a kind of ultimate, they're obscurations to the ultimate truth, which are these subtle dualistic perception, and then these obscurations to the conventional appearances that are emotional,

[18:25]

obscurations of greed, hate, and delusion are, you know, interactive, day-to-day human stuff seems to obscure the freely functioning, harmonious activity of the relative truth. So because of these obscurations, then we need a path or a practice. And traditionally, Sometimes the path of practice can be divided into the practice that addresses the ultimate truth, the practice that purifies the cognitive obscurations to the ultimate truth, and that's the practice of justice. the practice of being the mirror itself the practice of non-dual awareness the practice of prajna paramita and

[19:54]

Zen tends to emphasize this one a lot classically. The practice of prajnaparamita settling into the undifferentiated space of brightness, which slowly and subtly begins to purify, in this case, begins to kind of permeate through these cognitive obscurations of dualistic thought and perception, revealing the ultimate ground more and more clearly. And then on the other side, we have these relative practices we could call skillful means. Sometimes it could be like practices of generating merit in the world of the relative appearances.

[21:06]

Practices like kindness and compassion and generosity and bodhisattva precepts, virtue, patience, diligence, and even meditative concentration. Concentrating the mind is just a kind of skillful means to open to a mirror-like realm of brightness. Practices going beyond giving, going beyond our ideas of giving. Ethical conduct going beyond the ideas of that virtue.

[22:11]

Patience, diligence, and concentration. These are skillful means practices. Purifying the obscurations, the emotional obscurations to relative truth of harmonious appearances and then prajna paramita the transcendent knowing awakeness itself is purifying the uh the ultimate truth from its Total obscurations of dualistic perception. Can you follow still this model? Right now we have the ground of the relative and ultimate truth. Talking about what reality or truth is. And we have these two obscurations to those two truths.

[23:14]

That are then purified by these two practices. The practices of skillful means and perfect wisdom. Yeah? And then the fruition, it's like, you know, this is kind of just Indian Mahayana maps of reality and practice. So the fruition of this practice, of these two practices, also comes in two forms. The whole thing is kind of like, has these two parallel tracks that aren't really separate. just like the practices of giving, ethics, patience, diligence, and concentration aren't really separate from Prajnaparamita, but we can talk about them as addressing different issues. So the fruition of practicing Prajnaparamita to be through

[24:25]

cognitive obscurations to ultimate truth, the fruition of that side is called the Dharmakaya, or the reality body of Buddha. It's the fruition of total freedom from discontent and even more freedom than that, the freedom to be anything. And then the fruition of these beautiful means practices, generosity and patience that are purifying the emotional obscurations to the harmonious working of the relative truth, the fruition of that,

[25:26]

is called the rupakaya, the form bodies of Buddha. The way a Buddha can manifest in an apparently human form to benefit humans. And maybe they can manifest in animal form to benefit animals. hungry ghost form to benefit hungry ghosts, and so on. Because of that freedom of the Buddhas, they can not just enjoy their own freedom, sometimes called the self-enjoyment samadhi of the Buddhas. They can manifest in these ways to benefit beings through skillful means. Called the other enjoyment, uh, They can enjoy benefiting others in the relative world.

[26:35]

The Buddhas can be the Dharmakaya mirror, the reality body mirror, at the same time as they're functioning in these particular relative ways as the images on the mirror. And in Zen, we sometimes say that the path of practice and the fruition, the verification of Buddha are not two separate things. So it's not like in our Zen style, we would say that in the moment of just sitting, there is the fruition, the verification of Buddha. of freedom. And in a moment of generosity and kindness, there is the fruition of a skillful, beneficent Buddha body, relatively speaking.

[27:51]

So that's kind of a map. And maybe it was a little too conceptual. Two types of ground, two types of obscuration to the ground, two types of practices, the path that purifies the obscurations to the ground, two types of fruition of the practice that purifies the ground. fully realizes and verifies the ground that was temporarily obscured. So you'll be quizzed on this later. I hope you got it. It's a map, it's a model. And I think these kind of conceptual models are helpful when we have, because we have all this array

[28:58]

and sometimes of practices and teachings, and sometimes it's hard to know. Are we talking about the relative or the ultimate here? Are we talking about skillful means or wisdom here? Are we talking about emotional obscurations or cognitive obscurations? Are we talking about the pure dharmakaya? Are we talking about these manifestation bodies of Buddha? We could explore this map more for the rest of our lives. But for now, a Zen story about this. The beauty of Zen stories is that they're not so heady. I think this is a teaching particularly about the ground. of the two realities, the ultimate truth and the conventional truth.

[30:00]

But Zen style. This is Case 21 in the Book of Serenity, which is a collection of these Zen stories. One day, Yunnan was sweeping the ground. Yunyan is one of our Zen ancestors. Ungan Dongzhou, whose name we recite in the mornings, is in our family. This is way back, like, maybe 9th century China. Yunyan was sweeping the ground because Conventionally, that's what often happens in Zen temples during Soji.

[31:05]

And his Dharma brother, Dao Wu, Dao Wu and Yunnan were both first disciples of the Linji. ancestor by john but later they started practicing with um with our ancestor yaoshan yakusan again and they both became disciples of yakusan again so they are dharma brothers and a lot of um tapers a lot of good stories about these two together this time union was sweeping the ground and his dharma brother dao came up and said Too busy. Or you're working very hard.

[32:06]

Or you're sure making a lot of effort. And I think these ancestors in our family always were looking for an opportunity to engage in some dialogue about to realities, and other such topics. They were probably supposed to be silent during Soji, but they may be whispering. Too busy. And Yunyan, who was sleeping, said to his friend, you should know that there's one who's not busy. Yunyan was sweeping the ground. He was practicing purifying the ground of the two realities with the practice of skillful means, sweeping the temple, and maybe wisdom at the same time.

[33:22]

Because while he was sweeping, he could have this kind of dialogue. He's practicing purifying the ground with skillful means and wisdom to purify the relative truth and the ultimate truth. Maybe he wasn't thinking all that. He's just sweeping the ground. The ground of reality. And Dao says, too busy. We could take to mean, you look like you're really... engaged in the relative truth, but have you forgotten the ultimate? This is the challenge for us Zen practitioners. I think it's quite easy to be engaged in the relative world of appearances. I shouldn't say quite easy. That has its difficulties, too.

[34:26]

That's what most of us are doing all the time. We're engaged in the relative world of impermanent appearances coming and going. But this timeless, unchanging reality of where there's no appearance, of non-appearance, that one maybe most people never even hear of or consider. So... And yet, how can we not make that some separate thing? How can we find that ultimate in unity with the relative? Union is sweeping the ground, the ultimate and the conventional ground. And his timer brother says, too busy. And Yunyan says, you should know that there's one who's not busy. We both should remember the ultimate reality of non-busyness.

[35:34]

Right in the midst of our busyness, I think is the point here, that it's not like, I don't think that Dawu said, when he said too busy, you should put down the broom and just come sit zazen with me. I don't think he meant that. don't forget the non-busy one. You seem too busy. And Jungian said, well, you should know there's one who's not busy. And Dao said, well, then are there two moons? Moon is a Zen metaphor for truth, a reality. The full, bright moon. And are there two truths? Are there two realities then? The busy one and the non-busy one? And Yun Yan, in response, held up his broom and said, which moon is this?

[36:43]

Is this the... ultimate moon of the bright mirror? Or is this the myriad appearances of Soji assignments and dust particles swirling in the air while the ground is being swept? Which moon is this? The wonderful story pointing to the The inseparability, the unity of the two truths. Is this form or emptiness? We can't ever separate these two. Which moon is this? And Dao Wu was silent. A good response.

[37:50]

Better not say, well, that's the conventional, that's the relative. you better not even say, oh, okay, that's both. At this point, saying anything, it would have been too much. So that's the story. I think really about the two grounds, I mean, the two realities of the ground, the two practices of skillful means and non-dual knowing, and maybe even the fruition of the Dharmakaya and the form bodies of Buddha right there in this room being held up. And then one song, the commentator on this story, says this. Good people, as you eat rice, boil tea,

[38:54]

stow your robes and sweep the ground, you should know the one who's not busy. And again, it doesn't mean you should stop eating your rice to know the one, but as you eat the rice and boil tea and sweep and sow, you should recognize or know the one who's not busy. the same time, then you will realize the unity of mundane reality and awakened reality. Or it could be translated as the relative truth and the ultimate truth. You will realize the unity of these. One song, the commentator says, And then it continues, in our Soto lineage, which we practice here today, this is called simultaneous inclusion.

[40:05]

Naturally not wasting time. That was a sweet little commentary, quite straightforward. This is the style of our tradition, is the unity of these two realities. You're called the mundane or literally like the world reality and the Dharma reality. The world appears in myriad threes and... and rocks, and walls, tiles, and pebbles, and you and me, and sweeping, and rice, and tea. That's the world dharma, and then the, I mean, the world reality, and the Buddha reality, or the world dharma, and the Buddha dharma, is what it's literally called in this commentary.

[41:17]

And the Buddha Dharma of the mirror and the world Dharma of images are inseparable. And in the Soto lineage of Zen, this is called simultaneous inclusion, naturally not wasting time. of conceptual story. We might wonder what to do with it. But I think it just helps us to fit in how sweeping the temple could be an actual practice of reality. And how just sitting and being the bright mirror is not just a waste of time. And many other things can be brought out by this roadmap and this Zen story of Yunyan and Dao.

[42:27]

But for now, let's leave it there and then we can have some discussion after we do a little bit of skillful chanting for the benefit of beings. For more information, visit sfzc.org and click Giving. May we fully enjoy the Dharma.

[43:18]

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