There are three kinds, or three levels of insight that are often spoken of in Buddhist teachings. There are three levels of prajna. When I say insight, rather than... Sometimes prajna is translated as... How is it usually translated? Mr. Are you familiar with this new Sanskrit word, prajna? J can be spelled on the top of the A, long, communal with A, spelled on the top of the A, prajna. Prajna. Prajna. Prajna, okay. Prajna. Either way, okay. He's saying, So the accent on the second syllable.

[01:06]

So this word often translated as wisdom. Wisdom is not so good. Wisdom is more related to the word, to words like witness. Wisdom is more related to wisdom, to witness. Prajna is more related to, prajna is related to know, prajna is related to gnosis. It's an Indo-Iranian root. Nya. Nya.

[02:09]

Nyosis. Nyosis. And so, nyo. And pra, in front of the nya. So, from nya, you make many words. You make a nyana. Nyana means knowledge. And the other is J-N-A-N-N-A. And the prefix means to, it's an intensifying prefix. It means to drive to the point and go beyond. Intensively reach some place and go. So pra has a feeling of not just going forward, but pra, pro, pro and pra going forward.

[03:12]

Pra also has this meaning of going beyond. So pralya means knowing that reaches to something. It penetrates it and keeps going. So insight is still not dynamic enough to spatter. Insight at least has a point in that the sight goes in. Penetration. But the ongoing insight of insight ongoing, of going inside. That was too much. So there's three kinds of prajna that are usually spoken. In Sanskrit, they're called shrutamaya prajna, cintamaya prajna, and bhavanamaya prajna.

[04:15]

means to hear. means hear. So the first kind of insight is insight that comes on the occasion of hearing. But hearing for hearing, seeing, smelling, touching, and tasting. In other words, insight that comes from reading, from hearing, from seeing, from smelling, from touching and tasting the Dharma. What kinds of information you can get about the teaching through your senses from outside, all that you can receive from teachers, from books, from Buddhist statues, from temple architecture, all that you can bring in Sometimes they say the usual way of learning or studying Buddhist texts is to first memorize, and then to clarify all terms, get all the definitions and etymologies correct, and all the information of the core words in the text, and then reflect on these, on what you've received, and then meditate with it.

[05:50]

So the first stage of taking in all the information you can about the text, hearing all that you can about it, getting as much information as you can from the outside, when that reaches climax, except that you have insight, the maximum insight you can achieve through receiving from the outside, this is called the Shriptanamaya Prajna. Prajna by means of insight, by means of Oh, sorry, through the sense organs. Second word, chitta, what? My means, I believe, abandonment. My, M-Y, M-A-Y, chitta. Chitta is related to words like Sanskrit word chitta, which means thought or consciousness or through thinking. Once you've received all your care from the outside, then you turn, then you can turn over and reflect on in your mind what you've received with all the things that you've learned.

[07:04]

So you take in some piece of teaching, as much as you can, and you fit it into the overall picture of your practice. You try to understand how it relates to your daily life, how it relates to how it relates to helping people. You try to see it in terms of the overall architecture of the path. You see it in place, you know, how it relates to all the different aspects of the teaching. And when you've seen all the possible relationships of this teaching that you receive, you turn them over in your mind like this. When you can't think of anything more about it, except just to be it, then you say that's it. pranayama, which is an insight which comes through actual cultivation or through meditation, above in the mind.

[08:12]

And then everything you are will give rise to this kind of insight. This insight can be brought back up through the thinking and then back out into the five senses, and back and forth. So in these, for example, here tonight, I've just told you about these three levels of insight, but they all come to you, first of all, three levels of insight. They come to you, first of all, through the first level. And if we keep talking about it long enough, you probably would be able to have some insight based on what we talk about here. Okay? So, last time we particularly talked about the basic term of a special transmission outside the scriptures. I tried to talk with my voice to give you more information about this term so that you could then work with it yourself.

[09:31]

And then we talked about the next section. We found that the next section was related to the first section. Do you remember? And then I also looked at some other sections of the Hōkyōki, for example, Section 5 and Section 30. And I found a number of sections will help to clarify this first section we discussed, Section 2. So what I'd like to do is to kind of... If it's okay with you to, in a sense, take this one teaching, this one term, this one expression, the special transmission outside the scripture, and try to weave in other sections to that so that you can make a kind of fabric.

[10:39]

You could try to make this as a central organizing principle to work with the rest of any other section in the text. Well, I may say some things now, so you may think I'm repeating myself. You may think I'm saying something that I've said before. So now I shall say it. Do you allow me to say it again? And we have these two sides. One side is the side we call the side of receiving teaching. The other side is the side of these two characteristics of a Buddhist teacher, to receive and maintain.

[11:48]

The receiving side can also be called the side of discipline. the side of discipline, or the side of becoming a disciple. A disciple in both the sense of the English word disciple as a discipline, but also a disciple in the sense of, like we talk about, a sravaka, a listener. So sravaka, you see, is related to sruta. Sravaka means a listener. They had to shoot to appear. So on one side we have the side of loyalty, the side of listening, the disciplined side, the loyal side, the innocent side. In Sanskrit, we talked about a noble person who had actually entered Buddhist practice, and we speak of the type of person as Shaiksa.

[13:09]

S with a slash over the top, A-I-K-S-T, Shaiksa. Shaiksa means, it also sounds like shh, but instead of meaning one who listens, it means one who's under-disciplined. Shaik, Shaik, Shaik means discipline, Shaik Sha, it's one who's under discipline. Okay, so that's the one side. Now this side is also we talked about, it's the kind of easy side, the safe side, the sure side, the harmless side. People, because it's safe and sure and harmless and legal and lawful, such people might, if they only do that side, they may, well, they don't have to worry too much.

[14:16]

They're pretty safe. The other side is the side which we can call Ashak, which means not under discipline, beyond discipline, free of discipline, no longer under discipline. But it is those who have been previously under discipline, have been under discipline, they have become the disciple, and now they go beyond that. And this is the side which is not so loyal, but more just devoted. They've grown beyond the scriptures. And they don't feel so safe. This side doesn't feel so safe.

[15:18]

And because they don't feel so safe and secure, and because they know they're doing something that's never been done before, they're very, to do it right, they must, they're very careful. And they're overly, they have to be very devoted to do these new things. So that was the, that's the cycle called maintaining. And this is actually the work of a bodhisattva. This is not a listener anymore. Instead of listening to the teaching and receiving the teaching by listening, by discipline, practicing through discipline, now the person acts more from listening, not to the teaching, but to all sentient beings. Now the cries of... evoke a response.

[16:23]

Instead of receiving the words and sounds and the shape of Buddha, by which the person can become a disciple, now the person, now the student responds out of the cries of suffering creatures. And this is the actual maintaining of the teaching. So again, on one side we have the expression in Buddhism, in Chinese, four character expression. First character means to go up. The second character means to attain. So one side is to go up and attain. The other side is to go down and transform. It's a circle, actually.

[17:26]

On one side, you go up and attain. The other side, you come down and transform. So, the coming down and transforming of the Enlightened One, the disciple is now coming down, changing, letting the teaching be corrupted in order to transform, in order to transform, in order to convert living beings, convert them to go up and attain, and then later come down and transform. Buddha is not something that just goes up and attains. Buddha is not, and even Buddha is not even a person who comes down and transforms people. That's not Buddha. It's not like Buddha comes down from the mountain and then transforms people. When Buddha comes down the mountain, after going up the mountain and attaining it, when Buddha walks down the mountain, he's still not Buddha.

[18:36]

He's not Buddha until the beings are transformed. It's when the beings are transformed that the Buddha appears. That make sense to you? You see the difference? It's not like this enlightened person walking down the hill who's a Buddha. It's an enlightened person, but they're not a Buddha yet. They're not a Buddha until other living beings are coming. Then the Buddha appears. That's the side of maintaining. When the Buddha goes up, when the student goes up and attains, he or she becomes a disciple. When they come down and help, when they come down and change into what's ever useful to people, and people are transformed, that's maintaining. And that's beyond discipline. The disciple is not limited by discipline in order to help.

[19:40]

So that's kind of the idea of the last one. Any comments about this? Well, I'd like to skip Section 4 for now. We can go to Section 5. So Section 5, let me read what I have here, and then somebody else could read what you've got there. In this translation, it says, Dogen asked, when a student disciplines himself to pursue the way, is there a mental and physical attitude she must learn? So again, when the student disciplines, when you discipline, when you become a disciple, when you receive the teaching, is there some physical and mental attitude or posture or deportment that you should learn?

[21:14]

And of course the answer is yes. So he's asking about this first step, right? And then Ru Jing replies, When the first patriarch came from India, the Buddhadharma entered China. How can there be no body and no mind? When we first form a determination to seek enlightenment through discipline, then we do the following things. So, again, what they're saying here is, well, first, when you form the determination through discipline, then you do these things. If you want to become a disciple, you do these things. If you want to receive, you do these things. These things will help you receive, inherit.

[22:15]

Okay. Questions about that? In other words, going back to what I said earlier, the teaching is, you first receive it through your soul, you turn it over in your mind, and then you manifest it in your body, you manifest it in your actual presence, your actual life. So, here, Ruji is also saying, the teaching must come down to your body voice. to your body and mind. Mind, people, and yourself. And to do these things, we'll do that. In other words, it won't be just intellectual receiving of the teaching to do these practices. But again, this number four, or number five here, this is on the side of the... These are restrictions.

[23:22]

This is the side of restriction. of limitation. This is the side of the lattice we're talking about. This is you make it firm. You can firmly hook into the structure of the dome of the temperature base, the structure of the tradition. You can grow on this. And this will be a good base. And if you can't do these things, things probably will be difficult. Although some people will not want to do this kind of practice. I'm not saying you have to do this kind of practice. Of course, these rules are particularly for Chinese person, right? Because there's various kinds of Chinese cookies in here and so on. So we have different rules here. If we made this some kind of rule in some place, we wouldn't put probably these lychee nuts. In all of us, it might not be what you would prepare.

[24:27]

So another thing we have to find out is pre-property. Of course, you wouldn't be told not to hang around, not to take this rotten wild tea and cold medicine if they didn't want to. But there would be some restrictions, and there are some restrictions. Every Zen monastery would have certain restrictions. People who are trying to become disciples, who are trying to receive and become photographic copies of the tradition. And it's necessary for people to trust us that some of us do this. Some people cannot trust us unless we do this. Not all of us have to do this, but some of us have to do this. I remember when I was a kid, somebody, I think this is still true, though, and it's when my friend's father said, we have this modern art exhibit, and he said, he didn't like the things, he didn't trust these artists because, he just didn't trust them.

[25:48]

But he said, I trust Picasso. He said, the reason why I trust Picasso is because if you look at Picasso's early work, you can see that he could make photographically realistically, practically, if he wanted to, even when he was quite young. So if an artist shows the ability to, for example, do beautiful calligraphy or make a picture that looks like a... Then if they do something that's never been done before, people say, I trust him. He doesn't do that just because he has the skill. He's obviously very skillful and very disciplined in the study of color, in the use of various materials, in the use of the brush. She can do all those things, but yes, she chooses to do this rather strange thing I find quite useful. But I trust her usefulness because she can do this other thing.

[26:54]

And now, so this is Section 5. So this is Section 5, and it relates to Section 2. Can you see that? The one side is Section 2. And then this also relates to Section 3, where we talked about by Dogen is, now these people in Section 3 that are doing these unusual things that Buddhists have not done before in order to help people, Dogen's wondering, are these people who are yelling and being rather rude and stopping the students in the middle of their questions, are these people going too far? Are they going so far that they're losing connection with free, with disciplined living? And that's the issue there. Now I'd like to skip, actually, quite a ways to another section. Section 34. Uh, can I see yours for a second?

[28:32]

Section 34 I think section 34 is, um, I love it.

[29:39]

I love it. Section 31. Section 34 here is Section 31 . We all have . I was reading Cordero. So 34 in Cordero is 31 in Waddell. So, here in Kodera, I'll read that one to you.

[30:59]

Dogen asked, You have never put on the dharma robe since you became abbot. What is your reason for this? Rinpoche replied with compassion, Since I have assumed the abbotcy, I have never worn the dharma robe. It is to be frugal, I suppose. Because the Buddha and his disciples wished to wear only The dusty rag had carried the dusty home with both. Could you repeat what you heard? The head priest passionately taught, from the time I took the habit ship of my first temple, never once have I worn a, let us call the reason, prudence. The Buddha and his disciples want to wear patch robes made from cast-off rags and to use discarded receptacles for their bowls. So I've liked this section for many years.

[32:06]

And it's difficult to talk about it as much as I'd like to, because God would be frugal. So I have to be careful. This frugality, I would suggest, first of all, is in a way It shows a way to go beyond what we just talked about in Section 5. The frugality is a more subtle way. It's not so much bound up in terms of restrictions or disciplined, narrow way. It is a kind of way. It's been something typical of Zen teachers. A danga robe is a robe that Ru Jing was qualified to wear.

[33:17]

And you see Karagiri Roshi will wear sort of a fancy robe, or a funeral ceremony or something. But there are these very gorgeous robes that you may have seen pictures of. that Zen teachers and other Buddhist teachers are allowed to wear. And some wear them a lot. Other times, we see them wear colorful, variegated robes. But Rujing never wore them. He always wore a dark robe with black or dark blue. He said, there isn't. Even if you follow the way we just looked at, or some disciplined way, even if you follow that, there's still some danger there.

[34:27]

And one of the main dangers there is the danger to become arrogant. You can develop considerable power by picking it up. But unless your way starts to open up and allow for some flexibility for other people's sake, it's as though they think you're not following the precepts. It's almost like you're violating the way of discipline if you stick to the way of discipline, when their needs are locked in. Of course, a great example of that would be I don't know, perhaps it's time for zazen. And people are going to the zendo, and someone asks you to do something for them. And you maybe want to go to the zendo. They can't maybe specify what precept you're breaking by not helping them, but they feel almost like they're

[35:39]

to your way, perhaps, if you won't adapt to their way. Another way to talk about this is that if you follow the way of the disciple very well, generally speaking, I think things will go pretty well for you too. I mean, your life will be pretty good. But to be able to live a life where you look like you're able to follow the rules, to live a life where you look like you're able to actually be a disciplined person, that you can successfully do that, it's very tricky. In other words, if you look like you're being successful at following the way, that may not be so good.

[37:02]

If you look like you're able to walk the way with no limping, then I would suggest that what might happen is that the rest of the world limps. If you don't link, then other people link. And because, since you are so successful at following the way, and therefore they have to link because you are successful, This is what it's like when you become a disciple, when you receive the way, and you just continue to receive. You don't take the next step. There's a time in practice when just receiving, you will live when you try to receive.

[38:15]

You will not be able to receive. you will feel like you're limping. And because you feel like you're limping, because you're not able to receive the teaching, because you just can't quite do it, because of that, the rest of the world is not limping. And people trust you. Even though you're not able to do it. They trust you as you're trying to learn how to draw the lines straight. To draw the straight lines. But when you can draw straight lines, you keep drawing straight lines, and people ask you to do something else, and you just keep being successful, and you stay in your success, then they start to learn. They live where they have failure to see, need to see again.

[39:19]

You make them have difficulty. You make your environment fail because of your success. And even though the very thing you're successful at is perhaps some discipline, the people that you really haven't mastered the disciplines They think you're sneaking. That actually, they can't see it, but they think actually you have not missed it. That is the suggestion. So to say it again in another way, if you learn something, if you're trying to learn something, but you haven't learned it yet, and you're making mistakes, people trust you, and they are encouraged by it. if you have mastered something and you stay in the mastery of it, and don't go beyond that, go to another stage where you're not a master, where you're limping again, then other people start to have a problem, and they even suspect that you're not a master of the thing you're stuck at.

[40:30]

And they don't mind that you're not a master. As I said, if you're not a master and you're showing you're not a master, and people can see you They're encouraged by that effort. But if you look like a master, but they can't see that you're not, and they suspect you aren't, then they think you're being dishonest. But you really are a master, you see. The only problem is you're stuck in it, and you won't give it up, and it goes to another thing. The next day, well, you're not a master. You won't be a beginner again in some other way. You won't take a chance. So on paper, you're actually strictly speaking, you're correct. But people's feeling is that they don't trust you. They think, what's she doing? Something stinks.

[41:36]

I don't know what it is. I can't prove it. If I can barely take care of myself, barely take care of myself, or not take care of myself, but I'm trying very hard and just overwhelmed by my own problems. And because I'm so overwhelmed with my own problems, I can't help anybody else. is just for me to sit still is so hard that I can't help any other person. If I am ignoble, other people think I'm very helpful. But when I look like I, as we say, have it together with myself,

[42:41]

And even maybe I could help somebody else, not only can I take care of myself, but I have something extra, then I'm also helpful. One time, Suzuki Roshi called me to his room, and he He took out a piece of paper, an envelope, and he wrote the Chinese characters, a couple of Chinese characters, a monastic rule. And he said, we have this rule, and he explained the rule to me. And he said, I don't want to tell you to do this. And I said, oh, but you want me to do it, don't you? And he said, well, yes. And then he drew, I think, five arrows.

[43:46]

Four arrows were about this long, maybe half an inch long, and one arrow was about an inch long. And he pointed to the tall arrow and he said, another one. In other words, We don't want to have one aspect stick up above the other ones. But by we, he means we Buddhists don't want to have it. We people do. We like to be very good at something, so everybody will look at the one thing that's very good. Oh, look, she's so good at that. And we don't want them to notice, we don't care if they notice that we're not so good at it. many other things in our life. We can sit very well, but we don't have good relationships with our spouses or children. Or we work pretty well, but we can't sit still, and so on.

[44:53]

We like to get really good at one thing. But there's two images of water that are helpful. One is that if water's running downhill over a bumpy ground, it just fills one hole, and as soon as that hole's filled, it overflows and fills the next one. Okay? It doesn't fill any hole. It just fills them one after another until it just fills them up and then goes on. That's one image of water. Another image is if water's coming down... uh... front of it it doesn't feel the big holes faster than the little holes or the little holes faster than the big holes uh... a little hole can only get so much water in from the water running down it only has a little place to fill in so just a little bit of water can come in the big the big water the big hole

[46:04]

It has a big front surface so the water can fill up faster. So actually the little and the big fill up at the same rate. But of course the natural human tendency is to fill up the big one first. Or anyway, to fill up the one that will get the most notice first. Now you may feel like, well, forget about the big one, fill the little one because then people will see I fill mine fastest. Either that way or fill the big one because that's what everybody looks at. That's my thing. The big one. So fill that one up first and don't fill the little one. No, that's not the way. Fill all of them. Bring all of them up evenly. This is frugality. it's also translated as prudence. This is prudent from the point of practicing Buddhism. But again, there's some tendency to want to be really good at some things and put the others back, really about the others.

[47:18]

So another summary of this is, we must be disciplined in order to be a natural Buddhist. So first there's natural, then there's discipline, then there's natural. We must be a disciple, we must receive in order to be natural. So frugality is... this idea of frugality, of prudence, is very important and very subtle. Do you have any questions about this?

[48:43]

Anything to say about this subject? I understand what you're saying about filling water in the holes at the same time altogether. Could we be doing one thing and focusing on nothing? Pardon? When we focus on one thing, well, it seems that if we try to fill too many holes at once, we could get scattered. And sometimes it's better to focus on one thing in order to have the discipline to be able to go on to something else. That it might not matter what we're doing, but how we discipline ourselves to do

[49:47]

The action. Well, you know, I think it can become scared, right? To kind of feel lost in the thoughts. So, what I would say is that there's one way is to... The one side is, the first side is, we don't think, we have trouble believing that we're always concentrated.

[50:50]

We don't quite see that. But if we do one thing, literally one thing, we call one thing like sitting, sweeping the floor, just sweeping the floor, then we feel like, gee, I can just sweep the floor. I can do one thing. I feel distracted. And when you feel like that, you feel, in a way, you feel disciplined. You say, I can get up, I can get up and go to Zazen. I can get up and go, I have some discipline, I'm a disciple, I'm a Zazen disciple. I can do that. And that is...

[51:56]

that is very loyal to Satsang. When the bell rings, get up and go to Satsang. That's right. But there comes a time, and it doesn't take so many years, when you become a fairly good disciple at something. some kind of practice, it becomes fairly good. And then it becomes clear that there's other holes, other areas to take care of. If you're not taking care of anything, if you're just generally overwhelmed and making no effort, then there's nothing to talk about yet. But when you fill in one hole, finally, you've got that hole filled in.

[53:01]

You say, yes, I do, thanks. Then we're talking, now I'm talking about that you've got that hole filled, right? Now, what about the other ones? When people start noticing you've taken care of this area, you have disciplined yourself to take care of it. Now go to the others. If you have no areas you've taken care of, Then let's take care of one now. Let's put some water in one of them and take care of one. When you are, when you do take care of that one, now let's go beyond that and become frugal, become prudent. If you just go one, you can be very arrogant about that one. But if you take care of all of the wholes, you cannot be arrogant. Arrogant is never about all the holes. Fill all the holes, there's no arrogance.

[54:02]

You'll never fill all the holes. You can only be arrogant about some little area that you're taking care of. But you have to start taking care of a little area, getting arrogant, then your friends say, hey, what's happening to you? Very good. Come on. come over here, help with this, help with this, help with this. I said, no, I can't because then my little area will fall apart. I'm just taking care of this. I said, you've been taking care of that for a long time. You can take care of something else. Don't worry. If you're all scattered and confused and you can't feel anything, you can't do anything, you're not a disciple of anything, people won't ask you to do other things. they'll probably tell you, why don't you concentrate on something? Why don't you do one thing completely? That's what they'll say to you. If you're just barely able to take care of yourself everywhere all the time, people won't ask you to do anything else.

[55:08]

They'll say, do something completely. But when you can do something completely, then people come to you and say, hey, help with something else. Come over here. They'll tell you, come over here. And I'm suggesting you should go. The will will tell you when you've taken care of one, and it's time to fill another one. Now, if you never fill one, that's fine too. Just concentrate on one, and fill one, and fill another, and fill another, and fill another. That's okay too. In other words, never attain anything. Just bring the whole universe up with you. if you can do that. But again, that's the best way, but most people can't stand that. So they have to start practicing by picking one and filling one hole. At least for a little while, filling one hole. Getting a hold of the practice, at least firmly in one place. Just to get a taste of it, because they can't believe anything until they do that.

[56:10]

But if you don't need to do that, you might as well act like you will act after you do that. People will ask you to spread out. And again, they'll ask you to spread out in relationship to how well you're doing. If you're doing very well, they'll ask you to spread faster. In other words, people naturally want you to be sort of prudent. They don't want you to have one thing standing way up. They like it. They think it's beautiful. They admire you and love you for it, but they don't trust it. I don't trust it. It's too flashy. The golden light around the Buddha is so flashy. The golden light around the Buddha is all of Buddha's disciples. The fact that all living beings are uplifted by the Buddha's practice is the light. It's not the light around that person, it's around all the living beings.

[57:15]

That's the aura. It's not the one light standing up. It's all the little holes, all the little things, all the way around the area that are being taken care of. So the one thing doesn't look so splendid or so brilliant or so profound, but the whole pattern is taken care of. In other words, the Buddha is limping. The Buddha can barely function. so that everyone else is taken care of. Now, if nobody was in a bin, then I guess the Buddha wouldn't have to live, too. Neither. Anything else about this? Okay.

[58:32]

A couple, a few days ago in San Francisco, someone came and talked to me. This person is concerned with what we call animal liberation. You know about animal liberation? It's an important thing to take care of, the situation of animals, the way they're treated in the United States and most European countries, too. For example, I think, you know, like veal. You know about veal? You don't eat veal anyway, but what you do to make veal is you take a baby little calf, and when the time is quite young, you put it in a cage, just slightly bigger than the body of the calf, so the calf can't move. The whole life, it can't move. And this is so that the calf won't have, so the muscles won't be tender.

[60:47]

So it's tortured that way for human consumption. And then also it's kept away from any kind of iron. But the meat will be white. And the cows chew on cages to try to get some air. Many other things like this are done to animals You need to do these kinds of things to animals. So this is a group. There's many groups, but there's one group called Buddhist Concerns. And so these people, when they went to see these, they also are concerned with the psychology departments. put electrodes in the heads of monkeys and shock them and things like that. Or even this one psychologist turned this monster milk tea, made this one mother milk tea and then turned it loose on her own babies.

[62:03]

And so she takes her own babies and smashed their heads on the ground on occasions. rubs their heads, their crushed heads back and forth on the floor. And the psychologist said, talks about how disgusting the behavior of these animals is, that they're trained to do this by raising in isolation from all other animals without their own mother and so on. So, some psychologists are, for, I guess for some benefit they hope for human beings, from the animals to these kinds of animals. And so there's groups trying to get them to stop this. So they go to see these people at these primate labs, and this one man went there to see them, and he just said he had no effect, he had no effect, and the people did their job, and they're trying to do their best, and they hope it's helped people, and so on and so forth.

[63:06]

And so I think he didn't listen to me. But what I felt when I was doing work on his animal liberation, he is concerned about animals. He really is. But he is not sufficiently concerned with other areas of suffering beings. And because he's not, He lacks enough authority for those people that are working on animals to pay any attention to him. Because they have some sense of... They're trying to take care of something, too. But this man, a good man, but he's not... He does not have a wide enough concern for all the different kinds of human suffering. but he does not have a wide enough concern for different types of human suffering.

[64:20]

People that are mutilating some forms of sentient beings. In fact, if those people take care of their own kids, the psychologist, maybe he really takes care of his children and makes sure that they don't get too little to eat or get sick. Maybe he's worried about someone taking good care of him. And just that gives him authority, some authority. So if the man who is worried about the animals doesn't take care of his own wife so well, then he doesn't have much to say. The people who have authority are those who have the widest concern. We're not just concerned about old people dying of cancer. We're not just concerned about drug addicts. We're not just concerned about money drug addicts. We're not just concerned about teenagers.

[65:23]

We're not just concerned about babies. We're not just concerned about dollars, and so on, and so on, and so on, and so on. We're not just concerned about their own wife. We're not just concerned about other people's wives. We're not just concerned about people who are practicing Zazen. We're not just concerned about people who are practicing Kijin. all difficulties. These people, when they ask somebody, when they talk to somebody who's torturing somebody, they are listened to. And one of the main reasons why they're listened to is because they are frugal. And they don't come with a sense of, I'm doing this one thing, I'm doing this thing, and this thing I'm doing He's trying to fix up what you're doing. I'm working on animal liberation and you're torturing animals. If that happens, it's either a battle or there's no... You can't talk to him on that score. If you care about animals and someone's torturing an animal, I would suggest to you

[66:35]

that if you want to go over there and just ask him, what are you doing to that animal? It's your authority in some other area that will be useful in this case. It's your concern for some other area. So that you're concerned that people were seeking Maybe what gives you authority with this person who's torturing animals? Do you understand that? Does that make sense to you? So more from the breadth of your suffering. And when you have wide suffering, when you have wide concern for suffering beings, then nothing about you stands up very much.

[67:53]

You're not a crusader for this or for that. So if someone's not taking care of something, you don't stand out as a representative of their antithesis. But in the area where they're taking care of things, too, you're with them, you're one of them. You join and support them. And then, in the area where they're not paying attention. So, you know, some people who are mutilating animals may be very concerned, or they're probably often concerned with making sure that the area in the suburbs is not developed, right? They want to keep it green. So that people, you know, keep the fresh air out in the suburbs where they live. Which is a perfectly good thing to be concerned with. And you should be able to say, yes, you know, gotta keep the air clean.

[68:58]

Try to control the emissions from these various combustion systems. You care about that. And you join with them there. Now, some people, of course, would say, gee, these people are doing this terrible thing over here, and over here they're trying to, you know, basically kill themselves. But there's some merit in that. If you can appreciate that, plus you have many other areas that you're concerned with, then they can change. There's a working in the arms business, can start off by saying, thank you for preventing a nuclear war. Tell me now. We all are trying not to have a nuclear war. And the people who are in the machine, that's what they think they're trying to do too.

[70:04]

And they've succeeded so far. So we should congratulate them for that and then go on from there. Now what should we do? now that we have that established. And this then leads into another section, which I think we can brush and continue.

[71:20]

And that is, what here would be 36, and so there must maybe be a 33. I think No, it's 32. Here. Um... Yeah, it's 32. Yeah. And, uh... 36. 15. So may I read this one?

[72:32]

Ruji taught one day, although the sitting in zazen of the Arahants or the Sravakas, the disciples, and the Pratyekabuddhas transcends attachment, it lacks great compassion. Therefore it is not identical with the sitting in meditation of the Buddhas and ancestors. Who considers compassion first, whereby they save all sentient beings? The Hindu heretics also practice sitting meditation. Heretics, however, always retain the three evils, namely attachment, perverse views, arrogance. Therefore, sitting meditation is eternally different from that of the Buddha's ancestors. Among the Sravakas, among the disciples, There is also the practice of sitting in meditation. However, the Śrīvākās rarely possess compassion.

[73:36]

Their self-property wisdom does not necessarily allow them to penetrate the true characteristic marks of all phenomena. They improve themselves in such a way that all the seeds of Buddhahood are crushed. Therefore their sitting in meditation is eternally different from that of the Buddha's ancestors. In their sitting in meditation, the Buddha's ancestors wish to gather the entire Buddhadharma from the first developing of the mind of the Four Enlightenment. Thus sentient beings are neither forgotten nor abandoned. Their compassionate thought is always extended even to insects. they transfer their every merit to the salvation of all sentient beings, determined to save them all. For this reason, the Buddha's ancestors always sit in meditation and pursue the way in the realm of desire.

[74:39]

Regarding Jambudvipa as the only region in the realm of desire, they cultivate all merits and attain meekness of mind. Dogen then asked, What is the attainment of meekness of mind? Rujing replied, The will of the Buddhas and ancestors to drop body and mind is meekness of mind. This is the seal put upon the mind of the Buddhas and ancestors. Dogen made six bodhisattvas. Now, the central point here that I'd like to emphasize is that Buddhas and ancestors were sitting and pursuing the way in the realm of desire.

[75:45]

The realm of desire is the English translation of the Sanskrit word kamadhatu. Kamadhatu. Have you heard the expression, three worlds? These three worlds are kamadhatu, rupadhatu, and arupadhatu. All experience that human beings can have comes under these all-worldly experiences that can be categorized in these three worlds. Kama means... Have you heard of the Kama Sutra? The Sutra of Sex. Kamadhatu is the realm of the five senses. And not only the five senses, but the realm of sex. Sometimes it's called also the realm where food is taken by the mouthfuls. The other realm, the next realm, is called the rupa dhatu, which means material, but in this sense it means refined or basic material.

[76:59]

which is another sphere of existence which we can enter into through meditations, there's no longer spoons or moths. There's still colors, smells, tastes, there's still five senses, but there's no composite forms like tapery glasses, lamps, chairs, people, breasts, babies, milk. These things don't exist. but there are forms. And then another realm is called the paripadattu, which means there's only mental phenomena. This can also be entered into by various transmutationists. The kamadattu is composed of basically six realms. The rupadattu is composed of one realm. Basically, our rupidattu is composed of one realm.

[78:04]

The kamadattu has what we call the realm of the humans, the realm of the gods or devas, the hell realms or the realms of extreme isolation, the animal realm, hungry ghost realm, the titan realm. Okay? Are you familiar with those six worlds? Human, god, god or divine, infernal, hungry ghosts, the animal, and the dragon. Okay? For us, the human realm is the center of these six. And in the human realm, there are, according to usual Buddhist mythology, four continents. In the center of the human realm is Mount Sumeru, Four continents, one, two, three, four. In the South continent, it's called Jambudvipa.

[79:07]

In the South continent is where practice is optimal. The human type of existence can exist in all four continents. But in the South continent, it's most... most auspicious. Why it's most auspicious is not because it's... I don't know why you might think auspicious, but the reason why it's auspicious is because Jambudbhipada is the place that has the most optimal connections with all the other realms. Jambhavipa is the center of the Kamadhatu.

[80:10]

And the Kamadhatu is the center of gravity of the three worlds. The higher realms go through trances, but when they completely lapse, the beings come back down to the Kamadhatu. So Buddhists sit at the center of the lowest and the highest. Like we say, the lotus grows up out of the muddy water. The Buddhists sit in the middle of the mud. They don't sit in the worst place. They don't sit in the best place. They sit in a place that's connected to the worst in the world. They sit at the focus of all sentient beings. They sit at the place which is the closest to all of them.

[81:14]

So, if they move over this way a little bit, people over there, but they'd be farther from these people over here. And similarly, if they move over this way, they'd be closer to these people, but farther from these people. There's a place where they're closest to all. That's the place they sit. It's the greatest intensity in terms of awareness of suffering creatures. That's where they sit. And they organize their life so that they can find themselves at that focal center of suffering. And it's there that they mature. And it's there that the supple mind is developed. And it's there that they can totally

[82:20]

the first noble truth, namely, that life is suffering. There they can completely understand it. So, in section 36 here and 32 there, and tomorrow I'd like to talk more about what this place that Buddhists are always sitting, what the place is like, and how we can create, how we can organize our life to put ourselves in that place where Buddhists sit, how we can find that place, how we can guide ourselves to that place so we can sit where Buddhists sit, what that place is like. Okay? How we can do it with our body, in our own body, and how we can do it in our own society.

[83:26]

Okay. So is that what it does, you know, two minutes? Nine o'clock.

[83:33]

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