This morning we did the ceremony to celebrate Shakyamuni Buddha's attaining the way. A lot of times you say attaining enlightenment, that's sometimes the way they say it, and that's okay. It literally, the Chinese character is attaining or becoming the way. Jodo, attaining the way. And the way can be understood as enlightenment, but also it's understood as the path or the practice, the way, the practice, the path. the Buddha way. Buddha attained the Buddha way. We celebrated that this morning.

[01:03]

You can also say Buddha's enlightenment. But I kind of wanted to celebrate the Buddha way. And the Buddha way is not just the Buddha's enlightenment. It is the Buddha's enlightenment with all beings. It's the practice of of all of us together that the Buddha attained. Some people see it that way. So we can call it a personal, that he had a personal realization of the truth. Yes. But his personal realization of the truth is the realization of teaching beings and beings teaching him, I would propose to you.

[02:04]

In other words, I'm emphasizing that the Buddha attained the way could be understood as the Buddha attained face-to-face transmission with all Buddhas and with all of us. Buddha's personal realization is the realization of transforming beings. So some Scriptures say Buddha attained enlightenment, but some scriptures say Buddha said, now how wonderful, how wonderful, I together with all beings attain the way of Buddha.

[03:15]

So in some phases, in some realms of Buddhist teaching, it sounds like we're talking about a personal practice, a personal realization, and not much emphasis on the realization being the teaching of others. But I'm kind of... not exactly saying this is the way it is, but just bringing up the way of looking at the situation, a way of looking at it which is our practice of meditation is teaching others. Teaching others is our practice of meditation. Sometimes when I'm sitting in the meeting room, the little meeting room, I sit in a little meeting room, sometimes people say something like, poor you, sitting in here meeting these people all day, listening to all these people.

[04:49]

Poor you, you don't get to sit quietly in the meditation hall. And I must admit, sometimes when they say that I think, oh yeah, poor me. When am I going to get a nice silent retreat? Today I'm saying, when I'm in a silent retreat, the silent retreat is actually also, actually also face-to-face transmission. Sitting in silence is a way to teach beings how to sit in silence, yeah, but also sitting in silence and stillness is a way to transform beings into beings who transform beings.

[06:01]

This is the bodhisattva way. My practice is the practice of others. My practice is the transformation and teaching of others. teaching others, transforming others, that is my practice. So I do spend sometimes sitting still and silent, celebrating silence and stillness, celebrating a meditation practice, yes, And which is, the meditation practice is, teaching others. So I don't need to have some other practice than sitting and listening and talking and meeting face to face with beings.

[07:15]

I don't need another meditation practice that is my meditation practice. Also, I don't need another practice from sitting silent and still in this room on that seat. I don't need another practice called meeting with people and listening to their questions and giving them teachings. I don't need another teaching besides sitting there. Sitting here in this seat for me today is meeting face-to-face. Sitting on this seat in silence and stillness is dharma transmission, face-to-face. And being in that room, of course, we would expect there's dharma transmission face-to-face in that little room. But that's not a different practice from sitting in silence and stillness.

[08:19]

I'm sitting in silence and stillness, face-to-face transmission. But there is many beings in the history of Buddhism who thought Shakyamuni Buddha sitting under the Bodhi tree, realizing the truth is one thing, and then after that he subsequently taught people. It looks like that. It looks like he's all by himself. But again, some scriptures say that while he was sitting all by himself, he said, marvelous, marvelous, I together with all beings attain Buddha way. So Suzuki Rishi said a few times, I don't know how many, he said, we say our practice is just sitting. But, he said, that may be rather difficult to understand, that just sitting.

[09:30]

So he talked. Just sitting is silent and still. That's our practice. That was his practice. So then he explained what just sitting was by talking. Because just sitting is teaching people. Just sitting is teaching people what just sitting is. And teaching people what just sitting is, is just sitting. Just sitting is wordless. And teaching people is wordy. The Buddha is wordless and the Buddha is talkative.

[10:37]

And the wordless Buddha teaches what the talkative Buddha is teaching, and the talkative Buddha teaches what the wordless Buddha is teaching. So, again, I mentioned recently here, not during the Sesshin, but now I mention again, sometimes we speak of two aspects of Soto Zen. One is just sitting. The other is going to the teacher and listening to the teaching or asking about the teaching. So again, it sounds like those are two different things. They are two things, but I suggest you open up to the possibility that these two things are actually identical. that meeting and listening to the Dharma is just sitting, and just sitting is meeting others face to face and transmitting Dharma back and forth.

[11:52]

Just sitting by yourself is not what we mean by just sitting in the bodhisattva Zen world, I would say. Just sitting is face-to-face dharma transmission and dharma transmission is just sitting. Just sitting is how to go to the teacher and listen to the Dharma. Going to the teacher and listening to the Dharma is how to just sit. So when you're just sitting, when you're successfully just sitting, you are actually opening to listening to the Dharma.

[13:01]

When you're sitting, when you're just sitting, when you're sitting and you're just sitting, you are asking the teacher about the Dharma. Your just sitting is a call for the teaching and it comes to meet your just sitting. And you listen to it and you question it by just sitting. and you realize the teaching, which is the teaching of how to teach. And again, teaching is how to understand what just sitting is. We have a bowing, bowing, B-O-W-I-N-G, bowing verse.

[14:19]

There's many bowing verses, but one of them goes like this. Person bowing, person bowed to, their nature, no nature. My body, other bodies, not two. Plunge into inexhaustible vow. Realize Buddhahood. Not by yourself, but in an active performance of a relationship. Someone bowed to me recently and said, what am I bowing to?

[15:27]

And I think I said, this relationship. We're bowing to the meeting. We're bowing to the mutual transformation. So we have many opportunities throughout the day and during sesshin. The day consists of lots of opportunities to sit in this room and some opportunities to meet each other outside this room, on the path, while serving, and in personal meetings, interpersonal meetings.

[16:28]

All these situations are opportunities to explore face-to-face meeting with another. And in the extensive exploration of these meetings The Dharma is realized. The bodhisattva precepts arise in the relationship, not from outside, dropped into the relationship. The relationship gives rise to them. And then the relationship can take care of them and practice them. For the rest of our lives, we have the opportunity to explore this face-to-face meeting, this just sitting.

[17:39]

to use just sitting as a way to understand all our meetings, to use our meetings to understand what meditation is. Once again, here's a perspective. The bodhisattva practice is always thinking of others. The bodhisattva practice is always aware of others, of the transformation and liberation of others. I sometimes meet others who are actually already quite, I don't know what the word is, sensitive to others.

[18:49]

They live their daily life and they're aware. Certainly when they meet another person, they're quite aware, oh, there's another person. And they're aware, this other person, this other conscious being, uh... has just changed my life by this meeting they're very aware of the impact of other beings on them and some people would like to go away from that and sit in the zendo where they won't feel the impact because they're actually quite aware that there is an impact that's like bodhisattvas are very aware of the impact but they vow to meet the impact, to explore the impact of other beings. Other beings do have an impact on us, and dealing with that is the bodhisattva meditation.

[20:02]

And again, what's the just sitting part? The just sitting gives you a teaching about how to teach. It teaches you how to meet the impact, which is, you could say, you know, it's just tremendous, the impact of others. The impact of others is what we are. We are actually others. They have a big impact. They are us. Of course, we're also ourselves, but we are also others. So other conscious beings and all beings, that's what we are. And that's a lot to deal with, is that what we are is everybody other. So you don't have to go away from them to seek refuge from this total, actually complete impact.

[21:14]

The impact is as complete as it can be. It's complete as you, as me. The impact of you is completely me. There's no more impact of you on me but me, and there's nothing more of me than the impact of you. And more than you, of course. Other people, too, that are outside the room. And just sitting is how I deal with the impact. And also, I have impact on you. Yikes. And just sitting is how I deal with my impact on you. How I deal with you is my sitting just. And my just sitting is. Is the kitchen allowed to stay till 11 o'clock? Hmm? What?

[22:16]

Okay. So if we end before 11 o'clock, you can stay till the end, right? So please stay till the end if it's before 11 o'clock. And the end is coming. It's going to be kind of an interactive end. We're going to do something together. We're going to sing to each other. You're going to sing some vows and people are going to hear you. And you're going to hear them sing vows. We're going to do this together and it's going to have a total impact. Here we go again, taking a chance on Zen.

[24:38]

May our intention equally extend to every being and place.

[24:51]

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