This podcast is offered by the San Francisco Zen Center on the web at www.sfzc.org. Our public programs are made possible by donations from people like you. I want to tell you tonight the story, the first story in the book of Serenity. I thought I would tell you the story because it's about the Buddha giving a Dharma talk. So since I'm giving a Dharma talk, I thought I'd tell you the story about the template of all Dharma talks. So this is the story. One day the Buddha ascended the ceremonial seat after bowing, so forth, and sat down. And Manjushri, the bodhisattva of perfect understanding, struck the gavel to formally open a talk. And he began by making a formal statement of introduction.

[01:02]

He said, clearly observe. The Dharma of the Dharma king is thus. And then the Buddha got down from the seat and went away. And that's the story. And I had this story in mind because we recently, I recently, stepped down as the headteacher in our Pacific Northwest groups, both of the big Pacific Northwest groups. So we had, this dialogue is actually repeated, reenacted in the ceremonies of installing a new abbot or headteacher. And often some old priest plays the role of Mantra Shri And I did this in these ceremonies. I struck the gavel, just like in the story. And I whacked the gavel.

[02:04]

And then you say in a very impressive way, The Dharma, the Dharma king is us! Whack! Like that. And then the new teacher starts to speak. And he does speak, in this case. Oh, like the Buddha. In the story, he or she does speak. And I think the idea of the ceremony is that the words of the new teacher utters are supposed to imitate the silence of the Buddha in the story of the Book of Serenity. Zen talks are the verbal equivalent of silence. In an ideal Zen talk, nothing would be said. If there are words, as here I am using words, if there are words, your hope is that nothing is said.

[03:14]

At least, nothing that would be important or informative. And the message of such a Zen talk is... Everything is important. Everything expresses the Dharma. And everything is already silence. So don't think that there's some truth in my words. My words are supposed to turn you back around, away from looking for something you think you don't already have. My words are supposed to turn you back to yourself, back to the ground that you are standing on. And I'm totally convinced this is true. Everything really is silence. Everything really is unexplained.

[04:20]

Everything really is significant beyond itself. And that's what makes it what it is. And we are all of us always living in the middle of all that, even though we think there's something that we need to go beyond. So the point of Zen words is to try to help us to remember this one salvific fact of our existence. So the story of the Buddha ascending the teaching seat is a story about prajnaparamitas, the perfection of understanding. Lately I've been writing about the perfection of understanding, and I kind of came to the realization that it would be good to say it that way, the perfection of understanding. The word prajna is usually translated as wisdom, perfection of wisdom, but I've been translating it as the perfection of understanding.

[05:29]

Because in English, when you say someone understands, you mean they understand something. But also if you say they understand, they're an understanding person, you mean that the person is sympathetic and kind. So that's why the word understanding is a really good translation, I think, for prajna, because prajna is just like that. You understand and you are understanding when you practice prajna. You understand that everything remains unexplained, everything is silence and everything is already complete. You understand that what you think you know, you don't really know. So you have a pretty open feeling about life.

[06:30]

And then yes, because you feel that way, you are going to have a great sympathy for others because you understand that we are all in exactly the same boat. All of us are sad and magnificent creatures. And we're sad and magnificent creatures together. So, technically, the perfection of understanding means that you recognize the emptiness of all dharmas, as we chant every single day in the Heart Sutra, which says all Brahmas are empty. There's nothing inside. Dharmas have no own being.

[07:32]

Everything is like this. You don't make dharmas empty by meditating. Sitting doesn't affect dharmas at all. They're already empty. And the only thing about sitting is maybe when you sit, you can appreciate the fact that all dharmas are already, have always been already empty. Empty. And if you keep on practicing zazen for a while, a whole lot of things that seemed important will no longer seem so important. And you will have some composure. Sometimes you'll surprise yourself. Somebody told me they were so surprised when they... got a diagnosis that looked like something pretty serious. They surprised themselves with their composure.

[08:36]

If you sit Zazen a lot, because of this you'll have composure, even when tough things happen, because you'll understand that things will come and go, and they always do. They're empty. That's very relieving. And when you're relieved, it's a lot easier to be kind. When you're tense and upset, you know, it's harder to be kind. The perfection of understanding is elusive. Even more elusive are words to describe it. And yet it's no mystery. Open your eyes. clearly observe. Everything you see, everything you hear, everything you taste, everything you touch is already empty and luminous, just the way it is.

[09:43]

All you need to do is clearly observe, just as Manjushri says. So the Buddha's Dharma talk in our story is an example of perfect eloquence. The Buddha knows that it's a good idea to say nothing because anything you say will be misleading. The presence of Manjushri in the story, Manjushri who was the bodhisattva of perfect understanding, tells you that this is a story about the perfection of understanding. You often see in Buddhist art depictions of Manjushri, the imaginative creature, bodhisattva of perfect wisdom, who is usually depicted as a 16-year-old boy. I don't know why anybody would think that a 16-year-old boy would be the paragon of perfect understanding, but somehow that's what they thought.

[10:49]

Maybe because of the youth, the vibrancy. And... Usually the Banjushri figure has a sword held aloft, you know, in one hand, and in the other hand, a book, the Perfect Wisdom Sutra. And the sword is to cut through all entangling words and ideas, slice right through them, so everybody can see the emptiness on the inside. And this Manjushri on our altar here, so beautifully painted by Kokyo Charlie Henkel many years ago, Manjushri has one hand in a teaching mudra and the other hand with a sword. But the book is on his shoulder, like on a vine or something like that. So this perfect...

[11:52]

Understanding Sutra is one of many sutras on the perfect understanding. There's a lot of literature about perfect understanding. As you can imagine, this vast literature doesn't tell you too much. Rather than asserting things that are the case, this is a critical literature. that just tells you what is not the case. It tells you that what we think and perceive is not the case. All dharmas are empty of own beings. Nothing exists in its own right. Nothing at all. Not you, not me, not anything. That we exist in some way is, of course, clear. because probably we would all agree we are here, somehow, living some kind of life, but the seemingly lonely and autonomous life we think we're living is actually a fiction.

[13:13]

Our life is not an autonomous life. It never has been. without the whole rest of the world, we don't exist. We would not be here. And if somehow we could manage to be here without the whole rest of the world, we couldn't remain here for even a second without everything and everyone else constantly supporting us every single moment of our lives until the last. And this is why the only possible reasonable response to being alive is gratitude. Because I am empty of my own being, but I'm full of everything else. That's what makes me. Thanks to you, I can be me for a little while.

[14:17]

A fact which is embedded in our very grammar. The word me could never appear in a language without the word you. My true identity isn't me. It's love. I have another little short story about perfect understanding. This one is about Bodhidharma, the legendary founder of Zen, and Emperor Wu of China, Chinese emperors. And this story is the opening story of the Blue Cliff Record collections. Bodhidharma goes to see the emperor who asks him, what's the highest meaning of the holy truths? Bodhidharma replies, empty, nothing is holy. The emperor says, who is this facing me, telling me this?

[15:26]

Bodhidharma says, I don't know. The emperor is a little nonplussed by this dialogue. Bodhidharma turns around, crosses the Yangtze River, goes to Shaolin, where he then spends nine years facing the wall in meditation. So that's the story of Bodhidharma and the Emperor. The holy truths that the Emperor asks about basically stands for normative, ordinary Buddhist teachings. And Emperor Wu was a pretty big supporter of Buddhism, and he was really expecting something really good from this great sage from the West. So maybe it was shocking. And the Bodhidharma gives him nothing.

[16:31]

He says, the teachings are empty. Well, we shouldn't be shocked by this, right? Everything is empty. Emptiness is a thoroughgoing fact of life. Everything, with no exceptions, is empty. of own being. Even the Buddhist teachings, which the Heart Sutra in a litany of phrases denies, even the Buddhist teachings are empty. Even the Buddha himself is empty. The highest meaning of the Holy Truth, the highest meaning of everything is no meaning. Empty of meanings. Beyond meanings. Emptiness and perfect understanding isn't a meaning. Even emptiness is empty.

[17:36]

There is nothing that perfect wisdom understands. So how would you live in the light of this teaching? If you really appreciate the emptiness teachings as they are, it would make you a very humble person. Because you would know you have no truth to hold. And you would know that the practice that you are doing, that maybe, like a few of us in the room here, you have devoted your entire adult life to, is nothing more or less than what any person you will ever meet is also doing.

[18:41]

So there is no possible source of pride. You might think that being humble in this way is a little distressing or depressing, or at least low energy, a phrase our president uses very bad if you have low energy. You might think that this kind of teaching would make you have low energy. But actually, it is precisely the opposite. To be humble in this sense is to be free. limitation, to be fully open. It's to be interested, to be curious, to always see possibility. This might be another word for emptiness, limitless possibility, because when all dharmas are empty, any limitation is dissolved.

[19:49]

Limitless possibility. And appreciating emptiness, you would naturally be kind. You would be understanding. You would be forgiving, very forgiving. There might not be anything at all to hold on to, but there is a way to live. With compassion. And with concern for everyone and everything. Which actually... is one's self. So when you appreciate the emptiness of all dharmas, you are very naturally, and in a simple way, protective of all beings, all living things, and all non-living things, too. In the story, the emperor asks Bodhidharma, who is he? And Bodhidharma's answer is, I don't know.

[20:54]

I don't know is the truth always true. When we practice the perfection of understanding, we don't know. This is not the I don't know that is involved with thinking that we could know something or we should know something or somebody else knows something, but we don't. It's not that kind of I don't know. It means we understand that I don't know is the truth. I was telling the people in our workshop about nothing, this story of I don't know. Dijang asks Fahyan, where are you going? And Fahyan says, I'm going around on pilgrimage. Dijang says, what's the purpose of pilgrimage? And Fahyan says, I don't know.

[21:59]

Dijang says, not knowing is most intimate. And in Zen talk, not knowing and intimacy are synonyms for awakening to Prajnaparamita, the emptiness of all norms. But then, notice what happens next in the story of Bodhidharma and the Emperor. I don't know. And Bodhidharma leaves and goes to Shaolin and faces the wall for nine years in deep contemplation. The emptiness of all dharmas is not a bright idea, it's not a philosophy, it's not an abstraction, at least not for us. Zen students, it's not. It's a personal matter for us. It's very, very personal. It's facing us all the time.

[23:06]

In everything we face. And in our face. And that's why we sit. That's why we devote ourselves to simple, upright sitting for a whole lifetime. When we sit, we're not practicing meditation so we can gain insight or some enlightenment. We're sitting in the exact center of the miracle of being humans, in the exact center of our attachment aversions, in the exact center of our collective human pains.

[24:10]

Sitting there, we join with everyone, and that's our liberation. Of course we do. And we recognize that there's nothing to hold onto, that it all comes and goes, comes and goes in a flash. And this is the shape of every single moment of our lives. The world is a troubled, troubled world that concerns all of us. There is no other way to live than to address the troubled world. Doing what we can. Not because we're mad at somebody. Not because we're freaked out. Not because even we're politically active or socially active.

[25:16]

No. Simply because we are human beings. And this is what human beings do. To be able to sustain a life of caring, we really need to have some understanding. And in order to understand, we sit. And we continue sitting. So that's my Dhamma talk, folks. The end. And now, according to my instructions, there are eight minutes left, correct? Eight minutes. In case anybody has something to say or would like to bring something up, we have precisely eight minutes, probably seven by now.

[26:20]

But you don't have to say anything. We could always leave early. But if you do have something, we can talk. Wow, such eloquent people. I really appreciate your Eloquence. Thank you. Thank you for listening to this podcast offered by the San Francisco Zen Center. Our Dharma talks are offered free of charge, and this is made possible by the donations we receive. Your financial support helps us to continue to offer the Dharma. For more information, visit SSCC.org and click giving.

[27:18]

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