So we discussed, we're studying case 20. So how many people have never seen this story before? Okay, so the story goes, this monk, this man named Di Cang, Chinese Zen teacher named Di Cang, asks Fa Yan, Di Cang means... Earth Womb. And Fa Yan means Dharma Eyes or Eyes of Truth. So Earth Womb asks Eyes of Truth, where are you going? And Eyes of Truth says, around on pilgrimage. And Earth Womb says, what is the purpose of going on pilgrimage? And Dharma Eyes says, I don't know.

[01:10]

And Earth Womb says, not knowing is most intimate. It says here is nearest, but also can be said most intimate. So we've been discussing for a while now what this not knowing might be like. And I want to say that a little bit about how to study these stories. One way to study these stories is to try to find the I always try to find the I of the story. Whenever you find one of these stories, after you have become somewhat familiar... Hello, what is your name? Bryce. Bryce? Bryce. Do you want to sit here, Phu?

[02:16]

Do you want to sit here? Diane, do you feel comfortable sitting that far away? Do you feel comfortable sitting that far away? Would you like to sit closer? There's a seat right here next to me. I can't see you. So these stories, they have eyes, like this kind of eye. And so it's good to find the I of the story.

[03:28]

So where do you think the I of the story is? Have any of you thought about that yet? I just read it, but it made me think something I thought before, which is all religions have a common element of faith, the lack of doubt, the trusting of something, and that state of lack of doubt, trusting, believing, tends to make this sort of state of mindless what's it called mindlessness or mindfulness or whatever the good stuff well that's all i want good so do you have any idea in the in the in the words of the story can you see where where the place of faith might be um let's see the way in knowing or in not knowing, let's see, when the not knowing is nearest.

[04:33]

Not knowing can be seen, at least by me, as that total putting faith in something unknown, be it God, or religion, or whatever it is. Maybe that's a flop out, but just this is it? Maybe that's cool. Well, particularly, so I understand what you're saying, but I'd like you to find a place where it says the case, Can you see where in that story do you think the I might be? Not knowing is nearest and I don't know. We're around in there? I don't know and not knowing is nearest? Okay. What do you mean by I? Well, like the center, the place that, as much as possible, I mean, the place that you feel...

[05:38]

most of the story is converging on. The place where you could, like, feel the word in the story that you feel connects to all the other words. Most. Or where all the words are converging. There's probably not necessarily just one eye. There could be multiple eyes. In fact, there are multiple eyes all over the place. But in the story you might be able to find the place you thought was the most concentrated, most converging center of the story, the place where you feel like you can look at that spot and remember the rest of the story. So... You know, I... Yes? Well, I hit on that word purpose. The word purpose? You felt that was the eye? Yeah. Because it's sort of like the dog having the Buddha nature, or the pilgrimage having a purpose.

[06:40]

Well, to me it wasn't about having or not having. I thought that the pilgrimage was the purpose. OK. So I think it's that kind of an individual matter, to some extent. Well, I think it's an individual matter. I think that this whole thing turns on individual selves. So yourself, it would be good if yourself would find an eye in this story. And then... And what... Well, you probably already know.

[07:42]

If you found this eye, what would you do with it? Why'd you found it? How would you live with it? Keep it. How would you keep it? Breathing with it. Breathing with it. Breathe with the eye. Look through it. Look through it. Not send me. Pardon? Not settling into it. Not settling into it? Let it change and come and go. Mm-hmm. Any other instructions you'd like to give about how to live with this I, if you found this I? Or even if you haven't found this eye, how would you live with this story as a whole?

[08:45]

Yes? I think I would let the eye close. Let the eye actually go to sleep? Let the eye close and go to sleep? Maybe use the eye to feel how other things are the same. Your situation right now. Try it on like a coat. Looking word. Looking word. Looking word. Forget about it. Forget about it. And how will you forget about it? I don't know. I don't know. Could you hear what she said?

[09:48]

She said, forget about it. And I said, how are you going to forget about it? She said, I don't know. Thank you. For me, it's rather hot this evening.

[11:12]

I just finished washing dishes. I can go on like this. I'll be allowed to talk, or we just have to listen. Oh, shucks. Oh, wow. It's fun. Do you feel allowed to talk? Obviously. That's good, that's good.

[12:23]

Yes. You gave a lecture sometime back about a monk that came a very great distance to... game teaching, I thought it was Fa Yan. Was it Fa Yan? I don't remember. What about it? Part of the lecture was, Fa Yan came to Zen Master and he said, I've come to receive your instruction. Zen Master said, get out of here. Different guy. But what about it? Well, I was making a connection between the great distance that that monk traveled and this monk going around on pilgrimage. The idea is if this is the same monk, then he seems to be

[13:39]

willing to undertake a lot of walking around in uncertainty? Well, you know, what do you call it? Literally speaking, this is not the same monk as that story. But that story was very much like this willingness to go around walking around in uncertainty. That was a story about this monk who came to the monastery, and he traveled a long distance. And when he went in to sit in the initiation room, which we call in Japanese, ,, the room for the itinerant monks, where you sit for some period of time if you wish to enter into the training of the temple. And the teacher came out and threw cold water on the people who were waiting. And he yelled at them and told them that, oh no, he just threw cold water on them.

[14:44]

And most of the monks who were waiting there ran away. But this guy and his partner just wrung their robes out and kept sitting. And he came back later and said, you're still here. He said, if you don't leave, I'm going to beat you up. And they said, you think after traveling hundreds of miles to receive your discipline? beating us up, it's going to stop us, or go ahead and beat us up, it's not going to stop us, something like that. He said, okay, you fools, you can stay. And then he made this monk into the head cook. And he was very strict, this teacher was very strict, and the monks had been complaining to the head cook about the low quality of the meals. So one day the teacher went to town. While he was in town, this monk, who had become the head cook, took the key to the storage room, went to the storage room and got, I believe, some oil and noodles and added them to the food and gave the monks quite a nice meal.

[15:52]

The teacher came back just in time to get the meal. When he got the meal, he... he noticed that the food had improved significantly without his permission. And he figured out that this monk had gone and somehow gotten food out of the storage room, and he asked him, and he said, yes, I had. He had done that, and the teachers... And he said, please, you know, discipline me. That's what I came for. So the teacher said, well, you have to pay back... you have to pay back for what you took, and not only that, but get out. So the guy actually had to sell his bowls and robes in order to pay back, and then he got kicked out of the monastery. And he asked to come back, not to live in the monastery, but he asked to come back at least to have an interview with the teacher to continue his study with him, and the teacher refused.

[16:59]

And then one time the teacher was walking in the town and he saw this guy standing around and he was standing in front of a rooming house that the monastery owned. The teacher said, do you live here? And he said, yes. He said, do you pay rent here? And he said, no. He said, you should pay rent at this place. So the monk then started walking around town begging and with the money he got from begging he paid his rent at the monastery's boarding house. And the teacher found out about that and went back and told all the monks in the monastery that this guy was a true Zen student. Oh, and they also say that every time the teacher said this stuff to him, he never complained. He never complained. So that's the story about walking in the unknown, as you were saying. He had some deep faith in something or other.

[18:02]

I don't know what it was. I guess it was deep faith that he wanted to get disciplined. And he got it. He finally was readmitted to the monastery after that. That's that story. But it's like this. Same spirit here. He has I think that story kind of encourages me to say that the word uncertainty perhaps isn't the most appropriate as a substitute for not knowing. Yeah. Yeah, thank you. Because in fact, you're right that this not knowing is a state of great certainty. You're so certain that you no longer depend on knowing or not knowing. And although you don't have the usual, you might even say crutches or dependencies of knowing certain things by which you can tell whether you're doing it right or not, you are somehow certain.

[19:21]

So, in the case of this story, how do you develop certainty in relationship to this story? How do we develop certainty in relationship to our life? We're not even in relationship to our life. Because again, relationship to our life is something that we know about. We know of this thing, we have a relationship with this thing we know called life. How can we live with certainty and free ourselves from the need to know about our life? To be certain about our life rather than know about our life. I can't do it very often, but for me, I found, and I'm human, I use behavior modification techniques to train myself to recognize certain physical signs that I'm certain, as certain as I want to be.

[20:39]

ultimately, and it doesn't happen very often. But for instance, when I came here, I had to stop thinking of all the bad things that could happen, like, oh, fuck, I'm going to be living with a bunch of idiots, and I'm going to hate it, and work is going to get too hard. And I go, well, Christian, if you think like that, it's going to happen. So in order to free myself of that, I just imagined you know, what if it could be really good somehow, you know, and not knowing what really good would be, um, I just thought, okay, then I won't, um, make the other shit happen. So I didn't, and then I started getting my usual signs, like I play the synchronicity game, where I notice, um, certain in, in the environment, certain things, like I play with numerology, I open a book at random, and pick a phrase and then write it down. Well, for instance, I'm a writer. I've had writer's block for a long time. And suddenly, since like yesterday, I've written pages and pages and gotten a reading list.

[21:46]

I've been starting to read. I've been starting to draw. My creative block is gone. after it's been a couple years already. Okay, so that's a physical sign that I'm doing something that I want to do, and I feel happier, too. So for me, it's just practice, practice certain things. Like, the meditation really helps make it unlocked for me, anyway. Anybody else carry a writer's block? I'm trying to live with both uncertainty and not knowing. Well, uncertainty can go with... It depends on what kind of not knowing. The not knowing he means here is a not knowing that goes with certainty. And the ordinary sense of not knowing that people usually are talking about

[22:47]

is more like uncertainty. Does that make sense to you? Yeah, it makes sense to me, but I think there's a step before you get there, and that's where I think I probably am, is that I'm not certain that any of this makes sense. I'm not certain if I should be here. I'm not certain if there's anything of pure value. And yet I don't know the teachings. I don't know much of anything. Are you sure that's kind of like an inferiority complex where you're basing it on what is the usual standard, like intellectual? You're not smart enough? You haven't read the books? No, that's not what it's about. Okay, good. Because I had that big time. Well, you know, I think we often get in situations where the thought comes up in our mind, is this worthwhile?

[24:15]

For example, is it worthwhile to listen to this person who's talking to me? Is what this person is saying worthwhile listening to? This person who's talking to me right now, or this person who's, yeah, this person that I happen to be with right now, who's talking this way. Ever have that happened to you? Ever think that? Especially if the person goes on and on. Or, you know, you don't necessarily have to sit there and listen to them. You could also say, well, is it worthwhile for me to say something back to them right now? Like, could you please stop talking for a little bit here? I want to say something. And then is it worthwhile for you to say something? Like if somebody tells you that you're cruel or something. Is it worthwhile to tell them how that feels?

[25:19]

Is it worthwhile to listen to them talk about that some more? Is it worthwhile to tell somebody that you feel they've been cruel to you? Are these worthwhile situations? Don't we wonder about that? So we'll probably keep wondering about that. Those kinds of thoughts probably will continue to occur unless they just don't for a while. They might stop, actually, for a while, too. It's possible that they'll stop. But fairly likely they'll start again. It's been my experience that they come and go. Thoughts of wondering whether I'm wasting my time at some particular time and place. whether this is actually the most interesting and important conversation of all time. And not even comparing it to the past, but just like right now, this is what's happening. Is this where my life's going to happen? So like, is this class where your life is going to happen?

[26:25]

Is this class where my life is going to happen? During this class time, for the next, we have 50 minutes left. We stop at 9 o'clock usually. So, I mean, you could all... You don't have to come in this room to think about that. So, but we have this text here. And Zen is not based on this text, right? So we have this ironic, paradoxical situation where you have a text, which is a literature of a practice that isn't relying on text, and we're using this text... as a point of departure for our discussions. So is that worthwhile? Is this class, is one of the things about this class to encourage us to use the moment by moment experience of our life as

[27:31]

as what we use, and actually to decide gradually or abruptly to decide that that is entirely what we're going to use for the rest of our life. Though we're always and only going to use what's happening right now, at least as a basic commitment. And you were supposed to remind me about something, do you remember? Yeah, it didn't happen. It hasn't happened yet? I don't have that feeling. I was going to remind you. If it happened. Oh. You were going to remind me if it happened, not, not, is that what you mean? Is that, was that the agreement? I thought you were going to, I thought we were going to bring it up even if it didn't happen, but were you, but anyway, I invited you. I invite you to... We'll talk about it, but I guess I invited you to spot, to mention it when it happens.

[28:38]

But I thought, so you do that, okay? And I'll bring it up in general. In general, what it's about is the fact that all these, a lot of these stories here and these comments can be interpreted in many ways. And... What Gloria mentioned was that sometimes when we're talking about the many interpretations that can be made about these stories, and even the many interpretations that can be made about the interpretations about these stories, that sometimes it sounds a little bit like the way an alcoholic might talk. when they sometimes talk in this very slippery way of kind of like making sense out of nonsense or nonsense out of sense, so you can't really, you know, pin them down for what's being said. And I feel that if that kind of language is happening in this class, and you start to get that feeling, like this is the way alcoholics talk, that it might be good just to say, I feel this is the way, this feels like some kind of dysfunctional way of talking.

[29:46]

And just say it, because that's one of the things that you don't say in those situations, right? Or you might not say. So if it starts to be that kind of alcoholic or drug type of talking, which is kind of whatever you want to call it, slippery or Evasive? Evasive, yeah. Denial. Denial. If you feel like that's what's going on, then just call it by that name, you know. If you get that feeling that reminds you people of some kind of way of talking that seems like the way you felt about talking to alcoholics. I got that feeling whenever I talked to her, that she's all, no, that's not it. but I didn't think about it until now well particularly you know particularly whenever you feel it you can mention it okay because it can happen here the same pattern can happen here right of feeling uncomfortable but don't but not wanting calling it not want to call it that or something of that nature did you have your hand raised

[30:53]

No, I mean, inside my head I did. I felt like that a lot in these classes. And it's almost like sometimes your energy gets so high and so intense, it's almost like someone on cocaine. Or alcohol, I've gotten really afraid at different times. And I know that it's different, but sometimes just the energy, the way the energy's moving feels pretty much the same. So, you might mention that. Does it happen tonight? You just look away and focus? I'm not really clear to say the way an alcoholic talks isn't a definition for what alcohol is. Could you be more specific? Well, like last time we were talking about this conversation between when Furong was talking to Mr. Yang,

[31:59]

And he says, how long has it been since we met last? And Furong said, seven years. This is a kind of straightforward talk so far, okay? Again, you can play with this, but you don't have to yet. Mr. Yang said, have you been studying the way in growth and meditation? Again, that seems a fairly straightforward thing to say to a Zen monk. But then Furong says this kind of funny thing. He says, I don't play that fife and drum. Again, that's pretty straightforward, in a way. He's saying, in a way, he's saying, I'm not, like we talked about this last time, he's saying, I'm not engrossed in meditation. He could have said, no, I'm not engrossed in meditation, but he said, I don't play that fife and drum. And we talked in one interpretation of that, is when you are really involved in something and someone asks you, If you're involved in it, sometimes to say yes maybe doesn't convey it as much as to say no.

[33:05]

Just like if someone might say, you do love me. Sometimes it might be more, somehow you just might feel like yes is not the right answer, like you might say no as a way of saying it. And then the next part, you see, is where it starts getting slippery because then Mr. Yang says, when you wander, then you wander for nothing over mountains and rivers, incapable of anything. And part of one of the things in Zen is that oftentimes as a compliment, sometimes when you can't, you know, you feel a compliment for someone, and then you feel a bigger compliment for someone, and then you feel a bigger compliment for someone, and then you get to a certain point where the people you feel closest to, all you can say is, you're a demon, or you're the worst student I ever met, or, my God, after 20 years of study, finally I get a blind ass as a student, you know. This kind of talk happens in Zen stories, right?

[34:08]

It's ironic. And it's obvious, you know, in retrospect, you can see it's obvious since this was his great disciple. You can see, obviously, it was a compliment. But somehow, in a lot of these stories, the teacher smiles or says, that's right. There's a lot of stories like that. Or the teacher says, that's right, that's it, you got it. There are stories, many stories like that. But the more interesting ones, in some ways, are the one the teacher says, This kind of stuff, like... Now here's a case where the student's saying to the teacher, well, you've been practicing all this time, or you're not practicing meditation, so you're wandering about incapable of doing anything. But again, incapable of doing anything is an epithet for a Buddha. Buddha, Mr. Incapable. For misincapable, that's an epithet for a Buddha.

[35:10]

Unable to walk or sit or roll over, that's an epithet. Those are all epithets for an enlightened person. So you can read that, and I can say what he's saying is, Mr. Yang is saying, what a wonderful way of talking, teacher. And then the teacher does the same thing, I could say. In other words, he's saying, while we haven't been apart for long, only seven years, again, sort of ironic, You sure can talk on high. And then Mr. Yang laughed aloud. So this is an example of language. It could sound a little bit like an alcoholic might talk or alcoholics might talk with each other. That's when it came up, right, Gloria? Well, mostly it's that you said that no is actually the stronger response to have you been engrossed in meditation? And And what I'm talking about is, what question are you answering?

[36:16]

And I'm sure if there's a one-to-one conversation, maybe you know what it is, but it's always that question, are you answering the question I'm asking, or are you answering some other variation that you're making up in your mind? Yeah. And also, I think you also said that in situations like that, no means yes and yes means no. Play those kinds of games, right? And so if you know what's going on, then you know what's going on. But if you don't know what's going on, then you let it go. Now, have you been drinking? Well, no. Or, yes, I've been drinking. In other words, say yes, but not really be sure that he said yes. because he says it in an ironic tone, so it's like, you know, he didn't really admit it or something. In other words, not straight. And in some ways, if you're really virtuous and if you're really honest, then maybe, then irony may be more acceptable and feel more comfortable with it.

[37:21]

But if you're, if you're using irony as a cover for dishonesty, then it's really, it seems to be unhealthy. I'd be a lot more comfortable saying that this is the way poets talk. Because I think that to bring in this type of language, dysfunction, alcohol, whatever, is, I think, straying away from our particular foreign language class, which is a whole other type. Great. And that's fine, too, for you to say that, right? But I don't want the people who are in the class who are feeling that this is like double talk or evasive talk or alcoholic talk, I don't want them not to be able to say that.

[38:24]

That's what I'm saying. I understand that. I think it's a good idea for people to be able to say it, to have some sort of neuro-linguistic anchor to the word alcoholic or dysfunctional. To me, it's actually... is problematic, so I would suggest the word poet. Or some other word that didn't categorize people so much. Right. Such a negative connotation. The basic thing in this Zen business is that there's nothing to attain. There's nothing to attain here. There's nothing to grasp. There's nothing to get a hold of. You heard about that? Right. And then when I say that, as soon as I say that, that becomes a kind of very basic insight in Zen practice. And then that gets made into something.

[39:25]

Okay? Yes? So... So we have to watch out to substantiate or hypostasize language about alcoholism, language about dysfunctional, language about poet, language about fundamental insight into non-graspability, too. What I'm specifically addressing my point to is a discussion we had about, well, what are you doing in this class, Reb? To paraphrase. We had the discussion of the lawn. What are you doing in this class? It seems like we're trying to solve these koans. No, I'm teaching a foreign language. And if we can learn to speak this language, we can speak it to one another to begin with. And maybe if we speak it to one another, we can speak it to other people out in the world. So to... used, I think, for this very important function in this foreign language class, the word alcoholic, to identify something that is going on that, to me, sounded like it had sort of a distracting element or a negative effect.

[40:38]

It doesn't serve us well. Yeah, I don't... I don't think that we should then say, that's what's happening. But I'm just saying that when people have feelings and are uncomfortable about something, there's some truth, there's some reason why they feel that way. Now, the word they may use for why they feel that way may not really be the right word for them, but they should be able to express they feel this uncomfortable. And whatever word they come up with, they can come up with that word. The reality is they feel uncomfortable. And that's what I'd like you to surface when you feel uncomfortable. It is. What? It is. It is. Yes, Lynn? I wanted to say that the way I perceived that, when it said, have you been studying the way? Yes.

[41:40]

To me, it was almost as if he was suggesting that you are separate from the way. And that was perhaps what sparked his response, because it would seem that I am the way. He is being the way. Right. Yeah. Yes. I wanted to say that whenever language starts getting that way, my inner visualization of the conversation usually is sort of like an M.C. Escher painting. There's all these different levels and all these different areas, and there's a little bit... meanings or interpretations sitting on each one and my very body sort of slides over to the one that fits what we're talking about at the moment. Sometimes the conversation gets so loose, so The words aren't carrying it. It's sort of the air in between the people speaking or carrying it. And if you're listening and trying to keep up with it, you're flipping from platform to platform to platform looking for it.

[42:48]

You start getting a headache. And when I find out when I'm doing that, if I just sort of float up there and look at all the platforms, My headache calms down. I find a little spot there, and I can go back to it. I guess I'm trying to say I sort of have a trust that we're not just speaking drunken gibberish here. We're not just batting words back and forth. Sometimes you might lose the track, but it's not that something negative or malevolent is out there or something to be afraid of. You find it's right again if you just... Well, you know, I'm glad you're in the room to say that. But I do not have faith that we're not speaking drunken, malevolent gibberish.

[43:49]

I just don't have that faith myself. I don't believe that or disbelieve that. But I do not feel that that... I do not sort of say that's not what we're doing in here. Even if we are, it might be fun. Gibberish is sometimes fun. Even if it's fun or even if it's not fun, I'm just saying that I don't believe that we're not doing that. I'm not carrying that one. But to have you in the class who's believing that that's not going on or is trying to work yourself into a place where you can believe that, you are welcome to be here feeling that way. And I would suggest to you that because you're that way, you constellate somewhere in this room some dark evil forces. I'll make a little black square.

[44:50]

But please, I mean, by you doing that work, you let somebody else do some other work. And we need, and this is the whole, we have the whole world in this class because we have some people who are working on one thing or another, you know. We have some people turning away from high states, getting into high states and then turning away from them. But when you turn away from them, you constellate something else. We have some people having fun and breaking through writer's blocks. I haven't fun anymore. That was then. Yeah, right. We have people... We have people constellating themselves back and forth. So, but, you know, you guys can clean this place up. Anybody who wants to clean this place up any time can go right ahead and do it. You can move up to a level where you can realize that actually this situation is really immaculate and the rest of us can be dirty or we can all be dirty and then from that filth an extreme purity will be manifested from the utter and complete filth of each, of even one of us.

[46:02]

Complete purity is manifested. But if we want to be goody-goodies, this can be the most evil room in the Bay Area, at least. Like right now, you know, because, I don't know, since it's not Sunday morning, right? So we don't have any competition. Maybe there's no place else. Like on Sunday morning, there's probably some churches where there's some real heavy-duty, goody-goody kind of imagining going on. Therefore, a deep evil is constellated by their ignoring their evil and all of them in the room feeling like, God, I better not feel any of that because nobody else in here is. Ignorance, just pure ignorance of the truth of Zen, that can be happening in here too. more I see and secure feeling just I find out even if I don't understand the language or I don't understand it's okay yeah so it's good feeling just be your stuff and for me not to understand and even I don't get it it's okay yes

[47:22]

Um, I get really confused about, like, the stories when I don't... I mean, I suppose I should be okay to not get it at a certain level, but it pushes buttons in me, like the story that you said about the Zen master who kept sending his students away. And, you know, before you explained it, I thought, well, that's really cool. Yeah. And so I don't know what to do with that feeling, but I think that that's really cool. to do that. And then, you know, then you explain it like, oh, you know, I guess I was wrong to think that that was really cruel. It was just the highest law. And I feel like I can't really trust my intuition on whether something was really cruel. Well, you know, that story, I told that story at Green Gulch on one Sunday, and I knew if I told that, that some people would have thought, well, this just sounds like abuse. You know? And, um, but The reason why I told the story was that I was talking to Mel about this story, and he was saying how, you know, in a way, you can have a whole Zen center or a whole community just so that one person like that guy could appear.

[48:39]

one person who, not that you could be cruel to, but one person that you could do what is necessary in order to help him or her mature. It wasn't so much, and it even wasn't so much that the teacher was so loving as to be this cruel. I don't know what to say about the teacher. All I can say is that the teacher was somehow a way for this guy to do something which a human being can almost never do. He did a phenomenal... The student was able to do something which almost none of us could ever do. And in the end, this student became, you know, the successor to that teacher. The one successor. Somehow, he was the only one that could do that and took the whole monastery and the teacher's whole life to provide what this guy needed in order to do this incredible thing. And... And at the same time, he was a nice guy in a way, too. He was nice, tried to make good meals for the monks and all that.

[49:41]

He was certainly not a wimp in the first place before he got to be. He was an exceptional person, but then when the teacher just... It wasn't like the teacher was being arbitrary, either. The guy actually stole the food, even though he had a good reason. It wasn't that he did wrong, either. It's that he gave the teacher a chance to do this thing, right? I don't know what to say. One of the dynamics in our practice is, you know, there's one world where you try to be really careful and do everything according to the rules and, you know, be very mindful and thorough and all that. There's another world which is really mysterious. and, you know, magical. And we have these two worlds, and we don't get rid of one or the other. They work together, bouncing back and forth. In China, the country where Zen was born, we have this Confucian tradition and the Taoist tradition in the background of this Buddhist tradition.

[50:45]

And Confucianism has these, you know, all these rituals and formulas and immoral patterns and so on. And Taoism is very wild and free and iconoclastic. And that's in the background there. And Zen inherits both of these traditions, plus has this basic insight of nothing to attain. And try not to make that into something, as I was mentioning before. So... And if there wasn't some other people teaching Buddhism in a way that you'd get a hold of, then it wouldn't be possible for me and you to have a class like this. There are other kinds of classes where you can, you know, which maybe are more... I don't know what you want to call them, but anyway, where... I don't think there's any classes that are going more into the mysterious side but there's classes that are going more into the understandable side or more into the human point of view side.

[51:49]

So that fortunately there are classes like that so that we can have a class like this where we can explore whatever we're doing here. Which is always pushing on the limits of what we can stand here. I feel some, I feel a It started making me uncomfortable just a minute ago, because even though I've been really on tonight, most of the time, but then whenever you started talking about the disciple attaining something really superior, that made me feel like, A lot of people, I do this, they want to be the best. They want to be the best Buddhist, be that disciple who succeeds, overthrow the king. That competitiveness comes up in me sometimes because I forget sometimes that you don't have to be the best in order to have it.

[52:54]

You know, you can have it even if you're not succeeding, you know. But it's gone now, it went away. Well, you know, the word success is a real important word because usually with success, not usually, I shouldn't say usually with sex, but anyway, with success, often there is some kind of violence around that. Trappling on the underlings. Yeah, or or progress usually has a waste product So one way it's so what do you do in a case like that one way it's for void success That's one that's one route especially if you tend to be violent with it, if you can't handle... I'm talking about being gifted, intellectually or physically, where you're confident, you know you have that, you're not avoiding competition.

[54:00]

except whenever it gets to the point where maybe you have a streak of humanity and you feel like you're hurting people or they're hurting you because you get alienated from them. You don't know how to be with them when you think that they hate you because they think you're better than they are. How do you toe the line? How do you be with people? with a certain gift or whatever. This is a different subject slightly, but sorry. No, it's a different little bit, but it's related. It's related to this. Because you don't want to feel alienated either. Or you don't want to create a practice with just alienating. What's happening, Sister Moon? From what?

[55:03]

What were you distracted from? What is happening right here? You don't think we can? Awkward. I'd like to say something. I wonder if I'm the only one in the room. I think maybe I'm not. But I have very little interest in these koans, really. They seem to me they go from boring to silly and mildly annoying.

[56:08]

And I come here for the interchange, this course. Anybody else feel that way? Except you. I felt that way about Keisuke, too. So, are these stories evil? Hmm? Are they what? Are these stories evil? Are these evil stories? Hmm? Yes? Well, I think they can be if you get into them as stories, but in a way, whatever's happening now, no matter what it is, is form that I cannot know.

[57:14]

If I treat it that way, then it's not even... You lost me. But did somebody follow? Whatever's happening here in a lot of ways is the same, no matter what the topic is, because it's the stuff that's happening right now. And if I'm in a place like I may be for one moment, but not the next moment, I can treat that as what's happening, and as you talked about last week, just be with that real closely, without regarding its content, in a sense. It's like being with the statue of the Buddha. I can be with the topic of this conversation. Is the statue of Buddha evil? It depends how I hold it, I think. It can feel that way to me if I'm not into statues of Buddhas.

[58:17]

How about if you were into statues of Buddha, then could it be evil? Yeah. Either way. Either way. It's just a statue of Buddha. It doesn't feel evil. Is it good? Yes. I did have something to say. Somewhere back in one of the other classes, way back when, you were talking about the koans and the interchanges that you can't really see. I think it was something, if I may correct me, that you can't really see the Buddha way or have some sort of opening enlightenment without interacting with other people. And that's what I like about reading these, is seeing the interchanges and knowing that it can, it's those exchanges that moves you along and opens things up and opens you up.

[59:18]

Not just sitting by yourself and in isolation trying to work on something. So that's what I appreciate about these. So I just thought I'd say it because it was helpful when you had that discussion for me. And you see, at the beginning of the story, Fa Yan was sitting by himself. I mean, he was by himself. That's where I can try that on. He's sitting by himself. This is like, you know, this is somebody who was really sitting by himself. He did that part. He did it so thoroughly that he forgot who he was. And then this person called Earth Womb comes over to this person who's sitting by himself completely, and then he goes and talks to him. And he says, where are you going?

[60:20]

He's not going anyplace. He's completely still. And the teacher says, where are you going? And he says, around on pilgrimage. Pilgrimage. Still completely staying home, but not responding. And what's the purpose of this? Every step of this story I propose to you is somebody completely still, somebody else completely still, somebody else completely still, somebody else completely still. Stillness and then stillness. But first stillness, and now another stillness reflects it. And then this stillness reflects back again. That's one way to see what's going on here. And you cannot, neither the teacher nor the student can understand without being still with what they are.

[61:26]

And it's very difficult for us to be still with what we are. almost all the time, it's very difficult. Once in a while, it seems easy, but then when it's easy, then we don't do it either because... No motivation. Right, exactly. I just came from being all by myself, you know, away from people, and I've been interested in this kind of stuff for a long time, but man, the lack of luxury turned me idle. Totally. And even though I had the opportunity to meditate as much as I wanted to, and I actually have gone to certain so-called high states that were very enjoyable and stuff, but there was no prod to keep... And every day and night is hella boring, you know? And you don't want to do this, it seems like too much trouble. But I think if I can make myself do it, I would probably be happier, so I'm going to do it. So will we. So how come these reflections have to speak?

[62:34]

Pardon? How come these reflections have to speak to each other? You mean why do they have to talk? They don't always talk. But in these stories they don't always talk either. Sometimes a guy picks up a piece of grass and sticks it down. But if I see you pick up a piece of grass, what I see there is a word. You don't see anybody except by a word, you see a word. That's it. In other words, everything you know, anything you know about in the realm of knowing, you know conceptually. Concepts are words. Concepts are community projects, community developments, like language. So, in fact, it is words. in the realm of seeing each other, meeting each other. There's words there. If there's not any words, then there's no bondage.

[63:40]

Without words, there's no bondage. I propose that. You cannot tie yourself up without words. And you cannot release yourself without words. Words release us and words tie us up and words release us. So whether they're talking or not, anyway, the reflection is verbal. I mean, it is linguistic, it is conceptual. So when we sit by ourselves and when we sit still by ourselves, we sit still by ourselves and as much as we can, we sit still with our words. And when we do that thoroughly, then we walk to meet someone And between this person being with her words and this person being with her words, between these two beings is a connection.

[64:45]

And that connection is what will make these two beings become free, will help these beings become independent. The way we're built is you cannot become independent by yourself. You have to become independent through a connection. Because the one who gets independent is the one who's not just on one side of this relationship. The problem is that between these two words is a ocean of death, a sea of death, or an ocean of death. And these people have to dive in here and swim through this death to meet each other. Otherwise, you can have two good Zen monks completely owning up to the words that they're living with. I'm depressed, I feel uncomfortable, I feel happy, I wonder if I should be doing something different from this. Can I be this way? Over here, being that way, and over here, being that way. That's as good as you can do by yourself.

[65:49]

That's good enough. That's your work. That's as much as you can expect of yourself. Except that you should walk this person to meet another person who's walking to meet another person. And then these two people have to dive into this death. And then they meet. And through that connection, they understand the limits of what they could do by themselves. And then they're independent. I propose that as the model of liberation. Complete liberation. Are you saying you can't get out of bondage without getting into bondage too? Yes, I would say that. But that is not a problem. Everybody is in bondage. I've never met anybody who doesn't have that problem except psychotics who refuse to admit that they're in bondage. Well, neurotics refuse to admit it too, but they don't completely refuse to admit it.

[66:52]

They admit it a little bit. And the more you admit it, the more you admit that you're in bondage, the more you're doing your work, the more you admit that you're in bondage, the stiller you become. And when you've admitted as much as you can that you're in bondage, then you should go meet somebody else who's admitting that she's in bondage. Two people who are honest. Two people who admit that they're completely trapped in words. Those people meet. And then they both have to jump into the water, into the darkness. The darkness. Not knowing. Darkness of not knowing. But not from just sort of like lackadaisically hanging out somewhere in the neighborhood of your neurosis, but right on the mark of your own pain. You admit that, and from there you jump into it.

[67:55]

You were talking about the darkness one time before, about sort of being in the suit of not knowing, all of us kind of rubbing around together. And the universe created an objective reality, a way of reflecting back on itself. You were talking about that. The universe provides an objective reality. Or experience. What did you just say? I remember pictures. I was wondering the same. So when I was looking to talk about two people reflecting and diving in, it just sort of, it seemed like, gave me a sense of aliveness being that, beingness and having an object to reflect on. And that's a sense of what I feel here, For me, as I listen, I try to put these thoughts into words, this language.

[68:58]

If that's what that is that's going on for me, it's something to help focus some idea or some awareness I have that's kind of like a soup. It takes form when I listen to everybody define it. It just kind of changes, and it goes on. But it pulls it into an objective place out here that I can look at from here. So that's what that seemed like. I want to tell you another story. I'm teaching across in Berkeley, and we're studying a case which goes like this, which some of you have heard before. A monk named Virtue Mountain was visiting another monk named Dragon Pond. And he stood in attendance upon Dragon Pond until late in the night.

[70:01]

Some people say, some versions of stories say, he sincerely questioned Dragon Pond. into late night. And Dragon Pond said, it's getting late. Perhaps she should retire. So Virtue Mountain walked out of Dragon Pond's room and met darkness and said, it's dark out here. And Dragon Pond lit a candle for him, a paper lantern, and gave it to him. And just as he was taking a lantern, Dragon Palm blew out the lamp, and Virtue Mountain woke up. So there was darkness, and the teacher gave a light. and the student was about to take the light, now there's light, and the teacher blew out the light, and the student was in darkness.

[71:09]

And when the student now entered the darkness and knew, first of all the student was in the darkness, then he got light, then he entered the darkness again. But this time when he entered the darkness, he woke up. So, again, I'm not telling you where the I of that story is, but I would propose one place the I of the story is, is at the blowing out of the light. If you can picture the place where the light gets blown out, you have a light, and you picture it getting blown out, and then see that darkness, the darkness before you can say what it is. Just when the light's blown out, picture that darkness that comes to you before you even can say it's darkness. There's a darkness that sneaks up on you, you know, gradually gets you open, you know, dark. You've already got it. Then there's a light comes on, now the darkness, when the light is blown out. So in this story there's a kind of thing like that too. All these stories, there's a place where the light gets blown out.

[72:12]

Where you face darkness. Where you face darkness before you make darkness into something. As soon as you make darkness into something, you've got the light on again. which is fine, but that's not the light we're looking for. We're looking for the light that comes on in the darkness. And so what did the teacher do there? You know, how did he, what did he do? How did he help that person? He gave him one darkness, and he gave him another darkness, and that was enough under the circumstances. So there's a darkness in this story too, and... Did he see that second darkness as darkness? Hmm? Did he see the second darkness as darkness?

[73:16]

Well, you know, I don't want to say what he saw. So it was a rhetorical question, I imagine. I'm just saying, you know, in that story, the I is either... I think the I of the story, for me, the I of the story is darkness. But maybe the way to find the darkness, which is the I of the story, not just the word darkness, but the actual darkness of the story... Maybe the place to find it would be in the blowing out of the candle. If you can see the light of your discriminating mind blown out and just meet darkness. It's like having the rug pulled out. But that only works when you've got your feet in the rug. So again, two people who have their feet in the rug both jumping into the darkness together.

[74:25]

You also mentioned Dozan's Five Ranks when you were talking about darkness. You did. Well, OK, I did. But you also talked about that type of darkness, the symbolic darkness. Well, this is symbolic darkness, too. This is a story about darkness. These are symbols of darkness to initiate us into our darkness, into the darkness of our mind. This happens in the last part of the story. So it would be like the fifth rank. It would be like the fifth rank, symbolized by darkness. When the candle was lit. No, I think in this story, the story about blowing the candle out, I think that the end of the story is the first or second rank.

[75:38]

Not the fifth. When he wakes up. First or second rank. And part of the reason why I think that, ladies and gentlemen, I will tell you next week why. I have to tell you more. I have to tell you more of the story to tell you why I know more of the biography of this guy about why I think it's only the first or second rank. It's in the, it's in the, it's in the Blue Cliff Record, it's case four, and it's in the book of, it's in the Mumon Khan, the Gateless Gate, Room 28. Deshan? Huh? Deshan. Deshan, yeah. It's called, it's called Dragon's Ponds, Far and Wide. After, after he woke up, he said, he bowed, and Dragon Pond said, what have you seen that you bow? And he said, from now on, I will never doubt you. the words of old teachers who are renowned far and wide.

[76:45]

So I don't know what to do now. We're on case 20. So I don't know what to do. What do you think? Should we go to 21? Yeah, definitely. Want to get into Case 21? No. Yeah. What? I wanted to hear about the intimacy. Well, what do you want to do? Do you want to start studying Case 21 but then come back to 20 next week? More or what? 20. Okay, well, if you want case 21, it's up here if you need it. And so you can start studying it if you want to. And we'll do more on 20 next time.

[77:53]

There's, you know, it's... We're just scratching the surface, actually. Up 20. So find that eye if you can. I hope you can find a way to live with it if you find it. These are, you know, they're all eyes into the same wound. But they are different eyes, actually different points of entry. They're different access points. So be careful about trying to see if you can notice the difference between these different eyes. It's important. Anything else before we stop tonight?

[78:58]

You were saying about the exchange between people. In the stories I'm always struck by how much they care about each other and they keep thinking about helping each other. Yeah, that's the thing about, you know, each of you with each of you and each of you with everybody that you meet throughout the day. Can we somehow recognize the person in front of us and enter into a life like that. May our attention

[79:46]

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