I will do what I can, if you will bear with me, to shape and contain the discussion somewhat. We'd like to build on what we've been talking about all week and have the people whom we have been teaching participate with us and be available to answer questions as resources, but not to stress their participation so much as to include and elicit ideas from everyone. To begin with, I would like to go around and ask anyone who has some specific question or specific observation to state it. I'll keep track of the questions and use those to frame discussion as we go along. Now, if not everyone needs to say anything, if anyone does wish to say something, I would invite you to be concise.

[01:01]

And then, based on that, I think we can build the discussion for the rest of the day. Our concern has been the development of spiritual practice, Buddhist practice specifically, and the larger framework in which discussion has moved thus far during the conference has been in the context of monasticism, Buddhist ethics generally. For me at least, the principal through-line has been monastic practice. What is it? Is it something accessible to us in the United States? If so, what shape is it likely to take? What can we learn from our own experience to date? What can we learn from traditional experience in Asian countries where Buddhism has been practiced in a monastic way? What are the issues that face us as we seek to develop a community of Buddhist practice in this country?

[02:06]

Those are general questions. What I would like to do now, as I say, is to ask any of you who wishes to state particular questions you may have in mind, which I would like us to consider collectively. And I'm dealing my way along somewhat as we go, as you may notice. But I think this may be a useful endeavor. We've done this somewhat already. My sense is that things may start a bit hesitantly, but by the end of the two and a half or three hours we're together, people are buzzing and buzzing, and there's been quite a bit of fruition in the process. So, with that, I would like to start looking for Nenna. No, I don't need to start. You want to start? No, I'm done. Let me just start here in front of me. Steve, if you wish to say anything, we'll go this way. Yes, actually, as an object of last night's discussion,

[03:09]

we talked a lot about celibacy and its virtues. I'd like to hear some more from us, and also from the teachers who haven't been celibate, what have their virtues been of being in a relationship, and how they've used, or how we've used, relationship as a path, as a way to practice. Last night when we stopped, I was going to ask Katagiri Roshi, but I couldn't. I'll throw it out for everybody. It seems to me that American people are really caught up in the fact that they have rights, and any little sensory delight that they want to fulfill, they feel that they have the right to do that. I just wonder if, culturally, if this pursuit of happiness, it gets drummed into us by the advertising media, over and over again. My credit union has an ad campaign for loans that says,

[04:09]

Taste the Sweet Life. I think we're really... So my question is, is this a major hindrance to developing selfless Buddhist practice in America? Sometimes people talking about the Constitution, they'll point to the pursuit of happiness, and others will wonder, is it the pursuit of happiness, or the happiness of pursuit, which is the... I meant to find the Bill of Rights at my house this morning, but I got caught up doing the dishes. I think we can piece it together for you. I like to see the way that women together practice. It feels that it might be a little different from men's practice that we took over, especially in Zen practice. It feels to me that women might practice a different way together, and so there's a possibility of maybe nunnery, that we can practice together. I'd like to see that happen.

[05:11]

Please don't feel like everybody has to... Let me come back to the sofa. Heather, you're interested? I haven't been here, but I'd like to just ask the place of healing practice in spiritual practice. I was wondering what happened to the... We were going to finish the talk on emptiness. I can't hear you. We were going to finish the talk on emptiness. I think what happened was we decided that the continuation of the talk on emptiness was infinitely extensive, and that we wanted to move to this form, and we may be able to come back to it in time. All right. Let's see. Let's go around the circle on the floor, and then we'll come back around this way. We'll get you a good room back. No, I won't forget to include you with your help.

[06:22]

Oh, good. I passed too. What? No. Did you? Stephen, did you... There's already a lot out on the floor. All right. I'm mostly interested in how practice can support getting through emotional confusion, as well as developing meditation practice, especially in some non-dualistic practice. Because I always train myself very much in thinking about that in terms of there being a boundary between myself and other people. So I don't know some new way of thinking about that

[07:23]

in terms of Buddhist practice. I'd like to hear some people's views on... It seems that there are degrees of situations of discipline that is extremely strict, which you could call a strict monastery. Very cloistered, very definite in its practice, very traditional. And then there seems to be a unit, and perhaps within that there could be a hermitage that's even more solitude, more ultimate. And on the other side of that, there's other kinds of establishments that are kind of in between that, let's say, and the everyday world. And you can think of the traditional church, where people come from the outside and gather, and then leave to go to the outside world.

[08:25]

And then between the church and the monastery, there's some other level there of practice. There seems to be a graduation between totally in the world and totally within spiritual practice. And what is this continuum? And what are some of the parameters of this continuum? What is the importance of this continuum? And is this important to address now in this country? And just one other thought. It seems to me that perhaps the same continuum is within each person. As we go within ourselves, at the bottom there's a hermitage and a monastery, and then you're out into the world. And that this is somehow perhaps a model, an inner model for the external model. This may be a little unfair,

[09:32]

but I wanted to ask Bob if it was appropriate for him to imagine that he had stayed in the monastic Tibetan tradition, and that at some point your abbot or teacher had said to you, it's time for you to go to America and set up a Buddhist sangha. And I understand that America is not Tibet, it's not India, it's not China, it's not Japan, but you have freedom to do what you will in that country that you have some association with. And please go and set up a sangha. And for you to, if there's time and if it's appropriate, to let us know what you might consider doing in setting up a Buddhist sangha in this country. I don't have a strategy for seeding a sangha. I have two questions. They're not completely unrelated.

[10:54]

One is, I'd like Rinpoche to talk to us about Gampopa's fourth dharma, about may the defilements arise as wisdom. And also, I wonder if he could talk about Dakini energy at all. And also, I wonder if he could talk about Gampopa's fourth dharma, both maybe how it relates to that, and also how it functions in a monastic setting. I'm sure it does function in a monastic setting. How do the monks practice with it and when it arises? Gunga, fine. Gunga, what would you like us to talk about? You pass. Let's go.

[11:57]

Quite often, people in this sangha here, Zen Center sangha, want to find some form to express the next step in their commitment to the Buddha way. And many times they think, I want to become a priest to express my commitment to the Buddha way. So, sometimes they do that. And when they do that, that's wonderful for them. And then sometimes some other people say, I want to express my deeper commitment to the Buddha way, but I'm afraid if I become a priest, that therefore, since it's an act on my part to express deeper commitment, that in some sense I will put down people who aren't priests. That if you become a priest to express deeper commitment, in some sense it makes it seem like it's better than being a layperson. So, I would like to hear how we handle this problem, because people want to have some form to express a deeper commitment, but then the people who don't take that form, maybe they're not as good.

[13:01]

So, what do we do there? I'll pass for the moment. Since I'm working on the master plan, I'll pass as far as it needs to be. I'm collecting these things. It's a real thing. Nothing special. Maybe we can address something ordinary. How Zen Center's organizational practice has begun and has continued to now,

[14:25]

I don't know. Monastery is something to do with everybody's aim is one, so people can come together without any question of personal fever, so to speak. So, that is my one basic question. And so, in that line, the person who represents the whole Sangha, internally and externally, has a collective authority

[15:35]

whether the monastery should continue or not. That monastery should continue or not. I greatly appreciate President Abbott and Zen Center allowing us to gather here this time. Without that open-minded personality, we cannot have this kind of open meeting. I appreciate that very, very much.

[16:38]

And other subject is... I'd like to hear about the spirit of monastery, monastic practices. Along that, the rules and precise organizational content within the monastery, which reflect the

[17:46]

society, ordinary people's life, which create the monastery. So, rule of the law or precepts of the monastery, in particular, should have crystal expression of why this monastery has appeared, which was caused by large society in broad. And so, our question, each question, contains the necessary information to the total

[18:55]

who, in another word, who came to practice monastery, present the rule of the monastery. That's my big presentation of the discussion. Never mind. I think I'll figure out what's happening. Never mind. That's sort of the temporal dimension of nomad. Stephanie. I'm interested in how monastery can be a model to the outside world as a way of living in harmony with the environment by way of teaching and practicing ways of restraint, especially in American culture, which is bent on excess.

[20:06]

It seems inevitable in such specialized places as practice places that some have pitfalls. One of them, Rev. San mentioned, about priests feeling special and lots of other things like that. I've been living away from here, and I found the world as a whole to be quite supportive and useful to be out there. And I wonder what other people's experiences are with that, and if it wouldn't be useful for people who stay in a practice place to leave once in a while and have a chance maybe to lose some of these things

[21:14]

we build up in our practice that might not be so useful to us. Good. That's a good question. I'd like to ask Rev. Cochet if he could elaborate a little more on what he was talking about Sunday in terms of Manjushri and also wisdom and freedom or liberation and the necessity to combine sitting or practice with wisdom and scholarly endeavor, which you mentioned was necessary in order to bring them both together.

[22:16]

In your lecture sometimes, you just perhaps mentioned the definitive meaning that comes along. I'd just like to reiterate that I'd like to see the issue of whether it makes more sense in America to have model denominations or whether it makes more sense for us to be integrated in the sexism or what kind of model in regards to practice for women particularly makes sense. I have an impression in China and Japan, I don't know about Tibet, but an impression that the model or the source for ethics was Confucian doctrine and that's why there's very little said directly about ethics in Buddhist writings.

[23:18]

And I was wondering how, I mean, I happen to be a Christian now and the ethics of the Ten Commandments and so on being one specific thing are very intimate, connected with the Christian religion. So there's just some way that this idea of the background of Christian ethics could move in to provide the same kind of background for Buddhism as Confucianism provided in Japan and China. And I take it part of your question is to the assumption that the source of ethics in Japan was Confucian. Yes, yes. And one other question What should be the role of Bruce Lacy for America? That's a small task. Thank you. Oh, thanks.

[24:19]

All right, I don't know who in fact did that, but I've registered now two requests. Three. And there may be more. Yeah, there's a way of looking at Japanese Buddhism as kind of a severely diluted form of the monastic tradition. Having dropped the monastic precepts and the 250 precepts, etc. Which in this case, the situation was pretty grim, it seems to me, in Japan. But there's also the alternative that maybe there's actually a different model, a different archetype in which Japanese Buddhism is affirming. It seems to me that that model might have something to do with King Srimala, might have something to do with Vimalakirti, and Kinshotoku Taiji, and Empress Suika, and Saicho, and Shinran. That's not the monastic model. It's coming from someplace else, maybe. Something to do, I think, with the Bodhisattva tradition. So, I then hesitate to

[25:35]

look upon Japanese Buddhism as that kind of severely diluted remnant of monasticism. One other thing, it seems to me to some degree that Buddhism is a virus. Say, like, Daisetsu Taikara Suzuki, I think, is a kind of virus that got in under a lot of our skin. Krishnamurti, Reverend Suzuki, I don't think of Reverend Suzuki, our founder, as being monastic, trying to find a way to establish a monastic tradition or a lay tradition. But he was a virus that got under a lot of our skin. So, it seems to me, say, like Alan Watts, for me, I got a big dose of virus Alan Watts. A lot of people did. So, it seems to me that virus results in all kinds of things. It results in monasterism.

[26:36]

It results in Buddhist studies at Amherst. It results in all kinds of things. That what we should be working at is that virus. Think of our teachers here today and the virus. Once they get under your skin, there's nothing you can do about it. You just have to let it scratch you. Scratch you. How do we live with this? It's a disease. It's called just scratching. Yes, but I really want to... We've heard a very vigorous defense of the monastic model, the archetype or something like that. I think it needs to be balanced or fulfilled or something like another trust, which I think, in some degree, the Japanese tradition does represent. Well, I know at least one person present has given some pretty serious attention to what we want with characters. That's a good debate.

[27:38]

Yes. All right. I have... My question is right on another subject that we were talking about this morning. My feeling, as I was arguing with Tim, is that we are seeing a degraded form of practice in Japan currently in the family temples. And this is more of what I would call a religious practice. What is called the Bodhisattva way is to me a very typical kind of a church practice. When people come to service, they get rituals performed for births and deaths, and they get some lectures on how to be good as one another, all of which is a tremendous contribution to society and to the general peacekeeping in society, but it is not necessarily this total rooting out of the self and attainment of a vision of ultimate reality that Rinpoche has been presenting to us. But I hear from Kadagiri and from Thich Nhat Hanh and some others of a way in which possibly

[28:41]

we could have this kind of vision but continue our lay practice, and that is to be mindful, living in the instant, to be performing a continuous meditation on the present and on what we're doing as a form of self-development instead of more of an esoteric type of meditation. And my question to Rinpoche was whether or not in the Tibetan tradition this is a valid form of practice, a valid form of meditation, to meditate in the instant, live in the present, and meditate on the manifestation of reality which exists all around you, which is my understanding of it. Thank you. First, I like Monica's question a lot. I would love to hear the first few chapters of Bob's dissertation on the grand plan. On what? On the grand plan. Yes. And that also it seems to me

[29:45]

that Rinpoche has gotten to know us some, and I would be very interested in his initial responses to us and perhaps if you would say something about how he might go about taming the particular kinds of energies that you've seen in this group. Taming. Taming. And in general to me, today I feel like there are a lot of discussions that we can continue to have with each other for months and years. And I'm particularly, I feel very honored and very grateful to have a number of our guests here and I suppose particularly the guests from the farthest away, and I feel it's a very precious opportunity for us to hear from Rinpoche on whatever subject he wants. Emptiness, monasteries, the news, Star Trek,

[30:46]

whatever it happens to be. I've heard a lot of discussion about we and what we should do. I wonder what Rinpoche thinks about that. The idea that maybe it's not we at all, but it's something else. What? I'm sorry. Well, I've heard a lot of discussion today and the days about we and what we should be doing about Buddhism in America and so on and so forth. I wonder about Rinpoche's opinion about maybe it's not we at all, it's completely something else and what that might be. That we don't have anything to do with it. Okay. If I understand your question, there was a metaphysical leap. It's a mystical leap. Sunspots or something like that. Thank you. I was hoping Rinpoche would comment a little further about the heart sutra. Rinpoche talked yesterday about the goals and directions

[31:48]

of the practice in Tibet. I'd be interested to know how monks are actually trained on a daily basis. What kind of schedule they have. Is it optional? When you wake up? When you wake up is it optional? I don't know. Gladys wasn't present that evening at the membership conference. Yeah. We heard that. It's a wonderful take. And I want to know if it included lay practice. And then I'd like to see how Bob's version would differ from the Tibetan exposure. Okay. I can't resist the opportunity

[32:51]

I can't resist, just as a student, in this impressive assembly of teachers to bring up a longstanding question of mine having to do with views, right views. And it seems to me that phenomena arise in a seamless way as it were. And that similarly there is a mind generating view of views that corresponds to this seamless arising of phenomena. And that too often we live in the shadow the very shadow of right views for instead of a non-regressive

[33:53]

or immunizing remember she spoke of this aspect yesterday or the day before instead of that we have imperviousness. This is what I mean. And so I'm very I hunger for some kind of creative non-self some way that I can generate an ongoing non-stopping way right view. I don't know how. Since we have enough to talk about already I would say for me it's been very inspirational to be here this week. And as I feel myself in the American Sangha moving through this not whole this American Sangha

[34:55]

creation not whole that I hope that our patience and our tolerance can stay with us. And we can remember that it's a creation phase that we're in. And somehow maybe gather more frequently in these kinds of assemblies where this is really the issue. The issue that we are moving through in this creative way because it's very inspirational to gather like this. In respect to the form and the function of the Sangha I'd like to hear more that was brought up about the levels of possible for people to make their commitments to the community from the monastic camp to the lay person and what those levels and how they would be structured.

[35:57]

And the second is in respect to I know everything that is taught is in respect to world peace but in the form of outreach or missionaries or Peace Corps or how the Sangha can be active or useful in that way. Just maybe a little bit faster. And the third is a question to Rinpoche regarding women's spiritual development whether he feels that women learn the same or differently as men in spiritual enlightenment in the way of spiritual enlightenment. I'd like to give a third voice to the issue of feminine principles and how to integrate them.

[37:03]

How to integrate feminine principles in practice. Perhaps I could say a bit more about subtle boredom or not so subtle boredom versus I'll put it real simple. Bad boredom versus good boredom or helpful boredom versus structure boredom. I'll pass. I'd like to learn a little bit more about the compatibility of Tantra yoga with the question of celibacy that we were addressing last night. I'd like to quote from the Heart Sutra but in lieu of that I'm quite interested in how

[38:18]

Buddhism coming into this country does not get inundated by Christianity much as Buddhism in Asia got abraded and somewhat crippled by Confucianism. Let me show that. If anyone were concerned about topics for future meetings or conferences on my list Oh yeah. Hey Bill. David, yes? Now I know what you all are talking about. The thought I have is that we have these great teachers here

[39:22]

and it seems to me one thing that this week has pointed to is maybe we should discuss the need for an area to be built in Green Gulch where there could be some sort of cloistered or isolated practice a monastic practice or something like that. I think there's been a a very beneficial friendly coming together of teachers and older students here and I think there should be discussion on whether at this point when we're working on the master plan of Green Gulch if maybe we should think about some little monastery within Green Gulch to carry out to continue a traditional more limited

[40:22]

you know, isolated way within the sort of screwed up way that we do in general here. Well let me suggest for purposes of reference as we proceed wherever we are going to proceed that if you would concur David we simply designate that the cloister. Yeah. So if we say any one of us says cloister we can understand at least for purposes of this conversation what we mean is an isolated situation where some kind of defined practice will occur without so much contact with something else. I put it that way because it still wants a lot of definition. That's what we mean by cloister. In Kadagiri Roshi's language I think it would be called maybe a sodo. I don't know if he's listening. What do you mean? No, I'm newly. Can you not be?

[41:24]

Your voice got this far. Very good. I think it's about about 10.30. All right. What I suggest we do and what we'll proceed to do I think is call these questions up from the top. We will provide time for Rinpoche to talk about the Heart Sutra. I think not before lunch however. I think there's enough on the table. It's crucial for us to delve into this material. This was very much an announced part of the conference and I think in terms of its effect going forward the more pebbles we can drop out the more weapons we have. The initial question was what is the virtue for practice of being in relationship and that was posed in contrast I think to a premise about

[42:27]

the nature of celibacy as not being, at least not being in a sexual relationship. So let me put that under comment. Does anyone including our teachers and everyone else want to comment on that? What is the virtue of being in relationship and what is the virtue of practice? I think we understand very well that our married priests are visiting married priests. They talked about celibacy yesterday. What is the other side of that? We actually have several married priests.

[43:28]

Yesterday we discussed about celibacy. What I want to tell you is not to judge which is better, which is wrong, which is right. Because if you see married life as a priest you can learn a lot from your life with somebody else in your whole life. And also from that point of view I think very deep suffering individually the more you seek for the truth seriously I think you can see you can see how deeply human desire is rooted. That desire is basically coming from

[44:48]

that desire trying to have a relationship with somebody else. It's very difficult to be right in the middle of emptiness completely being aloneness. Aloneness doesn't mean separate from somebody else. Whether in the samsaric world the aloneness is to taste deeply who you are or what a being is very deeply. That kind of thing is very important for us. So if you become a priest and I think if you read deeply the scripture Buddhist teaching it says for a priest to be exactly right in the middle of emptiness and settle yourself within yourself

[45:49]

and practice it and demonstrate human life as a good example to the to the all sentient beings how to live in peace and harmony. This is a priest's mission. If you become a priest this is your mission. But on the other hand in this case I think if you become a priest as a monastic life I think you can see it's very difficult even though I can say so I can say the pure sense of practice I can say with my mouth but practically I accept all sentient beings giving richness to the human life. So

[46:57]

what I wanted to say is from now on I think if you want to develop monastic life or Buddhism in the United States you cannot pay attention to only one side monastic life is fine you cannot say so or celibacy is fine you cannot say so either so you have to pay attention to both of them that's what I wanted to tell you that's why I said I will not present these questions so always individually you have to face directly Buddha's teaching beyond your desire beyond your inconvenience feeling from a desire you have to face directly what the Buddha's teaching is and then you have to reflect upon yourself in the concrete aspect that's why I mentioned Would any of the other

[48:02]

married priests care to comment on this topic? I was going to say any unmarried priest you know I became a priest expecting somehow that I would feel a deeper identity with all sentient beings that was kind of my intent and I was celibate I quit my job and all that sort of stuff and I became a priest I went down to Tassajar and I was celibate somehow I found that I was kind of more isolated than everything I was kind of an isolated monad so to speak so

[49:03]

what I had expected didn't happen later I got married Can you elaborate a little bit on what the nature of the isolation felt, what was the source of the isolation perhaps, what were the circumstances in Tassajar at the time? Well yes not only I found Tassajar to be for example a very normal place and Zen center in general to be a very lonely place so not only where I thought I would feel the most feeling of sisterhood and brotherhood with everybody I didn't find my friends dropped me because I had done strange things I would say they dropped me they just didn't understand of course my relatives didn't understand I'd gone to California or something so

[50:04]

the way I did it anyway, it didn't work at least it's my parts of what I intended later I did get married I feel from that a more of a sense of relatedness with all the deeper sense of relatedness including some sense of giving away myself not to indulge in my mundane desires but literally I'm I'm giving away myself not on purpose it is that way I'm giving away myself so that is closer to the intent of what I originally had, namely the deeper sense of identity than as a windowless monad thank you the reason I ask for more detail

[51:09]

is that I think it will be useful and fruitful for us as we talk today as specific as as we can because I think in looking what our several experiences are looking at that collectively we can really enrich the whole discussion for example what are the circumstances that we're considering a cloister that will work towards creating within the cloister some sense of relationship with the people who were there some sense of companionability I was going to say that I spent a year in Tassajara which was not actually as close to a celibate life for me as spending a few months in India happened to be partly because this culture is so completely energized by sexual imagery and activity that to me it didn't feel so much as if I were practicing with a group of like-minded celibates

[52:09]

say in Tassajara as they did in India and I when Blaine said the other night that she was interested in say a more restricted practice I can really see the advantage of practicing with like-minded people because they obviously bring up all the issues in their practice so I can imagine doing celibate practice much more readily if I in fact had a group of like-minded people because we would say be exploring it much more jointly and I just haven't run into that kind of group yet except maybe in a Catholic monastery but I don't know that I well I became I think I consciously I became a priest I think to be closer to my teacher was the reason why I did it and I didn't understand at the time that becoming

[53:12]

a priest was primarily to save all sentient beings that point didn't strike me so deeply at the beginning I just had this interest to be closer to my teacher but then as I continued to be a priest I found out that that's what it's about and one thing I noticed was that as a single priest as a celibate priest or whatever because there's so many women at Zen Center it was kind of difficult to know what to do and so things got very complicated around my relationship with women as a priest and in many ways what I did is I felt like I got married to clarify my relationship with women and I felt that after I became married that my relationship with women cleared up quite a bit that

[54:13]

they were much cleaner and less fantasy in both directions not necessarily less fantasy but maybe awareness that the fantasy was fantasy was very important and now I've really come to the issue that I don't know which way is best I don't think either way is best or you can say one way is the right way we have to find out and I feel that being married, for me the type of person I am I would like to be in many ways some place where there's just men and no women even come around and I said that to Suzuki Roshi he said, for you that's too easy so maybe someday that will be hard but being married

[55:13]

and having women practice in the temple for me has helped me develop certain areas that I might shy away from if I didn't have to relate with members of the opposite sex in practice so I feel that for me it's been good maybe someday it will be different but so far it's been helpful as we continue on this question let me bring the next question on the list up because I think it really connects very good and Kobo too no

[56:28]

no no now before we can come to real insight about the whole business of relationship of layperson and monk or none we should try to understand the intention of the founder in this regard how these categories actually develop historically and the first thing to understand is that the notion that the monk is higher and the layperson is lower which we find in all the Buddhist cultures this is not something that was made by decree of the Buddha this is something that emerged by which was made by the early laymonks and laypersons monks and nuns and laypersons themselves as they began to define their roles and differentiate between themselves

[57:31]

in the early history of the order this notion of hierarchy between monks and laypeople monastics and laypeople first of all the notion of a monastic emerged from within the large culture, huge culture of India the Buddha did not order people you must become a monastic otherwise no hope type of thing he did not make any such order to people various people themselves in this culture and in that time found that they are felt in a state of stress

[58:33]

and tension and conflict because of being tied to a certain home life because of having responsibility of family and children and labor and work and service and so forth and embeddedness in a certain social fabric found that conflicting with their individual aspiration to transcendence and so forth they then came to the Buddha saying I feel this way and I'm under these pressures and stresses and what can I do and in regard to that the Buddha found in regard to them that it would benefit them if they would become free of certain kinds of concerns to concentrate themselves to other kinds of concerns and that is how he then developed the idea that they could have such a way of living as a monastic this is how it emerged from their need in fact in fact it is the case that if one understands the function of human life

[59:34]

and if one is intent on a certain type of development and understands the idea of development towards long term evolutionary perfection as an individual in relation to many then it is definitely true that in most cases it will be easier to achieve a kind of happiness and there will be a greater intensity and speed of development if one is in a situation where one does not have the immediate concern and responsibility for an immediate family an immediate spouse, immediate children that one does not have this kind of commitment and obligation it definitely enables one to develop a certain level of happiness in this life more easily for example the matter of livelihood becomes much simplified unless attention has to be given to the livelihood of the body of this life then if one has to bear the livelihood of many

[60:35]

as a lay person if one has to bear the livelihood of many as a lay person and therefore a person who decides to put their energy withdraw all their energy from normal short term avenues of satisfaction and short term avenues and short term commitments such as to an immediate family and put their energy into the large scale development of themselves and evolutionary development using this human life for their own evolutionary development in a multi-life perspective with total energy and successfully does that it has been a historical case that such individuals have quickly

[61:37]

and easily achieved a certain type of being and bearing and contribution where it just has come to be that everyone in their society whatever emanates from that person their mere presence is so delightful and so useful I really like to be around them I really like to see that they can represent that to us I rejoice in how they are practicing I rejoice in their type of development and their type of way of being it just has so happened that such individuals have come to represent such kind of banners of peace and joy to the world and social world in which they live it just has happened that way ... and therefore when it says happened naturally as an organic kind of evolution within those societies it has not been

[62:38]

that people in those societies because of some like a burdensome authoritarian order of the Buddha when they see a monk they think oh god now I've got to do duty to put the monk over here and this and that and be hierarchical and creep and crawl and do this it has not been always a case like that it has been that because of this fact in these societies because the monastics have represented a personal representation of a certain coolness, happiness, freedom and bliss that people naturally over the centuries and millennia in these countries when they have met such persons they have thought oh this person is a kind of icon of those goals that I also wish to achieve and a kind of reminder of the possibility of achieving those goals so when I see those persons I want to put them up higher I want them to sit here I want them to be calm and just to radiate and be happy I want to see them up above me a little bit I want them to represent my own higher aspirations so I want to put them up there people doing that out of their own pleasure their own delight in discovering that there can be such human beings

[63:39]

this is how it has developed not because somebody ordered people to behave in such and such a way as some sort of burdensome obligation therefore another point it has been that as Buddha developed a situation where he felt that beings, were they to commit their life in a certain kind of a way could easily achieve a certain stage of development where they would become manifestations of a certain type of peace and selflessness and therefore in that context he didn't want such beings to be isolated from the community he didn't want them to be cloistered away from the community part of the newness of Buddha's monasticism was that they should be closely connected

[64:40]

to the community while not totally in the world also not totally out of the world like the Indian ashrams were for the sadhu types who already existed but sort of right in the suburbs nearby the town where they had to therefore daily go into the town and daily get their sustenance from the lay people so the lay people could enjoy their presence in immediate presence and then give the feedback to the lay people of some sort of exhortation and simply some sort of a presence so that this different kind of life wiring, this different channeling of life energies could be represented very close in the world but not of the world so to speak, neither totally just as another lay person and neither totally out of it as a totally cloistered cloistered hermit Buddha as they call it but something right in between and very close to the world and yet a little out of the world so this was why the Buddha's design of such an institutional niche for these monastics was very, worked out to be very beneficial similarly

[65:46]

it was not at all the case that the Buddha ran out from under the Bodhi tree and rushed in downtown and just sort of made some orders hey, we've got to build a lot of monasteries around here and everybody had to jump and salute and run out and build monasteries, not at all a case like that it was a case that the Buddha was enlightened he was a certain kind of personal presence therefore, and people immediately this own presence through his expressions to others and their requests of him they found it easy to transform themselves into his similar type of presence and this ripple of this kind of presence spread so powerfully through the society that as the lay people approached that and as the kings approached it, they also, they wanted to create some sort of space where that presence could be institutionally sheltered and cultivated and nurtured and therefore they requested, can we do this, can we do this will you come and stay in these buildings if we build them and so forth, and it was the people's wish to have this kind of presence living near them that caused this to happen Buddha did not come in and order build a monastery here and do this and that there to anybody and therefore the difference

[67:01]

between monastics and laypersons between monk and layman between nun and laywomen emerged from the way the people of the society naturally sorted themselves out according to their abilities according to their interconnections with other people according to their understanding and wish to use their life in certain ways this happened naturally as a kind of shake-out of the levels of development and levels of integration and inclination of the people themselves and as far as the differentiation between monastics and laypersons relating to the differentiation between bodhisattvas and non-bodhisattvas the Buddha never made any bones about the fact that irrespective of these institutional forms that developed out of the needs of the people on the level of lay and monastic that the bodhisattva differentiation

[68:01]

which does not come out of immediate social need but comes out of evolutionary stage over the multi-life perspective amongst the two therefore of the four possible types you could have amongst the two of the four possible types namely the non-bodhisattva monastic and the bodhisattva layperson the Buddha was quite clear that the bodhisattva layperson was a higher level of evolutionary development although within that other social matrix by being lay and not monastic there was a level of greater inefficiency in their way of living orientation towards enlightenment but the interesting thing was

[69:02]

that in spite of the fact that the Buddha take the case of Vimalakirti that the Buddha esteems the achievement and the insight and the level of development of a lay bodhisattva such as Vimalakirti and there was no question even in any of the monk's minds about the evolutionary stage of the Vimalakirti being higher than that of many of the monastics who were non-bodhisattvas nevertheless according to the people and their understanding in general of how they oriented to different people and which kind of personal presence they found more beneficial the people still esteemed the monastic as a higher being with a higher bearing giving them a higher benefit and respected them more greatly by virtue of their office if you will by virtue of their station those people even including Vimalakirti Vimalakirti himself bowed to the monastic he liked to scold the monastic about their dualistic views and give them absolute hell this is my footnote but nevertheless Vimalakirti first bowed to that monastic

[70:03]

and afterwards bowed to that monastic and respected him by office completely and laid himself at their feet as a lay person so this kind of subtlety we have to understand that's my footnote but it fits in exactly with what it says the irony of the lay bodhisattva which I wanted to stress is that they are higher in evolutionary development recognized by the Buddha other bodhisattvas, even the monastics and yet within the social notion of creating a set of offices that are most beneficial to the majority of people the people respect the lay bodhisattva less than the monastic irrespective of the individuals evolutionary development because of the general prevalence of the development of the society for example therefore in sutras such as the heart sutra at the head of the heart sutra at the beginning of the heart sutra therefore in all the Mahayana sutras

[71:10]

we see that the way they begin evam maya shrutam kasmin samaye bhagavan this famous way they all begin says thus did I hear upon a certain occasion the Lord Buddha dwelt in Rajagrha in the bamboo park with a great assembly of monastics and a great assembly of bodhisattvas and always the great assembly of monastics is placed first before mention of the great assembly of bodhisattvas even if it is a sutra as in the case of the heart sutra where in fact the teaching is given by bodhisattva nevertheless the monastic sangha is still mentioned first in that sutra of Mahayana which is in fact oriented toward the bodhisattva this is the reason why the monastic sangha is still mentioned first ...

[72:13]

... [...] therefore in fact in the development of the Vinaya during the first six years of the development of the earlier sangha after the Buddha achieved his perfect enlightenment under the Bodhi tree and had his first retreat and then began to teach and so forth for a period of six years there was a natural wave of transformation of individuals and development of natural certain kind of development within the society without the slightest problem without the slightest hitch or sort of anything going wrong or any kind of problem taking place it was just a natural wave or ripple like a stone into a certain water automatically creating a certain kind of structure and so forth as irresistibly by the power of that enlightenment for six years only after six years did there begin to develop certain kind of counter ripples sort of cross feedback

[73:22]

and so forth that then created a certain need for discrimination and situations would arise where then the Buddha had certain kinds of flaws would arise in the behavior of individuals and the Buddha had to say oh this is not good this is as Koban Roshi was saying this was not good this is not how you should behave in the future you shouldn't do like this and from this instance we can derive a rule and a lesson that should be adhered to in the future and the precepts as specific rulings given out by the Buddha's analysis and criticism and discrimination about the action within the society of a certain case out of that developed a rule which became a rule of the Vinaya only organically did that start to develop after six years when there first began to be some sort of back ripples which indicated some sort of problems that required a certain critical evaluation and a ruling and from that year the sixth year

[74:27]

of the Buddha's teaching that is his age of 41 up until the time of his death at his age of 81 there developed specific rulings and specific situations of specific social difficulties social and individual difficulties of individuals both bhikshus and bhikshunis laymen and laywomen where the Buddha then gave certain rulings and these rulings then sort of as if they were added up and recorded and remembered by the people added up to the 252 or three or so rules of the bhikshu order and 350 or 40 some rules of the bhikshuni rule or level of discipline and then there's so many rules for this kind of layperson and so many rules for that kind of layperson this all developed as a kind of precipitation of the actual situation that developed during that next 40 years from 41 to 81 of the Buddha's life and therefore taking after the Buddha had attained

[75:28]

ultimate nirvana parinirvana full liberation and passed from that world that social time and place until after that then the new rules were closed and the basic first sort of set of judgments the set of boundaries and disciplinary things that the Buddha developed in those situations was considered to be the foundation of it was considered to be laid and the later ones that were developed in later situations by later patriarchs and so forth all took as their model what they considered the ideal way of handling a social situation and a social context and being the ideal way being the way that the Buddha himself handled it during those 40 years so the basis from which other judgments later were made of situation and context and individual behavior and so forth was taken to be that set that emerged during the Buddha's own interaction with the social matrix during those 40 years foreign and then in the centuries after that

[76:50]

the fact that while the had had this initial powerful expansion during the Buddha's life and still there was a certain continuous ripple going outward which was a continuing expansion of the sangha the monastic sangha male and female monastics through the society at the same time within some areas of society very much those areas where they had initially first expanded there began to be a sense of dissatisfaction among the laity both the Buddhist laity and the non-Buddhist laity about the contribution of these monastics because in fact certain individuals didn't measure up to what the earlier monastics had represented in that from that place from that niche where the icons as it were of the first arhats had been developed like a niche to put those where they could have maximum radiation kind of where lay people could develop sort of maximum basking in the glow of those monastics because those monastics in fact themselves developed their ability they developed their self-transcendence and self-radiation poorly they used that niche poorly they didn't really they didn't work out

[77:50]

they didn't get there they didn't use they just used the niche to just goof off and therefore there was nothing radiating to the people and people were just serving this empty icon this like this murky cloudy foggy icon and the icon didn't glow to them so they began to think less of it and they began to think what am I putting up this thing it's like glowing nothing to me just gobbling down more and more food and not really doing nothing for it just acting arrogant about it so they began to esteem the institution less and less and look for other models and look for glow and look for kind of example in other places this began to happen over the centuries after the Buddha had gone and therefore nowadays for example

[78:56]

this Holiness the Dalai Lama constantly exhorts the monks and nuns that this is up to you you have to continue to earn your status it is because it never was never said by the Buddha that automatically by wearing a robe of monk or nun and so forth like this you can then allow yourself full scope of arrogance and full scope of I am so great and the people should come and grovel and give me a lot of stuff and if they don't I'll threaten them with hell and wag my finger and say Buddha said and therefore you behave even though I'm a jerk because I have a robe on and if you behave like that you naturally simply become obsolete because the point is the Buddha never made such an order what happened was that certain people had a certain need and they had a certain kind of a way of approach and it became impossible for them to attend certain kind of detail and they were in fact more useful to others by radiating and being free of those details in a certain way and therefore this naturally developed by the pleasure of the people in these people they wanted the people and they wanted to bask in the glow of these people and they put them up in a certain way and they wanted to carry them around on the

[79:58]

top of their head but when the people stopped glowing they didn't want some kind of heavy horrible hat that was like iron and had no luminance to it at all and so then they naturally got tired of it and shuffled it off and so I never made an order that it should be held there like a prison cap but after it had stopped glowing so you guys and you there girls have to keep it up and turn out your hearts inside out for these people if you want to be set up there it will not naturally happen to you nor should you think that it should the Dalai Lama constantly absorbs his monks and nuns in this way no no no now the other point to understand secondly is that we then turn to what did the people turn to

[80:58]

back in the history after the time of Ashoka Lhasa in those centuries when the monastic saga was beginning to deteriorate and people were creeping into the niche and snoozing in the niche and being very dualistic about doing nothing and just hogging on it and people were getting sick and tired of them they then developed this new ideal idea they turned to of the lay bodhisattva the bodhisattva sangha as it's called but here we must not think that the bodhisattva sangha was again someone who just by some sort of automatic evolutionary development could just sit and be like a fat bodhisattva and be big respected while hogging around in the middle of worldly life just as worldly as could be on the contrary the lay bodhisattva had a very difficult discipline the bodhisattva vow as originally elaborated in the original Mahayana sutras has many many precepts has like 18 major and 46 minor precepts and in fact these precepts are even more difficult to keep than the monastic precepts were now not easier to keep it was not that on the social level on the level of restraint of mind and body and speech they had something less to restrain even though they were more developed because of that higher

[82:00]

development they were capable of and they were asked within the Mahayana sutras to maintain a higher level of discipline in fact than the monastics were so we must not think that there's nothing for them to maintain in the way of precepts ... and we know this because

[83:02]

from although these again did not emerge in a certain kind of system in other words when this new ideal became more and more necessary as provided for according to our Mahayana faith provided for by the Buddha's skill and liberative technique the Buddha designed for the evolution to assist the evolution of the society and the people that there were these Mahayana teachings given Mahayana sermons given in assemblies that remained a little less well known in the early time which then Naraduna brought up from another realm where they had been preserved and in these Mahayana sutras in those individual assemblies the Buddha also gave certain rulings over the 40 years of his teaching Mahayana sutras and all these rules were not systematically given out like 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 but they came from all parts of the Mahayana sutras and in the time of Arya Asanga and Nagarjuna starting with Nagarjuna but especially by Arya Asanga from Asanga's time in the 4th century up to Shantideva's time in the 8th century the great masters and analysts of the Mahayana sutras took out from all the vast ocean of Mahayana sutras, aha, this rule just like

[84:04]

earlier out of the Buddha's rulings given in individual cases the monastics took out the 253 precepts of the monastic and the 353 of the female monastic and so many of the lay people, etc. From Asanga's time to Shantideva's time they took out the precepts from the sutra and put them in an order system to make it easy for people to embrace, accept, and remember and use of 18 major root vows of the Bodhisattva male or female lay Bodhisattva or lay or monastic Bodhisattva I suppose you could take both of those simultaneously actually monastic, the greater person to both levels of both monastic and Bodhisattva but anyway 18 major ones and 46 minor ones in the eventual list that developed was finally perfected by the time of Shantideva and so therefore in the context of your discussion which you are all saying and the discussion, the healthy, the wonderful discussion

[85:05]

that you are having about well what should we do? Should we have a monk? Should we have a lay person? Should we have a monastery? Shouldn't we have a monastery? How should we do? How should we do? Which discussion I must confess it is subtleties and details I'm not too well sure that I'm grasping whether or not however you end up both collectively and individually whether you decide to be a Bodhisattva mainly upholding precepts and wish to uphold the standards and the role of being lay person lay man or woman or whether you decide that in addition to that you wish to uphold the monastic precepts as well as the Bodhisattva precepts or whether you decide only to do the monastic precepts that you can't somehow take up the charge of all living beings right away or something like that and can only manage about individual liberation or other roles, whatever you do in fact the value

[86:06]

and the power and the glow of whatever you do either as a group or individual will depend on how much and how intense and how clear your practice as an individual, each of you one by one will be. That still will remain the central thing. How you actually keep your own mind turned, how you keep your own selflessness attuned and view and action and behavior and speech, this is what will be the key of whatever these arrangements you decide to come up with at whatever time. How each individual will turn their own heart inside out and maintain it that way this will be the key of it. Any individual who truly puts to implementation selflessness and compassion that individual whether they decide that their particular network and relativity and interconnectedness

[87:07]

and nonduality with people is best served and they and others purposes best served by being either monastic or being lay or within this context or within that context as well as they maintain in their own inner practice of selflessness and compassion that the more excellent will be their benefit for themselves and others and that will depend upon that individual's inner realization and manifestation of selflessness and compassion. And in fact therefore within that those who wish and who feel and can see how their wisdom of selflessness and universal and messianic compassion of the manifested to the majority and maximum number of people on the visible and invisible levels both and who feel that they can do that best by being carrying as well as bodhisattva commitment also monastic commitment and living in a certain kind of meditative way and living with a certain kind of level of restraint

[88:08]

and level of concentration and so forth as many as can be monastic and as many as can be supported as being a monastic and as many as can glow from within the monastic niche male and female the better for the society the better for them the better for those who know them and support them in fact. And there's for such beings who both can radiate within the messianic internal connection universal interconnection of the bodhisattva and those who can radiate within the monastic notion of the monastic who can do both the more the merrier. It's really excellent something everyone should carry on the crown of their head. No. Uh.

[89:08]

Uh. For example there is a teaching there is a teaching that a monk monks may have a teacher who is a lay person a lay bodhisattva who has real realization and the monk is studying with that bodhisattva as their student as their disciple even and they are revering that bodhisattva and learning from that bodhisattva seem to transform themselves according to the teaching emanating from such a bodhisattva. Nevertheless it is still taught that in a public situation where a number of mixed groups say monks and lay persons are present that in the outset of the teaching even though in general when we receive a teaching from any teacher within the ancient thing it is important to prostrate to that teacher to pay homage and salutation to that teacher initially to express a kind of receptivity to the teaching for a monastic to prostrate to a lay

[90:09]

teacher is forbidden. It is not to be done even though mentally that monastic is to be totally receptive and totally respectful to receiving the teaching of that teacher nevertheless the monastic should not in public prostrate to that teacher. So therefore even though to one's should make prostration to express one's complete receptivity and complete wish to not to resist the teaching and to receive it and fully put it into practice. In that particular case the monk even though that monk wants to prostrate to that lay teacher because they are receiving some very valuable insight for their own development from that teacher they must not do so because then that would confuse the social level of orientation of the different roles in regard to the lay people should therefore prostrate. The monk should salute that teacher in another way and maintain receptivity without publicly doing that by publicly prostrating to a lay teacher.

[91:09]

The reason why they should not do so is that this if they do it will displease the lay assembly. They will not like it. They will feel all the monks my monks have bowed to another lay person over there. They will say that oh if those monks do this to this other layman then this layman is going to become so proud, is going to scold and make trouble to the monks, is going to make everything confused about what is a monk and what is a lay person or we don't like this at all. The other lay people will feel on some level. Therefore even though this would be a case where the lay bodhisattva would not at all

[92:12]

necessarily get ruined or inflated by the monks bowing to them and it's just a necessary preliminary to a teaching which they validly genuinely understand and can transmit even though the monks want to prostrate to them because they want to show their receptivity for the teaching, they want to see their teacher as indivisible from the Buddha which is the best way to receive a teaching because our sensitivity to the unconscious reaction conscious or unconscious reaction of the other lay beings but have emerged due to the needs of the community, due to the embedded experience of the wisdom of people having developed sensitivity to each other and their needs and therefore embed centuries of experience of the most developed kind of most enlightened type of people in very varied types of social situations and therefore are something really to be reckoned with and therefore but because these

[93:14]

developed from the needs of the people at every stage and because in fact one of the elements embedded in these rules was a self transformation of the rules for some principle that principle of the self transformation of the rules in fact was that the rules should continue to modify and adapt to the needs of the people and that is why the Dalai Lama for example constantly praises to all of his people against any kind of conservativistic, criticalistic tendency that begins in them to say that democratic development of ways of living the democratic concept that the people have the power of determining how to live is truly something fantastic is truly something that one should bow to and here I'm adding a footnote and this is why he actually said when he went to Monticello at Jefferson Memorial in Washington D.C. he chuckled and turned to the press who were with him and said I think I must be the reincarnation of this fellow and now I know who was my previous reincarnation and it was this fellow referring to Thomas Jefferson

[94:15]

no and within that for example the kind of principles and procedures and sort of voting systems and democratic ways of coming to decision and taking votes of disciplining another monk or nun who began to misbehave who began to abuse the niche that they were in of honor and respect within a community the way in which these people were brought back into the rule or sometimes dismissed from the monastic community and made to revert to lay status in some sense due to some infractions they had committed, some abuses they had committed this procedure of how this is done how these decisions are made, how the person is treated, how there still remains a certain respect, how it's not too violent but yet it is clear and critical and so forth this is beautiful the whole system devised for that the principle of justice in other words as administered within the Sangha community is itself beautifully designed out of great sensitivity and experience

[95:25]

to the needs of both those against whom the abuses have been committed and those who have committed them with a view to rehabilitating them not just to punishing them and to keep the community moving smoothly serving again the needs of the many in the optimal way so maybe we should leave it there thank you since we can never finish following to the observing and following to the precepts which is a reflection of perfect enlightenment if one devotes their life

[96:26]

to it it causes different qualities of question of nationality and nature of Sangha and the nation in broader sense and I have a this is a question of so precepts

[97:33]

we study I do not talk about struggle between historical religions and world history how to live together on this earth without racial discrimination discrimination beyond the conduct of

[98:37]

beyond conduct of nationalism particularly this country has a already full potential of all races coming together and all religious traditions embedded in each people so out on this chaotic situation

[99:41]

in this particular historic moment it is called struggle it is due to this situation it is very wonderful to hear your expression of how Buddha existed and liberated the people chaotic situation of people in history thank you very much shall I say something else he says that's true this different races and different religions and the tremendous disharmony that has come throughout that historically this was people's

[100:46]

way of thinking being distorted their views being distorted it came from that root and therefore as much as we can understand the way of distorted thinking and the way of distorted and as much as we can correct individually our own outlook and attitude as much as we can do that no matter what all other things will be the better any of these arrangements will work and the better they will be if we're not careful and we don't do it that way and instead we think that oh it's a situation where we should eliminate some race or some nation

[101:47]

and everything should be like one nation and the others should all be squashed and eliminated or whether it's a case where we should eliminate some religion and say that's all been no good and we're going to squash and eliminate it and impose upon it some other religion and promote only the other religion if we proceed in that sort of a way of trying to dominate all the others by one race or religion or trying to dominate all the others by one nation or people if we proceed in that way then it will never come to peace it will never come to harmony it will never work hmm also it's not a question of saying well in order to become harmonious and to become friendly what we should do is eradicate all nationalities and try to pretend that no historical

[102:47]

racial, national, cultural differences have ever existed or we should try to pretend that there are no differences in religions and there are no different kinds of traditions and we should sort of make one big super religion or something like that and mix them all in that super religion these things won't work either for example in this kind of an institution here which is an institution that has developed from the tradition of Zen which has the institutions of Zen and the practice and the tradition of Zen at its heart this kind of institution must absolutely go back to the very heart of Zen find the very core of its tradition and dwelling within that core of the tradition and adapting that core of the tradition to this particular situation that must preserve its lineage and its life in that way it must not abandon that core of its own tradition absolutely not however, it is not at all a question

[103:57]

that however one should take any one particular presentation of the core of that tradition like somebody's version at a particular time or the version that has happened to come to us from somebody and consider that, well that must be the core because somebody told me and never therefore to be allowed to criticize or to examine or to look into it further or to see where this came from or see if that's the core or not the core and to discriminate between what is the core and what is the accidental accretion it is not at all the case that one should just accept a particular dogmatic version that that's the core and then leave that without any further evaluation or examination or adaptation that is not the case, on the other hand this is because even though at the core of all traditions there is something valid there is something imperishable there is something eternal there is something ever valuable there still is the case that by the nature of being interrelated

[104:58]

and connected to human history and faults of humans and different kinds of confusions it is inevitable that any tradition will have useless things that will creep into it and some sort of less impurity and imperfection will come and kind of attach itself to that core, that perfect core and will kind of make it less useful and obscure one's entrance into the core of it and so forth, and it is a continuous process of washing that and cleansing that and removing that that should always also be maintained that is in fact paradoxically always part of the core itself I'm not saying this because I know anything about Zen and sort of have a deep understanding that this and this and that is the nature of Zen I don't I'm just talking in terms of our experience in Tibet and what I know of the different traditions that have existed in Tibet and therefore this kind of examination and investigation

[106:06]

is something that you should all very much dedicate yourself to consulting with and seeking the deep advice of those who themselves are scholars and historians and who have deep knowledge of the Zen tradition and its history and its interaction with its different societies comparing also all of the different things that they say and by examining them yourself this very elaborate process that you should deeply be devoted to No No it's not No Why is that? That is because in the interests of harmony in the world, among traditions, within traditions among people, within people in this interest of this this is now the time in the world

[107:07]

in this sort of chaotic situation that you refer to in what we call the soup in Tibet in this kind of situation the process of evaluating and analysis and gaining insight through comparing and looking at principle and context and relativities and so forth this is the time when that is of crucial value and of crucial importance And also that means that if we don't do that that there's a great day if we don't do that and we just become attached to our own traditions and we say this is Buddhism, this is great there's no need to examine, there's nothing to say there's nothing to do, we'll just go ahead stubbornly this way and that way then there's a tremendous danger that there will be tremendous dissatisfaction and we will cause by pretending that whatever our version is, is Buddhism that we will draw down upon Buddhism itself and upon Zen itself

[108:07]

or upon Tibetan itself or upon Christianity itself, or whatever it is great criticism, we will present something unsatisfactory to people, we will cause people to think that the great source of health and happiness is in fact some damaging and corrupt and useless thing, and this will be great disservice on our part And so today of our assembly here and our discussion here if we remember to make that some kind of essential import and essential impact and something that we carry to move us in our further life and investigation and insight and study, it will be wonderful No No No No No And I think for example

[109:07]

that in fact in the nature of Buddhist history, the fact that there developed clear demarcation between the monastic male and female and the lay male and female that this did develop systematically in the different cultures throughout history I basically feel that at the heart of this through its way of development and how it served and can serve people, it's something very positive and something very beneficial, I do feel that Hmm And similarly, it is something that if the lay people truly understand really what it takes to be a monk or a nun and what is involved in being a monk or a nun and if they therefore, if people become monks or nuns clearly understanding that and especially if the lay people clearly understand that I feel that it will emerge naturally as something that no lay people will in fact, who have such understanding will resent at all. They will think well, I'm being lay, that's my role

[110:09]

and I'm doing that, but I love it that those people are being monks and nuns It's so helpful to me, the fact that they themselves maintain a certain kind of monastic rigor and a nun rigor and a male and female monastic rigor It's something, I love it, it's nothing they will feel as a strain or a burden and nemesis but it's something they will be absolutely delighted that there are beings who wish to do that and they will feel totally served and benefited on invisible and visible levels by that fact, I feel it will come through understanding, in fact If they don't know exactly what is the meaning of it and how it emerged and how it serves then it will be such that it will seem, what's the use of being a monk, actually maybe it's better that everybody shouldn't be a monk, natural people will think that I don't want to be a monk No Then there is a great danger that something that was embedded

[111:11]

by the Lord our teacher of this history, Shakyamuni through his great struggle and his great peak of evolutionary achievement embedding in his own biography the example of himself having achieved perfect enlightenment and thoroughly finished his job completely, nevertheless maintaining as a social role, being a monk himself his life long something about our attitude today will be that therefore we will think Ah, he kind of blew it Ah, he was sort of backward there Ah, useless kind of thing, what we call a repudiation of Dharma will arise to us which will cause us great ill In fact, if we look at the history according to our history when Shakyamuni Buddha spoke to the group of five the five ascetics who were his first disciples in the Deer Park in Sarnath in Varanasi and he spoke to them of the four truths

[112:13]

and he went through the thing of the four truths as insight dawned upon them in fact without any formality without any like this and that and looking up which precept and what naturally their robes changed their hair flew off they were automatically became, entered into the homeless state with all of his signs and marks effortlessly almost magically we could say It wasn't at all that they said Oh Buddha, four noble truths, all interesting all great, now wait a minute Buddha shall we be monks, shall we be lay people how shall we do, can you look it up please in the library, what shall we do is it better here or is it there, what is the situation and so forth, there was no need at all as their enlightenment and their arhatship dawned and their mind burst into the sunlight of freedom they automatically became monks this is how it happened according to our view and so we Buddhists, it's something that

[113:14]

in spite of all of our role of examination and all of our need to adapt and so forth it's something that we should never block our ears to and block our vision of those particular moments of history if we don't know about this, if we don't understand this then it's definite that in any kind of society where there will always be hierarchies and this person better than this and that and this kind of thing, that there will always be conflict over those hierarchies and structures and there will always be confusion about it and things will never work out no matter what arrangements one makes so that's all I think in light of the response that first question was pretty good did people tell me that I should say something after 12 o'clock or something after lunch was this about the hardship or something I thought what we might do is spend some time after lunch if Bishay is willing is that what you want here?

[114:16]

yes, yes it is if you want me to say something I think it might be better that I talk rather than a model heart sutra about brahmacharya that's because you all are talking so much about this issue about lay and monastic and about how can I stay with women how can I stay without women how can women stay with us how can women stay without us and all this, how should we sit together shouldn't we sit together there seems to be so much discussion about this I think therefore the more I can tell you about some other views of that issue the better it will be, the more helpful it will be it seems to me

[115:16]

we should always try to say what is useful to people and not what is useless but if we talk about the business of emptiness about the heart sutra if we don't talk about it for a really long time then it's something really hard to really get an understanding of so I think it will maybe be less beneficial I just wanted to tell

[116:21]

I wanted to plead with Rinpoche that forgetting about the heart sutra which then we go into the ocean of pratyaparamita that's what he's hesitating about jumping into the cold water over here at the beach we did say we would go through either the foundation of all excellence or the three principles the three principles of the path one of these notions of the complete lamrim and even if he does a tiny thing on the one or two verses that are there on what is called right view or view of reality, view of emptiness it's sad to have left just that last part the most important of the three principles of the path the one on shortness and emptiness and left it completely out I won that concession if you don't mind can you make a better about Brahmacharya? the weather is so good so if we could gather under the tree or something that would be great Grandson

[117:21]

that would be great that's what I like to think I don't think we can do it on the front lawn we might be able to do it on the garden lawn ha [...] there's no pizza time now Kelly that's my opinion we'll have to ask them it's society, come on in the shade down there no Tibetans don't like to be too much in the sun maybe Jacks people would want to join us I don't know anyway we can start in the garden

[118:24]

we have another ten minutes here let me suggest we do at least consider the next question and then this afternoon we can start with the Rinpoche wants to say and we'll go from there no no now the next question I think does really connect to what we were just talking about it was the question what do we do in the United States where there is so much advertising in particular that urges some entitlement to the sweet life almost a duty to how do we deal with that because it may seem to be a real hindrance to practice we're talking about relationships with each other the relationship between husband and wife

[119:24]

husband and wife lover and lover this is a question that strikes me it goes to our relationship to the material aspects and urgings of the culture in which we live which we may perceive as a hindrance how can we use that to develop virtuous practice the question is how do we respond to the inducements particularly which come to us from advertising to live the sweet life how do we respond in terms of the development of virtuous practice isn't all that a hindrance the advertising will go on

[120:38]

let me make a couple of announcements then we will break for people who haven't signed to be on the mailing list for the mailing list mailing list mailing list for the mailing list

[120:52]

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