The Zazen is wisdom beyond wisdom is delusion being delusion. Wisdom beyond wisdom is not a delusion's enlightenment. It's that enlightenment's enlightenment and delusion's delusion, but there's no preference. The Zazen is definitely wisdom beyond wisdom, and we all have perfectly manifested wisdom beyond wisdom, because, I mean, that's, you know, not all of you have manifested wisdom, but you definitely have manifested wisdom beyond wisdom. In order to appreciate that, you need to, like, visit the land of wisdom for a while, so that you can give it up, and then be deluded again, just to prove that you're not attached to wisdom. Okay? Had enough? Want a break?

[01:01]

Okay. Okay. So, I just read the book on Zazen-gi, and, so, it's a Japanese text originally translated

[02:05]

into English, but the name of the text is still up there in Japanese, and the way I would translate it is, fu means universal, kan means admonition or encouragement, Zazen, just leave that Zazen for now. I won't say what it means right now, okay? And then there's gi, and gi, basically, I think you could translate it as ceremony or ritual. Usually, when that text is translated in English, they don't usually say ritual for the universal encouragement of Zazen-gi. Well, I think it's good to notice that the Chinese character for ceremony is in there, but that, in a sense, really, that's what it's all about, this text, is a text on this

[03:05]

ceremony for the universal encouragement of Zazen. And as you can still hear the text echoing in your head, remember, at the end it says, �The treasure store will open of itself, and you can use it at will.� Remember that? If you practice in such a way, you are assured of being a person such as they, remember that part? In other words, if you can practice this, this Zazen practice, �Want a place to sit? Want to come up? There's a cup in the chair here.� So if you practice Zazen, or I should say, if Zazen

[04:10]

is practiced, you are assured of being a person such as they, �they being these beings who practice the samadhi of the ancestors.� And I think you also remember it said in there, �Zazen has nothing whatever to do with sitting or lying down.� Remember that part? So Zah, Zah means sitting. It's a nice character. It's a nice character, but the blackboard, the blackboard. This is a character for a person. You make another character for a person, and then you put a character for birth. This is a character for birth.

[05:13]

And then put two people sitting on the second story, and that's a character for sitting, or seated. Zah, I didn't write Zen down there, but Zah. So it literally says, sitting Zen, or Zen sitting. But you also could read it, you could also look at the picture and say, well what it is, is it's Zen, and then it's kind of like Zen in the terms of people on the earth. It's Zen for people on earth. That's what Zazen is, as opposed to Zen for people someplace else, like under the ocean, or up in the sky. So Zazen is a practice of us, people. It's for people. It's a people practice. But it has nothing to do with sitting, or lying down.

[06:15]

Zazen is... Zazen is the samadhi of the ancestors. It's the state of awareness of the ancestors of the tradition of the Buddha. It has nothing to do with sitting or lying down, but that doesn't mean that when sitting it isn't there, or when lying down it isn't there. All people, all people, there is a Zazen of each person. Some of you have heard the expression. If all the Buddhas in ten directions gathered together all their wisdom and tried to measure,

[07:25]

you could say one person's Zazen, or the Zazen of one person, they would be unable to do so. So, you know, Zazen is not something that I can do. And yet there is a Zazen of one person. There is a Zazen of me. Which you could call a Rev's Zazen. But it's not exactly like I own it, it's just there is a Zazen of me. When you look at me there is a Zazen here. And this Zazen, based on this Zazen, the person can use the treasure store which is his Zazen at will. But I can't do my Zazen.

[08:27]

Of course you can't do my Zazen either. But you also, each of you, there is a Zazen of each of you, too. And none of you can do that. Zazen is not karma. It's not something you can do. Karma is a word for your action, for the action that you can do. Or it's the name for what you think you can do. Or it's the name for the thought that you can, that you do think you can do something. Karma is based on the illusion of personal power. Which most of us have. And in terms of your own personal power then, of course, we teach and encourage all people who are practicing according to personal power to use your personal power in a wholesome way. If you use your personal power in a wholesome way it will lead to good results.

[09:36]

If you use your personal power in an unwholesome way it will lead to bad results. But using your own personal power to do this or to do that is not Zazen. The Zazen of a person is equally present while you're doing an unwholesome act and doing a wholesome act. The Zazen of you as you do an unwholesome act goes right along with you as you do an unwholesome act and you get in trouble for it. Zazen doesn't like, you know, run away when you're doing an unwholesome thing, or stay with you when you're doing an unwholesome thing and then run away when you get in trouble. The Zazen of you is the Dharma of you, is the truth of you, which is never apart from you, right where you are. And you cannot do that. You cannot do what it is that goes with you everywhere. That's Zazen. So if that's the case, if everybody is fully endowed with this wondrous practice which realizes the Dharma moment by moment,

[11:00]

and also this practice which is the practice of all Buddhas and realizes the Dharma moment by moment, then what's the need of practicing it if you can't do it? In fact, you cannot practice it. So, what are we talking about? Well, I think what we're talking about, in this text anyway, is we're talking about a ceremony. What you can do is you can do a ceremony. And this text which you just read is a manual for a ceremony you can do. And you can do it thinking that you're doing it, or you can do it not thinking you're doing it. But still, it can be done, it can happen. Go into the meditation hall, cross your legs, sit up straight, don't lean to the right or left, forward or backwards,

[12:06]

keep your eyes open, put the tongue on the roof of the mouth. You can do that, or that can happen by the kindness of all beings, and you don't have to think of it as karma. But you can also think of it as karma, and that's fine too. Thank you. So, I didn't tell you the meaning of Zazen, did I? But I'm writing down this wonderful term of character on the board. I like it anyway. Does it say something like that? With your kindness, we can have this beautiful stone diamond for another hundred years? Is that what it says? Something like that? With your kindness, we can have a new blackboard. In a hundred years, we can have a new blackboard.

[13:10]

This character, which you may or may not be able to see, since it's written on such a lousy blackboard, is pronounced Yi, and it means, it means, ha-ha, meaning. It means, also it means justice, and it means loyalty, and it means clarified butter, and it means, what else does it mean? Something else good. Righteousness, justice, loyalty, that kind of stuff. Okay? It's pronounced Yi. Now, here's another character. Watch carefully. As you see, it doesn't write on the blackboard.

[14:22]

Can you see it? Can you see it? Oh, it's working better over here. Can you see that better? Now you see a relationship between those two characters. Look carefully. Do you see some relationship between them? Huh? Okay, you see that this character here is the right-hand side of this character. See it? Can you see it? Can some people see it? Can you see it over there? Can you see it? Can you see it? Who can't see it? Laughter See, that means meaning, and justice, and loyalty, and righteousness. Okay? See it up here?

[15:31]

And this part over here, that part over there, on the left side, that character, that's a character also. Okay? So it means person. It means a person. It's like the person that was sitting on the workbench. So the character for this character means ceremony, or ritual. It's also pronounced gi. And that's the character that's in the Fukan Zazen Gi. Okay? Ceremony is the intersection of the person and the meaning. Or the person and justice, or the person and loyalty, or honesty, things like that. Right? Now, along with this are some other Zen teachings like, Meaning is not in the words, yet it responds to the inquiring impulse.

[16:36]

You could also say, the meaning is not in the ceremony, but the meaning responds to the inquiring impulse. Now, inquiring impulse could also be translated as, instead of inquiring impulse, it could be translated as, the arrival, or the coming of energy, or opportunity. So you people coming in this room, me coming in this room, and sitting down here, the meaning is not you coming in here and sitting down. You go up and sit in the meditation hall, the meaning is not in your going up there and sitting in the meditation hall. When you leave the meditation hall and go to the toilet, the meaning is not in going to the toilet. But when you bring yourself to this room and sit down, when you bring yourself and you

[17:48]

bring forth this energy, when you bring forth the opportunity of your life and put it down in the seat here, the meaning responds to the arrival of your life. When you come here and sit here, the meaning responds. When you go up in the Zen dojo and you sit down and you follow the procedures of the manual, read the manual and you check it out and go do it, sit there and do what it says in the manual, it's not in your following the manual, the rules, that is the meaning of the practice. But the manual provides a way for you to bring yourself forward and follow those instructions and by following those instructions and giving your energy to those instructions and giving your energy fully to those instructions, 100% even, you bring yourself and make an opportunity. An opportunity arrives at that place by that ritual. But the meaning of Zazen is not in you doing that ritual.

[18:53]

You doing that ritual is the arrival of your energy, your life, in that time, the meaning responds to that action. So you don't do Zazen by going up there and sitting there. Even if you do it wholeheartedly, 100%, you go there and sit there, it's not in your whole hearted effort that that Zazen is. But without your whole hearted effort, there's no opportunity to be responded to. The response and the energy together is the meaning of Zazen. It's the meaning of this practice which is, you know, he says all those wonderful things about it. It's a practice that you can't do, that I can't do, even that we can't do all by ourselves,

[20:00]

but we do what we can do and everything in the universe comes and meets us at that time. There's the meaning. It's not under our control, you can't make it happen, but it turns out that you don't have to because you're so lovely to make the effort, the whole universe says, great, we're here, we thank you, and in that meaning is the meaning of Zazen. Fabulous practice of liberation for all beings. Now, in addition to that, it's the dual mirror awareness where it says, the meaning is not in the words, it's not in the forms of practice, it's not in the forms of practice, but meaning. When the forms of the practice are a vehicle for you bringing forth your energy, the meaning

[21:00]

arises in response to that. It also says that the arrival, the coming forth of your life effort, the arrival or the inquiry and the response happen simultaneously, that's the other thing it says. It isn't that you go up and sit there and then the Buddhas come down and pat you on the shoulder. It isn't that you bow to Buddha and Buddha says, thank you. The response is simultaneous with the bow. The response is simultaneously with the sitting. It's at the same time. It's not like when you say, Buddha, it's not Buddha and you say, yes, it's Buddha, that's the response. You see it? Buddha. So you cannot see the response because it's simultaneous and this response is completely non-dual, completely inseparable from your activity.

[22:03]

And your activity is not the practice. The practice is the simultaneity of your effort and the entire universe. In concept, that's the Zazen. That's why Zazen is not, it has nothing to do with sitting, lying down, anything. It's completely free, always have it, and yet if you don't bring your life forward, you have no opportunity to realize it. And also the realization is not the slightest bit different from your coming forward and your effort and yet it's not in your effort. It's a practice of freedom and it's also a practice which is also free of us. We can't, traps and snares can never get it. You can't take it home, you can't get rid of it. But you can realize it. Or rather, it can be realized. And it can be realized anytime, anyplace. And it's okay, it says, and it says, Zazen is not learning meditation.

[23:23]

In other words, Zazen is not the practice of concentration. People, you can think, I can think, okay, I'm going to do practice now to get concentrated. Some people do that and they sometimes are successful. Fine. Sometimes they try to do it and they say, oops, I'm unsuccessful. I'm not going to concentrate, this is bad. It's sad. I'm a lousy Zen student. It's not so much that you're a lousy Zen student, it's that you're a lousy concentrator. There are such things as lousy concentrators. I've met quite a few of them. They're unhappy people. Retired concentrators, though, are something quite different. But anyway, it's okay to concentrate. It's really alright. Just don't think that Zazen, don't think that Zazen is this thing you can do called getting concentrated.

[24:25]

And also, don't think that Zazen has not been lost because you couldn't, you know, coerce yourself into concentration on what you didn't want to pay attention to in the first place. If you try to practice, if you try to concentrate on your breath or something and you're successful, that doesn't make Zazen happen. If you try to concentrate on unsuccessful, that doesn't make Zazen go away. What makes Zazen happen? What makes Zazen happen? Just being? What else did I hear? Zazen makes Zazen happen, yeah. What's happening makes Zazen happen. The way you are makes Zazen happen. You being you makes Zazen happen. And you being you is not something you can do. Each of us is supported by everybody but ourselves to be ourselves. And that makes Zazen happen.

[25:27]

Okay, so you can practice concentration, you can play golf, you can do a lot of things, that's fine. Just don't think that that's Zazen, don't think that that's something which all beings are doing together with you. Unless you can get all of them to agree that they are in the golf game with you. And in fact they are. So if you think of golf as something you don't do by yourself, if you think of concentration practice as a concerted activity of all beings, then concentration practice is Zazen. But then you don't think you can do it anymore. And also you won't be depressed if you can't. Because all beings are supporting you in being unsuccessful. That's Zazen. But anyway, it is okay to be concentrated, it is okay to practice those practices. And while you are doing them, you can also practice Zazen, or Zazen can also be practiced in exactly the suchness of the way you are practicing concentration. Zazen is equally present in a successful concentrator

[26:33]

and an unsuccessful concentrator. The unsuccessful one might be more open to Zazen than the successful one. The successful one might say, I don't need Zazen, I'm a good meditator. Look at those people who are practicing Zazen, they are totally distracted. But of course, you know, Zazen is not totally distracted, Zazen is totally imperturbable, nothing can distract it ever. The other kind of concentration comes and goes according to circumstances. But your Zazen practice is never ever disturbed. It moves, it never comes, it never goes. And we do ceremonies here, we celebrate that and give us an opportunity to remember Zazen and bring our energy forth so Zazen can be realized where we are. Okay? So that's it.

[27:33]

Any questions? When you willfully bring your attention back to the present, that's something that you feel like you do, that's your will, bring it back to the present, let's say your feet, your breath, whatever, is that setting up the conditions to realize Zazen? Is that a necessary part of realizing Zazen? Is that a necessary part of realizing Zazen? Yeah. If you're not here, then the realization of Zazen is meaningless to you, has no meaning, because you're not here. But Zazen is here waiting for you to come back. So you have to be like over there with this person in order for the Zazen of this person to mean anything to you. The Zazen of this person is always there

[28:34]

and never goes away. When this person is distracted, the Zazen of this person is just exactly the Zazen of this person who is distracted and not here. When this person is present with his experience, the Zazen is the Zazen of that person who is present with his experience. The Zazen is always there. But if you're not present with your experience, then you're not going to be able to realize, you're not going to get to share in the realization of your Zazen with the Zazen of you. So then you're going to be trapped in the suburbs of your Zazen, suffering out there, at some distance from your Zazen. You're dragon-like, tiger-like, totally liberated in nature. You're going to be off-center. You're not going to be there because you don't want to be here. Of course, the reason why we don't want to be here is because it's painful here. We'd rather be, you know, some other place, a little bit better place,

[29:36]

or a lot better place. Even perhaps in a state of great concentration, which can be done off-center. You can concentrate yourself away from your suffering, if possible. But you can also be right in the middle of your suffering and be totally with yourself and not the least bit distracted, and just happen to be doing concentration practice. Like paying attention to where the knife in your hand is. That's concentration practice. But you don't have to be distracted from other things that are going on with you at that time. So then you get to enjoy the realization of Zazen and experience this person being liberated, which is important. That's why we do this ceremony, so that Zazen gets connected to the person. Because we care about that. So we've got this facility, this opportunity, this treasure called Zazen. It's there all the time with us. It's just a question of connecting it with the person

[30:36]

so that the person can enjoy his wealth. So she can enjoy her family blood. That's all. But it's not that you have to have a transfusion to be happy. You have to take residence in your body to feel your blood. It's like that. But it's painful to be a person, so we'd rather be an angel or something. It's a lot easier to be an angel than to be a person. Although it's hard to be an angel, it's easier than to be a person. There are angels, and angels are the students of the persons who are faith-willing to be persons. Yes? Another word for Zazen? Self-fulfilling Samadhi. Sitting upright in self-fulfilling Samadhi.

[31:38]

Sitting upright with an awareness that fulfills yourself. Sitting upright in the Samadhi of the self receiving its function. Sit upright in absorption in yourself as your self receives its assignment, its function and movement. Okay? Yes? Is my Zazen unique to me? Well, it's unique to you, but it's like the way you're you is exactly the same way that Anton is Anton. You know, there's no way for me

[32:42]

to tell the difference between the way he is him and the way you're you. They're identical. Everybody's exactly the same in the way that each person is himself or herself. That's not the slightest bit different. And so, another way to enter into Zazen is to enter the way that we're the same in being ourselves. But your Zazen is connected to you being you, precisely you being this moment. And that Zazen arises out of your uniqueness but it's exactly the same as Anton's uniqueness being his uniqueness. That's why, in that way, Zazen's all-pervasive, we all share it equally, completely equally. But, unless we're willing to be this person, we don't get to... the function of it doesn't circulate fully and so we experience relative degrees of liberation

[33:44]

in direct proportion to how much we're willing to be this person. What does Dogen mean when he says to concentrate your efforts single-mindedly that he felt was negotiated in the way? The same thing I've said. It sounds like concentration efforts. Yeah, but understanding it differently is another way to understand it. When Dogen says concentrate your efforts single-mindedly he means concentrate your efforts single-mindedly only have one thing in mind. What is the one thing you have in mind? What did you say before that? Self. Everybody always has only one thing on their mind anyway. Yourself. We like to say,

[34:46]

well, actually I'm thinking of others all the time. Fine, that's you. You're always concentrating on yourself as it receives its function. That's single-minded practice. You can't do that. You can't do that. But that kind of single-minded absorption gives us... Okay? You can't do that, though. You can do a ceremony about it if you want to. But you can run away from it. You can run away from being yourself. You can run away from the samadhi of the self. It turns out that it is selfless to be absorbed in yourself. That's selfless. Selfless people don't want to do that.

[35:47]

Selfless people do that. And that's studying the self? That's studying the self. But again, studying the self is one way to say it, which is fine, but another way to say it is model yourself on yourself. Learn how to imitate yourself. Yeah? What I'm having a problem with is being physically raised Catholic. Did you say physically raised Catholic? Physically, yeah. And the thing is, when we die, in the Catholic religion, the soul goes one place or the other. Heaven, hell, something like that. But in Buddhism, what happens to the sadhana? Is there any similarity to sadhana in the soul?

[36:48]

Is there any connection there at all? Sadhana follows wherever you go. I'm not sure what the soul... I'm not an expert. But let's just say I am. Let's just say, no, I'm the Pope or something. I would say that the soul is the way an individual person appears in concert with the entire universe. That's the definition of soul. Okay. Right? That doesn't go with you anyplace. But you never can be apart from that. Because it's always the way you are appearing and disappearing. You appear and disappear. But in your appearance, it's the same. Your appearance is by this concerted activity of conditions.

[37:52]

Your disappearance is by the concerted activity of conditions. Your growth, your deterioration, your life, your death, all by that same process which we call soul. That never dies. That is immortal. That process is immortal. So you pop up now. There you go, pop. Now that pop goes away. Another pop. That's your life. Then you have this thing called pop death. That life and death are in that sense soul processes, or processes of the soul. There's no end to those processes. And that's immortal. Now, if the conditions of your life are such that the way things come together for you is that you do all kinds of unwholesome things, then there is a process, a continuous process of death.

[38:54]

If you do wholesome things, there's a continuous process of death. If you celebrate the soul, if you celebrate the way things come together in that way, and there's an appreciation of that, then there's an appreciation of the immortality of the process of soul making. Then there is a practice of appreciating the concerted activity of your life and all beings, which will never end. There's no way for it to end. That harmonization between you and the entire universe keeps happening forever in your life, in your death, when you're growing old, when you're growing young, all that stuff is the same. So it's a matter of tuning into a process which is the way things are, rather than just what we can do, what we can imagine we can do. In that way, if that's what they mean by soul in the Christian church, then I could map that to the way we actually have it in Buddhism. And I think that's what the enlightened Christians mean by soul. I think so, actually.

[39:58]

I don't know much, but that's what I think. And I can tell you where the enlightened ones are. I think Jesus was one of them. I think Meister Eckhart was one. I think Don Juan de la Cruz was one of them. I think there's quite a few, actually, that understood the soul this way, from what I can tell. I think Saint Francis was one of them. It seems to me that he demonstrated that you can act like him if you understand the fact of Zazen. I think he had a nice little treasure story with the view that way. So I think some Christians understood the soul basically the same way that the Buddhists understand independent co-arising.

[40:59]

Zazen is to be absorbed in independent co-arising. Zazen is to be absorbed in the interconnectedness of all beings. And when you're absorbed in that, it's not something you can do. That awareness, even though you still walk around, go to Zazen, leave Zazen, be on time for Zazen, be late for Zazen, be this position, cook dinner, no matter what you do, there's a possibility there to realize that this is the concerted activity of all beings manifesting. This is interdependence. This is not something you're doing by yourself. It's always possible to be aware of that, to join that view of the world. And that has no beginning or end. There's no coming or going of that process. That independent co-arising doesn't come and go. I'm sorry, I don't quite...

[42:05]

I may have missed something. I was thinking, why am I not getting this? Is this an advanced seminar? This is an advanced seminar. Sorry. It sounds kind of like a solution in search of a problem. I don't know. Can you state? Could you tell me what you mean by that? Well, Zazen not being what I do, but being what I be without what fulfills me as I... Zazen is your... Zazen is not what fulfills you. Zazen is your complete fulfillment and liberation and happiness and saving all sentient beings. That's what Zazen is. Zazen is the dominator of repose and bliss. That's what it is. You want to know what the problem is?

[43:06]

The problem is misery. If you practice concentration and you're successful, well, that's nice. But you're still scared to death. If you practice concentration and you're unsuccessful, you're unhappy about that, but in some sense it's nice because you're distracted from the anxiety you would have if you were successful. Basically, people are scared and anxious all the time. If you do a practice that you can do, you're still scared because you're still operating in the world of what you can do. And as long as you're living in the world of what you can do, you're under threat, global non-stop threat. You're in threat of guilt, of thinking that you personally can do things aside from everybody else helping you. You are totally arrogant and any minute you may be called on it

[44:11]

and condemned for it. This self is going to end. This is not a permanent self. This is going to be killed any minute. All the time you're worried about that. When are they going to get me? Also, you know that this is totally meaningless, this whole thing. It doesn't make any sense. It's totally nonsense. It's not even common sense to think that you're independent, that you can do things by yourself. As long as you practice Vajrayana, for example, or anything of you doing it, you feel terrible. And again, when you're successful, you can more easily tell how terrible you feel. If you try to practice and you're a failure, then you think, I guess the reason why I'm so unhappy is because I'm no good at this and no good at that practice, and I can't do this practice, and I'm late for Zazen, and I can't do Ki He. All that stuff, you know, my Oryoki isn't good, and I cut my finger yesterday. This stuff distracts you from what it'd be like. If you were successful, you'd realize you're still scared. Scared big time. Anxious, threatened creature. Zazen is the antidote, is the cure, is the medicine for that,

[45:13]

because it's dropping that whole personal power trip. But it isn't that we don't do anything, it isn't that we don't act on personal power, we drop it. We don't try to choke it to death and kick it out of Tassajara. You still go to the Zendo, you go to the Zendo, you do the ritual, you do the ceremonies, you still do this personal power stuff, but you know it's just personal power. Meantime, you know it's personal power, and you say, personal power? Yeah, well, fine. I let go of it, and the way I prove I let go of it is by doing it. I go do these rituals, just to show people that I can do them with no attachment. Anybody can not be attached to them by not doing them. Thousands, millions of people are walking around unattached to Zazen, and they think by not even trying it. But as soon as they try it, they become attached.

[46:01]

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