Good morning and welcome. For new people, I'm Taigen Leighton, the teacher here at Ancient Dragons Zen Gate. And this morning, I'm going to continue the series of talks I've been doing some of the time on the stories from the Book of Serenity collection of old teaching stories going back to China. And this morning, the case I want to talk about is about Linji in Japanese Rinzai, founder of one of the two main branches of Chan or Zen. So I'll start just reading the story. When Linji was about to die, he admonished Sansheng, one of his students. After I pass on, don't destroy my treasury of the eye of truth.

[01:07]

Sansheng said, how dare I destroy the teacher's treasury of the eye of truth? Linji said, if someone suddenly questions you about it, how will you reply? Sansheng immediately shouted. Linji said, who would have known that my treasury of the eye of truth would perish in this blind ass? So this is a story of the transmission from Linji to one of his students, Sun Ching. So he said, after I pass on. don't destroy my treasury of the eye of truth. Treasury of the eye of truth is a translation here for the true Dharma eye treasury, which in Japanese is Shobo Genzo, one of the two main works of the founder of Soto Zen in Japan, Ehe Dogen. But also this goes back to the first story of

[02:13]

a dharma transmission from Shakyamuni to Mahakasyapa. So the story goes, as he was talking to the assembly, Shakyamuni held up a flower. Danny is smiling. Yeah, so Mahakasyapa smiled, and Shakyamuni said, now I pass on to you the treasury of the eye of truth of the wonderful mind of nirvana. Now, that's a story that goes back to Shakyamuni Buddha, who lived 2,500 years ago in northeastern India. It doesn't appear anywhere. There's no record of that story until sometime in the 1000s in China. So like many stories in the Buddhist tradition, it's probably apocryphal. It's possible that it was transmitted orally all that time.

[03:17]

But probably that story was made up in China. And this points to The fact of Chan, Chinese word for Zen, which is the Japanese word, was, well, I think of it as Confucian Buddhism. So I'll come back to that, but I wanted to just say a little bit more about the story itself. There's a lot to say about this whole case. So Linji was about to die. He admonished Sansheng, after I pass on, don't destroy my dharma, the dharma treasury, true I, Shobogenzo. Sansheng said, how dare I destroy this? Linji said, if someone suddenly questions you about it, how will you reply? And Sansheng immediately shouted. So this was a very well-known teaching strategy or practice of Linji himself.

[04:25]

He shouted a lot. And so Linji said, who would have known that my treasury of the eye of true dharma would perish in this blind ass? Talking to Sansheng. Part of the point, so this is all about how do we continue this practice and this teaching. So this Dharma transmission is one of the key aspects of Zen. And this is a story about it. And part of it is that here, Sun Qing is just repeating what Linji did by shouting. And that's not good enough. for someone to receive this dharma fully, to be a successor in this tradition, one has to find one's own way of conveying it. This doesn't mean never shouting, and in fact, this is part of, this happens in the Soto tradition too, and in the commentary, it refers to a famous shout.

[05:37]

Wan Song's commentary on the case, he talks about, about the shouting. And in Wansong's commentary to Hongzhou's case in verse, he says, when you don't stop what should be stopped, instead you bring about disorder. Sansheng immediately shouted, in high antiquity and later times, appearing within the gate, since Bai Zhang was deafened for three days by Mazu's shout, none have compared to this shout of San Xing." So actually, in the commentary, he praises San Xing. And, you know, we might see Linji's calling him a blind ass a kind of praise, too. But Sansheng needed to go beyond just shouting.

[06:37]

The story he refers to is Baizhang, great master, we've talked about in terms of his interaction with the fox, was a student of Mazu, and these are in the Linji lineage, and Mazu shouted once at Baizhang. Baizhang was deaf for three days. So Linzi, or Rinzai in Japanese, didn't start this shouting. And it still continues. Ah! So people can do that. But who would have known that my treasury of the Eye of Judaima would perish in this blind ass? Sun Sheng, it happens, was not the disciple of Lin Ji from whom all of the Rinzai lineages succeeded. That was a student named Xinghua, and there's actually a reference to Xinghua in the beginning of Wan Song's commentary.

[07:44]

Linji admonished Sanchang, don't destroy my Dharmai treasury. And then Wansong says, this was the same kind of action as when Xinhua told Superintendent Khetpin, before long, you will be a teacher of the way, and expelled him from the monastery. as punishment for making rich soup rice. Now, I don't know that story particularly, but it sounds very much like another story that's kind of in our tradition, well, both Linji and Xiaodong or Shoto tradition. So Xingua, again, was the disciple of Linji from whom all of the later Linji or Rinzai lineages descend. Sansheng, I think, had some students, but his lineage died out. But there's a story in China of another Linji lineage master named Fushan, it's in Dogen's Pure Standards, who was the Tenzo.

[08:54]

And the teacher was very, very strict. in that monastery. And once the teacher was away and Fushan Aztenzo made a very rich, creamy soup for the monks because he felt bad for them because the food was so bad. But the teacher happened to come back while and go into the meditation hall as the food was being served. So he knew about it, and he expelled Fushan from the temple. Fushan stayed around nearby, in the town nearby, begging and practicing. And eventually, he came back and received transmission in the Linji lineage. But he's also important because he helped the Cao Dong or Soto lineage survive. So this whole thing about, Lineage is very important in Chan and Zen. Well, just the story about Fushan.

[09:58]

One of the Cao Dong, or Soto, lineage teachers in China, Da Yang, Taiyo Kyogen, we say in Japanese when we chant it. passed away, well it was all of his students who had passed away before him, and he had no one to continue the lineage, but he was friends with Fushan, and Fushan took the a teaching from him and passed it on to one of his students, Tosu Ichin, Tosu Gisei Daisho, we say in Japanese, who revitalized the Saodong lineage. But we chant Taiyo Kyogen Daisho, Tosu Gisei Daisho. They never met each other. Tosu Ichin was a student of Fushan, this guy who got expelled from the monastery. Anyway, it's possible that there was another version of this story. And often, these old stories, different teachers get attributed to the same story.

[10:58]

But at any rate, here in this commentary about Linji's blind ass, Wansong, the later Caodong Soto commentator, who put together the Book of Serenity, says that when Linji said to San Cheng, don't destroy my treasury of the eye of truth, of the eye of the true dharma, this was the same kind of action as when this teacher Xinghua had a superintendent expelled from the monastery, even as he told him that you will be a teacher of the way. So I don't know that story, but at any rate. So just to say a little bit again about why I call Chan, Confucian, Buddhism. In China, lineage and ancestry was very important. Filial piety and veneration of parents was a major value in Chinese culture and still is.

[12:07]

So ancestry was very important. When Buddhism and Chan, supposedly from Bodhidharma, whose image is on our altar on the left there, when he brought the teaching to China and founded Chan when he came from India. In India, they hadn't really been concerned about history or lineage or ancestry very much. But in China, that was very important, again, because of Confucian values. And as Chan developed, they developed a lineage to show that they went back to Shakyamuni. So we chant a list of names of Indian teachers, too, from Shakyamuni to Bodhidharma. And we know now, historically, that that's not historically accurate. Some of those teachers also never met each other. So they didn't really care about history and lineage in China in the same way. But in India, I mean.

[13:13]

But in China, that was very important. So they put together a bunch of names of great Indian teachers and called that the lineage. And we chant that still. But it doesn't matter if it's historically accurate in our terms. There was somebody in every generation carrying on this tradition. So this whole idea of transmitting the teaching, transmitting the practice is very important in Chan and in Zen. And this has to do with this sense of ancestry and lineage from China. So again, it wasn't in some ways one could hear this comment by Linji that calling Sanqing a blind ass as a commentary on his just copying his teacher's teaching.

[14:17]

But there's more here, too. I'll read the introduction now to the case from Wansun. Devoted entirely to helping others, you don't know there is self. You should exert the Dharma to the fullest without concern that there be no people. So we have a full room today, but even if there was just one or two people here. Like, you know, I would give the same talk. It's not important how many people. And some of the great masters in our lineage in China, like Yaoshan, maybe only had eight students ever. So, for this, Wang Cong says, it is necessary to have the ruthless ability to snap a wooden pillar in two. So there has to be that kind of strength to persist. When about to go, what then? So Linji was about to die in this story.

[15:19]

And here was this student of his, Sun Xing. So there's a lot more to say about all of this. So in his commentary, Wansong adds, in reality, this truth, this dharma, this practice does not increase Even though 1,000 Buddhas appear in the world, nor does it decrease when 1,000 sages pass away, how could one Sansheng be able to cause it to prosper or die out? The ancient demonstrated this thing and also showed that there was someone in the congregation. After all, Sansheng came out and said, how dare I destroy the teacher's true Dharma I treasury? It was like one who did not accept to teach another's revilement, immediately offering his own provisions. And in fact, the true Dharmai treasury has not become extinct. So there's another story in our tradition about, well, I won't tell the whole story, but a teacher asking a student,

[16:34]

Is there a practice realization or not? And Nanyue said to the Sixth Ancestor Huining, it's not that there's no practice realization, only that it can't be defiled. So in some ways, this true Dharma I treasury can't be destroyed. and this practice and this reality and this capacity for human beings to just sit upright, to be present, to pay attention to what's in front of us, to express Buddha, awakening in our body and mind. This has gone on long before Shakyamuni Buddha even. So, Just to continue, and again, there's a lot more to say, but Hongzhe, who picked the cases for the Book of Serenity, also wrote verse commentaries. He said, the robe of faith, in his verse, the robe of faith

[17:45]

is imparted at midnight to Huaineng, stirring up the 700 monks at Huangmei. So that's a story that's foundational for this whole transmission thing, and I'll come back to that. The eye of Dharma of the branch of Linji, the blind ass destroying it, gets the hatred of others. Mind to mind, they seal each other. Ancestor to ancestor, they pass on the lamp. leveling oceans and mountains, magically producing a rock, a kind of magical bird. It's been translated as phoenix, too. Just the name and word is hard to compare. In sum, the method is knowing how to fly. So how does one fly? How does one take wings? How does one soar in the Dharma? This is the question.

[18:49]

Now, the robe of faith was imparted at midnight to the sixth ancestor, Huineng, stirring up the 700 monks at his teacher, Huangmei's monastery. So that's an important story. So all these teaching stories refer to many other stories. The more you read them, the more you become familiar with the various different expressions. But the story is that Huineng was A poor woodcutter from the south of China, from the boondocks of Canton, and illiterate. But he heard a phrase from the Diamond Sutra about the mind not abiding anywhere. And he awakened and he wanted to know more about it and heard about this monastery in the north of China, Huangmei. So he went there. And it's a long story, but he ended up working in the in the kitchen, pounding rice in the back of the kitchen of this large monastery.

[19:53]

And at some point, Wong May, the teacher there, gave him, it's an involved story, but he gave him Dharma transmission in the middle of the night at midnight. And then said, you better get out of here because the other monks are going to be really upset because they've been studying this and very learned and they've been practicing for a long time and here you are, this illiterate woodcutter from the South. Southern people have been kind of dumped on in many different places and cultures. But anyway. Incident, and so Huang Mei helped row him across the, in a boat across the river to the south and he went and didn't teach for 17 years. Anyway, and eventually though, all of Chan and Zen descends from Huineng, the sixth ancestor. But ever since then, the transmission has been done, the formal transmission ceremony has been done at midnight.

[21:01]

That's what that is referring to. And partly, it's a way of talking about how this has nothing to do with study and learning and having a lot of knowledge, or even having years of meditation practice, but just this immediate awareness that the Sixth Ancestor Huineng said. So the first commentary says, the eye of truth, the eye of dharma, the branch of lingeing. The blind ass, San Cheng, destroying it gets the hatred of others. So part of this story seems to be putting down San Cheng. And he's put down by many. Mind to mind, they seal each other. Ancestor to ancestor, they pass on the lamp, leveling oceans and mountains, magically producing a phoenix. Just the name and word is hard to compare.

[22:06]

In some, the method is knowing how to fly. So again, I want to say some more about all this. Well, I'll start with Wansong's commentary. After the secret transmission on Mount Huangmei, south and north bickered for 20 years. Linji made a clear transmission, but even now, some people don't get it. This kind of technique is like a giant fish becoming a phoenix, mountains and seas being leveled. So there was, for some period after Huining received transmission, there was a southern school and a northern school in China, and they had various different perspectives and quarreled. Eventually all of John, Linji, and Rinzai Ensoto comes from the Southern school.

[23:07]

One of our chants says, it's not a matter of south or north. Actually, the teacher who was the lead teacher in the North was also very good. But he says, this kind of technique is like a giant fish becoming a phoenix. Mountains and seas being leveled. And this temple is called Ancient Dragon Zen Gate because of the dragon gate that is in China. This was in one of the big rivers in China. And when a fish swam through it, they became a dragon. So there's an image on the right side of our altar of this fish swimming through the gate and becoming a dragon. And we don't know if there's such a dragon gate in Lake Michigan, but maybe so. Anyway, so this has to do with this whole process of continuing the teaching.

[24:12]

The commentary goes on. Well, he quotes another teacher who said, The ancient waited till death. Why did the treasury of the eye of true dharma after all die out in the blind ass, Sansheng? Linji carried out his plan in a hurry, and Sansheng, too, was hasty. Because of this, the sense of father and son was forgotten, eventually causing people of later times to lose hope. If one doesn't find flowing water, one must go to another mountain. If one doesn't find flowing water, one must go to another mountain. So it was common in China and in Japan and now in America that students go around and check out different teachers. So a mountain is a way of referring to a teacher.

[25:18]

Many of the teachers in China took their name from the mountain where they taught. So if one doesn't find flowing water, one goes to another mountain. And people come and go here. And one of the things I love about this sangha is that many of the people here have practiced or studied with other teachers or in other traditions previously. Not all. Some just started here. But this kind of enriches our Sangha. And Sangha is very important in this. So the point of all this, again, is how do we carry on? How do we continue? How do we transmit this practice, this teaching? There's some more things from Yuan Song's commentary worth mentioning, and I want to say some more. So he refers to Linji's death poem.

[26:23]

In the original record, after the story in the case, Sansheng finally bowed. Wansong says this was not quite good-hearted. But then Linji gave a verse, his death verse, which said, if one asks how it is along the flow without end, real illumination, boundless, bespeaks it to him. Apart from names and characterizations, people don't understand. Once the sword is used, it should immediately be polished. And when he finished saying this verse, he calmly passed away, Lin Ji, Rinzai. So, and Wanseng says, this is a real letting go of an easy dismissal here. Is there anyone who can show some spirit for the ancients? Dangerous, Wanseng says. So in some ways, Sansheng is being praised here when Lin Ji calls him a blind ass.

[27:30]

So being blind means being blind to causes and conditions, being blind to our usual worldly values, being blind as in the Heart Sutra where it says, no eyes, no ears, no nose, no tongue, no body, mind. So there's a way to see this as praising samsara. So actually, we're here from the lineage of Dogen, who brought Xiaodong or Soto Zen from China to Japan in the 1200s. But actually, we are both from Linji and Xiaodong or Rinzai and Soto traditions. So in the lineage paper for receiving precepts that I give, it clarifies that

[28:39]

The precept lineage comes from both. Dogen had a teacher named Myozen in Japan before he went to China who was from the Linji or Rinzai lineage. So the precept teaching is the same in both. So we're actually formally both Rinzai and Soto. So we talk about the Linji lineage too, because that's part of our lineage. And this whole thing about Dharma transmission and lineage, which is central to Chan and Zen, is an important part of Zen. How does it get continued? But I would say that this transmission doesn't happen just because of a single string of beads that's referred to as a single string of teachers, even though we chant the names of teachers going back to Shakyamuni.

[29:51]

All those teachers had many, well, many of them had other teachers, just like nowadays people have different teachers. And in some ways, I don't know how, so I called Chan and Zen Confucian Buddhism. What's happening here in America is something else. It continues that, but it's also about community, about we the people. about including everyone. So this has been referred to as the Age of Sangha. None of those individuals whose names we chanted could have continued, passed along this practice and teaching by themselves.

[30:53]

So Sangha is the context for continuing the true Dharma I treasury. So all of us here together is how this actually gets continued. And still we have this tradition of Dharma transmission. So in spring of 2000, At Tassajara Monastery, I received dharma transmission from Tenchin Reb Anderson. It's almost 19 years now, and I still have not given dharma transmission to anyone. So I guess I can't die yet. But how this happens is not based on just single people. And now we have this practice of Sangha, of community, that allows this to continue.

[32:07]

And all of us practicing together. So for people who are here for the first time and just coming to Zazen, this practice of sitting upright and facing the wall and facing ourselves and facing all the beings on your seat depends on the support of many people. Many people find it difficult to do Zazen at home alone, so to speak. And it's clear that when we sit together as we just did here, there's tremendous support for just being present and upright. So of course, even when you're alone at home, all the Buddhas and ancestors are there and everybody you've ever known. But when we come together in Sangha, that is supported and we can realize it fully. are the basic instruction of Dharma transmission is to continue this true Dharmi treasury.

[33:26]

My teacher, Reb, A couple years, I don't know, before I received Dharma transmission, maybe a year before, had a heart attack while he was meeting with a student, one of my Dharma sisters, and he was taken to the hospital. And I heard about it and got there. He's still alive, but as he was being taken into the operating room, I was there and he held my hand and said, don't let it be cut off. So that formal, in some sense, that was the Dharma transmission, not what happened at Tussar.

[34:37]

And so that's my commitment. But it's not possible without Sangha. This is something we do together. And maybe Western Buddhism will be not based on Confucian values, but based on the values of community. So we have a little bit of time. Comments, questions? Ah! That's for Sanchik. Last time I sit here. Well, that was nothing.

[35:41]

You're not deaf yet. So any comments or questions or anybody want to yell? Yes, Nicholas, hi. Is the shouting related to the lion's roar? Oh, sure. We can talk about it in terms of the lion's roar of Buddha. But the lion's roar of Buddha can be like this. So Shakyamuni Buddha, our Buddha, Sometimes it's referred to as the Buddha who taught with silence.

[36:45]

So we sit silently. It's not encouraged to start yelling or so forth during zazen. Please don't do that. So there are many kinds of lion's roars. In the sutras, they describe Buddhas who teach with fragrance. They describe Buddhas who teach with water or rain. Anyway, there are flowers. So there are many different ways to give the lion's roar. So, you know, that part of the story is that it's not good enough to just repeat your teacher. You have to make it your own. and in the lynching tradition, there was lots of shouting, and that's one way to teach, but how to make this teaching your own. So some of you students give talks here, and I often hear versions of things that I've said.

[37:52]

And it's kind of nice. And it's great that people here are getting the teaching. But to really make it your own is the point. How do you find Buddha in your body, mind, on your seat? So thank you for your question. Oh, Asian, hi. Can you talk a little bit more about the importance of community, because the whole Dharma transmission thing can seem a little bit elitist. Like, there's just, you know, one or two people per generation. Yeah, and... That leaves out a lot of people. Yeah, and they talk about not forgetting all the sweating horses. Each one of you, even if you're here for the first time, is part of this sangha, part of this community, and none of this is possible otherwise.

[39:05]

So yeah, it does seem like, and I'm the only one now wearing a brown robe, which is in our lineage, consider signifying teacher authorization, dormant transmission. And I remember when I first went to San Francisco Zen Center, Baker Roshi was the only person with a brown robe. So he had a lot of power, because it was a huge, big establishment, not just a little storefront temple. It was three big campuses. Anyway, but then after a while, now there are many people with brown robes there. And now in our sangha, we have a number of people leading the monthly sittings. So Douglas, next Sunday, will be doing that. And so I'm very happy about this Sangha and that we have a number of practice leaders and a lot of people taking on positions of responsibility. And that's how the True Dharma I-Treasury actually gets continued.

[40:12]

It's not by one charismatic leader, it's through, and I think I'm sort of anti-charismatic, but anyway. So I'll say something about Nakajima Sensei, my first teacher. He was a Japanese Zoto priest trained in Japan at Sojiji, and wonderful. He had a little center in the Upper West Side of New York where I started for several years. He had hair and kind of like Dylan's a little bit. And wore a coromo, but I never saw him in an okesa. And he never did anything like transmission or ordaining priests, but it was just zazen every night. And doksan every week. Anyway, he was great. But he was sort of totally anonymous. I once saw him.

[41:14]

His English was pretty terrible. He spoke in English, but he had Japanese accent. His English was not quite as good as Katagiri Roshi's, and if you've heard his English, it wasn't that great either. But I once saw him going to work. He worked for a Japanese company downtown, and he was in a business suit, and you would not have even seen him. He was just totally invisible. Nothing special. Didn't look like a 15-foot golden Buddha. So anyway. And very charismatic teachers in various branches of Buddhism have gotten into lots of trouble in this country. That's not the point. Other comments or questions? Yes, Dan.

[42:14]

My saying is still. And that doesn't diminish the practice in the sense of trying to be very aware and present to others in my life, or in my work, or practicing compassion, and all that, is alive, is alive. have been inherited by the psychotherapy. Thank you.

[44:28]

Yes. Wonderful. Wonderful. Yeah. So the word faith appeared in the verse. Faith in Buddhism is not belief in some dogma or belief in some super being or belief in some teacher. It's the act of just continuing. It's like taking the next step in walking meditation. Confidence, trust. And it's trusting oneself. So Zen is about questioning. I wrote a book called Zen Questions, and questions is a verb there. So yes, sometimes some people have said to me, well, I don't have any questions. And that's fine, too. But the practice is actually to allow questioning. to invite wonder, to invite and work with questions.

[45:31]

So these teaching stories, these koans, sometimes they're taken as some riddle that you have to solve or pass through, and that's not the point at all. The point is that they bring up questions. They bring up awarenesses. They teach us about our own practice. not something that happened when Rinzai died in 867, but we're still talking about him because this has something to do with us and with our practice. So yes, the practice is not to get rid of thoughts or feelings. That's not the goal. Somehow people seem to think that sometimes. The practice is to allow thoughts and feelings to arise, to be calm and present and aware and keep breathing right in the middle of all that. And as questions come up, not to try and figure them out. so it's not about some calculation to solve some puzzle.

[46:32]

It's about sitting calmly right in the middle of questions, because I can agree with all of the things you say about our modern world and its awareness, but also there are lots of things to question in our modern world. The whole idea of progress. and how that has been, in some ways, harmful. So the point isn't to think about some question, but the point is to be able to be present and upright and calm and express that in your life, in the world, in the middle of questions. So thank you. Time for one more. Comment or question, if anyone has one. Yes, Bo. So I wonder if Linji calling this student an ass, after the student repeated this gesture in the class, is Linji calling himself an ass a little bit, too?

[47:46]

Good. Is that sort of a teaching about infallibility with teachers? Absolutely, yes, very good, yeah. So there's actually many stories where the teacher says something and the student repeats it. And sometimes that's right and sometimes it's way wrong. So how this all continues is mysterious. And it is through each one of us doing what we can to support Sangha and to support the true Dharma, our treasury, and pass this along. And all of us have received this, because here you are. But how it happens is mysterious. There's not one, you know. There were five houses of Chan in China. They consolidated into two. Linji and Saodong, which is in Japanese, Rinzai and Soto. But actually, we're both, as I said.

[48:48]

And we don't have to worry about those different approaches. It's just how do we live our lives? So thank you all for continuing this Chudarma I Treasury.

[49:07]

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