Zendo Talk

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SF-04065
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and tension
the terrorists
early versions

i'm delighted to be here again with you this evening
this will be my last appearance for a while
i want to again express my appreciation and and atkins appreciation for your hospitality
ah all this time to express my thanks to you individually
and to
rob and his staff
for ah
wonderful respite working vacation
the thank you yvonne and bill for their hospitality also during the last part of our stay
looking forward to seeing all of you again

i have been working on
revising my tape shows on the long com or women go on
on
transforming them from
transcribed tapes to essays
and this is one of those
no two shows
kiss forty five
of the mama com or woman on
a book that was put together in the early thirteenth century
ah a collection of forty eight
classic cases
dialogue stories dreams and folk stories
and a simple challenges like today's case
i said i could hold this flashlight in my mouth you know
a

fire i'm don schon said shakyamuni and maitreya are servants of another tell me who is that other
women comments
if you can see this other and distinguish that one clearly then it is like encountering your mother or father at the crossroads you will not need to ask somebody whether or not you are right
women's verse don't draw another's bow don't ride another's horse don't discuss another's faults don't explore another's affairs
hey i'm dumb shun is no other than would sue or gossip
a familiar case a familiar figure ah in these cases
he he was a some period lindsay or rinzai master lived in the
eleventh century just into the twelfth century
he was the instigator of case thirty five in this book
t
the story of the young woman who got separated from her soul
and case thirty eight about the water buffalo that passes through a window i'll accept his tail
thus he appears in this collection three times as often as mon or union
which gives an indication of how highly ah woman thought of him
he was actually yeah
a great great grandfather of ha ha woman in the dharma and was teacher of yuan will the compiler of the blue cliff record
but so was ordained at thirty five after a very promising career as a scholar of buddhism
he went from teacher to teacher seeking the dharma and at one place he heard the words it is like drinking water and nine personally whether or not it is warm or cold
and he said to himself
i know about warm and cold but i don't know about personally
and is and he settled in the assembly of bot pour une showed one
and one day he heard the roshi say there are several monks from mount new all of whom have had satori
if you ask them to speak they give beautiful tax if you ask them to write pithy commentaries they do so nicely yet they have not attained it
well he was dumbfounded by this and pondered over it and his realization of showed ones meaning was his personal realization his reputation spread and for some forty years he was a prominent teacher
yet they have not attained it
this is reminiscent of case nine story of the non attain to put up
hmm
you know
in then there are two points of view which sure
melt and blend just as farm and emptiness blend
those two points of view are the essential point of view and the practice point of view
now of course
woods's teacher here was speaking from the essential point of view they have not attained it
ah but there is also a practice point of view and i'd like to to stray a bit from ah
our topic here and going to that a little
ha
i'm often asked
ah
how is it that people who have passed their first gate
are obviously not yet mature
that's a tough one you know you've had enlightenment but you're not mature
me as by abolish that word an enlightenment at least in that context i think

well the holograph maybe as the best model or metaphor for explaining this point the holograph will reveal a three dimensional picture sharp and clear when you shine a laser through a plate if you break the plate and shine a laser through any of the fragments
you will still get the first full picture but the perspective will not be complete and it may not be so sharply and focus
destiny roshi used to say can show
realizing true nature is like rubbing a clear place in a piece of frosted glass
when you look through the clear place you look the clear place and that's essential nature all right
but you don't really see it in focus yet
you need to clean up the whole glass and maybe push it out
that is continued practice
i remember the hassan say ceremony that is conducted in the somebody killed on school for people who have completed their con study this was a hassan safe or an old timer
and yes attorney roshi in his
words at the ceremony said now he is beginning his practice
those of us who are still struggling away at her first cons are thinking ah or has put us you know

and of course maturity of character is a matter to of concern how is it that a person who has passed his or her first gate is not mature in character
well
this is sir
another interesting question
i think it's like a cleaning up the first floor
but there can be lots of spiders and other things in the basement
i need cleaning up
can show realization experience opens the gate
or rather it reveals the open gate
it is up to us to go on through
in my own case on
ah i suppose i formerly
eh had can show or with africa sign was she at
retreat our session held at san juan bautista
nineteen seven nineteen sixty nine one has it
forget nineteen sixty nine
at a catholic retreat house that we rented for the purpose of session
i'd actually had an experience many years before that but it wasn't clear enough
and i went through some checking questions with
sonia she and then when yamato she came to lead our diamond sangha centers in nineteen seventy two
suddenly the boulders that were blocking mine my way broke loose and the waters rushed through
ah and then after that i went through collins study with yamato roshi and i went to japan every year for four months and we worked intensively with him
and nineteen seventy four i had my aha on her side a sunset
ceremony and we had our first session with me as the roshi in at the marriage and or nineteen seventy five
and shivaay amorosi is a book goes and comments on them mankind had just been published
and they students gave me a copy of that book and they all signed it and it's the copy that i still years and every time i leave past that the title page with all those of names on it i feel very nostalgic
but the point is that when i read that book
ah i found there are many points i didn't understand
how has quite a shock and there i was a roshi already
and i know that does she have a amorosi was a teacher i could trust
ha
his
ah teachers teacher was
toyota docket time rashi
ah but a man's mg
and toyota target than russia was also the rinzai teacher of harada sagar quraishi who later and whose descendants founded the sample kyoto
with a subtle lineage also
so i felt very close to share by amorosi in the lineage
what i didn't understand a lot of what he said
ah you can believe that i really worked on those points that i didn't know about you
that was truly an important beginning for me
always beginning
so please see this whole matter in perspective
ah does a matter of hard work all along
yeah to realize what has been true from the very beginning
the hump the the essential nature that has been claire
from the start
so of course would so is speaking from the essential point of view here on he asked that question shock shock him money and maitreya are servants of another i want to ask you who is that other
shakyamuni buddha the great founder of our way who after years of hard practice realize that all beings are the to takata only their delusions and preoccupations keep them from realizing that fact
testifying to that fact
my trail is the buddha still to be barn
in a chinese iconography my maitreya is indistinguishable from blue dye or ho tae so called laughing buddha
with a big belly his arms raised in the air with a warm smile they arrived to put up that is potential in all of us
in the ten exerting pictures
the figure in the last picture
entering the marketplace with bliss bestowing hands consorting with publicans and prostitutes and enlightening them all
this is haughty
well this marvelous buddhist figures and a buddha himself and my maitreya these teachers of us all our servants of another tell me who is that other
in i'm reminded of yasuo hiroshi comforting us the second night obsession
we went to bed
saying when you are tired the enemy is tired
who is that enemy who is that other this is the question
in our school and the diamond sangha school a we work on they call on mo at the outset
and we enter the dark knight and sip hard through all kinds of difficult conditions to personalize that other
if you can see this other woman says and distinguish that one clearly then it is like encountering your mother or father at the crossroads you will not need to ask somebody whether or not you are right
just that my father is that my mother
just one glimpse is enough
ah i recall a few years ago we received a brochure from
the bank of upper lake europe or like lakers and it's where my grandparents my mother's parents lived and my brother and i frequently visited there and in fact i spent my senior year in high school there
ah my grandpa was i was a member of the board of directors of the bank of upper lake
and ah
he had stock in the bank and
we have a few shares of that stock which we inherited sin about to seventy five dollars a year ah well they sent this brochure and on the back there was a little tiny picture of the bank of upper lake in
in the nineteen twenties and nineteen thirties i guess it must have been
a little picture no larger than an inch and a half high and there was a tiny figure entering the bank in that picture and it was grandpa the the it was his back was to the camera but it was unmistakably his figure and it was no higher than maybe
half an inch in that picture no think
ha
well
mans verse don't draw another's bow don't ride and others horse
you must be your on archer you must be your on horsewoman your horse or your own horse man
i think of your stan hiroshi is wonderful my aim
of this line don't ride and others horse
he was his on rider
the next two lines are not as easy
don't discuss on others' faults
of course this is the same as the sixth the precept doesn't it

but the does this mean you just shine it on
ah you know
sometimes so groups
proceedings
excuse me
yes don't discuss and other's faults this is a real everyday life go on isn't it that's right so i tried page i can i can win it
now
how do you deal with another's faults and what do you say
something has to be said sometimes
how do you handle it
don't explore and others' affairs the same kind of point how do you do it
you cannot live in this world
oh thank you
you cannot live in this world without an awareness of the affairs of others and without dealing with them how do you deal with them

i think we can get a hint from the high and such a
that we are all reflecting each other
that we all include each other one another
in what dick not harm cause into being

the buddha said at his birth above the heavens below the heavens on the i lawn and sacred
and he also said on his enlightenment now i see that all beings are the buddha
so is this individuality and this otherness and the sameness of the self and others
ah that would is getting out here
who is that other
okay i'll stop there and invite your questions
the go until
a thirty nine o'clock thirty
okay are we have time for
ah half an hour so or questions

prague
oh yes

tom
if we are
ah you have to deal with ah
a mistakes of others
and you have to
help resolve the tendency of others to make mistakes
surely that is the main focus of of people in in who are in responsible positions in this very sanga
ah
if somebody is messing up
clogging the toilet say
a bad habit
you have to go about it in the right way
so how how'd you do it
hey

for dumb yes there you go
report

this
yes yes
a peep
yes
we're on

you bet
you
you
he

one
course some
that's the that's the basic question for western students it's not regarded as a problem and the east because
people who are
buddhist practice are living in a monastery and if you live in a monastery
ah it's like living in a training center
you are like rocks with rough edges that are that are
being rotated around in a pot and you gradually rub off the
the rough edges and become smooth and bright to through sanga interactions ah while applying the wisdom that you have
that you have gained
ah
but
it is possible especially for a person have some talent
and to you
grow grow up ah maybe even go through all the way you can't study without ever having to deal with
yeah
the spiders in the basement
you are in the words of
my dear friend beatrice would potter and or high valley a talent bomb
you know
ah and there are lots of talent bums in this swirled you know and who have a
ah wonderful achievements behind them but they're still neurotic as hell
my hon
and so we must look at the the limitation of con study
ah that it takes one through a course of wisdom
ah and if at each step one examines how this works in everyday life
i'm thinking of
ah
the case of
case forty of them among kind where his sun kicks over the water bottle
and months verse runs
i'm tossing bamboo baskets and ladles away cause a son was the cook of the monastery
he swept all before him he kicked over the water
jaco joe's great barrier cannot interrupt his rush after chose the teacher who set the water bottle on the floor and said you may not call this a water bottle what do you call it the and and some kicked
ah and then the last line reads thousands of buddhist come forth from his toes
well i always regarded that as a kind of conceit you know kind of decorated line
fancy idea
but
my student who is now an independent teacher and nelson foster
says to his students how do you show that in your daily life thousands of buddha's come forth from your toes
so if there is the constant referral back
to daily life from this arcana
from these empowered fragments of wisdom
then certainly call and study is going to
ah
clean out the basement to
but it's sir
ah obviously possible
yeah to bypass such questions
and maybe even get the knack of showing out to do this in daily life and not do it
no
so
yeah i was talking about this the other night with someone who called
in
and
she was looking at the relationship of but at the twelve steps
to zen practice
oh and i said the
that to explicitly
you're more likely to find that in terra vada practice and in tibet and practice than in zen practice
ah but the on meditating about this question a little more i realize that one can
pick out in con study teachings that to and can be related to each of us are important twelve steps of a al anon it's on
it seems to me you know it when one of the things i noticed when i first began my zen practice in japan was how arrogant some zen monks were
ah
and my first san fran used to
and tell about the time that he was
in korea at the shinji but so in branch of your shinji
which was and saw r k jaws it was not in those days before the war
and there was a marker who had oh there's a monk who always kick the dog the stray dog that came around
them out
and after his
you can show mr plath watch to see if you're going to kick the dog
and sure enough he did to say seem to kick him harder
that is my point you see can show our realization experience exposes the open gate and it's up to us to walk through
it's up to us to take all this to heart to personalize it
that's the that's the task right through to personalize
ah one can be exposed from from hell to breakfast and a not change
zen practice is transformational or it is nothing modern she is to say a purpose of zen is the perfection of character

parents
own that's a very interesting question
maybe basically there is no difference
i am
yeah
hillary and the other night was mentioning something she ran across and heraclitus fragment that says character is fate
course you can read that as character is karma
character is your karma in other words
i don't believe that one is born a tabula rasa
a white her
a tablet
on which everything is inscribed after press
i don't think it's true
scientifically i can i think it can be shown that this is not throw us to their studies of twins
twins
grow up separately or fun too
huh mary
spouses with the to get married and and their spouses have the same name
they married they named their children the same names they named their cats the same
day i have the same habit to for maybe a flushing the toilet before they're completely done you know
it's incredible how how similar they are even though they were separated at birth
and the little details of habit and preference and ah taste in movies and all of that
wonder where free will comes in
the point is the normal nokia you see the gnomon nokia is the infinitely varied body of the buddha the unique body of the buddha
the prototype is shakyamuni buddha there was never anybody before like shakyamuni buddha and there will never be anybody again like him there will never be anybody with your face again and there never was before
you are completely unique
you're a special as mister rogers says
and that special ness you see is your character that is your karma
and it is your responsibility
see within this world of harmony within this indra's net to cultivate that particular talent ah and potential that you have within you
ha in this process of rubbing off the rough edges and harmonizing with rpx

so personality you know is that original character with whatever has been inscribed on it since
change
our the degradation
and what is it dr johnson says sir
ah speaking of another's faults
he said about somebody
sherry sir is naturally dull but it must have taken him a good deal of cultivation to become as dull as he is
so it can go both ways

yes
agreed that are especially by some sort of teachers contract
vision ah and i really don't understand this to overwrite an example of this
whatever going man he says alignments used to justify it that me go to to carry the south for
to carry yourself forward to being like voted him out our movie and adwords coin practice seems to be a practice that designed to cultivate the self or self improvement so yeah now it seems so ah
and to go back to duggan's line and incidentally you know
is it duggan's and g certainly used cons and his teaching i mean the a corker is simply a collection of cards and in the shovel gonzo
there is a case in virtually every chapter a call on case in virtually every chapter and and many of the
in the ganges con the case ends the chapter but in many of the chapters the case begins the chapter and the rest of the chapters a commentary on that case
ah and with regard to that famous passage in the ganges con
that the self advances and confirms that ten thousand things is called delusion that's the difference he doesn't say it is this a delusion if you know japanese that word top is their top is the is the particle
that is equivalent to our quotation marks
it's called delusion
ah
it's one of the ways in other words
it's it's it's it's what the
it's kind of thing that god commanded adam to do to name the animals
right
ah naming his ah an extremely important human
endeavour without naming we can't function
am so yeah that
a
no
that that the those two lives that the self advances and confirms that ten thousand things is called delusion that the ten thousand things advance and confirms the south is enlightenment there's no top in the in that second line there's no quotation marks
he is simply highlighting
the two ways so to speak and he not this is not a giving excessive stress to direction allottee here and he is not i think making invidious comparisons
now the next point is about current study
i am current study
the is not self improvement in the in the modern sense of human development
if it is i resign
ha ha
there is no realization apart from perception
beginning with a buddha who looked up and saw the morning star
three
ah there it it's very interesting to look at this in terms of gender terms of of the traditional sexual roles see of striving and receiving the masculine role of striving
the feminine role of receiving
there is both
in zen practice as i see it
ah hee jin kim
a translate so one passage in in dogan ah must mustering the self which is a really great expression as a military expression you know mustering the self getting it all together so to speak and and
striving
but that striving is the striving of focus
openness you see openness open
one pointed open focus so that ah the sound of the birds goes right through
the shine was star goes right through
the smell of incense goes right through
ah and when we look to us and literature that's so what happens to these old where these
remember a story of nanga crew twisting bustles knows
that is perception to feeling of pain
kogan hearing the sound of the stone striking a bamboo
little sound
my own case was was a hearing my teacher shout in the dojo
ah
it is not attainment and this is the whole point of votes as teacher here saying
they have had can show as they can write pithy commentaries and all of that but they don't have it
there isn't nothing to attain really
but you have to work hard to realize that
and current study is no more than this aspect and that aspect of nonattainment

when is perfect
nothing to say yes why bother
that was course the against question in all and it was a little by
mean if all beings by nature are buddha how is it that all the old worthies of the past had to sweat blood in their practice
you know
and that that question and took him from teacher to teacher
sure it's the all complementarity see what can our girl came at nor attainment
and if are in a dog into something like am
yeah you may practice and and get enlightenment but it's that is equal and substance
that's not an exact translation but it's something like that

ah
but you know
in nowadays
there is quite a separation between
they they practice of a current study and the practice of as she can't d'azur
but in our heritage they were not so separate
ah and it's on me with the with the
hmm developments of time you see from the sun period down that we say this just progressive separation
but even now in in now
of score there are these hard questions being asked
and even now in ruins ice school ah
all i don't know about high syscall you know i have my my practice in their insights was much before i had any real understanding
but anyway in the sambo killed on school in what do people do in between calling practice
commonly the person who has finished are completed his checking questions on more and is working on on coins beyond mode he'll come to a ducks on and we'll work on a con and finish that car and you get the next one and
we'll walk out the door make a spouse walk out the door and on his way back into the dodgers have the wow that must be at sea
well he's got he's got hours of zazen during session before he can see the russia again
so or she has but what what to such people do they do she can't answer
or they do move which is at that stage
not distinguish about much from chicago data
ha ha
too much is made of these distinctions i think and this is this was harada russia's face you see in finding no real satisfaction and is sorta practice so he went to study in orange high school
came back to start of soto practice and that is a and he founded aligned which he ah felt i am sure was to revitalize the sort of score
and there are other ways to to bring these to a lines together
not only i think should we bring these two lines together but we should be concerning ourselves about about to finding the the perennial truths that underlie
piano and tarawera between the my anantara vata and vagina
ah
send zaki since a believe the so firmly that the he would use poly
instead of sanskrit
whenever never had occasion to to use the old words by dharma he would always say dharma instead of dharma
and he would always bring in a caravan teachers to talk to us

we must find the water in our on well
but at the same time and you must be open to other tastes and to find the a taste of no taste
makassar at the very source
scuse me i got carried away
twenty eight thirty or it
you see the sitting there korea
oh