in which Japan attended for the first time. And his teacher Soen Shaku gave a talk. Soen Shaku had several disciples, but two of them were Nyogen Sensaki and D.T. Suzuki. And D.T. Suzuki became this wonderful scholar who introduced so much of Zen to America. Actually, he introduced Zen to America. And Nyoge Tsenzaki, who blended with the infrastructure of America. for the first 50 years, 58 years. And when he, when Sensaki came, no, there was no practice here.

[01:06]

And he was a dishwasher and a hotel clerk and he did various, I think he was a, took care of canaries for a canary trainer. He did whatever jobs that he could find. And then at some point he started teaching and he would set up an apartment and mostly women and people would sit in chairs. He didn't think it was time to have people sit on the floor but he would have them do zazen in a chair. and he was in San Francisco and he was in Los Angeles, he kind of went back and forth between San Francisco and Los Angeles, and he would study in the San Francisco Public Library, and he would set up what he called his floating zendo, no particular place.

[02:11]

And he also had what he called his mentor garden. Mentor garden, like kindergarten for baby Buddhas. That was the way he taught people. So he loved America and he felt that the Bill of Rights was the greatest document ever written. There was a sutra. He saw it as a sutra. the Constitution and the Bill of Rights because there's no greater Sutra in the world. So he was also interned in an internment camp during the Second World War and But he was really a wonderful poet, and he was also a kind of iconoclast.

[03:29]

He didn't like the formality of Japanese, the over-formal way that Japanese Zen had formulated itself. So he was very informal and outspoken. An iconoclastic. I really like him a lot. So, I want to read you a poem of his about Buddha's birthday. This was in 1946. He also liked to celebrate Buddha's birthday on Easter. the same way we do Sagaki on Halloween. The same kind of spirit that we do Sagaki, the hungry ghost ceremony on Halloween.

[04:29]

Because he felt that Easter has to do with resurrection and with eternal life and rejuvenation. which is the same, similar feeling of Buddha's birthday, where we bathe the baby Buddha with sweet tea, sweet fragrant water. And this is like spring and the feeling of growth and birth and rejuvenation. So he says, again this spring, We gather flowers and decorate the flower house for the baby Buddha. The church bells of our community peel their tidings to our rooftop. I think he means Easter. Thousands of worshippers kneel to the ground to pay homage, each postulating his or her own legendary hero, which would be Buddha.

[05:42]

they should stand up as our baby Buddha and declare their independence of thought, saying, above the heavens, beneath the earth, I alone am the world-honored one." So we have this phrase, you know, when Buddha, baby Buddha, a few days after his birth, when he could stand up, faced the East, South, North and West, put one hand to the sky and one hand to the ground and said, I alone am the world honored one. So this I alone is interpreted various ways. I alone means each one of us. It doesn't mean just me. If he meant just me,

[06:44]

He should have his mouth washed out with soap. But each one is maybe a little different interpretation. But at one, you know, I alone, alone has two meanings as I often say. Alone means isolated, singular, but also means at one with everything. This is etymological meaning. Alon means at one with. So it has both those meanings as both individual and true self. There's no self. I alone or each one of us. is the world-honored one.

[07:49]

So Buddhism is about each one of us. Buddhadharma, sin practice, is about each one of us, and yet it's about all of us at the same time. So he says each one should stand up and declare this independence. Independence dependence and interdependence. And as Suzuki Roshi used to say, independency. Nyogen died in 1958. And he and one of his Dharma brothers, one of his teachers, Soen Roshi, on New Year's would face each other across the ocean and bow.

[08:50]

Soen Roshi would be in Japan and Hyogen Zenzaki was here and at a certain point in time they would bow to each other. Soen Roshi never quite came to America but he couldn't stay because he became the abbot of Miyotakuchi, Japan. But he wanted to come too. I want to read another little piece from Nyogen Suzuki. He's talking about his mentor garden. And he says, this place was established to be the birthplace of Buddha. We do not want to raise butterflies here. They fly from one teaching to another.

[09:53]

We do not want to have the children of asuras. Asuras are fighting demons. They fight even in the stage of babyhood. We do not want to raise monkeys and parrots here. They simply imitate what they have seen and heard. The mentor garden is the nursery only for baby Buddhas who love silence, and who will express loving kindness without a word. If we do not warn each other and watch our steps, this flower pavilion may turn into a spiritual zoo filled with strange creatures. These creatures are born every minute, everywhere in the world. Look out. This is in 1948. It's interesting that This place is the place where buddhas are born and buddhas are nurtured, a kind of kindergarten, a kind of one-room schoolhouse.

[10:58]

I've always thought of the Burmese zendo as a one-room schoolhouse. You can be a baby or mature, but we all practice and learn together. So, you know, it's Buddha's birthday, but it's the birthday of all of us. You know, Buddha is... Although Buddhas are born, Buddhas are made, not born. In other words, You have to do something. We're born with the seed of Buddhahood, but we have to nurture that seed in order for it to come to life and mature and flower.

[12:03]

Which reminds me of this story that I sometimes tell about this well-known abbot in Japan who, when he was a boy, lived with his father, who really couldn't support him. And so the father asked the abbot of this temple, the monastery, if he could let his son live at the monastery. This is not uncommon in Japan, to have children living in the monastery and being brought up as acolytes. So the abbot consented and so the boy was living in the temple, in the monastery. In the monastery they would train the monks to sound the bell for service and for various occasions.

[13:17]

So when the abbot was in his hojo, in his office or in his room talking with somebody and he heard the sound of the bell and when he heard the sound of the bell he was quite startled because he thought this sound is a wonderful sound Who is making this sound, this wonderful sound? Who is sounding the bell in such a beautiful way? And I wanted to see this person. So his attendant went out and brought back the boy who had been sounding the bell. And the abbot was quite surprised and he said,

[14:23]

asked him, he said, well, what did you think about when you were sounding the bell? And the boy said, well, my father told me before I came here, he said, they will ask you to sound the bell. They'll train you to sound it. And when you sound the bell, you should realize that every time you sound the bell, a Buddha is born. The sound of the bell inspires the Buddha within each one of us. This is the spirit with which we sound the bell. This is why it's so difficult to make a good sound of the bell. Not because of technique, but how we express our inner being through that sound.

[15:24]

and how we express our practice through our actions and our activity. Thank you. OK. Yeah.

[16:09]

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