How are you feeling today? Okay? Still sleepy? Are you still tired? Recovering? Recovering? Do you see the light at the end of the tunnel? It's going to be hard to stay indoors today with the snow in the air. Want to go for a hike? Yeah. Um... What? My mom said she might see you two weeks later today. She said you might not be home. She said she can see me two weeks later. Um... Sometimes Zen is called the religion of emptiness.

[01:06]

A practice is actually a form of emptiness. Emptiness. Or emptiness in action. Again, if you can't understand that, just remember it. And after you do understand it, or after you understand that this practice is emptiness in form, then you can forget it. After you understand that this is emptiness, that this itself, what we're doing here, is emptiness, or that our forms are empty, once you understand it, then forget it. Don't keep patting yourself on the back. It's okay, it's emptiness. But before you understand it, pat yourself on the back.

[02:16]

It's okay, it's emptiness. Don't worry. Um... This morning I had a wonderful dream. I just, I remember... I don't remember the beginning and the middle too much, but that some kind of... I was looking for... A bunch of us here were looking for some kind of vessel, a container for the teaching. I think Robin was involved in some kind of pottery work to make some kind of chalkboard or something. Anyway, at the end, I was doing Kihi in the San Francisco Zen Center.

[03:18]

I was up at the... near the Doshi door, making a right turn, as usual. You know about making right turns in Kihi? Right? You only make right turns. No left turns. Um... And I think I stepped on Peggy Denial's cushion. And then, the question occurred to me. And I said it out loud to the person in front of me, which was Katie O'Connell. You know Katie O'Connell? I said, How does the Avatamsaka Sutra end anyway? And... And she and I broke out laughing. Pretty soon, everybody in the Zen Center knew the question.

[04:22]

How does it end anyway? Isn't that funny? Well, it hasn't been... Tom Cleary's third volume hasn't yet been published, so... We don't have that translation to read, but I can tell you that the last chapter, the 39th chapter of the Avatamsaka Sutra is the Vows of Samantabhadra. It ends with the Great Vows. So, I'm mostly... I'm not mostly... I'm... I'm trying to not build systems here. Or rather, I'm building a system, but I'm trying to stay away from it. And keep the systems low to the ground. Real low. About the height of a flower. And I keep trying to tell myself to tend the garden and make sure it's growing rather than build a big tower. A big edifice. So, I'm not exactly trying to build a system. I just want to clarify a few pieces of compost here.

[05:25]

First of all, Emptiness is not the absolute. Emptiness is the non-duality of the relative and the absolute. Emptiness is suchness. And the teaching of suchness is, form itself is empty. Emptiness is form. That's the teaching about emptiness. Emptiness is the Dharmakaya Buddha. And it is the non-duality of the karmically created and the uncreated. And I also want to say I, again, agree with what Pragyeta said. And that is, in order to study emptiness, there has to be psychological sophistication. And that's why we have Abhidharma class.

[06:28]

It's to be sophisticated about our psychological processes, so that when we try to study, investigate into what our stuff is, what our psychological experiences are, we're not just kidding ourselves and playing some psychological game. And we need some sophistication in psychological work in order to do that. So that's why we study Abhidharma. The sixth ancestor of Zen had quite a few disciples. As I said the other day, no less than a thousand were enlightened. But there were two, two, you might say, vessels, or two containers among his disciples that I particularly want to note.

[07:33]

One is the monk Chingyurang Shingsa, Sagan Gyoshi Dayosho. And the other one is Nanyue Huairang, Nangako Heijo. Except for those Zen traditions which split off from the fourth ancestor before the sixth ancestor was born, all the Zen schools come from these two teachers. And actually I'd like to give some attention to each of them. But today I'd like to give some attention to the one directly in our lineage, and that is Sagan Gyoshi, Chingyurang Shingsa. I believe Chingyurang is the name of

[08:42]

his mountain, Chingyurang. It's the name of his mountain where he taught. And Shingsa means universal liberation. The master of Chingyurang The master of Chingyurang was from Anshen in Xi province, from a family named Lin. He became a monk when he was young, and whenever he was in a group discussing the Way, he alone remained silent, kind of like Brian, quite so it is. Later he heard about the school of Cao Xi, which is where the sixth ancestor was teaching,

[09:48]

and went there to pay his respects to the ancestor. He asked the ancestor what work was on, what to work on so as not to fall into stages. And the ancestor deeply esteemed him as a dharma container. Shingsa said to the ancestor, What should I work on so that I don't fall into stages and steps? The ancestor says, What have you been doing? And Shingsa said, I haven't even been studying the Four Noble Truths. The ancestor said, What stages and steps do you fall into?

[10:48]

Shingsa said, If I haven't even practiced the Holy Truths, what stages and steps are there? So in the first place he asks, What should I do in order to not fall into stages and steps? Like yesterday when I was about to start to explain how it is that sitting is really swell, Jim said, It sounds like there's a goal there, Jim Abrams said. In other words, it sounds like there's steps and stages there. Again, Zen, as I mentioned before, Zen has tended to be pushed over into

[11:53]

the sudden school or the sudden enlightenment way of the Lotus Sutra and the Prajnaparamita Sutras. But really Buddha's way uses both methods according to the circumstances. But some Zen students want to know about sudden enlightenment. And this guy, Shingsa, he went to the sixth ancestor to ask about sudden enlightenment. An enlightenment that doesn't get involved in steps and stages. It doesn't fall into a gradual process of improvement. And stepwise moving along the path. However, I want to say clearly that Zen Buddhism does not put down or never use gradual methods. It certainly does use them when appropriate,

[12:55]

I hope. And sometimes it's appropriate. For example, our Abhidharma classes are studying often stages. And the ten ox-herding pictures, for example, are stages. And so on. And in our Dharma Transmission study, we study stages. However, there still is a possibility of practicing in such a way that you don't fall into stages. And this is what he wanted to know about. How can I practice without falling into steps and stages? It would seem that even though we say

[13:57]

we study by stages, or even though he says he could fall into steps and stages, that's just... that's not steps and stages, really. You mean because they're empty? Yeah. I mean, just because... You think you're doing steps and stages, but... You just think you are. Like, now you think you're on stage 6.8, or whatever. That's just what you think. Alright. But sometimes people want to do that way. So the Buddha has that kind of practice. For people who want to have some sense of progress. And sometimes people want that. In other words, sometimes people want a story about how the practice is going. So, want a story? Okay, here's a story. So he's saying, how can I practice without a story? Give me a story about no story. So the 6th Ancestor has these two big disciples,

[15:00]

the Chingyuan and Nanyue. And Nanyue's great disciple was what? Who? Matsu. Matsu. And Chingyuan... Chingsa's great disciple was? Seketo. Seketo. Seketo. Stonehead. Okay? So the next generation had two huge, important figures too. These two, Nanyue and Chingsa. I mean, Chingyuan. These two mainly had just two disciples. Each one had basically one disciple. But those disciples had between them 160 enlightened disciples. So it really blossomed after that. Then the flowers came heavily. So, over on the Nanyue side, Nangaka side, there's a famous story. Matsu

[16:03]

sitting Zazen and Nanyue says to him, what are you doing that for? He says, I'm sitting Zazen in order to become Buddha. And then Nanyue starts polishing this tile. And Matsu says, what are you doing that for? And he says, I'm trying to make a mirror out of it. And Matsu says, well, how can you do that? And Nanyue says, well, how can you make a Buddha out of a sentient being? So, the tradition around this time is emphasizing the fact that you can't make sentient beings into Buddhas by practicing meditation. Just as I mentioned as I read yesterday, six ancestors said, don't think that meditation comes first and then wisdom comes. Or that wisdom is there and then meditation comes. This is not correct. Our meditation is wisdom.

[17:06]

Our wisdom is meditation. Our enlightenment is our practice, is our meditation, and our meditation is enlightenment. This is a point to kind of make. This does not put down gradual practice. It sometimes is useful. But anyway, it is practice in realization or realization in practice. When we got show to each other, we're not doing this in order to get enlightened. But, if you insist, you can do this in order to get enlightened. But, it also can be seen as this is realization in practice. We don't necessarily follow the schedule in order to get enlightened. We follow the schedule as enlightenment. Our schedule following is realization in practice. So in that sense, Zen Buddhism starts with awakening. So,

[18:18]

how do you practice in such a way that you don't slip into these stages and so on? And the ancestor says, what have you been doing? And he says, I haven't even been practicing the Four Noble Truths. The Four Noble Truths are the first teaching of Buddha that people could sort of catch on to. And, in the early practices of, for example, the Four Foundations of Mindfulness, under the Fourth Foundation of Mindfulness, as we learn in Abhidharma, comes the study of the Four Noble Truths. After studying the skandhas, the athanas, and the dhatus, and so on, after paying homage to the psychic screens and hindrances, we can turn our attention to the Four Noble Truths. Shinzo says,

[19:19]

I haven't even been doing those. I haven't been even doing the early practices. So, there he was, he was a monk, a Buddhist monk in China, studying from his youth, and whenever people were talking about Dharma, he didn't say anything, and it looks like he didn't even try to practice anything, in the sense of getting into any stages. So, the ancestor says, well, what stage have you fallen into, or what stage are you on now? And he said, if I haven't even been practicing the Four Truths, what stages are there? When I read this story first,

[20:28]

and when I read it second and third, and for quite a while, it seems sort of funny that he's asking, how can I avoid falling into stages, and it seems like he knows he already isn't. But anyway, it's funny how sometimes people say things, I have this experience sometimes, people come in and say something like, my eyes are blue, and I say, oh, you have blue eyes, and they say, I do? Geez, how couldn't I see that? Maybe that's not a good example. A better example would be, I'm feeling good today, and I would say, oh, you're feeling good today, and they say, geez, I never thought of that. Where did you get that from? Oh, you just told me. Oh, I did? Oh, yeah, I did. Wow, why didn't I see that? Sometimes it's funny, you know, so looking at this story, it looks like he already knew the answer at the beginning, and in the middle and at the end, he knew it all the way through, and yet he went through this.

[21:28]

So that's part of it, too. You go to Buddha and you say, Buddha, how can I be Buddha? Already you know that the reason why you're going there is because you're Buddha. But, still, you have to go through the conversation. Everybody goes to the mountains to study Zen because they're studying Zen. So that's the, that's our dear ancestor, Seigen Gyoshi, for you. And I want to point out, also, I find it interesting that he was kind of quiet. He was a quiet person. And I'm not saying that the sixth ancestor was noisy. I think the sixth ancestor was a very calm and extremely compassionate

[22:32]

human being. But he did talk quite a bit, and he seemed to like to say how he felt about the Dharma. And if you heard people talking about it, he would say, hey, can I join the conversation? I have something to say about that. He liked to listen to the Dharma. He liked to talk about the Dharma. But Seigen Gyoshi, I think, liked to listen to the Dharma, but he didn't seem to like to talk about it too much. So we really don't have any books or much teaching from him because there isn't any, apparently. But we do have his conversations with other people, like with his teacher we have some conversations. So, the Dharma sometimes goes like that. You have a talkative teacher, and you have a quiet teacher, and you have a talkative teacher. Or you have a talkative teacher and a quiet disciple, and then a talkative disciple, and so on. They sometimes alternate like that. Or a very expansive teacher and a very kind of concentrated teacher,

[23:32]

and so on. So there is this kind of rhythm in the in the world. And Buddhism reflects that. Or Buddhism accords with the rhythm by having its own rhythm. His way, Seigen's way, I've heard characterized as meticulous and severe. And I've heard of Nanyue, the other Great Disciple of the Six Ancestors' Way, characterized as dynamic,

[24:33]

bold, dramatic. So, the Six Ancestors, in this sense, by having two disciples, we have sort of two, in some sense, two nice aspects of the Buddha. Also, I'd like to point out, which I've said a number of times but I want to say again, is that the Six Ancestors splits off into these two big teachers who have these different emphases. And then a couple of generations go along like this. And so you go, on one side you go Seigen, Sekito, Yakusan, Ungan. On the other side you go Nangaku, Matsu, or Nanyue, Matsu, excuse me for mixing up Japanese and Chinese, Baizhang. Okay? But at the Baizhang place,

[25:36]

the lineages connect again. Because Ungan was Baizhang's attendant for 20 years. But he didn't become a Dharma successor to that lineage. He first started studying over here with Baizhang, but then, so he was a Dharma brother of Wangbo. But then, Baizhang died, and I think, he started studying when he was apparently 14 years old, he became Baizhang's attendant. So from 14 to 34 years old, he was Baizhang's attendant. And his teacher, Baizhang, died, and then he went and studied with Yakusan. And became a successor to Yakusan. So the lineages go like this. And then through Ungan, in a sense, they connect again. And then, so the Six Ancestors splits apart, and has kind of reunited it for a while, through Ungan and Dongshan and so on.

[26:39]

So the lineages are at the source, not only start at the same place, but then reconnect in various ways in China. They're not so different. But another thing about about teachings or whatever, particularly let's say teachings and religions, is that a lot of energy is put into discriminating between forms that are very similar. So we don't have to put so much energy into discriminating between ourselves and Theravada Buddhism, or ourselves and Hinduism, or ourselves and Taoism, or Tibetan Buddhism. But we have to put a lot of energy into discriminating between ourselves and Rinzai, because it's so close. And one theory, one anthropological theory, is that the Cro-Magnon man

[27:41]

killed off the Neanderthal man. He killed them off because they were too close. And you get genetic confusion. So there's some difficulty between teachings that are very similar because the neighbor confuses the house. So you want to get the very close one a little bit farther away so you don't confuse your own house. But, you know, you can't get too far away because it's the neighbor. So it's kind of a problem. I'd like to cite another story about

[28:42]

Sagan. A monk asked Sagan, a monk asked Ching Yiran, What is the great meaning of Buddhism? Ching Yiran said, What is the price of rice in Lu Ling? What is the great meaning of Buddhism? What is the price of rice

[29:42]

in Lu Ling? Our ancestor, Dogen Zenji's grand-uncle, Tien Tong Hong wrote a verse on this case. The verse goes, Accomplishing the work of great peace has no sign. The family way of peasants is most pristine. Is most pristine. The family way of peasants is most pristine. Only concerned

[30:46]

with village songs and festival drinking. How would they know about the virtues of Shun or the benevolence of Yao? How would they know about the virtues of Shun or the benevolence of Yao? I just was saved from that thought. Now it seems like nice to be indoors, doesn't it? Maybe even more

[31:53]

dramatic afterwards. Accomplishing the work of great peace has no sign. In other words, great peace pacify your mind with no contrived activity. Great peace is not something that can be you know, you can't have this thing

[32:55]

over here which causes great peace. Great peace has nothing in addition to itself. It's just great peace. There's no thing making it happen. There's no way to get to it. There's ways to make small peace. But great peace gobbles up all methods. Great peace consumes the medicine. OK? This is what I've been saying since I was in the last few periods. The body of emptiness is stillness. The body of emptiness is peace. Removable peace is the body of emptiness.

[33:55]

The body of vast space is tangible stillness. And what's the function of vast openness? Excuse me, what's the function of vast peace? Emptiness. Accomplishing the work of great peace has no sign. What is the great meaning of Buddhism? What's the price of rice in Karma Valley? Have the gas prices gone up since we've been through this practice period? Yes, they have. Dramatically. OK.

[34:55]

The family way of peasants is most pristine. Only concerned with village songs and festival drinking. Does that remind you of anybody? Hm? What? Ryokan? Anybody else? Not body, does that remind you of anything? Huh? What? The city center. It reminds me of Kasarov. Much more than the city center. Because we are only concerned with festival drinking and singing folk songs. Following the schedule, eating lunch,

[36:00]

bowing, sitting, washing our face, this is our village activities. It's all we do. Except for sometimes we forget lectures and sometimes they're a little distracting. But basically, we're just villagers here singing the songs of our village. Have you noticed the songs of our village? And we drink the festival drinks. Have you noticed the drinks we drink? We drink ambrosia three times a day. Actually, we don't drink ambrosia. We drink nectar. But the nectar tastes like ambrosia. Hmm. Our village drink is called nectar. And it tastes like ambrosia. That's what we're doing here. Our way is the family way of peasants.

[37:02]

We're only concerned with village songs and festival drinking. That's our practice from the point of view of sudden enlightenment. That's the not the gradual view of our practice. Let's see. I remember one time I saw this movie called The Seven Samurai. Did anybody here not see the movie? You didn't? Hey, congratulations. Huh? It's a movie about these seven samurai, right? And this is a very interesting group of people. Right? It's like it's like seven seven Buddhas before Buddha. I remember

[38:14]

they were testing them, you know. They were like recruiting samurai. And they had this test. One of the tests was they had these guys who were sitting inside this house, a group of testers, you know, recruiters. And the candidates this village was being attacked by a big gang of bandits. So they wanted to hire seven skilled protectors, right? So they're interviewing these protectors. So these guys would be walking up to the house and the camera would be looking out the door. And behind the door they had this guy waiting with a club to hit them when they came in the door. So anyway, so you'd see how each one would react. I don't remember each one, but I remember the last two. It was kind of like, it was a little bit like the story of Billy Goat Gruff, pre-Billy Goat Gruff. Anybody not know that story? The Germans

[39:15]

don't know. The Germans and the Swiss and the Argentinians. And the French Canadians. Do you know what I mean? Okay. And the Mexicans don't know either. Okay, here's a story. There was these three Billy Goats. A Billy Goat is a male goat, right? William Goat. It's like Paul waiting. Paul is a Gruff Billy Goat. Okay, so these three male Billy Goats, they're brothers, right? And they come in three sizes.

[40:15]

Small, medium, and large. And they eat grass for a living. And so they're eating grass and at a certain point they run out of grass. And there's this little river next to their pasture and on the other side of the river is another field of grass which they want to eat. And there's a bridge from their pasture to the other pasture. So they want to go across the pasture, but underneath the bridge which goes across the river, underneath the bridge is a troll. Do you know what a troll is? So there's a big troll underneath the bridge. Do you know what a troll is? A troll is also like Paul. Imagine Paul under the bridge. Imagine Paul under the bridge.

[41:16]

Ready to gobble you up as you come across the bridge, okay? First the little one goes across. Over the bridge. And the troll says, What are you doing walking on my bridge? I'm going to eat you up. The little Billy Goat says, Well, don't eat me. Eat my bigger brother. He's coming over in just a minute. Much bigger and better to eat. So he says, Okay. And he lets the little fellow over. Then the medium sized one comes over. And he says, What are you doing on my bridge? I'm going to eat you up. And he says, No, don't eat me. No, no, no, no, no. My big brother's coming and he's much bigger than me and you'll have a much better meal. So eat him. Let me over. Okay. Then the big brother

[42:22]

comes. What are you doing on my bridge? I'm going to eat you up. Please, go ahead. So he goes up there and tries to eat the big Billy Goat. But the big Billy Goat gives him a butt. And knocks him back into the river. And he goes over. Boom. Boom. So that's three Billy Goats rough. Now this was related to this story. Okay. This is what you call village songs. We're doing village songs here. That's all we do. This is peasant style. What do we know about the virtues of Shun or the benevolence of Yao? Oop.

[43:22]

We're not in the steps of stages. We're in kindergarten. We haven't even got to kindergarten yet. How can we follow the steps and stages? So the last two or something. The second last one comes up. And this guy's waiting there with a club. He walks up to the door. I don't know how to do this. He walks up to the door, steps inside the door, and the club goes on. Pretty good. I thought. Then the last one comes. And the guy's waiting. He walks up to the door and says, Come on. You must be kidding. So they were very impressive group. Very alert.

[44:28]

Ready people. Fearless. Honest. All kinds of good stuff. And alert. Calm. You name it. Anyway, they beat off I think a band of about 40, I would say. 40 vicious murderers. They beat them off. And almost all of them died in the process, I think. Two survived. Anyway, it's a great story. And of course, it's a great film, I guess. Anyway, at the end, I remember the last scene. These two samurai, they're kind of leaning on their swords and their rice paddies. Looking out at the rice and the water and the peasants handing the rice. One turns to the other one and says, That's very sad. But anyway, that's what he thought.

[45:31]

And that's kind of the way of the Chinyon. Peaceful government has no special form. It could even be this. As Dogen Zenju says, The expression when the Dharma comes means it's already here. So if you want to practice sudden enlightenment, don't even go to kindergarten. If you want to practice gradual enlightenment, come to Abhidharma class. There is a gradual path. It's very interesting. But the Sixth Ancestor has provided a method of instantaneous

[46:34]

sudden enlightenment for pre-kindergartners. He himself, being the leader of the pre-kindergarteners. Sagan is his quiet disciple. But again, although he's quiet, and although it's even before kindergarten, this way is meticulous and severe. Village people just, you know, sing village songs and do festival drinking. But there's a way to do it. Being on time is different than being late, even in the village. And the rice has to get in at a certain time, and you have to pull the weeds out at a certain time. It's hard work, too. But anyway, it's just village life. It's no big deal. It's just the price of rice in New England. We are intentionally waiting

[47:45]

every day, every evening, in place where the children can help put us in place to do all the things they are known to do. Om Om Om Sagan Om [...] Sagan Om Om Om Sagan Om Bon

[48:47]

Sagan Saban Sagan Om Saban Om Om Sagan As great as exams are possible, I vow to be an out.

[49:09]

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