If I were to use the cord with the ancestral source, I wouldn't be able to open my mouth. But if I don't say anything, it's hard for us to get a quick hold. But if I talk, you and I should remember that these are just cripples. They're just something to tentatively hold on to while you put yourself along the way.

[01:08]

I hope I can remember throughout this process period, throughout this change period, to remember the nature of longing and not get fooled by it, or perhaps we already are fooled by it, so we keep looking for some way to disperse the spell that has been cast upon us by longing. Buddha did not talk about reality. He just talked about the way.

[02:16]

Language is not adequately endowed to express reality. That's not the purpose of language. The good news of language is to melt the glue and knock off the cake. To say that language has nothing to do with reality is, I think, way too strong. But to remember that it is not a full expression. It does not express reality. Reality is defiled by it.

[03:28]

And yet, being human beings, we must, are only approaching to reality through language. There are three kinds of karma. Mental karma, physical karma, and vocal karma. Three kinds of actions. Mental karma is the origin. The source karma. Physical karma, which means process, means substance of karma.

[04:38]

Substantial karma. Vocal karma is, you might say, the essence of karma, or karma as itself. It is the only being of karma. There is something very special about vocal, about making sounds. It is more like karma. It merely is karma. Essential karma. And then, we convert this vocal karma into language, which means, what it means is something, we work out some conventions with each other, in this realm of essential karma. And the language is called conventional truth.

[05:48]

It is conventional truth, it is not ultimate truth. It is only through conventional truth that we unite our lives with ultimate truth. So we need, as a practicing group, we need to deeply plunge into conventionality. We must become deeply conventional. We must understand that conventions of speech, or any other way that we can be conventional, are better. That's why being in a situation like this, one of the reasons why being in a situation like Asahara, is a great opportunity, because we have lots of conventions. Lots of agreements about what we're doing, and how we deal.

[07:00]

Our speech should also be very conventional here. There is a tendency among Buddhists, as there is among non-Buddhists, to try to talk in some special way. Some enlightened way, some ultimately true way. This is a dead end, this tendency. A more fruitful direction is to try to speak very conventional, very purely, and from there meaning comes. The meaning of our speech comes from the conventions. Conventions mean grammar. The way we use, the conventions of the way we use language give rise to meaning. If meaning is not about ultimate truth, it is about how language works.

[08:03]

The meaning, then, can show us the way to practice. If we understand the meaning of the language, we can practice. So, this is in the background of all speaking. We cannot talk about absolute reality, but we must talk. We must have stories. And then, if we're clear about these stories, these stories can be used to be useful. So, again, I said Buddha did not state what reality is. He said, and the Evangelical disciples said,

[09:12]

you have reality. The teaching of reality has been conveyed to you already. You have it now, so please take care of it. The teaching of dustness has been intimately conveyed to you. You have it now. Please take care of it. Protect it and maintain it. What have you received? What do you have? You have your life. The dustness of your life. Please take care of it. Protect it. Maintain it. This has been conveyed to you by the Ancestors, this life. The essence of this life. So, basically, the way is how to take care of life.

[10:22]

How to take care of the teaching of dustness. And very simply, we take care of it with concentration and wholeheartedness. Moment by moment, take care of life. These are words I'm saying to you. I'm not talking about reality. And if what I say has some meaning to you, take it. I believe that these words, if you can practice them, will be helpful. That you can be totally one with ultimate reality.

[11:37]

If you simply, wholeheartedly, single-mindedly take care of life. So what is the way? Today, we say the way is gazen. Today, I'm saying gazen is simply to take care of the teaching of dustness. Take care of this life. During the last session in San Francisco, we talked about and we studied and tried to practice gazen. In particular, we tried to practice gazen as described by Dogen Zenji and Eijo Zenji as the absorption in the treasury of life. Absorption in the treasury of life is another word for gazen, another description of gazen, another description of shikantaza.

[12:46]

So, Eijo Zenji says, trust everything to inhaling and exhaling. And then, throw body and mind into the treasury of life. There's the way, very simple. Trust everything to inhaling and exhaling and pass body and mind into the treasury of life. Wholeheartedly, single-mindedly breathe. Don't worry about anything else. And then, throw your body and mind into the treasury of life.

[13:57]

How do you throw your body and mind into the treasury of life? You think somebody knows how? Nobody knows how. There's no way to throw your body and mind into the treasury of life. There's no way to do it, but doing it is the way. What is the treasury of life? What is the treasury of life? Bodhidharma said, vast emptiness, nothing holding. Throw your body and mind into vast emptiness, nothing holding. What is the treasury of life?

[14:59]

The life doesn't increase in buddhas and doesn't decrease in ordinary people. It doesn't increase in enlightenment and doesn't decrease in delusion. Nothing holding. Trust everything to inhaling and exhaling and throw yourself, throw your body and mind into the life. So again, you can, I can, we can find a way to throw ourselves into emptiness. There's no way to do it. However, there is a way to breathe. There's a way to walk. There's a way to talk. That we can do.

[16:06]

We can do it heartedly or we can pretend that we can do it half-heartedly. If we can do our life with no ambivalence or even use ambivalence to help ourselves do it without ambivalence. Then we're told after that, or the same time as that, cast body and mind into the treasury of life. So I believe that just completely living a simple life of survival is the place where I put my foot before I jump into, before I jump into the treasury of life. I don't put my foot on a life that I'm not totally involved in.

[17:15]

Then my foot's not on, I can't push off of a life that I'm not living completely. If I live completely at that moment, I can step into the treasury of life. That's my grief. And by my belief, I don't mean that's what I think will happen. I mean that's the way I try to live. That's the way I love to live. My belief is not something I think is going to happen, it's something I do. I try to do. So I'm talking about Zazen in this way, in terms of this treasury of life.

[18:18]

We have a big, vast banquet around our simple practice of trusting everything to sitting, trusting everything to breathing. And when we're doing service, when it comes time for service, we trust everything to chanting and bowing and offering incense. When it comes time for breakfast, we trust everything to chewing. We trust everything to cleaning bowls. And so on, throughout the day, what we're doing, we trust everything to that. When we sit Zazen in the morning, we trust everything, we hold nothing back, we just completely sit. We just completely breathe.

[19:20]

We're holding back nothing. We're not using any energy to wonder what we're doing, or how it's working, or if it's going to work, or what Buddhism is. There's no Buddha Dharma there, there's just trusting breath, trusting sitting. This is called not doing karma. No karma is done at that time. As you do the karma of breathing, as you do the karma of sitting, just to do that is not karma. And the same with service, and breakfast, and work meetings, and so on. Throughout the day, just do that. And around this, lurking constantly behind every breath, underneath every toe, behind every cheek, is vast emptiness. There's nothing holy about this.

[20:23]

The emptiness is not lurking behind a breath that you don't do fully. There is no such place as a breath that you don't do fully. That's just a fantasy. But there is a place called breath fully done. That is a real place. That's the only kind of place there is. There is a place called putting your foot down completely, and underneath that foot is vast emptiness. Just look, just lift your foot up sometimes, and look under it when you step down completely, you'll find vast emptiness there. Just look behind, you're not supposed to look behind, I'm just kidding, but anyway.

[21:31]

Right behind there, at the same time, when you breathe completely. Vast emptiness is there. Light, your light is there. Okay. So, again, this is a kind of background for what I suggested I wanted to get into, which was to try to dedicate students more and more of a vitality, true vitality, on some way to dedicate more and more of our life to our life. More and more of our heart to breathing. But, you know, it's not that I want you to be thinking about the background while you're working on the program,

[22:35]

but rather I want you to know the background so you can forget about the background. So you don't have to worry about whether what we're doing is good or not. Forget about everything and just breathe. That's why I give you the background. So I give you the background, my words, so that you realize that there's a background. And the words are just words, I'm just giving you the words as words, that's all they are. And then the same with the breath, same with the posture, same with the chanting, everything. It's just conventional phenomenal world. Nothing more than that. And we live in that simpler world. If I want to do more than survive, I demean my vitality.

[23:49]

Does that make sense to you? In other words, I want to honor my vitality by not wishing to do anything more than that. It's like walking down the street with someone. You demean them if you do anything more than just walk down the street with them. If you walk down the street with them, and also looking around to see if someone else is around. Like a cocktail party, when you're talking to one person, you're looking to see who else is there. I've been to parties like that, where you're talking to somebody, and they look particularly political parties, you know, like government officials. I've been to the governor's there, and you're talking to some judge, and he's talking to you, but he's looking to see where the governor is. This is not very nice conversation.

[24:55]

You don't feel good about that. You want the person to pay attention to what they're doing with you. So they demean you, or you demean them if you're looking around for someone more interesting. And what I also suggest as a fundamental hint about how to knock the peg out, is if you don't honor your vitality, your vitality will dominate you. You will be a slave of your vitality if you do not honor it. Your vitality is in charge of your life. Your vitality is boss. If you don't honor that, you're going to be a slave. A slave of your life.

[25:58]

But if you honor your vitality with no reservation, you will not be a slave of your life. You can be free even though you're alive. The same goes with everything. If you honor your delusion, which is another name for life, if you honor your delusion, you can be free even though you're deluded. But if you do not honor your delusion, you will be dominated by your delusion. Same with anger. Same with confusion. You're demeaning your vitality, and your vitality is going to pull you around by the nose. Again, to think, I want to save all sentient beings, is the result of being alive.

[27:06]

Life produces such thoughts. And that's fine. And if you understand, oh, here is a biological event that's occurred, the thought, I want to save all sentient beings. Then you hear that intention, but you know it as life. That's good. But if you think, to save sentient beings, that thought or that wish, you have more than being alive, you demean your vitality. You miss out on how total life is. So don't be fooled by these words. Remember, produced by you, produced by others, they're life. If you can respect everything in this way, things won't hurt. Won't knock you out.

[28:09]

And this is the way I feel, okay? So, now, I feel this way, so strongly, partly because the ancestors told me so. But I feel that way too. Here's what they said, I already said part of it. This is the eight doors words I already told you. Trust everything between inhaling and exhaling. And cast body and mind into the treasure of life. This is Koan Enzo's words. Now, Dogen Zenji also wrote a classical on Shobo Genzo called Shobo Genzo Konyo. Konyo. Which means, the treasure of the true Dharma I. Life. Life, the treasure of the true Dharma I.

[29:18]

And in that classical, he tells, he quotes a Chinese young teacher named Jiang Sha. In Japanese, they pronounce it Cho Sha. And Jiang Sha said, the whole universe is the eye of a monk. By the way, is anybody here, is it alright with you? To me, you are monks. Does anybody have a problem with that? I mean, while you are at this Tathagata in the next few months, does anybody have a problem considering you are a monk? Any problem with that? How about it? What, you don't like it? What do you think a monk is?

[30:21]

Well, to me, a monk is somebody who is totally dedicated to wholeheartedly living. It should be everybody, that's why I think everybody must be a monk. But it seems like in this group of people, I can call you monks. Because you know that that's what you are doing. I wonder, can I do that? Or do you want me to say yogi instead? It's just words, but we have to have conventions, and I'd like to establish a convention that you agree with. But if you don't agree, it's not a convention. So, there's two choices so far. Yogi and monk.

[31:31]

How about yogi-monk? Both is good, how about both is good? Yogi-monk, anyway. Because, basically, you know, you've got to keep a sense of humor about all this. So yogi-monk may be good. Esoterically, he understands me very well. Yes. Your definition is like, monk is like, by action. By action. Like a person who steals. Or the master becomes a robber. So it's not like that. The identity is action. Rather than, like, keeping a card or something.

[32:33]

Or even if you have a sign over your seat saying you're a monk. So some people may be in a monastery, but they're not really completely dedicating themselves to breathing. At that time, they're not a monk. But some other person in the supermarket may be, in a quite concentrated way, trying to carefully maneuver their shopping cart through the people without hurting anybody. And trying to take care of life. At that moment, I call them yogi-monks. But you all are doing that all the time here, so to me, you are yogi-monks. Okay? So, that's why I said this, because the entire universe, the whole universe is the eye of a yogi-monk. This is what the Yantra says.

[33:41]

And this is why I have to bring a notebook to write that down. The whole universe is everyday conversation of the yogi-monks. The whole universe is everyday conversation of the monks. Or of monks. The whole universe is the total body of a monk. The whole universe is one's own life.

[34:49]

Okay, again from the top, the whole universe is the eye of a monk. The whole universe is the everyday conversation of monks. The whole universe is the total body of a monk. The whole universe is one's own life. And one more sentence, in all the universe, there is no one who is not one's self. Okay? Who is the master? Jangsha. Jangsha. Romanized C-H-A-N-G-S-H-A.

[36:11]

And Japanese pronunciation is Chosha. C-H-A-S-H-A. This is the main thing. C-H-A-S-H-A. Okay. This is the main case, the main koan, the main manifestation, the reality, that's presented in the Trilogy of Life, Komyo. Also commented on by Heijo Genji in the Treasury, in the Adversary in the Treasury of Life, which is called in Japanese, Komyo Zanmai. Yes? How can you see this conflict in your life? It's clear that it's just you, I'm living it. I'm living life. It's in a sense of, it's going to be what you're going to see when you leave this world. And I just don't know.

[37:12]

It's like, I don't even know if it's going to be the same or it's going to sound like a different thing. But it's not clear. I just don't want you to see it. I want you to know that I'm living it. But I don't want you to think that you're just always trapped, because you're living it. I don't want you to see it. I want you to know that you're living it. The same way that I'm living it. Yeah. Again, I said, I warned you. You've got to remember this. Whenever I talk about anything I like, it always has a back side. Mainly. Whatever else I'm not talking about is putting a shade. So when I tell you I like you, then you guys think that I don't like you when you're in the city. But when I tell you that you're practicing very well here, then you think, oh, when I'm not here, I'm not practicing. So I don't mean that. That's natural that when I emphasize how

[38:16]

the perfect opportunity you have here for three months, that you think, well, that means that before I came here and after, I'm in big trouble. I don't mean that. But again, it's a characteristic of emphasizing one thing, that the other thing is in the dark. So like, Lily was here, she was a doctor the rest of the time. I totally respect that work. That's also a great opportunity. But if I emphasize how good the opportunity is here, there may be some slight put down to all the doctors in the world who are not here. Well, I don't mean that. Because just surviving is the practice you learn all the time. If you can just do that, you're a yogi monk. So, I just, I want to be able to call some group of people yogi monks. So, that's the point of this.

[39:26]

Because then I can say, then I can quote this thing about the whole universe is your eye, and you know I'm talking about you, not some person in some Japanese monastery. But, in order to do that, the danger of that is I'm going to put everybody else down in the world. That is not what I'm going to do. Yes. Which chapter is this? That's the chapter? No, which number? Oh, which number? Well, in this translation here, it's chapter 13. But that's not the chapter where it is in other books. Yes. Does resistance or a sort of a willful inattention, does that separate us from being a yogi monk? Again, if you understand resistance as a vital activity, OK,

[40:28]

then you scoop that up, you know, into your life. Then, no problem. But if you think resistance is something other than life, if you don't respect that as your vitality, then somehow you pull this big trick on yourself. And you feel cut in two, or cut in ten. But the act of cutting is life itself. Resistance is not paying attention to the action. If you understand the vitality of not paying attention, in other words, if you respect not paying attention, then not paying attention is an opportunity to realize that you're alive at that moment. I'm not OK with it. And that is an occasion with vast emptiness, nothing holding. That is simultaneous with

[41:32]

the treasure of life. But if you put down resistance, and put down active inattention, then you're putting down life. Because remember, life is based on ignorance. Life is based on ignoring something. But we respect, we must respect life. We must take care of life, even though it's based on ignorance. We must. And all the different manifestations of life, resistance, ambivalence, laziness, all these things, those are life, they're produced by life. They are totally, completely alive. Yes? I wanted to say, the concentrated person in a supermarket is more of a negative

[42:33]

than a dissipated person. Why? Why? Because one person appreciates the vitality, and the other is not appreciative. It's a matter of appreciation. It's a matter of being respectful. There's a difference between being respectful and not being respectful. Being disrespectful is completely vital. Totally dynamic function is disrespectful. Being respectful is totally dynamic function. Okay? They both are, but they're different. The ones that are disrespectful doesn't feel alive. They don't appreciate their total vitality. Again, that's my name. My name is Tenchin Zenki.

[43:34]

Tenchin means resistance to disrespect. It means respect is respect. It means disrespect is disrespect. If you can see disrespect as disrespect, that's honoring disrespect, and that is total, that's Zenki. Total dynamic function. What do you think a Buddha does with resistance? Hmm? Buddha honors resistance. Buddha said, Hey, resistance, how are you? I respect you. You are a total manifestation of reality. Resistance is genjokon. But when you're resisting, you say, Hey, genjokon, if you do, you're a yogi monk. You are awake at that time because resistance is a manifestation of ultimate reality via ignorance

[44:37]

in the form of life. Take ultimate reality, mix it with ignorance, what do you get? Life. That's a manifest, manifest, that's ultimate reality manifesting in conjunction with ignorance. It comes out in all these forms, resistance, non-resistance, wholeheartedness, halfheartedness. Halfheartedness is ultimate reality being manifested. The difference between the two kinds of manifestations of non-resistance and resistance is only made by discriminating consciousness. Actually, there's no difference between them. They're both genjokon. They're both ultimate reality

[45:38]

manifested in the present. So you have this little thing now, so we can talk about this a little bit more. And then, when you have an advanced background understanding of our life, then I'd like to delve into as much detail as makes sense this text about breathing. So now I'm giving you a very simple concentration practice.

[46:39]

Very simple. It's called, what's it called? How do you say it? It's a simple concentration practice that we do. Concentration of breathing? Concentration of breathing. It's a concentration practice. That's simple. Then, insight practice goes along with that one called throw yourself into the treasury of life. Throw your body, mind into the treasury of life. That's an insight meditation. How do you do it? There's no way. But Buddha's way is doing that. That's what Buddhists do. That's where they all are. Throw me into that ocean of life. Then later, I'd like to go into detail about this concentration practice called trusting everything to your breath. Which again, means trust everything to your life. How to trust everything

[47:42]

to your life? How to trust everything to your breath? And this text could be that I will be reading to you as a translation from Chinese. And it exists because it's been made by me right now in conjunction with some other attempts at it. So, it could be taken directly to the city in Xerox and passed out to you. But, I thought better to do it kind of at a little bit like you know, we're trying to conserve on fuel. you know, I'll just read you part of it and you can write it down. Okay? If you want to write it down. If you don't want to write it down, you can just listen. But if you want to have the text, then I could read it to you at the beginning and talk about it a bit and I'll read some more and talk about it a bit. Okay?

[48:43]

So that's my plan for the next little while. This text that I'm referring to is called, by the way, Six Ineffable Dominants. And written by a Chinese, another Chinese fellow in the 6th century named Giri. One way to romanize it is C-H-I-H dash I. Another way to romanize it is V-H-I dash I. Giri. Anything else today?

[49:51]

One question here for you. How do you spell it? Ineffable is spelled S-U-V-T-L-E. It's also spelled I-N-E-F-F-A-B-L-E. Is that right? Invention. Inventional reality. And by the way, ineffable means you can't say it. Ineffable means Yeah, that's great. The etymology of ineffable is you can't say it. You can't speak it. Is that what you mean? Yes. So these

[50:55]

these dominants are something that you can't speak about and yet there's a book about how to enter them. You can't say what they are exactly but you can enter them. We can talk about how to get in but we can't say what they are. So they're very subtle. And these are six ways six doors you have to do reading practices. And I got onto this text because there are two reasons. One is in the Shoryo Roku the Book of Ecumenicals the third case the author of the commentary Wonsang says before you people come to this Zen monastery to study this Shoryo Zen text with koans you should have mastered the six ineffable dominants.

[51:55]

Okay? So another way to say this is before you try to study using koans you better be able to follow your breath. Or you better be able to follow your breath really wholeheartedly. You can do that then you can study then you can study then you can listen to Zen stories. But if you don't respect your life forget about Zen stories. If you don't protect and care for your life you can't hear the stories they're no use to you. But if you can take care of your life take care of your breath then these stories are for you. They're not appropriate. So first you should study in detail your breathing your life then the stories. Okay? So that's what I thought you could do this time. And if this

[52:58]

if you have some problem with this the way we're going please let me know I don't I don't know if it makes some sense or if there is I'm enjoying myself but I don't know you. Thank you. Is that all? Can I get a break? walk the world together with with

[53:32]

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