This must be the warmest rohatsu sashin in the history of Tassahara, don't you think? He's our historian. I think at least this is the fourth one since I've been back in Japan. And usually one occasionally cherishes the discrimination that might be a A few degrees warmer, two or three or four, but it's about twenty degrees warmer here this session. I'd like to try to continue talking, a little bit anyway, about what I was talking about yesterday. Enlightenment may be sudden, you know, but the preparation takes a rather long time. It's rather like conception or germination or birth may be sudden, but the preparation of your field takes some time. So I'm talking with you about the preparation of your field.

[01:41]

And as I said last night, we want to get down into our consciousness. And there are certain tools or methods for doing this. But it's almost impossible without what I've been calling the last few days, a context of real choice. came up first talking about politics with Governor-elect Brown. You may be able to do without a context of real choice, as I'm speaking about, if you have enough psychological disturbance to create your own necessity to find or basics. So people who are quite disturbed, you know, turn to washing the dishes, try to limit themselves to essentials – two or three meals a day, etc.

[02:54]

But in any case, it's helpful to have a context of real choice, and by that I mean a situation in which we roughly understand where things come from. This effort has been true from ancient times, the need to make this kind of effort and to keep all of culture based on this kind of being in touch. And monastic life has particularly been society's way of of demonstrating this, or doing it for the society. We are so estranged from our government, which is now, not only have we disbelieved in, but now is discredited, and the means of production,

[04:37]

ability to have some participation in or knowledge of things. You know, we didn't build that stone wall out there personally, that wonderful stone wall, but Miffin and Steve and Leland built it, and we know who built it. That's quite different than if it comes from the drugstore or a factory. That's a big difference, to know who did it. So monasteries in the West and in the East, and Zen communities in general, tended to do their own building, tended to do things from scratch, start from scratch. As I said, it was a very early decision in Zen Center. I mentioned that before, didn't I? I was trying to think, was that Suzuki Roshi's decision, or is it Zen, or was it my decision? Almost everything I can pinpoint to some conversation with Suzuki Roshi, but I can't pinpoint exactly when we came to that conclusion.

[06:07]

But it was the context of the way Suzuki Roshi taught us to do everything, chanting the sutras. He never taught us how to chant. He just gave us a chant and said, start doing it. And he never made any suggestion for about two years. We just did it. Some other teacher might teach you how to chant. Now here's how you chant. But Suzuki Roshi didn't do it. He gave us just bare minimum and let us do it. And with that spirit we started Tassajara. First we were going to build it in the horse pasture. And in Europe, monasteries did their own building and stained glass windows and made their own furniture and clothes. Or they were closely related to a community of craftsmen who did it. They knew who built them. That was the ideal and, I think, was largely followed. And this need to get back to sources is pretty basic, you know.

[07:30]

some of the most creative educational experiments in this century have done that. For instance, Black Mountain College. Did you know Black Mountain College? Many of you? Some of you know. It was in North Carolina, and I guess it dissolved in the mid-50s. And it existed from maybe the 20s. I don't know exactly when it started. I forget. It was, interestingly enough, started by Margot Wilkie's sister and brother-in-law, I believe. Margot Wilkie is a woman connected with She's one of the heads of the New York Zen group, but actually she feels she's a member of this Zen group and is very closely connected to us. She lives in New York. And her brother-in-law and sister, I believe it's her sister, not her brother, are now one of the leaders of transcendental meditation in this country.

[08:45]

But anyway, Black Mountain College, de Kooning studied there, and John Cage, and Robert Duncan, and Charles Olson, John Wieners, many painters, musicians, sculptors, poets. I can't remember all of them. In fact, the majority of the most seminal East Coast art scene in all fields was connected with Black Mountain as students or teachers. It produced more... It's interesting, it was very teeny, and if you look at, you know, the who's who in various fields, you usually find Harvard produces, because it attracts good people, I guess. And it gives the people there a sense that they... aren't down a step, which is just a matter of permission, but Harvard usually produces as many as all other colleges together, something like that. And Black Mountain produced as many as Harvard. Black Mountain was very teeny. Black Mountain was founded on a different idea of property. The students... I think the faculty owned the campus.

[10:12]

and student and faculty should support themselves and should grow their own food. And they did that. And when we started Tassajara, Charles Olson wrote me and said, you are the next step after Black Mountain. Black Mountain couldn't solve certain problems and it's land ownership and disputes among people got more and more complicated. And the morality became complicated in that some people felt hurt by what other people did. Anyway, it finally dissolved. And he wrote that we were doing the next step, and most of the problems they had we haven't had, because Buddhism is such an ancient tradition and has solved those problems centuries ago. And Frank Lloyd Wright, with Taliesin West, did the same type of thing. Artists, many creative people, also return to the source, need to return to the source in order to have a matrix out of which they can create. And Wright had everyone go out and farm, I think, until noon or something, and then come in and work on the drawing boards.

[11:40]

The word genius, to me, is the same as genital, genitive. It means to start, to create, to be able to return to beginnings, to see things without prejudice. And it also means, maybe most basically, guardian angel. Nowadays we have the security blanket. A while ago every child was considered to have a guardian angel. But now every child has a blanket instead. But function is nearly the same, perhaps. Not so useful as an adult. But your guardian angel was a recognition that the mystery of creativity was beyond you. It required participation in a larger scale of things. And genie, when Aladdin crosses the boundary by rubbing the lamp. We were talking about rubbing and entrance and trance as rubbing. Genie that comes out is the same as genius. And genius doesn't have much to do, actually, with intelligence. So intelligence gives you confidence. Genius really has to do with lack of prejudice.

[13:11]

being able to see things directly. And that's what your practice is all about, to teach you how to return to sources, to know the beginning of your own mind. And wherever you are as a member of the Sangha, you have three choices, really. You can go to work in the everyday community. If you do, you'll have some you should have, as a member of the Sangha, always the sense of returning to sources. If you do, you'll probably end up to be president of the company or something, because anyone who can look at the situation as if it didn't exist makes very accurate decisions. Anyway, you can go participate in the everyday community as a craftsman or professor or something.

[14:13]

Or you can, that's one choice you have. Another, you can stay with Zen until you manifest it, perform it. To perform means to intensely furnish for others, per form. Form is furnish and per is to intensify, to intensely furnish for others. And performance is to be able to make known, to act on emptiness, is a sign of enlightenment, one of the marks. I was talking about the marks yesterday. We have certain marks of our conditioned mind, and there are marks of unconditioned mind. One of the marks of unconditioned mind is you can make things known. You can act on emptiness. you another mark is you have no… you're free of plans for the future. Anyway, there are various marks like that that characterize an unconditioned being.

[15:32]

Anyway. Third choice. So second choice is to manifest desire, to manifest emptiness for others. And third choice you can have. All these can be combined, too. You have three, I think, three choices. Third choice is, because I think you're more imprinted with this practice than you may realize. Third choice is, you can try to create some alternative way of life, as Gary Snyder is, as Green Gulch is, as Zen Center as a whole is. some way of life based on returning to sources. This may be completely original, something no one's thought of yet, no one's done yet. This, again, this

[17:21]

need to return to sources. Many of the best halfway houses are based on farming, people who are quite disturbed. You have some way in which they begin to see the relationship between what they eat and what they grow, etc. And then there's an interesting man named Eugene Rosenstock Pussy. You've probably never heard of him. You probably should have, but you probably haven't. He was born a Jew and he became a Christian when he was quite young, and he became a doctor of law, taught at universities in Germany. and began the first labor camps. He was in the First World War, completely thought Europe was lost afterwards, and then he began the first, he went to work for, instead of going back into law, he went back into, he went to work for companies to see what life was actually like for people. The, you know, the hermit and the monastery are very far

[18:54]

opposite from the White Tower and the academic, the Faustian sort of White Tower, you know. And I'm getting off... going off tangent a bit, but Goethe, you know, who wrote Faust, nearly went crazy, it seems, and he, to straighten himself out, he went to Italy, and his Again, his motus was to seek sources, and he went to the famous gardens at Padua, where he discovered what he considered the original plant, the Ur plant, or the Palmas Gurte, or something like that. And this plant still is alive, growing in Italy. in those gardens. And he studied botany, I believe. So Goethe, to get out of that White Tower kind of situation, academia, he went back to find the first plant. And Peter Matheson, some of you know who Deborah Matheson is. She died of cancer.

[20:16]

rather like Trudy died of cancer, Trudy Dixon. Some of you knew Trudy, I think, which was rather an experience for the whole group, to say the least. And Deborah had that same relationship. Her death and sickness had the same... was the same kind of experience for the New York Zen group. She came here for one or two... one practice period? Or one summer? And her husband is recently... Peter Masson, who's a novelist, has recently gone to Africa, where most... I guess all of our civilizations came from. to find what he calls the tree under which man was born. He's done a rather interesting book on Africa with beautiful photographs. Anyway, back to Eugene Rosenstock. I don't know German, so I don't know if I'm pronouncing his name correctly. So he formed the first labor camps

[21:29]

And he organized the first labor associations and then he was chairman of the first worldwide adult education group. As you may know, I worked for adult education for five years after leaving university. And his early labor camps led to the group that opposed Hitler. And so his early ideas were very... Dr. Konze was one of the first people to oppose Hitler. Hussein, also his ideas, which are very similar to our own, to the Buddhist and to Dr. Konze's ideas, The influence he had on young people led to the group that tried to overthrow Hitler. And his ideas, I think, probably led to the CCC camps. What are they called? The something conservation... Yeah, Civilian Conservation Corps camps, right. And the early CCC leaders and participants are many of the people who are intellectual and artistic.

[22:53]

leaders now. Anyway, the CCC camps, which we turn to in times of depression, but we don't like our childhood, and as soon as the depression's over, we abandon. He formed the first... Roosevelt had Hussey try to form the first CCC camp, which, called the William James, camp, which tried to see if the CCC could last for a long period of time. And he's the spiritual founder, maybe, of what Paige Smith and Paul Lee are doing in Santa Cruz. What they're doing, they have the William James Society, which is a combination of Chrissy's ideas and So they have a work company as part of the William James Association, which comes from Zen Center, et cetera. And Page Smith, who founded the William James Association with Paul Lee, just finished a monumental, many-volumed History of the United States.

[24:13]

and disillusioned with the various ways it was going to be published, he and Paul left the university together, feeling the university was finished. He was provost of one of the colleges at Santa Cruz. And he's turned to raising chickens, because he sees the destruction of or dilution of the various kinds of chickens. breeds of chickens as symptomatic of the delusion or destruction of America. So, it takes a brave man to raise chickens. And he's very interesting on chickens. He's written a whole book on chickens. And when you study chickens, it's really quite phenomenal. It's a perfect example, really, of what's happened to America. I'm sorry.

[25:35]

I can remember when I was pretty young, my father was a professor at a university and some teaching associates of his left the university to raise chickens and were driven out of business. And there are chicken farms that have been driven out of business all over the United States because it was thought of at one time as a way a small guy could support himself. All you needed was a hundred or five hundred chickens, and you could grow enough eggs, produce enough eggs to support yourself simply. And then mechanization set in, and the next guy did it with a thousand chickens. And so you had to go to a thousand chickens, because he could drop the price. Eventually the price goes back up again, but for a while it works that way. And then they went to 10,000 chickens, and pretty soon people who couldn't, didn't have the capital investment at that level, just went under. And I guess the whole United States has many, many, many failed chicken farms. And now I guess you have to have a million chickens to be in business, or maybe several million. I mean, it's a huge business.

[27:02]

and the process has led to the destruction of the breeding lines for some reason, I don't exactly understand. And now there's an enormous problem of chicken disease, because the chickens are very fragile, live in isolated situations. So eggs are now raised by... So one little germ will kill a million chickens. So chickens are raised now on these big farms by bright lights and methadrine speed. You know that, right? And then, some of it may be illegal now, but mostly I think it's done, and by completely sealed sanitary buildings where people enter in suits with helmets on and everything, and they don't touch anything, and you touch the eggs and the chickens, etc. It's just incredible. I remember, this is just a biased anecdote I'm going to tell now,

[28:26]

I was hitchhiking from Boston to New York once, and this man picked me up in a big Lincoln Continental, and I was living on very little money in those days. I literally did not have ten cents for a cup of coffee over several weeks at a time. And I was hitchhiking to New York, and this man picked me up, and he began trying to impress me with himself. I guess I looked uninterested or something. So he told me how much money he had. First he told me how big the car was, which I could see. How much money it cost. And I said, oh, it did cost $6,000. In those days that was quite a lot. And still is. And then the chairman, how many corporation boards he was on, and I still was listening. I mean, not sort of listening, but I didn't know what to say. So he kept trying to up the grade. And finally, he said, well, do you know what my real racket is?

[29:46]

I couldn't believe my ears. It was like something out of a play or something. I was just sitting in this car. Man going to tell me what his racket is. So at this point I did participate and I said, no. He said, old people homes. And I said, old people's homes? What kind of racket is that? He said, oh well, some guy or some couple, they want to get rid of their old mom or dad and they pay me forty, fifty dollars a day to take care of them. It only costs me thirty cents for breakfast or twenty cents for breakfast and thirty-five cents for lunch. I said, my God, how come it's so cheap? He said, because I feed them mostly chicken necks. And they buy chicken necks from slaughtered animals and they boil them up, one egg for breakfast and chicken necks for lunch, made into soup, you know.

[31:01]

What greed will get you to do to a bunch of old people? Full of hormones being stuffed by the chicken farmers down the necks of the chickens to fatten them up for slaughter. And they were so greedy, they were stuffing so many pills in, that not all of them would get down into the bird, but would remain in the neck. And so when the bird was slaughtered, the neck would be stuffed with hormones. And then they'd be feeding these to old people who were having all these hormonal changes. One might say we're out of touch with something. Anyway. That even one instance of such a thing can happen, you know, without any corrective social mechanism, you know. interpersonal social mechanism. It means that everything is tilting. Anyway, that's why Paige Smith is raising chickens. So you've made some choice.

[32:40]

Actually, most of you already. You've chosen to leave your... to leave college or teaching or some profession. Some of you have left medical... in Zen Center, have left medical profession or law profession or teaching profession or social welfare profession. I think almost all the leaders of Zen Center, the older people, have all left college or graduate school. There's very few people, except elderly people like Yvonne, who have finished college. I guess she finished in the fifties.

[33:43]

And some people in Zen Center are still ambivalent about their decision and may want to go back, etc. Going back may be a very good thing to do, but the ambivalence mostly comes from the situation of our choices is not clear. And now you have another choice to make, or partly you've made another choice. You haven't just chosen to do just anything else, you've decided to practice Zen Buddhism. Some people have decided to become craftsmen and then also practice Zen. Many people have decided to do the William James Society or become artists or carpenters or something. Anyway, this choice that we're making now in rather large numbers is a rather significant choice. This trying to return to sources, to recognize the child and adult, life and death, as one activity which has to be in touch with itself.

[35:22]

In Buddhism it's likely to play a rather major role in this... It may just be a little bump, you know, in current history, but eventually I don't see any way out except by a return to face-to-face communities and knowledge and participation in production. You understand what I mean? I don't see any way out except that. So eventually Buddhism, because this is what Buddhism is all about, and Buddhism is pretty old, maybe the oldest of the viable alternatives now. It's certainly the most developed and probably the most sophisticated monastic tradition in the world, and the most long-lasting basis for a community that I know of. So it's likely to play a rather large role. At present, the most... not exactly viable, but the most powerful institution in the world are the multinational corporations.

[36:58]

They are actually more powerful than governments. Governments only have power, I think, because they control military power. But effective social power, the multinational corporations are. They're far more powerful than the UN. The UN couldn't do what the oil companies are doing to the world right now. And strangely enough, the alternative to some people are actually looking through the multinational corporations, because in power terms that's what actually exists, to see if they have the ability to solve the problems. But the alternative to that is some sense of international, non-boundary community, which we in our minor way are engaged in. I'm not saying what we're doing is important, you know. I'm just trying to point out that we are involved in a situation of real choice. And we have intuitively decided to try to do something about our condition, personal condition and social condition.

[38:13]

So Zen Center is created... Again, I'm coming back to talk with us, because we're creating Zen Center. Talk with us about what we're creating. We're creating a place to uncreate ourselves. We're creating a... try to create a place which has some connection with participation in production and a face-to-face community. and which probably, like the monastic tradition of Europe, which consciously saw itself as the keeper and caretaker of crafts, we probably will have some such sense in our community. I don't want to go in at this time to the distinction between profession and craft.

[39:30]

So I've been trying to give us a sense of the choices we're involved in by practicing, by leaving what we were doing to practice, and by what kind of place we're creating to practice in with. to be in a situation in which things count. Everything counts, each moment everything counts, and the willingness to be counted. And in a situation of real choice, you know, which you don't say as a student in a college community, have much real choice, and what you do and how you relate to people is not very important, you can change to some

[41:19]

other dorm or class the next semester or quarter. But here what you do, how you know each person counts and will continue to count and stay with you. There's no escaping from each other. So how you relate to each other, how you practice friendliness or not counts here. How we relate to each other. How we take our own share of the burden of survival is whether we survive or not. It's more and more in our own hands. It's not being done for us. In this context, you can begin to review your consciousness. developing vigilance. As I said last night, you should be able to peel through the layers of society and personality in you.

[42:50]

Buddhism teaches that there's three natures that we see. Now nature again, the word genius, this idea of an innate nature is philosophically and verbally very difficult to deal with, but I think we have to talk about it at least loosely. This idea of genius has this sense of suchness or innate nature, of recognising things as they actually are. Or, as Zukioshi talked about, innermost request, which is quite similar. And genius also has, or genie, or crossing a boundary, also has the sense of but the potential for germination, the potential for creation, and in that sense it's close to the Dharmakaya, Vairocana Buddha. So Buddhism teaches that there are three

[44:27]

Again, when I say the word, I want to say something else. The idea, the monastic ideal, is not just to be in touch with production and face-to-face relationships, but also to exemplify the inner order of things, the nature, the inner nature of things. As I said, you should have a sense of source, of the sources of things in your activity as a member of the Sangha. And the community should reflect that. So, anyway, that was an ideal of Western monastic tradition to reflect the inner order, to be able to bring people back to the inner order.

[45:29]

Now, this sense of inner order is part of right practice, and in Buddhism the problem of order or nature is a very subtle one, because there's no such thing as any particular nature. But rectitude or right or order is the same word as, of course, rex or king or realm. Sambhogakaya Buddha is coterminous with his realm. The boundaries or marks of his body are also the marks of his land by which he's supported. Each Buddha produces his own land, we say. And the Sambhogakaya or bliss body is identical to his boundaries and his land's boundary which support him are the same. This is for our practice. This is a rather subtle idea. I won't try to explain it now. But as in all these words that I've been discussing, to find the roots of reality in our own language,

[47:01]

we have worship, as I've said, worship is to turn toward what actually happens, means there's value or meaning there. And our intention is to stretch out, to extend ourself, to realize our larger body. And right practice, the reign or realm or the various words that come from it. It seems to at root means to reach your hand straight out to someone. It means straightforward, but it means to reach your hand straight out to someone. When you meet someone, to reach straight out to them. No craftiness. No playing for advantage. That's the sword arm when you do that. Just to reach your hand defenseless, straight out. Defenselessness is one of the end products of Buddhism. And it also, for some reason, means not only r-e-i-g-m, but also r-a-i-n, rain. This is also very closely connected with Buddhism, because the dharma is said to be the dharma rain, which penetrates everything.

[48:26]

This straightforwardness is one of the tools of our practice, tools of our consciousness, tools of finding out your nature. So there are three natures Buddhism teaches, svabhāvas. One nature is imagination. I don't want to hurt your legs. I should stop pretty soon. I have a feeling that you're all blanking out at a certain point and seeing the great white light. I'll try to stop pretty soon. Anyway, one is imagination, mere imagination, what you think up, misconceptions, misperceptions. So when you examine your consciousness and when you have the steadiness to look at what's coming up, you should be able to recognize what's imaginary, what's not real. Second one, second nature, is dependence on others.

[49:56]

This has two meanings. One meaning is the collusion of self and society and parents to deceive you, to protect us from revealing that there's no such thing as self, to protect us from revealing our weakness. Your parents started very early. Your parents don't want you to know their own limitations. So there's a, you don't, you can't really confront your father or mother with their weaknesses. So there's already a collusion. Already we agree not to do such and such that goes on between children and parents. And this collusion is the bigger collusion of all of society. We agree to realize we're not ripping off everyone else. Or ambitious, ambition to hit your wagon to the star is out-and-out aggression. We agree to not recognize that to win means to destroy someone else, to have more than your fair share. Anyway, this is one, in this sense, dependence on others.

[51:25]

is very similar to imagination because it's all unreal. So in this sense, number two looks back to number one. And what I've been talking about, I've been trying to talk about this history, partly to give us a chance to look at our social attitudes, you know, that come that aren't real, that are the base, that are actually a collusion. Beliefs about the world or about the way it will be or the way we have to prove ourselves or establish ourselves, it's all a deception. And you should be able to see it as a deception. and with courage, ability to face it. So that's number two. Second part of number two is the truth of interdependence. And the first level, the level at which most scholars understand emptiness, is as interdependence. And it's quite good if you can understand. You can really

[52:51]

act on interdependence, you'll get your first sense of emptiness, of the unreal nature of everything. But that's only rather superficial or first-level understanding or experience. Understanding experience, ability to act on emptiness, is more right. Second level, second svabhava is also a recognition of our interdependence on others as being, as a kind of being itself. This also we should recognize. Okay, the third is, third being, is ultimate reality. Now ultimate reality means a recognition that interdependence as being is false. But to recognize this means you have to have a perfected consciousness, a perfected knowledge which

[54:17]

sees through everything and is stable. This is all very accurate. I mean, this is exactly the way our mind and practice goes. when you begin to be able to look at the layers of your own consciousness, what you see as real, what you think exists, what you act on, what the world you live in falls under these three headings. The third one is, requires some development of your subtle consciousness. no object of the word, of your subtleness. First you need some diligence, and sometimes that's translated as zeal, and this means courage and persistence.

[55:39]

courage to advance or be present moment after moment without flinching, and persistence, not giving up at all, which means some kind of faith or purity. As long as you have some divided, ambivalent feeling, as long as you have things you're not satisfied with, as long as you do things This is where rectitude comes in. As long as you do things that you don't feel are right, you can't have perfected understanding or consciousness. You can't really be consistent, because you'll waver. Even if you're courageous, you'll waver. So some purity of intention. until there's not anything you do that you're... Or rather, your effort is always something you're willing to live with.

[57:05]

One of the marks, by the way, is to not put yourself down, not be depressed, not debase yourself. This diligence or zeal is combined with what are called the three roots, R-O-O-T-S, of... What is it translated as? maybe wholesome roots. And these are non-delusion, non-anger, and non-desire, or non-possessiveness. Desire, maybe it's better to say non-possessiveness, non-anger or frustration or aversion, and non-illusion. So, I'm spelling this out for you because

[58:09]

You should become familiar with what's going on when something occurs. Anger or non-anger. Delusion or non-delusion. Possessive feeling or ability to look at something without possessive feeling. You should know that. When you can do this, And you can know this. You can begin to have the kind of vigilance, alertness, which allows you to come close to seeing things as they are, and which produces equanimity, calm, even state of mind. You're not disturbed by anything. And from this comes your ability to not harm anything. to act in the world without harming anything. Anyway, all of this procedure, this Buddhist craft of consciousness, finding out how to proceed to know ultimate reality,

[59:29]

It comes from putting yourself in a situation of real choice, of where things count and in which you're willing to be counted, and taking stock of your own apparatus, your own worlds, your own inventory of illusion or delusion. anger or desire. Finding out when you're able to not be possessive, what it means not to be in the same situation but not have anger appear. This is also called a dharma. Anyway, this minute

[60:34]

examination of our consciousness, our Vedana psychology and in the basis of all the sutras, is the basis of all Buddhist practice and is particularly emphasized by Suzuki Roshi's lineage. This is why the precepts are emphasized so much. The true understanding of the precepts.

[61:37]

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