Good morning everyone. Welcome. So again this morning I would like to speak about Zazen and read a comment about Zazen from one of my Dharma sisters. But first I I feel compelled to speak about the horrible terrorist attack in Charlottesville, Virginia yesterday. The, what to say, alt-right, KKK, neo-Nazi, white supremacy terrorism in Charlottesville. yesterday. Not an isolated incident.

[01:03]

I don't know what's going on there today. Last week there was an attack against a Muslim mosque in Minnesota. So we have domestic terrorism and hate and We don't know yet how many people were killed yesterday, but this white supremacy terrorism is now with us. And it's part of a movement of hatred against clearly against African-American people, against immigrants, against Latino people, Hispanics, against LGBTQ people, against women.

[02:19]

So we need to look at this hatred, not just hatred, but violent, violent attacks based on this hatred, this violence that is now present in our country and beyond. Last week I spoke about the anniversary of Hiroshima. And this is not irrelevant. Our country now is threatening nuclear war. Part of the violence in our country is a product of our national budget being devoted to military and weapons and violence and militarism and at the expense

[03:56]

education, healthcare, infrastructure, job opportunities. Our government is now pushing for immigration that will only be for white people, white English speaking people. This is, so we need to speak out against this, so I'm expressing that. For those of you so inclined, there's a demonstration today, well, there are demonstrations all around the country, but at one o'clock at Michigan in Randolph, there's a demonstration against all of this hatred and for equality. And again, this hatred is being spread by our government now.

[05:12]

So I'm not sure what else to say except that our practice is about connectedness and inclusion and the opposite of hatred. Trying to stop this ignorance that allows this kind of hatred to spread. So one of our precepts is to benefit all beings.

[06:30]

And we chant in the Metta Sutra, may all beings be happy. Our practice is about including all beings. As well as attacks against blacks and immigrants and refugees from the wars that we have created or helped create in South and Central America and in the Mideast, and from the climate damage that our country and government has created, there's now attacks against women and women's reproductive rights and healthcare. And I want to talk about that because I've been looking at, for a project I've been working on, looking at Japanese history and our Japanese Buddhist history.

[07:32]

So this kind of persecution is not unique to our time, and particularly persecution of women is not unique to our time. Right now, there are people in our government who are attacking women's reproductive rights and wanting to ban contraception even. In Japanese history, and in most of the history of the last few thousand years, patriarchal culture has persisted. And it's really a wonderful thing that in American Buddhism, Western Buddhism now, there are many women teachers and women priests.

[08:35]

So I want to talk about something from this wonderful book, The Hidden Lamp. Both of the editors, Florence Kaplow and Susan Moon, are old friends who have visited Ancient Dragon. And they've unearthed some of the history of great women practitioners in India, China, and Japan, and also the commentary by modern women teachers, Buddhist teachers. So the commentary is even more wonderful than the old stories. But I wanted to talk about something in Japanese history. In 1285, Kakusan Shido, the widow of a shogun, Hojo Takemune, set up a convent, a women's temple, Tokeiji, in Kamakura, the center of Rinzai-zen, a little south of Tokyo.

[10:02]

It was called Edo then. And it was a sanctuary for women, and particularly for women who wanted divorce, because divorce was illegal then. So for women who wanted to get free from abusive husbands, in Japanese, in Japan. So, particularly in the Edo period, 1600 to 1867, this served as a sanctuary. So, the idea of sanctuary is relevant now. There are sanctuary churches and sanctuary centers in the Chicago area now for immigrants and refugees who are fearing deportation. and for children who are fearing deportation.

[11:05]

Tokeji served as a sanctuary Women couldn't get divorced, but if they could get to Tokai-ji, and there was one other temple like this a little north of Tokyo, if they could get to Tokai-ji and enter and stay there for a few years, they would be able to receive a divorce. given the whole of Japan, this was a very small number, but still, this is an example of something to be saved from abuse and violence. So, this kind of violence that happened yesterday in Charlottesville, Virginia.

[12:16]

I thought, was curious, has anybody else here been to Charlottesville, Virginia? Oh yeah, did you live in Charlottesville? Yeah. Oh, so that must have been very poignant for you. Yeah, Charlottesville's a beautiful place. Yeah, horrible what happened there yesterday. And I don't know what's going on there today. And this, these alt-right terrorists who are supported by some of the people in our administration now. It's just horrible. Anyway, so I just, I wanted to talk about Tokaiji and how this is an example of a sanctuary from violence in the Japanese Zen tradition. And there was a tradition of poetry from Tokeiji.

[13:24]

There were volumes of poetry by women at Tokeiji. For a long period of time, men were not allowed in Tokeiji. It was really a sanctuary for women escaping from violence. But I wanted to read one story in The Hidden Lamp. So this book is a wonderful resource which has many stories and then comments by modern teachers. So the convent of Tokeji had a great mirror. The founding abbess, Kakusan Shido, would meditate before it in order to see into her own nature. So this is not our usual practice, but there has been at times the practice of sitting and literally facing a mirror. Later generations of nuns would practice zazen in front of the mirror, concentrating on the question, where is a single feeling, a single thought in the mirror image at which I gaze?

[14:35]

Each abbess of Tokeji wrote a verse in response to this mirror practice. The following verse was composed by the fifth abbess, Princess Yodo. And the verse is, heart unclouded, heart clouded, standing or falling, it is still the same body. So sometimes our heart is unclouded. Sometimes it is very clouded. Standing, falling, still the same body. And I want to read the reflection on this by Zenju Earthland Manual. who is a kind of Dharma sister of mine. She's a successor of Blanche Hartman, who was my Shuso teacher. But just to say a little bit about this first, we face the wall in our Zazen practice.

[15:40]

And in some, even though it's not literally a mirror, in some way, this practice of just sitting upright but relaxed facing the wall is facing a mirror, seeing ourself. One basic Zazen instruction is turn the light to shine within. So we look at ourselves. We're seeing everything that happens as we sit facing the wall is this body-mind, clouded or unclouded, sleepy, alert, mind shattering away, moments of calm, a settledness. moments of agitation, emotions arising.

[16:44]

We sit and face the wall. We face ourselves. In the course of a period, like the period we just sat, various things arise. And the practice is just to pay attention. Mirror, mirror on the wall. Who's the fairest Buddha of all? Well, you've got the one sitting on your seat. The wall is also a window. So our practice is not to build walls to keep people out. We're not interested in building walls on all the borders to keep out Mexicans or Muslims or whomever. We're not trying to build walls to keep out the bad thoughts. So we only have, you know, there's some ideas of, you know, some new age ideas of meditation that we should only have beautiful thoughts.

[17:54]

We want to keep out all the yucky thoughts. But actually sitting facing the wall, facing the mirror, facing the window into all beings, You know, all beings are here on our cushions, on our seat. Everybody you've ever known, and even those you haven't known. All the people in Charlottesville, Virginia yesterday and today who went to protest against hate and neo-Nazis, but even the neo-Nazis and the deluded, ignorant, hate-filled people Can we see them too? Can we see our culture of violence and Virginia is, what do they call it, an open gun carry state? But how do we see the violence, the impulses to lash out in our own hearts?

[19:14]

It's there, you know. If people can do that, if there can be Ku Klux Klan and neo-Nazis and people who hate so viciously, It's part of being a human being that that's possible. So, you know, do we kind of, do we keep that, do we build walls to keep them out too? Do we deport all of the neo-Nazis? I don't know, how do we make peace with All beings, all beings. I heard John on the radio this week singing, all you need is love. I kind of still believe that, somehow.

[20:23]

Maybe that's just me. Maybe that's an old-fashioned, archaic idea. I don't know. But I think that's kind of what we come to in our practice. Facing the mirror, facing the window, facing all beings. And yet, you know, we have a government that should be stopping violence, stopping hate speech, stopping that, instead of encouraging it. So I want to read what Zen Jew Earthland Manual says, but also I was going to read something from this, but maybe I won't. But I'll just mention Ruth Ozeki was here last fall, who wrote that wonderful book, A Tale for the Time Being, also about Japanese Buddhism and bullying. Dogen and Zazen, and she wrote this little book called The Face, A Time Code, and she did a practice of spending three hours, she's a writer and a Zen priest, and she did this practice.

[21:44]

It's a little book, but I recommend it. She spent three hours facing a mirror and reflecting on her original face and the face she saw. And so it's this little book of comments on three hours of just sitting in front of a mirror, looking at her face. Strange practice, but it's really interesting. So, Zen Jew Arthur Manuel did it differently. She did a practice of looking into the mirror Well, I'll read it to you. And I thought it's a little funny for me to read this, because it's very personal. And she's speaking as an African-American woman. And I'm not African-American, and I'm not a woman. But I want to read it as she says it.

[22:45]

So she's reflecting on Kakuzan Shido and this practice that took Keiichi at this women's sanctuary in old Japan where they had sanctuary and looked into this mirror. and concentrated on the question, where is a single feeling, a single thought in the mirror image at which I gaze? So Zenju says, where is a single feeling, a single thought in the mirror image at which I gaze? When we ask this question, at once we enter the purpose of our lives, which is to look upon our lives and discover who we are as living beings. We enter a dark abyss in which we encounter our heart, mind, and body. On the journey of discovery, we fall through the sky. At times, the sky is clouded, and at other times, it is unclouded.

[23:55]

On the earth, we plant our feet, and still we stumble. What are the clouds, and what takes them away? What makes us stand or fall? Looking into a mirror may seem easy, but being honest with what we see is difficult. A few days before my 59th birthday, I looked into the mirror to see if I looked old. I asked, am I old? What is old? I did this exercise for five minutes a day for seven days. So that's a different way of doing it. On the first day, I didn't see anything because I was afraid of seeing an old lady. My eyes constantly turned away. On the second day, I spent time plucking the hairs from my chin. I could see them clearly, the white hairs against my dark skin. They provided a nice distraction. On the third day, I thought I should grow my hair longer so that the thinning parts would disappear.

[24:58]

I remembered my mother's hair thinning in the same places when she was my age. Still, I didn't want to see my mother in me, nor see an old lady in myself. On the fourth day, as I looked in the mirror, I wondered what an old lady looked like. So I spent much of my day examining women as I walked in the world, deciding who looked old and who didn't. On the fifth day, I decided I must be old because my neck skin was beginning to sag like I had seen in the so-called old women the day before. On the sixth day, I cried in front of the mirror. I felt I had no control of my stumbling into old age. I felt my death was closer than ever before. On the seventh day, I saw fear and the tightness of my lips, confusion in the brow. I thought, what a tough journey life was. Then I looked deeper, without an idea in my head, just the question, what is old?

[25:58]

And I saw a courageous woman willing at least to look at herself. There are many mirrors. A physical mirror can reveal expressions on our faces. The mirror of zazen, of sitting meditation, allows us to look into the heart and body mirror. So I'm gonna pause there and comment. Part of this practice, and she's describing it, is the courage just to look at ourselves. It takes guts to just show up on your seat and face the wall and face yourself. And whatever shows up, just to be there with it. not to only have beautiful thoughts although you know sometimes beautiful thoughts come and that's great and we should enjoy that and we can settle and feel the wholeness of just being here and Zazen gives us that as a gift but also then there's the yucky stuff you know our own tendencies towards hate and anger and

[27:14]

the people we hate. Maybe it's not Muslims or blacks or, you know, whatever. Maybe we hate the people who hate. Maybe we hate the neo-Nazis and the Ku Klux Klan people. Maybe they're easy to hate. I don't know. Anyway. How do we face it all? So, Earthland Manual says she saw a courageous woman willing to at least to look at herself. Then she says, when I look in a mirror, I see a black face. In the past, I have responded to being black with painful emotions. However, through Zazen, when I see my black face, I am awake to the suffering that arises. I see the old pain rising in the moment of looking in the mirror. I want for my response to pass, as it is guaranteed to do. And in that passing, I see more of who I am and not so much how I appear. When we face the mirror of Zazen, our minds tend to face ourselves as objects first.

[28:23]

Our skin color, age, gender, sexual orientation, all the ways we are embodied and move in the world, we begin to unfold stories about I. So yes, we all have our ways of identifying ourselves. And if we sat facing the wall and it was literally a mirror, we would see all those things, those characteristics, those stories about ourself. Anyway, Berthelin continues, if we are willing to look long enough in the mirror of Zazen, past seeing ourselves as objects, we have the potential to see that we are nature itself, we are born and will die, just as the trees, flowers, and animals in the wild do. And sometimes in Zazen, we can see that the mirror is clear. There are no clouds, no dust. The human condition is set aside.

[29:24]

I'm not old, middle-aged, or young. I am fulfilled in my own spirit. And in this recognition, I feel the connection to my ancestors, to those who came before me, or to a life larger than my own. I am returned to an open field in which there are many possibilities. So we also all have this openness to other possibilities besides our stories. Ursula continues, this open field is my original home where there is no blackness, no old age. As Princess Yoda wrote, heart unclouded, heart clouded, standing or falling, it is still the same body. I say, in the silence of my open field, face clear or face colorful, dancing or sitting, it is still the same body. And there's a little capping phrase from Florence and Susan that says, what do you see when you look in the mirror?

[30:26]

Are you there? So this is our zazen, and this is our practice of facing all of it. The stories about ourself, our horror at the terrorism, domestic terrorism, white supremacy terrorism in our world, our confusion about how do we respond, what do we do, our uncertainty about who am I, how shall I be in the world, What am I doing here? What is this life? Changing, changing, changing every week, every day, every year.

[31:33]

Getting older, getting older. So I do relate to Earthlin talking about getting old. I'm older than she is. But how do we feel right now? How does it feel? What are the new things in our life? Today, this week, this year, how do we meet them? Who is this person? on your seat. Look in the mirror of Zazen. What do you see? How is the next breath? How do we encourage caring instead of hatred?

[32:42]

How do we respond to the terrorism of our country. So there's lots more to say. I'm going to let some of you say it. Comments, responses, questions, please feel free. Any response? Yes, hi. Yeah, yeah, well said.

[34:25]

Yes, fear. The people who are attacking non-white people are afraid that they're going to lose something from all the others. So there's this fear. Yeah. How do we see that we don't have to live in fear? That there's a way to be in the world that has to do with sharing rather than killing, attacking. Yeah, thank you. And we all, you know, we all can get into that place of fear. Other, thank you, other comments.

[35:28]

Sid. I really appreciate that comment. I really appreciate your talk as well. Thank you. The chapter about tables made me kiss stories. Right. pain and our own anger and throw ourselves into that instead of running away. And it's scary because it's easy to first come up with a reaction.

[36:32]

So yeah, and you were, I think, referring to facing it inside of us, but I also want to say something about all the people who showed up in Charlottesville yesterday to say no to hate, to say no to the Neo-Nazis and Ku Klux Klan, and I keep looking to see who, the name of the woman who was killed, and there may be more, because there's five or six people in critical condition. They haven't released that yet, but I just, you know, I appreciate all those people who went there to say no to that for all of us. Other reflections, comments? Questions?

[38:06]

But also just to say yes to what you said, Sid, that we have to, we face that within, for ourselves, each of us, in all of the different responses that we each have. Yes. Yes? Aisha? Actually, my first, maybe my second reaction was to have a feeling of, you know, this is like, we've kind of clocked back 50 or 60 years, and it reminded me of some of the things that happened really 50 or 60 years ago, and some of the movements that came out

[39:26]

rights and gay rights. And I don't mean to be like a gloomy predictor, but I think I immediately worry about is this just the first of many such situations. And knowing that or thinking that or remembering that this could be something that's very widespread for the science, how can we heal that situation maybe here, right now, since we, here's where we are, and here's where we can start, and sort of thinking about what is hiding below the surface here in Chicago that we can access. well there's so much going on in Chicago and it's so complicated and it's, you know, there's

[40:34]

It's hard to know where to start, but being aware. I mean, I do think it's, you know, for us, our work, we're looking within, that Sid was referring to, is what we have to offer to it. But then, for anyone who wants to go down to Michigan and Randolph at one o'clock and join that demonstration, to be there in a center non angry but centered way will help that event be more productive because there are angry people on all sides. And there are various ways to help and there are, somebody was here earlier talking about immigrant children, refugees who are in various centers around Chicago who need pastoral care and who face deportation, perhaps.

[41:50]

And so there are ways that people here can help. So we have to, I think maybe we can, maybe this is something, Alex, for the Promotion and Outreach Committee to work on more assiduously. But they're also, you know, we have a widespread sangha from Evanston to Hyde Park to the western suburbs and beyond. There's lots of things going on in various places in Chicago. So I think that level of trying to be helpful is also something that we should attend to, can attend to. as a diverse, small lay Sangha. If anybody knows of things that other people can help with as a Sangha project, that would be great. Yes, Claire, welcome back.

[42:55]

Yes. who skipped shortly after dropping the shot. Thank you.

[44:45]

Yes, patience is one of the, maybe the most important part of our practice. We learn patience by sitting, you know, just sitting, waiting, sitting. But it's not passive. as you were saying, it's actually attentive and receiving but actively, responsively. So how do we watch all of this but be ready to respond, ready to accept? Refusing something is a way of accepting it. Yeah, thank you for that. So I have to accept that it's time to stop this part of the morning event, so we will.

[45:36]

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