I want to comment on the beginning of Dogen Zenji's Gakudo Yojinshu, which is translated variously as Guidelines for Studying the Way. guidelines for Steadying the Way is divided into ten sections and I'm going to comment on the first section. The first section, Dogen, outlines as

[01:27]

you should arouse the thought of enlightenment or the need to arouse the thought of enlightenment as a requisite for entering away. So Dogen says, The thought of enlightenment has many names, but they all refer to one and the same mind. Ancestor Nagarjuna said, the mind that fully sees into the uncertain world of birth and death is called the thought of enlightenment. So he says the thought of enlightenment has many names. but the mind that fully sees into birth and death or into how everything arises and disappears.

[02:38]

This is called the thought of enlightenment. The thought of enlightenment has many names and There are many ways that we think about enlightenment. Often we think about enlightenment as a turn-on or a big flash of light. But he says, seeing into the uncertainty is the thought of enlightenment. In other words, to penetrate the reality of our life and death is the thought of enlightenment.

[03:41]

Or it's called impermanence. Understanding impermanence Or you could also say understanding birth and death as no birth and no death is enlightenment. You could also say that enlightenment is the norm. Buddha always, Shakyamuni Buddha in the Sutras, always talks about enlightenment as the norm. He doesn't talk about enlightenment. He talks about just understanding the norm, which may or may not be normal. Our normal way of understanding is dualistic.

[04:51]

But Shakyamuni Buddha always talks about abiding in the norm, meaning reality. So he says, Ancestor Nargajuna, who is the 14th ancestor, said, the mind that fully sees into the uncertain world of birth and death is called the thought of enlightenment. Thus, if we maintain this mind, this mind can become the thought of enlightenment. Indeed, when you understand discontinuity or transiency or impermanence, the notion of ego or self does not come into being or does not arise.

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The notion of self or being or ego arises when we don't understand the notion of impermanence or discontinuity. So when you understand transiency, or impermanence, the notion of self or ego does not come into being, does not arise, and ideas of name and gain do not arise. When we understand who we really are, there's no need to try to be famous or to gain anything. As a matter of fact, rather than to gain anything, our effort becomes how to let go of everything, how to neither attach nor reject anything.

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When we have this mind, when we have this understanding, then we neither grasp for things, grasp at things, and we don't reject anything. we let life freely come and go because we neither crave life nor crave death. So this is through the understanding of birth and death or how things arise and cease. When we have this understanding, We no longer cling to life and we no longer, neither cling to life nor wish for it to be over, but merely abide in the present without anxiety or great desire.

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So he says, fearing the swift passage of sunlight, sounds like a contradiction. Practice the way as though saving your head from fire. Reflecting on this ephemeral life, make endeavor in the manner of Buddha raising his foot. There's a story. in the sense of something that happened. But there's a story about in a former life, Buddha, Shakyamuni Buddha was inspired by another Buddha. And In order to pay respect to this Buddha, he stood on his tiptoes for seven days reciting a sutra.

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This is used as an example of wholehearted endeavor to do something. These kinds of extreme Examples are sometimes cited in Buddhism as examples of striving to find the truth. So then Dogen goes on and he says, when you hear the song of praise sung by a Kinara god or a Kalavika bird, let it be as the evening breeze brushing against your ears. If you see the beautiful face of Mao King or Xi Xi, let it be like the morning dew drops coming into your sight. Freedom from the ties of sound and form naturally accords with the essence of the way-seeking mind.

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A Kinara bird or a Kalavinka bird These represent the fountainhead of music. These birds are legendary birds, which are the source of music. And they sing very captivating songs, maybe like the sirens. Not exactly like the sirens, but he says, sounds because beautiful sounds are just ephemeral no matter how beautiful they are. In other words, don't get stuck here in this place. It's easy to get stuck here in this place because the world is very seductive. So he says even if you hear these wonderful seductive sounds, don't get caught by them.

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And if you see the beautiful face of Mao King or Xi Xi, these are famous courtesans in China, ancient China, very beautiful. And he says, don't get caught by those either. Don't get caught by anything. Don't get caught by the beauty of the world. It's a very beautiful place sometimes. But behind this beauty is what? the world also wears a mask of beauty. And it's so easy to be caught by our own image in the mask. It's one thing to be able to appreciate beautiful sounds and beautiful sights and beautiful people and wonderful things.

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To appreciate them is good and correct, but don't be caught by anything. That's what he's saying. It's like the fresh breeze. It's like the fresh breeze blowing against your cheek. You can appreciate this wonderful cool breeze blowing by your cheek, but Don't crave it. Don't run after it. And he says, if in the past or present you hear about students of small learning or people with limited views, often they have fallen into the pit of fame and profit and have forever missed the Buddha way in their life. what a pity, how regrettable, we should not ignore this. In Dogen's time, I think one thing we have to remember, Dogen lived in the 13th century in Japan, and he was a reformer.

[14:11]

And he had studied Buddhism in Japan, in the Tendai, Buddhism came to Japan quite early and had been already there many hundreds of years before Dogen. But the Buddhism of Japan was mostly for the aristocracy and was very steeped in literature. And Dogen really had a hard time finding good teacher and what he felt was pure dharma, pure teaching. He felt that there were no really good teachers in Japan and the Buddhist monks and priests were just trying to make a name for themselves.

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Like when a religion becomes established, then you have a lot of people becoming priests in order to become famous or to make a living or to be well thought of. So this is what he's kind of complaining about, saying, don't do it for this reason. So the only reason for becoming a priest or practicing the Dharma is for the sake of the Dharma. So Dogen was actually persecuted quite a bit by the established schools of Buddhism in Japan at his time when he came back from his understanding from his teacher, Rui Jing.

[16:32]

And he came back to establish his Zen school in Japan. And so he had lots of complaints. And a lot of this is directed scholars of the time. So he says, just doing this for fame and profit, you miss the whole thing. So he says, even if you read the sutras of the expedient or complete teaching or transmit the scriptures of the exoteric or esoteric schools without throwing away name and gain, it cannot be called arousing the thought of enlightenment. So for arousing the thought of enlightenment, this is the most important thing for Dogon.

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The complete teaching. In Buddhist scriptures, there's the complete teaching and the expedient teaching. And the Tendai school and various other schools categorized all the sutras and teachings and classified them. or complete, and the Lotus Sutra, the Avatamsaka Sutra, and Prajnaparamita were called the complete teachings. Sometimes just the Lotus Sutra is called the complete teaching, and the rest are provisional And then he goes on to criticize or point out a problem of studying certain teachings without having the fundamental

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desire for practice. So he says, some of those people who study these scriptures and who become famous through expounding these scriptures say, the thought of enlightenment is the mind of supreme perfect enlightenment. Do not be concerned with the cultivation of fame or profit. Some of them say, the thought of enlightenment is the insight that each thought contains 3,000 realms. Some of them say, the thought of enlightenment is the Dharmagate. Each thought is unborn. Some of them say, the thought of enlightenment is the mind of entering the Buddha realm. All these are actually true teachings of Buddhism. Such people do not yet know and mistakenly slander the thought of enlightenment bare remote from the Buddha way. So this is a little confusing. He's not saying that these teachings are wrong.

[20:00]

He's saying that, well, I'll read a little more. Try to reflect on the mind concerned only with your own gain. Does this one thought blend with the nature and attributes of the 3000 realms? Does this one thought realize the Dharmagate of being unborn? There is only the deluded thought of greed for name and love of gain. There is nothing which could be taken as the thought of enlightenment. From ancient times, sages have attained the way and realized dharma. Although as an expedient teaching, they lived ordinary lives, still they had no distorted thought of fame or profit, not even attached to dharma. How could they have worldly attachment? The thought of enlightenment, as was mentioned, is the mind which sees into impermanence. This is the most fundamental, and not at all the same as the mind pointed to by confused people. The understanding that each thought is unborn, or the insight that each thought contains three thousand realms, is excellent practice after arousing the thought of enlightenment.

[21:10]

This should not be mistaken. I was talking to yesterday to Carl Bielfeld, who teaches Buddhism at Stanford, an old friend of mine. And we were talking about a sutra, a platform sutra, which he was going to teach at Page Street. And we were talking about how he was going to go about doing it. And he was talking about the students at Stanford. He said, who are scholars. And he said, it's much different when you're teaching this to students of Buddhism than when you're teaching it to scholars in college because the sutra just points to something. And there are big gaps.

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in a sutra. The sutra doesn't explain how you do something. It just inspires you to do it. It kind of points out something, some encouragement to look in a certain direction, but it doesn't tell you how to do it. And this kind of baffled him for a long time, because sometimes he complains about, well, like a meditation sutra of Dogen. He says, I can't find where Dogen says how to do it. Really, how to do it. And of course not. It's not in the sutra. The sutra is a great help. The text is a great help, but it has to be accompanied by a context and a teacher. You can't get it from the book. So for the students there are these big gaps.

[23:18]

For the scholars there are these big gaps. And if you try to tell the students about practice, even though you tell them what practice is about, they still don't know. They have no idea what practice is. You can't know until you actually engage in practice what practice is. It can't be explained. So this is kind of what Dogen is talking about. These are wonderful practices after you understand what practice is. But just to expound them, Buddhist teaching is so lofty that it attracts many philosophers and scholars. very attractive because it's so lofty and such wonderful philosophy. But that's on top of, it's not the fundamental thing.

[24:25]

You can't get along on just that kind of food. It's like, I don't want to say It kind of parallels, you know. It may nourish the mind, but it doesn't nourish the... It will not sustain you. But in conjunction with practice, it's quite wonderful. After we practice, we should study. And sometimes study introduces us to practice. That's good. Study introduces us to practice. And then we should just practice. And then when we have a good foundation of practice, then we should study again. And when you study again, your understanding illuminates the Citra. And then you say, oh, I understand that.

[25:31]

When you sit the Sheen for seven days and then read the Citra, It's an altogether different experience. You completely understand it. And then two weeks later, you read it again. You don't quite get it. So Dogen says, just forget yourself for now and practice inwardly. This is one with the thought of enlightenment. We see that the 62 views are based on self. The 62 views are referred to Buddha's time. In Buddha's time there were many philosophers and philosophies around. It was actually quite a wonderful time

[26:34]

because it was a time when people were really thinking about what life was about and the philosophers were always engaging each other in dialogue and there were many, many philosophers who came to talk to Shakyamuni Buddha And he would always point out to them where the flaws in their thinking were. And these came to be known as the 62 Views, 62 Views. And they're actually in a sutra. There's a sutra called the 62 Views where Buddha points out the flaws in their thinking. And the flaws range from The biggest problems with most of these ways of thinking is either they fell into the soul theory, which proclaimed that there was a permanent soul that continued forever, or the nihilistic theory, which said that there was nothing happening after death.

[27:55]

So these are the two extremes. And most of these views fell So, when we see that the 62 views are based on self, these views are just based on the notion of a permanent self, or no self, or either eternalism or annihilation. And understanding of Buddhadharma is neither eternalism nor annihilation. but because there's no self that exists to be either permanent or annihilated. It is there.

[28:58]

So when a notion of self arises, sit quietly and contemplate it. What is this self? This is Buddhadharma. We do this, except that we don't say, what is this self? We just let go of it. Is there a real basis inside or outside your body now? Your body, with hair and skin, is just inherited from your father and mother. From beginning to end, a drop of blood or lymph is empty. So none of these things are the self. What about mind, thought, awareness and knowledge? Or the breath going in and out, which ties a lifetime together? What is it after all? None of these are the self either.

[29:59]

How could you be attached to any of them? Deluded people are attached to them and enlightened people are free of them. You figure there is self where there is no self. You attach to birth where there is no birth. You did not practice the Buddha way, which should be practiced. You did not cut off the worldly mind, which should be cut off. Avoiding the true teaching and pursuing the groundless teaching, how could you not be mistaken? It's easy to, or it's possible to practice Buddhadharma without really understanding what Buddhadharma is about. Buddhadharma is about investigating the self in order to let go of the self, in order to understand what it is and what it isn't.

[31:05]

So Dogen talks about the mind of enlightenment and worldly mind. We all live in this world. Everyone lives in this world, whether we have worldly mind or enlightened mind. But enlightened mind is the mind which sees into the arising and falling of phenomena. and into its cause, and mostly into the cause of suffering. What is the cause of our suffering? And Shakyamuni Buddha says, The cause of our suffering is wanting things to be the way they're not.

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But why are they not the way we want them to be? Why are things not the way we want them to be? There are good and bad events in this world, but the fact of what we see in front of our eyes always is the arising and falling of phenomena in this world. And so it gives rise to the thought of birth and death. When we see the arising and falling of everything in this world, it gives rise to the thought of birth and death.

[33:54]

And because we have the idea of a self, which is just an idea that we have, we think there is a self that arises and a self that ceases. But in Buddhadharma, there is no permanent self. For most of us, we're either ego-centered or human-centered or But in Buddhadharma, Buddhadharma is all being-centered. So when we identify only with ourself, that's ego-centered.

[34:58]

When we identify with human beings, that's human-centered. When we identify with birth and death, that's arising and ceasing centered. But to be identified with all being is to be free of sense of self. It's called to be one with Buddha nature. Buddha nature is all being. It means that We're not centered around anything, but everything is a part of everything. When we understand the no-self, then we realize that everything is part of everything.

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Nothing is gained and nothing is lost. Nothing arises and nothing disappears. because there's nothing to begin with, although we feel that there's something. So there's I and you, me, and we have our life. But it's important to see the reality of this life. Not just the illusion. So to be worldly is to be caught by the importance of the world. To seek fame and gain and to create a kind of

[37:06]

From beginning to end, our life is transient and unstable and not fixed. There's nothing fixed. We're not fixed around anything. They're just elements that come together and create a life, so-called life. But all these elements are all being life. Life is quite sacred. All being is quite sacred. So, the question is, if I have no self, who am I? If there is no self, who am I? What is myself? Do you have any questions?

[38:43]

Susan? When you say identify, what do you mean? What? When you say we identify with an ego, life and birth, or life and death. To identify with ego means to be self-centered. It means the whole world revolves around me. This is me, and everything else is an object. That's self-centeredness. Human-centered means, as humans, the whole world revolves around human beings, and everything else is an object. So these are very narrow views.

[39:55]

If we understand all being, or if we identify with all being, then we can realize myself as a center, and we can also but not the center. The center of the universe is right here, but it's not only right here. So being ego-centered means the center of the universe is right here, but it's not someplace else. So sometimes when I'm weeding, I'm creating a disaster. When you're doing what? When I'm weeding. Weeding? Weeding. I see. I'm tearing everything up.

[40:58]

Insects are running for their lives. It's a nightmare. And when I see them running, I feel some of their fear. But is that centered around me? Because you have some empathy with their feeling. But it's still my projection of what they're feeling. Right. It's your feeling. You can have that. Thank you. It's your feeling. But your feeling for them, because they're not separate from you. Even though they're bugs and you're a person, that's a kind of separation. because they're there and you can feel them, you're not separate. But are they really feeling matters or projection when I'm seeing?

[42:03]

It doesn't matter. Matters to them? No, matters to them. There is something that matters to them. But the universe So, we're creating what they feel. But that's okay. It's important to identify with all being. Those are bugs. This is me pulling up the weeds and those are the bugs. The bugs are myself. And the weeds are myself. And this person is myself. But it's not only this person is myself. The bugs are also myself.

[43:07]

The weeds are also myself. Because then it makes some responsibility for tearing up their little homes. That's right. It gives us some responsibility. It means that we have to have responsibility. It makes it more complicated. We have to be more careful. And instead of tearing up the world, we have to take care of it. Because the world is ourselves. That's what we have to realize. I'm not just a person in this world. The world arises with my consciousness. You said that being is sacred.

[44:17]

Does that exist outside of our mind? Or is that just a choice that we make to say that? Otherwise, when you realize a whole being, then it's sacred. That's a kind of strange word. It's maybe not strange, but... More than our thoughts will reach.

[45:43]

Greater than our thoughts will reach. The totality of our being. take care of. But sometimes taking care of is to destroy, because everything is constantly being destroyed. Everything that arises is constantly being destroyed. But there are certain ways that we think are good ways for it to be destroyed, and certain ways that we think are not such good ways for it to be destroyed. since we're in this human form, or since we are expressions of our enormous self as human beings, this is where we have to take, where we have to act out this life.

[46:59]

So we act out life as human beings. That's our chore, our task, is to act out life as human beings. enormous self has to be acted out in small details. The previous question, question and answer, reminded me a little of, I don't know the person's name, but some Zen teacher said, in response to And so he got something which was something like, what does it mean to subjectively know the feeling of hot water? And he was told that something was like to subjectively know the feeling of hot water.

[48:12]

And his response was, I know the feeling of hot water, but what is it? Does it mean to subjectively know? It can be. Is the self necessary for the sacredness of all beings to be apprehended? Is the self necessary for the sake of all beings?

[49:13]

Well, for the sake of all beings to be apprehended. Is it, like once you said it was necessary for us to experience Buddha, for Buddha to be realized in this world. Is it the same for sacredness of all being? Yeah. Self is And so it's not that we should try to get rid of this in order to see all being. But I hope we just shouldn't interfere with what it does and sees and apprehends. As long as we don't interfere, this is called getting rid of ego.

[50:22]

You can't get rid of ego. Just don't interfere with seeing everything as it is. To return to your earlier remarks about being human So it's a little hard not to be human-centered, as you remind us. But maybe you would say just a little more about how precious it is to have a human expression of Buddha nature, and where else it is Buddha nature.

[51:32]

Hungry spirits, hungry ghosts live? Hungry ghosts live right here. Right here in this room. This is where the hungry ghosts live. Ghosts, you know, are disembodied spirits. Dis what? Ghosts. Ghosts are disembodied spirits. They haven't really found it, a place to really settle. So until you find a place to settle, I don't know about any other realms.

[52:57]

But I do agree with you. Human life is very precious and is an expression of total life. Total life is expressed as a human being. You should appreciate it. It's quite rare, actually, to be born as a human being and to be able to enjoy this expression of total being as a human being. So, you know, when we bow, what do we bow to? say, we bow to ourselves.

[54:05]

When we say, I bow to myself, it means I bow to a total being, not some ego self, but a total being. This is what bowing is. But we can also bow to an ant, or a dog, or a cat. because that dog or that cat is total being, buddha nature. So, you can say we're buddha nature centered, except that buddha nature is not a thing. So the main practice of Zen is to drop self-centeredness or selfish mind.

[55:44]

Very simple. But sometimes we need all these words in order to be able to say that. to find our self, big self, true self. But they're not two different things. And we need our small self in order to do that. So, we can appreciate total life in each act. When we're enlightened, we can appreciate the totality of life in each act.

[56:53]

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