Good evening. Tonight I'm continuing with the series I'm doing for some of my talks on the cases in the Book of Serenity koan collection. So just to say briefly about koans, just because there's so much misunderstanding, koans are traditional teaching stories that we study because they have something to do with our own practice. In some Zen lineages, there's a curriculum in which people work with a teacher and go through the whole curriculum. In our tradition, the Soto Zen, founded in Japan by Dogen in the 1200s, we talk about these stories as ways of looking at our own practice. And it's not about, they're not riddles to solve.

[01:05]

Although the one tonight is, might seem more perplexing. It's actually very humorous. Part of the, well, just to say briefly again about the structure of these, the Book of Serenity is the Koan collection from Hongzhe, a century before Dogen in China, who picked the cases and wrote first commentaries later on. Later in the 1200s, a Zhaodong or Soto teacher in China, Wansong, wrote introductions, and then commentaries on the case and the verse, very much patterned after the Blue Cliff Record, an earlier collection, used more in the Rinz Island Angela, both were used in both. Anyway, and this case tonight happens to be in both the Book of Serenity and the Blue Cliff Record. I'll refer to the Blue Cliff Record version a little bit later on.

[02:08]

One of the other things about these stories, not all of them, some of them go back to Buddhist time, but a lot of them have to do with the great masters in the 800s, 700s, 800s, sometimes 900s. some of the characters, historical persons, but they become characters in these stories. And so I want to introduce the cast of characters for the story tonight. So the teacher in this story is the great master Masu, the horse ancestor, Masu Daoyi. There will not be a test, but his dates are 709 to 788. He's famous for having 139 enlightened disciples, all of whom became teachers. It says in the commentary to the case that Masu had the stride of an ox and the glare of a tiger. He could extend his tongue over his nose.

[03:12]

Can anybody here do that? I haven't met anybody who can, but anyway, he was a big guy, and he was very imposing and impressive. And the soles of his feet were circular marks like the marks of the Buddha. Anyway, and 139 people succeeded him in the Dharma. But the story tonight is about Mazu and two, and later on in the commentary, another one of his famous disciples. The first one is Zhizhong, Zitong Zhizhong, again, don't worry about these names. Seido Guzo in Japanese. And then the second one is Baizhong Waihai, very famous teacher. 720 to 814, they both died in 814, Zhizhong and Guzo. Anyway, Baizhang is famous for the first code of monastic conduct.

[04:25]

He's also, for the three-day sitting we have coming up in a couple of weekends, He is the main character in that story about a wild fox and about karma. So there are many, many stories about him. So Baizhang is a very famous master like Mazu. But anyway, these are the three main characters in the story. And there's another one, another character I'll introduce later. Okay, here's the case. So some of these stories are rather brief. This one is a little more involved. A monk asks Great Master Masu, apart from the four propositions and beyond the hundred negations, please directly point out the meaning of the ancestors coming from the West. Cleary translates it in the Book of Sranan is living Buddhism, the meaning of living Buddhism. Literally, it's the meaning of Bodhidharma or the ancestor coming from the West. But that's a way of saying the same thing. What is the meaning of the Bodhidharma?

[05:26]

So this question, this is a monk who is very knowledgeable about Buddhist teachings. He says, apart from the four propositions, and beyond the hundred negations. Please directly point out the meaning of living, of the ancestor coming from the West, of the Buddhadharma. So the four, so he says, apart from the four propositions. This goes back to Nagarjuna, a great teacher who was the master of emptiness back in 200 or 300 in India. And the four propositions basically or that things exist, they don't exist, they both exist and don't exist, they neither exist nor don't exist. So this is very famous in Buddhist philosophy, that there's these four possible things.

[06:29]

Yes, no, both yes and no, neither yes and no, you can see it as. So this monk is asking what he thinks is a tricky question, maybe, apart from these four propositions and beyond the hundred negations. And Nagarjuna also taught, you know, we just chanted the Heart Sutra, which says no eyes, no ears, no nose, no tongue, and so forth, many negations. There are a hundred, maybe there are hundreds of them in Nagarjuna's teaching, including that there's no emptiness, no nothingness. But anyway, so this is, you know, this is a sort of philosophical question, in a way, that this monk is asking great Master Masa. Apart from the four propositions, beyond the hundred negations, please directly point out the meaning of the ancestor coming from the West. And Master Masa said, I'm tired out today and can't explain for you. Go ask Jizo. So this monk, who was a diligent monk, he went and asked Chisholm the same question.

[07:33]

And Chisholm said, why don't you ask the teacher? The monk said, the teacher told me to come ask you. Zhizhong said, I have a headache today and can't explain it for you. Go ask Brother Hai. I've done this sometimes. I've said, oh, go ask Yoshinji. or ask Doug Luceration or somebody, anyway. So the monk went to ask Baizhang Weihai, who was still a student then, became a famous teacher, and he asked the question to Baizhang Weihai, and He said, when I come this far, after all, I don't understand. the monk related this to, went back to great master Masa and told him this, and Masa said, Zang's head is white, Hai's head is black. So that's the whole story. It's a little more involved than some stories, and I find it very amusing.

[08:35]

I have a headache today and can't explain for you. Go ask this other guy. So do you get it? It's kind of pretty straightforward in a way. I'll read, so both, the structure of these cases is the same. Okay, I'll read the verse first. This is the verse commentary by Hongzhe, Jianzheng Hongzhe, and I'm not gonna refer to it so much, but Hongzhe said, medicine working as illness, it is mirrored in the past sages. Illness working as medicine, sure, but who is it? White head, black head, capable heirs of the house. Statement or no statement, the ability to cut off the flow. Clearly sitting, cutting off the road of speech, laughable as the old ancient awl at Vaishali." So that old ancient awl, awl like a punch, a leather punch, refers to Vimala Kirti, who we talked about in our practice period, the great master, great enlightened layman who

[09:55]

is famous, amongst other things, for his silence when he was asked by Manjushri, how do you go beyond duality? And Vimalakirti gave this thunderous silence. In some ways, and this is part of the, he says that that's laughable because really all three of these teachers, Mazu and Zhezang and Baizhang Weihai, went beyond the silence. So the introduction says, where you can't open your mouth, a tongueless person can speak. Where you lift your feet without rising, a legless person can walk. If you fall within their range and die at the phrase, how can you have any freedom? When the four mountains all oppress you, how can you penetrate to freedom?" So this is a typical kind of Koan style challenge, you know. How are you going to get, penetrate to the freedom, seeing this case, seeing this story.

[11:02]

So, again, it's very, to me it's very funny and pretty straightforward. But there's some interesting commentary here. And in the commentary, this is Wansong, who was a great teacher too, says, when we look at this monk, he too is a student of the Buddha way. He uses the four propositions in hundred negations to make sure of the source essence of the special transmission outside the teachings. So Wansong takes the view that this monk is challenging these teachers and giving these teachers a chance to clearly express the essence of reality. Later on, Huang Po, who was a student of, later on in this lineage, a student of Baizhang's student, Linji, Huang Po said, if you want to understand directly and immediately, everything is not it.

[12:18]

But then Wansung says, if you understand clearly and thoroughly, nothing is not it. So again, he's playing with these propositions. Both yes and no is it, neither yes and no is it. looking at it the other way around, without abandoning the four propositions of the hundred negations, where is the meaning of the living Buddha way not clear? then one some quotes great master Nagarjuna, who started this fourfold propositions, who said, wisdom is like a massive fire, it cannot be entered from any side. Yet he also said, wisdom is like a clear cool pool, it can be entered everywhere from any side. So this wisdom is like a massive fire. I had not realized or forgotten that in the song of the dual marriage samadhi that we sometimes chant from Dongshan, he says it's like a massive fire, just to depict it in literary, no, turning away and touching are both wrong.

[13:34]

So this massive fire comes from Nagarjuna. Dongshan borrowed it there. Part of the point is, All of these guys are giving very clear expressions. This has happened to me. I have had some students who, some of them very persistently come to me and they want an explanation of what is the essential meaning. In China, they said, why did the ancestor come from the West? It's kind of a slang for that. And these guys all made it very clear. Mazu said, I'm tired out today. I can't explain for you. Go ask Zhuzhong. Zhuzhong said, why didn't you ask the teacher? And the monk said, the teacher told me to come to you and ask you.

[14:37]

Zhuzhong said, I have a headache today and can't explain for you. Go ask Brother Waihai. He could have said, I don't have a headache today, but I still can't explain for you. Go ask Brother Waihai. Waihai said, when I come this far, after all, I don't understand. So, I'm not going to explain this for you, but there's another story. that involves these same characters, actually not Mazu, but actually Mazu and also Zhitong and Baizhang Huaha, but also Nanchuan, another one of his great, great students. Nanchuan was the teacher, Nanchuan or Nansen in Japanese, you may know him, has many, many stories about him too.

[15:42]

And he had a student named Zhao Zhou, or Zhou Shu, who is one of the great masters of all time, and there's many stories about them. Anyway, but in this story, Baizhang Waihai and Nan Xuan are still students along with These names in Chinese are tongue twisters sometimes. But in this story, they were all out gazing at the moon. Four of them. This is something that people in East Asia do. And when it says gazing at the moon, probably it means the full moon. But it could have been, maybe it was a half moon or something. But when it's full moon time, does anybody know when the last full moon was?

[16:45]

Any moon gazers here? When? Okay. So recently, yeah. I saw that moon. Anyway, people in East Asia go out and just go out and hang out and look at the moon. They didn't have television. But the full moon is almost good enough. Anyway, they were out there gazing at the moon. And Masa asked the three of them, what should one do at this very moment, at a time like this, when the moon is full? I'm sure it was a full moon. What should one do? And Baizhang said, just write to cultivate practice. And remember, he's the one who founded the rules for conduct for monastics. Although in the story we're going to look at during the three-day sitting, he did something really heretical. Anyway, Zhitong said, just write to make offerings. Oh. That's nice, the moon is full, let's go make offerings.

[17:48]

I like that. But Nanshuang just brushed out his sleeves and left. Kind of common Zen pantomime. And Master said about this, The scriptures, the sutras, go into Zang, the treasury. Zhe Zang's name means treasury. So he says he's gained all the sutras. Meditation goes into Bajang Waihai, the ocean. Hai means ocean. Nanchuan alone transcends utterly beyond things. Wang Tsung says about this, even here, black and white should be clearly distinguished. So these stories get commented on. Zen is supposed to be this teaching beyond words and letters, pointing directly to the mind.

[18:53]

And I would say these three guys in the main story all pointed directly to the mind. But in Zen, we have these koan collections with comments on these stories. And then we have comments on those and comments on the comments. So we have huge libraries of Zen Babel. I'm going to cite just a little bit from Dogen. So first of all, in Dogen, In Dogen's koan collection in volume 9 of his extensive record, he cites this case. and he has a verse comment, the last two lines say, if not comrades from a site for selecting Buddhas, who would see that both Bajang Waihai and Zhezang directly pointed it out?

[20:03]

This is an interesting term, the site for selecting Buddhas. That's a nickname for a monk's hall, for a zendo. A site for selecting Buddhas. This is where Buddhas arise. So, Dogen said about the story, if they were not fellows from a site for teaching, for selecting Buddhas, who would see that both Baizhang Huaha and Zhezang directly pointed it out? So again, Jyotanga said, I have a headache today and can't explain for you why I said, when I come this far after all, I don't understand. Dogen also has a comment on that story about gazing at the moon. So this is from one of his Dharamhala discourses in his extensive record. He says,

[21:04]

about these three people gazing at the moon, so Baizhang, Waihai, Shitang, and Nanchuan. He says, all three of them together equal one full moon. So he doesn't take sides. Not that Mazu did either, really. So, That's the story. That's the case. I'll say a little bit more about it. There's, again, this verse comment by Hongzhe. Medicine working as illness. It is mirrored in the past sages. So we're telling the story about a number of past sages. Illness working as medicine. Sure, but who is it? So the relationship between medicine and illness, I talked about also in case four about the blade of grass and the story about how Sudhana could not find any plant in the world that was not also medicine.

[22:09]

But of course, too much medicine causes illness. White head, black head, Hongzhi says, capable heirs of the house, statement or no statement, the ability to cut off the flow How do we cut through the flow of our usual self-descriptions and self-business and ideas about ourself and the world? Clearly sitting, cutting off the road of speech, laughable as the old ancient all at Vaishali, Vimalakirti, who used silence And part of how these koans work is that they present language that cuts through language, cuts through the dualities of language. About that, and I'll just read a little bit about, of Wansong's comment on the verse. He says, when I was a scribe at Daming in the old days, Master Hung of Tanshi passed through Daming.

[23:15]

So this is Wansong's telling a personal story. I knocked on the door of this master in the dark of night, calling his attendant, burned incense, and formed a relationship. So he went to see this teacher. And the teacher allowed me to see him, Tanshi. I asked him to tell me more about what is the living word and what is the dead word. He said, if you understand the dead word, it is the living word. If you don't understand the living word, then it is the dead word. So, how is it that When Zhazang said, I have a headache today and can't explain for you, go ask Waihai. How is that a living word? How is it a dead word? When the great Baizhang Waihai says, when I come this far, after all, I don't understand. So this is kind of funny.

[24:21]

I'll just close with what I have to say about all this with the introduction to the case. So it's case six in the Book of Serenity in the same exact story as case 73 in the Blue Cliff Record. And the introduction, the pointer to that says, in explaining the Dharma, there is neither explanation nor teaching. In listening to the Dharma, there is neither hearing nor attainment. Since explanation neither explains nor reaches, how can it compare to not explaining? Since listening neither hears nor attains, how can it compare to not listening? Still, no explaining and no listening still amount to something. As for all of you right here listening to me explain here, how will you avoid this mistake for those with the eye to pass through the barrier? As a test, I cite this old case, and then he tells the story.

[25:25]

So, there's a lot going on in this story, and maybe there's nothing going on in this story, but this is a story about a monk coming, asking for the basic meaning. What is the meaning of Bodhidharma coming from the West? Bodhidharma, the Indian master who came to China considered the founder of Chan. What's the essential meaning? I have a headache today, I can't explain for you. When I get this far, after all, I don't understand anything. And then there's Vimalakirti, who just was silent. So, living words, dead words, comments, questions, responses, utterances, silences, please feel free. Jan, you were laughing a lot, so I think you got it.

[26:27]

I thought it was kind of funny when he said, I've come all this way, but I don't understand. And I was trying to decide whether he couldn't understand why he'd come all this way, or whether Yeah, that's good. Thank you, yes, very good.

[27:41]

So poetry and koans are different, but also they work in a somewhat related way. Other questions or comments? Does anybody want to explain this? This is such a fun story. I actually prepared for class today. The first thing I wrote on top of my paper here is Genji poem. Okay. Yeah, that's right. That's good. These people are, you know, getting into each other's hair. Yeah.

[28:51]

Somebody's saying I have a headache. It's completely leaking beyond this Nagarjuna talk. It exists, doesn't exist, both exist and exist, and both exist and don't exist. So there's this, and I love this student. I want these monks to be named. What if it was like, Could be. Or something else, you know? So I'm just, I'm like. It might have been a fox. Could be a fox, because the fox is referenced at the end of this, right? Yeah, well. There's all these fox stories. There's another, that's right. And there's another, and there's a big fox story coming from the three-day sitting. Yeah, I've heard tell of that. So I just, you know, lately I've been reading these commentaries on Gender Quo on this year at Boca San's commentary. So, you know, one of the things he says is, every single thing is actualizing the fundamental point of practice.

[29:52]

Right. So like everywhere this monkey's going, you know, and I think kind of, I suspect that he feels that. Yeah, it feels, from one reading, one might think they're putting down the monk. But it's not. The thing that you mentioned, he's not named. In these stories, when it's a monk, a monk asks such and such a great master, the monk is only named if they later became a great master themselves. So, you know, the other thing, though, is that I think about this anonymous monk traveling around asking questions of all the great teachers in China. Who is a great master, but not named? Yeah, the Tomb of the Unknown's end student. Who, like, bested them all.

[30:53]

But then, you know, the other side of this is that I have had students, sometimes they'll just do it once, sometimes they come back again and again and again asking me for explanations. Please explain this. It's pretty funny. But these people all, what I like, they all had something to say to the student. They actually were taking the student very seriously. Yeah, he revealed his headache. Yeah, on this reading of this story, the first teacher, Mazu. Ma means horse, and Zu means ancestor, or baso in Japanese, so the horse ancestor. Horse ancestor. I love his response, because the super intense question of like, besides this very specific teaching and this very specific teaching, I want you to tell me right now what the meaning of everything is.

[32:04]

Just show it to me. Like, you know, the most intense question you can get, and his response is like, I think pretty accurate, of like, okay, well, reality, as it is this moment, is that I have a headache. You know? You want the grand answer every other day, like, what's going on right now? The grand answer is, I have a headache. And also, I can't explain for you. And that's the other part of it, too. Each part of it is a great teaching, because that he can't explain it because he has the headache. Like, oh, I wouldn't be able to. I have a headache today, I can't explain it to you. But maybe not necessarily they're connected. Maybe it's the supreme reality of what's happening right now is I have a headache. Yes, good. And also, I can't tell you what reality is. Like, it's your life, you know? No one's going to be able to tell you. what the meaning of your life is. Like the poem, that you can't explain the poem. Exactly. But he's not abandoning him.

[33:05]

He's saying, but you should go ask this other teacher, too. So it's a great teaching, because it's saying, this is exactly what's happening with me right now, but I can't tell you what your life is about, but here's the direction you should go, just to keep walking the walk. I think it's a great response. Anybody else? Yes, Kirsten. So I don't disagree with anything that anybody over there has been saying, but I just want to say, when I do saws and I'm distracted by people, they often ask that question. Of course. I try to explain to them, how to put their thumbs lightly together. and that, and so I struggle with guilt for me. Well that's, okay, and then the thing about living words and dead words.

[34:54]

What are, living words keep something alive, dead words shut it down and it's over. And I think your response is quite in line with these people. That's a good question. Go down to, ask them now. It's Jerry, ask Jan. Yeah, asking the question is a good thing, but don't expect some definition. Bye-bye. But I think that that wish to get the right answer is also Like, I think to think, don't ask that, that's not the right way to send. To hold on to something is shaming and isn't like, keep asking, you might get a headache.

[36:02]

And be like, awesome. Where I got that headache from, I've asked it so many times. Anybody else? Any other? Yes, Ed. That's a great story.

[37:13]

Yeah, all these koans are shaggy dog stories, yes. So, well, very good. So this is not to say that we've finished with this story. Because part of the point is that we never finish with any of these stories. There's more to see in these antics. This is why they've been studied for a thousand years. But we got into it some tonight. So thank you all very much. We'll close with the four bodhisattva vows.

[38:06]

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