The chant we just recited was a bodhisattva vow written by a person in what we call the Zen lineage in Japan named Tore, Zen Master Tore. So he was a person who aspired to be a bodhisattva and this was one of his vows that he wrote. And this morning we chanted another bodhisattva vow written by another more ancient Asian master named Dogen. That was one of his bodhisattva vows that we recited. And may we attain maturity in Buddhist wisdom. May we. And I mentioned this morning that I'm somehow meaning to talk about this word, this Chinese character, which you may be familiar with.

[01:12]

It's quite, you see it around Asian bookstores and things like that in the West a lot. In Japanese it's pronounced do, in Chinese it's pronounced dao, in Japanese do. So it means a path, a road, but in China and Japan you see maybe various streets, say such and such, A lot of the streets in Kyoto have this character, and then another character which means principle, and then like third street is third, the character for three, and then dori, this character, and another character which means principle.

[02:15]

So it means a road or a path. So in Sanskrit, This is a translation of the Sanskrit word marga which means path. They use it that way in China. So in Sanskrit marga means path and also means practice. So this character means path. Usually don't talk about it as practice but the path in Buddhism is a practice. This character was in China in circulation in China long before Buddhism came. Buddhism came around 2,000 years ago to China. But before Buddhism, this character was in use. And again, it meant road or path or a way of life. But it also means speak. So and so spoke to this character.

[03:21]

And as you all may know, there's a very illustrious text, which is called a Taoist text. And... Where's Homa? Oh, there they are. And it's called Tao de Ching. Tao de Ching. This character, Tao, and de means virtue, and Ching is scripture. It's one of the main... Scriptures are the Taoist school. The Taoist school is the school of the Tao. Taoist. And so it starts off by saying, the true Tao cannot be Taoed. In that case, it's the true Tao cannot be spoken. But you can also, that's the way they usually translate it, the true path is a path that cannot be spoken. But you can also say the true path is not the path.

[04:26]

Or the true speaking is speaking that's not speaking. But they usually translate it, the true path cannot be spoken, this path here. So this means path, but again it means a way of life. It's a great way of reality, of the nature of the universe. That's the Tao. but the Chinese Buddhists used this to mean a path, but they also used it to mean enlightenment. So in Sanskrit, marga means path or practice, and then one of the words for enlightenment is bodhi. So this character can translate marga and bodhi. And of course in our tradition, the path, the marga and the enlightenment are the same thing.

[05:30]

So we often chant, the way is perfect and all-pervading. That's the way they usually translate it, and it's this character. But you can also say enlightenment is perfect and all-pervading. But if it's perfect and all-pervading, if the way, if the practice is perfect and pervades everywhere, which is the same as enlightenment, perfect and pervasion, why do we have to practice? And yet, if there's a slightest discrepancy, in other words, if our activity is not in accord with this way or this path or this enlightenment, it's kind of like, it's almost like the way doesn't pervade. So we had somehow the... And that relates to another story which many of you have heard is a Zen teacher is fanning himself and a monk says, the nature of wind is permanent and reaches everywhere, so why do you fan yourself?

[06:47]

Zen teacher says, you may understand that the nature of the way, of the wind, is all-pervading, but you don't understand what it means that it reaches everywhere. A monk says, well, what is the meaning about reaching everywhere? And the teacher fanned himself. Your practice is the meaning of the way reaching everywhere. Even though it does reach everywhere, the meaning of it is your practice. Here's the great character which means both practice and enlightenment in Chinese Buddhism and speak, which is also very interesting to me. If your speech isn't practice, then it's like the way doesn't reach everywhere.

[07:54]

So if the way, if enlightenment reaches everywhere. Why do you have to talk, teacher? Another word that I want to relate this to is the word for a practice place, which many of you have heard the term dojo. And that compound do, it uses this character, do, and another character which means place. So there can be Zen dojos. Zen places of practice. But also it's a practice place, a way place, but it's also an enlightenment place. A dojo in Buddhism is an enlightenment place.

[08:56]

But all these other traditions like Aikido dojo, judo dojo, karate dojo, and all those other arts like flower arrangement, that's a do. It's a path and it's an enlightenment. Tea ceremony, archery, archery is kudo. The path of of archery or the enlightenment of archery they're all practiced in dojos but dojo also means translates a Sanskrit term called bodhi manda so the dojo is a bodhi mandala it's where you sit where you practice enlightenment so again coming back to the theme of this year, this is a good place to build a sanctuary.

[10:02]

This is a good place to build a dojo. This is a good place to build a bodhimanda. Wherever you are is a good place to build a dojo, a bodhimanda, where you practice enlightenment, where there's enlightenment practice. At Tosahara, outside the... I believe, outside, we have a little plaque given to us. It's a nice plaque from the headquarters of Soto Zen. It's not as good as a disabled person plaque, but it's a nice plaque, and it says that this is a place for practicing. It's a San Zen, which means practice dojo. So this is our... Chinese lesson for today. And this will be located in your friendly neighborhood temple kitchen.

[11:06]

Can I have that book, please? This is the Book of Serenity. It's an English translation of a Chinese collection of Zen stories, of Zen conversations. Chinese... collection of many, 100 basic face-to-face transmissions. And then in the commentary, there's many other stories of face-to-face transmissions. So this is a book full of wonderful stories of bodhisattvas, or at least people who are aspiring to be bodhisattvas, having conversations with bodhisattvas. And some of these stories, only the Buddha is talking. But again, I say to you, whenever the Buddha is talking, the Buddha is talking to everybody.

[12:13]

And then again, the story I told you at the beginning is the fourth story in this book. It's called The World-Honored One Points to the Earth, or Points to the Ground. The Chinese character there means earth and ground. So again, the world-honored one, the Buddha's walking along on the earth and points to the earth and says, this is a good place to build a sanctuary. In this case, they don't use the Chinese characters for dojo. They use the character for sanctuary. And then in his group, always traveling in a group, even when you can't see Buddha's students around her, there's this inexhaustible, inconceivable group that the Buddha is sitting in the middle of all living beings. Wherever the Buddha goes, all living beings go with the Buddha.

[13:17]

So he's walking with his group, he points to the ground, says this is a good place to build a sanctuary and in his group is various divine beings, one of them is the emperor of the divine beings, Indra, takes a blade of grass, sticks it in the ground, and says, the sanctuary is built. And the Buddha smiled. This is the conversation. Good place. Okay, the response. Put the grass in. The Buddha smiled. That's the story. Number four. And then there's, what is it? Then there's number 41, right? Four, five, six, up to 41 on your way to 100. Let's see what number 41 is. This is 53, which is another good one.

[14:29]

But I'm going to go back to 41, sorry. So this is called Lupu. Teacher Lupu is about to die. I'm going to talk to you for a little while and then because if you listen well we're going to give you a treat and some tea. Right Linda? Okay so here's the introduction you want to hear it?

[15:36]

Who knows this might be apropos of our world today. We'll see. Sometimes, out of loyalty and sincerity, denying oneself, the pain and cramp is hard to express. Sometimes, calamity extends to other people, but one doesn't take responsibility. What about to pass away, to die. We are cut down cheaply. At the very end there is the most care. Tears come from a painful gut. It's impossible to hide or escape anymore. But is there anyone with cool eyes?

[16:40]

Lupu was about to die he said to his group I have one thing to ask you people if this is so this is adding a head on top of your head if it is not so this is cutting off your head seeking life that's what he said to his group as he was about to die. These are his final care for his students as he was about to die. If this is so, this is adding a head on top of your head. If this is not so, this is cutting off your head, seeking life.

[17:51]

That's how he started. And then the conversation starts. At that time, a monk, or excuse me, not a monk, the head monk. So, oftentimes there's a head monk in a monastery. Like over at Green Gulch, we have practice periods. Tausaha, our city center, they have practice periods. And they have a head monk. Which literally means first seat, So the shiso, the head monk, said, green mountains, or the green mountain is always moving its feet. Don't hang a lamp in broad daylight. Okay, so the teacher offers this. The head monk says, the green mountains are always moving their feet. don't hang up a lamp in broad daylight. They're having a conversation.

[18:54]

He's trying to have a face-to-face transmission as he's dying with his group. And the monk comes forward, the head monk comes forward to try to practice this with him. And Lu Pu said, what time is this to make such a speech. Or, in other words, how can you talk like this at a time like this? Or, this is no time to fool around with such talk. Then, another elder comes forth, his name is Yan Feng, and said, leaving these two paths, What are the two paths? Did you hear him? Yes. Leaving these two paths, I request the teacher not ask the question you just asked.

[19:55]

Is that clear somewhat? The teacher has these two paths. If you say it's this, that's like putting a head on top of your head. If you say it's not this, that's cutting your head off, trying to get something. The monk comes forward and says, you know, why do you put up a light in midday? And the teacher says, basically, why are you talking like that? Then the elder comes forward and says, putting aside what you just said, I ask you not, I ask, I request the teacher not ask what you just asked, okay? This is a conversation at that time, back in ancient China. Lu Pu said, not yet, speak again. In other words, didn't quite get it, try again.

[21:02]

Pretty good, I'm adding that. Not yet, try again. He didn't invite the other monk to try again. Not yet, try again. So then the elder, Yansung, says, I don't care if you can say it all or not. And then, I think this is a mistake, typo. It says Yansang, but I think it means... This is funny. It says, Yansang said, I have no attendant to answer the teacher. Right now I'm not sure what's going on there.

[22:04]

Anyway, that was a conversation in public. Then, that evening, Lu Pu called the elder Yansang to his private quarters and said, your answer today was most reasonable. You should experientially realize the saying of my late teacher. Quotes, before the eyes there are no things. That meaning is before the eyes. It is not something before the eyes, not in reach of the eyes or ears. Unquote. And then he says to the elder, which phrase is guest and which phrase is host? If you can pick them out, I'll impart the robe and bowl to you.

[23:10]

So Lu Pu, the elder says, I really don't. And Lu Pu shouted and said, how miserable. And the monk, a monk asked, not the elder, what is the teacher's meaning? And Lu Pu said, the boat of compassion is not rowed over pure waters. Over the precipitous straits, it is wasted effort to set out a wooden goose. Wooden goose? Wooden goose, yeah. So sometimes, you know, when they're going, sometimes if you're going through rapids, you might put a piece of wood or a wooden goose in the water to see where the goose goes so you can follow the goose. And he's saying,

[24:11]

in precipitous straits, it's a wasted effort to put the goose out. So here's people trying to have a conversation, an intimate conversation, and we can talk about what they're up to, but the main thing I want to say today is here's an example of an attempt by a noted teacher, excellent Stu Dens, And it's difficult. It's difficult. And that story is actually only part of it. Actually, I think how miserable also can be translated, it's tough.

[25:20]

It's tough. And then Lupu died right after that. We could we could converse about this story we could converse about this conversation for quite a while I can imagine that you would bring many things into question if we did and I would be happy to do so and there's many other conversations which we could converse about for the rest of our lives and this conversations are what the Buddha way is, according to some traditions.

[26:25]

According to this tradition, the Buddha way is for us to continue to have conversations about everything, including the conversations of the last 2,500 years, some of which have been recorded, some of which we do not know, but we can still talk about them. Is there anything you want to bring up? Yes, Katie? I'm thinking about what you said earlier about the solitary time to get fellows in a conversation. And I'm wondering if you could say more about skillfully use those together when the conversation is difficult, when there is struggle, when it's skillful to move toward that difficulty and when it's skillful to go away and spend the solitary time and settle and

[27:50]

what we do when we're in the middle of the struggle. Yeah, so you're initiating a conversation with me about what you just said, okay? And so when you were talking I was thinking about someone who's in this room who came to see me I don't know how many decades ago and on more than one occasion she said When we were talking she said to me, would you stop talking please? Because while I was talking to her she was unable to like be aware of herself and she sensed that she needed me to stop talking so she could like be solitary. She sensed that she was having trouble like actually conversing with me because she was losing track of her side of the conversation which is how she feels. and how she feels and what her posture is.

[28:55]

So she asked me to stop so she could check in. So I stopped, and then she checked in, and she felt present again. And then she said, okay, continue. Do you remember that? Do you remember that? Looks like you don't. I hoped I was okay to help you but that's good she sent on some occasions she came to talk to me but then when I started talking to her I think maybe she felt you could say overwhelmed by what I was saying and she said okay fine but just a second where am I so she asked me to stop and I would say, in general, you can do that with me. If I'm talking and you're losing track of yourself, you can stop me.

[29:59]

I'll stop, find yourself again. So sometimes you feel like, this conversation is too much for me. I gotta let go, I have to go. I need some time alone. You sense that for yourself. And I hear that from a lot of people. that they're in an intimate relationship and their partner in the conversation their interlocutor is chatting away or yelling away or whatever and they're like they can't be present anymore they're on the verge of running away which can be seen as abandonment or they're going to fight back because they're on the verge of losing their integrity okay So I say, I think you should have an understanding with your interlocutor that you can have time out, you can go away for a while and, you know, kind of regroup.

[31:04]

But I also recommend that when you do that, especially if it's like somebody, not necessarily a teacher of Buddhism, but maybe an intimate partner, that you say, I need space. and I need one hour or one day, and I will come back. Don't just run away. Because they don't know. Some part of them doesn't know if you'll ever come back. So, say, I need space. I need an understanding that I need space to find myself and calm down so I can meet you in a skillful way. We should let people do that, and we should ask for it. We should learn to ask for it, and we should have an understanding that we can ask for it. So with a Zen teacher, you should have an understanding about that, I would say. Now, the other way around also occurs, you look at the stories, the student's chatting away, the teacher's okay with it, but the teacher feels that the student's not really present with what they're saying.

[32:10]

Like, I don't know what, they're trying to impress the teacher or something. Or they're getting too much in with their head. Anyway, they're not really present, so the teacher often says, go back to the zendo and calm down. You're not following what you're saying or you're not listening to me. But they don't necessarily say that. They just say, go sit. There are many stories like that where the teacher feels like the interlocutor is not able to be present and the interlocutor is not asking for the space to return to their presence. So they have to watch Learn to watch while you're talking and while you're listening. Are you taking care of your own face? Are you paying too much attention to the other face? And or too little to your own? Kind of the same. That's a very important point. Thank you. And in the middle of my answer, you might have needed to stop me, but you didn't.

[33:17]

Yes? In the beginning of that story, he said, if you understand this one way, it's like having another head. So that's kind of, like, useless, right? Like a head on top of your head, it's like... Well, it's kind of like, to make it into this is unnecessary. Yeah, you don't have to, like, make what you have into this. And to make it not this, that's extra. That's adding something you don't need. And the other one is, if you try to avoid that tendency to make something into something because you don't want to get in trouble, then that's cutting your head off. So then he's leading up to, well, what are you going to do? And this monk comes forward and He kind of says, you're getting colder. And then the other guy comes forward and does pretty well.

[34:30]

But not quite, so he wants to try again later. Sounds like turning away and touching you're both wrong. It's very much like that. Turning away and touching you're both wrong. I thought that the Schuster's response was a good one, because it sounds like that's what he was saying. This sounds like the Schuster said, you know, why do you hold a lamp in the daytime? Yeah, why? Anyway, he thought it was good, and maybe it was. And then the teacher said what he said. And the Schuster shut up. And instead of him talking, the elder came forward and said what he said. The Shishul could have said what the elder said, maybe. And the conversation would have gone on, but... The Shishul also could have said, well, what about you, teacher? Or he could have shouted, it's tough, it's tough.

[35:34]

A lot of possibility only he stopped it. He didn't go on. Doesn't mean he was wrong. It just means it seems like his... His part of the conversation was then shifted to... Maybe you could say he passed the baton to his big brother. I don't know. Yes? I'm really taken with the precipitous waters and the wooden goose. And the way it's kind of hitting me today is that... There's an immediacy, you just have to, you can't, there's nothing to follow. It's echoing when you said right after the election about we have to be the adults now. So it's kind of echoing that there's nothing that we can follow. Yeah, Barack's not going to lead us anymore. Barack's not going to set a good example for us.

[36:36]

We can't look outside ourselves for dignity and poise. That being said at that moment of death, there's nothing to follow, you just need to be in the water. You need to be in the water, and don't look for, again, don't look for some, this is it. Be in the water, in the rough water, rowing away without this is the way to go. Yes, exactly. You could be, I think this is the way to go, but that's just me thinking. We don't try, again, and try to stop thinking that this is the way to go. That would be to cut your head off. So we have to find the balance and not look to someplace else and also don't do it by yourself. Nobody's going to do it for you and you can't do it by yourself. And I have this fantasy that you guys are okay with that. you don't think you can do it by yourself and you don't think somebody else is going to do it for you but that you are going to do it in face-to-face meeting with the other because that's what enlightenment is and that's tough some of the time and if it's not tough then it's tough later and if it's tough later then it's not tough later

[38:09]

And so it's very dynamic. These waters are really white and wonderful. It's a fragile situation. Let's be careful and let's meet face to face because opportunity is always there. And let's take care of being present with our own face because that's what we have to give. and help other people give their face to us completely. Which they are, of course, because the way of totally giving your face to this intimate communication is reality. But we have to practice it. Otherwise, it's kind of like it isn't reality. It's like we can be half-hearted. Well, yeah, that's true. And if you are wholehearted about being half-hearted, you'll be free of being half-hearted.

[39:12]

So now, since you've listened so well, we will do our dedications and have a little tea party. Unless there's something else you want to say before we conclude. this. Thank you for making a great effort to be here with us today. It was a joy. Everybody helped me in many ways. Even part of the helping was, you're going to do that? How are you going to get up the stairs? And people back at Green Gulch, you know, I had to convince them that I was going to not push myself to heart, so I'd asked for a bed to lie down and Alma brought a massage table just the right height and so I could rest.

[40:16]

So I don't think I push myself too hard today. And even though it was not difficult, I still enjoyed it. Usually my one-day sittings here are really hard because I see about 20 people and give two talks and sit 40 periods. And they're, you know, But today was pretty easy, and I think I won't get into any trouble now, right? May our intentionally extend to every being and place with the true merit of Buddha's way. Beings of thy numbers, I vow to save them. Decisions are inexhaustible, I vow to end them.

[41:22]

Gates are boundless, I vow to enter them. This way is unsubstable, By the way, did you hear the doorbell, elegant doorbell? So Eileen answered the door and it was an Asian nun and two other female friends and they saw the Dharma wheel and the deer on the roof. So they came down and said, is this a public temple? And Eileen said, do you want to hear a Dharma talk? It'll start in about 10 minutes. But when she went down, they left. But anyway, that happened. Thank you very much.

[42:26]

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