Last month I think I told a story from the Lotus Sutra. I also told this story in Brooklyn, this story. It's a story about the path of bodhisattvas. Bodhisattvas are... Bodhisattvas are or bodhisattva is a form of being which has a... a wish to realize perfect enlightenment for the welfare of all beings.

[01:13]

It's that kind of being. It's that kind of life. Bodhisattva. And there's a path for bodhisattvas, a practice which realizes perfect enlightenment for the welfare of all beings. And then there's some stories about this path. And Lotus Sutra has several stories about this path, this bodhisattva path. The Lotus Sutra is... As in the Lotus Sutra, the Lotus Sutra is for bodhisattvas. It's a teaching for them. It's a teaching for the beings who are devoted to the welfare of all beings. But, you know...

[02:16]

And so here's the path of being a bodhisattva. I told it in more detail last time than I'm going to tell it today. Today is going to be a summary. Here's a summary of the story. There was a child who lived in a home. And the child wandered away from her home. And the longer she wandered away from her home, the more needy and destitute and troubled she was. And then one day after 50 years of wandering, one day by chance, she wound up back where her parents were.

[03:26]

Her parents, by the way, became, in a way, became very, very affluent. And when he saw her parents, or when they saw their parents, they were frightened because their parents looked so wonderful and gorgeous that they thought, oh, they might actually apprehend me and put me into a forced being in my destitute miserable condition they might see oh there's a possible slave so i better get out of here so she ran away from after she found her home again and found her parents she ran away

[04:38]

Her parents, however, saw her. And her parents had been looking for her for 50 years and were very happy to see her. So then her parents sent some of their well-dressed servants to apprehend this dirt-covered, emaciated, frightened person and bring this person into their womb. into their room of compassion and love. And so when servants apprehended the lost child, the child said, leave me alone. I haven't done anything wrong. Get away from me. The child thought that they were being killed by these powerful of wealth. And fainted. And then the parents could see, oh, I see, this is not going to work.

[05:49]

And sent a message, sprinkle water on him to revive him and tell him he can go. So they did. And she woke up and was very happy to be released and ran away. And very happy to get away from this terrible possibility. The parents got an idea, which was, I'll have some servants put on dirty clothes and put dirt on themselves and rags and go offer the child a job of shoveling dung, shoveling animal excrement. and offered good wages for doing this. And so the servants did do that.

[06:51]

They found the child again, who was now rather old, and offered him a job. And the child was very happy to get this job and asked for the money in advance and was given it and went to work and was happy to do it. although it was difficult work, they thought, this is appropriate for me. And this is not slavery. This is actually a good job. And they did that job. This is a period, I would say now, a period of recovery. And after this period of recovery went on for a long time, the child could tolerate actually having the parents and invite them into the house, which before they would never dare to go near. They had become so downcast and disoriented and lost.

[07:58]

But now after a long time, about 20 years or 30 years doing this recovery work, they had confidence enough so that when the when the father, undisguised, came and offered them an invitation to come up into the palace and actually start to work with what's going on. The child could say, oh, okay, I can do that. And they came into the house and they learned about the house and what's going on there. And then finally the father said, well, actually, you know, Not like you are my son. You actually are my son. You are my daughter. And now the child could actually accept, oh, I was always your son. Even when I was afraid of you and thought you were going to make me a slave because I was so worthless. I remember I used to think I was worthless and not even allowed to be anywhere near you.

[09:06]

And now I find out that I'm actually your son. Your own body. I understand that I am the true inheritance of you. And that's what you've been wanting all along. And that's the story of the bodhisattva career. So, the bodhisattva career is, we have a home. We bodhisattvas have a home. Also the Lotus Sutra, by the way, says everybody's a bodhisattva. Everybody's got a home. And in that home, the business of this house is being conducted. And the business of this house is the way of making bodhisattvas. Realize Buddhahood. That's the business of the house.

[10:08]

We all live in that house. That's our home. This chapter, this story appears in a chapter called Faith and Understanding. The faith of the Lotus Sutra is we have a home and our home is a home where the business of the Buddhist is being conducted, is being practiced. But the story also says we wander away from that home for some time. Fifty years is a possible number. It could be longer than that. And the longer we wander, the longer we feel. However, it is going to happen that all these beings who have this home and have wandered away, they will wander back someday.

[11:14]

And when they first get back, they very well might say, if they actually came into the house, they might actually be frightened. Wonder, what would happen to me if these beings in this house came near me? And even though they find their way back sometimes, they run away. Sometimes they don't actually find their way back to the house. Sometimes they actually find their way back to the stables. And so they get the job in the stables right away. That's another story. Finding their way back to the house, they found their way back to the stable and they just went to work in the stable. All bodhisattvas, I would say, are going to go through this process.

[12:18]

And you do stable work until you completely settle into the stable work. And when you settle into the stable work, you start to open up to the possibility that you could be Buddha's child. And you can do Buddha's work, to move into the house. But again, once again, the story says the person had to leave to come back, and coming back they had to do recovery work. After they did the recovery work, they actually go into the house and do the work of the house where they lived, but they didn't know how to do the work when they were a little kid. And it's possible you could tell another story slightly.

[13:21]

There was a child who lived in a home, and the parents said, would you like to learn about our family business? And the child said, no, I do not want to learn the family business. No, thank you, Daddy. The child wandered away. rather than, yes, I would like to learn the foundation of this business. What is it? Well, it's the Buddha way. We have all these practices we do for the welfare of all beings. The child says, oh, great, please teach me. But the children who did the other part of the story, which we just talked about, Because that's what it's like when you're a 70-year-old, like in the story, when you're 70 or 80 and you come back home and you're enthusiastic about learning the business finally, which you weren't when you were 10 or 11 or 20. So that's the picture, that's the story that I propose.

[14:24]

And today, I actually would like to talk to you about the family business. But again, before the family business is being talked about, I just want to mention that in order to accept the family business, you have to be open about doing dung shoveling. And you have to do dung shoveling until you feel completely settled in dung shoveling and open to doing it forever. When you're open to do it forever, you're ready to do the family business. And it's not that the family business isn't dung-shoveling. It's not that it's not. It's that the family business is the business of how the dung-shoveling always includes the entire universe.

[15:29]

That's the founding business. And after really being into dung-shoveling, you're ready to open to the revelation that in the dung-shoveling that the whole universe supported your dung-shoveling, and your dung-shoveling supported the whole universe. But most people have to do quite a bit of dung-shoveling before they can be settled enough to have that revelation. The practice of that revelation is the business of the house. It's the business of the Buddhists and the Bodhisattvas. going away from home, coming back to home, settling down in the neighborhood of the home, and then if you settle down in the neighborhood of the home, you find out that the neighborhood of the home, when you settle in the neighborhood, is actually the home again.

[16:37]

And then you watch your children run away from home. So I also, I think in the afternoon last time, after telling the story in the morning, I think we chatted a text called Zazen Shin, did we? In the afternoon? So here's the text called Zazen Shin. It's a text about Zazen, but it's also a text pointing out The zazen is a pivotal activity. The word shin in this text means a needle or acupuncture needle or like a point.

[17:44]

So sometimes this zazen shin is sometimes translated as the point of seated meditation, or the pivot, or the point of seated meditation. So, this sitting meditation, in this text, is the business of the house. This is the business of Buddha's house, this seated meditation. And we were born in this house. We were born in the house of Zazen. And we wandered away, more or less. We wandered away from this. And this is a text about what it's like at home.

[18:46]

And then we'll see if you feel ready to come home and do the work. Or whether maybe you need to do more recovery work before you want to come home. I'm laughing now. If you don't want to come home to this business today, it's okay. And then we'll give you dung shoveling instead. And then when you do dung shoveling, More and more, wholeheartedly, you will be ready for this work. But some of you may say, no, I don't want to do the work of the house. This might be a trick to make me a slave of Buddha. We'll see how you feel about it. Are you ready to start the business of the house? Are you sure? Yes. Really? Wow.

[19:48]

That's great. Let's drink to that. So also last time, the first two lines of this text go, this translation here says, the essential function of all Buddhas and I pointed out that essential function is a translation of characters. The character for essential can also mean necessary. That makes sense? That necessary and essential might be two dimensions of the same. But the concrete image of the character is pivot.

[20:50]

Pivot. The other translation which I think I'd like to talk to you about today is the pivotal function, the pivotal action, the pivotal business of all Buddhas. That's the pivotal activity of all Buddhas. The next line is the active pivot of all ancestors. The pivotal business of all Buddhas? No. Yeah. the business life, the pivotal business, and the busy pit of all ancestors. That's what Zazen is.

[21:55]

Maybe that's not a surprise to you, that the family of Buddhas is called Zazen in the Zen school. Is that not a surprise? Anybody surprised by that? That's our business, our family business. Like Gerbers used to say, babies are our business and our only business. Zazen is our business. The pivotal activity of all Buddhas is zazen, and that's our business. And the active pivot of all ancestors, that's zazen, that's our business. What's going on in Buddha's house, that's where we're born. But part of our story is when we're immature, we do not want to hear about this zazen. We do not want to hear about Buddhist activity. We want to hear about other things called girls or boys or people who are not sure whether they're girls or boys or hamburgers or football or fame and fortune.

[23:11]

We go off to... to learn about those things. We're not interested in . And then we find out that things are going not so well, and we think maybe it would be good to shovel some dung, because we're really in bad shape. And again, as we start to shovel, to do the business of the Buddhas. to engage in the pivotal activity. And what's the pivotal activity? That I wish to speak about a little now. The pivotal activity is the way that you include the entire universe.

[24:14]

That's not you. And it's the way the entire universe includes you. That's the pivotal activity. You are actively, every moment, you are the activity of including the entire universe. The activity of being included by the entire universe. That's the pivot. That activity is the activity of Buddhism. That activity is the activity of Buddhism. The way you support the whole universe and the way the whole universe supports you is the activity. The way you pervade the whole universe and the way you are the pervaded universe, that's Buddha's activity.

[25:18]

That's the work of the Buddha's house, is that function. Which the Buddhas are not in control of it, they're not operating that dynamic pivot. They are doing that. And we are too. What we are doing, it is our life. Our life is the activity of all Buddhas. That is what we mean by zazen. And Buddhas and sentient beings? Buddhas completely include all living beings. Buddhas are included by all sentient beings.

[26:24]

All Buddhas are included in you. and you are included in all Buddhas. But you're also included in all other sentient beings. All of us are included in each of us. And each of us is included in all of us. There's a pivot. And that function is zazen. That practice, that function is our practice. And that practice is Buddha. That practice is our enlightenment. So we all have the same practice and the same enlightenment. That's the pivot. Because I am included by the whole universe, it's not like I... plus the whole universe, the whole universe completely, fully accounts for me. I'm nothing in addition to that, and the universe is nothing in addition to me.

[27:31]

This is the pivot. The chapter is called Faith and Understanding. This is a statement of faith of the sutra. The story is a statement of faith. But we wander away from our home. We find our way back. We have trouble accepting our home. We go through recovery and reintegration, and then we're back at home. And we never really were the slightest bit separate from our family, but we thought we were because we thought we went away. But we really didn't. It's a story of faith that we are.

[28:38]

home, and that all Buddhas are included in us and practicing with us. All Buddhas are practicing with us right now, and all Buddhas are practicing with everybody right now. So they're all practicing with each of us, and all of us are practicing with each other. There's the pivot. That's sasa. That way we're practicing together is sasa. Of the Buddhas. There's other kinds of sitting meditation. This is the sitting meditation of the Buddhas. Another principle here is that the more you are yourself, the more you become not yourself. That's the principle. It's not that the more you become yourself, you become nothing.

[29:41]

It's that the more you become yourself, the more you become not yourself. The more you become yourself, the more you become liberated from yourself. The way the universe is saved and liberated from suffering is by somebody who realizes this pit, by being completely themselves and realizing not their self. It's not realizing that you're not yourself, it's that by being yourself you realize not yourself.

[30:44]

which is already going on. Each of us being ourselves realizes all the not-ourselves. And you are being yourself completely, and you are realizing everybody. We have to practice that. We must return to that. We must remember that and receive that because this pivot is given to us because the pivot is how we are a given thing. We are given by the Holy Spirit and this givenness is also given to us. So every moment we can receive this This what? This essential activity. This pivotal activity of all Buddhas. Every moment it is being given to us. That's what we are. We are giving it back every moment. However, if we don't remember this, then we forget it.

[31:48]

And when we forget it, we're wandering away from it. Which, of course, we can't. But because we think we can forget it, because we think we can, it almost is away. And then it's almost like we get into big trouble, and then it seems like Buddhism is just this, you know, very ritzy place. Like it says in the Song of the Precious Mir Samadhi, because there's the base, because there's the degraded, there's jewel pedestals and fine clothing. When you're actually at home, you don't really look at your... It's not... When you're really home, your parents are not really sitting on lion thrones with jewel pedestals and, you know, covered by precious pearls. They're just you. They're just you. They're not even best or worst.

[32:49]

None of that's going on. But when we... wander away then so then our home looks very very very treasure-like and fantastic and special and we afraid of it it's not really that way it's just that way that that's a pivot the more we wander away the more home seems special we have and we have to shovel that and then we'll show that we said okay It looks fine, but then it doesn't look like that when you're really into shoveling dung, you don't really see jewels anymore. Or dung. So, that is a kind of another dimension of introduction to the essential, the pivotal activity of all Buddhas, the active pivot of the ancestors.

[34:01]

Which is the zazen of the Buddhas and the zazen of the ancestors. We use that word. When they sit, their sitting is a statement of faith that this sitting pervades the whole universe, and the whole universe pervades this sitting, and therefore this sitting is not sitting. And not sitting. So when I sit, I pay attention to what's going on. I don't really pay. I give myself. It's not like a required payment, but somehow it is required that I give my attention to what's going on.

[35:11]

And what's going on may seem like business as usual, Buddha's work? Okay. I'm sitting here in the Buddha's house giving myself to Buddha's work. I'm remembering where I am, where I'm not, in Buddha's house. And I'm receiving the work of Buddha's house. The work of Buddha's house. I'm sitting here and I'm practicing Buddha's house work. Buddha's house work. And this practicing of Buddhist housework is transmitted Buddhist housework. That's my faith, and that's my understanding. And I have wandered away. I think I have wandered away. And now I'm back. And if I wander away, I will come back.

[36:18]

I vow to come back. When I'm home, I vow to do the work, and if I wander away, I vow to come back. And I might even vow to admit I got distracted, sorry. I forgot that you're all supporting me, and I'm supporting you. I forgot myself completely and realized who I am. Now, one more thing I'll say, which is, as I often mention, this place is called No Abode. And that expression comes from the Diamond of Perfect Wisdom scripture. Buddha says that bodhisattvas, people who are on this path,

[37:25]

should have a mind that doesn't dwell anywhere. It doesn't dwell in anything, or dwell on anything. This pivot, this place where you include everything, and everything completely includes you, that place is Non-dwelling. So we call this place... This place could also be called non-dwelling. Non-abiding. It could also be called the pivotal activity. So the Buddha's work is the work of non-dwelling.

[38:28]

Bodhisattvas learn to do the work of non-dwelling. Which again means to take care of what's happening so thoroughly you don't dwell in it. And if you don't fully engaged with what you're doing, you very well might dwell in it. And if you find yourself dwelling, you may also find yourself not fully engaged, and then you can admit that and try again to develop the faith that where the understanding comes is in faith, in non-dwelling, in where you are and what you are and what you think and what you feel Not by pushing these things away, by rejecting the dung shoveling, but by fully engaging them, fully becoming them, and realizing not them.

[39:37]

So when we're sitting, we have the opportunity to practice non-dwelling. This is our nature. We have an opportunity to practice our nature. But our nature is not the slightest bit different from the way we are appearing to ourselves and others. So I have an appearance here. It's a clock. And I started the talk today with you a little early in hopes that Buddha would soon be here. In hopes that this Buddha's pivotal activity would soon be here.

[40:39]

I would like now to see if you're ready to enter the house and join the Buddha's work, which you, of course, have already been doing your whole life. But I'm asking you now, are you willing to re-enlist in your life of Buddha's activity? Yes. So, we sit, we have the opportunity to sit completely, and remember the pivotal activity of our ancestors, and remember the active pivot of all ancestors, and to offer our life

[41:51]

to that work, to that business. We can be Buddha workers in this way. Or working Buddhas. We can be working Buddhas and working ancestors. Or we can be the ancestors' work. I wish to be the ancestors' work. And I think the ancestors would like me to do their work. Or I should say, the ancestors would like me to be their work. I am the work. You are the work of the ancestors. They would like you to receive this work, to remember and receive the work of the ancestors. Are you ready to have your life right now be the receiving... the inheritance of your nature, and the practice of your nature, which is the inheritance of this work is our nature.

[43:02]

So, could I have a stripper, please? So I'm going to ring this bell three times, and then after three times, if you want to, you can enter the house of the Buddhas and remember the practice of the Buddhas and receive the practice of the Buddhas, which they are giving us, and practice it, and transmit it. right here, right now, if you wish. You are invited to do the practice. Ready? I'll ring the bell now. You don't have to wait till I'm done ringing the bell. You can stop now. You must decide whether you're going to accept the job or not. you you

[48:15]

I am sitting here remembering bodhisattvas. The pivotal activity of all Buddhas. I am remembering it. How about you? This work of bodhisattvas is being offered to us and I am sitting here receiving it.

[50:15]

I am receiving it sitting here. How about you? every moment receiving it again. This is the moment-by-moment business of the Buddha's house.

[51:28]

practicing the functioning pivot of all the ancestors. This is sitting here inheriting the ancestors' business, the ancestors' samadhi. This is receiving it, practicing it, and transmitting it. How about you? My practice of this work of bodhisattvas includes all of you.

[53:06]

Each of you includes my practice and the practice of all Buddhas. If you are able to receive this inheritance and take care of it, this is called the host within the host, within Buddha. I pray that this business of Buddha's house goes on forever for the welfare of all beings.

[58:16]

Thank you for watching!

[58:22]

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