Some of us have been sitting here, this is the third day, and some of you are here for the first day today for this talk. Some of us also have been doing a practice commitment period for the last eight weeks focusing on these Bodhisattva practices, transcendent practices. We've been talking about those. This weekend I've been talking about three of them, focusing on three of them, generosity, patience, and Prajna, or insight. And I've been talking about them, well, mentioning the conventional aspect of them, but talking about the ultimate practice, Bodhisattva practice, of generosity and patience, and today Prajna. So I focused on generosity, Friday, and patience yesterday, and of course they're all

[01:02]

related. But today I want to talk about what's sometimes translated as wisdom, Prajna, or insight. So in the Bodhisattva way, you could say conventionally, Prajna is about, or conventionally, seeing emptiness. Emptiness, of course, is a technical term. It does not mean nothingness, but it means seeing how we ourselves, and, but actually everything, all dharmas, all events, all phenomena, is empty of inherent, substantial self-existence. Each of us, and anything you can think of, or

[02:03]

see, or hear, or taste, or smell, is a product of many causes and conditions. So emptiness also means interrelatedness, or sometimes we could say sameness, that in terms of emptiness we are all one. The causes calligraphy for one is in the front hall. This is the side of emptiness, to see how we're all, well, we could also say not separate. We're not exactly all one. I can tell the difference between Don and Jeremy and Laurel, but yet they're not separate. So emptiness, wisdom, Prajna, is to see that, to see this interrelatedness, or interconnectedness. To really see that. And it also has the meaning of to see, well, just to look, to

[03:12]

look within, in some sense, insight. And that means to see what is most important, most dear, most central, right now. So Prajna is a kind of faculty, a kind of way of, you know, any word I use is wrong. It's not a way of seeing or being exactly, but it's a way. To practice Prajna is to hold this awareness of the interconnectedness and sameness of all things. To see into any one thing, and to see how it's empty of separateness, of inherent substantial self-existence. So, you know, the wonderful example that

[04:17]

Thich Nhat Hanh, he's the one I've heard of first using it, to look at this, and there's many things you can say about it. It's yellow and it's lined, there's scrawls on it, but also can you see the clouds? Can you see the nitrogen in the soil? And the logger who cut down the tree, and the trucker who drove it to the mill, and so forth. Anything we hold up, anything we look at, is like that. Innumerable clauses and conditions come together to allow each of us to be here this morning. Many things allowed you to show up here today. And to look at this closely is the practice of Prajna, our wisdom. But also, emptiness is not some thing. We hear about this, it's hard in our

[05:25]

language. Emptiness sounds like a noun. Sameness sounds like a noun, so does one, and anything we say. And so we think it's some thing out there. But actually emptiness is the way all things is. So, emptiness is the way all things is. Attached to the most dangerous attachment is the attachment to emptiness, or the attachment to non-attachment. We can think, well, it's all one, and so we don't need to take care of any particular thing. Anyway, that's a kind of delusion that comes up in studying this. But what I've been doing this weekend is looking at some commentaries about these practices from our Zen perspective, from the perspective of Dogen, founder of our tradition. So I wanted to look at a few of those. And the first one is from Dogen's extensive record, from volume 10, his poetry. And this one is one of the poems that he actually wrote

[06:26]

while he was still a student in China. This is very early, before he came back to Japan, before he wrote Fukunsezaki, and that stuff. He was already a pretty sharp guy. And so it's a short poem. I'll read it, and I'll say some things about it. Natural, wondrous wisdom itself is true suchness. Why should we employ Confucian discourse or Buddhist texts? Rely on sitting at ease at your place and hang your mouth on the wall. Friends arrive here and are released from emptiness. There's a lot of this. Natural, wondrous wisdom itself is true suchness. So, Friday I talked about the kind of ultimate side of generosity as non-self, as giving away self, letting go of self-claiming, letting go of me. Seeing this wider self that is totally non-separate and interconnected.

[07:31]

And yesterday I talked about patience in terms of suchness, that patience is seeing, being patient with, being attentive with the suchness, the reality of just this. So here, Dogen says, natural, wondrous wisdom itself is true suchness. So yesterday I talked about the ultimate wisdom, Anupataka Dharmakashanti, patience with the ungraspability, or maybe unknowability of anything. And that's equated with wisdom. That is, being here, being here, just this. This is wisdom. So, Dogen says here, in his first line of his poem, natural, wondrous wisdom itself is true suchness. Why should we employ Confucian discourse or Buddhist texts?

[08:32]

You know, when we could talk, you know, this is a... Confucian discourse is just the culture that he lived in, that Zen grew out of. We could say existentialist discourse, or whatever Western context you want to put in there. And, of course, the Chan Zen slogan is to see directly into mind, beyond words and letters. So, in some sense, why should we employ discourse or Buddhist texts? But, of course, Dogen himself, you know, knew all the Buddhist texts cold and encouraged us to study those. And some of you are more inclined towards that kind of study than others, and that's fine. But you don't need to rely on those texts, because, instead he says, rely on sitting at ease at your place, and hang your mouth on the wall. So, here, before he wrote Bendowa and Fukunza Zengi, this is,

[09:38]

this line totally encompasses Zazen. Rely on sitting at ease at your place. So, in one of the chants we're doing this weekend, we say, Shinto says, let go of hundreds of years and relax completely. Now, I know that sitting all day, or sitting for a couple of days, or sitting for a few days, or, you know, there's pain in your knees, or your back, or, you know, shoulders. It's not always great ease. And yet, can you breathe into the tension or pain that you feel, and just let it go? So, this is a practice where we come back to sitting at ease at your place. So, we each have a place. We each have a dharma position. We each have this body and mind, here, this morning. This situation, this life, we're living.

[10:40]

He says, rely on sitting at ease at your place, and hang your mouth on the wall. It's a funny line. So, my job is to sit up here and not hang my mouth on the wall, but to blabber at you. About this stuff. But, you know, when you're sitting at ease at your place, all the words, all the thoughts, you know, our thoughts are also connected with our mouth. Just put it up on the wall. Just relax completely. Rely on sitting at ease at your place, and hang your mouth on the wall. Friends arrive here and are released from emptiness. So, Sangha is about that we come together. You've all arrived here. We support each other. What is it we support each other to do? He says, to be released from emptiness.

[11:43]

So, this true wisdom is not about emptiness. Actually, it's about releasing from emptiness. Getting over emptiness. So, true wisdom is emptiness going beyond emptiness. Just forget about emptiness. Release from emptiness. What is release from emptiness? Well, friends arrive in Sangha. What we do is release from emptiness, instead of holding on to the non-separation of all things. We take on your place, your dharma position, your place in the zendo, your task or assignment during temple cleaning, which Roy will give you later, or your position hitting the bells, or serving the meal, or receiving the meal, or preparing the food, or whatever you're doing.

[12:46]

All of you. Release. Friends arrive here, and we are released from emptiness. So, the ultimate wisdom is letting go of wisdom. And, of course, this is in the sutras, too. Manjushri says, the various bodhisattvas talk about coursing in true prajnaparamita, is to not have any idea about prajnaparamita. So, let go of emptiness. Let go of wisdom, even. That's wisdom. Any period now, you shall be released. Relax completely. So, don't, you know, push yourself and try and work at relaxing completely. It doesn't work that way. Just take the next breath. Enjoy it.

[13:48]

So, this true satanas, just this, is to take on just this, the particular part of the wall that you hang your mouth on. So, again, this is a commentary on wisdom from Dogen before he was Dogen, when he was still a student looking for his teacher. Maybe this was after he found Wu Jing in China. I wanted to, a few things from Dogen this morning, and this next one is a story that he tells and then comments on. This is a story about the body of Prajna. So, it begins this dharma hall discourse, clouds appearing on the mountaintop are an auspicious omen.

[14:52]

And, of course, we live here in the plains and don't have mountains to look at, but the image of clouds and mountains has to do with, all temples have a mountain name. So, ancient dragons and deities, in a way, are mountain named. Clouds refers to all of you, floating around, coming to the temple, going back out into Chicago, the realms of your life. Clouds appearing on the mountaintop are an auspicious omen. So, thank you all for being here. And then he says, I remember once, Zhaozhou asked Dasa Huangxiong, what is the body of Prajna? So, Zhaozhou, Zhaoshu in Japanese, is one of the all-time great Zen masters, if you can say such a thing about anyone. Maybe just because he lived to be 120, but there are more stories about him than any other great Zen teacher. He lived in the 800s, and he's famous for, amongst many other stories,

[15:58]

he was asked if a dog has Buddha nature. And he said, mu, or no. So, some of you have heard about that. Another time, of course, he said, yes, of course dogs have Buddha nature. But that's another story. Anyway, it took a long time for him to find a temple where he resided at and taught. And at this point, he was apparently practicing at the temple of Dasa Huangxiong. And Dasa was a disciple of the great teacher Baizhang of Kakujo. Anyway, all these characters have all their stories. But anyway, at this point, Zhaozhou was, they were, you know, kind of equals. They were, Dasa wasn't his teacher, but Zhaozhou was practicing there. And one time, he asked Dasa, who was the abbot of the monastery, what is the body of prajna?

[16:59]

This is an interesting question. It's not just, you know, what is the meaning of prajna? Or what is prajna? Or what is the body of prajna? Our practice is to actually enact the teaching. To be the body of dharma, to, you know, so some of you are artists or therapists or teachers. And, you know, you can see the product of your work in your students or in your clients or in some work of art. Zen students, we don't have any, you know, real people. A couple, a few people have talked to me about this. What do we get from this? All of these hours of sitting here. And so this question points at that. When you leave and when you walk out, what you have is the body that's leaving.

[18:04]

It's taking the next step. It's taking the next breath. So our body becomes more, over time, as we do this practice, becomes more flexible, becomes more ready to respond in different ways. So we talked yesterday in terms of patience. There's also capacity and tolerance. We develop our capacity and our tolerance. So it's not that there's some product. I mean, some of you may have certain fancy robes or whatever, but really it's the body of prajna. What is the body of prajna? What is the body of dharma? What is the dharma? That's the Buddha work, is to, on your cushion, allow the body of prajna to arise. So Jaojo went to Dazo and asked, what is the body of prajna? Dazo said, what is the body of prajna?

[19:06]

Jaojo gave a hearty laugh and left. The next day, Dazo saw Jaojo sweeping the ground. So this is a very common activity traditionally of Zen people. And even later on during temple cleaning, some of you may be sweeping or cleaning the floor. Anyway, Dazo saw Jaojo the next day, the day after, sweeping the ground and asked, what is the body of prajna? Jaojo threw down his broom and said, who clapped his hands and roared with laughter. Dazo immediately returned to his habit school. So that's the story. What is the body of prajna? It's not enough to just, you know, read books about prajna or even have insights into prajna. What is the body of prajna? How do we express it in our posture, on our cushions or as we're serving

[20:09]

or as we're receiving food or as we're doing temple cleaning? What is the body of prajna? Jaojo just threw down his broom, clapped his hands and roared with laughter. So Dogen has a little comment. He said, Dazo and Jaojo only were able to speak phrases that resembled prajna. They were not able to speak phrases that were the body of prajna. So is Dogen criticizing Jaojo and Dazo here? Yesterday we talked about this other story where a great Zen student, became a great Zen teacher, spent eight years sitting like an iron pole on his endo trying to respond to some question.

[21:10]

And this teacher had asked him, what is this that thus comes? And he was speechless. And after eight years, he finally was able to say, anything I explain or demonstrate about it, misses the mark. So Dogen says, they were not able to speak phrases that were the body of prajna. Then Dogen says, if someone asks me, what is the body of prajna? I would say to them, come along and follow it. So this may seem like some strange and sweet little story, but it's pretty simple. You could just say, do it, come along, follow it. What is the body of prajna? How do we enact the Dharma? How do we express it? How do we digest it? And all the words miss the mark. Still, as Ishan said yesterday, we have to say something.

[22:14]

So these are a couple of stories about prajna or insight. Maybe I want to read this. I love this little Chinese poem that Dogen wrote in China. He said, natural wondrous wisdom itself is true suchness. Why should we employ Confucian discourse or Buddhist texts? Rely on sitting at ease at your place and hang your mouth on the wall. Anything you say misses the mark. Friends arrive here and are released from emptiness. So how do we together release each other from emptiness? How do we support each other to release from emptiness and from wisdom? And just express the body of true suchness in your posture, in your activity. Just come along and follow it.

[23:20]

So when talking about generosity on Friday, I read from another longer writing by Dogen about the four bodhisattva methods of guidance. And the first one is giving. So I talked about that in terms of ultimate generosity. The fourth one, the second is kind speech, which is important. And third is beneficial action, which is what we're doing here. The fourth one, though, I want to talk about today because in many ways to me, it seems like this is a way of coming along and following it. This is a way of expressing the body of Krsna. And so Dogen calls this cooperation. That's tongue theory's translation. Cause translates it as identity action. Non-difference, cooperation. How do we cooperate? This is also the practice of Sangha. So he says cooperation means non-opposition.

[24:27]

It is not opposing oneself and not opposing others. So we don't oppose others, but also we don't oppose ourselves. How do we cooperate and identify with others who are not separate from us and with ourself? It doesn't mean giving up. It doesn't mean, you know, sacrificing yourself for others. Because when we really give up the self, we see that we're connected. Non-opposition, non-difference, identity action. It is not opposing oneself and not opposing others. It is like a human Buddha being the same as a human. So this is not a practice for some, you know, magical being on some cloud somewhere. You know, the body of Krsna doesn't necessarily, isn't necessarily gold-plated and 16 feet tall. This is a practice for human beings.

[25:33]

Back to you. It is like a human Buddha being the same as a human. Because of assimilation to the human world, we know a Buddha must assimilate to other worlds. So, you know, maybe our business is human beings, but how do dolphins express the body of Krsna? They have their own way of being Buddha. They have a bigger brain than us, so they probably know a lot more. But how do trees express the body of Krsna? How do grasses and bald eagles and lakes and rivers express the body of Krsna? Because of assimilation, the Buddha's assimilation to the human world, we know a Buddha must assimilate to other worlds. When one knows cooperation, self and others are one suchness.

[26:36]

So it's not exactly that self and others are the same, but they're empty of separation. One suchness. So this is all about the body of Krsna is, how do we meet this, just this, in front of us on the wall? After we've hung up our mouths. So we try and maintain silence through fission. Please do your best to maintain silence. If you need to say something to someone, okay, but quietly. When one knows cooperation, self and others are one suchness. Their music, song, and wine accompanies people, accompanies celestial beings, accompanies spirits. People keep company with music, song, and wine, and music, song, and wine keep company with music, song, and wine.

[27:40]

So people have been asking about all these rituals we do. This is just our Bodhisattva music, song, and wine. We have bells and chanting, and insects instead of wine. Just performing the everyday activity of drinking tea, preparing food, serving or receiving food, cleaning the temple, this is the incestuous of wisdom. Just this activity. We do all these as a way of expressing the body of Prajna. And at first you might think that you're chanting or cleaning the zapatons or all the other things you could think they are, but really it's just come along and follow. Just this. So Dogen says,

[28:43]

a task of cooperation is a manner, is a standard, is an attitude. So this is from Tom Cleary's translation, cause translates it as, instead of standard, he says it's a dignity. So the task, the actual work, the Buddha work of cooperation is a kind of style, a kind of manner, a kind of dignity, a kind of way of expressing our inner dignity, an attitude. A posture. After regarding others as self, there must be a principle of assimilating oneself to others. And Dogen says, self and others are endless with time. So yesterday talking about patience and patience of ungraspability of things, I was also talking about time, that this is seeing that our work here today, of course it's just this, this period, this task,

[29:43]

this scoop of rice, this bowl I'm holding now, each thing in and of itself, but it's endless with time. Each inhale, each exhale that you perform during a period of zazen on your Krishna chair is endless with time. Many beings going back, so of course we're talking about the Buddha, we're talking about Zhao Zhou in the 800s, talking about Dogen in the 1200s. Long periods of time. We are not just practicing for ourselves, and we're not just practicing for this moment in history, although of course we are. But how do we see that this practice is also about, when we see that, when we have the principle of assimilating oneself and others, self and others are endless with time, and what we're doing here today has something to do with people walking by

[30:45]

on Irving Park Road five years from now, and 500 years from now, whatever Irving Park Road looks like then. Self and others are endless with time, and that's right now, and that has to do with the self and others in this room. How do we assimilate together? How do we work together? This is about cooperation as Prajna, as the body of Prajna. Dogen then quotes an ancient Chinese philosopher, Guangzi, who was supposed to have lived in the 7th century BCE, famous statement, he said, the ocean does not refuse water, therefore it has been able to become so immense. Mountains don't refuse earth, that is why they can be so high. Mountains take more and more earth. An awakened ruler doesn't refuse people,

[31:47]

therefore his community can become populous. So this principle of cooperation, he says, know that the ocean is not, so that's the quote that Dogen says, know that the ocean is not refusing water, it's cooperation. So we are benefiting all beings, and that means taking care of yourself well, taking another breath, accepting rice into your bowl and eating what you need to eat, no more, no less. So this body of Prajna, this cooperation, it is, the ocean is not refusing water. No further that the virtue of the water not refusing the ocean too is complete. So each of you coming here,

[32:48]

you know, in the way in which you're a separate individual person with personal history and particular problems, particular experiences, particular skills and particular patterns of habits. How can you not refuse the ocean of Sangha? So this practice of identity, action and cooperation is not, is letting go of some sense of separation. So Dogen says, for this reason, waters gather and become oceans or lakes, great lakes. Earth accumulates and becomes mountain. We implicitly know that because the ocean does not refuse the ocean, it forms an ocean. Sorry, we implicitly know that because the ocean

[33:50]

does not refuse the ocean, it forms an ocean and creates its immensity. Lake Michigan can be a great lake because it allows the water to enter. Because the mountain does not refuse the mountain, it forms a mountain and becomes very high. So he talks a little about rulers and sovereigns and part of that is this, in this Confucian cultural context, and he talks about justice in terms of not being based on rewards or punishment, just to meet this body of prajna. And he says, even now, there must be people who seek the right way, even without reward. This is beyond the conception of the ignorant man. So this expression of the body of prajna, this come along and follow,

[34:53]

this meeting true suchness is about not, it's just doing it without needing some reward for it. Can you see that the reward is zazen, it's just zazen? And that after walking meditation, you'll get to sit another period. Can you see that the reward of inhale is that you get to exhale? And then hopefully you will inhale again. So again, a few people have been wondering this weekend, well, what do I get out of this? And it's natural to think that way. Of course, that's, we're human beings. And it's not that there is not some transformation when the body of prajna is not transformed. That becomes the body of prajna. When we take on the bodhisattva work, when we express body of prajna,

[35:59]

when we meet true suchness. Because there is the logic of cooperation, Dogen poses, cooperation is the practical undertaking of the bodhisattva. One should face everyone with a mild countenance or a gentle expression. How do we be gentle with each other and with ourselves? So again, talking about prajna, insight, wisdom, it's not about some idea, it's some practice that we actually do. And I'm suggesting that this practice is to be called cooperation or identity action. We act in non-opposition. We see our connectedness.

[37:01]

We enjoy our connectedness. We take on our own particular seat in the mandala of the zendo. But we do this together. So, you know, it's pretty clear we couldn't have this event without many, many, many people. In fact, each one of you supporting it. And that allows us to just settle into relaxing completely, letting go of our tensions and taking on our tensions too when that's what's happening. Not turning away from anything. Not turning away from anything.

[37:50]

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