It seems like we have the ability to forget the most fundamental points. When we remember them we say, oh yeah, well yeah, sure. So I'd like to make a fundamental point just to make sure that we all remember that the Buddha way and the Buddha Dharma, the foundation of it is great loving-kindness and great compassion for all beings. So we can build a house on this foundation, can build a community, a society on this foundation.

[01:20]

But sometimes after we start building, we sometimes forget the foundation, get concerned with the beams and the roof sometimes. And roofs are really beautiful sometimes. sometimes people don't actually even notice the foundation of some beautiful roofs. The last meeting we had here in August, we were studying the Samdhi Nirmacana Sutra, the chapter 4, And a number of you are here for that, to hear that chapter. This chapter starts out memorably, I feel, with the Buddha Tathagata asking his great disciple Subhuti how many people he knows

[02:38]

who are not living under the influence of conceit and pride? And how many he knows who are living? Did I say aren't? How many does he know who are living under the influence of pride? And Subodhi says, well, I know just a few that are not living under the influence of pride. Just a few sentient beings are not living under the influence of pride that I know. But I know incalculable, innumerable ones, sentient beings who are living under the influence of pride. And then Subodhi mentions a little bit later, basically, that because of pride we sometimes stop short in our study of reality.

[04:00]

We think, when we think this is the way something is, like today is Saturday and we just stop there, proud that we know it's Saturday and there's no need for further investigation, or that we're right and somebody else is wrong, or that somebody else is right and we're wrong. Anyway, we have various phenomena which we meet, and because of pride we do not keep going in our practice. And then, so we had our meeting and we were happy to study our own pride. And here at No Boat, nobody seemed to be insulted that this point was made. And almost no one thought, as far as I know, it's nice to be among the ones who aren't under the influence of pride. I'm just so happy that I'm not proud. I feel sorry for the people who are.

[05:04]

Nobody seemed to be happy that they weren't proud, and nobody seemed to be insulted that the topic was brought up. And then I brought it up at the beginning of the session at Gringos, which happened shortly after that. And there, too, this teaching, this suggestion that there's quite a few people who are proud and not too many who aren't, it was received, I would say, with open hearts. And a lot of people actually thought, yeah. I'm proud, but I haven't been remembering that. Somebody says, where did you get that idea? How come you brought it up? It's so relevant. Not just to the other people, but to me. I said, well, because of the sutra. Wonderful sutra brought this to our attention. And then I went to Europe and I brought it up to people in England.

[06:06]

And they too really appreciated being reminded of a basic problem that we have. And as I mentioned over and over on the evolution towards becoming free of defilements, conscious and unconscious defilements, the last thing that's dropped that we become free of is pride. And of course if you get over greed, hate and delusion, you know, if you're wise and not angry and greedy anymore and kind and have almost no addictions. It's pretty good. The last one to drop is pride.

[07:08]

Like, yeah, I do understand pretty well what's going on here. I'm doing my practices actually very, very good. What can I say? It is. How can you see that your practice is good, which it is, Your practice is good. It's true. Your practice is very good. It is. And how could you receive that without being proud? Well, yes, I hear that he says my practice is good, but what does that mean? What is that? What is he talking about? What is that practice that is good? And then the Buddha states with great confidence, how can you have the confidence of a Buddha with no pride. This is our problem. We want a lot of confidence. We want deep faith. This is the Buddha way. To have deep faith in the Buddha way without being proud.

[08:11]

Well, probably we're not there yet. Probably if we have a lot of faith, we probably have pride. Some people then try to turn their faith down so low that they think, oh, now, you know, I don't, you know, my practice is no good, and the practice that I'm trying to, my practice is no good, and Buddhism is no good, and it's not better than Christianity, and Christianity is, yeah, Christianity is great, Judaism is great, but my practice of the Buddha way is just lousy, so now I think I couldn't possibly be proud. Well, that won't work. Not that any of you have tried it, but that won't work. Now the new things I'd like to bring up, this again is to now reiterate that this has been a year which here at No Abode at the beginning of the year, like January 3rd or something, I committed, I promised to concentrate on

[09:23]

studying causation this year, and I wish to continue to study causation, to develop and encourage deep faith in cause and effect. Deep faith in karmic cause and effect, not deep faith in karma, People have actually already enough faith in karma. They're doing it all the time. But deep faith in studying the causal processes of karma, to understand how karma works. Deep faith that understanding how karma works is an essential part of practicing the Buddha way. So I've been saying this over and over for nine months. Now almost, yeah, almost nine months in various ways.

[10:30]

Did you notice? Have I been following my commitment somewhat? Okay. And then I told a story, I'll tell again, try to make it brief. that towards the end of Dogen's life, he made a strong emphasis on deep faith in cause and effect. And some people feel like he went back to kind of like basic kind of beginner's practice by doing that. But whether that was what he was doing or not, anyway, he was emphasizing deep faith in karmic cause and effect. Basic teaching, skillful actions lead to beneficial results.

[11:32]

Those who practice skillful actions rise up. with confidence and become free of pride. Those who practice unwholesomely fall down. How that works is not deterministic but it works by that basic suggestion. He emphasized this towards the latter part of his life. Now, in the latter part of my life, I follow his example and emphasize it. And I'm really enjoying cultivating deep faith in cause and effect. And also, again, realizing not to make the faith too deep. In other words, not to make it proud. or rather to be aware that there may be some pride in this emphasis.

[12:41]

When I went to England, what I promised to talk about there was not causation, I promised to talk about the Dharma flower. You could say the lotus flower turning the lotus flower. No, not the lotus flower of the Dharma turning the lotus flower of the Dharma. The Dharma lotus turning the Dharma lotus. That's what I promised to talk to them about when I, and so I did. I talked to them about that. And now, along with this emphasis on causation, of studying karmic causation, of studying karmic consciousness, along with this study, surrounding this study, irradiating this study of karmic cause and effect, I wish to bring in for the rest of this year and through the beginning of next year,

[13:55]

the lotus, the Dharma lotus turning the Dharma lotus. To make the Lotus Sutra turning the Lotus Sutra the context in which we do this difficult work of studying our karmic consciousness. the Lotus Sutra says in chapter two, one of the most important things in the whole Sutra is in chapter two when the Buddha says, this Dharma, this Dharma is very deep. Only Buddhas together with Buddhas can fully know it.

[15:03]

And he also says, that the Buddhas appear in this world or I would say appear in worlds for one great causal condition and that is they appear for the sake of They appear by the desire to help people enter Buddha's wisdom. That's what makes Buddhas appear, is that desire. In other words, they appear in the world by the compassionate desire to help beings open, see, understand, and enter Buddha's wisdom. So I would like to have you help me reiterate, now for a while, the Lotus Sutra context, the lotus womb in which we study karmic consciousness.

[16:28]

So we're doing the challenging work of studying our karmic consciousness, of hearing teachings about how it works with confidence that this is what Buddhas do. Dogen says, the Buddhas, the Buddha Tathagatas, they don't do anything beyond clarifying cause and effect. That's all they're doing is clarifying cause and effect. That's all they do. But that's in the context of their doing this to help us clarify cause and effect. And we're doing, I hope we're doing clarifying cause and effect for the benefit of all beings because clarifying cause and effect just for myself or for my own improved karmic consciousness will not be fully successful

[17:32]

only with the aid of this huge context will I be able to do this very challenging, all-consuming meditation on cause and effect. So I have to meditate not only on cause and effect, but I have to remember who I'm practicing with and for whom I'm practicing. And just again to remind you that we have this simple... so Dogen's emphasizing very literally and classically deep faith in karmic cause and effect And early in his career, he didn't use the word karma so much.

[18:34]

He didn't talk so much literally about cause and effect. But he did say that studying the Buddha way is to study the self. So now, later in his life he says to study the Buddha way is to study the self of karmic causation, is to study the way the self keeps propping up karma and the way karma keeps impelling the sense of self. So really in the beginning of his life, of his teaching, he was emphasizing studying the self, studying karmic causation. And later it gets more literal and sounds more like Indian Buddhism. In his early days of teaching he didn't sound so much like Indian Mahayana. Towards the end of his life he more and more gets literally sounding like Indian Mahayana Buddhism.

[19:37]

And if you skin for saying so, me too. I'm getting to sound more like Indian Mahayana Buddhism. And less like what some people might think is Zen. Now I'd like to bring up some really, so I'd like you to think about how is this teaching studying the self related to studying cause and effect and how is that related to Buddha meeting Buddha and exhaustively understanding the true Dharma. And now I have been studying in priest meetings at Green Gulch, two different, with two different groups of people.

[20:45]

One, people who are candidates to become priests and others who have already gone through a process called, it's actually called, literally, leaving home and attaining liberation. That's the a classical name for what we call priest ordination, leaving home and attaining liberation. There's another ceremony which is called actually staying at home and attaining liberation. And I I'd like to offer you some kind of difficult things to look at because most of you are not literally priest candidates. Some of you are, but most of you are not literally, formally priest candidates.

[21:52]

But I'd like to talk to you about this because I think it might be helpful, but also I think it might be shocking and disturbing. So, I'm aware of that, but may I continue? Yeah. You used the word faith a lot this morning, and I just would appreciate if you would say a little more about what you mean by the word faith. Faith is what I think is most important. My faith is what I think is most important, is the thing I most want to put my life towards. So if I think that at the end of my life the most important thing would be whether or not I gave myself to the welfare of all beings, then my faith would be in giving my life to the welfare of all beings.

[23:02]

I would believe that that was the most important thing to do with my life. And that belief, that faith would be the basis upon which my life would be lived. Now, if I believe that that's the most important thing, but I don't act in accordance with that, then my faith is kind of a little bit weak. If I acted half the time that way, I would say that's like a full half-strength belief, half-strength faith. If I was able 90% of the time to act based on that belief, I would say I have a very strong faith. And, of course, I would aspire to a life in which every action was for the welfare of all beings. And aspiring to that is slightly different than a faith. You could have a faith but not aspire.

[24:04]

So to have that faith in that path, which is the same as the path of the Buddhas, that's what their life is, to wish to live for that reason, and then to promise and vow to live for that, the vows would be an action that follows from that belief. And so, based on that belief, some people enter into these formal ceremonies in one case, called staying home, in the other case, leaving home. And it doesn't say in the name of the ceremony, but it's staying home and receiving the Bodhisattva precepts, or leaving home and receiving the Bodhisattva precepts.

[25:08]

So staying home or leaving home could also be called, you could also translate that as renunciation. So if you would, yeah, whether you live in a monastery or in a house with only one person in the house, it's possible, theoretically possible, that you would be practicing renunciation. Now most people seem to need somebody else in the house to help them not just be dreaming that they're practicing renunciation. So one monastic manual starts out by saying all Buddhas of three times say that leaving home is realizing truth.

[26:35]

And I would just mention briefly that taking the word the out kind of alludes to the truth we're talking about being the ultimate truth. Because the ultimate truth is that there isn't the truth. The ultimate truth is that all truths are contingent. Realizing the ultimate or realizing ultimate truth is leaving home. What's leaving home? It's realizing ultimate truth. Well, that sounds good. What's ultimate truth? It's leaving home. I don't know about that part. Then Dogen, after quoting this, rephrases it and says, not all Buddhas of three times, but all Buddha ancestors say that leaving home and receiving the Bodhisattva precepts is realizing the truth.

[27:56]

And receiving Bodhisattva precepts means deep faith in cause and effect. So it isn't just that you renounce all attachment and renounce apprehending anything. But you do that together with deep commitment to the bodhisattva precepts. So you're studying bodhisattva precepts, you're studying karma cause and effect together with not apprehending the Bodhisattva precepts. You're committed to the Bodhisattva precepts and you're practicing non-apprehension of anything. This is an expansion on what realizing the truth is. Oh, it's on here.

[29:08]

So one meaning, and in the so-called staying at home and realizing liberation ceremony, the haircutting ritual involves less hair being cut. But there is actually a haircutting part of the so-called staying home and attaining liberation path. So it seems to me that the ancestor Dogen is affirming that people who stay at home can pursue the Buddha way, can enter the Buddha way. But they have to practice renunciation too. Well, how can you practice renunciation and stay at home?

[30:13]

Well, you stay at home giving up fame and gain. If you stay at home, you still must practice renunciation. You can't stay at home and hold on to fame and gain and practice the Buddha way. And Dogen says, if a person who's staying at home, dash layperson, is somebody who's not appearing as a monk, is living without trying to get anything out of life, and is trying to practice the Bodhisattva precepts, they can realize the truth.

[31:14]

And he also... So one meaning of leaving home is transcending the values of secular society. Transcending the values of the society of attachment. The society of attachment, transcending those values. being compassionate towards the society of attachment, loving all beings who are devoted to attachment and gain, but renouncing and transcending the gain and fame agenda society. The other meaning is to take on the form and the ceremony of a monk. including that you take on the form in the ceremony of the monk renouncing gain and fame.

[32:25]

Some monks seemed in the history of this tradition to have taken on the form of a monk and still being concerned with fame and gain. Some lay people also in this tradition, people who tried to enter this tradition but got involved in fame and gain, probably almost no monk has avoided ever slipping into faintling gain. That's why we have confession and repentance for monks and non-monks. Just a minute? Okay. So Dogen is... And I think Zen Center, San Francisco Zen Center is saying, we affirm, I think it says it now in our high laws practically, we affirm the path, I think they use the path of the lay person, we affirm the path of those who live at home, those who are not residential monastics.

[33:35]

We affirm their path as a way to practice the Buddha way. But we also, I think at Zen Center, affirm the path of formal monastic practice. So now as we're approaching an ordination of quite a few people at Zen Center at Green Gulch, we're looking at what does renunciation mean for you people? What are you renouncing? How is your renunciation at receiving the precepts the same as not apprehending anything and realizing the truth? The testing ground, the classical testing ground to see if you're attached to anything, if you're apprehending anything, is the practice of the Bodhisattva precepts. Can you practice these precepts wholeheartedly and not attach to them? Now, some people who don't practice them at all, they feel like, well, I don't attach to them.

[34:36]

I never even think about them. But again, that's like trying not to be proud, to turn your confidence down so far that you think, no, I'm so depressed I couldn't possibly be proud down here. So once again, the medium by which we practice to see if we're actually letting go of attachment is with these precepts. Make that clear in this tradition. That's what we work with, to test and verify non-attachment. Now, a very advanced practice could be, can you test your non-attachment by forgetting the precepts all the time, just completely forget them as a test? And I would say that's too advanced probably for this world system.

[35:38]

So I'm personally, you can see, I'm personally trying to practice the forms and ceremonies of a monk. At the same time, I live in Green Gulch, and I live here. But this place and Green Gulch do not belong to me. And this place and Green Gulch are things for me to not be possessive of, And I'm devoted to my wife and to various grandchildren and their parents. I'm devoted to them. But I'm also devoted to you. When I first got ordained, when I first took the form of a monk in an ordination process, my understanding was that I was getting married for the welfare of all beings.

[36:57]

And I had the idea that the last person I was devoted to was my wife. I didn't tell her that, but she gradually found out. And over the years I stopped making her last. I just make my devotion to her total. But I also vow to make my vow to everybody total. In that sense, I vow to leave home and be totally devoted to all beings, not just my wife, not just the grandchildren. My wife is not my best friend. She's my wife. And I only have one. So far, that's the setup. Probably won't change because that would take quite a few years.

[38:02]

I'll be gone before that gets reorganized. Some people do have many wives. I don't. But I wish to be devoted to all beings, and the wife I have is actually letting me be devoted to all beings. She's remarkably not jealous. The center of gravity of the word jealous is to be possessive of what you possess. And envy is like wanting something you don't have that kind of belongs to somebody else, wishing you were as good looking as somebody else. And jealousy is more like holding on to your own good looks. So she's remarkably un-jealous about me. She's sharing me with the whole world. And also, she appreciates me being her servant and being devoted to her, and I do too.

[39:04]

And that makes my life already much more simply, that I just focus on being devoted to her and everybody. That's the foundation of leaving home, is to be devoted totally to all beings and not being attached to any of them. And once again, when the devotion is total, it's simultaneous with not apprehending. If you're devoted to someone, you're still apprehending. I wouldn't say stop being devoted. I would say be more devoted. More, more, more, until there's no place to get hold. Go so low there's no place to go. So, once again, I want, I affirm, I'm committed to you all practicing the Buddha way together with everybody.

[40:20]

And I also enjoy doing the practice of you know, the forms and ceremonies. So you are actually doing some of the ceremonies and forms that are usually considered the concrete manifestation of a monk. And some other people are doing more than what most of you are doing. and they may do this and the most formal part of that training happens for five years. After that, they can continue that same level of formality or they may leave. And I say, this person did this training for five years and now I feel they can present themselves as a priest. In other words, they can present themselves as someone who has done this training for five years and wishes to continue to enact these forms. And I'm giving my life to this.

[41:28]

I enjoy this. I think this helps. I think it's helpful to the people involved, to me, and to the people aren't involved. I think it helps me help those who are not yet making this commitment. It helps me be clearer about what leaving home means. I'm in other words not giving up the issue of leaving home and saying we're not leaving home. I think that it's necessary to leave home. So I'm saying to you I think it's necessary that you leave home in your home. I think it's necessary that you be devoted totally to your family. and that you'd be devoted totally to a much bigger family. And I think that's best for your family, your small family, that you'd be totally devoted to them and everybody else.

[42:37]

I think it's best for your family to tell your family, I'll give you my life on a dime if you need it. and my true family includes all beings. However, I'll probably be buried next to you. Looks like that's, you know, that's probably where, you know, not everybody's going to have their ashes right next to mine probably because you're my husband, you're my wife. you have a special relationship. We have a special karmic affinity here. But my true family is all karmic relationships. And it's good for your special karmic relationships to know that they and you together are actually living together with everybody.

[43:43]

I hope I'm not being too proud about this, but I do kind of feel like gently but firmly biting the leaving home bullet. And once again, It's not the case that people who assume the form of being a priest don't have some great challenges about being more devoted to one person than another. They seem to continue to have a struggle with really being totally devoted to this person, this person, this person, this person. But what does that mean? It doesn't mean the same thing for each person.

[44:55]

The way it plays out is different for each person. And the way we feel in our heart, holding back or not. And again, not being proud. of our understanding that there's no holding back. You might feel like there's no holding back with somebody, which is great. But do you actually approve of that understanding? Are you proud of it? Think of the possibility that actually you're just deluding yourself, that you're not really totally devoted to the person. And you might say, yeah, I am. I feel like I'm totally devoted, but I'm open to maybe I'm just dreaming that I am. And maybe something would happen that would show me that, no, no. Oops, I don't want to do that.

[45:45]

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