Clarification is called hidden activity. Saluting in front of the gate, walking down the hallway. This has a reason. What about dancing in the garden or wagging the head out of the back door? The case. Guishan asked Yangshan, where are you coming from? Yangshan said, from the fields. Guishan said, how many people are there in the fields? Yangshan planted his hoe in the ground, clasped his hands and stood there. Guishan said, on South Mountain there are a lot of people cutting thatch. Yangshan took up his hoe and went. Teacher and apprentice join ways. Father and son complement each other's actions. Family style of Gui and Yang is a guide for a thousand ages.

[01:07]

Guishan asks Yangshan, where are you coming from? Could Guishan not have known Yangshan had come from the fields? He was just using this question to have a meeting with Yangshan. Yangshan didn't turn away from the question put to him, simply saying this, from the fields. Now tell me, is there any Buddhist principle here or not? Guishan entered deeply into the tiger's cave, going on to ask, how many people are there in the fields? Yangshan planted his hoe in the ground and stood with clasped hands, immediately meeting as a patrol monk. Shensha said, if I had seen him there, I would have kicked over the hoe for him.

[02:16]

I say he can't control his zeal. Chan master Tozu I Ching said in verse, few really understand the point of Guishan's question. When Yangshan answered him by planting the hoe, Buddhas and patriarchs disappeared. Xuanzha kicking it over as a bystander doesn't agree. to avoid letting the blue, yellow, green deepen with spring. I say, when the grass is withered, the hawk's eye is swift. The verse of Chan Master Ping of Fa Lun Temple of Nanyere says, Meeting on a narrow road, escape is impossible. When planting the hoe, standing with folded hands, having come across the bridge, he walks on the shore, for the first time realizing his whole body is muddy and wet.

[03:26]

I say, not worth looking around. in the light of the moon. The versification of these two old adepts, Tozu and Ping, only have the thousand-foot coal pine. Look again, Tiantong lets out and draws forth a stalagmite. Maybe that's enough. All these stories in the book, of course, are about a relationship between people. And here's another example of a relationship between two people, a teacher and a student.

[04:35]

I don't exactly want to put ideas in your head, but just a little frame you can put on this story, or a lot of stories, is that we live, we walk around and we live in some world that we see, or we live in a world to some extent that we're thinking about. And sometimes we step forth from this world, or we step down from this world into another level. And that level is not exactly someplace else.

[06:09]

It's kind of like some part of us comes up to meet us, some deeper part of us comes up to meet us, or we go to meet some deeper part of ourself that we hear calling. But it's kind of like in between this deep part that's calling and this part we're leaving, There's like a kind of, in a way, a kind of intermediate realm where we run into stuff which we ordinarily don't run into unless we try to… communicate between the level we're usually functioning in and this other level which complements it. Maybe if I make a circle like this, and then at the center of the circle is maybe the outside circles are kind of like our active psychological processes.

[07:31]

the center of the circle is something that doesn't move, which is the core of our being. Or you could also think of it like the ocean, the waves of the ocean, and the bottom of the ocean, where there's nothing moving, and on the top of the ocean there's quite a bit moving. Anyway, to move from this active realm of psychological processes, where the processes are in a relationship of cause and effect and habits and all that, into this center, we run into stuff as we move towards the center, which we ordinarily don't run into. And in some ways that material is sometimes strange, unfamiliar. Sometimes we may think it's really neat. We may even construe it as the center. Because in a sense it is kind of on the way to the center. This story makes me think of that.

[08:39]

This is an example where these people are not behaving quite normally in a way. What they're saying to each other makes sense. Like he's coming up from the fields Yangshan's coming up from the field, so Guishan asks him where he's coming from, and he says, I'm coming from the field. That's straightforward. But at the same time, Guishan's not really asking him where he's coming from. He knows where he's coming from. He's asking him where he's coming from just so he can have this meeting with him. And... But the meeting that we're seeing here is not actually the meeting that he's hoping to have. It's a meeting that looks quite a bit like an ordinary meeting. Where are you coming from? I'm coming from the field. It looks ordinary. But it's also not ordinary because he's considering who we have here. Something a little unusual is happening. But it's still in the realm of kind of like things are happening, right?

[09:43]

It's still kind of like they're talking and thinking. But they're heading towards, it's like they're heading towards some other place where they can really meet, actually where they've already met, or actually where they're always together. And they kind of need each other to get to this place. And another thing is that the teacher, although the teacher's just a human being too, they're both the teacher and the student are both human beings, the teacher is sort of taking the initiative, in a sense, playing from the place where they're both going. So that's why he asks the question that he knows an answer to. And so he says, you know, could Guishan not have known Yangshan had come from the fields?

[10:52]

And then he was just using the question to me, so I'm just saying that. I'm agreeing with that interpretation. I'm not exactly agreeing with it, but I think that interpretation is a fruitful approach to this interaction here. And then it says, Yangshan didn't run away from the question put to him, simply by saying, from the fields. Now, when somebody asks you a question, when you're coming up from the fields and somebody asks you the question, where are you coming from, you could say, you know, well, what do you mean, where am I coming from? What are you driving at? That would be okay, too. That'd be fine. But if the person who's asking you is this guy, Guishan, who is...

[11:58]

I don't know, he's one of the Buddhas in the history of Buddhism. He's kind of a Buddha. So a Buddha says to you, Buddha sees you coming up from the fields and says, where are you coming from? You might say, what are you driving at? But you might also just be very careful and say, from the fields. And I'm kind of emphasizing being careful here. That there's kind of a delicate thing here because In one level you're entering another realm. His question is inviting you into another realm. Without violating the ordinary realm we live in, he's also inviting us and inviting Yangshan to go down someplace else. And Yangshan's carefully responding by saying, from the fields. And then it says, now tell me, is there any Buddhist principle here or not so far in the story? In a way, I would say, no.

[13:10]

However, although there's not a Buddhist principle, there is a kind of spiritual principle here, or some kind of, I'm describing this as some process towards the Buddhist principle. But you could also say there is a Buddhist principle here, either way. Anyway, the question is there. Then it says, Buesan entered deeply into the tiger's cave. going on to ask, and I think here he's taking another step. He's again asking from this deep place. And tiger's cave is, you know, tiger's caves are hard to get into. As you try to get into a tiger's cave, that's the most dangerous time. If you're far away from the cave, tigers don't usually come running out of their cave, probably. But as you go in, you've got to be really careful. Once you're in the tiger's cave, I don't think tigers kill things in their cave.

[14:18]

I mean, I don't think they attack in their cave. I think, but I don't really know. I think for most predatory animals, when you're real close to them, they don't attack. I mean, if you can somehow get close to them. It's as you move into their space, is when they attack. Do you know about that? It's the same, it's somewhat the same, even with non-predatory animals, like even some grazing animals, like cows and so on. There's a circle around lions or around a lot of animals. There's a circle. If you are walking outside that circle, they will pay no attention to you. If you move inside that circle, they will move away from you. Even predators will move away from you. I mean, assuming you're not the prey. We're not the prey of most animals. So if we move into that circle, they will move away from us. Cows, lions, tigers. And then if you get inside another circle, maybe concentric circles, if you get inside another circle, they'll come towards you.

[15:26]

But if you get inside another circle... You're so close that they're built not to attack you. So I sometimes say it's safe to be in the backseat of a Volkswagen with a tiger. Now, it's hard to test that. But if you watch the way lion tamers and tiger tamers work, they use a stick, they use a whip and a chair or something like that. What they usually do is they play with that. They interject something into the space where the animals come forward and get the animals to come forward. And then they pull whatever it is out of that space and the animal stops. You notice that, how they do that? They interject into this aggressive circle and then the animal will attack whatever it is in there. And then they pull it back out and the animal stops. And they play that edge.

[16:28]

And if they can somehow, if they can get inside the other circle, they can get quite close to the animal, put their, you know, right up next to them, put their head in their mouth and stuff like that. But there's a space where you have to learn how to get through this intermediate zone, so to speak, which is quite dangerous, which is very intense and very tense. And the animal is most scared and so are we. Farther out the animal is more relaxed and so are we. And inside is the most relaxed place. So something like that I think is characteristic, that this is a kind of reflection of the nature of reality too. Guishan is going deeper now into this tiger's cave and says, how many people are there in the fields?

[17:33]

And again, once someone has invited you to come in, more deeply into our nature. And once you've carefully responded, now the next thing they do is going to, in a sense, is going to, you know, just like when you're playing ping-pong or something, you volley once. Every time you volley, in some sense, you get deeper into the process. So now he's doing it again. And it's going deeper. Now, Yang Sha's next response is again going to be deeper. So what does he do? He plants his hole in the ground and stands like this. Traditional Chinese formal posture for a monk, but also in some ritual situation he must stand this way. Anyway, he stands like this. So that's again his response.

[18:43]

And then Guishan says, One more and another. This is now another level. There's a lot of people on South Mountain cutting thatch. And then Yang Shan picks up his hoe and goes. So again, looking at the introduction, knowing before speech is called silent discourse. There's a kind of silent discourse going on in this conversation. I mean, they're talking, but there's also a silent discourse. A spontaneous revelation without clarification is called hidden activity. So, there's a spontaneous revelation going on in this story.

[19:47]

but there's no explanation of it. I'm not explaining it either, really. I'm just telling you that there is one going on, but I'm not explaining it. I mean, I don't mean to anyway. Maybe I am. And so the activity isn't hidden anymore. Saluting in front of the gate, walking down the hallway, this has a reason. What about dancing in the garden or wagging your head out the back door? Then later these other Zen masters are making comments on this story. In a case like this, we don't know if somebody witnessed this, there was somebody else standing nearby, the so-called bystander.

[21:03]

We have bystanders around here. Zen teachers don't always have their attendants with them, but the attendant might have been there and witnessed this little interaction. Or Yangshan may have gone and told somebody later, or Guishan may have told somebody later what happened. But anyway, somehow this story's been transmitted. after it happened, or it never happened and they made it up. And if they made it up, why did they make up this story? And after they made it up, why did it get transmitted? What's so good about it? Either way, for some reason or other people have been transmitting this story for more than a thousand years. Of course, once this book was written, it was hard to get rid of it. So maybe people are just dragging it along with the rest of them that are better. But it got in this book, after about 400 years, they decided to put it in, this Tian Tong decided to put it in a book.

[22:06]

So something about this story he likes. Yes? It seems that the relationship between Guishan and Yangsheng is particularly well documented. I wondered whether perhaps Yangsheng... A lot of recorded dialogue. That's one possibility. The other possibility is that Yangshan and Guishan, this particular combination of teacher and disciple, they're particularly outstanding Zen teachers, and a lot of people were watching them. The way these two guys worked... It says again and again in stories about them that the way that they interacted was really unusual and really rarely met with. You know, they talk about the two of them a lot.

[23:07]

Sometimes they say, about other Zen teachers, they say, this Zen teacher was really something and this Zen teacher was really something. But they often talk about these two. Their relationship was There's something exceptionally wonderful about their relationship. And they often speak of the two of them. Like here they say, Yang and Gui. What does it say? For a thousand years, for a thousand eons, a thousand ages. The family style. The family style. As a guy for a thousand ages. Yeah. In other places they say that, you know, What you see in this case is something which, you know, almost no one else can do this. It's nice that they did it, but this isn't necessarily for everybody. Anyway, so these other two Zen masters make these comments, but maybe before we, I don't know, you want to look at that or you want to start talking about the case now?

[24:11]

So Shrensha, another important Zen teacher. He was quite a guy. He was first enlightened when he stubbed his toe. And in the midst of stubbing his toe, he said, the body doesn't exist. Where is this pain coming from? So, I don't want to get too much off on him, but it's very important to be very present all the time so that when you stub your toe, you can be enlightened. or rather just sort of stubbing your toe.

[25:18]

If you're going to get a stubbed toe, you might as well get something out of it. And if you're very present for a stubbed toe, it's really a good moment. Ever noticed how intense it is when you stub a toe? It's like, it's the pain and also the, God damn it, and who did this, and where did that rock come from, and oh, poor rock, and a lot of stuff's going on when you stub your toe, right? So if you can be there, right at that stub, and then also remember, Genshaw was there, Shrensha was there, you know. He's there, when you stub your toe, he's there saying, hey, body doesn't exist, where is the pain coming from? That's there too, you know. Every time I stub my toe, I think of this story. It's hard to be fast enough, though, to catch it. So anyway, this other Zen teacher says, if I had seen him, I would have kicked over the hoe for him. Another chance. Boy, I can do it again.

[26:19]

And then the commentator says, I say he can't control his zeal. Now, that could be two people he's talking about, or three even, but two. Who's he talking about? When he says, I say he can't control his zeal. He's got to get there and do something. Yeah, maybe so. He says he's got to get out there and do something. That's a good possibility. What the commentator says, oh, this is his great Zen teacher, but actually he's getting a little bit carried away here. Guizhan didn't kick the poles in. He stayed cool. And he said, there's a lot of people on South Mountain cutting thatch. He stayed cool, real cool. Easy does it.

[27:20]

Stay cool, boy. Also, you know, Yangshan's got zeal, too. Clining his hoe and standing like this. There's a lot of zeal there, too. But it's cool, too. Cool zeal. Again, you know, we don't want to be tense about this stuff. We don't want to be, you know, be affected in our practice. One of these ordinary people, right? But still, even so, when you go in the dish washing area, there's a chance to meet. You know, give the people a dish, put your silverware in there, there's a chance to meet people. You don't have to be tense. Matter of fact, if you're tense, you won't be able to meet.

[28:25]

So to both be relaxed and be ready to have a meeting with somebody when you give them your dishes, or when you enter a room, or when you meet on the path, these moments, these ordinary moments, how to have the balanced attitude of, hello, how are you today? to be there completely and yet not overdo it or say, hey, this is not going to be the time to do that kind of Zen stuff. This is just, I'm meeting this person, so what, you know? I'm just putting the dishes on the table. Some other time I'm going to be real intense and alert and have some kind of real presence of mind and find out what's going on in my life. Maybe, I don't know when, maybe at the top of a mountain sometime, you know? Or maybe when I stub my toe. Maybe so. But anyway, here's a chance Now in this case, somebody's already invited you. It's like you come in the dishwasher and somebody said, where do you come from?

[29:27]

Where are you coming from? And you say, from the dining room. From the other room. Are there a lot of people out in the dining room? Let's put the dish down. Stand there. I'm a little busy. I have to wash the dishes. There's some people watching us show up in the TV room. But it's hard to do something like that. Even when people are, well, it's also hard to know the other person is there ready to meet you and opt for it. You can blame them. Say, you know, they're not ready for this. They'll think I'm weird if I meet them this way. We've got to stop meeting like this. We've got to start meeting like this. Do you know that expression, Eva?

[30:28]

It's a kind of idiom. We've got to stop meeting like this. You don't know that one. It's like, you know, it's like two secret lovers. They're like meeting in a park or something, you know? Maybe one of them's going with somebody else, or they don't want anybody, or their parents don't let them, or it's anyway, they're secretly meeting. And they say, out on the park bench, and maybe it's real cold or something too, or something, there's some strange place, they say, we've got to stop meeting like this. In other words, we have to either cut off our relationship or find some more reasonable way to meet. So that's the expression, we've got to stop meeting like this, and there's lots of jokes about that in English. So there's that feeling sometimes, you know, of we've got to stop meaning like this and kind of, you know, it's got to be more ordinary, right?

[31:33]

Isn't that part of the feeling? We've got to make it more ordinary. This is too special. Huh? Yeah, we've got to get real. There's something weird about this. It's right on the edge there. I don't have the problem as much as I used to, but some people I would only meet in Doksan or in the formal situation. And then when I meet them outside, we didn't know how to talk. Because we only talked in the Doksan room, we couldn't talk that way in the hall or at the dining room table. But we also couldn't stop talking that way because that's the relationship we had. So we felt uncomfortable and we couldn't say anything. So we were standing there, kind of good friends, and not able to say anything. And we could talk to everybody else at the table, but not each other. But this is a case where they have probably an intense formal relationship, but also this is an everyday situation.

[32:41]

But the formality is there, too. and yet they've found a way to have the intensity of a formal meeting out in the fields where they're talking about Dharma and yet they're also talking about daily life. So let's, in a sense, this... What is it? Knowing before speech and spontaneous revelation. So what's spontaneous revelation? So, like, I put my hand up, right? What's a spontaneous revelation there? It's not something that sort of jumps out of my hand and goes, Hi! Spontaneous means it's nothing more than just my hand being up there, right? And yet somehow my hand is a revelation. It's not like my hand has to do something in order for it to be a revelation. This could be a revelation too, but it could be like this. So right out of the situation, but not being separate from it, there's a revelation.

[33:44]

So in this story too, this is a kind of revelation, and yet this is an ordinary conversation. What is being revealed here? And then this other guy says, Totsu I Ching says, if you really understand the point of Guishan's question, When Yangshan answered him by planting the hoe, Buddhas and patriarchs disappeared. Shrensha kicking it over as a bystander doesn't agree to avoid letting the blue-yellow-green deepen with spring. I say, when the grass is withered, the hawk's eye is swift. The verse of Chan Master Ping Fa Lun Temple on Nan Yue says, meeting on the narrow road, escape is impossible.

[34:48]

When planting the hoe, standing with folded hands, having come across the bridge, he walks on the shore for the first time, realizing his whole body is muddy and wet. I say, not worth looking around in the light of the moon. The verse of these two old adepts have only a thousand-foot coal pine. Look again. So before we look again, now you ready to... Any thoughts? Yes.

[35:50]

My first thought is that Oisham's first question seems to be a very old question. Where are you coming from? This is a question that is asked a lot. Many people on various spiritual paths. You say on various? On various spiritual paths. Yeah, it's an old question. So, since it's been asked for so long and by so many people, it seems like an important question. Yeah. I ask people that quite often. Ask them where they come from. And they say San Francisco or Los Angeles or And at that point, yes.

[36:56]

I'm sorry, I just think it's also a question, like what angle, where are you coming from? What's the basis of your... Yeah. And sometimes when I ask people where they come from, I'm asking them where they're coming from. And then they say Los Angeles, and I think now, what do they mean by that? Can I take another step, or will it be too weird? See, because I just said, where did he come from? And they say Los Angeles. It's fine. They could understand what I'm saying, right? I mean, I'm trying to find out where they came from, really, and who they are. And they say Los Angeles. But the next move is going to be... In other words, that's a scary move, you know what I mean? They could be coming right along with me if that's what I want to do. But the next step is going to be tricky. they're going to think Zen Center is a weird place. Or, you know, or I'm going to start, or I'm going to start maybe leading them on to fool around and be insincere in some way if I'm not careful.

[38:04]

So it's a, the next step is hard. It seems related to a question you asked last week, that looking at what we were totally dedicated to, Right. So when you meet somebody, and if you can remember to ask the question, what am I totally devoted to? And then you say, where do you come from? And what you're asking is, out of my total devotion, I ask the question, where are you coming from? That's where this question is coming from. Now, what am I totally devoted to? If I'm Guishan, what am I totally devoted to, do you think? Waking up Yangshan.

[39:06]

Waking up Yangshan? What did you say? To saving all beings. To saving all beings? And we've got a being right here, called Yangshan. And so I feel both of these answers are things that we might be totally devoted to, right? Waking up this person who is our dear student and also waking up all beings one at a time and say, what? Starting right here. Charity starts at home. This person is standing in front of you. Right, yeah. Your dear student or a new monk that just walked in again. Right, right. So that's probably what he's up to. And it says, you know, it says there, he thinks of his descendants. The old enlightened one's feelings are many. He thinks of his descendants. What he's totally devoted to is his descendants.

[40:08]

Really? You're looking for something? Where he says he's thinking of his descendants. Where does it say that? It's right after that, in the verse, in Tiantong's verse, just beyond where we get read to. Ah, okay. Old enlightened one's feelings are many. He thinks of his descendants. What is Yangshan totally devoted to? Is it... Yeah, and who is that? Responding appropriately. Yeah, and it's also Guishan, in a sense. Part of what is going on here is that your teacher can play the game, your teacher can play that role. You can pretend as though your teacher is the one who's not busy and who's inviting you to meet the one who's not busy and realize yourself. The one who's not busy.

[41:24]

You know that story? Yun Yan is sweeping the ground and Da Wu walks up and says, so busy. And Yun Yan says, you should know there's one who's not busy. And then Yun Yan and Da Wu says, then there's two moons. Ninyana pulls up the broom and says, which moon is this? And Dharu walks off. So this is two brothers. They're not so much playing the role of one being the student, one being a teacher, one playing the unbusy one as a way to act out and start this dance between our busy mind and the unbusy mind through this interaction. In this story, that's part of what may be going on, is that The unbusy one is saying, where are you coming from? And the busy one is saying, from the fields. But the busy one who is saying from the fields also knows that this is a conversation between two, which is really one.

[42:36]

It seems that front of the fields has a literal meaning, but it also has a meaning in terms of spiritual development to many different kinds of toiling in the fields. And also, I think in Chinese in particular, the word for fields, it has a very broad meaning and might readily is often applied to certain kinds of fields. For example, a cinema field. Oh, what field? A cinema field, the Dantian. Yeah, right. And also, it could be coming from the Buddha field. I'm coming from the fields is a short nickname for I'm coming from the Buddha field. Also, I'm coming from the phenomenal world and also I'm coming from the phenomenal world where all phenomena are connected.

[43:46]

In other words, the Buddha field. Now, if I'm coming from the Buddha field, then what question do you have for me? What question did you ask me if I'm coming from the Buddha field? How many people are there? How many people are there? How many is this? Is this one? Or is this all beings? Did you say whole beings? All beings. All beings, whole beings, one being. This response reminds me about another dialogue between these two vulnerable characters. And what Khoi-Shan says to Yang-Shan that after they talk for a while, well, if you believe that, then you have a fixed disciple nature. And he says, I'm just Khoi-Chi. Who else can I have faith in? Yeah. That's sort of like... Yeah. How many people are there?

[44:47]

So I'm feeling we're approaching this story, on one level, we're approaching this story from a kind of, you might say, ethical point of view or behavioral point of view, that we're analyzing this story like a dance between these different realms. In fact, recognizing these different realms are going on all the time. It's the same old story. Right. And here again, things are very fast.

[45:53]

Does South Mountain have a special meaning? I don't know of any particular illusion here. As in the verse, he must remember the singing about South Mountain. Well, the way I read that was the saying about South Mountain is on South Mountain there's a lot of people cutting thatch. That's the way I understood it, but maybe there's other ways. That this statement is the final step here. So again, you know, one way to see this is it's like where you're coming from, and it's imitation of people on South Mountain.

[47:06]

And he goes there. So you can see this kind of oscillation between You know, this many people and lots of people. Between how many people? Between this many people and lots of people. But in each case, it's one, one, one, or all, all, all. And yet at the same time, it's back and forth. Back and forth. Back and forth. Between being one person and being the mind of all people. And then being one person. Back and forth. Back and forth. This is our... This is our rhythm. This is the rhythm of freedom. And this is the middle way between one and two, or one and many, or unity and multiplicity.

[48:13]

And this relationship is a way to try to play with this this back and forth thing and try to balance the two. And also to do that without getting up in your head when you do it. Because again, here in this story, they're not discussing abstract philosophy of unity and difference. They're using completely conventional speech But if you know who's talking here, you realize that these guys are never just involved in the conventional truth. They're also working with the ultimate truth. And the unity of the two is always going on here with these people, particularly with these two.

[49:18]

And while I'm talking to you, too, you know, I'm I don't know if this is making any sense to you what I'm saying, but I feel like, for me anyway, this is the way I ordinarily would talk. This is not some special way of talking to you. And I don't kind of think, you know, I have this side person over here who's saying, really, I'm operating on another level here. I'm not really in this room like this. It's not like that. That would be kind of weird. I'm not into that. Although, I might get into it a little bit now and then. But again, that's just another conventional way of thinking about something unusual. But something really unusual, something really weird, namely oneness, is also going on. And what I've been proposing is

[50:22]

that the willingness to be involved in the conventional world completely and not get the slightest bit ahead of it or excited about it is the realization of a complete faith in the ultimate world. Does that make sense? No? Not to you? Sonia? The willingness to be completely immersed in the conventional world is the realization of the world which is completely beyond the conventional world. Or, to put it the other way, one who has realized The ultimate is completely willing to let go of it and can be completely involved in the ordinary.

[51:27]

If you don't really trust the ultimate, then you're going to have some reservation about being involved in the ordinary. Or you're going to get really excited about being in the ordinary. So you're going to hold back or get ahead of it. Think that the ordinary is really neat and get excited about it and overshoot it. So like in the area I'm strong, like in the realm of thinking I'm very strong. So when I start thinking and expressing my thoughts, I can get really, my conventional thoughts, I can get really excited and kind of ahead of myself and almost not be able to remember that this is just, you know, This is not really the thing I'm totally devoted to. This is just a momentary rollercoaster ride I'm on, which is quite exciting. And in some area where I'm weak, there I might sort of not quite be willing to get involved in it and holding back.

[52:40]

I don't want to really get involved in that. But to not get excited about what I'm strong in and not have reservation about being involved in what I'm weak in shows that I really believe that the ultimate is totally pervading this situation. If I really believe the ultimate is pervading this speech, even if I say something quite clever, I don't get too excited about it. If I don't believe the ultimate completely pervades every syllable, then if I happen to say something smart, I get really excited and want to go for another one. So if I'm willing to not get ahead or behind then I start somehow to realize this revelation of both sides starts to become fulfilled, yes.

[53:44]

And it has something to do also with being completely willing to be in the conventional world as it is, and as I am, with my strengths and my weaknesses, and with the conventional world being... as I would like it to be, and not as I would like it to be. Yeah, that's exactly what I'm saying. And to the limit, in the moment where I can totally come into the conventional world in either whatever dimension is happening, at that moment anyway, I'm manifesting my faith that The ultimate is not somewhere else and doesn't need to jack the situation out or cool it out to be totally present in this. That's what it means that it's totally beyond this, is that this stuff doesn't really make it happen or not make it happen.

[54:51]

We're not going to make the ultimate happen by having a really good class tonight. We're not going to destroy it by not having a good class tonight. But if we can completely have the class we have tonight and not get ahead or behind the class we have, then we have some kind of, you know, settling into what we're really concerned about. And the ultimate is, in terms of human relationships, is ultimate is this mutual awakening, mutual meeting. That's what we're really devoted to. And we can use this kind of interaction to realize it. For me, I'm enjoying time as a case. Because Gai Shan seems to, well, I don't know the name of the words, but there's a giving and receiving going on. And

[55:52]

the getting into the skin, into the bone of Yangshan or wanting to come near to Yangshan and also it's almost to say we are one so it's like the invitation and the attraction is going on and when Gai Shan said on South Mountain he's begun with a question and gives a statement which then Yangshan can leave and he's free to go. It's a complete experience between them, a complete moment for them. So there's no clinging there. There's an invitation to come together and then there's the completion for Yangshan to go. Yeah. This whole story could be seen as... If you want to, I would propose you look at this, explore this story as the structure of one moment.

[57:02]

That this is the way one moment actually is. This is how complicated one moment is. In other words, the way one moment really is is like this. But we need a story like this to understand what a moment's like. I think it was with the ground that made me think of doing it with, I guess it was all this light. He'd touch his finger, come into the ground. And all of a sudden that seemed as ordinary and it seemed The same. Looking great. That's another way to see this. Planting the hole in the ground. And Guishan says, go save those people on South Mountain. You're a Buddha now.

[58:09]

Go to work. How many people are in the fields? This many. This many. Okay? Go help those people on Salt Mountain. They're cutting thatch. And also, you said dependent coral rising. Think of the story that Dogen says, life is like riding in a boat. You raise the sails, you row with the oars, you work the rudder, And although you row, the boat gives you a rise, a ride. And without a boat, no one could ride. Although the boat gives you a ride, your riding in the boat makes the boat what it is. And then he says, investigate such a moment.

[59:14]

In other words, all this is happening in one moment. It isn't like you row and then the boat gives you a ride. It isn't like you row, and then your boat gives you a ride, and then when the boat gives you a ride, then since you're getting riding in the boat, you make the boat a boat. It doesn't happen in four different moments. He says, investigate such a moment. So this is how dependent co-arising works. I cause life, life causes me. I cause you, you cause me. Without you, I can't be me. But then me being me, God makes you be what you are. And all that happens in a moment. Every moment is like that. Every moment is like that. So since every moment is like that, it's hard for us to be that present. But that's exactly how present we are, because that's the way we really are.

[60:17]

Well, first of all, it says, for the first time realizing. Now who is realizing here? Who is his? Whose body? I would think Yangshan. Yangshan realizing his own body. Right? Is that what you think? Okay. The jaw? So Yangshan is realizing for the first time that his whole body is muddy and wet. Okay? So you're wondering, what does it mean that Yangshan for the first time realizes that his whole body is muddy and wet?

[61:33]

What does that mean? When I first read it, it seems like it ran all this as a joke. That Yangshan is coming up and he doesn't realize he's all muddy and wet in front of the field. And that Yangshan asking him, where you're coming from is almost like a pun, or a joke, as if making him realize that his body is not anymore. This is a pun, definitely a pun. When a Zen teacher says, where are you coming from, that's a pun. Whether he remembers or you remember, or when a Buddhist teacher asks you where you're coming from, that's That means where you're coming from means both where you're coming from, like Los Angeles, but also what's your reality, right? So that's definitely going on. And the muddy, there's a triple pun there, or maybe more than triple.

[62:36]

One is that he's coming from the fields where there's mud and water, okay? Two, the story is he's just crossed over the bridge and walks on the other shore. Another possibility for mud there. This is the shore, right? This bridge is going over water. So you cross over to the other shore, right? That in Buddhism means you get beyond suffering, right? You get enlightened. You attain, all right? Now when you attain, what do you find out? You get over there and suddenly you don't... What's it like over there when you attain? Well, maybe it's... Just like over here, except you realize that your whole body is muddy and wet. Before that, usually, you're not really sure. You think, well, maybe if I was enlightened, I wouldn't be so muddy and wet.

[63:37]

So then you realize that your whole body is muddy and wet, not just part of your body. So Guishan, Yangshan, together okay how many people are in the fields my whole body is muddy and wet this is wonderful to have a muddy wet body and just let it be muddy and wet That's it. The mud may fall off if you get to read it yet. Well, there's another pun there that is coming from the dust of the phenomenal world. Yeah. The mud of the phenomenal world. Yeah. I was just going to say a thought. It seems like the planet of the whole is a Marsha transition. There's another pun too.

[64:43]

Planting the hoe. This seems like a transition. Because in the commentary, he plants the hoe and meets as a pastoral monk. After planting the hoe, he takes this formal position. So now he was maybe... Yeah, he was a field worker. He puts the hoe down and now he's a monk. And then in the other verse... And monks don't farm. Right. So he comes across the bridge. He plants the hoe. He stands with folded hands. And doing that, he has now come across the bridge and walks on the shore. So there's... That's the transition, crossing the bridge. And then it's sort of like this conventional and real come up together. So it's, I don't know if that makes sense, but before that transition happens, he's again just a farm worker. Then he goes back to the... Yeah, and he goes back.

[65:46]

Yeah. So... So when he goes like this, he crosses over the bridge. And when he crosses over the bridge, what does he realize? That his whole body is muddy and wet. And then it says in the commentary further on, if he hadn't been checked, he would have reeked of rice and gruel in the gate of shadows of a light ahead of an ass, but behind a horse. So he sort of would have been... If he hadn't been checked like that, to bring him back to... Well, you're coming from... Okay. That... In one sense, when you say, if it hadn't been checked, one way you think about it is, if you've got a student and a teacher, if the teacher doesn't check the student, then what happens? What are you going to say?

[66:48]

Well, he would have just gone on thinking that he was just working the fields. He wouldn't have realized he was... So that's one possibility, okay? The other possibility is, when he comes up out of the fields, he knows who he is. This is Yangshan, man. You know who Yangshan is? This is Yangshan. We don't know what point in his career this is, but anyway, it's still Yangshan. Yangshan comes out of the fields. Guishan asks him, where are you coming from? He says, from the fields. How many people are in the fields? Now here he crosses over the bridge. Now you say, if Guishan hadn't checked him. There he is. Whoa, sorry. And you say if Guishan hadn't checked him, he wouldn't have known, he would have still thought he was, what?

[67:51]

Well, you know, I'm thinking, again, say, what are you doing? And someone says, I'm doing dishes. But you say, but what are you really doing? No, not what are you really doing. That's not conventional speech. How many dishes do you have to do? How long are you going to be doing the dishes? When are you going to be done? Okay? How many dishes do you do? Anyway, this is interesting because you say if he didn't check him, he wouldn't know. But I say he already knows. However, if he's not checked, it isn't realized because the thing's not enacted. He knows. I mean, you know. You already know. And yet when you get checked, The checking enacts this thing.

[68:55]

For us. For us, and for him. Even though he knows... They just do each other a favor. it's so close, you see, because he knows already. I mean, first of all, Yangshan knows. Second of all, even if he doesn't know, Yangshan knows, right? There's a Yangshan, there's somebody who knows all the time, right? Who's not busy. But Yangshan also knows, because he really is. But still, even if he knows in both those levels, still, if Guishan doesn't check him, it's not enacted in this world. It's sort of like the boat. It's like the boat. It isn't that the rower doesn't know he's rowing exactly. It's that he can't row without the boat. It's real close there. He's checking, but it's simultaneous.

[69:57]

It's the checking and the response are at the same time. still the checking makes him cross over. And it's like, even though I know that my whole body is muddy and wet, I know that. Now it says right here. His, mine is too. But until somebody checks, I don't know the same way. That's why I need somebody to check. You know who, I know who I am. But when you tell me who I am, I know in a way that I can't know without you telling me. But I already know. I know I'm not a farm worker. I'm a priest. But when you say how many people are there and I go like this... You see that? I do, I see it. And I see this other sort of reminding aspect of it too.

[70:58]

There is reminding, but it's... What I'm saying is even if he doesn't need to be reminded, okay? Even if he didn't need to be. Here's a story. It's kind of like this. We have these ceremonies at Zen Center called the Head Student Ceremony or Shuso Ceremony where the head monk is asked questions by people. And we do it kind of, you know, American way, right? Which means... You actually go up and ask the person, and he actually gives you an answer. But in Japan, what they do now is they have set questions and set answers. So the head monk memorizes all the questions and all the answers. And the other monks memorize all the questions. They don't even know the answers. The head monk's going to ask them. Or they may know them, but anyway... So the head monk goes out and practices these. However, even though he knows the questions and knows the answers, he doesn't really know the answers because they're like classical Chinese poems, right?

[72:05]

So he memorizes them, but he doesn't really understand them exactly. I mean, sort of he does. This is the question, this is the answer. So they do this. You ask the question, I give the answer. But still, in the ceremony, they understand the questions. And they understand what they didn't understand by having the person ask them. It's like that. And that's why we need to play this game, you know? Okay. Yeah. Along those lines, the expression of being ahead of an ass but behind a horse is a designation for being maybe in an early stage but waiting. So by being checked by the interaction of the teacher, and this is part of the process of continuing to develop awakening.

[73:12]

So one way of looking at it from that perspective is that realizing that this whole body was covered with mud and water was realizing that He had been talking conventionally. That's from the perspective of being asked the question. He was just answering conventionally, that he crosses over the bridge, realizes that there's something more to it here. His realization has developed, and he takes a further step, realizes his previous condition. And instead of answering with words in this case, then he answers with an action, which is more immediate, perhaps, than answering words. Okay. I have to end this class on time. So I want to say a few things. This is our last class in this little series. And I'm going to start with another class. I don't know when. When?

[74:14]

In a month? About three weeks. About three weeks. Another class is starting. And we're going to start with this case for anybody who wants to come back. Now there's some things you can do on this case between now and then. And basically, part of what's going on in this class is you're learning all the questions and the answers. That's part of what's going on. When you learn all the questions and answers, there's many questions and answers in this text. There's a whole ceremony in this text. like maybe, I don't know how many. There's lots of questions. There's lots of questions in this connectiveness that we can agree on beforehand. However, when we can do them together, that we will understand them in a way that we don't understand them before, first of all, we have to learn them, but then when we actually act them out and we can play them back and forth with each other, we will understand better. And it's interesting that part of what you can study on in this case is it says here

[75:20]

At the top of, you know, after the verse, it says, all these are empowered descendants inheriting family work. Okay? So part of the family work here is to learn this language. And then you like learn the language and then you go to work, you just start doing the family business and the family business starts making some sense to you. An example of this, thus we know that Lord and minister, see thus, we know that Lord and minister and father and son as a teaching device was not particularly first established by Dungshan and Saoshan. Father and son Gui and Yang had already carried out this order. and then if not for thoroughly checking. This is referring to this system, this teaching device in Soto Zen, which you see in the Jula Mir Samadhi, this host and guest thing, a relative and absolute.

[76:31]

or lord and minister. When a son obeys the father, if a son does not obey the father, this is not filial. Do you recognize that? That's the theme of lord and vassal, or father and son, or emperor and minister. This theme is something you might want to do some research on. And if you don't, then you won't. But I think we'll do a little bit about this next time we come back to this class. Again, there's this interplay here between these different possible relationships between The school, the Dungsha and Saoshan school have this teaching of the lord and vassal or the lord and minister interactions. There's five types. Or guest and host. But it's also relative and absolute. This is part of what's going on in this story. These people are acting out these different possible relationships.

[77:37]

And the relationship between the emperor and the minister, those possible relationships, are metaphors for these relationships between oneness or completion and partialness or relativity. So this is just an example of this case. This case is part of learning the family style so that when you learn it and we play it, you'll have some understanding. But we need to go over this a little bit. And if you can study this between now and the next class, if some people can do this, that will be helpful. You'll be somewhat more familiar with it. Well, you know, The Timeless Spring, that book, in the section on Saoshan, Dongshan's disciple.

[78:46]

There's something in there. Do we have Zen dust in this library? In the back of in the appendix of the Blue Cliff Record those five ranks are taught. under traditional teaching devices, under Dungshan, Dungshan's traditional teaching devices. Anyway, in a timeless spring, there's a presentation of the five falls of Saoshan and in Zen dust. And is it back here? Is it in the back here? in Luke's translation. In the Zen and Chan teachings, second volume, by Charles Luck, it is in there.

[79:53]

If you can find some stuff, maybe I'll try to, the next time I make the class, I'll try to present something on here. It's not so, we don't have to go into the five ranks here, but I'm just saying that these, this story here is playing out this thing, this traditional teaching device of the relationship, the five types of relationship between teacher and disciple, but it's also the five types of relationships which show the unfoldment of awakening. That's part of what's going on here in this story. So if you want to, you can study this story between now and then. We'll start up here again in three weeks or whatever. In the meantime,

[80:51]

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