I vow to take security for that which I possess worth. Good morning. Recently, I got a letter from a 13-year-old boy from King Junior High who said he had to write a paper on what's the benefit of religion in our society today. And he asked me a number of questions in the letter. And the questions are very provocative. So I want to talk a little bit about the questions and what my responses are.

[01:07]

I may not be able to get through the whole thing. Each one of these questions is a big subject in itself. So the first question is, does Zen Buddhism believe that there is a God or an outside force? And in what way does Zen Buddhism believe that the earth and man were created? Does Zen Buddhism believe that God or an outside force controls in some way what happens to an individual? If so, can prayer change what will happen? What is the purpose of prayer? What do you think is the role that Zen Buddhism plays in the day-to-day lives of the members of the Berkeley Zen Center? Are you happy with this role? In what way does religion play a positive role in today's American society, and in what way does it play a negative role?

[02:19]

That's a really good question. I need to start my paper by June 1st. Well, the first question, does Zen Buddhism believe that there is a God or an outside force? Well, the word God, you know, is not only, not just a Western term, but also an Eastern term. and people have gods and gods and objects of worship. And the way we relate to these objects of worship varies enormously.

[03:28]

Some people set up an idea of a deity and it becomes a very concrete idea. and other people have a very loose idea, which is more cosmic and spiritual and non-defined. To set up a defined image of a deity is not Buddhist. Buddha is not a deity, although within the range of Buddhist understanding, Buddha comes out almost as a deity. But strictly speaking, in Buddhism, there is not a god set up as a deity, and Buddha is not a god set up as a deity, even though in the development of Buddhism, we have the Trikaya,

[04:40]

the three bodies of Buddha, which became necessary. So in original Buddhism, early Buddhism, there was the nirmanakaya Buddha. Nirmanakaya means a person who is a Buddha. Tangible, walking, talking person. But in the development of religion, one has to go beyond a person. You can't worship a person. Some people do, but in religious practice has to go beyond the worship of a person. And it has to become more cosmic in order to actually become religion. So Buddhism developed the cosmic Buddhas in order to express the cosmic full expression of spirituality in Buddhism.

[05:55]

So they developed the understanding of Dharmakaya. Dharmakaya is the totality and the great dynamic potential of creation. And in between is they developed Sambhogakaya Buddha. And Sambhogakaya is like the spiritual manifestation of the Dharmakaya in the world. So we have these three bodies of Buddha. And one could say that Dharmakaya is like equivalent to what other religions think of as God. It's the matrix from which all things proceed. But Buddhists don't call that God.

[06:58]

Even though there is a representation which is Vairochana or Adi-Buddha. Vairocana Buddha is the closest that Buddhists come to that kind of understanding. So Vairocana stands for the primal matrix from which creation proceeds. But, and people, there are schools of Buddhism who maybe worship Bhagavad Gita. But strictly speaking, there is no deity in Buddhism. But there is a point where you could argue it.

[08:04]

So in order to develop a religion, it inevitably comes out this way. So is Buddhism a religion or not? This is always also a question. In the last or most recent issue of Tricycle, there's an article by Thich Nhat Hanh who says, Buddhism is more a way of life than a religion. He doesn't say it's not a religion. He said the tendency is more a way of life than as a religion. So there's always some It's not fixed. You can relate to Buddhism as religion, or you can relate to it as a way of life.

[09:10]

Religion, if you look up the etymology of religion, it refers you to the word ligament. First you have to look under ligament, paragraph 10. is an adherence, a clinging or a grasping of something, adhering to something very strongly. So people who are religious adhere to something, some doctrine or some way of life, and they adhere to it in a very strong way. Yoga means yoke. It has a very similar meaning.

[10:16]

So it's kind of like being bound, actually, to something. So, you can use the word, I sometimes use, I don't dismiss the word God when I'm talking about Buddhism, although I don't use it unless I have to. But it can be a useful term. And also, if you dismiss it when you're talking to people who believe in God, and believe in the idea of God, then you create a gap. So, better to use the word, and use it with your own understanding, because everyone has a different understanding. And I don't have a problem using the word, because to me, I don't have a concrete image or idea about it.

[11:36]

To me, it means ultimate, and Buddha means ultimate. So in that sense, you can use the word, or I can use the word, to term God as some ultimate, but without an idea of what that is. So, did God create the world? That's an argument that is insoluble. I don't purport to say what God did or didn't do. In Buddhism, we say There's no beginning and no end. The world was not created by somebody or by a god, a deity. From the beginningless beginning, there is the law of cause and effect, which turns the wheel of creation.

[12:46]

This is also pretty much an Indian idea, although Indians do have a whole pantheon of gods. And there is a pantheon of Buddhist deities, but they're not gods in the sense that we usually think of gods. They're spirits. representations of a certain kind of spirit. If you look at Tibetan thangkas, they have all these representations of human psyche or human spirit in some way. So is there an outside force called a god? That's not Buddhist understanding. Buddhist understanding is that the law of cause and effect keeps the whole thing going.

[13:53]

So in Buddha's time, there were many ideas. And Buddha, he grew up at a time when there was a lot of religious foment and people with various ideas. And he encountered all these people. debated with him. And there was a school of thought which was the school of fate, that everything came into existence preordained. And there's nothing you could do about it, because your fate was already set. And people still believed This is an old idea that continues. It's like people believe that whatever their fate is, the Indian society is like this.

[14:58]

They have the caste system. The caste system is kind of like a fatalistic system. Whatever caste you're born into, you can't get out of that. You have to live your life within that fate. That's your fate. But Buddha didn't believe in the caste system. And he said, you can change your destiny. Destiny and fate are not the same. Everyone has a destiny. Everything is destined to some way. So destiny and fate are not the same. Fate is fixed and destiny depends on volition. So karma is volitional action and our actions create our destiny.

[16:02]

But that destiny is not fixed. It can be changed. Buddhist practice is the practice to change your karma or to be free from karma. So there are two ways of life in Buddhism. One is living by karma and the other is living by vow or intention. Living by karma is just to be involved in the world and living through habit energy. Through habit energy, our life just continues in the same cycle of suffering over and over again. And it's like being on a wheel and you can't get off of it. Living by intention or vow, vow is a little bit strong, but in intentional life, you can actually change the direction of your life and not just be

[17:13]

stuck in karma. And this is the basis of Buddhist practice. So, and there are two kinds, there are many kinds of Buddhist practice, but there are two major ways to practice. One is through effort, through your own effort. and the other is through resignation. So monastic practice, Zen practice, is practice through effort. In other words, it's possible to change your karma through your own effort. And the other way is resignation, which means that No matter how hard you try, you can't change anything.

[18:14]

And just give yourself up to Buddha. So, in China, in Japan, they developed pure land Buddhism, where you resign yourself, you give yourself over to Amida, Buddha, and you chant the name. Namu Amida Butsu, Namu Amida Butsu, or Nam-mei-tofu in China, or Nam-ho-hyo-ren-ge-kyo, the name of the Lotus Sutra, over and over again. And the vow of Amitabha is to save all beings who chant the name. So that's more popular kind of Buddhism. And there was a time when people believed that you couldn't, it was too hard, you know, to find your salvation from karma through your own effort.

[19:32]

And you just had to, the only way you could do it was through resignation. So these two ways are prevalent in Buddhism. But the second way leans more toward a deity. Amitabha will save us. That's more deity kind of Buddhism, more god-like type. Whereas the effort to save yourself through your effort is more traditional Buddhism, more archaic Buddhism. So we don't talk about that, we don't chant the name of Buddha so much. We don't have prayer exactly. Prayer is, I would say, Namo Amida Butsu is more like prayer in Buddhism.

[20:40]

And for Zen Buddhism, Zazen is, I don't like to say takes the place of, but is the activity of unity with the cosmos. That's what Zazen is about, is unity of yourself with the cosmos, because religion is The purpose of religion is how you relate to the cosmos, how each individual relates to the cosmos, relates to the ungraspable. So, God, you know, is a word. that stands for something.

[21:44]

And in the Jewish religion, originally, the name of God was unspeakable. In other words, God is just a synonym for the true name. So you can say that, but there's this saying that, don't take the name of the Lord in vain. What that really means, originally means is don't say something partial about something whole. In other words, it's vanity to create a partiality about something that's not partial, which is very close, actually, to Zen Buddhism. So the real star makaya is ungraspable, unthinkable, and has no special characteristics.

[22:58]

And as soon as you start to talk about it, it's called vanity. So, in Zen, we don't think of an outside force. Our lives are created by ourselves, through our interaction with the law of cause and effect. So our life, this is basic Buddhism, our life is self-creating. That's why it's very important to be very careful about how we live our life, because through our actions we create suffering for ourselves and for others, through our greed, through our ill will, and through our ignorance.

[24:04]

And what the result of our actions creates, or the cause of our actions creates a result. which is harmful to others and comes around to ourselves as harmful, even though we can't always see the results. So a good cause, a good action creates a good, a good cause creates a good result, and a bad cause creates a bad result. This is the law of cause and effect in the realm of good and bad. So people say, Well, if there's no God, you can do whatever you want in Buddhism because there's no retribution, which is not so, because retribution, the law of cause and effect, is very strict and doesn't allow for exceptions. When I used to go up to Sonoma, I used to stop at this little cafe

[25:12]

where they served really great chili for lunch. And they had a picture of an airplane. And the airplane was an old two-winger, and it was stuck in a tree. And the caption under the picture was, the law of aerodynamics is strict and allows for no exceptions. But we have to be very careful about what we do, because everything comes back to ourselves. And through our ignorance, we don't pay attention to it. So there is retribution. Actually, it's called retribution. I like to call it result. Retribution has the connotation of somebody up there saying, naughty, naughty, or giving you a spanking.

[26:20]

But it's just a result. I mean, it's impersonal. It's just when you do this, that happens. And when that happens, this happens. It's the law of cause and effect. And we call it, broadly, karma. Strictly speaking, karma is our volitional action. And the result of karma is its fruit. So whatever we do, the result will either be immediate or sometime in the future or way in the future. And even though it The result may not come to us, personally, it will come to our children or the next generation.

[27:26]

The stuff that we do now will be visited, the result will be visited on the next generation and seven generations hence. And we are suffering the suffering of the people It's mistakes that came before us. It's inevitable. We can't get out of it. But each one of us can turn it for ourselves and for others. We can create good results ourselves. And so it's always this push and pull, you know? It's constantly going on. Can prayer change what will happen? Can our wish, can our supplication change? Well, what is prayer? Prayer has lots of different meanings. People often think of prayer as supplication, you know.

[28:32]

When we're in a really tough situation, we say, oh, please, you know, get me out of this and I'll do anything. I'll be so good from now on. And then, oh yeah, I'm OK. And then we just go about our business. That's one kind of prayer. But actually, prayer is more reconnecting. Reconnecting with our true self. You don't have to say anything. And Zazen is like returning to unity. Repentance means to return to unity. And Zazen means to return to unity.

[29:37]

That's what it is. So, true prayer, which has no vanity in it, is zazen. Not in the sense of supplication, but in the sense of returning to unity. And when you do that, of course it changes things. So, in a sense we feel maybe helpless in the universe, because the universe is so strong, we're so tiny. But we have an effect on the universe. Everything has an effect on everything else. Because it's one whole being with many different expressions. Everything depends on everything else. So, yes, tiny you can exert a great force on the universe.

[30:44]

either knowingly or unknowingly. If you know what you're doing, that's one kind of force. If you don't know what you're doing, you're still doing something, and that's also one kind of force. So, ignorance changes things a lot, and wisdom changes things a lot. And there's always this interplay that's going on all the time, pushing and pulling. that's causing things to change. What do you think is the role that Zen Buddhism plays in the day-to-day lives of the members of the Berkeley Zen Center? What I said to him was, through Zen practice and through meditation, we learn to be not self-centered.

[32:05]

What meditation and practice means, basically, is to let go of being self-centered. Buddhism, to study Buddhism, to study the Buddha way means to study the self. And to study the self means to let go of the self, forget the self. And that's what Zazen is. And that's what our daily life is, to let go of being self-centered and realize that everything that I encounter is myself. If we do that, then our practice has some meaning. And how you do that, all day, is your koan. And sometimes you're way off, sometimes you're way on. Or on the way. But we keep coming back.

[33:11]

We fall off, and we keep coming back. It's just like watching your breath, or keeping your attention in zazen. Your daily life is just like your daily zazen. In zazen, you sit there and you dream, and your mind wanders, and you bring it back, and you pay attention to your breath, and then it wanders again, and you pay attention to your posture. You can't sustain it. It's very hard to sustain it. And yet, there's something that's sustained. There's an underlying practice that includes wandering and coming back and dreaming and all this. There's an underlying zazen. And in your daily life, it's the same thing. You're dreaming and you're rushing and you remember and you come back and you pay attention to your breath and you sit still for a minute and you treat people as if

[34:15]

as you would treat yourself, as yourself, and then you treat people as if they were objects, and then you remember that they're not objects, and you come back. So, it's the same thing, but it's a different field, you know? When it's Zazen, in Zazen, it's a very close field, and in your daily life, it's a very wide field, but it's the same thing. And so back and forth, you know, into the Zen Dojo and out in the world. And pretty soon it's just one thing. Are you happy with this? Well, yes. That doesn't mean it's perfect. That doesn't mean that everything is okay.

[35:21]

always okay. But yes, I'm happy. I see people that are also happy. And I see that there's some reason why we're all here. So our life is sometimes happy and sometimes not happy. But there's an underlying strata, just like in Zazen, even though you may not even be aware that you're sitting Zazen always. It's still there. And happiness is something very deep that is not dependent upon whether you're happy or not happy. So, in that dharmakaya, sambhogakaya, we reach the place where, beyond happiness and unhappiness, which is called bliss, It doesn't depend on the waves of the surface.

[36:27]

All of the waves of the surface are all felt. Then he says, in what ways does religion play a positive role in today's American society, and in what ways does it play a negative role? I think that in a positive way, I don't see a lot because people are much too attached to their religion rather than to their spiritual life and to the intolerance of others. I think religion, in its worst way, breeds intolerance, whereas religion should be preaching tolerance and acceptance and, of course, discernment and understanding and broad-mindedness.

[37:48]

But most of what passes for religion today It's narrow-minded, sectarian, intolerant, and exactly the opposite of what the founder was preaching. So, it's in a sorry state. Religion is like fire, you know. Sometimes we say, well, let's just do without religion. What do we need it for since it's so harmful? But you can't do without it because everyone needs it. It's just that it's so hard to get it right. And the little tip of the balance, it's like a fire. You can't do without fire. We need fire because it's the important element in things. And religion is how we relate to the universe.

[38:53]

So we can't do without it, even though we brush it away, it's still there. So it can be, this fire is hard to control. Hard to control. And unless we do it with wisdom, unless we learn how to control this fire with wisdom, it just burns everything up. So it's a very destructive force. But when it's not a destructive force, it becomes life force, becomes truth and reality. So it can go either way. It's very dangerous. That's what life is, right? Dangerous. And we have to be able to control these forces without controlling them.

[39:53]

And so each one of us has to be able to have self-control, guided by wisdom, magnanimity, and generosity and true love, which is not partial. It's easy to love your family or your wife or your fellow cohorts, but what about everyone else? You can't call it true religion, universal religion. if you're still dividing between us and them, and making wars on each other, and saying, you're wrong, we're right. It just shows where the human race is. It's not very well developed. And so, we have religion, which, if it's really practiced, in its true sense, is very vital and beneficial.

[41:04]

But when it's perverted, it kills. So this great struggle, actually, is how to keep it from being perverted. How to keep it from getting out of hand. And in America today, religion is so perverted that it's not even religion, it's just politics, just being used. This is what happens to religion, of course. gets used. And so people start discarding the old religion and creating a spiritual practice. So I think we have to be careful about fixed religious ideas and not even be attached to Buddhism, Buddhist ideas. But I think Buddhist ideas are the best ones to be attached to, but still,

[42:11]

because Buddhist ideas are ideas about non-attachment. Buddha said, find out for yourself. That's also a problem. Some people need more guidance and other people need to explore. It's important to have more universal values, not to be provincial, and to include everyone.

[43:21]

your big mind. Even though we may actually hate certain religious ideas, to look for what is good in, or what we feel is the best part of each religion, so that we can actually engage and relate. rather than looking at what we don't like and fight. And within that context, there's giving and taking, sometimes debating, but still, people are people, and they're driven by ideas. And in order to get beyond that, We have to meet people beyond the realm of ideas.

[44:25]

Everyone meets beyond the realm of ideas. Clinging to ideas is divisive. Clinging to some fixed idea is divisive. And no matter how much we cherish our ideas, and stand on them. We have to be able to go beyond them. So, Buddhist philosophy, Buddhist practice, everything, everything that's an idea in Buddhism is just an indicator. It's just a pointer. It's not a dogma. It's a finger pointing at the moon. That's not the moon. That's just the finger. Don't get hung up on the finger.

[45:31]

So at some point, we have to throw out everything that we learned in Buddhism. But there's a wonderful finger. The finger is also the moon. But if you think that the finger is the moon, then you're off. When you know that the moon is the moon, then you can appreciate the figure as the moon as well. So, this is a big koan for each one of us. We had time to have a discussion, but it's a little late. Thank you.

[46:31]

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