Well, maybe I'm going to talk with... I guess it's on now. Good morning. Good morning, kids. Good morning, kids. Good morning. Well, I thought I would tell you a story today. This is a... It's an old story that comes from the Buddhist tradition. And... I hope you'll find it interesting, we'll see. The name of the story is The Dog's Tooth. We all know that dogs have teeth, right? Those teeth are very precious to the dogs. So, a long time ago, more than a thousand years ago, there was a young man, a Chinese trader, who left his home, he lived near the sea and he traveled all the way up the Yellow River.

[01:09]

And when he reached the end of the river, he traveled many, many more miles all along what was called the Silk Road. The Silk Road was a famous trading road that led from China to India and to what is now the Middle East. And he traveled all this way with just a few servants and horses. But before leaving, his mother asked him to bring her back a precious relic from India, which is the land of the Buddha. It's because his family was a Buddhist family. Do you know what a relic is? Does anyone? So a relic, in some cultures, they treasure the bones of an ancestor, or the teeth of an ancestor, or the hairs of an ancestor, and they put them on their altar, because those relics, those are called relics, they're supposed to have some of the precious

[02:24]

essence of holy women and men. So his mother, who was very devout, asked him to bring her a precious relic from the land of the Buddha. So he said he would. And he went and made this long, long trip. It took him months. He did this every year. It took him about half the year to get there and back and to do his business return home to China with horses that are laden full of precious spices and silks and herbs and brocaded cloth actually cloth I was thinking as I was opening my sutra cover caught, this is silk, it's a brown shiny silk and then it's kind of brocaded like that, see? It's really, it's pretty neat, pretty beautiful. So he brought these back to China from India and the Middle East.

[03:29]

He got all the way back and he got to the entrance to the courtyard to his house and I forgot the relic. He forgot what his mother had asked. Nobody's ever done that, right? You never forgot anything your mother asked. You did? And you're willing to confess it here? Right. So he went to his mother and he bowed down very deeply and he apologized. And she, of course, being a kind mother, forgave him. And he said, I'll remember next time. That's a setup, right? So several months later, he goes back out, sailing down the Yellow River, traveling along the Silk Route, visiting all of his friends and the people he did business with along the way.

[04:34]

buying again silks and brocades and spices. And he makes the long trip back and he gets to the entrance to the courtyard of his house and, oh no, I forgot again. Oh, this is terrible. So again, he goes in He apologizes to his mother, he bows down to his mother as low as he can get and he apologizes to her and again she forgives him. Very kind mother. So a few months later he goes back out again. And same deal, sailing down the river, schlepping across the Silk Route, buying all this stuff. It's very valuable. His business is very good. Everything is great. Gets back to the courtyard and, oh, no.

[05:37]

And did you ever hear in California we have a law that's called three strikes and you're out? So he thought he's really in big trouble this time. And he just was really, he was really upset with himself. You know, how could he forget his mother that way? He was really upset. And he looked down and there in the dust, almost underneath his horse's feet by the side of the road, there was the jawbone of a wild dog. Now in China and Tibet and parts of Asia, they have a lot of dogs and they're not like, you know, they're not like so nicely groomed with collars and little coats and, you know, very friendly. They're kind of, some of them are kind of angry and snarly and pretty wild and they run wild. They, you know, they don't necessarily have a home and sometimes they die just by the side of the road and people leave them.

[06:44]

So he saw the jawbone. And he noticed there was a tooth, there were a few teeth in this jawbone. So he got off his horse and he goes, and he yanks one of the teeth. out of the jawbone and he takes on his clothes and he rubs it up so it kind of shines a little even though it's kind of brown and gnarly because you know what dogs eat. They eat bones, they eat garbage, they eat whatever they can get. So his teeth had gotten a lot of work. So it was kind of brown and gnarly but he polished it up as best as he could and then he went and he found a beautiful piece of brocaded cloth. And he wrapped it very carefully. And when he came in, he presented it to his mother. And she was very, very happy because he said, Mother, I have brought you all the way from the land of the Buddha

[07:52]

this precious tooth that belonged to the Buddha's wisest disciple, Shariputra. That's actually his name. And this was a tooth of Shariputra. It's a little weird. But it's no weirder. When you lose your teeth, do you put it under your pillow sometimes? Do any of you do that? It's the same kind of thing. What? You never lost a tooth? That's right. I guarantee you will lose a tooth. It's part of the deal of having a body. You'll see. So anyway, he tells her, this is a tooth belonging to the Buddhas. Why is this disciple Shariputra? And she is really, really happy. He lets it lie there for the moment, but vows to himself that he will replace it.

[09:00]

But he's a very busy guy, and his mind is kind of on his business, like some of ours. he has to now, he's come back from the silk route in India, he has to go and sell all the stuff that he's bought. So he tells his mother he's going to go out to the markets in the neighboring cities and he's going to come back in a month. So he does, and his business is very successful. He sells all the spices and herbs and silks and brocaded cloth and he comes back about a month later. And when he gets to the courtyard, He sees something strange because there's all of these crowds of people in the courtyard and there are monks and nuns and pilgrims and neighbors who he recognizes and strangers who he doesn't recognize and he's really worried.

[10:07]

Although they seem like they're in a really good mood. It's not like something bad happened. But he's worried. He jumps off his horse. He ties it up. He runs in the house. And there, next to her old altar, he sees his mother just sitting next to the altar, just so happy, beaming with joy. And when she sees him, she gets really excited and she leaps up and says, my son, you have come back just in time. Look, look, look. And she points to that tooth, an old brown tooth on the brocaded cloth. And from that tooth, just like that, actually, just like Henry was just doing. Can you do that again? Shine the light on me. Yeah, so just like that, beams of light were coming out of the tooth, and it rippled across the room, and people were owing and eyeing and bowing down, and the son thinks, wow, she's got a real, genuine, holy relic.

[11:18]

Mother, where did you get this precious object? And she looked at him really strangely, And she said, my son, this is the tooth of Shariputra that you brought me a month ago. Remember? How could you forget the holy relic that you carried all that way across the Silk Route and down the Yellow River? I'm surprised. You know what this is. And he looked closer and he looked again. And he realized, yep, this was the dog's tooth that he found right outside the courtyard. There was no doubt about it. But even as he looked at the tooth, a beam of light leapt up from the tooth and it shined through the open window.

[12:21]

And he looked and he could see it reflecting as a bright spot on the very surface of the moon. Wow. So without having a further thought, just naturally, he fell to the floor and bowed down to this holy object, this precious relic. So in the end, a mother's great faith turned a dog's tooth into a priceless relic, the relic of an ancestor who himself had great faith. And how this happened is a real mystery, don't you think? So that's the story. I wonder... I wonder, do you have any, are there any thoughts, anything comes to you about this story?

[13:24]

It put you to sleep. Did you ever forget to tell your mother, did you ever forget something that your mother was going to ask you to bring for her? No. You didn't. So Leo didn't and Mira did. I don't remember. Don't remember. Well, let me ask you another question. Do you think Do you think he was telling a lie to his mother? What do you think, Malcolm? And do you think that was a lie that... Was there a good reason? Was there a purpose? Was it okay to tell that lie? How come? Okay, here's the question. Who fooled who?

[14:28]

Did he fool her into thinking this was a precious thing? Or did she not fool everybody, but did she actually make it a precious thing? How? What do you think did that? What? The lie, hmm. This is a deep discussion here. Did you ever have anything really plain, really ordinary that was very precious to you? Something you found? Leo? What? Yes, good answer. What? What was it? What?

[15:33]

A stick? Just a plain old stick? That you felt was very special? And so do you think it was special? Yeah. Well that tooth was special. Even though it came from a very plain place. So maybe that's a good place to end so you can think about that story and just think about that boy traveling all that way and think about the power of a mother's faith, what that does. And think about not just the mother's faith, but do you have that power within you? I actually think you do. I think you do. Let's have an argument. Thank you very much. We'll see you guys.

[16:42]

Well, I think the same questions apply. I would ask the same questions of you, but let me talk a little about this story. The more I thought about this story, the more interesting it was to me. There's a couple of different elements. One, in just a sort of practical, everyday sense of how our lives go is just to notice how busy we are and how we forget the things that we vowed to do, the things that we promised people, the things that really truly we want to do and then we get caught up in our habits or the things that we think we have to take care of, really often our business, our job, business and busyness have, they're pretty close to each other, right?

[18:27]

And we forget the things that are truly important. So I think that's, you know, that's something to consider in this story on a very straightforward level. But the more I thought about it, the more I felt like what I came to was that this is a story about alchemy. Alchemy is you know a matter of transformation and transformation or alchemy in the sense as the expression of bodhicitta. the workings of the mind in the direction of enlightenment.

[19:31]

Sometimes it's spoken of as the thought of enlightenment. So I was talking with Lori last night. We were talking about how hard it is for us to change. Often how stuck each of us is in the way we are, the way we think about things, the way we do things, the way we live. If you look at our governments, you see how stuck they are in their patterns. And if we can return to bodhicitta, there'd be a lot more flexibility and freedom. So when Dogen, in this practice, zazen is the expression of bodhicitta.

[20:39]

The way Dogen Zenji, founder of our lineage, talks about talks about zazen as what he called practice realization or practice actualization. So you know usually people think of meditating in order to become enlightened and I think for many of us we've heard over and over again that the way Dogen and Suzuki Roshi and Sojin Roshi formulate our practice, actually we practice because we are enlightened. Our enlightenment is the expression, our practice, our zazen is the expression of our enlightened nature. It's the expression of, our practice is

[21:46]

raising the thought of enlightenment, as Dogen says, is looking deeply into the nature of impermanence, the nature of change. It's recognizing that the practice that we're doing is The practice of Zazen and the larger container of Zen, Zen life, is alchemy. So alchemy has an ancient tradition that cuts across all cultures. You found it in ancient Egypt, Persia, in India, in Mesopotamia, which is that's Iraq, right? Japan, Korea, China, Greece and Rome and then of course in the Middle Ages in Europe.

[22:56]

And the goal of these alchemists who were in many ways the closest thing to scientists that they had in an era that was say you could call it pre-scientific but maybe not this was science was the transmutation of very common elements and things metals into something as precious so you know we've kind of reduced it to the transformation of lead into gold but there were other there were other many many other dimensions of alchemy one was to find a universal cure a panacea the elixir of life that would heal all of the illnesses that we have and that would prolong our lives indefinitely.

[24:06]

And actually you find a lot of that in the Taoist, the Chinese Taoist tradition. So that was another very strong function of these alchemists. And another one was to to discover, and I think this is also a sort of proto-scientific approach, a universal solvent. Some substance or fluid within which everything else could be dissolved and then could be extracted, refined, distilled, and, you know, recreated in pure form. so that was another it was another goal of alchemists and then when you get to the earliest early 20th century you find the Carl Jung you know this a seminal psychoanalyst wrote extensively researched and wrote extensively about alchemy as as an expression of

[25:21]

kind of blending of spiritual and psychological awakening that this is the process that's going on within all of us unless of course it gets stuck someplace and I think this is very akin to bodhicitta to raising the thought of enlightenment. So in this practice what we do, and I think most of you know what you experience as you're sitting here. The question is, can we take it out into the world, into our lives, into our relationships, intimate ones, daily ones, distant ones. Can we transform the common base or even uncomfortable elements of our afflictive emotions into their something that is their true nature their ground which is enlightenment this is

[26:47]

this practice, dimly seen and sometimes hardly felt, it's this process. Because, you know, we're also living with this, we're living with this conundrum, you know, what is base and what is Shariputra's tooth precious? You know in a way if you really if you look at it in a if you look at it in a way as an expression of evolutionary biophysics perhaps they're both a miracle. Shariputra's tooth is no more a they're made of the same stuff, they came about, they took form and function over thousands and thousands and thousands of years.

[28:05]

What is to make one more precious than the other except what we invest in it? So you know a couple of Zen contradiction that we can live with as a koan because that's actually our practice. I think this is one of the wonderful things about Zen is it teaches us how to sit still in the middle of things that are apparently contradictory. We're pulling in different directions. How can they both how can we recognize, acknowledge the truth that exists in both, in say, dare I say, two sides. So, you know, you have a Zen expression which, it's like it's in my head, I'm not, I don't think I ever quite found the source of it, but in all the world,

[29:21]

there's nowhere to spit, or it might be in all the world there's nowhere to piss, which is to say, if the whole world is holy, where would you do something thoughtless as a kind of act of defilement? Is there such a place? The whole world is holy. There's not a holy land. The holy land is everywhere. The holy land is right here. It's in the tangle of blackberry bushes and old cars and junk in Dee's yard next door. It's down in the city dump. It's everywhere. So that's one side. The other side that we simultaneously live with in Zazen and in our life is in Bodhidharma's response to Emperor Wu.

[30:38]

When Emperor Wu was asking about all the great things he's done, what's the nature of the world, Bodhidharma said, Emptiness, nothing holy. Nothing is precious. Yeah, I was trying to find, I think Lori probably, what's the line from the Shoyu Roku from that verse, if you raise the idea of holiness, you will succumb to all errors. That's right, if you raise the idea of holiness, you will succumb to all errors. Which is, that's really good. That's really useful. And we see the world in flames exactly because of that. Can we step away from that? So this is, and I think that this is a story about alchemy and the power of it.

[31:48]

the power of her faith and her devotion and literally the transformative mind energy that she felt. The mother in this story changes a dog's unimaginably beautiful and potent so that it shines, so that a beam of light leaps from it and shines and reflects on the moon. What is that power? Is there something that she has And then the power of that transformation as well is it transforms her son.

[32:59]

He knows where the tooth came from and yet he sees what it has become. The story doesn't go on but I suspect that really changes him. So this is a very dramatic, and this is a dramatic narrative that who knows how much truth there is in it. I'll bet something like this happened, although maybe it didn't give off beams of light, we don't know. But I think that the question for us is, How do we do this? How do we become alchemists, sitting on our cushions, walking through our day, meeting those whom we do and don't get along with?

[34:11]

all of the afflictive difficult emotions that naturally they tend to bubble up on us I don't know naturally natural is a trick word I think but they tend to bubble up how do we turn those those emotions desire and anger into great love what is the methodology of this transformation? And maybe it's to indulge here in a bit of proselytizing, but the only thing I know is Azen. That's the only thing that's worked, but I don't know it because I have some blind faith in it. The only, I know it because That's what I work with.

[35:22]

It's not that there isn't any other way. I'm sure there are many other ways, many other paths in countless religions and practices. But I think that everybody is in this room because you have some glimmering, at least, oh, this could work. And I want to put in the effort. And I think that this is, you know, as I was thinking about it, I really came to this, so there's this transformational element in alchemy, the transformation of things that are base or common into things that are precious. We can see that. But I also think this, that third element kind of goal of the alchemist is very interesting and that'll sort of be my last point I think this the notion that the looking for a universal solvent so sitting down accepting sitting down in an upright posture with a breath

[36:44]

that lets your full energy go and come, dying and reawakening. Within that, within the river of thoughts and feelings that flow through us just as we're sitting, this mysterious Every bit as mysterious as anything in that story, this mysterious process of Zazen is as close to the universal solvent as I know. When I'm in trouble with myself, I sit down. I don't know what else to do. I may not even want to sit down.

[37:46]

It's like anything but that, and I don't know why. I don't know why one tends to resist the things that one knows works, but I'm sure everybody has this experience. But if I will sit down, if I will find myself upright and breathing, there will be some Ooh, this is bad. I may find some salvation. Sorry. I'm sorry. I told you. I won't necessarily find a solution. I told you this would be the last thing. But, you know, and I must say, some things are more immediately, some things dissolve relatively quickly, and some things have, you know, a real diamond-like or adamantine strength, and they don't wanna go away so easily.

[39:12]

So that's fine. And when that's the case, all I can do is try this and come back again and again. But I have some faith in this alchemical process. And I know you're all trying. So maybe we don't need any more preaching. So a little time for questions, answer, discussion. I'll leave it there. Does anyone? Yeah, Donna. I was struck by the mother's role in that story and the power of her faith and love in both that alchemical process Good, that's good.

[40:15]

Well, I think that there's an incredible mystery, some of us have read over time, I think it's called the General Theory of Love, is that right? Where it talks about limbic resonance. you know, the mysterious connection without any wires or plumbing between parents, children, actually between all mammals and maybe between all beings, where we adjust each other. We take care, we have the capability of taking care of each other in this great mysterious way of actually adjusting each other's metabolism and state of mind and I think that's the function of the Metta Sutta and of doing that practice. That's what the monks in Burma were chanting as they were being beaten by the Burmese military because they have faith in that transformative power.

[42:00]

Michael? I thought the mother recognized that it was an old dark truth and that her acts of acceptance and forgiveness is what transformed the truth. And that may well be. Yeah. I thought it would be a better story when he came Yeah, well, that's like, yeah. That's like my favorite version of the Zen joke. You know, the joke, a man goes to a hot dog vendor, says, make me one with everything. So my version of the joke is, make me a hot dog with everything. But yeah, it could be. Right. Yeah. I was thinking along with the transformation is also a continuation of the ability of both the son and possibly the mother to also have to grapple with this lie and this delusion

[43:32]

at the same time of this other amazing thing. I can't imagine that. I was thinking about the precept across the line of delusion. And we know how much karma that can happen from that. We've been sold a war. And yet, there's not the precept. Don't buy the line of delusion either. Yeah, I mean she didn't have, she wasn't, she may have been, as Michael said, we don't know what her awareness was about what was going on. There are dimensions to this that we can't unpack. And that's precisely what, that's what you work with. That's what a story, you let a story work on you. what I feel in the power of the mother in this story is that the transformative energy that she invests in therefore brings forth from the tooth enables him to turn whatever

[44:56]

kind of pulling a hoax because he sees, oh well I did that but look, look what it has become because of her. And that is also a power that we have inherent within each of us even as we meet someone else's delusion, someone else's intentional delusion or unconscious delusion. I don't think his motivation was so bad in this but No, no. What I was trying to do was to savor that part of the necessity. We love the punchline, right? We love getting to the good part of the cake. But he still has to hang out with that other piece. And that's pretty good. And that's our work on the cushion. Right. So I think what he has to hang out with to me is How was it that I forgot those other all three times?

[46:08]

And what vow and intention comes forward from that? Seeing not, oh, I got away with it, but something can change because I'm in relationship. Something can change even within that. So one more question, Ross. That's actually exactly what we were talking about, is the challenge of meeting both oneself, not separating oneself from another person, recognizing that whatever stuck propensities or places

[47:25]

one may see in another person, there are at least analogs in oneself. And in relationship to that person, being willing to keep returning, not abandoning, turning towards without purpose, in a sense. you might have a hope or wish, but the wish is not like I want you to change or I want me to change. The wish is I wish it didn't hurt so much. Can I just be there with you so in that moment it doesn't hurt so much. That's all I wish. Not that you should be some other way or I should be some other way, but just that It's not so much about one's behavior as an inquiry into suffering and liberation.

[48:37]

Does that respond to your question? Yeah. Okay. Well, thank you very much. We can talk outside. It's beautiful. What month are we in? It's getting to be spring, March. It's almost spring. Thank you.

[48:53]

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