This afternoon, in this room, and throughout this temple, we will have a ceremony, and the ceremony is a ceremony to make bodhisattvas, to create bodhisattvas, to create beings, to at least ritually, ritually or ceremonially create beings who are devoted to the welfare of all life, who care enough for all life that they

[01:04]

want to give the very best to all life. They want to give an enlightened response. They want to learn to give an enlightened response to each being they meet. Bodhisattvas are those who are learning how to do that, who want to do that. This ceremony is called by different names in this temple, but one of the traditional names for it would be to call it the Ceremony for the Attaining of the Way for those who

[02:16]

live at home or those who live with their family, sometimes called householders. The Attaining of the Way for Householders. There's another ceremony which is the Attaining of the Way for those who have left the household and entered into the communal life of living with a wider group of people than just their partner, just their own family, but in both cases the ceremony is called the Ceremony for Attaining the Way, Attaining the Way of Buddha. So this is a ritual for attaining the way, entering into the actual practice. Can you hear me all right in the back?

[03:19]

Have you been hearing me okay? Please raise your hands if you can't hear me. Last week some people couldn't hear me in the back. In this ceremony I'm playing the role of the preceptor or, yeah, the preceptor, the official priest of the ceremony. When I first started to play that role, as part of that the students of Zen Center, the disciples of Buddha who practice at Zen Center and around Zen Center would come to me and

[04:25]

a lot of them would come to me like in some informal situation, like when I was making some toast in the snack area or something like that. They'd come up to me and they'd say, Hi, Reb, can I sew, can I start sewing on a robe, which is part of the ceremony? And I think I felt uncomfortable with that because it just seemed like a little too off-hand to initiate the process of taking this step of formally entering into a commitment to the Bodhisattva path so casually, and not only that, but calling it, can I start sewing, rather than recognizing that they were asking not just to sew, but to receive the Bodhisattva

[05:29]

precepts. So I said in the snack area over my peanut butter sandwich, I said, why don't we talk about this some other time, when we have a little bit of privacy. And then some people would come back and ask again, and they might ask again to sew, and then I would say, you want to sew, you mean you just want the robe? And then gradually they usually would say, well yeah, but I also want to receive the precepts. It seemed to be more difficult for them to say, to express their desire to receive the precepts than just their desire to sew the robe. And I think a lot of people look at the ceremony as a ceremony where you enter the ceremonial

[06:40]

situation, and during the ceremony you receive these precepts, you receive precepts for training your body and mind, for training your life into a mode of compassion. You receive these precepts to help you become a skillful and beneficent servant to all beings. And that's a big thing, to receive such a discipline. But still many people have entered into that process, into that discipline, and I might mention here that the word discipline, if I can remember, the word discipline comes from the Latin, something like disciplina, which means instruction or knowledge, and

[07:45]

disciplina comes from disciplus, which means student, and disciplus comes from disere, which means to learn. Discipline now has the association and one of the denotative meanings of discipline is to punish. One of the meanings of discipline is to punish. So it has a scary vibration around it, but the origin of the word is to learn. To learn what? To learn how to be skillful and behave according to the truth with all beings. To learn that. To formally and publicly receive these precepts then, for many people, is a major step in

[08:56]

their life. And during this weekend, the people, 17 people are going to go through this ceremony this afternoon, and we've been having some meetings, and one of the people remembered when she was 13 and was confirmed in the Roman Catholic Church, and I thought, I can still remember when I was confirmed in the Anglican Catholic Church, the Episcopal Church, when I was 12. I can still remember that day, a lovely spring day, and I can remember the rather chubby bishop from North Dakota who came to Minneapolis to lead the ceremony. I didn't know him, but he was, I thought he was quite a nice person and I liked that he came to help our local priest do this ceremony.

[09:57]

I still remember that day. And so this is a day when I would suppose that these 17 people will always remember, the day they entered formally the Bodhisattva path, the path of always thinking of the welfare of others, the path of learning how to do that. It's not to say that the people who are going through this ceremony today have already learned how to always think compassionately about every person they meet and everything they meet, but I think they all want to learn this. Maybe I'll check with them during the ceremony. And I guess I would ask you, all of you here, do you want to learn how to be compassionate

[11:06]

in every meeting of your life? Yes. Would you like to, every time you meet a living being, feel compassion and respond compassionately? Would you like to learn how to do that? Have any problems with that? Do you think there are some people who you don't want to be compassionate with? Well, would you like to learn how? Yes. So receiving the precepts is a big part of the ceremony. And sometimes people call the ceremony the ceremony of receiving the precepts, but actually it's only part of the ceremony.

[12:11]

There's another part of the ceremony which is very important, because the ceremony is not actually called the way I introduced it. It's not actually called the ceremony for receiving the precepts. It's called the ceremony for attaining the way. It's called the ceremony of attaining enlightenment. And the process of attaining enlightenment includes receiving the precepts, but there's a little bit more somehow to attaining enlightenment than just receiving the precepts. And the first thing that I want to bring up is that at the beginning of the ceremony, the first thing that the disciples do alone, in a sense, is a practice called renunciation. And so I would suggest to you that to receive the discipline of the Bodhisattva

[13:18]

in the state of renunciation is attaining the Buddha way. If I receive the discipline, but I haven't practiced renunciation, then I can work with the discipline, and that's good, but without the context of renunciation, it won't blossom into enlightenment. So first there's renunciation, then we receive the discipline. The discipline is exercises and practices of compassion. All kinds of compassionate activity are included in the discipline. Being careful of what you do, avoiding hurting beings and yourself,

[14:23]

being generous, being mindful, telling the truth, not poisoning yourself or others, not stealing, being concentrated and attentive and present, being patient with inward pains and outward insults. All these practices are included in the precepts, but for the precepts to reach their fulfillment, they must be practiced in a state of renunciation. So the ceremony starts with renunciation, and renunciation, the word renunciation has the etymology to re-announce, to announce again, renunciation, and it has the basic meaning of giving something up,

[15:27]

and especially to give something up by a formal announcement. So if you give something up, that could be a renunciation, but to do it in public and formally is the way that we do it this afternoon, and the gesture we use is to cut a little hair, give a very quick haircut to the disciples of Buddha, to symbol that they're giving something up. What are they giving up? They're basically giving up whatever will hinder perfect compassion. They're ritually, ceremonially giving up, saying that they're willing to give up anything that might interfere with the enlightenment of all beings.

[16:33]

Ritually, they're doing that. Ritually, they're being realized, that renunciation. Of course, after the ceremony, if you ask some of them, if they're really ready to do that, they may say that they don't know, but they'd like to learn how, to give up anything that interferes with the Buddha way, like to learn how to do that. How could I do that? How could I learn to give up anything that interferes with the welfare of all beings? I don't have too much time this morning,

[17:50]

because the ceremony is at 2.30, I have to stop pretty soon. So this talk will definitely end by 2. Ciao! And I can't cover much with you during that time, but just let me say a little bit, and then maybe later, we can discuss more about this practice of renunciation. But I'd like to just for some, kind of talk about three aspects, or three types of renunciation. First, you might call primary renunciation. Second, middle renunciation. And third, great renunciation.

[18:51]

The first renunciation is that you're practicing many, many kinds of virtuous activities. In other words, you're practicing good, and in practicing good, of course, there's some renunciation of not good. In practicing virtues, there's some letting go of, or trying to learn how to let go of non-virtue. So you're trying to learn how to practice virtue, and how to let go of non-virtue. So that's the first situation. If you're practicing non-virtue, and you don't want to learn virtue, and you just want to keep doing non-virtue, then I would say there's not much renunciation in that. But if you're a normal person who has some non-virtue,

[19:59]

do you know anybody like that? That has some little bit of unskillfulness and selfishness, if you're like that, then to try to practice and try to learn how to let go of your unskillful behavior, let it drop away, and to learn skillful ways of being with people, ways that bring benefit and happiness, then this would be a little bit of renunciation there, in giving up the unskillful and learning the skillful. But at this first level, you're practicing this skillfulness, you're practicing these virtues, and you actually hope, and you wish, to get something for it. You're practicing at the level of doing good, but trying to be rewarded for it, hoping to be rewarded for it. That's sort of the first way,

[21:01]

that's the first context for the practice of renunciation. And then, while practicing virtues and hoping to get some reward, or acquire something, you hear the teaching, the teaching of the Buddha, and you understand the insubstantiality, the voidness and the vastness of the practices you're doing. And you let go of thinking of these practices in rigid, substantial terms. So although you're still practicing these virtues, you renounce your fixed idea of what they are. You loosen up in the practice.

[22:02]

But you still hope for some reward. The next kind of renunciation, the middle renunciation, on one side, you continue to practice all these virtues, which you've been practicing all along. And you've already learned to practice these virtues in a more skillful way, because now you don't even attach to some fixed idea of what virtue is. You're more flexible. So the second kind of renunciation is based on the first kind, and is therefore more skillful. Does that make sense? But accompanying this second kind of more skillful practice of virtue,

[23:06]

more flexible practice of virtue, based on the renunciation of fixed ideas of virtue, which is achieved in the first renunciation, it's accompanied by no expectation of personal reward, no expectation of, or no hope for, personal gain or improvement. That's the middle one. And that's the big one. But at this level, although you've given up some fixed idea of what virtue is, in other words, usually a lot of times when people are talking about virtue, they think, oh, this is virtue, and somebody else thinks, that's virtue. Like, guys, you know, like, they have a different view of what virtue is than you do. Ever had a conversation like that,

[24:09]

about what's skillful? You think this is skillful, and somebody else thinks it's not? Like, you think what you just did was skillful, and they think it's not? Ever had that experience? And you have a little, kind of like, a little tussle there, like, well, what I did was really good, and you don't appreciate it. You are sick. You are deluded. You can't understand that what I just did was really good. Now, according to my idea, what I did was good. Well, that's fine. But do you hold to that view and think that that's true, and have an argument about it? And the answer is, sometimes. But the first renunciation is you let go of your idea of what is true. You still have your idea, but you aren't holding it. So now, in the second kind of, at the situation of second renunciation, you're free of that. And then you, in addition, you give up practicing in order to get something for yourself. You let go of that. You're not practicing for any reward for yourself.

[25:09]

See the difference? Not too many people nodding, but I shall go on. Maybe I have to go over this a few hundred times to get it. I did. I mean, I'm not saying I got it, but anyway... The third renunciation is called the great renunciation. In the second renunciation, although you're really cooking in the department of virtue, because you're practicing all the virtues and you're totally relaxed about them all, so you're really skillful. And like you're practicing virtue and people come up to you and say, you're not too good at virtue, and you say, what can I learn from you? Please tell me, help me. You're like really in a learning mode. Feedback, feedback, give me feedback. And people help you, people come to help you learn how to be more and more virtuous. And not only that, but you have no gaining idea in your skillful practice. However, you still do think

[26:12]

in terms of virtue and non-virtue, a little bit. You're still thinking in those categories, even though you're not attaching to them, you're still thinking in those terms. You still think in terms of actor or agent and acted upon or activity. You still think in terms, a little bit of enlightened and unenlightened, of self and other. You haven't given that up yet. In the great renunciation, you even forget about all distinctions. You forget about the distinction. You let go of the distinction between enlightenment and delusion. You let go of the distinction between actor and acted upon. You let go of the distinction between subject and object. Your mind becomes the great void and there's no things in it, no things separate from other things. All there is, is interdependence. That's where you live. And all activity comes not through your actions,

[27:13]

but through the interdependence of you and all beings. And this is the great appropriate response. This is the enlightened response. Every situation, when you and the other meet, the distinction between you is dropped and the appropriate response, the one that's beneficial to everyone, spontaneously arises with no deliberation. This is, you know, the ultimate renunciation, the ultimate enlightenment. But that kind of renunciation and that kind of completely spontaneous, undeliberated, enlightened response is based on the other two practices. And those two are actually based on a lot of non-practice. So now if I go back over those, maybe you can see the relationship.

[28:16]

The second kind of renunciation depends on the first. The third depends on the second. And also, the third depends on the first, because the test of the third is whether you can come back to the first. You must practice virtue, you must be involved at some point in your practice, you must be involved in practicing virtues with the idea of gain. You have to go through that. Now some of you may feel like, well, the practice of virtues I haven't got to, but I've certainly got to the part about gain. If you've got that part down, good, because you have to go through that phase of trying to get something from your life, and then you drag that greedy attitude into Zen practice. When you first come, you want to practice the Buddha way to get something, you want to get some reward,

[29:18]

you have to practice that way. You have to be an ordinary person, for starters. And you have to witness that and feel that, that you're trying to get something, that you want some reward. And you practice virtue. So that would be like receiving these precepts and practicing them, trying to practice them, trying to learn how to practice them, but with some hope for reward. And you just keep doing that and listening to the teaching in the neighborhood until you learn how to do those practices without some limit to the relevance of what's appearing in your life. For example, if you're doing some good act and somebody else comes and disagrees with you and thinks you're not doing it right,

[30:18]

you renounce the limit of the relevance of their criticism of you. In other words, you become open-minded about these virtues. That's the first level. And that's quite an accomplishment, actually. To be working hard at the precepts. To be working hard at something without a fixed idea about it. To be really devoted to something without being sure that it's good. So like right now, for example, you have people who think abortion's okay, not okay, but actually appropriate and good and beneficial and protective of beings, and other people who think abortion's bad. And they're interacting. They're both working on their virtues. But look at the two sides and look at the people and look at which side you're on and are you holding? Are you sure you're right? Are you sure you're right?

[31:23]

So this is saying, if you think something's right, that's fine, but do you need to be sure that you're right? Do you need to be certain? Do you need to be rigid? Can't you just be certain? Realize how you feel and work from there. And I think a lot of people feel like you can't work for good unless you're actually rigid about it. But then we have conflict and up to the point of war about it. So it's not easy to do, but that's the first thing to renounce, because that holding to your view of what beneficent practice is

[32:36]

interferes with the enlightenment of all beings. It causes your mind to go into turbulence and it causes your energy to be blocked and drained. It blocks the free flow of life energy that's holding to moral, religious positions. It doesn't mean the positions have to be thrown out the window. It just means the gripping, the attachment is renounced, is given up, and then the energy in the situation can flow in a beneficial way. So you've given up, you have limits and you have boundaries on your thoughts and attitudes, but you've let go of them.

[33:41]

You're no longer in the fortress of your opinions. Your opinions are something which you can give away. Here, you want one of my opinions? Here. And not even, will you take care of it and hold on to it like I used to? No, I'd like to state my opinion and you state it and you state it with your whole heart and in stating it with your whole heart, in stating it with your whole being, in the full expression of your view, there's no attachment. So you fully say, I do not want you to do that and you say it with your whole heart and when you say it with your whole heart, there's no attachment. When you have attachment to it, you say it with part of your heart. You don't express your views, you don't express your values fully when you're attached to them. When you express them fully,

[34:46]

you've done your job. Your job is to, your job, all of our jobs, we need each of you, the world needs each of us to express our views completely and that full expression is simultaneous with not grasping to our view and to be an opening. Once I said what I think completely, then I can open to you, your view, which might be different from mine. But if my poor little view has not been fully expressed, there's something about me which doesn't want to hear from you until, unless you agree with me. And if you disagree with me and my view hasn't been expressed, you know, I have underdeveloped, retarded views because I haven't expressed them, then I don't want to hear from you. And I certainly don't want your view to be like fully expressed, so I'll fight you. But I fight you because my view

[35:47]

is pushing me to be expressed. So that first level of renunciation of limits around what you think is right and wrong comes with full expression of what you think the limits of right and wrong are. Once you're free of that, then you move into the next phase where now you can somehow learn how to work on these virtues without any expectation, well, period, which usually when you're working on virtues you expect reward. And usually when you're working on non-virtues you're kind of watching out for punishment. You hope that you can do a little non-virtue

[36:48]

without punishment, but, you know, you kind of know that you might not be able to, or you might know that the punishments will come sometime later, and maybe they'll come after you're dead. Because you've noticed some people do that. They do some non-virtue and they seem to live the rest of their life without getting caught. So for some Buddhists that doesn't really work because they don't want to get caught after death either. But we try not to get into that because some of you, like, don't like that rebirth thing, I suppose. Anyway, putting aside the energetic practice of non-virtue in hopes that you won't get caught, and looking over to the side of practicing virtue in hopes that you will get caught and rewarded, that they'll find out that you were the one who did the good things. Please find out, please notice that I'm doing these good things.

[37:48]

I mean, especially even notice I'm doing good things without telling anybody. Because I heard that makes it even better. But still, would somebody find out anyway? Would somebody tattle on me? Would somebody spy on me while I'm doing good things and tell whoever's in charge of reward system? How can you give that up? How can you let go of that? This is a big one. Okay, so now you're, like again, you're practicing these virtues without any attachments, so you're really cooking, and again, but how can you, like, give up getting the extra special reward you're going to get for your high level of skill and virtue? How are you going to give that up? How's that going to happen? Where's that gift going to come from? Well, one way it's going to come is,

[39:00]

because it seems like pretty hard to, like, practice virtue without hope or reward. One way it can come is by meditating on the distinction between your suffering and others. So another way to talk about the middle kind of renunciation is you renounce the distinction between your suffering and other people's suffering. You renounce the distinction between your suffering and other people's suffering. You start to notice, you meditate on how it might be that if you make a distinction between your suffering and their suffering or your happiness and their happiness, if you make a distinction there, that that hurts them, that people suffer to the extent or in relationship to me making a distinction between their happiness and mine

[40:02]

or their suffering and mine. I'm not saying, I can't say for you that if I make a distinction between my suffering and yours, between my happiness and yours, I can't say for you, I guess, I can't really say that, that that hurts you. You'll have to tell me, does it hurt you if I make a distinction between your suffering and mine? Does it hurt you if I make a distinction between my happiness and yours? You tell me. But I'll tell you that if you make a distinction between your suffering and mine or your happiness and mine, it hurts me. So maybe you're like me. And I know some people have told me that if I make that distinction, it hurts them. And I know if they make that distinction, it hurts me. So rather than try to directly affront

[41:04]

the gaining idea in practicing these Bodhisattva precepts of virtue, you might meditate on the negative side, namely the distinction between your suffering and others and how that hurts people, hurts beings. And think about whether you're willing to give that up, because I think maybe if I'm not willing to give up the distinction between my suffering and yours, it's going to be hard for me to do things without trying to get gain from me. And there's nothing wrong with gain from me and there's nothing wrong with gain from you. It's just that me being concerned about gain from me is a hindrance to the path of the Bodhisattva. Me being concerned about my improvement and my gain is a hindrance. Me being concerned about your gain

[42:05]

is not a hindrance. Or your welfare or your rewards, me being concerned about that is not. Unless I would grasp it. Wanting that for you is okay. And if I give up the distinction between your happiness and mine, it won't be hard for me to want you to be happy. It won't be harder for me to want you to not be unhappy. Practicing virtue skillfully but also working on this this issue of gain from me and separation from you and holding the distinction between my suffering and yours. So finally I feel no limit to my responsibility in this world.

[43:10]

I practice these virtues and practicing these virtues I gradually am able to give up the sense of I'm not responsible for that and feel I am responsible for that. Not that I'm entirely responsible for that. I am responsible for that. I'm not entirely all by myself responsible for the wars in Northern Ireland but I am responsible. There's not a limit. There's not a border between that suffering and mine. I want to give it up. I want to learn how to give it up and learn that I'm responsible. I want to learn how I'm responsible. What's my contribution to that suffering and all the sufferings of this world? There's no suffering that I'm not involved in. No suffering I'm not involved in. No person that I'm not connected to.

[44:15]

No unskillful person that I'm not connected to. I'm connected to well I don't know who I should mention first Timothy McVeigh George Bush Al Gore Ralph Nader Palestinian terrorists Israeli tank drivers Northern Ireland Catholics and Protestants I'm connected to all those people if I'm on the Bodhisattva way. I'm connected to all those people. I'm devoted to all those people on the Bodhisattva way. So on the second level of renunciation I have to give up the distinction between their problems and their behavior and mine. There is a distinction that can be made. My mind makes it. Your mind makes it. Their mind makes it. We're not denying the distinction. We're giving it away. We're renouncing it.

[45:18]

We're handing it over to Buddha. Hey Buddha here take this distinction. This feeling of total responsibility for all the suffering in the world must be supported by the previous kind of renunciation which gives you lots of energy. Because you're practicing virtues plus you're practicing virtues in a state of renunciation so you've got a lot of good energy to help you cope with this unlimited responsibility. You wouldn't dare to be this open to the world's suffering if you didn't have a lot of virtue practice and not just virtue practice but virtue practice, relaxed virtue practice, skillful, playful virtue practice. Virtue practice without self-righteousness because you're practicing virtue renouncing self-righteousness and now with all that free-flowing energy

[46:20]

you can dare to open to this world of suffering little by little give up saying I'm not responsible for that I don't have to care about her or him or care to do that. Just like that story in a book recently published about this grandpa and his poet grandson riding down the highway in the night I think in the rain and in the rain in the night near rivers if you've ever been in a situation like that what sometimes happens is the frogs come out and they go from the frog land into the water and the road sometimes is covered with frogs so what are you going to do? If the road was covered with your grandsons

[47:22]

and granddaughters would you stop the car? Even if you had a date? Would you stop the car? Would you feel connected to your grandchildren? Little buggers crawling on the road in the rain would you stop? Because you feel like their suffering is inseparable from yours and you would not want to run over yourself? Would you stop? Would you not stop for the frogs? So the grandson says to the grandfather as he's out there trying to pick up these little slimy little frogs and get them out of the way of the truck, of the car he says, Grandfather, we've got some place to go and the grandfather says, so do the frogs. So I was driving down the highway in Minnesota one time, one of those situations and I confess to you I confess to you, I did not stop.

[48:23]

I didn't stop. I don't know what happened but I didn't stop and there were frogs on the road and I got where I wanted to go and I'm sorry that I didn't stop. I'm sorry I didn't. And I vow that the next time I'm driving down a road like that in the rain or even in the sunshine but it usually doesn't happen in the sunshine and the road's covered with frogs I'll stop the car and I'll stay in the car until the frogs are past or I'll park the car and walk because I can walk through a field of frogs without stepping on them or I can crawl through a field of frogs without stepping on them or I can go in the river and float downstream past the place where they're crossing but that's my vow is to stop the car and I say, well what if you're in a car and a human being is on the way to the hospital

[49:29]

and if you stop the car they might die in that case I don't know what I'll do but when it's just me driving down the road with some date that's not going to hurt anybody if I don't show up maybe inconvenient, maybe unpleasant but not really going to hurt anybody I would like to stop for those frogs and not only that but I want to do that without any expectation or reward so I hope I don't come back here and tell you that I didn't do it and I hope I'm not wishing that somebody saw me and would spread the word but maybe there would be somebody in the car and I could say, well don't tell anybody we did this but then they'll say, and not only that but he didn't want me to tell and it was his idea, he thought of it before me

[50:34]

I went along with it but really I didn't want to he's such a great bodhisattva so again the first renunciation is to renounce maybe it's not the first renunciation the second renunciation maybe I don't know, one of those renunciations is to renounce caring about what people say about you renounce being happy when you hear people are saying good things about you and being sad when you hear they're saying bad things about you renounce that and don't be perverse and like be happy when they say bad things about you and unhappy when they say good things just let go of that let go of that way of thinking because that way of having your mind operate

[51:35]

in that way is a hindrance to your work as a bodhisattva if you want to be a bodhisattva so then you can practice these virtues skillfully manifesting virtue not just practicing but really realizing the virtue manifesting it with no hope of reward and then you're ready for the great renunciation now in the great renunciation the reason why you need these previous two you need the second one because when you enter into the great renunciation you're going to renounce the distinction between self and other so in a sense there's not even going to be another really anymore and there's also not going to even be like a self

[52:40]

who's responsible for anything everything you do I shouldn't say everything you do but everything that happens everything that your body manifests everything that your mind thinks there's not really somebody there separate from everybody else that's responsible in that realm I'm not more responsible for what I say than you are and you're not more responsible for what you say than I am this is the great renunciation this is actually the realm of supreme enlightenment nobody is to blame for these problems blaming people is part of the system that causes the problems that we blame people for in the realm of great renunciation we've renounced self and others so in a sense there's no self to be responsible and you can use that no self that's responsible because in that great renunciation there isn't really a self there that's doing this stuff all by herself you've given up that way of thinking and there's not an other

[53:41]

either to be blamed you've given that up what's possible then is to use that as an excuse to withdraw from being responsible since there's no self to be responsible I'm not responsible so somehow you have to be totally into I am totally responsible I am like big time totally means I am totally responsible but not uniquely I am totally responsible for everything and so are you I don't usually go around saying that but please allow me to say that this morning that you and I are both totally to the limits of our responsibility we are responsible but we're responsible together when you realize that completely you realize that there's nobody that's responsible but you've got to be careful because if you hold to that position then you say it doesn't matter what I do and it doesn't matter what you do and everything is basically equal because everything is interdependent

[54:43]

so we need this level of understanding but we can't use it to avoid the other level which is that we are responsible for everything and we also can't use that to avoid the level of I'm doing something to get something so that's why the third one needs the second one can you see that? the understanding that there's nobody out there separate and there's nobody over here separate and therefore there's not really somebody to be responsible must be based on the feeling of I really am responsible and deny that but of course there's nothing to get there's no things everything is just interconnected there's nothing to get so you have to go back to the first one where there is something to get and where you want it you have to go back and feel that you want something and you want it for yourself and it's good so the first one corrects the third one

[55:46]

the third one corrects the second and first and is based on the second and the second corrects the first and is based on the first and all three are based on our true nature which is to be Buddha all these renunciations are aspects of Buddha's mind so the Bodhisattva works on these renunciations while she's working on these precepts and uses these precepts to test the renunciation and they go back and forth until it's just one big Buddha which takes a while but if you keep circulating these precepts with these renunciations it doesn't matter that it takes a while because there's lots of energy available so today

[56:58]

in a period of an hour or so we'll go through this whole process and make a bunch of Buddhas we'll practice renunciation in its full extent and then practice confession and open our hearts to these precepts and let these precepts in and then deeply to our body and mind which is already in a state of renunciation and in this situation we will ritually create 17 offspring of Buddha 17 new generations of the Bodhisattva way and then that'll be that and we'll have a reception and this reception just turns out is going to be a really good one the Tenzo is his last

[58:03]

great act before he retires and he's going to really have a wonderful reception for the new Bodhisattvas who will also receive new names and new little outfits to wear and this great, great wide path of devotion to beings complete liberation so if you'd like to see the ceremony, you're invited to come and in spirit you can join this great dedication, this great commitment to working for the welfare of beings and renouncing anything that interferes with that project so I welcome your feedback about whether that was too much information for you this morning

[59:05]

or too complex or something it kind of was a lot I know, but I like your feedback on whether that how that worked for you, whether you understood or have any questions about what I said or any disagreements because I'm you know, I'm trying not to grasp what I just told you please, you know, do what you want with it and if you have a chance, please save the world may our intention be

[59:48]

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