Good evening. Thank you for coming to the talk tonight. I've been focusing my study this year on the practice of upright and complete speech, or the practice of right speech. Upright and complete is the translation for the word in Sanskrit. Samyak, which for those of you who are familiar with the eightfold path, the eightfolds all start with right, right view, right intention, right speech, right action, et cetera. And that right is not the opposite of wrong. That right is complete, wholesome, skillful, beneficial. going all in the same direction, kind of like flowing in accord with things.

[01:04]

So that's the meaning of this right speech. So I've been using upright and complete speech. And the Buddha, as well as many other teachers, have talked about speech as a very important part of our practice. And karmically speaking, karma being voluntary action. It only comes in three flavors, three ways. The action of mind and body and speech, body, speech, and mind. So those are the only kinds of actions that create consequences that we have, body, speech, and mind. And great benefit can come from our speech and enormous... suffering and hurt and damage and harm can come from our speech. So the Buddha, Suzuki Roshi, Dogen, all these different teachers spend time with the practice of right speech, as well as our precepts, which we recited last night.

[02:26]

Those of you who came to the full moon ceremony there was at the end a recitation of ten major precepts or grave precepts, and many of them had to do with speech, not lying or not using false speech, not slandering, not disparaging the triple treasure, not praising self at the expense of others. So our precepts as well devote a good portion to how we speak, how we talk, how we communicate. This isn't just speech. I think we're talking about speech in the widest sense, our body language as well as writing. And so at this time in our life, and I'm not going to talk about politics, but I think I would say all of us, maybe, or almost all of us,

[03:29]

deeply concerned about the level of dialogue and the kinds of speech that's being used with abandon, you know, just all over the place. We can hear it, read it. And in studying right speech and what the Buddha said about right speech, you can reflect on, is this kind of speech skillful? Is it wholesome? Is it beneficial? Does it hurt? Does it harm? So Samyak Vak, Vak is speech, Samyak Vak, right speech, complete, upright and complete speech. The Buddha says abandons. You abandon four things to be able to practice right speech. You abandon false speech or lying. You abandon divisive speech. And under that comes all sorts of things like slander, gossip of all kind, telling tales and hearsay and passing on things that you haven't really found out for sure whether it's true or not, but you hear it, you pass it on.

[04:45]

And also creating disunity. This is divisive speech where you actually perhaps delight in the breaking up of a fellowship, the breaking up of of a group or a family or that you delight in factionalism. This is what Buddha says, this is divisive speech. So one abandons that. And the third is abandoning harsh or abusive speech, which could also, they all reflect one another, could also be divisive speech, might be harsh speech, but not always. Divisive speech could be like honey on a razor's edge, you know. But abusive, harsh speech, speech generated by anger and hatred and retaliation, revenge, that kind of speech. And the last is frivolous talk and idle chatter. And this is words, as the Buddha said, that aren't really worth treasuring.

[05:51]

You know, you just fill space maybe with words, various kinds, which could also be gossip, could be Also not telling the truth exactly, but just idle talk. So abandoning those four things is Samyak Vak, or complete and upright speech. And as we've been all week long in the, or at least since the retreat started, we've been looking at how do you know whether you're practicing right speech? And the Buddha also gave us five keys five ways to check, well, is what I'm about to say or what I just said or what I'm saying right as I speak now, is it upright and complete? And you can check with these five handy-dandy keys that you can have on your keychain and bring them out. And I think in the workshop, people have been memorizing them, learning them by heart.

[06:51]

And it's very helpful to learn something by heart so you can reflect and What was that thing I'm supposed to remember about speech? So the five keys to check on whether you are speaking in an upright way is, number one, is it true? The second is, is it the right time? And I would say time and place. It might be true, but now is not the time to say this or bring it up right in the middle of, you know, you know. serving up dinner or something. This is not the time to bring them. So you check that out. Is it true? Yes, it's true. Is it the right time and place? No. Or maybe it is. But then the third would be, is it beneficial? So it might be true and it might be the okay time, but it's not really a helpful thing. Yes, it's true, but it's not going to be a benefit. It's not beneficial. So one would refrain from that.

[07:55]

If it's not going to be beneficial... And that's the third key. The fourth is gentle and kind speech. Affectionate. Where is this speech coming from that's true and beneficial? Is it going to be kind? And that kind speech at times it may not sound kind because it has to be strong or intense or a immediate countermeasure to something that's happening, but it's coming from, and this is the fifth key, it's coming from a mind of goodwill. It's coming from your intention is to be of benefit, and it's not just about getting something off your chest or you're irritated or And you just want to say it. You say it gently, but it's really your intention isn't so upright.

[08:59]

So you can check those five. Is it true? Is it the right time and place? Is it affectionate and gentle? Is it beneficial? And is it flowing from the correct intention? So that, in and of itself, just what I said tonight, is enough to practice for a lifetime, really. We speak all day long. We communicate all day long. And this is a difficult area of our life. We find we sometimes don't even know whether we're speaking truthfully or not to ourselves, to another. We can fool ourselves. We can unconsciously be saying one thing but actually meaning another. And there's all sorts of depth to this, almost fathomless, of communicating in this way that is really a lifetime of practice.

[10:01]

So right now, as I was saying, I don't want to talk about politics, but how do we talk to one another? And speaking, right speech, and listening go together. How do we listen in a way that can help us to respond appropriately? including these things that I brought up. And even so, there will be conflict. There will be conflict. There'll be conflict internally. There'll be conflict with our partners and families and co-workers and sangha and friends. This is just our life together. Conflict means the... together strike. And, you know, I was thinking, well, what? The conflict is not always not a good thing.

[11:05]

We sometimes need to have, like the spark from a flintstone, you know, that spark can be something that illuminates, you know, what's going on and helps to change things for the better. It could also start a big fire, you know, but this kind of, there is conflict that we'll be coming up against. How do we skillfully work with conflict? Zen Center right now is going through some trainings and some putting in place some ways of skillfully working with conflict and the tools. But many of us didn't have them, don't have them, have no, are a little bit at sea when it comes to conflict and we just You might just avoid it or don't know how to work it out. Avoiding might be okay sometimes. That might be what the right thing to do is. So I wanted to talk with you about a story from the polycanon of the Buddha working with a serious conflict in the Sangha.

[12:12]

This was the first major discord in the Sangha in the community of monks. And it's the name of the sutta is the quarrel at Kosambi. And I bring it up because I feel there's enormous amount of conflict right now. Maybe not more than other ages and times, but it feels like everywhere we look, there's major, serious, devastating conflict that results... that's been resulting in great suffering, you know, true cruelty, brutality, and suffering all over the world, all over the world, Bangladesh, Afghanistan, Turkey, and not to mention the U.S., you know, Orlando, Baton Rouge, Minnesota,

[13:18]

I don't know what's going on right now, but I imagine there's other things going on right this minute. So how do we, how do each one of us make a difference with those who live with us and speak with us and come in contact with us? It's not a casual thing. Our voice, our words, our speech is powerful, powerful, as we know, as we can see. how speech can incite and change hearts and minds, both wholesomely and unwholesome. We see this. And, of course, with the tools of the Internet and so forth, that magnifies things. So how do we work with conflict and write speech? So some of you might know this story of the quarrel at Kosambi. And it's a wonderful story, and it shows the Buddha.

[14:25]

The Buddha gave it a try to work out this quarrel, this conflict with the monks, and ended up, well, you'll see in the middle of the story, you'll see what happened with the Buddha. I wanted to mention, this is the story where the term monks or sangha members or students, We have this in our guidelines for practice. Students should be like milk and water because we've, this is a quote from Suzuki Roshi, we've all been good friends in past lives. And this image of milk and water, someone mentioned, when do we ever put milk and water together? We don't really drink that. But milk and water, if you pour it together, if you're doing a recipe or something, they blend completely. You can't tell one from the other. It becomes one uniform, liquid, you know, milk and water, very smooth. So this is the sutta where this term, milk and water, the Buddha uses it, maybe uses it in other places as well.

[15:28]

So the coral at Kosami, and I want to finish this, and I know there's limited time for this talk so that we all get a good night's sleep. So the coral started out in a very small way, the way corals often do. You know, there's some, this is like the spiral of conflict. There's some triggering event. And in this case, a monk who was actually one of the teachers, a discourse teacher living in community, left some water in a jar. You might think, well, this is such a petty thing. Left some water in a jar in the latrine area. And the practice was to take out the water and empty it. you know, for the next person. So it was kind of akin to something like not flushing, you know, like about like that. So he didn't do it on purpose.

[16:30]

It wasn't intended. He didn't intend to do that, to be negligent. So he felt that it wasn't such a big problem. Other monks saw he did it on purpose. that he was, you know, negligent on purpose, and it was a provoking kind of thing, and that he was being recalcitrant and kind of not, you know, holding up to it. So they were annoyed at this. And another teacher who practiced, was a precepts kind of rule master, you know, agreed with these monks and suspended him from the Sangha. You know, this is, if you're not... like we did the full moon ceremony, which comes from the practice of the assembly of monks and nuns coming together. And if you've been following the guidelines and rules of the community, you're part of the assembly and in harmony with everyone. If you're not following the rules, then you are suspended and there may be something you need to do to get back in the good graces.

[17:36]

So this precepts person suspended the discourse teacher. And then the supporters of the discourse teacher said, this is unfair. This is not okay. He should be suspended like this. And there was factions. Immediately factions. And angry. And everybody holding to their fixed views. So the Buddha heard about this. And he said, there's going to be a schism in the Sangha. There's going to be a divide. And, you know, there's... divisive speech is the second one of the Samyak Bak. There's going to be a schism, said the Buddha. There's going to be a schism. And then he spoke with each one separately, which is very skillful, not publicly. He took aside the precepts master and he said, you know, this is a good monk. He follows the rules. You don't have to do every single thing. You don't have to suspend it, everybody. for a fraction of every single thing.

[18:38]

Just let it go. And then it went to the discourse person and said, even if you didn't do it on purpose, still, for the sake of harmony, just apologize, you know, just for the sake of harmony. But neither of them would do it. They both refused completely to listen to the Buddha. And they got very... caught and kind of zealous in their fixed view of what was right and what was unfair and the factions, I imagine, supported them as happens and make them on maybe even. So the Buddha, you know, took each aside and left them, trusting they would resolve it. You know, Sangha is bringing harmony to everyone. This is Sangha and harmonious living kind of the hallmark you know so he kind of trusted they would come together over this such a small thing but they didn't and in fact it got worse and not only were they angry at one another but they began to actually brawl in public and use harsh language and verbal daggers you know we have the term sharp tongue somebody has a really sharp tongue

[20:05]

The Buddha, in his translation of the Pali, he said, you know, verbal daggers and actual physical hitting one another. That's got that far, if you could imagine. Tassahara people brawling, you know, in the central area. So there was a lot of pride, self-righteousness. I'm right, you're wrong. And as we know, that triggers more fear and distrust. And it got really... It grew. And nobody was willing to compromise or collaborate or, you know, accommodate one another, none of that. So the townspeople, now, this is the nuns and monks order where they gather alms every day for their meals. They don't have, you know, they don't grow their own food, they don't have town trips and so forth. Their town trip is going from house to house getting food. And they were doing this in front of the townspeople, these brawling things.

[21:09]

So the townspeople went to these moderate monks who were not part of the factions and said, what's going on here? This is not, this is unseemly, please tell the Buddha about it. So they reported back to the Buddha. And the Buddha said, if the Samhya is not behaving in accord with our guidelines and our rules, even... Maybe you don't agree with one another. I'm not forcing you to have one mind, but still to behave in such a way where you can sit down and talk to one another. That's what I'm asking. That's what our sound of does. And to have you insulting one another with verbal daggers and brawling and actual coming to blows, that's what happened. I'm asking you to come together and sit down, at least, and behave in a civil way. Bottom line, you know. And they heard this, but they did not go along with what the Buddha said.

[22:23]

In fact, the dispute got even worse and more like real fighting and stuff in front, publicly and privately. stabbing each other with verbal daggers. Deep dispute. And you can imagine the pain of this for the other Sangha brothers and sisters, as well as the townspeakers. So the Buddha went, again, this is the third time. Often we do things, we try three times. You know, we ask three times. We try to reconcile three times. So this time, the Buddha, at first he asked, is it true what I hear that you're... brawling and coming to blows and verbal daggers. And they did say, yes, this was. And he said, you're no longer able to listen to each other, to persuade one another, to convince one another. You're just, it's gone so far beyond the basics of getting along. This is, you know. Then in the translation it says, he said, what could you possibly have in mind?

[23:29]

to think that this is the way to act. I mean, the Buddha's like, what are you thinking? And he says, misguided man, what can he possibly know that would cause you to act in this unskillful way? Kind of like come to your senses, guys. And then he gives this wonderful teaching about the six harmonious ways to be together. or the six memorable qualities that create love and unity and concord and respect. And he goes through these six. And the six are that monks and nuns, I think this is the same for monks and nuns, and this is the saga we're talking about, but I think we can think about that the... Ordain Monks and Nuns Sangha.

[24:30]

This is happening within this community, but this can be for all communities, all groups, family and work and gatherings of all kinds. So to create love and expect and conquer, we should maintain bodily acts of loving kindness, both in public and private. And then the next one, And there's lots of repetition in the canon because it was all learned by heart. So in order to create respect and love and concord, one maintains both in public and private verbal acts of loving kindness towards your companions, towards your fellow bees. So we've got bodily acts of loving kindness in public and private. So even by yourself, you know. karma, unkind, you know.

[25:32]

And then the third is maintaining mental acts of loving kindness, both in public and private, towards your companions, and this creates love, respect, conquer. So those are the first three, which are the first three karmic activities of body, speech, and mind. And then the fourth one is about sharing the requisites And for the Sangha, you know, there was the food would be gathered, gifts would be given of cloth or medicine or needles to repair things. And that would be shared equitably. And I think here we could say in Etta Sahara, you know, we share our meals and we share space and we share communal baths and we, you know, there's a lot of requisites and shared common space. And I think for families and at work you know what is the way that we share our space or for the world itself and our environment how do we share together in public and in private with loving kindness in order to be of help so that's the fourth of the six six memorable qualities the fifth one is the precepts and this is you create love and respect

[26:56]

by keeping and observing precepts both publicly and privately in order to live in a way that's harmonious and in alignment with your intentions. And the sixth, which is said to be the most important one, is right view. So both publicly and privately cultivating right view. Parts of right view, which is part of the Eightfold Path, Samyak view, upright and complete view, includes, you know, keeping in view that everything's impermanent and changing, that there's no abiding self or separate self, that we're all interconnected. And the third would be that everything has the quality of a kind of unsatisfactoriness, this... suffering that is, even in pleasure, there's this quality.

[27:58]

And that's part of right view. So he gave this, Buddha gave this wonderful Dharma talk to these factions of these six memorable qualities. And they were, it says they were delighted and pleased by this. However, they, basically said when he asked them, you know, will you, you know, take this up? They said, you know, well, they basically said, we're going to handle it by ourselves. Could you just leave us alone, please? This is their saying to the Buddha, you know, the Buddha is trying. That was the third time that he came to try to make them come together. And they said, could you leave us alone? We're going to deal with this ourselves. And not exactly like that, but they did say, um, we will resolve it ourselves. Well, of course, they were resolving it by, you know, fighting.

[29:00]

So the Buddha left them. And this, you know, this is part of the Buddha's teaching. If your companions are, he says, not worthy companions, meaning their actions are an influence on you that is not wholesome, and then it's okay to take a, time out, you know, to get some space. And the Buddha did that. He left the Kauraman monks at Kosapi, and he went off walking and came upon, you know, after walking some time, to a small group of monks that was living together in harmony. And this small group, there were just three of them, and they were doing really well together, really taking good care of each other. And what he said about them, was that they were like milk and water, the way they lived together. They were abiding together in harmony. And he asked them about it.

[30:01]

How is it that you're abiding this way so harmoniously? How do you do this? What is your practice? So they described, you know, if one of us goes out on the alms round and comes back early, we... put out the water buckets and put out the mats, kind of set the table and get ready for the other mugs who might come a little later. And the monk who comes later, eats the rest of the food that was there, cleans up, and throws compost things or whatever they had to do. And they shared their life in that way. Both the resources and the responsibilities of living together, they shared it harmoniously. They also, and this is interesting, they had, they didn't practice frivolous talk and idle chatter. If they needed to, you know, let somebody know something, they might gesture, you know, and so they kept silence a lot during work time, which is our practice here as well.

[31:03]

They practiced that, and then every five days or so, they had a small group meeting, and they would sit and discuss Dharma together. Very, very harmonious, very... kind of just a quiet, harmonious life. And the Buddha was really happy to hear about how they were living, stayed with them for a little while. And then he went off by himself. He took a little time away and went out into the forest, into the rainforest probably, by himself. And it says in the sutra that an elephant who had also left his unruly herd... also ambled away from the unruly hurt, followed the Buddha. The two of them kind of practiced together and forth. The elephant. Meanwhile, back at Kosambi, things are not going very well. It's gotten really bad.

[32:05]

And finally, the townspeople, who have been supporting these monks, probably for years, with food and the requisites, Basically, and this is really important because our practice and the fact that we have Tassahara and exist here and all our temples is because we have the support of our members and donors and practitioners. And why do they support these places and the people who practice here? Because they receive the Dharma, they receive the you know, instruction. We're all able to sit together and practice together. So the townspeople saw what was going on, and they basically said, we're not going to support them anymore. They stopped giving them alms food, which is like a major... That's what finally got through to these people, this group. They were not going to feed them anymore. Why?

[33:05]

Because they really weren't practicing the dharma. As the Buddha had taught it, they were... brawling in the streets. So they stopped revering them, not to be rude, but it was in response to the fact that these people were not practicing in accord with the Buddha way. It didn't take long for the monks of Kosambi to say, maybe we better go and see if we can settle this. And as it had been a while, the Buddha had left his practice with At first it had gone to Shravasti, and in Shravasti, Mahapajapati was there, Shariputra was there, the different monks and nuns that we know of, they were all, maybe it was rainy season, they had gathered there. And they, the Buddha was there too, Buddha went there too, they heard that these monks from Kosambi were coming, and they said, they're coming here, you know, what are we going to do, Buddha?

[34:07]

And the Buddha said, they're coming not to make trouble. They're coming to reconcile. That's why they're coming, to be in the presence of the Buddha, to reconcile. So treat them. Don't take sides with either faction. Listen to them. Treat them with respect. House them in separate quarters. Really, really skillful, you know. You don't, like, force them to be together yet in any way. housed in separate quarters according to seniority, you know, stay with, follow the guidelines that we have, and follow the Dharma, and we'll see what happens. So they did come to Fragasti, and what happened was they let go of their kind of self-righteousness and pride that they were right, and their... zealousness about I know the Dharma better than you do or whatever had happened and the precept master who had left the water in the jar basically apologized for being you know even though he didn't do it on purpose he apologized for that action and the discourse master who was the other way the discourse master had left the water and he apologized

[35:34]

and the precept person let go of his suspension, they both dropped their fixed views, really, of righteousness. And as they did, their supporters let it go too, and it quieted, and they were able to come to get it. There was still, and I think this is important too, some areas to look at in terms of the letter of the law and the spirit of the law, which they were both on opposite sides, you know, that, that will, the Buddha said later, this will need to look at this carefully, but at least they could sit down together, or settle, and, you know, the sangha came back together. So that's, that's a story of the quarrel at Kasambi, and I think for me, um, What can we learn from that? When do we hold to fixed views and can't listen and get our friends to be on our side or see it our way?

[36:43]

And when do we need help to come together to let go of arrogance, self-righteousness, and be able to listen to another view? And I think right now in particular, we may find ourselves in in situations where we're hearing very strong language, very strong different views, how are we going to respond? How are we going to find Samyak Vak complete and upright speech that expresses completely who we are, that doesn't, it either gives in or acquiesces, but awakens to our own our own expression, our own authentic expression, that doesn't, that's not attacking or cutting off or pulling away from another. This is a very, very difficult practice, so may we take it up, may we take it up together.

[37:54]

Thank you very much. and shall be great and stand to every thing.

[38:08]

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