He said, I don't have any questions. And I wouldn't know what to ask. And Mujo says, why don't you ask him what the essential true meaning of the Buddhist teaching is. So he went and asked Wang Bo. And Wang Bo And then Mujo said, how did it go? And he told Mujo, and Mujo said, oh, you should go visit him again. And he did. And Wang Bo slapped him again. Again, the head monk, Mujo, checked on the young monk to see how his interaction with the teacher went. And he said, well, he hit me again. You should see him again. And he did, and Wang Bo slapped him. And then the next time he saw Muzhou, he said, I'm not going to go again.

[01:06]

As a matter of fact, I'm leaving this temple. I don't know what I'm doing wrong. And Muzhou said, okay, but you should go say goodbye. And then Muzhou went to Wang Bo and said, this, you know, great young bodhisattva is going to come and see you. So, you know, please give him the appropriate instruction." So, Linji went one more time to Wang Bo. He went again to see Wang Bo. And then from a distance he said goodbye. And Wang Bo said, you don't have to leave. this area. Just go over the mountain. And Da Yu, he'll kind of, he'll show you what's going on here.

[02:06]

So he went to see Da Yu and told him what happened. And then he said, I don't know what I'm doing wrong. And Da Yu said, Wang Bo is giving his whole heart to you with great grandmotherly kindness. And Linji understood. He had great entry into intimacy with Wang Bo with the help of Da Yu. And I don't know if he was crying or what he was doing, but anyway, Da Yu could tell that something very profound had occurred. And so he said, kind of like, how are you feeling? And he said, there's not much to Wang Bo's teaching.

[03:12]

And then Dayu said something like, you bed wetting. Do you know bed wetting? A person who wets their bed. We say a bed wetter. What do you say auf Deutsch? Yeah. Yeah. So he said, he said, you bed wetting brat. A few minutes ago, you were whining about not knowing what you were doing wrong. And now you're saying that Wang Bo doesn't have much of a teaching, or there's not much to his teaching. And then Dayu grabbed Linji and shook him and said, speak, speak. But Linji didn't speak. He just punched Dayu three times in the ribs. And you let go of them, this newly initiated bodhisattva, you let go.

[04:27]

You said, okay, okay, I get it. And then in brackets, still, not still, in brackets, Though you woke up here with me, Wang Bo is your teacher. The bracket says, even, brackets, though you woke up here, close brackets, Wang Bo is your teacher. You can go back. So he did go back. And I forgot exactly what Wang Bo said when he came back, but something like, will this never end? you know, what are you here for now? And Linji told him what happened. And I don't know if he said I had great enlightenment or not, but anyway, he told him what happened in some way or another.

[05:28]

And Linji said, that so-and-so is too talkative. Next time I see him, I'm going to give him a beating. Bernard, would you move over one seat to your right, please? Thank you. And Andrea, would you move over that way a little bit? Would you guys move over a little bit? It's like, Paul, would you move over with Zach and David? I'm not going to hit you. Thank you. Thank you, Paul. Anyway, so he said, next time I see him, I'm going to give him a beating or something like that.

[06:33]

And Linji said, why wait for a beating? and uh... So, Linji slapped his teacher and the teacher said, Attendant, take this lunatic to the zendo. So, Linji became the most, Wang Bo had lots of great students, but Linji became the most prolific. His teaching was most prolific, most influential in many great bodhisattvas were born with him. I don't think I finished last time, did I? No. Well, now it's finished. And I just wanted to mention that what comes to my mind is a few years ago a woman was saying to me, But coming to these koan classes, you know, in a respectful, nonviolent way, she said, you know, I really don't know why I'm sitting here listening to these stories of men hitting each other.

[07:49]

When? Maybe. Maybe. Maybe. I don't remember. Check it out. Check it out. See, maybe you're right. But I just want to say that we have all... This is a... I really... I believe... It is my belief that the tradition of the Buddha Dharma is a tradition to realize nonviolence, to understand and realize nonviolence, no matter what's going on. And that's what attracted me to Zen, was the possibility of realizing nonviolence no matter what.

[08:54]

I thought that would be so cool to be non-violent when they're close to me and also when they're attacking me. I want to learn that. And so that's what I believe this tradition's about is to realize non-violence even when there's the appearance of violence. And to do that the benefit of all beings too. to realize peace. But still I think there's somewhat... people do sometimes have some trouble with these stories that have so much energy in them where it seems almost violent. So that's part of what I just wanted to acknowledge that there's a question here. And so this is a story where the student didn't understand the teacher's grandmotherly kindness, and then the student did, and then the student did, and grandmotherly related to the teacher.

[10:04]

And then this grandmotherly style was transmitted. Now, this isn't the only way Wang Bo taught, but Lin Ji, and that's not the only way Lin Ji taught either, but he did a lot of that kind of shouting and hitting But there's almost no record of anybody being harmed by it. As a matter of fact, there's lots of records of people waking up. But still, it's a question. How can such aggressive energy be compassion? That's a question. And now we come to another story about Wang Bo, which is also kind of aggressive. And I mentioned about, you know, that Buddha is a martial artist. And there's lots of martial artists.

[11:07]

Not all martial artists have the same purpose in mind. So I just looked up the word martial. Martial has to do with war and soldiers. One definition is a codified system or tradition of combat practices. which are practiced for a variety of reasons. For example, to protect self or protect others, for competition, for physical, mental, and spiritual health, fitness and well-being. Those are some different agendas. I didn't see anything on the article about the purpose is to harm others, to cause pain, and so on.

[12:12]

But it did say defense and competition. And again, Physical, mental, and spiritual health, fitness, and well-being. Well, I think spiritual well-being, one of the most healthy things you can do is wake up spiritually. Also, as you may know, in the Indo-Tibetan tradition, there's lots of emphasis on the practice of debate. And they debate with each other quite energetically, almost violent. In the Soto Zen tradition anyway, I don't know about Rinzai, we had this ceremony at the end of practice periods for the head monk, for the current Mujo, And the name of the ceremony in Japanese is Hosenshiki, which means Dharma Combat.

[13:18]

So it's like, and we don't really, we don't usually say Dharma Combat anymore around Zen Center. We say Dharma Inquiry. Which is fine with me, but in the In the Chinese, it's Dharma war or Dharma combat. And I think the way we practice here, the questions have a lot of energy often. And similar to the Japanese or Chinese way of So I've sort of said this before, but for me, compassion, when it's well developed, is an intimate transmission.

[14:24]

It's a holy communion. However, sometimes force can be part of it. Force can be part of an intimate interaction. And force, when force is part of the interaction, it does not need to have any issue of trying to control the person you're interacting with. and yet force as a gift, as information to be responded to. And it's possible to offer force in a way that the person can respond to in a way that is spiritually and physically and mentally and emotionally beneficial, releasing, liberating.

[15:33]

And I would say that in a sense, you know, I think in physics there's this term called work, and I think it's measured in like horsepower or British thermal units. No, no, that's energy. Or is it... Force over distance. Huh? Force over distance. Yeah, it's force over distance, work, right. So that's measured in horsepower. And what's the metric word for it? Is it ergs or jewels? Yeah, so it's jewels. Is it jewels? Yeah, maybe jewels. But I think also horsepower. Anyway, it's force times distance is the work. So the work of... What? Torque? Force times distance. Force over distance.

[16:41]

Force over distance. And force times distance is torque. Thank you. I don't know if I mentioned it to you, but some time ago I was talking to someone and she was talking to me and I couldn't hear her very well, so I asked her to speak up. And I don't know exactly how I asked her, but I feel like I said, would you speak up? Something like that. But it wasn't gentle enough. Later people didn't say, that was really cruel the way you asked her to speak up. I didn't get that. And he didn't say to me also that that was cruel. It's just that the energy on it stunned him. There was a little bit too much energy. So then he did speak up. And then I responded to what he said.

[17:52]

But because he was already stunned, he could still ask the question, but he couldn't answer in response. I think because he was already like shaking from the, would you speak up? So in a way, my question, my request, would you speak up, in a way it was violent. It was kind of for him. I didn't mean it to be violent. I just couldn't hear, so I wanted to ask him to speak up. But still, the way I delivered it had enough charge to stun him. And And so in a way it was violent. It was energy, but not energy that he could, you know, stay with and be upright with and turn with. So then I said, after I responded, he looked like, I didn't think he looked stunned, but I felt like I didn't see any sign that he heard me.

[19:08]

And I said, you look like you're not understanding me. And he couldn't say anything. And that was, then things moved on. But later, he was, he felt like not being able to respond when I said, you look like you're not understanding. He felt like he looked not good or stupid. So then he felt stunned and humiliated. So that was a big lesson in me that I have to be careful when I say to somebody, would you speak up? Or would you please come and sit closer? That I need to be careful. In other words, I need to be careful of my thinking, my gestures,

[20:10]

and my speech. And by being careful I maybe can tell it's time to be really gentle in the way I talk. And now I think actually it's time to yell. I think he's ready for a shout. And people come to me and shout at me and it usually works out fine, but I'm pretty ready to be shouted at. You can try it on me if you want. Thank you. Yeah, see? So you can try it on me, but probably you should start maybe with nobody else around. Of course, you might want some witnesses.

[21:13]

And that's another facet. Even though I may be fine with a shout, a bystander might be put into shock. And that's often happened that some senior person, like even a Dharma successor to me, I've shouted at in public, and they're totally fine with it, totally cool with it, you know, dancing with it. But bystanders are like, and, you know, leave the room or leave Zen Center and never come back. Because it's so frightening, they're afraid I might do that with them. So I have to be careful, not just to the person I'm talking to, but anybody who might be listening. So tonight, this is like, actually I was going to mention, I think this is like, me, Do you know what PG stands for? Parental guidance. We have these ratings on the parental guidance. So this is PG or PG-13. That means you have to have a parent and you have to be 13.

[22:18]

And then there's R-rated and you have to be 17 if you're coming without. But I don't think this is R-rated tonight. but I think it might be PG or PG-13. So please, does everybody have a parent nearby? Parental guidance suggested. Oh, okay. So this is PG, parental guidance suggested. I actually do suggest parental guidance, and I'm here to be a parental guider. But I think also you should be at least 13. So maybe it's not PG, maybe it's just PG-13. But I don't think you have to be 17. I think a 17-year-old would be okay for tonight so far. What do you think? Think it's been okay for a 17-year-old? Yeah. But I don't know about 13-year-olds. just to talk about people slapping each other maybe a bit much.

[23:36]

But it's part of our tradition, so here it is to look at, with the support of our friends, to look at such stories, such scary stories. where there seems to be some force expressed over distance, which does work, which does some work with people. It can, you know, it can move them. It's not trying to control them, it's trying to influence in a way that helps them let go of any fixed position. And again, many stories are about the student trying to work with the teacher, expressing force over distance to the teacher. So the student walks up to the teacher with energy and gives this gift, gives this force. And see if you can do that without trying to control the situation.

[24:45]

Are you staying here tonight? Bob, are you going to come back and stay here for a couple of days? You're coming back on Wednesday? So here's the story. And there's a sub-story too, which I really appreciate. The first story is called Wang Bo's Dreg Slurpers. And a background story is that Wang Bo was a really big guy. His teacher was, and Wang Bo was the teacher of Linji and Muzhou and many other people.

[25:49]

And his teacher was named Bajong Waihai. And Bajong Waihai was a little, kind of skinny person. Big, two really big, strong, great disciples, Wang Bo and Guishan. So when Linji, when Wang Bo was with Bajong, One day he came up to the hall where the monks were assembled and he came up to the monks and he had this long staff and he started swinging at them. Like a six or seven foot pole staff swinging at the monks and the monks ran away to him and he chased him and they ran further and he chased him and when they got to the door he said, what is it? That was his teaching at that time. And that teaching, that question is a very important question for our lineage.

[26:58]

But it was an important teaching for Wang Bo and then one day Wang Bo went up to the hall, but he's much bigger and maybe his staff was bigger too, I don't know. And he started swinging his staff and running at the monks. But they froze. They were stunned. And they probably knew this story too. But they didn't move. Their response was stunned. I would say, anyways, not moving. And then he said to them, carry on like this. Actually he said, if you travel like this, travel the bodhisattva path like this, how will you have today? You're a bunch of drug slurpers. Don't you know that in all of China there's no teachers of Zen?

[28:04]

And one monk defrosted and walked up to him and said, Oh, what about all these monasteries where people are practicing? And he said, I didn't. I said, there's no teachers. So my response for you tonight is that Wang Bo looks like a teacher. He's got this big temple with lots of students. He's a successor to one of the great supposed Zen teachers. People come from all around because they think he's a Zen teacher. And then he reenacts stories of his great teacher. So it looks like this is like Zen teacher, this is like big time Zen teacher, big time Zen teacher.

[29:11]

And Wang Bo is saying, you guys are stuck in that story. He didn't say this, but practically everything I do will probably look like your idea of a Zen teacher. But maybe you never heard a Zen teacher say before that there are no Zen teachers. So that's part of our tradition is for great Zen teachers to say there are no Zen teachers. And one could say, and the one And the one who says could be around where I think I am. And one could say that even today the situation might be quite similar, that there's no teachers of Zen in America.

[30:16]

And that can be said even without swinging a big staff at the people and chasing them towards the door. Fairly gently, wasn't it? People ask me to be gentle. I'm really like almost 100% fine with that. So I want to be gentle. And not just because people ask me. This idea that the Buddhas are gentle. So I want to practice the way like Buddhas practice. I want to be gentle and I think it's possible to be gentle and also quite forceful.

[31:35]

In a way, gentle is first and then the force comes from the gentleness so that the force is beneficial. strength instead of force? No, I don't think, I don't know if I do. I think force is like strength applied. It's actually applied. It's like, isn't it, it's something times acceleration. It's mass times acceleration, I think. So it's not just that, but they use their mass not just in an accelerated way, then that's the force. And it can be gentle. And if it's gentle, it can be received and worked with, and there can be this great communion, which cures all ills.

[32:44]

This precious Mere Samadhi is an intimate transmission that guides all beings and removes and liberates all pain. But there's a certain force, but it needs to be a generous ethical force that's not in a hurry for the receiver to turn and wake up. It's not in a hurry for the benefit to arrive. And so this is an example, was Wang Bo in a hurry? Were they in a hurry for the monks to turn? So both of them delivered mass in an accelerated way. There was a force. And they did it over distance, so there was work. And in both cases, even if not for the monks at that time, in both cases, their offerings have served to wake up future generations.

[33:58]

So I don't know if anyone, including Wang Bo, woke up when Bajang chased the monks with a stick. But in our tradition, our lineage, One of our ancestors is named Yun Yen, and he studied with Bajang and did not understand he was there. Our ancestor, Ungo Doyo Dayo Sho, is named Yun Yen. One of our ancestors was in the assembly when Bajang chased the monks, and he was actually Bajang's attendant for 20 years. And he didn't understand he was not turned sufficiently to enter. in this wonderful position of being attendant. And then later he went and studied with another teacher, one of Bai Jiang's peers, Yao Shan, and then he told Yao Shan that story, which he didn't understand, and which maybe I... Yes?

[34:59]

So if these tactics and techniques and teachings woke people up, Why don't we see here at Greenfield people shouting at people or running around with sticks? You see somebody shout at me a minute ago? But what? Yeah, well, sometimes people invite. The shouting that we do, I think the shouting that is liberating is an invited shout. It's not like the Buddha is walking along and shouts at people who aren't inviting it. The Buddha waits to be invited. I'm inviting you to shout at me at any time of the day. Thank you. What did you say? Not while I'm sleeping.

[35:59]

You said any time of day, but not at night. Okay? So I got it clear. During the day when you're walking around, anytime when you're walking around and it's light, but not at night when you're walking around. So just during daylight hours. That's the first time anybody invited me to shout at them during daylight hours. This is like, you know, a new Dharma event. I don't know if that's ever been asked for in the history of Zen. Wow. Congratulations. There's an opportunity here for somebody to invite me to shout at them in the dark. Only in the dark. So anyway, I made a general invitation. Mio, you took it up. And now Mio, I would also yell at me, be careful of who's around.

[37:03]

You're welcome to yell at me, but also I welcome you to yell at me carefully. And part of being careful is to make sure that there's no children nearby who might be, you know, who might harm someone. I just thought of my... My sister called me one time, a long time ago, like about, yeah, about 20 years... 30 years ago, like around 1985, my sister called and said, I've got this big, beautiful dog, and my landlord says that I can't have it in our apartment anymore. And if you don't take it, I have to put him down. So I said, okay.

[38:05]

And so this gorgeous, 95-pound ball of black muscle, beautiful Doberman Pinscher, you know, beautiful animal, he came and lived with me in San Francisco. And he was so sweet. and unaggressive, except when deer were around and when they ran away. But I saw him chase some deer at Gringold, and deer go up and down like that. So when going up hills, it's really good. They can lose a dog very fast uphill. And the dog's going. So the deer was actually in our garden, and he just was right on the deer in about 10 seconds.

[39:14]

And the deer was very smart. The deer laid down. And they left. Huh? The deer laid down. And then he stopped chasing it. He's like... And so I said, come on, Eric. And he came with me. But if the deer got up and started bouncing along, he ran away from me and chased the deer. But actually, if people ran away, they would be the same, so be careful. Anyway, he was with me, and one day I was standing in front of the San Francisco Zen Center, and a little dog barked at him. And he jumped backwards from the little dog and knocked over a man. So he was like really shy and sweet and non-aggressive and he was powerful.

[40:18]

And he taught me that a large, black, muscular male animal can be sweeter than you can imagine. It was a very good lesson for me. And then I got pressured to send him back to my sister because people said, it just doesn't look good for a Buddhist priest wearing black to have this black attack dog. That's how some people saw the dog. I called my sister and somehow, I don't know, she took him back and she lived someplace else so she could take care of him. But he had a lot of energy and mass and he could accelerate it. But he wasn't So you're welcome to yell at me if you think it's beneficial, but please yell carefully.

[41:32]

And please yell gently. See if you can learn to yell at me gently. So I imagine that Wang Bo expressed this gently. It was just right for his group, but maybe not. because maybe he overdid it. Maybe that's why they froze. They couldn't dance with him. But then that one guy came forward and asked that nice question. And then he could say, the next part, there's no teachers. And then the substory, which is so nice, a story about a wheelwright. So, This is called the Wheelwright Center. So George Wheelwright basically gave us Green Gulch. And so it comes from a family that has the name Wheelwright.

[42:38]

So this is Genie's Wheelwright. And so he was working on a wheel, I guess, in the courtyard of the estate of... Lord somebody, I forgot, anybody remember the name? Lord, Lord Zhao? I don't know, I don't remember the Lord's name. The Lord was sitting in his, one of his rooms at the edge of the courtyard reading some classical Chinese texts and the wheelwright looked up at his master and said, uh, sir, uh, what do you, and, uh, The lord of the estate said, I'm reading such and such text of the ancients. And the wheelwright said, are they alive or not? And the lord said, no, they're not alive. He did his shout.

[43:44]

The wheelwright did his shout, which was, well, then, sir, you're slurping dregs. You're a dreg slurper. And the Lord said, hmm, well, if you can save something good, fine. Otherwise, you're dead. And the wheelwright said, well, I look at it like my work. If I go too fast, it doesn't fit on. If I go too slow, it's too loose. And I cannot teach this to my son, and he can't learn it from me. And yet, it comes into my hands. And I've been practicing this for a long time.

[44:49]

And the Lord said, In other words, if you're a wheelwright and you go too fast or too slow, you're a drug slurper. And we are trying to help each other, we are working to help each other find this right wheel, make the wheel right. Not going too fast or too slow. Using our whole energy carefully. As a matter of fact, that's the way to use our full energy, is to do it carefully. Not holding it back. Trying to find that wholehearted, not too much, not too little, in our interactions. And we need gentleness to find it, and we need courage to take care of it when it comes into our hands.

[45:59]

How about you? You do have power. So there's force, power, work. Power is the ability to do work, I think. Force, power, work. You have power and you have work. Are you ready to work? During daylight hours and perhaps at night. You are requested to do this work by all beings, whether you know it or not. and you are responding to the request whether you know it or not.

[47:10]

Was that gentle enough? Did the monks understand that they requested a Wong Bo to come up with his mass and his energy and force and interact with him that way? Did they understand that they requested it? That he didn't think unrequested he's going to do this? Did they understand that they requested it? Did they understand that was their response?

[48:23]

I should say that he responded, and then did they understand he was making a request? I think they did. Did they understand that they responded? It's not clear to me that they understood that they were being invited to respond and that they did. Yes, they did. And you say, well, why would he say you're drug slurpers? Maybe because they weren't. Yes? I'm wondering whether there is something being a monastery or a temple when one is requesting

[49:34]

the energy, the force of the energy, as well as, as you explained, any one of us could formally request. And whether there's an implicit requesting just in a sentence. I would say, yes, there is an implicit request. And then there can be explicit requests, too. And sometimes the person you're making the implicit request to will respond on the implicit request. But you might think, I didn't explicitly ask for instruction, but now that you're instructing me, I realize I did implicitly. But when I implicitly ask, But now that you're giving me this gift, I wake up to my implicit request.

[50:46]

But sometimes people implicitly request. I mean, always people are implicitly requesting, and then they get a response that's explicit. So if you're implicitly requesting and don't know it, then if you get an implicit response, it might not bother you. But if you implicitly request and don't notice it, then if you get an explicit response, you may say, I didn't ask for this. Human beings often say that. I didn't ask for this. In other words, I didn't explicitly ask for this, and yet I'm being explicitly given something that I didn't explicitly ask for. Did I tell you the story about the kite runner? Does everybody know about the book The Kite Runner? A lot of people know about it?

[51:49]

Well, it's a long story. It's a novel. But for me, the two events in the novel were that, well, three of the main events. One main event is two boys were brothers and they didn't know it. And one of them was very loving to the other one, who he didn't know was his brother, but he treated him as though the other one's life was his mission in life, and he would give himself entirely to the welfare of his brother, who he didn't know was his brother. And the other brother loved this first brother, but one time down kites, the brother number one who was so devoted and courageous and would do anything to protect brother number two was being basically raped and and uh and tortured and brother number two saw it ran away and and the way that was described that was like the worst thing i've ever heard of anybody doing at that moment i thought that the way it was that the guys described it i thought

[53:11]

In other words, if I did that, I think that would be like super terrible thing to somebody who loved me that much, to that kind of cruelty. And many years went by and brother number two wished and wished somehow that he would get the consequences of this thing. And he couldn't see that he was getting it. And then one thing led to another and he found himself in a situation or he was being beaten to death. But he wasn't aware that he... This was an explicit response to him, but he didn't think he explicitly or implicitly was requesting it. And then while he was almost beaten to death, he started laughing because he realized that this deadly beating was what he was wanting what he had been requesting for decades.

[54:16]

And it's so funny that... And when he saw that and started laughing, the attack stopped because the attacker couldn't figure out what was going on. And when we realize that our life is actually a response to our request, we wake up. particularly when we think, I didn't ask for this. And then we relax, oh my God, I did. Then we wake up. So he woke up and his awakening, then he was freed of the attack with a few little other details which I won't get into. I thought that was just a great moment, a really great moment. And it was the moment when the karma unveiled itself. The drama reached its climax. And in this case, it was a comedy.

[55:19]

He did a terrible thing. He got just what he wanted. And he was so relieved and entertained by almost being beaten to death. And if he had died, I think he would have died laughing. Causes and conditions. The working of karma, the way karma works is doing this. It's not a person. It's the way we're... It's the combination of us thinking that we do things on our own and that we can actually control our actions. Consequence. And the way that works is who's doing it. And also who is an acronym for World Honored One. But in Buddhism, That who is not in charge of cause and effect. That who understands cause and effect. We don't have a controller of causation in this teaching.

[56:25]

We have causation, which we are mindful of, and it's explicit and implicit. We have perceptions of it, but the perceptions of it are not it. But still, we yearn for the drama to be completed. We yearn to see not the response, but to feel like, oh, I am in the process. I am getting there. Not too low, not too tight. This is called truing the wheel. Truing the wheel. Or riding the wheel. Yeah, so the wheel truer, the wheel rider. So most of us are making requests that we do not know we're making.

[57:36]

I mean, I say most of us a lot of the time. are making requests that we don't realize we're making. And then we get implicit responses which we don't realize we're getting. And we also get explicit responses which we may or may not think we asked for. But one could say, we did ask for it. And waking up is to realize nothing comes that you didn't ask for. You're not in control of the universe. It responds to you. You're not in control of the response, but you're asking for, you're requesting a response, and you get it. Yes, Andrew, and then Alex? Oh.

[58:45]

Oh. I don't know. I don't know how that works. But I think, I didn't see that point, but that's also true. One did invite this attack, this horrible attack. He did invite it. And I don't know if he, if it was explicit or implicit. I don't think it was explicit. I think it was implicit. that he invited it. And I have this strange feeling that Brother Number One, when it happened, might have realized that he asked for it. Because Brother Number One was, in a way, more enlightened than Brother Number Two. Because Brother Number One would give his life for anybody, especially for his brother. Brother Number Two, I think, was really ignorant and inattentive. So he didn't realize that when his brother was being beaten, that he also asked for that.

[59:51]

And that he wanted, you know, I think he did know that he did want to go help. He knew that, but he also knew he couldn't. He didn't. But I don't know who was aware of what and what was explicit and implicit, and I don't know how it all works. but I explicitly felt deep about whether I would abandon anybody who loved me that much just because I might lose my life or my life might be changed radically if I assisted them. I think what was so horrible is maybe that I thought that I might do something like that, that I might let I think sometimes you might let something like that happen, but not to protect yourself. And that might be okay. Because, in fact, you can't control it.

[60:54]

Because you could go over and join the fray and give your body to your brother, and they still might be happy. But you might be really happy that you're there getting murdered alongside him. And then, you know, and there would be consequences for that too, which might be, you know, great peace. And then again, Wang Bo's teacher, Nan Xuan, is the one who held up the cat. And what would you do if the teacher held up a cat and said, if you can say something, good. Again, nobody said anything. Say something or would you say something? What would you say? Something. That might have done it. That might have done it. Something. Yes?

[62:01]

Wait a second. Thank you. Alex? Say thank you to Madeline. I request that you do. Your understanding of at least that karma on an individual level. So what I'm getting at is that there's always an implicit asking for what's past or what if someone in this case is transgressing against you is it possible also that other people's karma you're kind of an externality of their karma like you're kind of just you get wrapped up in someone else's bad karma but it's not necessarily that you're asking for it well it's yes and no yes I think that way and no it's not really that way because

[63:09]

there's this intimate relationship there, and I think it's external. And by thinking it's external, that's karma. To think that I can do something to you, that I have the power to do something by myself, that I'm autonomous vis-a-vis you, and I have the power to do these things, and I own these things, that kind of action is called karma. When there's action and nobody owns it, it's not Like, you know, do I own the way my fingernails grow? Do I own the way they grow any more than you? Maybe I don't think so. I'm not making them grow. You're not making them grow, but they're growing. But anyway, we're equally responsible for my growing fingernails. That's what I think. But when I think that I'm growing my fingernails and you have nothing to do with it, Well, then I'm pretty insane to think that I can grow my fingernails or that I rot my teeth.

[64:16]

Obviously bacteria are helping me. And if they think that they're doing the, you know, rotting my teeth autonomously and that they're power over my teeth and gums, then they're doing karma. So karma is activity that you're not activity that you're ignorant of, that you're ignoring. Look carefully at karma. If you're attentive to it, you can see that you don't own it. Or you can see that's what karma is, is that you think, I own these actions. And then you can make people external to your, like, you can say, that person asked me, made a request to me, and their request was owned by them. And they, if they're awake, they don't see it that way. They don't, they see that the request, they don't think that they had the power over the request.

[65:23]

But they do see the request occurred. If you externalize their request, that's like you externalizing them to your action. And that externalization, if attended to, you'll see that it's nonsense. It only appears in ignorance or inattention. I'm concerned that I would think that I owned abandoning them, that I owned going away from them. But I'm also concerned if I think I own going to their aid. What I would like to do is go to their aid without owning it. Now, I might feel better about owning going to their aid than owning it. And I propose that Yeah, that if I don't own my action, I will not feel terrible about it.

[66:31]

And that, again, that's a tricky point. I'll be right with you. Is that enough on that for now? Thank you for your question. Maddy? I just had an ouch moment. Ouch? An ouch moment. When you were talking about brother one either implicitly or explicitly asked him to be sexually assaulted. I just understood what you said. No, I did say that. Yeah. I can imagine. How about brother number two being beaten to death, that he... Does that hurt as much? Yeah. But Brother Number Two realized when he was being beaten up more than Brother Number One was beaten up, Brother Number Two realized that he had implicitly and actually explicitly been asking for this for decades.

[67:42]

He realized that. And that makes the whole thing into a comedy. Before that, it was almost a tragedy. In the first case, there's no realization of invitation, so it's a tragedy. And it's a little bit or a big ouch. When I read the story, it was an incredibly big ouch because I didn't understand the relationship at that time. And when you do a relationship, then I want to understand the relationship and I'm begging to understand the relationship. And I keep begging and I keep begging and it takes a couple of decades and finally I get the result for not understanding the relationship. And then I'm released. I've been wanting this all along from that first moment and I didn't understand the request going on in the first moment.

[68:47]

I didn't see the requests. They were not explicit enough for me. I just don't understand why, in the first example, I requested that. But you do in the second one. No. My gut says that, I mean, it's bad to be beaten to death either way, but that he did something wrong. It's easy for my ego to justify that he's getting hurt. And I wanted that too, so that's his request. But I still don't think it's right. You don't think what's right? I guess, I don't know. Well, let's be careful here. Maybe we can get through this. Once again, climax of the drama, this person's being beaten to death and he realizes he did request it. Second, at the end, 10, 20 years, 20 or 30 years later,

[69:53]

Brother number two is being beaten to death, and at first he's asking for it, which usually when people are being beaten to death, they don't think they're asking for it. You know, a high percentage of the time. And he didn't realize he was asking for it at the beginning of the beating. And then he realized he was. And he didn't realize it, and the beating went on. And finally he, in the story, this is the story, finally he realized that he requested this. And when he realized he requested it, he got the joke of his life. And the joke is that We don't realize that we're requesting our life and responding to our life. Our life's going to keep knocking on the door, and we're going to keep asking for it to show us that we're requesting what's coming. It's not just coming by itself, it's coming because we request it.

[70:57]

And it's going to keep knocking on the door, and sometimes very fiercely until we finally realize, oh, I requested what's going on. And sometimes it needs to be something which no one would, in their right mind, so to speak, request. But he thought he was requesting it, and he was in his right mind to request it, because he needed it. But in the first story, we can't interview the first. The first brother did not realize he requested it. And the second brother did not realize the first brother requested it. And the second brother did not realize that he was being requested to do anything other than he felt the request. He didn't see that he was being requested to assist his brother. But I kind of feel like he was being requested to go assist his brother. And he wasn't listening. But I don't know how this stuff works. I'm just saying the story was built in such

[71:59]

that he realized that this terrible thing that was happening, this life-endangering interaction, he had been asking for. And that's why he laughed. And again, when he laughed, he was liberated from this terrible. It was not terrible anymore. It was what he wanted. Some women, when they're giving birth, they think they're being tortured. And they don't think they're requesting the torture at a given moment. They think, I didn't ask for this. And then they realize they did ask for it. And then they have what's called, then it's a comedy. It's a wonderful comedy called Giving Birth. But a lot of women think, I didn't ask for this situation. And then they just suffer through it, and then it's over. And then maybe the next baby, they didn't ask for it. Did the Jewish people ask for the Holocaust?

[73:07]

They did. Children? They did ask for it. There are a lot of examples that I would bring up, too, for the Holocaust. Yeah, well, start with the worst. And I'm saying... They did request it. What about if you're a small child and something terrible is happening? Same. I don't understand that. I don't know how it works. Can I give it a shot? Yeah. We all live here together. so you can't escape your togetherness with others. What one does to the least of us, one does to all of us. Responsibility is shared in this space. So, if I walk around thinking I'm unique, thinking I'm different and separate from what's going on somewhere else,

[74:16]

then with my separation, we are asking for it. So there's no separate responsibility and there's no separate violence. We joined this program and it's accurate. Yes. But I don't know how this works. I'm just saying, I'm proposing that we're requesting each other the world, and we're getting responses. And the world's requesting of us, and we respond to it. I don't know how it works. I'm just saying. And I'm also saying, and I don't know how it works, that when we don't understand, then we isolate ourselves from the process, and it's suffering.

[75:19]

My understanding of it was that the request, the implicit request, isn't a conscious asking for a certain thing. It's more of asking for existing. That by existing you are asking for life to come at you however it is. Or by existing... What existence means is that you're requesting and responding with everything. That's what life is. And what works is inconceivable. but I'm suggesting nobody's outside that intimate request and response. But also nobody actually can see with their perceptions how this works. But it's not like it's sometimes going on. It is sometimes we explicitly request and almost no one, none of the inhabitants

[76:26]

of the death camps, none of them were, probably very few of them were explicitly requesting, consciously requesting. They're requesting to exist and react to that however it does. And we're requesting to exist because we're being requested to exist. Our existence is a response to a request and that's going on all the time and no one knows how that works. But it's not like sometimes we request unconsciously and other times we request unconsciously. That's what I'm proposing. Yes? Is request, it seems to me, and I see where it's coming from, but it seems to me maybe it's a poor word because in using the word request it implies... duality that I think when you're applying elsewhere in your words is not there.

[77:30]

So, I mean, like, a thing, first a being requests something, but I think that beings don't resist independently of each other. Right. So, I feel like implicit in the word request are independent beings. implicit or explicit. Or maybe implicit, yeah, maybe implicit. But maybe there's another kind of interaction where there's requesting and responding going on and there's no idea of it going on, and that's why it's unconscious. And there's no idea that the request is separate from the response. ...separate from the responder. But when we say the word request, maybe you think there's some duality between the request and the response. But the path of peace is where the two cross, where they're not separate.

[78:39]

separate, then that's not what we're talking about. As we also say, inquiry and response come up together. It's not like inquiry and then response. When you say, please come, the response is right there, not later. But it's hard for us to see when you say, please come, that the response is there. Or if somebody says, I'm coming, at that moment you maybe don't hear the response. OK. Yes. Oh, Maddie. Oh, you already talked. No, no. Drew. be able to be intimate with having compassion for what they've experienced.

[79:51]

It seems kind of scary to think that, oh, I can request a beating or some tragedy that's happened in my life, taking ownership of that. And at the same time when I do that, then there becomes this opportunity for compassion to be very intimate with that experience and deepening your capacity to have compassion for it, like you speak Jesus. Have you ever had any of those experiences where it's allowed compassion to drop deeper in you and turn you so that your heart opens even more? I have perceptions of that. But when you say, do I have experience of it, I would say that is my life, that is our life.

[80:53]

The experience of what you're talking about, that is our life. But we don't know it. It's inconceivable. But sometimes you have perceptions of it. But the perception of it, of the compassion dropping into us and turning us, that's not what you're talking about. That's not the experience of it. But I think what you're talking about is our life. I'm feeling uncomfortable with what's being said. Somehow there's something that you know, words are, words don't reach it. But it seems like on the one hand, there's kind of a statement that we are inviting what comes to us in life.

[81:55]

And there's the statement also, we don't know how. But if we don't know how it works, how can we really say we are inviting? And then, I think it's awfully difficult for, you know, in that, for women in particular, she invited it. Rape, she invited it. And not just that situation, many other situations. I understand there's some point that you're trying to make that I don't think I'm quite getting. I think there's something that feels off to me here. Words are always situational, how they work. So what does it mean, people invited to the Holocaust, or a person is invited, being murdered, raped, or tortured?

[83:16]

We didn't see it's right or wrong. How I understand it is... because the request, what I find actually interesting as a word, being requested, because usually we say we are responsible. We are also responsible for what happens to us. And when we use the word request as well, the actual request and response are even in one person. It falls to one person. If we wouldn't request it, it would mean we are not responsible. It happens somewhere outside, and I'm not a part of it. And that cannot be what our teachings are. Yes. It would mean something happens outside, and it has nothing to do with me. And that cannot be it, right? So the consequence, it's right to say we request it. But we didn't request what we perceived happened as not what we requested.

[84:25]

Sometimes you have a perceptible request and you get a perceptible response. But in the case I don't think anybody of the people in the camps was requesting the perceptible response. I'm not saying that. I'm saying that what came to them, actually, they requested. But I'm not saying they requested what they perceived happened. For me, it doesn't really work. I don't know what you're getting at. I'm getting at a relationship and I hear you say, you don't get it. You don't get what I'm trying to... I mean to say... And they didn't get what they perceived happening.

[85:33]

They weren't requesting. Yeah, right. I don't think they wanted that they were to be tortured and brutalized and murdered. I don't think they requested that. You also don't think that's what they got. I think that's what we perceive they got. And I think almost none of them requested that. But what happened, what actually happened, they did request. And what actually happened, I don't know what that was. That's kind of, to me, it gets too much into the realm. It doesn't really, doesn't, yeah. I feel it's, I feel this, the danger that's inherent in what you're saying is not balanced out by, for me anyway, by some kind of, you know, if a general statement is made, what's happening now is the best that could possibly happen, I can accept that.

[86:42]

Because there isn't any alternative, really. But then to say, I just... I think you said something there about the dangers that we're dealing with here doesn't something. You kind of said it. The dangers are here. And the danger doesn't quite what? What is it? The danger is that I don't see accountability in what you're saying. That's what I'm saying. In a simple, straightforward sociological context, I don't see how you can have accountability in what you're bringing forward there.

[87:51]

I thought I started by putting accountability where you don't want it. You're saying, I don't want it here. I said there was accountability, and that's the danger, is to say that there's accountability. And what I'm saying, there's accountability for it too, and I'm experiencing the accounting going on right now, going on in this room. Heavy duty, intense accountability is occurring. And I... I accept that. And what you're saying is part of the accountability for what I said. But I don't see you turning it around to the situation I'm talking about. It's like you want accountability and don't want accountability. Because this started, what got people aggravated and got everybody upset, was I said, whatever happens, you're accountable for, you're responsible for, you do respond to.

[88:59]

I'm saying that, and I think part of it, people want to say, these people are not accountable. There's some situations where we're not accountable. Whereas I'm here, and I am accountable, and I'm getting accounted. And I accept that. ...story up, there would be an accounting. And this is the accounting. And I bring up another story. And then other people bringing up other stories and asking me, are they accountable? And I say, yes. And if I say that, there's danger all over the place. And then I don't know if the danger that has just been brought out into the room is good or whatever. because it's not accountable, but it is accountable. We are accountable. We're getting accounted. I think we are asking to be accountable and we are asking for an audit.

[90:12]

And right now I'm getting an audit. You're listening to me and you're auditing me. I see what you said as an auditing of what I said, a multidimensional audit, which I asked for. Versus welcome? Hmm? Versus welcome? Not versus. Welcome. I welcome, I welcome whatever, and also I welcome an auditing. So first welcoming and then ethics. Audit my action. I welcome the audit. And I'm receiving an audit. I came to this class knowing I was going to ask for an auditing. If I bring up these stories, I'm asking for an auditing. And then I get audited, and then I ask for another audit, and I get audited.

[91:14]

That's what's going on here. And the auditing is happening, and I came into the situation I got audited. I asked for this. And this is what I got. And I don't know what it is or how it happened. Well, it doesn't seem like there are drag surfers here. It does not seem like there are drag surfers here. You know, you're throwing... You know, people are going, wait a minute... I'm not so sure I want that stick. You know, maybe there's another way. Right. Right. Yeah. Yeah, I'm holding up the cat. Yeah. Would I say that to them? I don't think so. But you think like that?

[92:18]

Do I think like that? Think like that? But I tell you that that's what's going on. But you're not going to tell them. I'm not going to tell them and I might not even think that, but I'm telling you that that's the way things work. But you're hearing a request. I think you're hearing a request. I think I am too. Yes? I think that, you know, despite everything is just fine the way it is, sometimes it's hard. Almost too much like that force. We're requesting a little bit, maybe compassion. Compassion? Manifestation of it. Like you might... From me or from you? From all of us? What would I say to her?

[93:23]

I probably wouldn't say anything. I'd probably just be with her. Actually, I do not know what's going on. If that happened to you or anybody I know, I wouldn't know what was going on. I don't know. I'm saying to you, yes, but if you're in some situation where you do not feel you requested it, I'm not going to tell you you requested it. I'm not going to tell you that, but I'll be with you. Not the back of my head, in the back of my head, nothing. In the back of my head, in the front of my head, all I know is I want to respond to you and be with you.

[94:29]

That's all I know, probably. I feel like we are slightly and I think if we focus on the fact that we are physical forms of life and life will do what it needs to balance itself out and things happen such as war and then there's birth and then there's war and then there's peace and then there's war and then they happen, you know, and the liberation that the second brother got could only happen if the first brother, who was already liberated because he had such a compassionate personality, he was eternally properly fine. And, you know, quote, unquote, he went to heaven. But his brother was selfish and needed something to wake him up.

[95:29]

And it wasn't until his brother, who had suffered such a massive debt are beating He would never been liberated if his brother was happy and fine or maybe he would have but something else would have needed to happen for it to happen so it's like everyone is interdependent and the way that you're liberated will ripple upon me on how I'm liberated but it has not to do with one person. It's everyone being affected by everything that happens, everyone. The Holocaust has woken us all up to, oh, maybe I should never do this again. But it also has taught us we can survive under temperatures. You know, the human body, we learn from everything that happens in life. So seeing it as right or wrong is the point. I've just got to jump in because this is sort of like, for anyone, I don't believe there's any religious girls or children or women to be abused, or men.

[96:46]

and that individually they ask for it. I don't think that any of us believe that. But I think what we're missing here is we think we're getting caught up in this. implicitness is coming from each of us individually. There's a thing beyond our own karma. There's the karma of the people we're with, there's the karma of the nation we come from, there's the karma of the place we're at now. Implicit karma is really sort of like Everything. And one of the things I feel we should be doing is sort of realizing that each one of us, whatever abuse we've suffered, now, in the benefit of that, that this society that we live in is benefiting us and it's built upon abuse.

[97:51]

And that abuse is not just to children, and not just to women, and not just to black people, and not just to Syrians, and not just to the people who are dying in the Mediterranean, and not just to Africans. It's to all of us. We're all being abused by this society that we're actually getting benefit from. And if we don't wake up to that, you know, and... Find out we can really sort of justify living like this, then this discussion gets us nowhere. It just gets us all crying, whether it's outwardly or inwardly. And we've got to go beyond the crying outwardly. We did it as a race in 1945, 46, 47. And Pol Pot happened. Stalin happened. And what's going on in Syria now is happening. We're doing the same stuff.

[98:54]

We have to do more than just cry out. Sorry for the beginning. That's all. Very well. It's called collective karma, right? That we describe like Palestinian Jewish or whatever. But it's not a... And race, it just, when we see, we have to divide between race, what's going on. In fact, it doesn't really, what happened to the Holocaust would have happened, it still happened to the Palestinian, or to the Syrian right now. So it's the same thing, it's collective. So it's getting late. I think some people want to keep talking, is that right? So anybody who wants to leave can go.

[100:15]

I can stop now.

[100:38]

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