The formation of the Zen school in China. At the time of Bodhidharma, we don't know what was going on. We have some teachings that are now said to be Bodhidharmas. But we're not sure if there was a person who had those teachings or if later Zen people put those teachings back into the mouth of their founder. But I think at the time when you get to somebody like Dai Doshin, he seems to be a historical figure who had a monastery and did some teaching and so there is his recorded sayings which you can read in which you have now in the Zen Don and also that reprinted article.

[01:06]

That's a big part of his teaching you have. And you can see I think he actually spoke of Samatha and Vipassana. He didn't use Sanskrit but he used the Chinese translation of them which is jhār, guān. Jhār means stop or calming or tranquility, and guān which means to contemplate or insight meditation. So he was an early person in the Zen tradition who was teaching Samatha and Vipassana as part of his teaching. He also used another term, ansin, which means the pacified or tranquilized mind. And Bodhidharma is also said to have used the term ansin. And darsin, as I've said before,

[02:16]

one of his main points is to associate the tranquilized, the stabilized consciousness with what? What? With higher vision? Yes, but what particular type of higher vision? What? And what, how did he put it? What? Mindfulness and mind? Well, mindfulness and mind, yes. But in particular... What? Well, I'm glad I asked. The association in his case is between having no objects of thought and stabilized consciousness. That's one of his points that reoccur in his text, is the association between...

[03:21]

no external objects, or having no objects of thought and stabilized consciousness. Which is also the same as mindfulness of mind and mindfulness of Buddha, or Buddha's mindfulness. Buddha's mindfulness is without objects, external to the mind. Does this sound familiar? So Dao Shin is saying, And then having no objects or grasping no objects, same thing. When an object is external, when we think an object is external, we can't help but grasp it. If we don't think it's external, we can't grasp it. So when you understand that there's nothing external, you stop grasping objects. Stop. When you don't grasp objects, the mind is stabilized. Okay?

[04:25]

Understanding that there's no objects means you understand that everything, all the objects you see are mind. So, when you understand that all the objects you see are mind, the mind is stabilized. And when those two are united, this is called one-pointedness of thought, which the Samdhi Nirmacana Sutra teaches. Okay? So this is the main thing in Daoism, key point. This is called correct mindfulness by him. Correct mindfulness, again, the Chinese term for it is the same term that the Chinese would use if they were talking about the Eightfold Path and they were going to say right mindfulness. They would use that same character. And he means right mindfulness too, but his right mindfulness means mindfulness which doesn't have objects. And that mindfulness is stabilized without any contrivance.

[05:33]

When the mind doesn't have objects, it's stabilized. And so you can see the close relationship between Dao Shin and the Samdhi Nirmacana Sutra. Now, Daushin did not talk about the Samdhi Nirmacana Sutra, but I did. And you're listening to that. He talked about the Lankavatara Sutra. And so again, we say that our founder, Bodhidharma, also brought the Lankavatara Sutra. Now, Lankavatara Sutra is a very similar sutra in a very similar vein to the Samdhi Nirmacana. It's a much bigger sutra, but it has the same teaching of mind only in it. I... We could have been studying the Lankavatara, that could have been brought in too. So behind Daushin and behind Bodhidharma is this teaching of...

[06:38]

Right mindfulness, Buddha's mindfulness, and Buddha's mindfulness is a mindfulness that doesn't have objects external to the mind. All right? Now, another main point of Daoshin is to maintain mindfulness with no deviation. It's one of his main points. Maintain mindfulness with no deviation. I'm just looking for how to say it in Chinese. And so it means maintain mindfulness of no objects of thought. So his one practice samadhi, he taught this one practice samadhi, but it wasn't like he didn't make it up.

[08:06]

He got it from the sutra. where Manjushri teaches prajna. In that sutra, Manjushri teaches this one-practice samadhi. But this one-practice samadhi is one of the main characters of Darshan's teaching. So he's saying, stay on this one thing, this right mindfulness, the Buddha's mindfulness, which has no objects. Now, there's two kinds of oneness about this samadhi. One kind of oneness is that you're always on this one topic, But the topic also is oneness, because the topic is that everything is mind only. Everything is just mind. So it's doubly one. It's one topic, and it's the oneness of everything you see. Everything in the universe is unified as nothing but mind. And when you have this mindfulness, that is stabilization.

[09:09]

So this kind of vision is, this understanding is vipassana, and this kind of understanding is shamatha at the same time. Okay? Got it? It's on tape. Listen to the tape. Read darshan over and over. Let it sink in. Mindfulness of Buddha is mindfulness without object. The kind of mindfulness Buddha has is mindfulness without objects. Mindfulness of Buddha is mindfulness of mind. Mindfulness of mind means you're always mindful of mind, nothing but mind, ever. And stay on that. That's Darsena's teaching. And in Darsena still you can see the Samatha Vipassana going on, and he even speaks of it. But after him, we have trouble finding Zen people talking about Samatha and Vipassana. Did you want to say something, Robert?

[10:15]

I think so. Let's see what happens. Could you speak up, please? You can't hear him, can you? A couple of weeks ago you said It reminded me of a phrase I read in a book where he said, doing one thing completely covers everything. Mostly it reminded me because it's structurally the same. But that seems to be kind of what you're saying, the two things that come together is doing mind without optics, accomplish everything by doing one thing, completely accomplish it.

[11:25]

I hope so. Also, I want to mention that the Bodhisattva meditation texts that I went through one day, by Kamala Shila, Bhavana Kraman. So, it's in this book, which is, maybe there's only one copy of it at Zen Center. It's called Minor Buddhist Text, so it has the Bhavana Kraman in it. But Susan has typed it out, the Bhavana Kraman, so after she almost typed it out, so when she finishes, we can send a copy down to the Tassajara Library. So you can read the whole text. The Bodhisattva Samatha Vipassana as presented by Kamalashila. So it's presented by Kamalashila, Bodhisattva Samatha Vipassana.

[12:28]

It's presented in the Samadhi Nirmacana Sutra. It's presented in the Lankavatara Sutra, but hard to deal with there. It's presented by many Zen teachers. Now, what happened to the Samatha Vipassana? Well, what happened to the Samatha Vipassana in the Zen tradition is the same thing that happened to, pretty much, to the Jhanas and to the Four Foundations of Mindfulness and to a lot of other traditional Buddhist teachings. They kind of got put aside or it kind of got demoted to a category which, you know, you might say a category called not really to the point, or not quite as good as Zen, or not quite as good as this school.

[13:31]

This school, what is this school? Well, I don't know. Something neat was happening with these people, these Zen people. They were like, I don't know. Apparently, they were really something. I mean, you've read the stories. And there's something very vital about all these people. But they gradually seem to need to have some autonomy or separation from the traditional Buddhist teachings. And they even started talking about a special transmission or a separate transmission outside the scriptures. You heard about that, right? So in order to say they have a special transmission outside of the scriptures, they started to talk not like the scriptures. They started to not mention some of the main words in the scriptures, particularly some of the main words in the scriptures, which were some of their main practices.

[14:37]

So when it came to their main practices, they very much were careful to try to gradually not use the words that were in the scriptures. Other things which didn't matter so much to them, which weren't their special contribution, they still talked in the old way. Like the Zen school is not like super famous and everybody coming to the monastery is to learn about giving or patience or chanting or ritual. They came to learn about meditation, the Buddha's meditation. And these people said, yeah, we got the Buddha's meditation here. but they want, they gradually started talking about it less and less the way that Indian people talked about it. Now, Darshan, by the way, when he says, he says, you know, all this stuff, you know, that I've been teaching you, all this wonderful stuff, it's based on the scriptures, he said.

[15:43]

Darshan said, all this stuff's based on the scriptures. Then a little while later, quite a while later, the Zen people say that Bodhidharma said, I have a transmission, a separate transmission, not based on the scriptures, outside the scriptures. Now, Dogen's teacher, Ru Jing, said, outside the scriptures means neither inside or outside. In other words, free of the scriptures. But Taushin said, Looks like he said, I'm coming from the scriptures. But later Zen people said, we're not coming from the scriptures. And, you know, a lot of them didn't. Where did they come from? They came from a source which wasn't in the scriptures before the Zen school was there. What's that? Zen people talking.

[16:44]

There was these dialogues that the Zen masters were having with their students... became, in some sense, the literature of the school. So, the Zen school had a unique literature, which they could say, nobody else has got this literature. This is the literature of our school talking to itself. And this teaching, these scriptures, they're not scriptures, but these records of these dialogues between our people are more efficacious for enlightenment than the sutras. If you look at the Pali Canon, or if you look at the Agamas in Sanskrit, basically the same sutras of the Buddha's teaching, a lot of the sutras are Buddha's talking to his students, and in a lot of those talks, the students were enlightened in the talks. Just like in the Zen stories.

[17:50]

But the language style is a little different. The Zen stories, the language is more terse and concentrated than the Buddha's conversations. And the Buddha laid out big, long meditation instructions sometimes to his students, which culminated in enlightenment. And the Zen people almost never did. But also, their instructions were, when they were, they very seldom did they refer to the Indian dialogue, the Indian descriptions. Sometimes the question is the monk comes with a question using the Indian terminology and the Zen teacher comes back with something totally in another realm. And the monk is awakened. On the generous side, you might have had these people who were just simply uncontrollably enlightened and they just had to do something really different.

[19:01]

On the more mundane side, you might have said you have the Zen school which wanted to be something which is also somewhat like to be uncontrollably enlightened. They wanted to relate to Chinese society with a whole new teaching They didn't want to use Indian stuff to relate to Chinese people. They wanted to make up a new way of talking about what Buddhism was that they felt was more appropriate for themselves, that worked for them, and they thought that worked for Chinese culture. And they also wanted to say, but we're not just totally making this up. So we have a special transmission. We have a transmission from Buddha. This is Buddhism, but it is not Indian in any way that anybody ever saw before. And you notice we're not talking that way, but it's a special transmission, but also gradually it's a special transmission that obviously had nothing to do with India in terms of the material, because the material is actually the dialogues between Zen people.

[20:14]

Chinese people talking to each other becomes the source of a lot of the teaching and discussion. And somewhere between The early ancestors of Zen, like Daoshin, and when the Zen people, their main texts that they're using are Mahayana sutras, which they use some, but also using Zen dialogues and Zen encounters equally or more so. Somewhere in between there, the Indian description and the early Chinese description of systematic presentations of meditation in terms of Samatha and Vipassana, gradually that language disappears. But I feel that the actual process of Samatha and Vipassana still goes on. There isn't really a break with the practice, but there's a change in language And there's an adaptation to a culture.

[21:20]

And I feel it's important that we understand that we're not... Well, I mean, understand that actually the basic principles of how the mind works haven't been revolutionized by the Zen school. that the mind, the basic workings of the mind have not changed much since the time of Buddha. That the self that the Buddha found out is the self that is now being discovered by the interdisciplinary approach to the study of the self by psychologists, neurologists, biologists, you know, all these people, they're finding basically the same self that Buddha found. And so, so I want to say that I also want to just say a couple of things. One is, I just want to mention that Vimalakirti said that Sesshin is the place of enlightenment.

[22:27]

The Chinese... I think that the Vimalakirti Sutta was written in Chinese. That's what I think. And... There's a Tibetan one, but there isn't a Sanskrit one. And if you look at Vimalakirti, I don't think the Indians would ever come up with such a person. Anyway, Vimalakirti said, Sesshin is the place of enlightenment. In other words, Sesshin is the Chinese characters for Sesshin is the place of enlightenment. I just thought that was interesting for you. What? Do another Sesshin. I just want to mention a few other things here. Okay? Just a few other things. Here's one thing I want to mention. This is really basic. The shift between early Buddhism, Theravada Buddhism, I don't know what it's called, Theravada Buddhism or whatever, to Mahayana Buddhism, one way to characterize the shift that I think is really, for me, helpful, is that

[23:42]

the foundation of the practice shifted from personal virtue to compassion. At the early Buddhist practice, the root, the ground of it was personal virtue, was ethical conduct. So if you look in the Visuddhimagga, which is a wonderful book, it has three sections. First section is the ethical precepts. Next section is shamatha and the other concentration practices, and then wisdom. Okay? But in the bodhisattva practice, compassion is the ground. Then, from compassion you go into giving precepts and so on. Of course we practice the precepts, but compassion is more important to the bodhisattva. It's the ground. So, If you're very ethical and very careful of all the precepts, this is great.

[24:49]

But you're not going to get enlightened that way unless you have compassion at the root of that. You can get very wise based on personal virtue and concentration. and insight. But the deepest understanding has to be rooted in compassion. Some people who have compassion don't have much personal virtue, which is too bad. It is. Have you ever seen anybody like that? A lot of compassion and not much personal virtue? You know what I mean? No, you don't? Well, like they have, huh? They're compassionate, but they drink a lot of alcohol. You know? Or whatever, you know. They got a lot of problems. They're sloppy. They don't pay attention. But they got compassion. They will eventually develop personal virtue. Compassion doesn't allow you not to.

[25:51]

You have to. But you could develop personal virtue for a long time. Without developing compassion, you're going to hit it. So, compassion, the shift is from the ground, from personal virtue being the ground, to compassion being around. And then after compassion, personal virtue is part of the deal. You can't skip over personal virtue just because you've got compassion. You can't. You don't get excused, but you also, compassion won't allow you to. But personal virtue, you could, could be postponed compassion. And some people have a lot of personal virtue and they look down on these other people who don't. You ever seen anybody like that? And rightly so, right? Right? This person, you know, doesn't have any personal virtue. It's not good that they don't have it. I mean, the person who has compassion doesn't think that's good, but they don't look down on them. They look up to them. This is their life. So, anyway, that's the really important thing about Mahayana, is that compassion is the basis, and then personal virtue, and samatha-vipashyana, and all that.

[27:01]

I also wanted to give you a couple more examples of the places where you can find Samatha Vipassana hidden in the Zen tradition, which you haven't heard about. One of them I'd like to mention is in the, you know, very characteristic Sung Dynasty Zen text, the Mumonkan, or the Wumankan, Wumanguan. Okay? Real typical Zen text, which had the first koan is mu, And the second koan is the story of Baijong and the wild fox. Those two cases are the first two cases in the book, and those two cases are the meditation orientation of the book. And the first case, mu, is shamatha. And the second case is vipassana. Don't say anything about it, but that's what those two cases are. When you study those two cases and you learn them, you're learning first Samatha, then Vipassana.

[28:14]

Yeah? The wildpox story? It's a story about karma, of cause and effect. Basically, the story is the head monk was asked, does an enlightened person fall into cause and effect? And he said, no. And became born as a fox for 500 lives. And then he went, the head monk, went to the Zen teacher's talks, and afterwards he told him this story. And the Zen teacher said, okay, ask me. So then the wild fox man asked Bai Zhang, does an enlightened person fall into cause and effect or not? And Bai Zhang said, he's not blind to it, or he doesn't ignore it. In other words, you study dependent cauterizing, you study cause and effect. In other words, you practice vipassana. You're studying vipassana, but the vipassana has to be based on samatha, which is the mu koan, in that case, in this book.

[29:15]

Now, mu can be used other ways, but in this book, it's samatha and vipassana. But they don't tell you that, but it's right there, very clear. That's the way mu is used, just like a samatha practice. And Dogen Zenji grew up in the Tendai school, and the Tendai school, the main school, the main text of the Tendai school, the main scripture of the Tendai school is the Lotus Sutra. But the main commentary is the moho-jirguana, or the maha-sikkhana, the great Samatha-vipassana. He grew up in that tradition of Samatha-vipassana. He left and became a Zen monk, an inheritor of the Zen tradition. But in his teaching, I tell you, there is Samatha Vipassana all over the place. Where? Turn the light around. Whose teaching is that? Darshan. That's a Samatha practice. Basic Dogen is Samatha.

[30:17]

Then after Samatha, he says all over the place, investigate, investigate, investigate. What does he say to investigate? You name it. He tells you to investigate Abhidharma stuff. He tells you to investigate Zen literature. He tells you to investigate sutra passages. But first of all, when you really do the investigation, first of all, you stabilize your consciousness by turning the light around. He says you don't just go at this stuff like chasing the words of the Zen stories. and try to understand them just with your mind. Of course, you do that to some extent. You study these things. But when you really do the work, first of all, you turn the light around. Then you investigate. So, Dogen II is teaching Samatha Vipassana. And Yangshan, case 32, you see I say, he says, turn the light around. Reverse your mind. But in another place, Yangshan says, literally, every one of you should turn the light around

[31:20]

inwardly and look at the self within. That's yangshana. Right on, the same as darshan, except he adds in the vipassana. So he first does shamatha and vipassana in one sentence. And then he says, forget my words. Because when you do this practice, you have to forget the words that you got. When you do the shamatha practice, you have to forget the instruction. In other words, you're getting instructions in a non-conceptual meditation, so you have to forget the concepts that directed your attention towards the non-conceptual. And so, I would like to also say that, just generally speaking, there's a school which is called the Hongzhou School. And Hongzhou is a town in China where first of all Matsu taught, and then finally Wang Bo taught.

[32:25]

Okay? So in the reading list, there is Bodhidharma, Daoshin, and then there is Matsu, Baijang, Wang Bo. Okay? That lineage is the Hangzhou school. And the Hangzhou school is a school that, again, really transformed the Zen into something where you couldn't see the Indian stuff there anymore. But it is so straightforwardly mind-only. It's so straightforwardly right out of the sutras, out of the Mahayana sutras. They don't say it, but it's there. And these people who were teaching actually bodhisattva Samatha Vipassana, they all taught, you know, all these people say the same thing. Daoshin, Matsu, Baijong, Wangbo, they all say, outside of mind there is no Buddha.

[33:30]

Outside of Buddha there is no mind. They all teach that over and over. And they all say, therefore, no seeking and no attainment. You can't grasp mind because mine is Buddha. And Buddha has no characteristics. So there's no seeking, no attainment. And that's the way to enter into Buddhism. So they feel, and it looks like they were right, that they had this very direct way of initiating their students into Samatha Vipassana. They didn't mention it. And it's very straightforward. But it's there. And so I encourage you to look at the traditional Indian, to get familiar with the traditional Indian presentation, and then see how you can see that actually this Hangzhou school, very important school, out of which also the Linji or Rinzai school comes, they really are in accord with this bodhisattva mind-only yogacara practice.

[34:34]

Samatha Vipassana practice, even though you don't see any sign of it in their language in terms of specifically, literally mentioning it, in fact, what they're teaching is exactly the same thing as in the Samadhi Nirmacana Sutra. There's nothing out there. There's nothing to seek. So you check that out. Same thing. Exactly the same in all these people. Okay. Okay. So those were the kind of things... Oh, one more. I think this is also good. In case three of the Book of Serenity is where Bodhidharma's teacher goes to lunch and after lunch oftentimes Buddhist monks, first you'd feed them and then they would chant at your house.

[35:37]

They'd chant scriptures or give you a Dharma talk. So a Bodhidharma teacher after lunch did not chant the scriptures or read the scriptures to the king. And so the king says to the Prajnatara, how come you don't read scriptures? And he said, this poor wayfarer, when breathing in, does not dwell in in the realms of body-mind, which means, literally it says, in the skandhas. And breathing out does not get involved in myriad circumstances, but literally what it is, is it's like the 18 dhatus, you know, the realms of sense, like eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, mind, so on. I always chant this scripture 100, 1,000, 1 million times. What is his practice? He doesn't get involved in the five skandhas. He doesn't dwell in them. In other words, you don't dwell in them, you don't get involved in them, but also you don't reject them, devalue them, avoid them.

[36:46]

In other words, when it comes to the five skandhas, when it comes to feelings, perceptions or whatever, you don't activate your mind. So Bodhidharma is his disciple. In other words, he has a mind like a wall when it comes to the five skandhas. All right? Okay? Does that make sense to everybody now? In the commentary on this case, it says, maybe before you try Prajnatara's teaching, practice, which is very mystical... you might want to ground yourself in some of the more traditional presentations of meditation on your breath. So he's breathing in and out, body and mind breathing in and out, and the five skandhas are happening with every breath, and he doesn't value the five skandhas or devalue the five skandhas. Doesn't cough or sigh at the five skandhas that are arising while he's inhaling and exhaling.

[37:52]

That's his scripture, right? Same as Bodhidharma, mind like a wall. Very subtle teaching, right? So the commentary says, maybe you want to do some background work before you try this. And the text that they recommend is the Six Subtle Dharmagates by... Khyentai Jiri and Jiri is the Chinese guy who wrote that text I told you about which is the main text of the Tendai school which is the great Samatha Vipassana but he also wrote another book which was recommended particularly in this case because it concentrates on breathing so this book is I believe on the list isn't it is that book on the list no too bad Yeah, you can put it on. Anyway, we have a translation of this book called The Six Subtle Dharma Gates. And in that, The Six Subtle Dharma Gates are counting the breath, following the breath, and the third stage is stopping.

[39:03]

It doesn't mean stopping the breath. It means you shift from the breath being a, what do you call it, a conceptual object to a non-conceptual object. So it's like it's... The breath that you were working with before is like stops. Now you're working with a non-conceptual object. Then the next one, the fourth one, is called guan, vipassana. So stopping, jur. I mean, stopping is shamatha. And the next one's guan, vipassana. Okay? And the next one is called returning. And returning is turn the light around and shine it back. Look back at the mind which has been thinking. So it's shamatha again. And then the next one is purity, which is vipassana again. So it shifts from, it shifts, it makes these shifts. So you start with the counting the breath, and then it explains that when that gets too rough, you go to following.

[40:09]

Then you go to non-conceptual shamatha practice. Then you go to vipassana. Then you go to Now you're not looking at the breath anymore. Now you're turning around looking at the mind which thinks of things. And then you turn and purify the whole system by understanding suchness. So that's a text you might want to look at to help you give some background on this practice that Prajnatara is doing. But you don't have to do that if you feel like you can go right in and do Prajnatara's teaching practice of In the midst of the five skandhas, which means in the midst of your colors, smells, touches, tastes, sounds. Did I get them all? Five. In the midst of those forms, in the midst of your feelings of pain, pleasure, and neutral sensation, in the midst of all your concepts, in the midst of all your emotions and all your impulses, in the midst of your consciousness, in the midst of all the five skandhas, in other words, all your experience, if you can just not get involved, if you can have this mind like a wall,

[41:17]

You're on. But if you feel that's too much for you, take a step back, study this Six Subtle Dharma Gates, which starts out like, you know, kind of, what do you call it, conceptually, and shifts over into the non-conceptual. It's called a mixed text. So, so Jiri wrote many texts about meditation, but the three ones that I think are most relevant here are ones called the Shao-jirguan, which is a little, little jirguan. Shao is little. Little jirguan means little Samatha vipassana. It's a short one for beginners. Then he wrote this Six Subtle Dharma Gates, which is like an intermediate text, which is half like his beginner meditation on Samatha and vipassana as a conceptual practice. and half non-conceptual. And then the Moha-jirguana, which is all non-conceptual, and Mahayana. So there's three texts.

[42:19]

And we have translations of all three. Tom Cleary has translated the Stopping and Seeing, is it called? So that's the Moha-jirguana part of it. And Neil Donner translated the first chapter of the Moha-jirguana. So this is Chinese Samatha Vipassana. You can study that. This is, Dogen grew up in that tradition. It's in his background. He knows about that stuff, but he doesn't refer to it much. But it's in his background. It's there. And one other thing, and that is, this way of practicing, where as you're breathing, you don't get involved in the five skandhas. You know, in the midst of your experience, in the midst of your feelings, in the midst of the colors you see, in the faces you see, in the people you touch, in the things you think, in all that, in all the midst of your five skandhas that are happening moment by moment, you don't dwell.

[43:30]

You don't value or devalue. That practice is samatha. Okay? Okay? mind like a wall, but it then takes you into vipassana. And you see that all this stuff is nothing but mind. And you see suchness. And this same practice takes you back out of that world of realization into the world. Because when the bodhisattva returns from seeing that there is nothing out there, existing separate from our mind. When they return, when they come back into the five skandhas again, it's the same practice. Namely, you don't value or devalue. The same way that you went in, you practice when you come out. The difference is that you had this realization in between. And you understand that this stuff, which you before treated like was a dream, In other words, if things are a dream, you're not going to get too involved with them, right?

[44:32]

Maybe say, hi, but that's enough. But now you understand it's a dream, you act the same way you did when you went in. You treat it like a dream from your understanding. Before you treated it like a dream, but you didn't understand it was a dream. So that's why his practice, Prajnathara's practice and Bodhidharma's practice is a way to enter the path, enter into realization and return to the world. Same practice. And that's also... that's part of why it's a nice presentation because it is very simple and you could have just that one practice of having no objects of thought or mind like a wall can take you into realization and back from realization but shamatha vipassana is there and you have to do all the work that's in the sutra anyway so don't think you can skip over it but The Zen people present it this way because a lot of people, I think Chinese people, found it daunting to look at this Indian presentation, which is so complex.

[45:36]

It's like, you know, it takes so many eons. I'm not out there, folks. I'm not out there. And eons aren't out there. But we do have dreams called Reb and dreams called eons. You have to deal with me. Laughter Okay, that's most of the things I thought I should say for starters. Now you want to have some comments, you have some questions? So we have Martin, Linda, Susan, Nigel. Is that it for now? Yehuda? All right. Starting from the right. I just read a food-nosing, calm, beautiful book on Dogen's Foundation for Mindfulness, where Dogen contrasts the practice of dropping away body and mind to mantras, shamanic vipassana, and a few other things.

[46:41]

Right. And he calls those other things, mantra and shamanic vipassana, useless. Right. As the only practice for is dropping away body and mind. Right. Transmitting, dropping away. The transmitted, yeah, right, the transmitted one. That's also very important, that it's the transmitted one, it's not just the one... So when I read that, my first thought was, oh, they practice Shravana Vipassana, because what is the transmission? It seems to be the Dharma transmission, which is, after many years of practice, you get this mind transmission, but you don't get it immediately. because you have to practice, so it seems like you're suggesting, well, I can read anything, do anything I want, that mantras and, and you talked about the sutras too, I was going to make this my, um, question, say how useless chanting sutras is, and chanting the Krishna, in the light of the right, the right way of working. That's right.

[47:42]

In that light, it seems to suggest, you know, practicing all these other things, until this transmission comes. All this stuff, you know, is a dream. It's all a dream. The whole Buddha Dharma is a dream. Okay? But still, all these teachers were using these dreams to teach their students all along. And they had their reasons for, like, the way they presented their dreams. But I'm telling you that there's dreams within dreams within dreams and there's no dream in the world that doesn't contain all other dreams. These dreams are totally out of control and interdependent. And so all these teachings are interpenetrating each other.

[48:42]

And I find, I feel that Whereas the Zen school at a certain time in its history sort of needed to separate itself from vipassana or mantram chanting or whatever to say, this is what we're doing. We don't need to separate ourselves from anything. I take that back. I'm not saying we don't need to separate ourselves from anything. I would just say we need to be clear, I think, about how the whole thing is interpenetrating. I think we need to be able to find the Dharma everywhere. That's my feeling about where we are in America now. But that's what the... face-to-face transmission means here is that we have to understand that, given that's the kind of world we live in.

[49:47]

China was a certain kind of place, so it gave birth to Zen, a wonderful thing that had to pretend like it was cut off or was a special transmission. They had to talk like that. But the special transmission of Zen, the face-to-face transmission in Zen... Face-to-face transmission means that there's no practice that you ever do that's Buddhism that's more than face-to-face transmission. Face-to-face transmission is the entirety of Buddhism. That's what face-to-face transmission means. Because it means that a Buddha and a Buddha are facing each other and transmitting to each other. And so everybody in the universe is in on that. There's nobody, people maybe practice Zazen, like go up and sit in a Zen room and practice Zazen, somebody practices Zazen, but that's not Buddhism.

[50:51]

It's Buddhism when that Zazen is face-to-face transmission. And when it's face-to-face transmission, there's no other, there's nothing else in Buddhism than face-to-face transmission, because Buddhism is not about somebody, a Buddha having a face sitting Zazen. It's about a Buddha together with another Buddha. And there's nothing more about Buddhism than people helping each other, in other words. There's no additional Buddhism. So no additional kind of like neat things. So Samatha Vipassana has to be part of that face-to-face transmission. In other words, when you're practicing it, it has to be not you doing it by yourself. That's what I said a while ago. You cannot do any practice, anything by yourself. You can't do Samatha Vipassana. You have to do Samatha Vipassana as a transmitted face-to-face transmission. That's the way you have to do it. In other words, when you sit Samatha Vipassana or half a Samatha and two-thirds of Vipassana or no Samatha and no Vipassana and no Zazen, but just really just a little kinheen, when you do that kinheen, that kinheen has to be face-to-face transmission.

[52:02]

In other words, Buddha has to be helping you do that. If Buddha isn't helping you do that, it's not Buddhism. Something's left out. Either Buddha's left out or you're left out. Take your choice. It's about the same. That's like lonely Buddha and lonely you. But when you and Buddha are face-to-face transmitting kin-hin, there's no other Buddhism that takes care of the whole thing. Sometimes Buddhas use Samatha Vipassana because of the nature of the human mind. But the main thing is that you're always practicing together with Buddha. That's the reality. And you cannot do any practice by yourself. Any practice you do by yourself is just a dream. The practice you do together with Buddha is not a dream, but you can't even dream it.

[53:06]

It's reality. Practicing with Buddha is Buddhism, is reality, and there's nothing but face-to-face transmission. Right? There's no other... That's it. Sorry. Okay? And then we're coming around this way to Linda, I think. Was that right? Linda? It's like this. Linda, Susan... Nigel, Yehuda, Sarah. Okay? Okay. I don't know if I have to be a scholar to say what I'm about to say, but... Okay, here you are. This is your face. Linda. From reading some Taoist texts... Yes. ...Secret of the Golden Flower... Yes. ...and... Thomas Cleary has put out a book which is called Practical Taoism, which has something that I wanted to ask you about.

[54:11]

I haven't had a chance to, but it looks like very similar to the Fuga Zazen. Yeah. I just was, you know, that feel like Shabbat practice is from Taoism, so that maybe the culture, you're talking about the culture, when Buddhism came from India, it meant Taoism. It was in China, but somehow... It was that language, because in The Secret of the Golden Flower, they used to turn the light around. Yeah, right. Maybe what? Maybe some of the language came from the Taoist aspect. Maybe some of the language came from the Taoist. A lot of people say that Zen is like Buddhism combined with Taoism. That's part of the way Buddhism got changed, is using some of the Taoist imagery to make Buddhism more penetrating to the Chinese spirit. Yes, Susan.

[55:16]

I have always thought, in terms of Zen Center, my exposure to Zen and so to Zen, that there was a reason for not explaining the practice, not talking about the specifics of meditation. And I have to say, when I first came, I was really attracted to that because I had done some I worked at Spirit Rock with those people and they would talk to me all the time. They were telling me what to do in my meditation. I was too eager to follow it to know what my process really was. So the silence, the lack of explanation, felt to me really... that authenticity available to discover, for me, to discover what it is. So, I love what you've done in this practice, it's helped me tremendously, but I wonder, is there a value, or is there some point of not explaining it? this process of shamatha vipassana in the Zen school, or in the Sutta Zen school, or here at Zen Center, or... Is there some... Is there some... Some what?

[56:28]

Is there a point... Is there a point... Why is it done? Is there a valuable reason why these are not... She's saying, is there a point why Samatha Vipassana is not explained in Zen Center? Well, the main reason is most people in Zen Center don't know anything about it. That's the main reason. They don't know anything about it. And they learn a little bit about it, and they realize it's complicated, and they just get away from it. That's the main reason. But, Hardin, do you want to disagree? Later. Later. Later. That's the main reason. But in the history of Zen... The reason why they didn't talk about it, I think, is to establish a different... They knew about it. The early people did know about it. They grew up in it. Dogen knew about it. And early Zen teachers knew about it. That was their culture, their Buddhist culture. But they intentionally didn't bring it up. And their point was, you might have said because they felt it was a better way to teach people, but also they actually put it down.

[57:30]

And people knew about it, and they knew about it. They said, don't do this stuff. They say, stay away from it. The explanation was already going on to some extent. They said, don't do that anymore. So they did think it was a point not to do it. They said, this way is better. So they knew about it and put it aside and demoted it. They said, this is a gradual way. We have a faster way. We have a direct way. So wouldn't this be better to do our way? And also, the scholars would say, and they're the only ones who know this way. So if you want to learn about our way, you have to come to our temple and support our temple. Because this is the only place you can learn about this stuff. We have this direct way. This other Samatha Vipassana school, they say it takes three eons. We can do it like right now. So that was part of the point why they did it then. Nowadays, most Zen people don't even know about this stuff. But if they found out about it, they might say, no, I think Zen is more direct.

[58:35]

But it's different. In the early Zen, they knew about it and put it aside because they wanted to have their own school where they would have their own unique way, their own product, which nobody else would have. That's what the scholars would see. Now, you could say they weren't concerned about competition. They just felt that this was a better way for people, and so they just really felt that way. But they knew about it. Nowadays, people don't know about it. Nowadays, almost no Zen center has people in it that know anything about these sutras or know how to practice with them. So that's the reason why they don't bring it up, partly. And another reason is they probably think that their way is all that they know and good. Or some may have done other practices before and got burned out and liked the simplicity of the Zen style, like you. So did you want to disagree a little bit, Vicki? You can do it now. Okay, a couple things.

[59:39]

The first thing is that my impression of Zen... Uh-huh. I really feel that they're talking to an educated audience, a yogically educated audience, and putting it down is quite different from talking to an audience that's not educated as you. Right. So that's wonderful. Mm-hmm. You have that faith. Is that what you're saying? Well, I don't necessarily have faith, but when I read about stories of various people, I find an exactness that if I can't, I mean, maybe it's just another example of the skill at it coming from the inmost part.

[61:08]

Yeah, that's possible. But it just seems like the variety and the level of sophistication of those responses means that they, it means to me that they did have that skill. Well, I'm talking about skilled teachers, skilled teachers throughout the tradition. Well, the question is, when somebody, a teacher runs into a student and then they can respond to them, Part of the question is, do you think that they knew the Lankavatara Sutra, that they could use it whenever they needed to? Or, are you saying that? Because I'm saying, no, they couldn't do that. Early Zen people, around Daushin's time, those people knew the Lankavatara Sutra. They knew these Mahayana texts. And whether they mention it or not, you can see that they knew them, but they did mention it. They said, we're getting it from these books. Later, there was a transition space when they still knew about them, but they were looking for a new way. Then I think they gradually became less knowledgeable about those sutras and more knowledgeable about the Zen texts.

[62:12]

And then later, some of these people didn't know anything about the Mahayana sutras, and they knew about the Zen stuff, because that's what they used. They used the Zen dialogues and very little Mahayana sutras, and almost no Mahayana treatises which explain the meditation practices. And I do not find that they show evidence that they did know these texts any more later. However, I do agree that they had the skill, which is as though they were the sutra. And physical practices that we do, we totally know a lot of that skill. You know, I think that the way some Buddhist teachers, Zen or otherwise, the way that they pick up a cup conveys the prajnaparamita. And also, the way that they pick up a cup, and also the tradition of sitting cross-legged and then sitting, say, as if chanting with a certain intention and focus, you can't do that without...

[63:21]

without harmonizing body with body, and without dropping conceptions. You can't do what without what now? You can't chant wholeheartedly without being harmonized. You'll get there. Well, I don't know if that's true, but I heard you. I just don't know what that statement meant. That you can't do something unless you're yogically... Did you say yogically harmonized? So what does yogically harmonized mean? I'm saying that... You're talking about that now, but I'm not talking about any of that stuff.

[64:38]

So you're opening up another dimension now. You said something about you can't chant wholeheartedly unless you're something, and I didn't know what you were talking about. So we don't need to talk about sudden and gradual, do we? Just tell me what you mean by you can't chant wholeheartedly unless you are yogically what? The point is that I feel that the teachings at our school, physical practices, the postures, the set of things that we do, Yes. Yes. Yes. Those instructions and that way of doing things impose, it embodies the range of the teachings.

[65:59]

It's like they're transmitted in a static way instead of moving. It's a different kind of... Are you saying that the form encodes something or the transmission encodes something? I'm saying that it's impossible to actually do the form completely without receiving the transmission. It's impossible to do the form completely without receiving face-to-face transmission. Yes. Right, that's what I said too. It's impossible... for anything to happen completely without face-to-face transmission. Right? Yeah. So are you saying anything different than that? I'm saying that the teachers do bring out things like put your hands in that shawl, either this way or not that way, walk this way or not that way, sit cross-legged, then sit, say, do this chanting.

[67:09]

There's a full range of things that we do say in which many of the teachings that are said receptionally and interruptionally in the sutras are also I don't want to keep going on. That's how I feel that way. I'm missing something, yeah. I don't understand what you're saying. Does everybody else understand? What did you get? What I get is that, I think, when we say the complete Samogitaya, great activity, there's that kind of body-mind wisdom in movement and in being in touch with energy, flow, is...

[68:16]

What he's saying is that within the forms that were taught in this practice is the embodiment of the same kind of transmission that is talked about in the sutras and verbally transmitted to the sutras that you're mentioning to us. So what's happening? I feel like everything's okay until you say this form, you know, the form that we're doing here. Then I feel like I don't know what you're talking about. Pardon?

[69:20]

Pardon? I don't feel like you're missing. I feel like I don't see what you're talking about. I didn't hear you talk yet. But anyway, I don't understand what this thing about these forms is. I don't get that part. Talking about these forms. That's the part I don't get is why we're bringing up these forms and encoding sutras and stuff in the forms. I don't get that part. The reason for not explaining it, I think, the causes and conditions are the... It's not the reason, it's the causes and conditions. I don't think we have a reason for not explaining it. People in Zen centers, in... People don't know about this stuff. It's not like they're not explaining it. It's not even in their vocabulary.

[70:21]

They don't restrain themselves from explaining. It's not an issue, is it? Who's restraining themselves? Who's not talking about this? Wasn't that clear? When one comes to Zen Center, for instance, one is given things to do with very little explanation. Yes. It's sort of a way here. It's not explaining. Yeah. So that you're thrown into... Well, that's what you say. Other people think you're giving too much instruction. Okay, so, yes? I just thought that that was a decision, a way, a beneficial way of this school that... You found it to be beneficial not to get much instruction on how to do things. Okay, so that's when you were told to do some things. But this has got nothing to do with people restraining you from telling you about shamatha and vipassana. Does it? I mean... I think that there's an understanding, that this is just my understanding, this is my idea, that there is a purpose for not explaining and that people... Where did you get this? Did somebody tell you about this?

[71:21]

What did they say? They said, just do it. You heard it, you saw it, just do it. I see. So you think they have an explanation that they don't want to tell you? I see. not sit. Who are these people? They say to you, just do it? They do. And they have an explanation that they'll tell you later? People are talking like that, huh? Just do it, they say to you. And did they tell you what it is that you're supposed to just do? Oh, they tell you to just do it and they don't even tell you what it is? So then what do you do? You know, you jump in. You jump in. Is that actually going on here? And you're practicing that way? Fabulous. That's very daring. Wow.

[72:23]

I didn't know people were doing that. That's great. Terrific. Really. Pardon? . What? . So, so then, so then you say, then, then, and then what happened? Then they say, just do it? So, so you're calling, you're calling that instruct, pardon? Yeah. Right, I agree.

[73:29]

As a matter of fact, people were explaining about giving instruction on breath, and I generally was encouraging them not to talk about the breathing, just do the posture, because usually people get all confused about that and depressed after they get the instruction about following the breath, so I just said, just do the posture. And you people call that getting no instruction. Right? I call that getting instruction. That's right. That's what Vicki was saying. That's what I was saying. You were saying that that's getting instruction? I don't disagree with that. But the reason why I get instruction like that is not because I'm holding back instruction on Samatha and Vipassana. That's not why I'm doing that. Why am I doing that? Huh? What? No, I'm not.

[74:31]

I'm not holding back when I tell somebody to say, well, you sit there and don't lean forward or backwards or right or left. I'm not holding back when I say that. Is somebody holding back? But you're telling me those people are holding back. You think they've got some explanation and they're holding back. Yes. Yes. Right. Yeah, but see, now that's the part I didn't know about, that they had this stuff, they had these ideas and they're thinking it's not a good idea. You know, if I tell somebody, if I say, okay, now sit there and don't lean forward, backwards, right or left, I don't sit there and think, I think it's a good idea if I don't tell him about the rest of Buddhism. I don't think that way. But you're sitting there thinking, he probably thinks it's a good idea for him not to tell me all the stuff he knows.

[75:37]

Now maybe those other people, they had all this stuff that they were holding back from you. But if I tell you that, I'm not holding back all this other stuff. I'm not like thinking, oh, you know, I just, you know, I'm really not holding back. I'm just, I'm actually giving you a lot. I think, you know, wow, geez. And I say, now you may have trouble doing this. And you say, what? And I say, didn't you hear me? And you say, no, I didn't hear you. What did you say? I said, don't lean forward, backwards, right or left. Oh, that. When are you going to give me instruction? Wait a second. That was the instruction. Then you think, you must be kidding. That's the instruction? This is how I'm supposed to live my life? You must be kidding. No, really. I'm not kidding. I'm not holding anything back. So it's interesting, huh? Nigel? Yes, something earlier, earlier thing, an earlier thing.

[76:46]

What do you think about the monk practices, the comprehension that it's a dream? Yes, the monk practices the comprehension that it's a dream. That practice of comprehension bears proof. And the monk has an insight. He has? Now, the monk then notices that the insight has the quality of failure. And so afterwards, he goes back to his master and he says... The insight fades? Kind of. So he goes back to his master and he says, Master, why do you want the sight to fade? The master says, because the ground isn't wet enough. Now, you just said that if the malt then returns, or I think you said something like that, or shit comes out,

[77:50]

of that back to the practice of comprehending that it's a dream. Yes? Is this making sense? Yeah. Right? That's the culture there. Yes. You're welcome. Yehuda's next, and then Sarah. Change from India to China to the United States. Yes? My understanding, part of the reason why I was planning to use it, half of the reason, is that it became accessible to people who weren't educated. I read in a book, Zim Dawn, that wrong one person can have high education. Yes. Now, that's really interesting, but could you say something about what happened when the first annual policy, or when it went, went to Japan?

[79:00]

What kind of scope did it turn into? And then, are you going to put it there? No, it's a changing world. It's a changing world. well nothing is more interesting than your questions but they're too big for you know two minutes to nine o'clock they're just too big but these are very important questions I think especially the last one how is it going to what's happening now what is this you know and do you think that the instruction I'm giving you I'm holding back something I don't do that you know As you may have noticed, I'm always trying to give exactly what I think is appropriate at the moment, and I'm not holding back one iota. But maybe these other people are like you say, I don't know.

[80:01]

But just do it is not necessarily holding back something else that they could be telling you to do. Maybe that's all they know how to say is just do it. That's their whole instruction. for you at that time. They can't think of anything else but that. And it's not that they have another instruction. But it's great that you can listen to that and respond. That's wonderful. Because we have a lot of people who can say that, apparently. It's almost... Let's just enjoy these last three seconds before nine o'clock. It is now nine o'clock. And there are some questions on the floor. Should we have them for some other time? Hmm? Oh, we'll have another meeting. We'll have another Dharma event where there'll be questions. Okay, Sarah? Yes? Okay.

[81:07]

Thank you. Sarah asked me to say something. This is not just for the summer. This is for our whole life. And that is, when you're talking to someone, I think it's a good idea to be open to the possibility that they're meditating. And so, you know, talk to them with that in mind. And if somebody is meditating, they can probably handle the question, Are you meditating now? And if they are, they probably can say, Yes. And you can say, Oh, okay. Okay.

[82:11]

now would you please do it? Or now would you please pass me the broom? Or now would you please go work over there? But you know you're talking to somebody who's in the meditation process. And a lot of times when I'm talking to people, they're meditating. And so I'm talking to somebody who's trying to do a meditation practice while they're listening to me. Or while they're talking to me. And I find it good to be aware that that may be who I'm talking to, is someone who is in the process of meditating. And so, it isn't necessarily that I have to be quiet, but yet, if I'm aware of it, I do talk in a different way to take that into account. And I think that's a good way to talk to people. So it doesn't mean through the summer and after the practice period, it doesn't mean we can't talk to each other. It's just that if you know that this person over there is trying to meditate, it transforms the way you talk to them.

[83:17]

And then you, of course, are meditating too when you realize you're talking to a meditator. So that's another way to talk about how to interact verbally with each other. which Sarah asked me to bring up. Okay? I don't mean to be humorous, but maybe pins are some symbol. So you can tell. I mean, honestly, it's very awkward. It's very awkward trying to sort this all out. A pin? Some kind of way to... Do you have a pin on now? I don't. Well, then may I ask you, are you meditating now? So, if you had put a pin on earlier, would you have remembered to take it off when you stopped meditating? I think it would act as a reminder to other people so that just in the case that I set the intention... David, I just asked you if you were meditating and you said no.

[84:28]

And then I asked you, if you had put that pin on and you'd stopped meditating, would you have remembered to take the pin off Probably not. So you'd be wearing the pin, and I would be assuming that you're meditating because you have the pin on, but you wouldn't be doing it. So I would be misled by that pin. So that's why I think... I didn't think you were being funny. That's why I think you... To assume that the person's... I'm not saying assume they're meditating. I'm more saying... Be ready for the fact that they might be. Don't assume that they are. But be ready for the fact that they are and be ready for the possibility. Because if you assume they are, you're off balance if they're not. You're not going to be able to respond well if they're not meditating if you assume they are.

[85:31]

I'm saying be ready for that they might be. So I didn't know, really, if you were meditating when you brought it up, so I asked you. Now I ask you again, are you meditating? Huh? You're not. Now I ask you again, would you please meditate now? Okay. Are you meditating now? At these times, it's very tender at these times. There's this face-to-face thing that happens at that time.

[86:38]

So, once again, it's not face-to-face to assume something about the other person. That has a dirty word which describes that. That's not a good thing to do, I say. In my meditative gentleness, I say, it's not good to assume what's going on with somebody else. even to assume a good thing. It's more respectful to wonder and either ask or be open to the possibility that they may be meditating or may not be meditating. But I think a lot of times we may be open to a person meditating, but we're not open to it and taking it into account. And also be open to the person who might not be. Both, I think, would be good. This is called, excuse me for saying so, having a mind like a wall.

[87:48]

This is called, you know, meeting the person in openness. And it's really hard to get skillful at this, but this is a This is an example of it, okay? So should we go to retire now?

[88:16]

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