It's my pleasure to introduce today's speaker, who is Seishi Tetsudo Ross Blum, who is familiar to many of us. His Dharma name means pure determination, penetrate the way. And I think he's been demonstrating that for quite a long time now. He was born and grew up in Virginia and lived in New York State when he was between the ages of 18 and 33 in Syracuse and in the big city. He studied and began to work as a photographer, but grew less interested in that with time and then studied to become a school teacher. But right around the time he started doing that, he discovered Zen practice in 1984 and decided that would be the center of his life. So he began practicing at the Zen community of New York, where the teacher is Bernie Glassman. And then in 1987, sort of a quick sequence of events.

[01:11]

He moved out to California and received that Raksu, which he had sown in New York, but he was ordained here, and so he received a farming name from Sojin. And that was in June of 87, and he moved into Berkeley Zen Center right around the same time and has been living here ever since. He was Shuso in 1996, head student for the practice period, and Let's give him our full attention. Thank you. I'll take whatever attention you give me. Today I would like to talk about perceptions. perceptions of self and perceptions of others.

[02:13]

I'm going to read from Bodhidharma, or a story attributed to Bodhidharma, who brought Buddhism from India to China in the 5th century or so. And there's a depiction of Bodhidharma on the west wall there. After nine years had passed, Bodhidharma wished to return to the western land of India. He said to his disciples, the time has come for me to go back home. I want each of you to show your understanding. One disciple, Dao Fu, answered, according to what I understand, the function of the Dao cannot be grasped through literal knowledge, nor is it apart from literal knowledge.

[03:17]

The master remarked, you have gained my skin. A nun, Tsong Chi, said, what I understand now is like Ananda's glimpse of the realm of Akshobhaya Buddha. It may be seen in oneness, but never in duality. The master said, you have gained my flesh. Daoyu said, the four great elements are originally empty. The five aggregates, physical form, sensation, perception, impulse, and thought do not exist. And in my comprehension, there is not a single thing to be found. The master declared, you have gained my bone. Finally, Wico bowed and remained standing at his seat. The master said, you have gained my marrow. Wico had received transmission from Bodhidharma's authorization to teach and to carry on Shakyamuni Buddha's teaching in China.

[04:34]

And Bodhidharma returned to India. When I first read that passage, I thought, well, the first view is kind of superficial and not so important, and then it gets better and better and better. And I realize now that all four are very important stages in practice, and they all are vital to maintain a practice relationship to your teacher, to the Sangha, and to the Dharma. So in the first instance, the person received the skin. And for me, the skin is symbolic of a container of just showing up to practice. If you don't show up to practice, then you can't practice no matter how deep your realization is.

[05:41]

So the bag is really important. The container and a collection of karma that we all carry is vital to realization. but it's only skin deep. The none who saw the oneness of things got a glimpse into reality that there was actually more going on than what was previously imagined. And when I spoke about the five ranks some months ago or some weeks ago, there was that stage in practice where you get a little glimpse behind the curtain that there's actually more happening than what we're perceiving, what we're seeing. And there's actually an opportunity to let go of our suffering and our clinging, which is a central theme in Buddhist practice. If I forget that the central theme of lessening suffering or dealing with suffering

[06:48]

is not part of the thread of practice, then I've found myself being caught by my perceptions, that I'm thinking about something else. So it's really important for me and all of us to remember, how does this deal with suffering? How am I helping myself? How am I helping others to understand Buddha's teaching? So until we get a little glimpse of that, we're working on faith and hope that we'll see that. The third student spoke about everything being empty and nothing really existing. And this is reminiscent of what was to come a few centuries later with The Sixth Ancestor, the famous poem about dust and clearing the mirror.

[07:57]

While it's important to practice your way and look closely at what you're doing and whether you're promoting the practice and helping others or not, Fundamentally, there's nothing there to practice with. It's just what is. Sticking to the side of nothing there that is just empty is a dangerous place to be, because in fact, as the very first student said, the Tao cannot be grasped through literal knowledge, nor is it apart from literal knowledge. This is reminiscent of in the Lankavatara Sutra, which is a favorite of Bodhidharma's sutras that he studied, was that it says, things are not as they seem, nor are they otherwise.

[08:59]

So right there at the middle or the knife point or the fulcrum of all we have is what we see, what we perceive, And it's nothing other than that, but there's something beyond that. And at the same time, it's nothing extra. So we just get to work with what's in front of us. And in the fourth, the fourth student's understanding was just expressed in his silence. We return to silence when we sit Zazen, And given our tendencies, we talk and tell stories and do things. And sometimes we do that in a silent way and sometimes we do that in a not so silent way. My sense of it is that ultimately it has to come from that place of silence or stillness. And if we don't really cultivate that and really experience that,

[10:06]

then we're just moving our jaw up and down and not really doing anything. So I watch myself if I start talking a lot and I feel my energy and whether the talking is coming from a place of experience or a place of an idea of an experience. And it feels very different. In the Heart Sutra, it says, Avalokiteshvara, while practicing deeply the Prajnaparamita, perceived that all five skandhas were empty and was freed from all suffering.

[11:12]

The skandhas are what we're made up of. And the skandhas are the world of form, feelings, perceptions, mental formations, and consciousness. The world of form is a world of things that we physically see. This body, this bag, this stick of incense, candle. That's the world of form. In fact, it's that bag of skin that is practicing. The other, or the next skanda, is feelings. And feelings deal with what we're feeling, positive, negative or neutral. It goes beyond just this bag of bones sitting here on the cushion. So we have feelings about things, either positive, negative, or neutral.

[12:17]

The next ganda is perception. What is being perceived? white Jewish male with a ruckus suit from the East Coast. And from that pivotal point of pure perception comes mental formations. And when mental formations are created, the world of ideas come into being. And when the world of ideas come into being, a consciousness arises around all that. And there is where we have the opportunity to suffer.

[13:25]

So To me, it feels like right at that middle point of the five skandhas in the world of perception is our place to sit still and just perceive. And when we create a mental formation and subsequent consciousness, in one sense, our life is really enriched by that because they're very colorful. images that are conjured up. And it feels really far away from what's actually happening. And we're alive, and this is what we do. As it says in Laka-vatara-sutra, things are not as they appear, nor are they otherwise. I have an envelope here.

[14:52]

And I got this in 98 when I was the book salesperson here at Zen Center. And I used to write letters to Eheji, the head temple, one of the two head temples of Soto Zen in Japan, to purchase some incense for our table. So I got the letter back. And it says, it's really beautiful, you know, with the beautiful Japanese stamps and Daihanzan Eheji International Department, very officious looking. And in sort of 12-point type, it says Kara Berkeley Zen Center, 1931 Russell Street, Berkeley, California, 94703 USA in red. And at the top, in slightly larger type, to draw attention perhaps to the postal carrier, and maybe to me who's receiving it, it says, Reverend Ross Estes Blum. So I was quite taken by this envelope, and it's, as you can imagine, holding onto it for seven years, it means something to me.

[15:56]

And when I pulled out this book to look at Bodhidharma's test of his students, this envelope was stuck in there, and I started thinking about perceptions. And while on one level, it's very easy to excuse whoever wrote or addressed this envelope to address me by reverend, because most people in Japan who are doing this Buddhist thing are ordained priests and reverends. That person not knowing me just assumed that. And it really got me thinking about what people perceive when they see me. What do they think when they see me? I would imagine there's a whole range of feelings that arise. And I think some projections that I might know something, because I'm sitting up here and I've been around for a few years.

[17:01]

And we can learn a lot from watching people. We can learn a lot from listening to people and we can learn a lot by being around people and feeling them. I have a friend who is very much into the feeling realm. And he and I talk about this, and one of the things that comes up quite often in our conversation is, well, how do you feel around this person? Do you feel encouraged or supported? Do you feel seen? Do you feel acknowledged? Do you feel that they're helping you? Or do you feel objectified? Do you feel judged? Do you feel not seen? Do you feel diminished, do you feel invisible? I feel myself to be a rather visual person, having studied photography for many years.

[18:34]

that may have contributed to it, but whatever the case, I look around a lot and I have an assessment of things that I see and I have an assessment of things that I feel. And I get caught by my perceptions of things and my feelings of things. So I, Sometimes check in with friends about that. Sometimes I check in with my teacher about that. But ultimately when I lay down to bed at night, I'm just left with myself and my collection of feelings and perceptions. I remember Robin years ago saying when she gave a talk here that When she goes to bed at night, she's not sure she's going to wake up the next morning.

[19:39]

And when she wakes up, she's really excited and happy about that. It's like a miracle. And that really struck me. It seems really ordinary, but it's a miracle. We lay down, we have all this stuff that we think about, and then we wake up, and it's a new day. It's a new opportunity to wake up, literally and figuratively. So I'm working on my attachments to things that I perceive, sometimes erroneously.

[20:41]

And I invite everyone to come forward and share with me their observations in my misperceptions of things. While the story of Bodhidharma and his testing of his students appeared 1500 or so years ago, it applies with us today now and what our understanding is and how deep do we go. And while there's always a moment to take silence as your teacher and inspiration, sometimes you have to say something.

[21:46]

and choose your words wisely. And we don't test each other so much here. Uh, there's formal ceremonies where we do that with the Shuso at the end of practice period and with the Abbot at the end of the longer sittings where we question and response. And I encourage everyone to Be sensitive to your relationships moment by moment, not only inside the gate, but outside the gate. And check in with the feelings that you feel for yourself and so-called other beings and people. we're not supported out in the world in that way.

[22:49]

We talk about it a lot. We talk about practicing in the world and bringing the practice outside the gate. But ultimately, when we lay our head down to go to sleep at night, we can take an inventory about, well, how did it go today? What were those experiences like? Was it a feeling of connection or a feeling of distance? Is it bringing compassion in the world? Or bringing not compassion in the world? There were a lot of other people practicing with Bodhidharma back then, but these are the four that were chosen to bring forth their understanding. I'm sure there were others. There's a room full of others here who had their experiences.

[23:56]

So let us continue to have a dialogue about our perceptions and check in with each other about what's going on. and offer a corrective if that's necessary, and offer an encouragement if that's felt to be necessary. We have some time for discussion if people would like to share some thoughts or ask a question. Thank you.

[25:02]

Well, the five skandhas are made up. It's just a tool to describe how we take in the world. And labels of good and evil are just for convenience of categorizing things. So strictly speaking, you know, there's no such thing as evil. But in the relative sense, there's things that are to be encouraged and discouraged if we want to bring in compassion to the world. Ultimately, it feels like, well, what do I want to do today? Do I want to bring compassion to the world and help people? Is that my intention? I just saw this really great movie called Downfall. about the story of the last days of Hitler. And it was really powerful, even though it was just on a screen, because it was very evocative.

[26:30]

And it seemed like that's what he wanted to do, was to, he had an idea about things, and he was going to put that out there. And I think it's pretty clear that that view was not in accordance with the Buddha's teaching. And yet, at the same time, the secretary who was with him those last days and who the movie was mostly based on, her story was that he actually was a kind, gentle man and did some compassionate things within that group of people. So we're not 100% anything. I think we tend to be more one than the other. Yeah. Thank you, Olga. Marty? I was just bowing because you were bowing.

[27:34]

Oh. Well, I do actually have a question. Uh, okay. Is the idea that perceptions are neutral and that formations have more kind of judgment associated with them or not? Well, strictly speaking in the model of the Alaya-Vijnana with the various consciousness levels, the five skandhas that I just talked about are just a simple group, and there's not a judgment as such associated with them. And then there's the sixth consciousness, which is like a coordinating consciousness, and the seventh, which is the ego. And that's the one that is pretty much with this judgment question that you bring up. So I'm stretching that teaching a little bit to bring up what really is this perception.

[28:38]

And at the same time, it seems like that's really like a cusp of taking in the world and going from this world of just neutrality to something that is, in fact, more karma-producing. And so I say, admittedly, I'm taking some liberties. In the Vipassana teaching, and in our teaching also, we talk about pure perception, you know, just perceiving things without any kind of layers of judgment or associations with that, and that's really difficult to do because we tend to make these mental formations and create something around that. And because it's just a model of talking about how we are and not an actual entity as such, it becomes a little difficult to talk about because it happens so quickly. Just in a nanosecond, we've gone from feeling something to ready to throttle someone, or feeling something to embracing someone.

[29:50]

It's a very quick sort of thing, but the Buddhists have had a lot of time in their meditation to sort things out and look at it as to what, in fact, is going on here. Yeah. Oh, Ron? Why do you think that Waco's just bowing and being silent was the deepest response? Well, maybe it was talked out. For me, my assessment of people's understanding in how they practice, how they work, or what have you, is based mostly on what they do and not what they say.

[31:11]

I'm really wowed by some of my friends who are very smart, and not to take away their understanding of what they're talking about, but the way they put their thoughts together and itemize out things, it's really amazing. And in some sense, perhaps their verbal expression of some teaching, some understanding, is a as powerful as someone just bowing and being. And it may be my karma that I tend to like that realm of silence a little bit more than the realm of verbal expression. And lastly, my hunch is that when I've been around people who feel that embody the teaching, there's something about silence, not speaking, but being, that is really evocative.

[32:33]

And while someone could say, well, I'm kind of projecting onto them something because there's some kind of ineffable quality that they're bearing, and I want to kind of embody that, Just the fact that we use that word, embody the practice. We don't say in word the practice, but it's embodied the practice, it's in the being, it's right there at the heart of the matter. And I think about the famous story about the insentient teaching the Dharma. The so-called insentient are not, they're talking, but just by their being, in fact, an expression of the Buddha's teaching. Does that point to it? I want something more, but I'm not sure what.

[33:36]

To say that he's embodying But he's embodying the teaching. How is his embodiment of the teaching different than the other three? Or more than the other three? Or would you just say it's more complete? Well, I was going to say before you said that, that the that fundamentally in Zazen we sit silently and we bow and then we get up and we talk and we express our understanding. So the fourth student's embodiment of the teaching contained the other three, that there was a person there, there was this so-called superficial bag of bones and then there was a sense of the oneness of things and

[34:47]

that there was nothing there at all, fundamentally empty, so there were layers of understanding and we say that the Buddha is only halfway there and my silent and bowing all the time. That there are times, in fact, when we are just a bag of bones kind of yacking away. And then there are times when we get a little insight and we back off from our busy mind and have gone a little deeper. And we're constantly changing. But ultimately, we come back to that still point of silence. We don't talk in our tradition of coming back to the still point of explaining things.

[35:52]

Not in our tradition anyway. I think in the Jewish tradition there's a lot of explaining and a lot of honing of the understanding is through talking. Is that a little closer to your... Well, maybe it's obvious, but also it occurs to me that the other three were angles on practice. They were viewpoints, basically. True viewpoints, but also viewpoints. And the vow and the silence wasn't just that silence is more profound, that he wasn't, if it was a real silence and it was a real vow, he wasn't caught on a viewpoint.

[37:05]

Yes, he wasn't caught on a viewpoint. And he's also no other than a viewpoint because he's a living human being and has to speak and do and relate to people and do all this stuff. I think it is being caught. Yeah, the center of the zendo is right here. And this is where the bowing takes place. This is where the silence is here. And then there's all these angles all around. Thank you for your talk. Oh, you're welcome. Thank you. In a way, it seems like you have a specialty of being the lay person.

[38:15]

So, what can you tell us about how to do that? How to be the same here and there? Well, I wanted to be a priest. In New York, that would seem to be the practice of sincerity. And I was in a group to be ordained as a priest. And then the edict came down from high above from my teacher's teacher saying that if you're going to ordain anyone, then they need to be celibate. And I didn't want to take on that practice. So I let go of my desires to be a priest. And then when I came out here, it seemed pretty clear that the lay practice is the support of the temple and that we all can express ourselves through the laity.

[39:18]

And we have priests here to maintain the forms and to lead our sangha. And ultimately, we're all lay people. So I'm not doing anything particularly special as a lay person. I have a lot of confidence that sitting still gets to the fundamental ground of this life. I wasn't looking for the meaning of life or ending my suffering as such. it simply just felt really wholesome to sit still. And when I get caught thinking that there's something to get with regard to a robe or a position or things of that sort, then I realize that I'm caught in my perceptions of things.

[40:27]

And some of my closer friends are really aware of my, um, being caught over the years. Um, and I continue to struggle with it because, uh, while Sojin Roshi supports slave practice and that's the foundation of our practice here, With these eyes, I still get caught seeing the forms as an embodiment or manifestation of this teaching, because it's a monastic form that's come into this country. And I feel very, very alone a lot of time about that.

[41:29]

not in a sad way, in alone, but as I mentioned a little earlier, alone in where is the support out in the world? The sangha in New York wanted Bernie, Tetsuken Roshi at that time, to visit the lay sangha in the world at their jobs and such and encourage them or make pointers to that, but he didn't do that. I mean, I think the idea was that you come here to practice, this is where we're going to work it out in our laboratory. And Alan made a great photograph. He came into Pete's one day, and he took a picture of me behind the counter, and he took a picture of Sojo Roshi in the Dōkasan hut, and then he had a, it says, Men at Work. So I think, you know, that's getting at it. And I really appreciated Alan coming in and taking that photograph and really kind of demonstrating that we're all working on it here.

[42:34]

But it'd be an interesting dialogue for people to have that, you know, where are we practicing when we're out in the world? Or even are we practicing here for that matter? So I have my little tricks at work. You know, that's a very common thing of, you know, remember my breath, cop some attitude with a customer of avoidance or bringing closer to me. I see that as attachment and repulsion and my ego involved in that. But there's not a lot of support for it. So it isn't so easy. But it feels right to me. Some people, I think, feel that practice saved their life, given the circumstances that they were in before coming to practice. In my case, it feels like it gives meaning to life. And it makes me really sad when I encounter people who don't have that context of practice that seems to fulfill or inform and give meaning to what this life is about.

[43:46]

Seeing you and your husband at the Buddhism in Film series at PFA was really supportive and encouraging to me, to be out in the world and see a familiar face, and practicing knowing that we're intending as best we can to bring forth the teaching and be entertained at the same time. Does it go that way? Thank you all for your attention and questions. And I will remember, as best I can, if I'm feeling lonely out there practicing, that you all are out there with me, trying to make sense of Bodhidharma's teaching and Buddha's teaching and Sojourn Roshi's teaching.

[45:09]

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