I guess we could read the introduction. It probably wouldn't hurt us. This is the first time. The name of this case is . And this is the first time I've seen this guy in the Book of Serenity. Anybody seen him before? Isn't he mentioned at the end of the recipe? Is he? I think he's at the very end of it. Oh, really? Maybe it was two ago. Was it the last one or two ago? No, the last one. The very end of the column, the very end of the verse. Oh, take 34. Oh, yeah, Luke said, yeah. Just a second, folks. I'll be right with you. Yep, same guy.

[01:42]

So we have seen him before. The introduction says, oh, by the way, did even the guest house find any glasses in the yurt floor? Yes. They did? In the office. Yeah. Do they have blue metal lenses, I mean, frames? Are they yours? They were actually found on the planet. By the year? Yeah. Would you ever ask? All right. Quick action and swift intellect breaks the onslaught of outsiders and heavenly devils.

[02:46]

Leaving convention and transcending sect indirectly helps those of superior faculties with sharp wisdom." Is that what you guys have? If you suddenly meet someone who doesn't even turn his head when struck, then what? Okay, so when Lukpu visited Jashan, I believe Jashan, yeah, Jashan means coming of the mountain. When he met Jashan, Without bowing, he stood right in front of him. And Jaishan said, a chicken roosting in a phoenix nest? It's not of the same species, go away.

[03:53]

Liu Pu said, I've come from afar to find out your way, teacher. I beg you for a reception. Josh on said before my eyes there is no you Here there is no meat Lupu then shouted Josh on said stop stop Now don't be crude and careless Clouds and moon are the same valleys and mountains are different It's not that you don't cut off the tongues of everyone on earth, but how can you make a tongueless person speak? Lu Pu had nothing to say. Jiaxuan hit him. From this, Lu Pu acquiesced. So, well, any words should begin.

[05:02]

With the last word. With the word acquiesce? Yes. Well, I haven't thought to me, to me it means to silently accept something that's been said, but I'm not quite sure how that relates to getting hit. Any thoughts on this matter, anybody? Yes? I was just surprised by the word because usually the hit is followed by a vowel. Well, the word acquiesce, the two characters I made up, the first character of the word acquiesce means to prostrate. So he might have formally acquiesced by prostrating himself.

[06:05]

Oh, so there's other translations. Yeah, but the compound doesn't mean bow, but there might have been a bow as an expression there. He might not have physically bowed, but the feeling was of prostrating himself, of humbling himself before the teacher. He submitted to the teacher, in the first character means, to prostrate, to humble, to... What else? The yield, those kinds of things. Maybe some background would be OK.

[07:05]

But do you have anything more to say before you get any background? on the case? Yes. Well, I was just reading a new production talking about speculative faculties and shock with them. And then he was struck. And I was wondering if the acquiescence they're talking about it was surrendering to that intellectual. Well, acquiescence in this case means acquiescence of all faculties. It's total unconditional surrender. So you wouldn't just deal with your intellectual capacities. You'd submit completely. Right. Getting out of that, letting go of that. Since I got someone who was in the neglect and then they got hit and they... Okay, well, I'll make a proposal to you about this case and see if anybody else wants to do something.

[08:21]

This case follows the previous case, right? In the previous case, we have to set up something, the nation flourishes, but then we talked about the problems of setting something up and having the nation flourish. If you don't set up something, the nation perishes. And, well, there's, in some sense, there's no, there's some problems in that, too, of having no nation, of having no, no opportunities for people to approach the, to see where approaching the Dharma would be proper. And we also talked about how Setting something up is accommodating. You know, this is a positive setting up. It's a positive accommodation to people's needs. And not setting anything up is not accommodating to people, is holding to the absolute.

[09:23]

The other one is adjusting in a wholesome way to the relative situation of people. Both of these, and then we have classical examples of that, of a great accomplishment of this one sage and these other sages who noticed the drawbacks of the great accomplishment and went up the mountains and starved to death. So both of these adjustments in themselves are errors. So I would propose to you that this case comes right out in the last case, and we're talking about a situation where these errors are not being, where they're avoiding these errors. Yeah. I don't know.

[10:31]

Go ahead, but what are you going to say? Well, just in the fact that when Google came, he did away with formalities. He didn't bow before he stood in front of Jishan. And he was abrupt and rude, and then Jishan followed up by an abrupt and rude response. You are a chicken in a phoenix nest. Now go away. So, your book seemed to try to be a soft approach by saying, probably saying, I've come from long and far away to receive teachings. And so, he gives them a response, a really soft teaching. And very kind teaching. So we looked in case 33, we saw in case 33 and case 35 you have disciples actually of Linji coming in both cases. All right? We don't have... Lu Pu is not such a famous successor as Sanjong.

[11:37]

Sanjong is one of the two most famous disciples of Linji. Lu Pu is a less well-known person. Anyway, they're both coming to other teachers after they left the Zen master, Linji. And in case 33, this guy's presenting himself as an adept to a great teacher, Shui Feng. Here, this monk is also presenting himself as an adept. And, but I think I would, well, yeah. So, in a sense, he's presenting himself as a phoenix. And one commentator says that you don't get off your horse, you don't dismount your horse when you're meeting someone, when you're both sort of going your own way. If you're both, you know, going to go camp out here, maybe you both dismount.

[12:42]

But if you're going two different ways, You might just keep on your horses and say hello and then pass. So this is, in a sense, he's coming to meet, but not necessarily intending to stay. He wants to come and meet, but maybe move on. He's presenting himself as a phoenix. And I think, as has been mentioned before, a phoenix is a chicken that has completely become a chicken. that has settled so thoroughly into chicken nature that the chicken dies. The chicken is dropped. And out of the ashes of chicken land, a phoenix rises, an enlightened bird. So he's presenting himself as an enlightened bird. And the teacher sort of says, you know, go away.

[13:48]

In a sense, he's saying you're a chicken, but again, I think this is irony. In one sense, it's irony. As you can see down below, he's saying to this guy, it's not that you don't cut off the tongue of everyone on earth. done you've been able to do that but you need to do more you need to make a tongueless person able to speak so backing up again if you have that in mind that he's he's given this that Jyesang's giving Lu Pu credit for being able to cut off the tongues of everyone on earth. He's also saying, go away.

[14:55]

He's also saying, before my eyes there is no you. And here there is no me. And then Lu Pu shouted, which was an expression of his ability to cut out the tongues of everyone. Well, I think it means to avoid either of these errors that we saw in the previous case. That's what I would propose he's able to do. In other words, I propose that as the stage of the story is having avoided the errors of the previous case.

[15:57]

previous case is not interactive. He's just raising the dilemma of doing something and not doing something. In this case, I think we're now going to now, the stage has been set by the previous case, and we're now going to have an example. of people who act without going into either of these errors. They both can see clearly enough to avoid these two errors. Does the homeless man speak refer to taking a risk of setting something up in order to help people? Can you refer to that? Well, not necessarily. It might refer to... It might refer to appearing to set up or to not set up.

[17:19]

In other words, the person would be able to create something. There would be some creative activity. And it could be interpreted either as setting something up or as not setting something up. It could be interpreted by outsiders either way, probably. But I think what he's... indicting this monk for is that this monk has not created, has not brought this tongueless person into action. I don't think that, and I think when you come into action then people can always interpret it one way or the other, but as I said before, it's not so much whether you appear to be setting something up or appear not to be setting something up. You always have to look into your own heart and see if in your heart you think you're setting something up. or you think you're not setting something. And if in your heart you feel you're going in either direction, then you have to recognize you've made an error. And I will not go into this in detail tonight, but I will go into detail on this on Wednesday, in that I would say, in terms of precepts, that to emphasize the precept of avoiding evil,

[18:36]

or the precept of, you know, right conduct, to put emphasis on that one, too much emphasis on that one, and not realize that that one is always non-dual with doing, practicing all good and benefiting beings, to put emphasis on that one would be what? What error would that be? Hmm? No. There's two more guesses. Pardon? Grasping. What was the question I asked? Right conduct would be which of these errors? And you said grasping way? That's right. In other words, not setting something up. Grasping way is not setting something up. All right? Are we following this language? No? Pardon?

[19:41]

Sorry. It's OK. No, it's all right, really. Pardon? Right conduct and doing something positive in the world is called saying yes, as opposed to saying no. Well, right conduct, there's three pure precepts, right? I'm not going to go into this. There's three pure precepts. Right conduct. or avoiding evil, okay? Practicing all good and benefiting beings. Setting something up in the world is benefiting beings. You set something up so that people can, you know, do their exercise program. You offer some... You offer some transformation called nirmanakaya, right? The body of transformation you give to people so that they can do something. Right conduct is you know, that you do not set something up. So, for example, right conduct is not to set up a zazen practice or to set up a zendo or something like that.

[20:47]

Or it's also not to, it is to do whatever form you're doing, like it is to go to the zendo or to cook lunch or, you know, to drive downtown, but not at all setting anything up. In your heart you do not set something up and you hold to that. You hold to the absolute. You do not set something up. That is, however, if you emphasize that side by itself, if you emphasize right conduct or avoiding evil or, you know, avoiding any bias or any limitation, if you do that exclusively of the other two, it's an error. That's the case of the guys who starved to death in the mountains. They saw the world. They saw how it goes when people set stuff up to accommodate people's needs. They said, we're out of here. They went and starved. That was a mistake. The other side, to adapt to people's need, the granting way, the accommodating way, of course you should do that, but if you emphasize it too strongly, then you had this empire, and you had crafty ministers and powerful generals, and you got a lot of those problems.

[21:55]

And they did not mention, in those two errors, they did not mention the sambhogakaya, the bliss body, which is the practice of good, which is the union of these two errors, or it's when you don't do one of these precepts aside from the other. And I think this, in that sense, this case is talking about the practice of good, the practice of avoiding evil, and the practice of benefiting beings. They're trying to present a balanced picture now of the Buddha. And this guy's not veering off to either... He's not veering off too much towards avoiding evil or, you know, right conduct. He's not veering off towards adjusting to circumstances. And he gets credit for that. But he doesn't seem to be enacting the Bodhisattva's social club very well.

[23:05]

He doesn't seem to be unifying and developing the avoiding of these two errors, not sufficiently. But if we have a little bit difference here in terms of background, Some people studied case 34 two weeks or three weeks, and some people one. So if you have more questions about this, I'd be happy to drill on this a little bit, because I feel it's connected to this case. Yes? Is the transcendent sect then a little bit of a dig at the mannerisms of a rizakh practitioner? And so his shout's going to wear out. Yeah, and then Jishan, who who is not of the Rinzai school uses the shout. Maybe for the first time. Who knows? I don't know. He hits him.

[24:11]

He hits him. Same thing. Rinzai hit and shout. So... When you take away the tongue, you're also stopping from not setting anything up. This is like a deep removal of the tongue way back down to the, yeah, way back down to the, what do you call it, the mind. There's three forms of karma, you know, body, speech, and thought. It isn't just that you stop the person's tongue, you stop the person's body also from speaking, and you stop the thought of doing anything. This is deep, a deep taking away.

[25:12]

The tongue is just, the speech is like, speech is the, Verbal karma is like the essence of karma. Verbal karma is like a better example of karma than physical and mental karma in a way. They say in the Abhidharma Kosha that the mental karma is the origin. You always think. The mind always creates a pattern before it's rendered into vocalization or postures. So it's the source. The postures are the body of karma, but speech is the nature of karma. It's the own being of karma. Speech is so much like karma. It's the one that, in some sense, best represents karma, of the three forms. So taking out the tongue means take out the basis of karma. Isn't that setting up the absolute, then, in some way?

[26:14]

Is it setting up the absolute? I mean, setting up something, my understanding that you're saying by cutting off, he's actually avoided the error of setting up or not setting up. Correct. But not setting up is more like the absolute. If you don't set up, that's the absolute position. Nothing happens, nothing comes up, you don't do anything. Yes, but the other one also is cutting off the tongue when you actually stop people from doing things. In the realm of where you would do something, you don't do something, okay? In the realm of where you don't do something, you don't do that. It would not be a big deal, believe me. It is not a big deal to not set something up. A lot of people do that all day long.

[27:15]

You know? This is not a big deal. This is an overemphasis on being pure. A lot of people do that. Cutting out the tongues of everybody on earth not only means everybody, but it means all action. Okay? So it's not that cutting out the tongue is a real balanced thing. It precedes making a tongueless person be able to talk. The two together are, you know, the realization of emptiness and then the bringing of emptiness of the realization into the world of compassion. So, the way I'm interpreting this is, and again you can talk about this, I'm happy to discuss this, but I'm just presenting this as cutting out the tongue means you cut out the basis for doing what doesn't bother the tradition, which is right conduct. and doesn't efface the form by making the form into something, and also doesn't set up something and violate the form, you know, of purity and nothing coming up in the first place by setting something up for people.

[28:32]

Also, it doesn't, like, stay away from setting up something for people if they need it. If they need it, it would be an error on the other side not to give it. If it would be helpful to people to set something up, it should be set up. If you don't set something up when it would be appropriate and helpful to set something up, you're clinging too much to this other side. On the other hand, if you set something up, even if it's almost nothing, but in your heart you let go of realizing or remembering that nothing's being set up, then even if it's almost nothing, or even if it is setting up, not setting something up, you go into error. I don't mind going over this. This is related to this case. I'm tempted to say, yes.

[29:40]

I'm tempted to say that he, I would think that you could give him credit for stage of faith here. But I think almost that I would give him more credit than that. Almost like I would say he attained the stage of a person. But he hasn't implemented it fully enough yet. Almost, you know, I'm not sure. We can look into this more. Yes. So even though Little Poodle who was able to avoid setting up and avoid not setting up, that doesn't sort of guarantee the union of the two of them. Excuse me. When I say avoid either of those two, I mean avoid getting over on one side or over on the other side. The Buddha mind does not avoid these two. Avoiding these two would be doing one or the other too strongly.

[30:44]

That clear? But even though he has this right balance, he doesn't have the union that is the third part? Well, yeah, he has not yet completely realized the Buddha mind, which is his three mind, his three bodies, right? Right conduct or avoiding evil, which is the Dharmakaya. benefiting or purifying beings, which is the Nirmanakaya, and practicing all good, which is the Asambhogakaya. The truth body is right conduct. The transformation body is benefiting beings, and the bliss body, or the reward body, is is practicing all good. I think he has, to some extent, realized the reward body, but not fully enough to play with Jishan.

[31:49]

I feel some reward body functioning here. But it isn't that you avoid, you don't go in either one of these. That would be one of them. avoiding going in either one of them, I guess I would choose that it was the grasping way. But then it would be contradictory because you would be going into one of them. Now, are people following this? Does anybody dare say they don't? Yes? If this would figure out, like, you again sweep the ground for your pets and other kind of people, then we would have a different kid in our house. But the thing that would seem to be making a difference is that, uh, uh, simple acquiescence.

[32:55]

He doesn't, he doesn't he doesn't have an appropriate reaction at the end. Or is the acquiescent appropriate? Well, it sounds pretty appropriate to me. He seems to be pretty happy with it, I mean, because he's acquiescing. Acquiescent doesn't mean kind of like, well, I'm acquiescent, but I'm not really acquiescent. Well, but he's fully developed by himself. He said hello to the teacher. Yes. He prepared to leave. Yes. Or to give as good as he got. Give as good as he got? Yeah. What do you mean, give as good as he got? Well, he received a... Give as good as he got. I like that. What do you mean, give as good as he got? Well, he... Mr. Gowan. He made an impudent arrival, maybe. And so he gets this ironic comment, and that's answered with a shout.

[33:58]

So the next interchange is the second thing, but he doesn't have any answer for the second interchange. Yes. So if he were... He has no words. Having no words is not not an answer. It is an answer. He has no words. Supposing he had a different dance. Like, you know, which move is this? Yes. Well, then it might have gone on a little further. But I think my feeling about it is when acquiescence happens, I mean, you feel good about it. It isn't like you're kind of grumbling. That's not acquiescence. I think he felt good about it. I think that's what it means, is that it is appropriate now to yield. Something around that word bothered me, and it still... It feels like there... Or maybe it's me.

[35:02]

It feels like there needs to be a... Or there might have been some other translation that would come through a little better than this. Like what? You can look for an accepted message. That's nice. Yeah. That's a more interpretive answer. I looked up the characters and it didn't say anything about accepting as teacher. But in Buddhism, to accept someone as a teacher, often a formal way of expressing that is prostration. And that's what the first character is translated as. So I think accepting a teacher is fine. But again, accepting the teacher, it isn't kind of like, okay, you're my teacher. It's more, I think, it's more, okay, you're my successor.

[36:07]

If they had been equals, would he still bow? If he had come as an equal... to Busan, would that be traditional to bow with a show of respect anyway? Yes, that's traditional to come and bow. So not bowing really is a big deal, even if they were equal, that they were in the same level. Well, you know, if one old master comes to visit another old master, he might not bow to him. I mean, he might not prostrate himself to him. Suzuki Roshi, one of Suzuki Roshi's teachers, was hierarchically under Suzuki Roshi because Suzuki Roshi was head of a big temple and his teacher was head of a small temple under his temple. And when his teacher used to come to visit him at his temple, his teacher would bow to him. And Suzuki Roshi would say, no, don't do that.

[37:09]

He'd say, sit there. I'm going to bow to you. You're in charge of this thing. So you bow to him. But when Suzuki Roshi went... to the other guy's small temple to go to his Dharma talks, and Suzuki Roshi, with everybody else, would bow to that teacher. Because then he would be sitting in the teacher's seat for that event, but when visiting the senior temple, a senior teacher might actually bow to a junior teacher. In this case, he's visiting the temple, and he is junior, in a sense, apparently, and doesn't... just stands there. And the teacher says, okay, you're presenting yourself as a thief. You're coming to the Phoenix Hall and you're telling the Phoenix that you're a Phoenix, which is fine, but, you know, really, you're a chicken. And so Lu Pu gives a little demonstration. Well, he says something somewhat humble.

[38:11]

I mean, he does say, I come from afar to find out your way. He doesn't say, no, I'm a phoenix. I contrast it with case 33, the golden fish, where there's this other interchange. That's, you know. Well, we can look more into that, the second thing he says about what seems more humble. I beg you for a reception. I mean, he's not saying... No, I'm a phoenix, you know. Well, no, I'm begging you to receive me as a phoenix. It is tradition, they say anyway, what is traditional for these people after they left their teacher to go out and test out to see how they're doing with their teachers, to see if the other teachers would recognize them the way their teacher did. He left Linji and Linji said, you know, you're a red-tailed carp. You're going to swish your tail and go south. So he did. So then the carp comes to visit these other people to see if they'll recognize this carp, which is quite closely related to case 33.

[39:16]

And so he says, please, you know, receive me, you know, as a student, but also confirm me. He could hear it that way. I presented myself the way I want you to confirm me. I presented myself as a In this high-profile way. Can you infer in this high-profile way? I'm telling you, I've realized myself. I understand the self. What do you think? That's one way to read this. And the teacher says, this is the thing, okay? What does he say? He says, before my eyes, there is no you. He wants some recognition. I don't see anybody. And also, over here, there's no me. Okay? When he says he begs for a reception, he still hasn't bowed. It's sort of like, it's not written there, but it sort of says, like, and I'll bow as soon as you give it to me, as soon as you give me the teaching. Isn't LePo also, like, wanting to make sure that you saw him?

[40:22]

Is somebody, I mean, if he's not bowing in front of him, Is it possible that Lepo's saying, I've heard Jishan scatter away and I want to save myself? Yeah, and so part of what being checked out means is that you're checking him out is being checked out by him. He watches you check out him. And he said, he got my number. So he says, give me a reception. In other words, do you see that I see you? He says, I don't see you and there's no me here. So then he shouts. Okay? And then this guy says, well, come on now. Don't be so rude. I never said you couldn't do this thing, which, again, a lot of teachers say when the student leaves the teacher, there's a number of cases where the teacher says, you will cut out the tongues of everyone in the country. That's kind of like a goodbye that they say. In other words, I've taught you. how to practice the middle way. I taught you how to avoid these extremes and practice the middle way.

[41:25]

So now go test it out. So the great teacher, Linji, said, go ahead now. And so he goes to this guy. I don't know if this is the first guy, but he's here. Look. See, the trouble is I have a certain relationship with my ego that I would go to a teacher and I would want recognition. It would be around ego. And I assume that these guys have a different relationship with their ego than I do. But I don't have a clear idea of how that would feel, going for recognition without ego. And I don't understand that. Because whenever I think of ego, it's like Daddy's saying, yeah, we're fine. You know, that's how it feels to me. Or, yeah, it looks at me, you know, and feel proud or something. But I assume it's kind of a different feeling among these guys. Yeah, that's a correct assumption. It's a different feeling. So in this case, you're going to daddy to ask daddy to confirm you, but what daddy's going to confirm you is that you have sat so thoroughly on your ego that you've gone to the bottom of it.

[42:29]

You broke out the bottom of your ego. Now you're presenting this ego that you forgot. You even forgot to not bring one. So you act like an ordinary person. You forgot to act different, like you forgot to act like a egoist person. So you just come, tongueless and able to cut out tongues because your way is that way, and it is different. But it is very much pivoted on you in that these people have studied the ego so thoroughly and watched its Its tendencies to grasp or grant, to veer off in these ways, are ego repertoire. They've understood this, and now they've cut through it. Now they're going to go test to see if these daddies and mommies will confirm their forgotten ego, their forgotten self. And I think he did get confirmation of his forgotten self.

[43:35]

But there's more than just forgotten self. There's a dropping-off body and mind, and there's a bringing this dropped-off body and mind eternally into action without any trace. And that's what's being tested here. Well, the first thing's being tested, and also, can you now bring this forward with no trace? And what Dogen says, you know, forgetting the self is first to study because these people have studied the self so thoroughly they've forgotten the self, and then they've been confirmed by all things, they've dropped body and mind, and now this thing goes on. And the balance, the bliss body is the future, you know, is the carrying forth, the carrying us into the future. The thing that it doesn't have, this bringing forward, is it doesn't have a trace of cessation. There's no trace of this, you know, cutting off.

[44:39]

So they have cutting off, which is now being brought forward without a trace of being cut off. And this guy apparently has not transcended cutting off. There's a trace of cessation left in his attainment. From the shout? Is that the trace or the acquiescence? No, the acquiescence, I think, is in the shout and also in not being able to say anything, that he was quieted. He was not able to somehow bring this forward into the next phase of conversation. Yes? Yeah, I think that there's an echo of when he says, how can we make a timeless mess? Is that another way of saying, or similar to say, talking about wooden men getting up to dance, wooden men speaking, still women getting up to dance?

[45:44]

Yes, that's right. Because I don't know. reaching the stage of person where you don't just realize... Excuse me. Are you going to remind me to open the windows, Christine? Is everything okay? Airwise? You know, stuffy? Christina. Please. Sorry. I started to get high. I remember when you talked about that... The Wooden Man began to sing, and I had that the Wooden Man was like, it's a stage of emptiness. Yeah, the Wooden Man is this, I think that, I would even say the Wooden Man, this guy's even gone, I would say this guy's even gone beyond the Wooden Man, and this guy can sing. because he not only has realized... But all he does is say.

[46:51]

And he can't get the stone woman to get up to dance here. That's what's missing in the story. So having facility, having facility to at the same time be fully understanding emptiness and at the same time being able to do things with this with facility, with ease. Yes. But more than that, I think he's done this. I think he's realized emptiness, avoided these extremes, and he's acting from there. That's why I say he's actually realized the state of person, I think, this guy. However, the customer is always right, and the customer is not dancing. And when the customer doesn't dance, especially if the customer is Zizan, you have to acquiesce. Or try a different song and he wasn't able to.

[47:53]

Or try a different song and then see if that works. And he gave up. He stopped his sales pitch. But still, I think he's gone, you know. This is a, you know, there's many acquiescences in the history of Buddhism, but this is an acquiescence. That's very noteworthy. This is an acquiescence, a very interesting acquiescence. Well, they all are, but this is one at a quite developed stage. This is a postgraduate acquiescence. The last sense of the deduction, if you suddenly meet someone who doesn't even turn his head, what's the start? Then what? Is that returned to the acquiescence? Let's keep one spot, then you can get it. Yeah, yeah. Well, I would say my feeling is this is talking about both of them, but what did you mean by acquiescence as not turning the head? Well, I was unsure of that sentence, but I've been referring to the acquiescence. I think this could be heard as if you're in the position of jeshan, the teacher in this case, a senior person, what do you do if you meet somebody who when struck doesn't even turn his head or doesn't even turn her head?

[49:29]

What do you do with such a person? How would you teach such a person? That's one way to read this. Acquaintance. That's one way to do it, yeah. Or the other way is what do you do if you meet somebody like jeshan? who you can't, you know, we also have this other turn. He couldn't turn his head. He couldn't charm him. So I think you can read this either way. Either way. You can go either way. I feel good about it. Either interpretation of this is when meeting Lupu or meeting Joshan, what do you do? How are you going to treat him? Okay? Yes? I understand after he says... Yes. You're in the clouds. It's the same with the mountains. Yeah. What part don't you have? You mean the same and the different? Well, you don't understand.

[50:31]

What does that mean? You do understand something, right? What do you understand? I don't understand it. I mean, I understand it. I don't understand it. See? Is this the postgraduate question? I think the whole discourse is on a postgraduate level. I sort of thought that when this is a second chance here. Oh, OK. Because I found when he said, stop, stop, . He's already saying, I know you already got your PhD. I know you've already gone that far. You don't have to show me that anymore. Yeah, that's the way you could read it. But let's stay on his thing. What's his business about the moon and the clouds are the same, and the mountains and the valleys are not?

[51:32]

What's that? What's going on there? Yes. I think the moon in the clouds, the moon in the clouds is saying, is a statement that enlightenment, the awakening is one. Valleys and mountains are different. Our phenomenal occurrence is different. things different, but not all appears. But awakening is the same. So it amplifies self. I think it turns on, you know, what is the meaning of that shout is the shout The shout comes when Jiaxuan makes this statement of emptiness, makes an absolute statement of emptiness.

[52:40]

No you, no me. There's nothing. And when Luopo shouts this, that, to say that's where it ends, or is it that he's trying to deconstruct that? No, that's not it, we go beyond that. It seems that, in this case, his shout is functioning as, you know, that's the end of it, that's it. You said it, now I shout. This goes no further. And the meaning of Joshua's response is, no, there is another set. I can see that, I can see that interpretation, but I could also do it slightly differently and say that when, when he says, there's, I don't see any you, right in front of me I don't see any you, and here there's no me, he's making an absolute statement about there's nothing, but he could also be saying he's making an absolute statement about, not absolute statement, he's making a statement about absolute interdependence, that we're so interdependent, he's also saying that.

[54:06]

And now he's, and then Lu Pu's shouting to express that, to show that this interdependence where you can't get a hold of anything can manifest, can do things, can cause appearance. Now, after that, then he says, okay, but you, you know, I know you can do that. I knew you could do that when you first showed up. But I want you to take another step. I want you to get tongueless people to talk back to you now. You've demonstrated your ability to cut out the tongues, to put an end to anybody getting a hold of tongues. Any conceivable way of using it. You've demonstrated that. I know that. Let's see if you can get a tongueless person to talk now.

[55:08]

Let's see if you can get the stone woman to get up to dance. Okay? Go ahead. Could you say that's putting character into the teaching that is received? Could you say? Isn't that part of putting character into his teaching? Isn't what part of putting character? The stage of it, okay, now you've got to go ahead and make people talk. Yes, it is, but I think he put character into the teaching before that. By shouting? No, by going on this trip. By coming to visit, he was already putting character. The way he came to visit, that was already his character. When he shouted, that was his character. And that was his expression. However, it wasn't that unique, because that's what his teacher did. So it wasn't, you know... Now, he's given a... And so that's good. Now he's been given another chance. I think he's already trying to express his character. Now he's showing that to really express your character as a teacher...

[56:10]

is when you get somebody else to talk back to you. That's when the teaching is really working, is when somebody starts talking back to you. When somebody responds, not just responds to you as a person even, but responds to you when you've gone beyond convention and cut out tongues, and then with nothing available, people come back and talk to you. That's the fulfillment of your unique function as a bodhisattva. But I think he started to do that in what he did. I think he started to do that. And I think his acquiescence was good, but it didn't get, as far as you tell from this story, it didn't get the teacher then to change his mind and start singing and dancing. But there was later stories which we can see. Yes? Yes? Did somebody else have their hand? Just the name of it is .

[57:12]

I don't know why it wasn't just . Why I did want to dance was to get to it for lunch or something. I mean, there's nothing left clearly why this teacher needed that. Well, I don't know who to blame first. The student gets to choose, pretty much, which teacher she goes to visit. So already she got to choose. The teacher doesn't exactly get to choose who comes to visit her. Right? So the teacher can choose. Well, I don't feel like dancing. OK? So since the teacher gets to choose who the teacher dances with, in some sense it's the student's fault if the teacher doesn't want to dance.

[58:18]

Because even if you've had lunch, if it's a good enough offer, even if you don't want to dance, you have to dance. I'm saying it this way because, like I said, if the teacher was going to visit the students that the teacher wanted to dance with, then they might decide not to eat beforehand or something like that, right? But whether they eat beforehand or not, even if they hadn't eaten, you don't want to dance with some people. It's their responsibility to force you to dance with them. In other words, to make you into their teacher. So you can either dance with them, or if they say, hey, I'm not going to, acquiesce. and say, I didn't sell my product. But I accept that, and I understand why I didn't get accepted. And the reason why is because I didn't get a tongueless person to talk. That's the excuse. I accept that reason for why I acquiesced to that.

[59:20]

That seems reasonable, that I should be able to get a tongueless person to talk, and I wasn't able to. I said to somebody the other day that Part of what turned me off about Christianity was the stories of Jesus were often like I couldn't relate to them, like raising Lazarus from the dead or something. But in fact, now I see we have to do something like that. The teacher has to raise the student from the dead, and the student has to raise the teacher from the dead. Now, I don't know who to blame first. The teacher is in bad enough, is in as bad a shape as the student. The teacher who can't dance with the student feels just as bad as the student who can't dance with the teacher. It's mutual. They both want to dance. Yes? Yeah. Pardon? Lin Ji is one of these people that beat the teacher up.

[60:21]

Lin Ji was studying with Wang Bo, right? And the head monk said to Lin Ji, how come you never go talk to the teacher? And he said, why should I? I'm enlightened. So he went to see the teacher, and what happened? When he went to see the teacher? He hit him. The teacher hit him. And then the teacher sent him someplace else to visit another teacher, and then he beat that other teacher up. And he came back to his teacher and beat his teacher up. So there are examples of that. And because of that, Linji got into that habit. that became his thing that became his that became his his dance invitation and he went on hitting all his students you know and some of them danced with him and some of them didn't and then they left and tried to get people to dance with them and this guy went and tried to get somebody he shouted at him too he also shouted in that story so then he went all his disciples went out and tried to get other people to play that game with them and some of them succeeded and some of them didn't this guy didn't succeed at this time but he acquiesced he said okay

[61:30]

I get it. You know, I feel, you know. Well, I had a teacher, and he said I was okay, and he was a good teacher, but you're expecting something, you know. Somehow I had to learn a new trick with you, and I haven't learned it yet. Yeah. So, it isn't a black thing. It's just, you know, it's real life there for you. It's not part of what you're in. So... You know, it is a lack in him. He hasn't yet been able to charm the tongue-less person in the speaking. Yes, but that's his fault. It's his fault, and it's the teacher's sadness. But the student acquiesces to the teacher's sadness.

[62:35]

The teacher says, I'm sorry. I can't confirm this today. I'm not happy about this either. And here's the reason. And the student says, OK, I get it. And I accept that, and I bow to that. The bodhisattva vow is that every single solitary, tongueless person to speak. And you can say, not the right day, not affinity, but that's got to come back and try again. That's a bodhisattva vow. And today you missed, you struck out, et cetera, et cetera, although you're certainly a wonderful person. In other words, it isn't that you get regular people to talk. We're talking about you've got tongueless people on your hand. You've got tongueless people at your disposal. Because you understand that. So you're a person who can... If you're ready, you're on the stage, you're on the threshold of getting tongueless people to talk. You can get a stone woman to get up and dance. You can get non-existent beings to give birth.

[63:36]

That's what you can do here. From this position, you can witness and participate in the creation, but you're not doing it today. You only can get to the place, the stage at which creation happens, which is take away all the tongues, and now what speech comes from people who don't even have tongues yet? This is the beginning of the mind. And you, and he can speak. He can speak. A person who can take away all the tongues, he can speak. Now can you get other people to speak? And he wasn't able to, he couldn't even speak after a while. And he got hit. And that was it. So that's the proposal I have for you for this case. So there it is. So you can play with it, and I'm happy to dialogue about this until we feel settled on it.

[64:40]

But that's what I'm putting out there for... So what's the instruction? What's the instruction that he's given? Go ahead. What? Come back tomorrow? I accept your acquiescence. He told him, he said, I think he said, you've avoided the errors which, what is it, Wind Cave mentioned in the previous case. And it says in the commentary too, which, you know, you can look at it. These two people had eyes to... heart to push aside the weeds and look for the way. So he was able to push aside the weeds and see the way and express himself in the way. So he's already received plenty of instruction, this monk. He's been trained by the Linji and he's able to avoid the errors which are pointed out by Feng Shui in the previous case.

[65:47]

He's on the path, he's expressing his way, but he hasn't been able to express it enough to get somebody else to come and play with him. And it's only a Buddha and a Buddha that can really settle this matter. The Buddha is not really a Buddha until the Buddha teaches. And teaching isn't that you just try and get a response. And here he's coming to a teacher to basically try to teach a teacher. to get a teacher's recognition of his teaching, to get a teacher's recognition of his ability to see the teacher. And rather than trying out on a student, he's trying out with teachers still. So the process in Zen was train with a teacher, finish your training, go out and trust with other teachers, and then after you've tested with other teachers to get other aspects, because your own teacher maybe has some limitation on how they see you, so then go check out with other teachers and see if they also confirm you. In this case... He didn't get complete confirmation, but he did get a big confirmation. He got the same confirmation that people usually get when they leave their teacher, namely, you will cut out the tongues of everyone in the land.

[66:57]

Is that what it is? I was just going to ask what it means to dance. What was my answer? Well, you said for him, for Confession to be able to recognize Lupo as a teacher, to be able to get some sort of realization or understanding of his enlightenment, and therefore he would be the answer to that. Yeshan would be dancing. Yeshan would be dancing. Yeshan is a stone woman. Everybody's a stone woman, actually, but he's realized a stone woman. He's also a wooden man. And he got a wooden woman to dance in this story.

[68:02]

He was able to get a wooden woman to dance, a stone woman to dance. And his song was, his song worked. Lu Pu's song didn't work. His song was, and he got a dancing partner. But when Lu Pu sang, he didn't get a dancing partner. And the dancing partner says, I don't want to dance with you. You can't get a word out of me. He'd taken my tongue away. I'm talking to you, but basically I'm not dancing with you. And he couldn't say anything to get him up to dance. He couldn't do his mating dance to get him to get up. So then the unaccepting song woman whacked him. And then he said, you... you wooden man, you person who can take away the tongues of people, you have to get tongueless people to talk.

[69:08]

And he couldn't do it. So then he said, okay, now I'm going to show you how a wooden man gets a stone woman to dance. I'm going to get you stone tongueless person to speak. And he went, boom. Matter of fact, I'm going to use your teacher's style. Remember how your teacher used to do this? I'm going to do this like your teacher. Boom. And He gave the response. He danced. And he acquiesced means he danced. It doesn't mean kind of like, well, I'm not going to dance with you. It's just he danced. So that's the way I would read this. And again, this is just a reading. This isn't the truth. It's just a reading. It gives you something to chew on. Yes? Daniel? Daniel's next. would we have had to let go of the choice of cessation in the detainment that was selected?

[70:14]

At last, letting go of the detainment except for the choice of cessation? Well, that's certainly, I wasn't there, you know. That's a likely candidate. That's usually what's the problem. And again, it's demonstrated partly, tipped off by, he did what his teacher did. And his teacher was a big Mr. Cessation, let me tell you. Yes? I'm looking for, is it OK to see the meaning? After he just knocked off, he'll be pretty careless. OK, the fact that the moon in the class is the same value now, is that kind of an acknowledgement of, To say that one and the clouds are the same, valleys and mountains are different, is that a kind of balanced acknowledgment of his state, saying, yes, you understand the absolute, and you understand duality?

[71:28]

Well. You know, Stuart had an interpretation which I think is, you know, build on that, okay? You're using a metaphor here, right, which does metaphors, we use metaphors because they don't really apply, but there's a tiny overlap, right, in imagery and so on. The clouds and the moon are kind of the same in the way the clouds are mixed up there. So in a sense, there's something that seems to be kind of like the same, like what he called, like what is it, snow in a silver bowl or something like that, right? And the mountains and the valleys seem more different. So some things seem the same or are the same for me, and some things are different. There's these two realms. This is something for you to work on, I think, for next week. And this is a metaphor for something.

[72:34]

To me that sort of meant that everything's the same and everything's different, like the moon and the clouds is the same everywhere, and the terrain, the mountain, the terrain is always different. Everything is the same, everything's different. The reason for using metaphors is because they don't apply, and because they don't apply, it can mean a lot of different stuff. There's a lot of room here for you to work on this one. I think this is an important part. And there's some comments in the commentary, but I would suggest you don't read them. I would suggest that what you do now is you... Use these last two cases together. Use the instruction of case 34 to zero in on the mind of this case.

[73:37]

And then use your imagination to play out what the middle way between these two extremes would be and where and how to get full participation in this middle way. Lane? I'm giving myself a couple of sessions before I have to get up to snap with the language. So I'm going to go back to last week and ask a question about these two guys that starved. Yeah. Because I was thinking about them all week. Yeah. And I kept thinking about that last scene in Olive Island, Madagascar, where they're eating mushrooms and they're starving. And there's something that's so pure in that to me. And I kept thinking about the facing there, this kingdom, and they can't believe in it. So their actions mean that they're bringing down, they're destroying a kingdom, or they're not building up. But I mean, would the pure action then be just to go in a cave and sit? as opposed to point out and allowing yourself to starve. Why is the starvation such a mistake if we can't face this alternative?

[74:48]

Well, what's pure is not to hold to purity. so they were hoping in in that in these two stories elvira madigan and these two guys they held the purity now that's what it looks like okay if you can't live the alternative every cell in your body can't live the alternative i suppose that's holding i don't know if i use this i don't know if i used this example last week but anyway These people and these stories, I think, and bodhisattvas do make a commitment, for example, not to kill. And this is not like kind of a half-hearted commitment. You commit yourself. You seriously consider not killing. As a matter of fact, you almost would rather die, or maybe you just simply would rather die than to kill unless you were sure it was beneficial in some way. You actually would die rather than kill, okay? That feeling of wanting to die rather than to kill, however, can be interpreted as, I'd rather die than attach to purity.

[76:01]

Which, attaching to purity kills the Buddhist seal, I mean, kills the Buddhist seed. Being self-righteous can kill wisdom. And I'd rather die than kill wisdom. I really do not want to kill wisdom. Okay? So, I really... do not want to grasp purity and hold it and kill wisdom. However, when somebody, you can't tell by these guys going and starving themselves, maybe in their heart that wasn't what was going on. That's why they're kind of a metaphor for when in our heart we say, this is right and I'm holding. It's not that it's right or wrong, but anyway, for you this is a principle. This is your principle. And like I mentioned before, you know, like working with a teenage kid, what I do is I state my principle, and then I, if necessary, and it often is, I give it up. But I state my principle. I know what my principles are, and my principles do not vary.

[77:04]

Like, for example, I have a principle of not driving the car unnecessarily. That's my principle. But I have to give it up a lot. And I have all these reasons for why I don't want the car to drive around the world polluting the atmosphere and stuff like that. This is my principle. This is my position. And they had these principles of what they didn't want. They did not want to participate in a government that did cruel things. And these particular people, if they were around, they would have to participate or not. And if they didn't, they would have to oppose. So then they'd be participating and fighting. They'd be in a war then. So the only way they could not be in a war and cause, you know, be in an army to attack or just hang around and let other people kill other people, they just sort of had to say, we're out of here. We're making a protest. We're going to make far enough away so they won't even know where we are. So we won't have to fight against or for the government, this cruel government.

[78:06]

However, they might, in their hearts... If you went up and talked to them, they might have said, hey, man, we're just having a good time up here, you know. We didn't want to participate in that government, but we don't know what we're doing, really, you know. It seemed like a good thing to do, but we're not sure. We're talking it over, actually, up here quite a bit. And then, you know, maybe next week we'll come back down. However, you know, we might starve before we get back down because we kind of got ourselves in a fix here. You can't say what was in their heart. Maybe there was no attachment, and maybe they were beautifully representing the middle way. But the model looks like attaching to purity, and that goes towards death. The other one goes towards death, too. These are both not life-affirming roots. These are metaphors or classical examples of these two extremes, of accomplishment and of raising up something and doing something positive to accommodate to people's needs, and the other one is it causes so much trouble when you do that, stay away from it and be pure. So I'm not saying they're really that way, I'm just saying they are emblematic of those errors.

[79:14]

Each of you must look in your heart to see if you're veering off in that direction and So when I state the principle about car use, I have to look in my heart to see, are you holding onto that? Can you drop it and experience the world of dropping that principle and also dropping the other one, too, of holding to what you should accommodate? You can hold to that side, too. Following another principle or just dropping? Pardon? What principle? Are you following then another principle by dropping? Well, again, you have to look to see if you're grasping. It's okay to follow a principle. But you don't have to grasp a principle to follow it. It's not necessary to grasp a principle. There's a principle like, what is it, the principle of skeletal organization by which you walk.

[80:20]

You know? Muscular and skeletal movements are the way you walk. There's a principle there that you're grasping that you learn how to use to stand up and fall forward without falling on your face. There's a principle involved there, but you don't have to hold on to that principle. You can move with freedom and flexibility even while you recognize the way this system or this principle seems to work. You can also hold to that principle. So it isn't necessary to hold to something to use it. You can take a hold and let go. Take a hold and let go. But in taking hold or letting go, you can also hold to holding or hold to letting go. You can also not hold to holding and not hold to letting go. That's why you have to look back and check. And there are signs. Nice. There are, what do you call it? There are signs. It's 9 o'clock. I could talk about it next time. There are signs called outflows that you can use to spot if you're

[81:21]

If you're veering off, however you're using these scenarios, there are energetic signs that you can use to observe whether you're off or not, whether you're clinging or not. Yeah. I don't know if we can, but I'm willing to.

[81:43]

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