Good morning. Can you hear me in the back? Yes. So is there a high school class here? Or a class here? A confirmation class. Ah, from where? From First Congregational Church of Berkeley. Oh, great. Well, welcome. How many? It looked like there was, was that who was doing Zazen instruction? Ah, well, welcome. We are in the first of a three-day session, a three-day retreat that we're doing over this President's Day weekend, and it conveniently falls over President's Day weekend, but what we're observing on this weekend, and we'll be doing a ceremony right after the lecture, is the Buddha's Parinirvana. which is the Buddha's passing from this world. So we'll have a ceremony outside after this which everyone's invited to participate and offer flowers.

[01:15]

This is the historical time. There's some question about the historicity of this, but in the East and North Asian traditions, the Chinese and Japanese and some of the other countries, they observe his passing at this time of year. And in some of the Southeast Asian traditions, they observe the Buddha's passing in the summer. this is just our tradition, what we do. What I thought, looking at this ceremony as needing some unpacking, some storytelling, it occurred to me that I might make this an occasion for the next couple of days to talk about the somewhat daunting subject of death, which the more I thought about it, the more I realized all of the teachings that I've gathered to think about over the next couple days, they're actually not about death.

[02:37]

They're actually about life. They're about how we conduct ourselves moment by moment while whatever it is that we call life is unfolding in our bodies. We know about that. Each of us knows about that intimately and while there are some various reports from so-called afterworlds, we're not so sure about that. So we can't talk, or I can't, let's say I can't talk about death. And in the stories that I'll tell you today, which is basically the story leading up to the Buddha's passing, it's leading up to his passing. There's once he has

[03:38]

gone through this Parinirvana, this complete extinction or complete unbinding, there are no more stories about the Buddha. And he doesn't send telegraphs back. But we're still here. I was reflecting on that because these talks on Saturday, all of our Dharma talks are actually supposed to be, they have the text, the message of encouraging practice. And when I thought, oh, death, talking about death, that may not be so encouraging, but it's actually how we live. You know, what we don't know about our last moment, and what we really don't know about the moment after our last moment, if you think about your actual life, right now you don't know about the next moment.

[04:47]

You don't know about the moment, you don't know what will unfold as you walk out this door, or as you walk out in the street. All of that. that we call the so-called future is unknown to us. How do we meet that? I was recalling as I was thinking about this, one of our teachers, Robert Aitken, he and his wife both practiced together very, very hard. And their teacher, Japanese teacher, Yamada Koen Roshi, asked Anne Aitken at one point in their teacher-student relationship, what do you think about death? And she said, well, it's like when a bus stops before you, you get on and go. Which is a very subtle response, which also modeled

[05:59]

in her thinking, by all reports, how she actually died. When it was time for her to die in the hospital, having had a massive heart attack, she had awareness. And when it was time, when the bus came, she got on and went. Now this is a not always possible, but the other day as we were driving back from a retreat talking with some people in the car, it seemed like our collective experience was that some people do have, some people that we are with up until the last breath have awareness, have composure, have a spirit of accepting the impermanence of things and that that is when you're around that is tremendously encouraging.

[07:10]

Whether it is whatever the background of that person is and this is certainly has nothing to do with being special to Buddhists. The people of faith in whatever religious tradition or people of faith just in their human nature or their ability to accept the mystery of existence. Some people have this capacity and when we are in that presence it's profoundly encouraging. So that's kind of a spirit I'd like to enter these stories. What we find when we look at our lives is in accord with the Buddha's very last words.

[08:15]

which were, as they were recorded or something like, all the things of this world are changeable, impermanent. He was speaking to his community. All the things of this world are changeable, impermanent. Please work out your liberation diligently, without delay. In other words, please engage with your practice moment by moment. And your practice is to be able to understand, accept, flow with this fact, this immutable fact of mutability, that all things are changeable, that all things are impermanent. I found this, you know, the web is really incredible. You can find all these amazing things. I used to think the web was like a mile wide and a centimeter deep, but it's actually, there's a lot of stuff on it now.

[09:26]

So I found this, I was looking for the Buddha's death to see what was there. And I found this very interesting article from the Bangkok Post from 2001 written by a Thai monk who was also a medical doctor. And I'm sort of getting the mundane stuff out of the way first. He basically diagnosed what the Buddha died of. But first he lays out, you know, he looks at the Mahaparinirvana Sutta, which I'm going to talk from, which is basically in the Pali texts, it's the story of the Buddha's last year. And he says we have these two intertwining

[10:26]

narratives within this sutra or the story of what you could see as two people. You know, one person was a kind of miracle worker who could beam himself and his monks across the Ganges River, you know, who saw the divine presence of all kinds of celestial beings around him at every moment, who had the opportunity to live until the end of the world if someone actually asked him to do that, who determined the time of his own death and whose death was glorified by showers of heavenly flowers and sandalwood in the air and divine music that everyone could hear. So that's one of the narratives that's in this Parinibbana Sutta.

[11:29]

It's pretty, fairly heavy, heady stuff. And the other narrative that's intertwined with this is an old man whose health was failing after being on the road for 45 years, who had some kind of intestinal illness, and who died in a small dusty town, Vesali, in a grove by the side of the road, and who, at the end, was forced to come to come to terms with his imminent death after eating some kind of meal that was prepared for him, the content of which is somewhat questionable. So you have this kind of sacred and mundane dimension kind of intertwined with each other.

[12:38]

Uh, just to, to let you know, this, the, the monk is, uh, Metananda Bhikkhu. And, uh, you know, his, he goes through all of these, uh, diagnostic stages of what did he think that, that the Buddha died of. Did he die of food poisoning? No. The symptoms, the symptoms are actually a very, pretty clearly, uh, spelled out in this sutra. Uh, and I won't go into it, but, uh, It probably wasn't food poisoning and it wasn't chemical poisoning. What he comes up with, should you be interested in this, is that his belief is that the Buddha died of a mesenteric infarction. It's a particular diagnosis that he says is not, he says, mesenteric infarction is a disease commonly found among elderly people caused by the obstruction of the main artery that supplies the middle section of the bowel.

[13:43]

The most common cause of the obstruction is the degeneration of the wall of the blood vessel. Then it causes severe abdominal pain. and also bleeding. And it's often triggered by a large meal which requires a higher blood flow to the digestive tract. And it leaves you feeling very hungry, very weak, and ultimately you go into shock. Does that seem vaguely... We don't know. But anyway, my description of it is, she's a doctor. But she has to play one on TV. But my description, maybe you should. But my description is not, at least of that, that diagnosis is not off the wall whether he had it or not. Okay, all right, that's the mundane stuff, right?

[14:46]

So now I want to get to sort of the storytelling part. And this came up in our class. The reason I actually really believe in storytelling, I believe in that these stories mysteriously work in us. They resonate with things that are so deep in us that we can't even know. So I think there's a value to it. I'm not asking you to believe this. Right? Or to take it literally. I'm just saying that I think the stories help us unlock material that's in us. So, while the Buddha was, On a retreat at Vesali, and this is probably within his last year, he had taken up residence for the rains retreat, which is an annual event.

[15:56]

When it rains in India, the monks gather together. As severe sickness attacked him with violent and deadly pains, he bore them, by the way, I'm reading from the sutra, he bore them without complaint, mindfully and fully aware. Then he thought, it is not right for me to obtain final nirvana, final release, without having addressed my attendants and taken leave of the sangha of monks and nuns. And he says, suppose I forcibly suppress this sickness by prolonging the will to live. He did so, and the sickness abated. The blessed one recovered from that sickness, Soon afterwards, he came out from the sick room and sat on a seat made ready at the back of the dwelling. His attendant, Ananda, went to him and said, I have been used to seeing the Blessed One in comfort and in health.

[16:56]

Indeed, with the Blessed One's sickness, I felt as if my body were quite rigid. I could not see straight. My ideas were all unclear. However, Lord, I comforted myself knowing the blessed one would not attain final nibbana without a pronouncement about the sangha of bhikkhus, the community of monks and nuns. And the Buddha says, but Ananda, what does the sangha expect of me? My teachings have no secret and public version. There is no teacher's closed fist about good things here. So he has no secrets, but he says for the first time in this last narrative, so Ananda, each of you, he's practitioner, should make himself his island, himself and no other his refuge. Each of you should make the Dhamma his island, and the Dhamma and no other his refuge.

[18:05]

How does a bhikkhu, how does a monk or nun do this? Here, here she abides contemplating the body as a body, ardent, fully aware, and mindful, having put away covetousness and grief for the world. and so forth. So he's giving a teaching on mindfulness, which is the way he approaches every circumstance in his life. And this is his teaching for us. So he continues on in his travels. And a messenger comes to him at one point. This is several months later. At one time, the Blessed One was living with a large community of bhikkhus in the Vajayan country at Ukachela on the banks of the Ganges.

[19:11]

It was soon after Shariputra and Moggayana had attained final nibbana. So these are his two chief disciples. who died before he did. On that occasion, he was sitting in the open, surrounded by the community. And after surveying their silence, he addressed them thus. Now the assembly seems to me as though it were empty. The assembly is empty for me now that Shariputra and Moggayana have attained final nibbana. There is nowhere that one can look to and say, Shariputra and Moggayana are living there. The blessed ones in the past, accomplished and fully enlightened, each had a pair of disciples, the equal of Shariputra and Moggayana. So will those in the future.

[20:13]

I should add that not only did his two chief disciples die before he did, but so did his son, Rahula, and so did the wife that he had left behind, Yashodara, each of whom had attained arhat, or fully enlightened status. They died before he did. So it seems to me that he's, now the assembly seems to me as though it were empty. And this is not a kind of Buddhist emptiness that we accept. I think he's pointing towards, I think he's missing them. I think he has that sentiment, even though he rejoices in their passing, in their liberation, there still is something missing in the Sangha at that moment for him.

[21:23]

which is profoundly human. So one morning, the Blessed One dressed and He went into Vesali for alms. When He had wandered around for alms in Vesali and returned after His meal, He spoke to His attendant, Ananda. And then he's talking to Ananda. He says, when anyone has maintained in being and developed the four bases for success, made them the vehicle, made them the foundation, established, consolidated, and properly undertaken them, he could, if he wished, live out the age or what remains of the age. Ananda, the perfect one, speaking of himself, has done all that. He could, if he wished, live out the age or what remains of the age.

[22:24]

Even when such a broad hint, such a plain sign was given by the Blessed One, still the Venerable Ananda did not understand it. He did not beg the blessed one. Lord, let the blessed one live out the age. Let the sublime one live out the age for the welfare and happiness of many, out of compassion for the world, for the good and welfare and happiness of gods and men. So the Buddha, a second and third time, and this is often the Buddha says things three times to make sure that you get it, says the same thing. Ananda doesn't respond. He doesn't ask him. What he doesn't say is, that's a good idea. Why don't you stay around and not die? We need you here. So in this narrative, the next thing that happens is Ananda goes away and this figure,

[23:34]

also kind of archetypal figure, Mara, who's kind of like the devil. He's a tempter. He has all kinds of powers. He's known as Mara the Evil One. Soon after Ananda had gone, Mara the Evil One came to the Blessed One and stood at one side. He said, let the Blessed One attain final nibbana now. Let the sublime one attain final nibbana now. These words were once spoken by the blessed one. He responded, I will not attain final nibbana, evil one, until the bhikkhus, bhikkhunis, laymen followers, and laywomen followers, my disciples, et cetera, et cetera, are wise, disciplined, perfectly confident, learning until they remember the dhamma, the teachings perfectly. he's not going to check out at this moment.

[24:46]

When this was said, the Blessed One replied, you may rest, evil one. Soon, the Perfect One's attainment of final nibbana will take place. Three months from now, the Perfect One will attain final nibbana. It was then at the Kapala shrine, at this moment of this particular piece of narrative, that the Blessed One, mindful and fully aware, relinquished the will to live. When he did so, there was a great earthquake, fearful and hair-raising, and the drums of heaven resounded. Knowing the meaning of this, the Blessed One then said, The sage renounced the life-affirming will, both measurable and immeasurable, and concentrated inwardly, and happy, too. He shed his self-becoming like a coat of mail." It's like taking off this heavy weight because he's made a decision to move towards his passing.

[25:58]

this one bit of comment to me as I was reflecting on this, and this may be too much psychologizing, but I hear the appearance of Mara, who comes right after Ananda. Ananda actually disappoints him. Ananda disappoints the Buddha by not asking him to stay around. This is his attendant, he's very close to him and the guy just doesn't get it. And to me, I just had this feeling when reading this part that Mara represents the voice of that disappointment. the internal voice in the Buddha.

[27:04]

If you think of all things as Buddha nature, all things as Buddha, then Mara is part of the Buddha too, and he's communicating something that exists within the Buddha's world, within the Buddha's mind, and he says, you know, perhaps just to colloquialize it, God, my closest disciple doesn't get it. Let's just get out of here. But then the mind that he has, the mind of compassion, the mind of understanding says, no, this is not the way to do it. Everyone is not ready yet, and I am not ready yet. But he does have an exchange with Ananda a little later. He tells Ananda, Ananda, this very day at the Kapala shrine, the blessed one, mindful and fully aware, has relinquished his will to live.

[28:10]

When he heard this, the venerable Ananda said, Lord, let the blessed one live out the age. Let the sublime one live out the age for the welfare and happiness of many out of compassion for the world, for the good, the welfare, and the happiness of gods and men. Well, this is what he wanted to hear, right? And the Buddha says, enough, Ananda. Do not ask that of the perfect one now. The time to ask that of the perfect one has now gone by. And he speaks very strongly to Ananda in the next section. He basically, in the words of this text, he says, then Ananda, the wrongdoing is yours, the fault is yours, for even when such a broad hint, such a plain sign was given by me, you could not understand it.

[29:14]

And you did not beg the perfect one to live out the age for the good, the welfare, and happiness of gods and men. So I don't know what the language actually was. I'm not crazy about wrongdoing or false as language, but what he's saying is you have to take responsibility for this. I have to take responsibility for my actions and you have to take responsibility for your actions or inactions. You have to take responsibility for what you can and cannot see. I've been trying to show you It wasn't for a selfish reason that the Buddha wanted to be asked to live out. He wanted his disciples to have in mind the welfare of all beings.

[30:17]

And out of confusion, out of perhaps ungroundedness, Ananda didn't see this and didn't ask the right question at the right time. So, jumping ahead, in this final, he comes back to Visali after traveling around. And this is some of the matter of his last day. It's interesting where... I'm sorry.

[31:32]

to go back to this. So he comes back to Visali and a meal is prepared for him by one of his lay disciples. Ah, here we go. Kunda, the goldsmith's son, heard that the Blessed One was living in his grove. He went to him, and after paying homage, he sat down to one side, and the Blessed One instructed, urged, roused, and encouraged him with talk. Afterwards, Kunda said to the Blessed One, Lord, let the Blessed One with the Sangha of Bhikkhus accept tomorrow's meal from me. And the Buddha accepted that. And the next day, they went to Kunda's house.

[32:37]

And Kunda said, Lord, the meal is ready. Then, it being morning, the blessed one dressed and taking his bowl and outer robe, he went with the Sangha, the community of monks and nuns, to the goldsmith's son's house. He sat down on the prepared seat. Then he told Kunda, I know I have this here, I'm sorry. I'm looking for a different translation. Well, I'm not finding it. The translation here is, he told Kunda, serve the hog's mincemeat you have prepared for me. So either this was some kind of chopped soft pork, it's also, the translation is a little strange, it also might have been mushrooms.

[33:50]

Serve this dish you prepared for me, Kunda, but serve any other food you have prepared to the Sangha of monks. Even so, Kunda replied. Then the Blessed One said, Kunda, if any of the food you have prepared for me is left over, bury it in a hole. Even so, so he buried it in a hole. It was after the Blessed One had eaten the food provided by Kunda, the goldsmith's son, that a severe sickness attacked him with a flux of blood accompanied by violent, deadly pain. He bore it without complaint, mindful and fully aware. Then he said to Ananda, come Ananda, let us go to Kusinara. And he lay down, and he's very, very thirsty. The Blessed One sat, lay down on the seat that was prepared. He said to Ananda, please fetch me some water. I am thirsty and will drink. The venerable Ananda said, Lord, some 500 carts have just gone by.

[34:54]

The water has been churned up by the wheels. It is flowing poorly. It is thick and cloudy. The second time the Blessed One asked and received the same reply. The third time he said, Ananda, please fetch me some water. I am thirsty and I will drink. Even so, Lord, the venerable Ananda replied. He took a bowl and went to the stream. Then the stream, which had been churned up by the wheels and was flowing poorly, thick and cloudy, flowed clear and limpid and clean. As soon as the venerable Ananda came to it, he was astonished. Then he took water for the drinking in the bowl and returned to the Blessed One and told him what had happened. He said, Lord, let the Blessed One drink the water. Later that day, the Buddha continued to teach. He was having terrible pains. monk from another tradition, a non-Buddhist tradition, Subbata, came and all of the disciples tried to keep him away.

[36:02]

He wanted, he heard the Buddha was in the neighborhood and he wanted to see him. And they kept, they kept telling him to go away, but he wouldn't, he was persistent. So they finally, the Buddha hears this. The wanderer Subbata had made the same request a second and a third time and received the same reply. The blessed one heard their conversation. Then he told the venerable Ananda, enough, Ananda, do not keep Subbata out. Let him see me. Whatever he may ask of me, he will ask it only for the sake of knowledge, not to cause trouble. And what I can tell him, he will quickly understand. So he sits down with this wandering mendicant and they talk. And at the end of the conversation, Subbata asks to be admitted to the order of monks.

[37:10]

And the Buddha turns to Ananda and said, Venerable Ananda, give Subbata the going forth, the initiation into being a monk. And then Sabbath received it. And not long after his admission, dwelling alone, withdrawn, diligent, ardent, and self-controlled, the Venerable Sabbath, by realization himself, with direct knowledge, here and now, entered upon the supreme goal of holy life, And he became one of the fully enlightened arhats, one of the awakened beings. And he was the last of the Buddhist disciples. Finally, the Buddha addressed the monks and nuns and said, it may be that some of you have doubt or a problem concerning the Buddha or the teachings or the community or the path or the way of progress.

[38:22]

Please ask me now so you may not regret it afterwards thinking the teacher was face to face to us and we could not bring ourselves to ask anything in the blessed one's presence. When this was said, the bhikkhus were silent. A second and third time, he asked them the same question, and each time they were silent. Then he addressed them saying, perhaps you did not ask because you're in awe of the teacher. Let a friend tell it to a friend. When this was said, they were silent. Ananda said, it is wonderful, Lord. It is marvelous. I have such confidence in the Sangha of Bhikkhus that I believe there is not one Bhikkhu with a doubt or a problem concerning the Buddha or the Dharma or the Sangha or the path or the way of progress. You, Ananda, speak out of this confidence, but the Perfect One has knowledge that here in this Sangha of Bhikkhus, there is not one Bhikkhu who has any doubt concerning the Buddha or Dharma or Sangha or the path or the way of progress.

[39:33]

And then finally he says, indeed I declare this to you, it is the nature of all formations to dissolve, attain perfection, attain liberation through diligence. This was the Buddha's last utterance. With that he entered upon the first meditation, the second meditation, and he goes through all the stages. He goes through all the stages of And finally, he entered upon the cessation of perception and feeling. And Ananda said, Lord, the Blessed One has attained final Nibbana. And his Dharma brother said, no, the Blessed One has not attained the final Nibbana. He has attained the cessation of perception and feeling. And then the Buddha progresses. He continues through this dissolution.

[40:37]

When the Zen teacher, Yueshan, was dying, he shouted, the Dharma hall has fallen down. The Dharma hall has fallen down and all the monks rushed in and held up the pillars. And he laughed and said, you really don't understand. And he clapped and he died there. And that's the dharma hall of the Buddha was falling down, was just coming apart. With the blessed one's attainment to final nirvana, there was a great earthquake, fearful and hair-raising, and the drums of heaven resounded. And then you had this, the monks weeped. They felt the loss, even the most, even the enlightened ones. And there were showers of flowers from the heavens and celestial music and the scent of sandalwood in the air.

[41:51]

So that's in a sketch the story. I'm aware of the time and aware that we have this ceremony, but I'd just like to take a few questions. I think we're not exactly rushed, but it's a rich and not It's a story that doesn't exist completely within the realm of rationality. But how do we make it exist within the realm of our practice? So I just want to leave some time for questions or comments. Anyone? Hey, David. Well, since I actually don't see any contradiction between Theravada and Mahayana, I, yeah, I accept that.

[43:11]

Some do, but yeah, this is a fault of the mind that we have that divides things in two. This is not in the original teaching. But yes, the Buddha was here for the sake of everyone waking up. And this happened 2,500 years ago, and we're still talking about it. I kept feeling perplexed about that interpretation of what Ananda didn't say. The way I heard it was that Ananda In another section which I didn't read, what it, each time the Buddha, each time somebody died or the question of death came up, Ananda speaks of his own internal reaction and the way it's described is his thoughts are unclear, he's very unsteady, his body gets rigid.

[44:35]

So I think if he had had the full wide vision that actually included the welfare of all beings, then he would have intuitively asked the right question. That's what I think was... But he wasn't thinking straight. So he was coming from a self-centered view, or the view from within his own confusion or grief, and so he wasn't thinking as widely as his teacher would have wanted him to. He also said, but he also said, take refuge in the Dharma.

[45:42]

And he was saying this to the community. It was within the context of community. elsewhere in there, you know, he asked them if they have any doubts about the Buddha, the Dhamma, and the Sangha. So that was always, there was always this, these three jewels were in his formulation. But he was also pointing to to the fact that each of us has to take complete responsibility for ourselves within that, within being Buddha, within the teachings, and within the community. These are our refuges, but we also have to work out our own sense of responsibility, which is deeply personal. So this is the tension. The tension is between, I hate this word, the transpersonal and the deeply personal.

[46:50]

And to find out that the deeper you go, there's no clear boundary between them. And yet we exist within this bag of skin and have to take complete responsibility for everything we do. I was just thinking of the guests that are in the Zendo today and I wonder if, you know, say a 13-year-old kid or something should be thinking about death. I don't know. Do any of you think about death? Have there been people who are, you know, ill or that you've seen gone among your family or friends? You can answer that with a yes or no. Yes? Not really. Okay. Well, that was why when I saw you all come in, I had some hesitation about this talk.

[47:58]

But I also know, and I don't think I'm that weird. Well, I am that weird. I did think about that at that stage of my life. Yeah. Well, as our teacher, we do talk in our classes about death and suffering and what we think happens and how the divine is engaged in that. So it's not something that they, it's foreign to them to talk about. I think it's just fine. Good. Thank you. And this is just coming at it from another angle. Yeah. Maybe, what, Donna, what are you? Oh yeah, go ahead, yeah. Yes. Yes. There were, at the time of the Buddhas, at this time, there was a very, very well developed order of nuns.

[49:03]

and a very well-developed order of monks. The stories about that are numerous, and to be quite honest with you, it was a struggle to create an order of nuns, and it was perhaps one of the early times in anything like religion, certainly in India, where the Buddhist teaching was that women had exactly the same capacity for being fully awake as men. And then, as I was reading this, I just have to say that the habit and tradition of patriarchy, patriarchal domination was very strong in India as it was and is in many cultures.

[50:06]

And so basically after the Buddha died, there was very shortly, within a year, there was a council of the whole community. And I don't think it is a matter of accident that somehow all of his male disciples got the invitation and none of the women. They weren't there. And in this text that I'm reading, I read community, I read monks and nuns, but literally in the text that I read, it's just monks. We don't know who was there. I don't fully believe this text as it stands. And the important thing, I think, about any of these texts is not to believe in the text, but to see what do you want to make here? Do you believe that all beings, irrespective of gender, race,

[51:16]

any of the usual differences we designate have the same capacity for awakening, I do believe that. And so I read this, but I don't take it as gospel. I take it as throwing back the responsibility upon myself and upon us to, if all beings are Buddha, which is another teaching of Buddha, then creating a world in which there's equity, there's equal opportunity to awaken. So that's a really good place to end. Thank you. That's a really good question. And if it troubles you, it should. And this is what we need to be We need to be thinking about this in the midst of how we take complete responsibility for the practice of our religious traditions.

[52:20]

So, thank you. And I think after I leave, Andrea will explain the ceremony, right? Meetings are numberless.

[52:37]

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