Good evening. What brought me to Tessahara this week was the annual, it's become an annual That's not exactly a seminar, but a day and a half of teaching of Suzuki Roshi's understanding of our practice. There are many people here in this room. Some of you have never been here before. Some of you don't know about our history or why we're here. And some of you are our old seasoned students and everything in between. I want to say a little bit about our practice here and how we got here.

[01:06]

Suzuki Roshi, Shinri Suzuki, was our founding teacher. He came from Japan in 1959 to be the head priest for the priest of Sokoji Temple, Japanese temple. Soto Zen Temple in San Francisco. And he did that. Some people say that he came with the idea of establishing Zen in America. I think that's a little bit of an exaggeration. I think he came to be the priest of the Sokoji people. But he'd had experience with people in Japan, an American lady who educated him, and he educated her, and he was open to whatever would happen.

[02:19]

When he came to San Francisco, He said, I didn't read any books about San Francisco. I didn't look at pictures. I didn't look at a map. I just wanted to see it with my own eyes without any preconceptions. So that was his character, basically. That was his basic teaching character, to not have preconceptions and to see everything very clearly for the first time, which we rarely do. So when he came to Sokoji Temple in San Francisco, the temple had, it wasn't a Japanese temple, it was an old synagogue, and the oldest one in San Francisco. And it had pews and a kind of stage, theater stage, downstairs. So he sat in the pews every morning, zazen.

[03:25]

Zha Zen is our practice, our main practice, the practice that he presented to us as the main, the centerpiece of our activity, sitting cross-legged in meditation, so-called meditation, called Zha Zen. And this was 59 in 1859, and there were a lot of young men, young people, actually, who, um, not just young people, actually older people as well, who, um, looked him up in the telephone book. They were looking for something. A lot of people had been to Japan during the war and were interested in finding some zentuckled in America. So he invited them to come. He said, I said, it was 5.45 that he sat in the morning, every morning, and you're welcome to come and sit with me. And, uh, gradually a group found it, uh, um, was founded around him, and that was the beginning of Zen Center.

[04:30]

And when I came to Zen Center in 1964, the group had been incorporated, and there were quite a number of people, and there was talk about some people, some members, were interested in finding a place to have a monastery so they could have some more continuous or deeper practice. Masuzuki Roshi. So, as it turned out, in 1966 and 7, Tassahara was discovered. And it was sort of for sale. And it was an old resort. Tassahara means something like neat, dry place. And... It was basically the way it is now, but more or less. The layout is about the same, except when we extended it.

[05:35]

The old cabins are the same cabins that were there then. So Tassahara, after it was purchased in 1967, the first thing we did, more or less, was to build the kitchen. You've seen that kitchen that's made out of stones. That kitchen that was made out of stone, you know, this place is nothing but stones. So it's pretty easy to get stones. And the project was a great project. People would, I heard about Tazahar and about a Zen monastery and so forth, and people showed up at the gate, carpenters showed up at the gate, That's always a plus. You know, my experience is in Zen practice, if there's someone, if some group gets hold of a place to practice, carpenters appear.

[06:39]

Always works. And then at some point, they disappear. With all of God, they disappear. So they love it. working that way. This was in the mid-60s. It was the time of communing. Up in Northern California, there were many communists based on various plans, I guess you'd call them. People just had various ideas of getting together and going and getting back to nature and living together. free of their parents and their parents and society's corruption, actually. And there were a lot of people like that at Tatsuhara.

[07:45]

By 1970, Suzuki Roshi invited Tatsugali Roshi, who was a more monastic practitioner than he was to come, and he developed the monastic rules that we have for tasahara, and still have those rules. So, that's why you're all here. You wouldn't be here except for that. I always, Suzuki Roshi was my teacher, and I practiced with him for seven years before he died in 1971. And I always, he ordained me in 1969, and I've always felt that this is my destiny to promote his practice.

[08:49]

So Suzuki Noshi was a very kind person. He was a Subto Zen priest, and he responded to what he felt we needed or wanted. You know, he didn't found exactly himself. He didn't go out and look for Tazahara. His students did that. So he always encouraged his students to do things. And... we say Shizuki Roshi was the founder of Zen Center, which is true, but it was his student, it was the founder of Zen Center. He just encouraged people. Because this had never happened before. He did not say, you should do things this way and that way because this is the way he could do them in Japan. We do have a Japanese model, which is all he knew. But it works for us. This is actually American Zen, the Japanese model.

[10:01]

And we are developing it. And people would often say, shouldn't we just have an American Zen, you know, and drop all this stuff, those foreign stuff? And to me it was not foreign. But to a lot of people, it felt that way. He said, well, you should be careful. This is 750 years of people's experience and lifeblood, creative practice, and we should not just look out the window because you want to do something egotistical. In time, things will change. In time, things will change. Everything will change. That's the fundamental. dynamism of the universe, everything, not only everything will change, everything is teaching.

[11:04]

That was his fundamental teaching, actually. But in time, everything will change, and so-called American Zen will emerge out of this particular paradigm on its own. We're just patient and continue practicing. So, Suzuki Hiroshi appeared at a time when other teachers from Japan were beginning to come as well to teach. And his teaching was a little different than most of them. Most of them were, most of the teachers were Rinzai teachers, style, and their teaching was Kauan practice, which is a deep contemplation of sin stories, basically, which would open your mind to realization.

[12:24]

His understanding was realization or enlightenment. I think there are two things. There's enlightenment and then there's realization. Realization means realization of enlightenment. You may have enlightenment, but you don't necessarily have realization. So, how we say... Everyone has Buddha nature, or everyone is actually Buddha nature, but we don't realize it. So I can talk a little bit about that later. Our understanding is that enlightenment brings us to practice. That's the motivation that brings us to practice, is our inherent enlightenment. We say Buddha seeks Buddha.

[13:27]

Enlightenment seeks enlightenment. So we don't recognize water seeks water. This is enlightenment. Because we're half Buddha and half ordinary person. But it's the ordinary person that is more dominant. And we don't think, well, I do that. We don't have that realization, but it's enlightenment that brings us to practice, and practice encourages enlightenment, enlightenment encourages practice. So Suzuki Roshi never, I don't say never, but he didn't encourage us to seek enlightenment. Mostly when we read about Buddhism, we say, you should seek enlightenment.

[14:32]

That's okay to say that. Good idea. But actually, when we start to practice it, we stop seeking. We just practice. And this is one of the most difficult parts of, I think, to kind of get a hold-up, because Mostly, when we do something, we want something. We want a result for what we do. Don't we? Yes. If you work all day, you want to get paid. So what's the payoff for practice? So Suzuki never promised us anything. He never said, if you sit tsa zen and practice every day, he didn't say, you'll get enlightened. He didn't say, you will have realization. He didn't say, he didn't promise anything. The only thing he promised was, if you sit, you will sit, if you need.

[15:42]

The payoff is in the activity itself. Some people say, Well, the reason people come to practice is because of suffering. They want to do something about their suffering. I'm not so sure about that. This is called the Saha world, which means world of suffering. That's what it is. It's true. It's not only suffering. It's also enjoyment and so forth. Those are all supplements or supplements according to the dharma. We get a little pleasure out of life. That's good. We should get a lot of pleasure out of life. But anyway, so Suzuki Roshi was a, I would say, realist and big pole.

[16:56]

a lot of teachers were emphasizing what we call Kensho, Kensho means an enlightenment experience. And at that time, in the 60s, people, a lot of the teachers that came to America were recruiting students and having long sitting sashins and trying to encourage people to practice real hard to gain an enlightenment experience. An enlightenment experience is, well, a waking up experience. I won't tell you what it is. If you think you know what an enlightenment experience is, that's a hindrance. there's a story about a hunter who went out to shoot a rabbit.

[18:09]

So he went out and he looked for the rabbit and a rabbit came by, running as fast as he could. And the hunter was standing next to a stump and the rabbit went right into the stump and shoved itself. And the husband held up the rabbit and said, God, that's great. I didn't even have to do it. So the next day he came out and he stood by the stump again. You get it? So I tried to get the rabbit. It's a mistake. trying to get the second baptism instead. You may have some kind of experience. It's nice to have an enlightenment experience. That's good. We should have one every moment. Moment by moment, we should have an enlightenment experience. Not just once in a while.

[19:12]

But then there are enlightenment experiences and enlightenment experiences. So, in the literature, it worries about the enlightenment experiences of certain teachers, which is great. But that's not the way everything happens. What we say is, when you walk in the fog, you don't realize your clothes are getting wet until you reach down and feel it. So, Suzuki Ngozi's practice was more like, okay, enlightenment brings you to practice, Don't worry about it. What we need to do is not try to get enlightened, but just put your energy into practice. And stop trying to get something. Stop trying to pay off, because searching for enlightenment is a kind of egotistical practice.

[20:22]

enlightened practice is to let go, to just let go of everything and offer yourself to the universe. So there are two kinds, two, they say Buddhists and ordinary people. Siddhi beings are not too. So we're both ordinary and Buddha. When we start to practice, when we Siddhi Zazen, we don't say, I am Siddhi Zazen. Buddha Siddhi Zazen. So that's the Siddhi Zazen, it's not me. It's not an egotistical or self-centered activity.

[21:28]

It's Buddha-centered activity. So ordinary-centered activity is based on greed, ill-will, and delusion. That's the hub in which are the ordinary life. Not everybody, not all time. But that's basically ordinary activity, as you can see in the world today. Buddha's activity, to have a Buddha activity is generosity, love, and kindness, and wisdom. So when our meal turns on generosity, love, and kindness, and Buddha's wisdom, that's enlightened activity. So we're both Buddha and ordinary. We do have greed, we do have ill will, and we do have delusion.

[22:32]

We cannot deny it. It's really hard not to have greed, some ill will, and some delusion. But at the same time, we can also base our activity on generosity, love, and kindness, and wisdom. Wisdom means to realize our three natures. We have human nature, and we have cosmic nature, and we have Buddha nature. Those are the three natures. Cosmic nature means that we realize that we don't own our body. You're just part of the cosmos.

[23:34]

Human nature means that we belong to this small community called people that has struggled to find itself. And human nature is in between. Buddha nature realizes, our Buddha nature realizes that our human nature is based on our cosmic nature, and not separate from our cosmic nature. So human nature, we have huge roles for how we act with each other, which are always changing, and not everybody conforms to them. cosmic nature is totally independent of whether or not we like it or don't like it. Whether we're good or bad, right, wrong, has nothing to do with that.

[24:41]

It just stays the way it is. Just collects how it is. Without judgments. So, Buddha nature is to realize the oneness of those two natures. The oneness of those two natures. So it's not like we're all alone in the universe. We are the universe. We can't escape from the universe. So we say you'll always appear somewhere in some form because you are. cosmic nature. The blood runs through our veins, the body acts on its own. It's not acting on its own. The cosmic nature is running everything. We say, I breathe, but actually we're being breathed.

[25:47]

Inhaling is inspiration, Exhaling is expiration. You don't have anything to do with it. It's just cosmic activity. You get thirsty. You don't have anything to do with it. We're just being run by cosmic activity. But we cope, as humans, we cooperate with it. We have that ability of freedom cooperate with universal activity. And if we don't cooperate, we lose it. So that's why our practice is based toward harmony. Sometimes people say, well, what are you doing? How come you're not out there doing worldly work?

[26:58]

or humanity, which is a good question. But actually the etasara is to express this harmony and this unity and this understanding as a way to help the world destabilize itself. We're way out of stability, and somebody has to find a stable way. There's no world leadership. There's no cooperation to speak up. Everything's up for grabs. And our visions and our views are so natural.

[28:00]

People need to understand how we actually exist. Our views are so narrow. And when we practice in this way, the energy, or whatever you want to call it, is transmitted to the world. Even though we're kind of far into this forest, energy continues. So that's our wish. And that's at the Agama Park. We call it samādhi. Samādhi means stability and connection.

[29:11]

Jijūyu samādhi means self-fulfillment, which we offer to the world as our offering for fulfillment to everyone. If our practice is just selfish, then it's not real practice. So, we train many people here. During the summer, it's very different than the practice period. During the practice period, there's no guests. But during this guest season, people experience something from our practice, and kind of like a disease they carry on. So it was time for me to stop talking. And thank you for coming.

[30:20]

Thank you.

[30:24]

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