Good morning. Welcome. My name is Tokyo. So they're here and I've been sitting here for a couple of weeks now. And it's getting the talk today, it seems like. And as an animal sector, we should have a Zen talk. Zen is this particular tradition within Buddha, that's largely transmitted through stories.

[01:10]

So we have a lot of Zen stories, and that are like questions in the form of stories, or questions about stories. On the other side of our own lives, we were ancient stories. So, I'd like to share some with you again, if you don't mind. I think I mean, I'd like to read my story, which is a very big story, and that's the most valuable story for us. The woman and her spirit have separated the name of the story in the testimony.

[02:21]

But before we get to the main story, I want to tell some further stories. old Canadian Zen teacher from the 11th century, Wutsu, and he's the one that brought up this story about sharing their spirit suffering. It kind of wore up to this story to get the sense of this Zen teacher, Wutsu. Buddhism has been flourishing in China for many centuries. It's a big version for a couple of centuries, but there are other Buddhist traditions in China at this time. And Utsu, I think you've probably heard about, Zen, but we're studying these many more academic versions of Buddhism.

[03:29]

the mind-only school of Buddhist philosophy that says that mind and the world are not dual, are inseparable. And he studied a lot of those tasks, but he didn't quite already know what to make of this. went to learn about one teacher at that time, and I said, well, I've heard that the mind and the world, subject and object, are really not separate. They can't be broken into two parts, really. What we call the world is actually mind. I've heard this. I've been studying this a while.

[04:33]

feel like I don't fully trust that kind of teaching. And this teacher said, well, to realize it yourself is like drinking water and knowing for yourself whether it's hot or cold. In other words, a very direct experience. And also very simple, simple and direct experience. You know the water is hot or cold. But if you have to describe exactly what hot or cold means to someone who never experienced hot or cold water, for example, it might be difficult to describe. But you have no doubt that it's hot water. Definitely room temperature.

[05:53]

No doubt. Can I prove that to you or use logic and reasoning? Maybe not. So this guy, Utsu, interested in, like, well, I got all these teachings, but I want to directly taste this truth of non-duality. So we asked various other teachers about this, and they said, well, if you really want to get into this direct experience of reality, you should talk to the Zen people. You've read enough of these old philosophical treatises.

[06:55]

You should talk to those Zen teachers that lived down south. So he did that. He went down south, and he met a teacher named For some reason, Bayun told his new student, Wutsu, there's a group of Zen practitioners visiting the temple this week, and they're visiting from Mount Lu, and they all have some realization, some Zen realization. If I ask them to speak about dharma, they can give really good dharma talks.

[07:58]

And if I ask them a kind of koan question, they can give a really immediate, direct response. And if I ask them to write a really pithy commentary on a koan, they can do it. But I humbly say regarding these... Practitioners, it's not quite yet. I haven't fully gotten it. Not yet. Zen teacher I practiced with in Japan, talking about Hirana Roshi. He liked this saying, maybe it came from this story, Mada. in Japanese means not yet. People would offer some statements or express something and he'd say, not yet, not quite yet.

[09:09]

And that's what he kept buying and said, this great practitioner says, not quite yet. And somehow this story from Wutsu's teacher, these great practitioners are not quite finished, captured the spirit of Wutsu. He really worked on this. What does it mean? What did he mean by not yet? He really sat with this for some days and suddenly and finally realized himself what he'd been looking for. Like the taste of water being just room temperature to contemplating not yet.

[10:13]

In modern koan systems. This is one of the koans, too. I've been working through various koans with a koan teacher, and this is one of them, this story, not yet. And then the question is, what's the soul meaning of not yet? You do when you hear a question like that. What's the subtle meaning of not yet? Well, what do you say about such a thing? But this is this, this kind of koma in practice is not trying to explain an answer, but directly expressing something. So Wutsu realized through contemplating not yet, he realized completeness. And

[11:16]

Then he started teaching Zen. And so here's just a few of the stories that have come down to us from Wutsu Zen teaching. They're all kind of similar. Maybe you can start to get a sense for the style of Wutsu as a teacher. One day he addressed the assembly in the Dharma talk. He said, yesterday I was I went into town to get some things, and I saw there was this puppet shemo going on. In the old days, that was the kind of cutting edge entertainment. Maybe I'm picturing it might have been like a life-size puppet, like a person with these strings attached, but you could barely see the strings, or like a person walking around, this puppet. puppet moving around on a stage.

[12:17]

It was really something to see this apparent person walking around. But when I looked closer, I saw it. It was this puppet, but it was doing all these things seemingly on its own. But when I looked closer, I saw these strings attached, right? And there was some person behind the blue curtain. Maybe this was like a new saying that he'd never seen a puppet show. So he was kind of amazed by this. And he said, I couldn't help but yell out when I saw these strings. Yell out to this invisible person behind the curtain. Sir, what's your name? And the voice behind the curtain said, honored priest, just watch the puppet show. Why ask him our names?

[13:20]

And Wutu said, monks. He's telling the monks the story. When I heard him say, just watch the show, why ask for names? I didn't have a single word to say in reply. Can any of you here give a word? What would you have said if you were there? And that invisible person had said, just watch the show while I ask for names. And if any of you say anything in my place, yesterday that embarrassing situation actually ended up uprooting all my ideas. that that's one zen teaching story or two and it's related to the story we're going to get to keep this in mind who's pulling the strings behind the blue curtain that makes these puppets move around and when you ask

[14:52]

Who are you? Playing the strings. The voices. Don't ask my name, priest. Just watch the show. Don't ruin it. No, they're not. There's a few great short koans in this gateless barrier collection of koans that are attributed to Wutsu. He kind of A lot of these koan stories are records of conversations between old Zen ancestors, but Wutsu, part of his style, he just uses these ordinary situations to make up a difficult question, like this puppet show. He makes up these questions. If we really get into them, they can make us sweat.

[15:54]

But here's another one. It is Gateless Barrier. And this is later said amongst koan people that say what is said to be one of the most difficult koans. See what you think of this. Wutsu said, it's like a buffalo. that passes through a lattice window. Its head, horns, and four legs all pass through. Why can't the tail pass through? So some people might hear that and say, so what? That's a silly made up question. But some Zen people might be like, this is a problem.

[16:58]

I didn't have this problem until I heard the story. Now I have a problem. Buffalo, big old buffalo passes through this latticed window. The head, the horns, and the hooves all pass through. just has this little tiny tail, you know, a big buffalo has a little tail, and it's made it through the window, except this little tail can't pass through. Why not? It's the question. I think it's a little similar to this story that Utsu, a week at two. All these great practitioners from Mount Lee came in, and they all have the same realization. They can give great Dharma talks, and they can respond to columns, and they can write pithy commentaries, but I humbly still say, not yet.

[18:08]

Kind of similar, don't you think? The whole buffalo passes through. It's a little payout. hasn't yet passed through. Why not? And then we start to feel really frustrated, the payoff can't pass through. I think we're meant to get into this, feel a little frustrated. If it's just like, that's a stupid question, then it doesn't really help us. But if we take it up, if we are all complete, is there some little something that's not? We might feel this way sometimes, right?

[19:12]

So that's a classic kind of type of koa. This teacher, Wutsu, offers. He just made up this story. It's it. It. This. It. What is it? This is a situation we're in. It's like a water buffalo. Passing through this window. The head horns and legs all pass through. Why not the tail? Another... Another story, not even really a story, another question invented by Wutsu, also related to our sexual story that you haven't heard yet today. This is warming up to it. This is another case in the gateless barrier. Wutsu said, Shakyamuni Buddha, the founder of Buddha Dharma,

[20:16]

The Buddha, the historical Buddha in India, Shakyamuni Buddha and Maitreya Buddha, which is, according to legend, the future Buddha, the next Buddha. Shakyamuni Buddha and Maitreya Buddha are both servants of another. Who is that author? greatest awakening to beings of all times are actually servants of another. Who is that other? Again, this is very related to this Tian and her spirit are separate story that you'll hear soon. One more before you hear that social story. One more for Wutsu. Also very similar because He's just bringing up an old, like, power, kind of a secular power that was kicking around China in his time as a Zen teaching.

[21:32]

Somebody came to ask Utsu about Zen. And he said, have you heard this old poem? It goes, she calls to her maid, little Jade, little Jade, little Jade. Not because she wants something from her maid, but just so her lover outside the window can hear her voice. And he said, this is what Zen is all about. You might have heard that story, Shakyamuni Buddha.

[22:46]

was held up a flower. I can picture maybe that people offer flowers to the Buddha. So maybe he had a vase of flowers at the seat of his Dharma talk. And the assembly was gathered there to listen to the talk. Before the Buddha started speaking, he just picked up one of those beautiful flowers and twirled it around. And most people thought, Get on with your talk, Uda. But one of his students appreciated that before he even started talking, just to see Uda twirling his flower was enough. He didn't need any more Dharma talk. But the rest of the people in the assembly were like, Uda, are you going to put that in the flower and give us the talk now? And then the Buddha did give lots of talks.

[23:52]

But the talks maybe weren't so much the point. Talks didn't really have this purpose of explaining to us the teaching about how things are. They were just so the disciples could hear the Buddha's voice. But some of them were really into the content of the talks, so they didn't really care about the Buddha's flower and the sound of the Buddha's voice. So I think this is an intriguing Zen expression to It's a summing of zen for someone who asks it. It's like this poem. She calls to her maid, little Jade, little Jade, not because she wants her maid to bring something, but just so her lover, who she knows is secretly waiting outside her window, will hear her voice.

[25:09]

to like practical rational reasons to do things. How ridiculous to call your maid if you don't need anything. Maybe there's other things going on besides the obvious. Something about Zen, it's not so obvious. If you came for a rational of Buddha Dharma, maybe this is already getting disappointing. It's just the sound of a raspy voice of someone who's getting over a little bit of a cold. This is the warm up of these stories of Utsu to today's case. Sorry it took so long to get there. The 35th case, the public case, the story.

[26:27]

And the woman, the gateless barrier. The woman's shame separates from her spirit. And so it's again, it's Wutsu just telling this story, like a folk story, a folk tale, just like a poem about calling the Maid Little J a popular culture at the time. It's just an old folk story from a few centuries earlier that I guess a lot of people maybe knew. And the story is that there was a male with a daughter named Chien and Chien liked to When she was young, I liked to play with her cousin, boy from across town.

[27:29]

And they were really good friends growing up. And Chen's father sometimes would joke around and say, you two are such good friends. You'll be a perfect married couple someday. And then, I don't know, because he said that or just coincidence, As they grew older, they realized they were in love with each other. And they did imagine they were kind of like married. Figured maybe they would someday. I think Tian's dad didn't really know about that. Meanwhile, he was looking for a good husband for a wealthy man from the neighboring town. And like an arranged marriage, which is... And so one day, he found the right person and told Chen, I found my husband for you.

[28:33]

You're going to get married in a couple months. And Chen, her beloved girl, was totally distraught by this because they wanted to be together. But because of how society was, how families were, that we're not going to be able to talk her down out of this. And so, beloved, husband, totally upset. It's just, I'm leaving town. I'm out of here. My beautiful relationship is ruined. And I'll just go start a new life somewhere else. There's no way to get around this. So he left at night and got on a boat going up the river, upstream.

[29:48]

As he was going upstream in the boat, leaving that town in tears, he saw somebody in the dark running alongside the river. And what's that? They keep running along the boat. So he pulled the boat over and it was Tian. She said, I couldn't leave you. I ran away from home. I'm joining you. Don't stop me. They were both overjoyed. She got in the boat. It went upstream. to a town far from there and got married and had a couple kids. And after a few years, Tian started feeling like we have this great life, but actually, you know, I also feel pretty bad that that I ran away from home, left my dear father behind without saying anything.

[30:52]

I haven't been in touch since because I know he's totally upset with me. But maybe there's a way, now it's been some years, we got these kids. What if we go back now and apologize and try to make amends, reconnect with my father? And my husband thought it was a good idea too. So it's a little trepidation. they settled back downstream to their hometown. And they got there, and the husband said, well, let me go see first, try to see, I'll go alone first so your dad doesn't freak out, and I'll try to explain things and see how he is and if he's, you know, really, really upset that maybe we don't even go through with it and we should meet him.

[31:52]

Let me go see what I can do. So he goes to the house and his, Chen's father is delighted to see him and his old nephew and said, and he was surprised, his nephew. The husband of Chen said, guys, he's so happy to see me after we ran away together. And so Chen's husband says, well, we've come back, Chen and I have come back to see you again and to apologize. And Chen's father said, well, what do you mean? Is this some kind of joke? Tian is here in her bed and in her room. Since you left several years ago, she hasn't spoken a word and hasn't been able to get out of bed.

[32:59]

She's like really sick and has gone silent and like is kind of lightless ever since you left. His husband says, I don't know what you're talking about. Chen was in the boat with me. We just came back. What do you mean? And neither one of them understand what's going on. So Chen's husband says, I better go get Chen, bring her here. We don't know what's going on. So he goes back to the boat, gets Chen, tells her the story. Your father thinks you're still in your room and you haven't spoken. And so Tian and her husband come to the house. And meanwhile, Tian, who's been lying in bed without moving and silent for these years, gets up out of bed and moves for the first time and comes to the doorway.

[34:12]

And when the other Tian sees her. They see each other at the chin. He was in bed in the chin. He was with her husband. They see each other and come together and merge into one chin. It's an old folk story from the Tang Dynasty. And Wutsu notices Later, in the Song Dynasty, he brings up that old story and has a coma and says, this woman Qian and her spirit have separated. They separated and they came back together. But which is actually the true Qian? That's the same coma. Which is the true Qian? The one who was very responsible with her obligations to her parents and did what was right by not running away from home, even though it took all the life out of her, it took the spirit out of her because her love disappeared.

[35:41]

Is that the true shame? It was a rational decision. With the true chin, the one who followed her heart and ran away and had the life that she wanted. What is the true chin? So you might say, Well, the one who did the responsible thing and followed her parents, and probably more of you think the true one was the one who followed her heart and didn't have to go with this obligation. But those are just two stories. Isn't our life

[36:46]

Often like this, we have these two sides. We have many, many dilemmas. I think this one is framed largely around this issue of responsibility and obligation versus doing what one wants and following one's heart. We have lots of dilemmas, but that's one that I think we all face sometimes. And sometimes you go into what you want, you pay the price, And sometimes you follow the responsible obligation and you pay the price. And you might feel like one is more true than the other. But the Zen koans are usually not trying to just like give you like an either or quiz. They're not done. It's a dualistic setup, right, from the beginning.

[37:47]

Here's these two, which is the true one. If you say it's this one or this one, you know it's not going to be the correct Zen response because that's just like a one-sided answer. Some people sometimes say like, Part of me wants to do such and such, but part of me feels this way. So that would be similar. If somebody said that, we could, as any teacher would say, well, which is the true part of you? There's no true part of us. Maybe the equivalent question is, now which is the true part of you? Part of me feels like this. Part of me feels like this. Which is the real you, which is the true qian.

[38:53]

Which is the you that has these different parts. And that's what Zen is aiming towards. Yes, in a relative world, we often have to choose this side or this side. And we'll keep doing that. But the important question here is not which is the best decision, actually, but which, who are you? Who is the you that's not divided into different options, different parts? like Freud put it, as I understand something like, the person has these three aspects. The id is like the Sutter principle, right?

[40:06]

The id is the part of your personality that just wants to do what it wants no matter what, just go in the direction of what is most pleasant or happy and then the superego is like the responsible rational responsible part of the person that's kind of like kind of counteracting sort of fighting against maybe even the id don't just do what you want you're going to get in bad trouble if you do that the superego and then the ego has a As I recall, Freud is sort of moderating between the id and superego. Something like this. Well, maybe you can have a little bit of what you want if you're kind of responsible too. Something like that. So maybe this would be a modern version.

[41:06]

In Freud's id, superego, and ego, Which is the true one? Which of the three is the real person? And everything comes with a price. Cause and effect plays out. So we can watch our cause and effect plays out. What brings more relative happiness and less relative suffering? But meanwhile, there's this question, apart from all these pros and cons, who are we really? So these collected Zen stories have a little commentary about women that

[42:13]

one who connected them together. So his commentary is on the story. If you realize the true one, you will know that we pass from one husk to another, like travelers staying in a hotel, different hotels. We pass from one husk to another, and you could say, During our life, today we're living in the Green Gulch Hotel, the Green Gulch Darmatok Hotel. That's our identity. You might seem like, yeah, I'm a Zen practitioner listening to a Darmatok. That's a husk. But then we go back and cook dinner for our family or something. That's another husk in another hotel. It's the hotel in Kabul.

[43:15]

Or maybe we go traveling, stay in an actual hotel. So this is like, we pass from one to another, but what is it that's passing from one to another? Sometimes we're in bed, totally depressed, that we're stuck in our obligations, and someday we're just... We're free and doing what we want. But these are both just different hotels, actually. The Hotel of Raising a Family of the River Hotel, depressed and very, which is the true tune. So again, a woman's commentary. If you realize the true one, you will know that we pass from one husk or shell to another, like travelers staying at a hotel. If this isn't yet clear, don't rush about wildly.

[44:21]

When earth, fire, water, and air suddenly disperse, the four elements disperse at the time of death, you'll be like a crab struggling in boiling water with your legs flailing around. Don't say I didn't warn you Ume bluntly says. So he's encouraging and strongly to clarify this one, this true one, apart from the hotel dwellers. Because when these elements disperse at the end of this life, we're moving from hotel to hotel during this life, every moment really. But then it At the end of life, we're going to leave this life's hotel. So we say before that time when our elements disperse, I want to leave this life, clarify this one.

[45:26]

It doesn't depend on a particular body, either. A particular mind and a particular set of memories. Suzuki Roshi said, life is like a movie. Life is like a movie. And we get totally involved in the content of the movie. But meanwhile, our big mind is like a school. playing white screen on which the movie's playing, but we're just not interested in the screen because we're into the content of the movie. And in this movie, there's this dilemma. Should we follow the obligations or should we just be a free spirit and do what we want?

[46:36]

And we're caught up in the dilemma of that movie. But meanwhile, Who are we really? Are we either one of those options in a movie, or are we the white screen on which the movie's playing? We remember the screen in the midst of the movie. Very simple screen. It's not hidden, but... It usually seems to be because we're so into the content of the movie, especially if we're calling a dilemma. It's like, should I do it this way or this way? It's almost like every moment is almost like a dilemma. What do we do next? We have to decide, but it's not

[47:40]

The most important thing is not which way to go, actually. The most important thing is not which way to decide. I would say the most important thing is to remember the screen of which this movie is playing. So finally, the verse, woman, the compiler of these stories is a verse to celebrate the story of Tian and her Spirit separating. The moon behind the clouds is always the same. But valleys and mountains are different. Ten thousand blessings. Ten thousand blessings. Is this one? Is this true? Thank you for listening to this podcast offered by the San Francisco Zen Center.

[48:48]

Our programs are made possible by the donations we receive. 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

[49:13]

@Transcribed_UNK
@Text_v005
@Score_89.08