Our body and minds in the flames of the teaching, in the light of the teaching, we listen to hear that when even for a short time, if we express the Buddhist seal, If we express imperceptible mutual assistance in all of our actions, sitting upright in the awareness of this non-dual, imperceptible mutual assistance, it's inconceivably wonderful. expressing this in the midst of the awareness of this, in the midst of the awareness of this, expressing this, even for a short time.

[01:13]

The entire phenomenal world becomes this bodhisattva, and the entire sky turns into the light And because such broad awakening like this resonates back to you and helps you inconceivably, you will unmistakably participate in dropping off body and mind of self and other. whereby you, together with the completing enlightenment of all things, will turn the great real time together.

[02:44]

All the Buddhas are turning the Dhamma wheel in the midst of fierce flames, in the midst of burning light. They are all taught by this light and stand in the middle of it and listen. May we serenely allow ourselves to be burned up by these flames. The great ancestor of Zhang Jiao asked his teacher, Nang Chuan, what is the way

[03:57]

Manjuan said, ordinary mind is the way. Zhaozhou said, can I turn towards it? Manjuan said, if you do, you immediately turn away. If I don't turn towards it, how will I know whether it's the way or not? The way is not in the province of knowing or not knowing. I came across a comment on this, I should have known it was coming, but I didn't.

[05:01]

The commentator said something like, Being asked by Zhaozhou in this way, Nanchuan simply crumbled and melted. unable to give an explanation. Another translation of this comment is being asked by Zhao Jiao, lost no time in showing the smashed pile in the melted ice wherein no explanation is possible.

[06:18]

These two together, I like these two together. On one side, it's showing that the teacher being asked by the student is smashed. Probably the Chinese says, ,, and it probably says, ,, just smashed tire, melted ice. Probably just has those images. which you could translate as non-chuan crumbled or was smashed and non-chuan melted. When the student asked the teacher a question, the teacher did smash and melts. But also the teacher shows Themis gets being smashed, and genis gets being melted.

[07:32]

The teacher's technical explanation to the teacher shows no explanation. Both is rendered incapable of explaining and shows that no explanation is forthcoming. from this place of being burned up in the light of our relationship. What's the way? Ordinary mind is the way. It's now the explanation. It's the sound of being smashed. Yesterday, Kazan asked me to explain something about the I, the meditator, being the whole universe.

[08:54]

So I explained, didn't I? My explanation is that the thought we're having right now is the whole universe. The whole body. Your whole body is the whole universe. The whole universe is your light. And there's nobody in the universe who's not you. That's my explanation. He laughed and laughed. Now I feel like, I think I managed not to give an explanation. Yay! I was smashed. And Scott tried to get me into making this speech. Now, teachers on most things think, oh God, students come in and ask for an explanation, I should give one.

[09:58]

I feel much better today. A student comes to me with an explanation, I'm smashed, I'm melted, what can I do? What do you think it means? So she explained it. Very nice. Now you can say, well, some students aren't mature enough to smash the teacher. So then the teacher gives an exclamation. Very sad story. Anyway, let's tune in to a relationship where we're burning each other up. And when we are sitting there in the middle of these flames, they've burned up, and the Buddhists are right there with us, turning the wheel of jhana in the heat, lighting up the flames.

[11:14]

It's what we call the fifth day of a 90-day satsang today, kind of in the middle. Four days before, four days ahead. What did you say? The celebration. A Zen sandwich. And it's starting to taste delicious, isn't it? What? It's kind of cold. A cold Zen sandwich. Anyway, we're kind of in the middle of the Monday Sashi, and partly we're kind of, you know, Trying to get out of the heat, and partly we're kind of knowing that we're in heaven, and sorry that's going to be over in four days.

[12:30]

We're kind of conflicted sometimes. And we're also kind of in the middle of the practice period. It's about halfway through. There's about 40 days ahead and about 40 days behind. Approximately. We're in a great spot. I thought I'd tell you that just in case you hadn't noticed. And recently, here in the middle of the practice period, some people told me that they have resistance to the forms, the ceremonies. This is not an explanation about comfort. Not something to get stuck on.

[13:36]

Someone said to me, how come during the Bodhisattva ceremony you said, embrace the sustaining forms of the ceremonies instead of avoid evil? I thought the three pure precepts were avoiding evil, doing good, and saving beings. Well, that's one way to say it. But literally, in the Chinese, it says precepts. Actually, it says embrace and sustain forms like regulations, rules, and ceremonies. Precepts. Embrace and sustain. Precepts, rules, ceremonies, precept. Next one says embracing, sustain, wholesome things, precept. Next one says embracing, sustain, living beings, precept. And this is Chinese and it comes from Sanskrit.

[14:39]

The Sanskrit is prakimoksha-sambhara-shiva. Prakimoksha means that which is conducive to enlightenment or deliberation. that bhakti-moksha is a set of precepts, rules, and ceremonial ways of conducting oneself. So it's rules like not killing, not stealing, but also things like how to cross your legs, how to eat your food, how to bow, things like that. But this isn't in contradiction to avoiding evil, because if you practice these forms, they're conducive to liberation and conducive to avoiding evil.

[15:45]

In some of the translations, discussions of this pure precept, sometimes it says, precept, in modern translation it says, precept of embracing and sustaining, or precept of embracing in all precepts of forms and ceremonies, and then it puts in parentheses, avoid evil. I guess I like to translate more literally, because it says the word evil does not appear in characters at all. In Sanskrit or Chinese, there's no word for evil. Now, there is a teaching in Pali, in Dhammapada, where the Buddha says the teaching of all Buddhas is avoid all evil, practice all good, and purify the mind. That is a teaching of the Buddha, but in the Chinese Mahayana, In the Sanskrit mahayana, the first pure precept is the precept of bhakti-moksha, of ceremonies and forms.

[16:55]

Again, it is to avoid evil, but it's to avoid evil through practicing these forms. So I like the literal translation of the Chinese. Also, I find out that that that translation seems to bring up resistance. Whereas people also resist avoiding evil, as you know, but they usually don't admit it. They'll say, Well, I don't really... I resist avoiding evil. I don't want to... I do want to do evil. But if you say bonsai ceremonies, they feel more comfortable saying, I resist. And resisting is bonsai ceremonies, so That's nice, because then people can admit that they do want to be equal, which is, of course, not doing these forms eternally with people. Almost everybody got that one.

[17:59]

So now we're in the middle. Now you can't go forward or backward. Actually, you are going forward, and you can't go back. You are going to be delivered. You're in the birth canal. You can't get out. Here he comes. So now that you're fixed and stuck, you can resist. Now that you have no choice, all you have left is resistance. So resist. So probably we're all resisting, and some of us are. If the two people expressed it to me in one day, there's probably 70. And there's two kinds of resistance. One is you don't want to do the forms, or you don't want to do them wholeheartedly, and the other is you do want to do them wholeheartedly.

[19:12]

That's another kind of resistance. Some people don't like them. That's one kind of resistance that people do like. Liking the forms is resistance. Doing the forms isn't liking or disliking them. It's just doing them. It's just being them. Which, by the way, is also avoiding evil. So we now have the resistance to the forms and ceremonies, to the schedule. So that's where we're at now. And that resistance is the way we can tune ourselves in to wholeheartedness. You just watch until you get to a place where there's nothing added to or subtracted from anything.

[20:15]

And the resistance is the thing that's being added or subtracted. A little bit extra, or a lot extra, or a little bit less, a lot less. That hesitation, that excessive use of caring too much, of caring too little, these are the resistances. It's normal. But it's not normal for people to notice it and be aware of it. A lot of people are noticing it, aware of it. This is good. This is what the precept was there for. In a way, the precept of doing good is not so much about resistance. This one is, the first one is about resistance. And isn't it amazing? People are resisting it. Nobody's coming in and saying, I'm resisting doing good.

[21:18]

I'm resisting helping people. I just don't want to help them in a formal way. I don't know if there's anything you want me to say about that. time for people to come forth if they like, or a person could come forth. Really? I came up yesterday and not very often. Yeah, you can come every day. Every day. Unless people tell you not to. You gave a very nice explanation. I'm sorry to say. And it was helpful. I found it helpful. So the danger that I see with explanations would be if I get attached to it and say, oh, this is it.

[22:24]

Now I know it. Before I knew about forms and ceremonies, I thought, oh, what does it mean? And I was thinking it could mean that or it could mean that. And now I know what it means. Now you should know a lot of that. Yeah, exactly. The moment of knowing. I'd like to add a little cheese to the sandwich. Oh, do you? Confess something. Okay. I know a lot of people probably don't want to hear this, but... Can you hear him? Nope. I said I know probably a lot of people don't want to hear this, but... That's better. Thank you. Nice and loud. It's something that I definitely have a problem with.

[23:28]

And it's just to start here, it's been going on for a long time with me. And it goes back to where I was brought up at. And I say that is because I was brought up around a lot of hillbillies and what we call rednecks, that you have big trucks with flags. I have a very disturbing environment sometimes. And what I want to confess is that I realized something yesterday, although I shouldn't have been talking, but I realized that what I'm confessing is that I'm prejudiced. And how I realized that even more is that I'm thankful for this so seeing you, because that's brought up a lot of things. And I served yesterday, and I was on my way to the bath. And John was walking with me.

[24:29]

And the whole walk, I was entertaining stories. Look at this redneck. Look at this hillbilly. So when I got in the bath, It was so built up entertaining this story about him because the way he looks or what I appear to think when you're building this image that I kind of lashed out at him from all this anger of building a story. And then when I look at certain people like Charlie or someone that it's hard for me to see, that, you know, Charlie's not crazy. So he's dead. He's not dead. But when I look at john or someone else that reminds me of the rednecks and hillbillies that I grew up with, I start building stories and funny towards it. I'm really tired and over exhausted of being like that because we been practicing and talking a lot about love and compassion.

[25:37]

Yeah, I just can't keep living like this. But It's really painful because of the way I was brought up and how I was belittled by a lot of the rednecks and hillbillies. And then when I look at certain individuals here, that story comes up and then I act towards them a funny way. And I know some of the people here probably can realize that. And I want to just apologize to John about what I said yesterday in the bath. It wasn't really necessary and it was very unskillful. But I realized why all this is coming up. It's because the way I was brought up, the environment that I was brought up to, and I want to be able to eradicate this and do away with this, these different crazy concepts about individuals that looks like him really and right next to me. And with that, John, I wanted to ask you if it's okay that I hug you

[26:39]

And I apologize to you because although you might look like that to me, but I still want to have love and compassion towards you. Thank you very much. Mr. Sashin and we were talking to each other about important situations like this.

[28:21]

But I just wanted to say that Maybe some people want to tell you, Kazan, that they really appreciate what you said, but it's hard for them to get into a session. So can you wait till after the session if they ever tell you? I think they really do appreciate it. But I don't want anybody to come up to you and bother you with their appreciation, because you've got to sit with them, right? So you can see more stuff. So please, I'm sure you all appreciate this. Maybe just sitting in the quiet and calm after the session, if you appreciate it.

[29:25]

There's somebody standing up over there. I thought somebody rose up there. Are you used to adjusting your posture? I was going to come and say something, I'll say something. Okay. So, I was sitting there and I had about six, you think, really good questions come up. And then I had a huge resistance to coming up here because I don't want to fool myself. Oh, okay. But then I was thinking about, you know, working on what you're just saying about performance in ceremonies and just being wholehearted and not kind of letting resistance lead the way, really?

[30:41]

So I decided to try coming up here and put all my resistance and experiment with that. I suppose one of my six questions should follow. Great. I just wanted to experiment with that. So wholeheartedness with this resistance right now, you know, can you find, can you right now find a way to be wholehearted right now? Can you see it? Yeah, yeah, yeah. You found it? Yeah. Thank you. You're welcome. So again, wholeheartedness doesn't mean you follow the schedule. but don't follow the schedule. It just means there's a schedule, and there's you, and you're wholehearted.

[31:51]

And then you see, what is wholeheartedness? What's that look like? Good morning. Good morning. I'm proud to be a hippie from Lima. I'm from Baltimore. Before I came here, I was talking to a group of people. We were studying how we couldn't find a self in the five aggregates. So when I was saying goodbye, And we wanted to leave them with something that would inspire them so they wouldn't feel bummed out about not being able to find any. So I read a poem.

[32:58]

And I don't know about them, but I was very inspired by this poem. So inspired that I memorized it. I've been kind of carrying it around like a little treasure in my pocket. And so I wanted to tell you this poem so that I could not feel like I was just keeping it to myself. May I? I think it'd be better if you didn't. You think it'd be better if I didn't? No. Fine, I'll keep that. But, you know, probably some other people didn't agree with me. Catherine wants to hear the poems. I could tell her another time. Yes, sure you could. Right, we could have a confab down at the baths. Did you have a good reason?

[34:13]

It's not exactly a reason, that's just where I am. I just wondered if your body wasn't comfortable again. Pardon? I thought that you found some way that you didn't feel that there was going to be no benefit to you. I thought it would be better not to do it. I thought it would be better not to do it. I thought it would be better not to do it. But also, more importantly, I thought it would be better for me to say that I have no attachment to what happens. Thank you. I hope I don't. You're expressing yourself. I appreciate that. I was going to say you're the boss, but I'm not so sure about that.

[35:20]

I want to be the melted boss, the smashed boss. Okay. I'm willing to be the boss so you can smash me. Somebody can provide that. That's my seat. And the person who's sharing this right now, I think, I hope on this one I should ask. And I hope I'm not giving an explanation. Well, then, can I ask you a question? Mm-hmm. Do you think we can get intoxicated in a light? But if you open to it, it'll burn off the alcohol. Then we get the light.

[36:24]

Everything is a manifestation of light. Everything can burn itself. And that was just the accent? And then there's the next thing. Actually, not to give an explanation, but to tell more of what came up in the is I wanted to stop her and say, you're stuck in the words of the poem. That's my first response. Well, you did great.

[37:33]

Resistance could also be said, you know, instead of saying resistance, you could say traction. I feel some traction with these palms that sound like this. So we can use that to go forward. I feel pressure. on this point with sermons, with these points with sermons. I feel I'm moving us forward.

[38:25]

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