Well, I hope to say a few things but not talk so long. So that we can discuss during the rest of the morning. And I'm going to try... I noticed this morning, earlier, when Bekiroshi was talking, that Otmar was working really hard. I could smell the smoke coming out of his brain. So I hope to... give Otmar a little easier time. And I want to also say how happy I am to be here and how grateful I am to be here.

[01:06]

Because I think it's really the truth that, and I don't mean to, this maybe sounds strange, but it's really the truth that wherever I go, Baker Roshi is with me. Und es ist wirklich wahr, und ich hoffe, das hört sich nicht seltsam an, wo immer ich hingehe, ist Bekaroshi mit dabei. Because in that time that we spent together, living together and practicing together, his influence on me was transformative. Und in der Zeit, wo wir zusammen gelebt und praktiziert haben, war sein Einfluss auf mich wirklich verändernd. Nevertheless, it is nice to actually be where he is in the physical space. So I appreciate that. And it's thanks to Baker Roshi That I became a Zen priest.

[02:40]

Which was not my choice or desire. I'm sorry. It's his fault. And also... Vegaroshi performed the wedding of Kathy and myself. And gave his blessing in some way that's hard to explain to our being together. and I think that I have a stubborn and impractical character and so if I did not have Kathy in my life and I were not a Zen priest

[03:52]

It's hard to know what fate would have befallen me. But I have the feeling it would not have been a happy fate. But I think I would have had many difficulties. As it is, my life is very easy. So, I'm very grateful to Begoroshian to be here in this place. and this feeling of gratitude.

[05:09]

might be the actual subject matter of our seminar. Even if we don't talk about it very much, I think it will be the underlying feeling of the seminar. Because what we're intending to do in these few days is to think through together. And this reminds me of... one of the phrases of Begaroshi of many years ago that he taught us. I don't remember exactly the phrase. But it had something to do with the close proximity of thinking and thanking.

[06:20]

but it had to do with this Yeah, just like in English the two words have a close sound together. Because they're quite related to one another. So it means that Thinking isn't thinking about something. Thinking in order to figure something out. And gain supremacy over it by thinking it through. But it's the opposite of this, thinking as an expression of gratitude.

[07:46]

We imagine that thinking is the boss. Thinking is the king of everything. Thinking is going to survey everything and explain it and control it. But I think that in religious practice, in Zen, thinking is the servant. Thinking is the bride. Thinking is opening up our arms, opening up our heart. To receive the world.

[09:01]

Because it's by thinking that the human form of being meets the world. So if we can think together in this spirit, then actually we can refresh the world, not only for ourselves but for itself. And this is something that we can only do together. And our Being together in silence is part of that thinking.

[10:12]

Our being together in silence nourishes and makes this kind of thinking possible. So I think whatever our topic would be in this seminar, it would always be that. So now I want to introduce the first phrase or series of phrases of Dogen that I chose. And it's about thinking. And this is a quotation from Dogen that will be very familiar to many of you.

[11:23]

It wasn't one that I was thinking about when I was collecting different phrases of Dogen. But because I know that a few of you at least are new to the practice of Zazen, I thought I would bring it up. And it's a phrase that Dogen brings up in Fukan Zazengi, his introduction to Zazen practice. And this is a sentence that Dogen says in this introduction to Zazen in the Fukan Zazen-ji. The phrase is think, not thinking.

[12:30]

And the sentence is think, not think. Denke das Nichtdenken. And Dogen goes on to say, how do you think not thinking? Und Dogen fährt fort, wie denkst du das Nichtdenken? Non-thinking. Nichtdenken. This is the essential art of Zazen. Das ist die grundlegende Kunst im Zazen. All the other phrases that I was thinking about had nothing to do with Zazen. But Of course, for me, after sitting for so many years, I just assume Zazen.

[13:38]

I don't really think about it or talk about it so much. I assume it. And I think also Dogen assumes Zazen. Dogen's feeling for Zazen or understanding of Zazen is everywhere in his writing even when he doesn't mention it. Because Dogen doesn't think that zazen is meditation practice. He says in Fukan Zazenji, zazen is not meditation. He says something like, it's the dharma gate of repose and bliss. So it's as if... We don't know repose, yeah.

[15:00]

Repose is resting. Ah, von Glückseligkeit und Ruhen. Ja, danke. So, for Dogen, it's as if zazen is... the location or the place, the feeling for being, almost a returning to being, a returning to presence. A coming back to ourselves, a coming back to our home. The only place in which a real life is possible. The only place where true life is possible.

[16:08]

Although he speaks about meditation in a very special way. What he means by Zazen is being himself. You know, the most marvelous thing, the thing for which one has the most gratitude is just that we are at all. It didn't have to be that way. We could not be. And we didn't plan our being.

[17:11]

Or earn it. Or produce it. Or think it. Somehow we just aren't. And this is a remarkable, unprecedented fact. I mean, the marvel of it is beyond expression. And yet, who notices this? We never notice this. Because we have a lot of problems.

[18:19]

We're busy. We have things to do, places to go. We have to worry about our money, our relationships, and so forth. So we're busy, important people. And we just don't have time to notice that we are. We take it completely for granted. And yet everything depends on this. And it's the only thing that matters. And it's the one thing that we don't even know how to appreciate. So this is how zazen helps us.

[19:25]

It helps us to return to that location in which we can appreciate and actually feel the feeling of being alive. return to the basis of everything set aside all of our problems and our important issues and just feel our being And in this quotation, Dogen is telling us that Zazen is a form of thinking. This to me is very surprising.

[20:45]

Because we don't think of meditation as a kind of thinking. But he's telling us to sit in zazen is to think Not thinking. So this is a kind of thinking. Nichtdenken ist eine Art denken. And the way we usually think is thinking as the boss. Und so wie wir normalerweise denken, da ist das Denken ist der Chef. Thinking as the master. Ist der Meister. thinking that will reduce the world to something we can manage and manipulate. And that will also reduce ourselves to something we can manage and manipulate. Because in usual thinking, we ourselves are also objects in the world.

[22:05]

And when we think in that way, we can't feel gratitude. And we can't feel the marvelousness of our simply being. So in order to throw off this kind of thinking, we have to return to a thinking that brings us home. And Dogen calls this kind of thinking, not thinking. So then he says, how do we think, not thinking? non-thinking.

[23:20]

This is the art of meditation. The art of zazen. So it means exactly what Baker Roshi was speaking about this morning. When he referenced Suzuki Roshi's saying, don't invite your thoughts to tea. Did you ever think, you know, what makes thought go? Hast du jemals darüber nachgedacht, was das Denken gehen lässt? What's the energy that drives thought forward as it searches for the next thought? Was ist die Energie, die das Denken weiter treibt auf der Suche nach dem nächsten Gedanken?

[24:28]

There seems to be a track, there seems to be something to be followed. What pushes this track along, what pushes us along the track of thought? It's desire. clinging to ourself as an object in the world. An object in the world that is already in exile. It's already outside. It's already in exile from itself.

[25:29]

So naturally it has energy to appropriate more and more. So thinking has an urgency. In a goal. In a need. That however is never fulfilled. To think not thinking is to gently open the hand of thought. And allow all that we grasp in our hand just to be released. And then thinking could simply arise.

[26:56]

Without being pushed. Without need. And with nothing outside of it. Every moment brings jeder Moment bringt seinen Gedanken. The thought that must occupy that moment. Der Gedanke, der diesen Moment besetzen muss. And when we don't grasp, und wenn wir danach nicht greifen, is der Gedanke eines jeden Moments besetzt. and fulfilled. And maybe sometimes there is just quiet.

[27:56]

But whether there is quiet or not, anyway there's always quiet. Because even a thought that arises without this driven quality has quiet at its center. So in the practice, in the actual practice of zazen, it doesn't make any difference whether the mind has a thought or not. So as a practical meditation instruction, when we sit in meditation, we're not trying to still the mind of all thought. We're just trying to open the hand of thought.

[29:10]

Giving ourselves a break from the drivenness of our thinking. And the drivenness of our living and thinking. So that we can allow the thinking that is most truly wanting to arise in this time to come. And go, because thinking comes and goes. And something else comes. And this, I think, Baker Roshi also was speaking exactly of this this morning, too.

[30:14]

He was talking about parataxis. Just letting something come and letting something go. One thing comes, one thing goes. We don't have to drive something. Seeking some connection. Because that drivenness, that seeking a connection closes up our life and causes us pain. Sometimes, of course, we do think like that. Because in the practical world this is necessary. But if we're practitioners, this kind of thinking, even this kind of thinking, also exists against the constant background of not thinking.

[31:34]

But for a practitioner, this kind of thinking also exists in contrast to this... So that the feeling of our zazen practice is never far away from us. So this becomes our home. This kind of a mind, this kind of a heart of opening always our hands. And allowing ourselves and allowing the world to be what it is. And appreciating always what's there.

[32:36]

So it's a place to be, a place to dwell, a place to live. We can feel it as a place. It's as if Zazen is our house, our home. And it becomes, after a while, very concrete, very palpable. The feeling of the body itself. The feeling of the breath itself. The feather lightness of consciousness. These things are never not present with us.

[33:50]

They're never. They're always present. But we haven't noticed. Because we've gotten so much training and so much input not to notice these things. And this is why, again as we heard this morning, flight hours are helpful. Because it helps us to remember this. And to have the literal feeling of it, to make the neural pathways to it so that we have it at our fingertips.

[35:02]

And when we do, we don't feel surprised when we hear Dogen speak about think, not thinking. And this doesn't seem complicated to us. Since we're in the landscape of Martin Heidegger, I want to read something from him that reminds me of what I'm talking about. And I'll finish with this little quotation. Which I might render into a more simple English. for compassion of Otmar.

[36:04]

Thank you. Because I felt a little smoke coming when I heard Heidegger. I even don't understand him in German. So this is from an essay of Heidegger called Building, Dwelling, Thinking. And in this essay it's very similar actually to what I'm talking about. Because now I'm going to give my own impressions of Since I'm only quoting a small part, I have to give my own impressions of the whole of the essay. He seems to be telling us that true thinking comes from a sense of dwelling, a sense of really being, letting oneself be an expression of a place.

[37:21]

Which he calls, uses the word in English anyway, dwelling. I don't know what the German word is, but in English it's translated as dwelling, to dwell, to abide, deeply abide in a place. Yes, dwelling or abide, I would translate it as verweilen. So now he's talking about dwelling, this abiding. So this verweilen. And building, meaning to build a building or to take care of something. Oder zu bauen, ein Gebäude zu bauen oder sich um etwas zu kümmern. And thinking. Und denken. So he says, building and thinking are... each in its own way, inescapable for dwelling. But building and thinking do not support dwelling. If each goes its own way and they do not listen to one another, when both thinking and building

[38:57]

abide with dwelling, then each one will remain in its own limits and each one will realize that it must come from the workshop of long experience and incessant practice. So the first part is that building and thinking must understand their own limits. And they both must realize that they come from the workshop. They're created by long experience and constant practice.

[40:07]

So in other words, thinking comes from being. And it's an ongoing practice. And to make something in the world, if this is what we mean by building, can only be successful when it's connected to this kind of thinking and this dwelling. Then skipping a part, he says the problem of this dwelling is this. That we always have to learn over and over again how to do it. In other words, it's not something that we can grasp

[41:18]

and control. It's an everyday new situation, new exploration. So in a way, we're in a constant condition of homelessness. Immer in einer Position der Heimatlosigkeit. But as soon as we give thought to our homelessness, aber sobald wir einen Gedanken an dieser Heimatlosigkeit geben, we come home. Kommen wir nach Hause. And this thinking calls us home. So all of this is from the outside.

[42:33]

No different from any ordinary way of life. There is thinking. There is making something in the world, in our life. There is a place to be at home. But from the inside there is a shift in how we view these things, how we understand these things and how we live them. Maybe we could say that in our practice We constantly refresh questions. We constantly wonder about our life at every point.

[44:01]

And we know that the reaching for answers and places of peacefulness ahead. is the path of suffering and confusion. And what a relief to let go of it. So I was very happy last night and this morning to sit with all of you in the meditation hall. Kathy and I have been traveling around Italy, having fun and eating good meals.

[45:04]

and what a pleasure to come and simply sit to return to dwelling to return home the deepest pleasure of all the deepest pleasure of all So I close with a poem of my own, which I am not going to ask Otmar to translate. And afterward, you'll tell me whether it's worthwhile to read a poem in English. Here's the poem. What a luxury it would be to have an inner life a few trees in a pot a scrawled list of formerly used words and music plenty of music that tinkles down the stairs like water or tiny shards of ice falling off melting roofs

[46:47]

Not to have to worry about the many arrangements that go to shore up a life. It would be a pleasure to sink into those waters and there would be no more images.

[47:06]

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