May we continue to study the teachings of wisdom, the teachings about how to contemplate phenomena in such a way that we come to understand the nature of phenomena and thereby become free In the Lotus Sutra, I think it's in the chapter on faith and understanding or faith and wisdom, there's a place that says that there is one great condition for the appearance of Buddhas in the world.

[01:13]

This one great condition is a wish. Now before I say what the wish is, I want to sort of give a kind of framing on that wish and the appearance of the Buddhas. So one way to see it is that this wish arises. So, and a wish is an example of, according to the Samdhi Nirmocana Sutra and other sutras, what kind of a phenomena is a wish? It's an other-dependent phenomenon. A wish has a other-dependent character.

[02:21]

So actually, wishes arise and cease. Something about this universe a lot of things about this universe came together to produce a wish. And because of that wish, Buddhas appeared in the world. Buddhas didn't make this wish. Buddhas are born of this wish. It could also be called a vow, a desire. A desire. And because of this vow, because of this wish, Buddhas appear in the world. The world that this wish arose in, or arises in, is in a world where living beings arise, and where living beings arise in such a way that misery arises.

[03:26]

Living beings do not make their own suffering, but living beings have suffering arise for them. They do not make their basic ignorance of the nature of phenomena. But because they are given, living beings get a gift when they're born. You get a gift. You get life and ignorance. Thank you very much. And because you're given life and ignorance, combination of the two. Put the life in, add ignorance, you get suffering. So you've got a world full of these wonderful living beings, these beautiful babies. If you look at the other dependent character of the babies, they've got a beautiful baby Mothers can often see the other dependent characters, so they see that their babies are beautiful.

[04:30]

They get a little assistance there. But these babies are born with ignorance, so they suffer. And then this world, this huge world of suffering, those conditions give rise to a wish. And that wish... which arises from the conditions of the suffering of the world. That wish then is the main wish, the main condition. There's other conditions too. There's not just that wish, it's also all the suffering people. So you got all the suffering people, all the suffering beings, not just people, all suffering beings. And there's one additional condition which we have to add into the mix. called the wish, a wish, and then the Buddhas pop up. And what is the wish? The wish is that these suffering beings, these people who do not understand the nature of phenomena, the wish that they would open to the wisdom which sees phenomena as how they really are.

[05:46]

That wish that beings would open to the wisdom of the Buddhas and the wish to demonstrate to them the nature of phenomena, to demonstrate Buddha's wisdom, to awaken them to Buddha's wisdom, and to help them actually enter into Buddha's wisdom. That wish with those four parts is the main cause, the main condition for Buddha's appearing in the world. I have this feeling, although I'm not sure about it, that there has been some opening during this practice period to Buddha's wisdom.

[06:50]

And the sutras that we've been studying are examples of the tradition's attempt to demonstrate the Buddha's wisdom to people like us. And so now I feel like we're in the process of looking at the demonstration and also on the verge of awakening We're considering the demonstration. So Buddha's wish, Buddha's appeared in the world, and their wish to open beings has been somewhat successful. Some beings have opened to Buddha's wisdom. The demonstration of Buddha's wisdom is chugging along. Beings are receiving the demonstration of Buddha's wisdom. Beings are waking up little by little to Buddha's wisdom. Once we awaken to it, that's the first two kinds of wisdom, wisdom from learning and wisdom from reflection.

[08:00]

Then we enter into samadhi, and then we enter and become Buddha's wisdom. Soto Zen of the tradition that has reached this temple, coming through Japan, coming through, what is it, Ehe Koso, the person who wrote the verse you just chanted, Ehe Koso is Dogen Zenji. The tradition coming through him also really comes through the Lotus Sutra because Dogen Zenji is really... a disciple of the Lotus Sutra, too. And so this one great condition is a very big thing in Soto Zen.

[09:05]

For Soto Zen, the one great condition is that beings will open to Buddha's wisdom, the wish that they will, the wish, the vow that they will, that all of them will. it occurred to me, it might be good to mention or to ask, now how does, or how did, you know, how does it seem, anyway, that Buddha first taught wisdom? And when I say Buddha, I mean, you know, the historical Buddha, Shakyamuni, who we have heard lived in India 2,500 years ago, how did he first demonstrate wisdom?

[10:14]

Actually you might even ask, how did he first open beings to Buddha's wisdom? I've heard various stories about how he opened beings to wisdom. One way is he was sitting there under the bow tree and looked really good. He looked like the warm center of the area, radiating lots of lovely golden light. properly, you know, perfectly attuned warmth to every being that could see. And so beings, when they saw the Buddha, kind of opened to the situation. When he saw, when he was, he attracted some divine spirits and they begged him to teach. He didn't think people would be able to understand.

[11:19]

He wasn't planning. Even though he wanted to help beings, he thought, no, this is too hard. Forget it. But with this encouragement, he tried to teach. And supposedly the first attempt he made to teach was to teach five yogis who he used to practice with, five yogis who he practiced samadhi with prior to his realization of Buddha's wisdom. I think kind of like he was walking along on the earth And he saw his old friends and they saw him and they said, hi or whatever. And they said, anything new? And he said, well, yes. Since I saw you last, I became a Buddha.

[12:23]

And they said, oh, how nice. But they opened to him. They opened to him somewhat when he said that, but part of the reason why they opened to him was that he had previously practiced with them and he, I guess, they never felt like he lied to them. They practiced with him, they felt like he was an honest person. So if now he says he's a Buddha, it's possible that he would not be falsely claiming that. So they had some openness to him. And I think they somewhat sincerely said, well, tell us about it. How is it? And he started to speak. And as he spoke, they opened more and they opened more. And he demonstrated this dharma, this truth about the way phenomena are.

[13:27]

He started demonstrating it. with words, and they started to open more and more. And the demonstration and the opening proceeded along. And by the end, as we hear it anyway, by the end of like one page of discourse, one of them woke up. By the end of a few weeks, all five were awakened. And I think by the end of two months, they were all basically completely enlightened in terms of personal liberation. They all became arhats like in two months. This is the story. this first teaching that he gave is called, in Pali it's called Dhammacakkha Pavatthana Sutta, which means the scripture of setting the dharma wheel rolling.

[14:40]

This teaching in this sutra seems to me to be right off the bat He's teaching these friends of his wisdom teachings. He's not teaching them how to practice shamatha. He's not teaching them tranquility meditations. He's not teaching them precepts. And just recently, you know, like just last year, it struck me that his first teaching was a wisdom teaching, and he didn't give teachings on precepts and samadhi. So among the basic dimensions of Buddhist instruction, Buddhist teaching or Buddhist learning, the three basic types of precepts, concentration, and wisdom, or sila, samadhi, and prajna, among those three types, in the first sutra, he skipped the first two and went right to wisdom.

[15:47]

Usually in the early tradition, they usually suggest people go precepts, concentration, wisdom. But he went right to wisdom in his first time. But then I thought, well, of course he did, because who was he teaching? He was teaching people who were, these people were, I believe, all excellent yogis in the sense of excellent samadhi students. I don't know if they were as good as he was, but they were, I think, peers with him in terms of samadhi practice. They already knew how, they already had received the teachings on samadhi. Plus also, in order to practice samadhi as successfully as they did, they were also practicing the precepts. These guys were not going on stealing food from people. They weren't having, you know, even, you know, some, what do you call it, some celibate people have inappropriate sexual relationships. The way they're celibate is not good.

[16:50]

But these people, I think probably, they were celibate, but they were celibate, I think, in a fruitful, healthy way. I think so. I guess so. You know, they weren't going up while they were begging and sort of like manipulating their clients, I don't think. I think they probably had precepts done pretty well Otherwise, they wouldn't have been able to be that good at samadhi. So he could immediately give them the wisdom teachings. And not only that, but the first two types of learning were so well established in one of them that at the end of one talk, he woke up to the Buddha's wisdom teachings. So they were ready for it. But anyway, but... we should understand that not everybody could hear, as you may have noticed, not everybody who reads that first scripture wakes up.

[17:54]

Of course, not everybody has the Buddha in their face delivering it either. So if the Buddha was delivering it, you might actually listen a little differently, and maybe you would open to it, and maybe you would enter samadhi and all that just by being in the presence of Shakyamuni, but whatever, anyway, this first teaching was a wisdom teaching. in how to teach the wisdom teaching, he basically first told them, I found a middle way. And it's the middle way he presented was a middle way which avoids the two extremes of self-mortification and self-indulgence. or addiction to sensual pleasure on one side, not just sensual pleasure, but addiction to sensual pleasure, excessive involvement with sensual pleasure, and on the other side, addiction to self-mortification. I found a middle way between those two, and it's peaceful, it's blissful, it's nirvana.

[19:08]

It's freedom, this middle way I found. And then he says the truth of suffering. Then he says the truth of the origin of suffering. Then he says the truth of the cessation of suffering. Then he says the truth of the path. of freedom from suffering, the path of cessation from suffering. He teaches these things. And what teaching is that that he gave them? What kind of teaching is that? What's it about in terms of what we've been studying in the Samdhi Nirmacana Sutra? What kind of teaching is that? What? It's wisdom. And what aspect of wisdom? Huh? He's making conventional designations, and he needs to use an imputation in order to talk to people. But what is he encouraging them to meditate on? What? He's encouraging them to meditate on the other dependent character phenomena.

[20:14]

He's saying suffering. Is suffering an other dependent character? Does it have another dependent character? Is it impermanent? It's an other-dependent phenomena. It's a dependently co-arisen phenomena. Right? So he puts out an other-dependent character in terms of phenomena, which is another dependently co-arisen phenomena. Then he says, the next one is actually a teaching about dependent co-arising. He says that this phenomena, this suffering arises. In other words, it's a dependent co-arising. Then he says it ceases, which also, of course, because it's impermanent, it can cease. And then there is conditions for the ceasing. So the teaching really was, the way he presented it, was all about, basically the front face of it is all about the pinnacle arising. In other words, I initially teach people the pinnacle arising.

[21:21]

But actually in the sutra, in the Samadhi Nirmacana Sutra, it says, initially I teach people the lack of own being in terms of production. So he was also teaching them, although he didn't say so, he was also teaching them a lack of production in terms of own being. He was teaching them a lack of self-production of suffering. Suffering is not produced by itself. Therefore, if suffering was produced by itself, then that would be it. Once there was suffering, there would always be suffering, because something that's produced by itself doesn't arise or cease. But then he said, just in case, he said, there's the truth of suffering, but he said, just a second, this suffering arises. There's an arising of it. In other words, this suffering... right there is the implication of a lack of own being in terms of production. It's not self-produced. And of course, the production of it is not self-produced.

[22:26]

So the cessation is not self-produced. And the path is not self-produced. And the path, of course, shows you that the cessation is not self-produced because the cessation arises with the path. So he taught actually dependent core arising right off when he taught the Four Noble Truths to these people. And he also taught a lack of own being in terms of production right off. Does that make sense to you? If it doesn't, we can stop here for a while because this is like, seems like a good point to contemplate. At least this, my present, at least, you know, what I'm saying is consider what I'm saying and refute it or or revel in how wonderful it is, you know, to look at that. That the Buddha right off taught the pinnacle of rising even though he didn't use the word in the first sutra. But it goes, you see, in the Sambhinirmocana Sutra where the Buddha says, initially I taught a lack of own being in terms of production.

[23:29]

When he said that, in a sense, he's referring back to the first sutra and many other sutras where he was first teaching the entry-level students. These five yogis were very advanced Samadhi people, but they were entry-level students of Buddha's wisdom. Excellent, tremendously good background, but they didn't have wisdom yet. And so this is what he taught them. Now, this is like a midterm test. Did he teach them the imputational nature of phenomena in the first sutra? Pardon? He didn't say anything about the aggregates in the first sutra. No. No. I mean, nice of you to bring it up because now you know.

[24:33]

Since I didn't read you the whole sutra, he did not bring up the aggregates. He didn't teach them the aggregates yet. That's later. So did he teach them the imputation? Did he point out the imputational character phenomenon in his first sutra? You didn't hear the whole sutra, but I'll just tell you he didn't. What I told you so far, did you see him teaching the imputational nature of phenomena? Did you hear him saying, and all these phenomena which I just talked about, this suffering, origination of suffering, or the arising of suffering, the cessation of suffering in the past, did he say anything about this process I just talked about, these phenomena I just pointed out to you, these Four Noble Truths? By the way, they have an aspect of being mere concept. They have an aspect of being conceptual grasping, by which I can talk to you about this. I can use that to make conventional designations to tell you about this other dependent character.

[25:37]

Did he say anything about the imputational character in this first sutra? I don't think so. Early Buddhism was not presented with that much linguistic sophistication. He didn't bring it up yet. We're looking at a sutra where now he's bringing up the imputational nature. Pardon? Yes. Well, not only, more than that, because you said for suffering to arise, doesn't there have to be imputation? Okay, that's your question. Answer is? What's the answer? Nancy. Nancy. What's the answer? Does it have to be there? Yes. Okay. What else needs to be there for suffering to arise? And what else has to be there for suffering to arise? Let Nancy answer.

[26:37]

She got the first one. Pardon? I'll let him help you, and I'll also let him not help you. So you want to answer it or not? You can say, I don't know. If you want to. What? Okay. What else needs to be there for suffering to arise? What? Pardon? One person. Yeah. You have to adhere to the other dependent as the imputation, then the afflictions arise. Affliction is not just suffering. Affliction is severe suffering. Severe suffering arises from this confusion. Minor suffering, like the suffering of childbirth, the suffering of a broken leg, the suffering of having your head smashed, these minor sufferings do not arise from confusing the other dependent with the imputational.

[27:43]

they arise from other conditions which you can probably imagine. Getting pregnant, for example, is not the same as confusing the other dependent with the imputational. When you confuse the other dependent with the imputational, you get major suffering. Almost nobody commits suicide from childbirth. When you confuse the other dependent with the imputational and life gets extremely painful. That's the next thing. You have to have the other two, of course. You have to have the imputational and the other dependent, but you always do. We've already got them. And then when you confuse them, then you have the arising of, you know, like it says also when he first presents the 12-fold chain of causation, you know, in relationship to the second noble truth, there is an origin of suffering. What is it? Craving. How come craving happens? Craving happens because you confuse the imputational with the other dependent.

[28:45]

Does that make sense? When you confuse the two, then you crave things, then these afflictive emotions arise. Does that make sense, Nancy? Yeah, so you do need the imputational, and we've got it. Buddha had it when he delivered that first discourse. According to this sutra, he needed to use the imputational in order to set the stage for this Dharma feast. He put the imputation out there and then he put his little conventional designations which turned into the sutra on top of that platform of the imputational. But the Buddha didn't confuse the two, so he was free. When they first started hearing the sutra, they were confusing the two, but somehow in the process, without him even mentioning the imputational, they disconnected the two and saw, you know, they saw the other dependent which he was trying to elucidate to them. They saw it without the confusion. But he didn't tell them about how to disentangle them for whatever reasons of time and history.

[29:48]

He didn't deliver that yet. But to me, looking from through this sutra back to the first sutra, I see him teaching the other dependent, and I see him teaching the lack of own being of the other dependent. And what is the other dependent that he taught? He taught it in the form of, he called it the middle way. He called it the four noble truths, the four noble truths and the middle way. He taught the middle way and then four noble truths come. So he's showing them the middle way. Now the middle way is not the same, and the Four Noble Truths are not the same as the, excuse me, the middle way is the same, and the Four Noble Truths are the same.

[30:50]

The middle way is the same, as the thoroughly established. This place in the middle which avoids the extremes is not actually the other dependent character phenomena. The middle way doesn't arise and cease. But he's teaching on middle way. He's teaching on the thoroughly established, and the way he teaches the thoroughly established is with the other dependent. In the process of studying the other dependent, they discover the middle way and wake up. This is the way, this is a picture of how he initially taught. And then there's another teaching, a later sutra, which teaches the middle way in a somewhat different way. The first way taught the middle way, avoiding the extremes of What were the extremes in the first sutra?

[31:58]

Pardon? She said indulgence in self-mortification. That's not quite right. It's not indulgence in self-mortification. It's not indulgence in sense pleasures. It's not indulgence. Because indulgence just means you yield to it. It's addiction to indulgence in sense pleasure. It's addiction. It's the addiction. That's the extreme. Self-mortification can arise, and if you're not addicted to it, it's just sitting there. They're on the side of the road all the time. It's a question whether you're addicted to them. When you're addicted to them, you veer off into them. It's possible to eat a strawberry without being addicted to sense pleasure. It is possible. On our heart, a Buddha can eat a strawberry, and it can taste good. But the addiction, like to avoid looking at the middle to get another strawberry, that's what he doesn't do.

[33:06]

It's the addiction. So that's the first way. And the second kind of middle way is a middle way which doesn't approach the extreme of existence or non-existence. That's the second way that he taught. or another way he taught, the second way he taught, the middle way. And he taught that in many sutras, but in, I shouldn't say many, but he taught it in more than one sutra. And one of the sutras he taught in, he taught to a monk called Kacchayana. So it's called the Kacchayana Gotra Sutra. Gotra means talking to Kacchayana scripture. And in that scripture, he says, generally in the world, there's two extremes, extreme of existence and non-existence. When you don't approach either one, or not approaching either one, you find the middle. Or not approaching either one or without approaching either of these extremes, the Buddha teaches the middle.

[34:08]

And what is the middle? How does he teach the middle? Depending on ignorance, karmic formations arise. Depending on karmic formations, dualistic consciousness arises. Depending on dualistic consciousness, and so on, leading up to old age, sickness, death, lamentation, grief, and so on. And here we go around again. In other words, the first way he taught, the way he initiates the practitioner into the study of the middle way. The middle way is the thoroughly established nature. It really is the middle way. It's like the center, the central issue is like to be on this track with the way things really are. To be with the ultimate truth, to be tasting and smelling and thinking and hearing.

[35:11]

And everything you hear, you hear. what you're looking at is the object of purification of your life. You're looking at the ultimate. That's the middle way. But the way he introduced the middle way was not by just laying, showing people emptiness. He taught them dependent core arising. So again, as he initiates them into the middle way, he teaches them the other dependent character phenomena. And then by teaching the other dependent character phenomena, they realize the lack of own being in terms of production of these phenomena, which is teaching. So I just want to make a case again, this is part of the opening process, a case for studying always start with and stay on the path of studying dependent core arising as the foundation thing. So that's why you keep studying the Four Noble Truths. As long as you're studying the Four Noble Truths, you're based in you have the base of studying other dependent phenomena.

[36:13]

You're based in studying dependent core arising. But as you read this morning about when the Buddha teaches dependent core arising, when Buddha teaches the lack of one being in terms of production, these wonderful things happen to the people who are contemplating. Did you hear about it? They really go a long ways, but they are not fully liberated because they have not heard about the other two aspects in relationship to the other dependent phenomena. The other two aspects which are related to the other dependent phenomena are the imputational and the thoroughly established. We have to learn those two also. They have to be understood in order to understand really what other dependent phenomena are. So does that make sense? So I'm I'm encouraging us to stay, always stay at our basis, studying dependent core arising, at the same time understanding that that's not the whole story of wisdom.

[37:23]

That's just the ground. That's just this earth and all living beings and how they're happening. That's the ground. But that's not the whole story of liberation. But it's a wonderful study, but it's the basis, not the complete process of wisdom. I see some hands, and I wonder if I didn't call on those hands if those questions would be lost forever, or whether they could come up later. What do you think? Hands? Or people? Huh? Later, okay? Lost forever? Well, you think it'll be lost forever? Well, okay, go ahead, ask it then. You're sorry? You think it's okay to wait? Do we ask it later? Maybe. Well, since we don't know if you'll ask it later, go ahead, ask it. Okay.

[38:23]

Is the middle way independent of the established characters? Is it independent of the experience? I don't see how it's independent. Well, it's not independent. It just doesn't approach them. It lives with them in a kind of unattached way. It's kind of like, hi, hi extreme, hi extreme. You're coursing down the path with the extremes popping up all around you all the time. Addictions are like left and right, you know. Always a chance to become addicted. In other words, get distracted from the way things are. That possibility is always there until you're like at a very high stage where you're kind of like stuck in, you know, just like gridlock on the middle way and you just sort of like never veer anymore. So they don't even count anymore. But for most people who actually are tuned in, there's still a chance to tune out on reality.

[39:29]

So it's not that they evaporate or aren't, they're non-existent so you're independent. You're interdependent with the extremes too. In a sense. Pardon? I just feel there's no way as you explain kind of working with these streams and seeing them and interacting with them. Yes, yes. And then my idea of a thoroughly established society is something that doesn't depend on anything. It does depend on the thoroughly established, the way things really are, does depend on something. It depends on the other dependent character phenomena. The basis of the thoroughly established is the way things appear to be arising and ceasing.

[40:31]

So impermanent things are the basis of suchness. Suchness is the way impermanent things really are. So it depends on the way, it depends on impermanent things. Because it's about them. Because it's about freeing beings from a misunderstanding of impermanent things. It's about freeing impermanent beings from misunderstanding impermanent beings. So it depends on, there's no thoroughly established floating around in mid-air. It has to do with the nature of beings. If there are no beings, we don't have any thoroughly established. Like someone said, if there were no conscious beings, would we have the thoroughly established? I don't think so, because there would be no attribution, there would be no, well, actually there would be. There would still be an absence of imputation to the way stars happen. So I guess the thoroughly established way that star would be was that there's no ideas about stars, we'd reach stars.

[41:35]

if there were no beings around who could imagine the stars were such and such a way. So I guess the thoroughly established would be in a sense there because there would be an absence of this fantasy. But even while things were still pulsing away or potentially ready to pulse, excuse me, So, I thought I'd say something about breathing. And just before that, I'd like just to say that, so in the sutra, the Samdhi Nirmocana Sutra, it says, initially, after he describes the process by which affliction arises in this chapter we read this morning, tells how affliction arises, how we adhere to the other dependent as the imputational, and then how we get totally, you know, kind of flush with conventionalities.

[42:51]

And by that process we, you know, we approach everything that way and make all these attributions and all this confusion arises and suffering. Then after the picture of the arising of all the different types of afflictions, then he says, initially I teach beings, how does he put it? Initially I teach doctrines starting with the lack of own beings in terms of production. So initially I teach the teachings, Initially I teach the lack of own being in terms of production. And he teaches it to beings who have not generated virtue a lot, you know, big time. Now I'd like to also just say this now and I'll say it over and over. So he's teaching beings to first contemplating, first contemplate dependent co-arising, first contemplate how what you experience in terms of moment to moment, impermanent flux, how you experience that, to contemplate that as all those phenomena as lacking self-production, having a lack of own being in terms of self-production, this kind of contemplation.

[44:16]

Contemplate dependent co-arising and the additional teaching that the dependent co-arising, the other dependent character of what's happening, is also a lack of own being in terms of self-production. This is something which could be rephrased as surrender to the other dependent character phenomena. are surrendered to the teaching of the other dependent character phenomena, which means surrender your self-powered feeling about what's happening. So for example, sitting is an other dependent phenomena that arises and ceases. So first contemplate the teaching that the sitting this sitting, which is happening and ceasing and happening and ceasing, that this sitting is a self-production lack of own being.

[45:28]

That this sitting is something which is not produced by itself. And it's not produced by yourself. So surrendering to the sitting as an example of other dependent phenomena. Surrendering to the sitting as an example of a production lack of own being, we call that just sitting. So you surrender to just sitting is similar to surrendering to that sitting isn't something that you do. You surrender to the sitting which is given to you. You surrender to being in the mode of receiving the sitting. And then in the mode of receiving the sitting, which is to surrender the perspective of you making the sitting, or you producing the sitting, or you doing the sitting, you surrender that aspect, and then you receive the sitting.

[46:41]

This mode of receiving the sitting, again, I would call just sitting. So you surrender to just sitting. You surrender to the sitting that's given to you by all things, moment by moment. Other dependent phenomena, sitting. That's just sitting. And receiving the sitting, you receive the sitting, and then you can use the sitting which you've been given. You get to use it for just a little while, but not for long. So you're meditating, you're contemplating receiving this sitting, receiving this standing, receiving this off-walking, and then being able to use the sitting that's been given to you. So this is what we call the self-enjoyment samadhi, or self-receiving and employing samadhi. To sit upright in the mode of receiving the sitting, and also you get to receive a body breath.

[47:50]

you know, a name and so on, too. In other words, you receive everything you usually call yourself, and you get to use it for a while. This is another way to talk about contemplating the other dependent character of sitting posture, breathing, thoughts, and everything. This is also a way to say, first I teach beings to contemplate non-thinking. So this contemplation is you're contemplating something that's beyond thinking. The other dependent character is beyond thinking. In other words, how it is that you're being given this body, how it is that you're being given a sitting body, is beyond your thinking. You can think about it, and you can think about it in two ways, for starters.

[48:55]

One way you can think about it is, I made this thing happen. Even though I don't know how it happened, I made it happen. This is to think that your sitting is something that's within your thinking. But the recommendation of the Zen tradition is, The way of entering is through non-thinking. So sitting with non-thinking means you're sitting and the sitting, you're looking at the way the sitting is, the way the sitting is, the way the sitting is, the way it happens is beyond thinking. The way it's other-dependent is beyond thinking. You're being told it's other dependent, which makes sense to you. You can see, I guess, that various conditions contribute to the arising of the sitting posture. But that also means that the sitting posture is beyond your thinking about how it happens.

[49:58]

You can think about how it happens, but that doesn't make it. No story you can think of, no story all of us can think of together can measure how this sitting, your sitting, in one moment happens. Like it says at the end of the Self-Receiving and Employing Samadhi, if all the Buddhas got together and tried to measure the merit, in other words, how wonderful, the wonderful way that a person's sitting happens, they would not be able to fully comprehend it. So of course, individual people like us can't comprehend it. So non-thinking means Surrender. Give up your thinking in regard to your sitting. Give it up. Doesn't mean you don't have it, but give it up. Be in the mode of giving up your thinking about your sitting and receiving the sitting. Thank you very much for this posture right now. So again, this is, I'm trying to say this is the practice of just sitting.

[51:05]

This is the practice of non-thinking. Because the way you're thinking about your sitting is that you're thinking about your sitting after having given up your thoughts about your sitting. You're thinking about your sitting in a way, you're being with your sitting in a way called just sitting, which means you're being with your sitting in a way of being beyond your thinking about your sitting. You're more intimate with your sitting. You surrender to your sitting. And don't feel bad about, I shouldn't say don't feel bad, but it's okay not to feel bad about surrendering to your sitting, because Buddhas surrender to their sitting. Buddhas just surrender to sitting. They surrender to sitting. They sit with no expectation of accomplishing anything, like Buddha, like making a Buddha. And sitting giving up, seeking to accomplish anything, is the way Buddhas sit.

[52:08]

So a Buddha is made by giving up. And so this is like, sit, understanding that this sitting, understanding how this sitting is beyond your thinking. So I was going to talk about some other things, but it's getting late. I'll do it tomorrow. Do you have any questions? Lynn? Excuse me. What did you say? Did you say something? Well, that's not, I don't agree. I don't agree that the cause of suffering is craving.

[53:11]

I think suffering is a condition. I mean, craving is a condition for suffering, but that's not the cause. There's many conditions for suffering. When the Buddhist says that suffering has an origin and he says that craving is it, he's just sampling the conditions for suffering. That's just a skillful means. I just want to say that I don't agree with that that's correct, that that's the cause of suffering. The origin of suffering does dependently co-arise with craving. But craving is not enough. got to have some other things too. So they should be acknowledged. For example, you have to have a living being. Okay? You want to go ahead now? You see that?

[54:21]

Yeah. Confusing. Adhering to the other dependent as the imputational. generates craving, generates afflictive emotions, one of them being craving. Craving, you know, means it's not just that you want lunch, because that's fine, you know, that's totally zen to want lunch, especially around 12 o'clock or so. You can actually want lunch at 4 in the morning until it's okay. Some people do. But to crave lunch at 4 in the morning, that's affliction. Wanting can be real light, kind of like, hey, I want, and you're not giving it to me, but I still love you. Craving is like, give it to me or else. Give it to me or there will be severe consequences.

[55:23]

That's craving. See the difference? Good. Craving is like want in an addictive mode. It's want that distracts you from what you need to be looking at to be happy. And when you confuse what's happening with your ideas about it, you start to get into the addictive mode. What do you call it? You're at risk. You're always at risk. It doesn't mean you're always doing it, but you're always at risk of confusing what's happening with your fantasies. And when you do fall into that risk area and you do actually adhere to what's happening as your ideas, then craving may arise. But you may skip over it pretty quickly and move on to hatred, but, you know, afflictive emotions arise. Yeah.

[56:32]

I'm suggesting it's only one, but it is a big one. It's actually its boss. Hatred really is secondary to craving. Craving is more basic. Living beings are more first into craving. First they want life. And second of all, they get angry when they don't get it. But greed and craving is more basic. The life-life thing is more rather than swatting things aside and killing anything that interferes. It goes right along with it. But we don't first want to kill everything. We first want to eat everything. And then when we eat something that wasn't what we expected, then we get angry and want to blame the chef or whatever. But greed is, you know, supreme among the afflictive emotions. Of course, it has to come with confusion. So you could say, well, confusion is supreme. But anyway, they're struggling to find out which, but greed's really, craving's really big.

[57:43]

That's why he chose that one, you know, for short. But he was busy, you know, he had to move on, had a lot of work to do, so he just said craving. We should be in awe of craving, it's the big one. And then, like Aphrodite is the big one, and then comes Mars. Yes, Vernon. Is it other than? Is it other than? Well, yeah, it's kind of other, but it's very, very cozy with it because you can't have emptiness. Emptiness is based on dependent co-arising. Emptiness is about the way dependent co-arisings really are. Emptiness is the way of looking at impermanent phenomena that purifies your life, that sets you free.

[58:47]

But you can't find any emptiness without an impermanent, dependently co-arisen something to look at. So your basic meditation is on dependently co-arisen, impermanent, unstable, unreliable phenomena. You're watching them all the time like an eagle, or not a salamander. Those little newts are not very observant. When it gets cold, it's like they're, you know, it's like you're a warm-blooded, hawk-eyed meditator. You're watching the dependent core. You're always, [...] hopefully, watching impermanence and dependent core rising. And then, based on that, you can see emptiness. And then, but that's what really purifies us, is to see the emptiness of the dependent core risen. So we need both. We need to meditate on dependent co-arising as a basis for our meditation on the ultimate.

[59:49]

You can't look at the ultimate without first looking at the dependently co-arisen. Otherwise you just, you know, there's no base to your insight. You're not really looking at emptiness. Emptiness is founded on the other dependent The ultimate lack of own being is founded on the self-production lack of own being. That make sense? So we always have to be providing an opportunity for the ultimate, for the vision of the ultimate, which is that we're contemplating the pinnacle arising. You're tuning in to contemplating the pinnacle arising, now you have a chance to see the ultimate. But we also have to study the imputational, in order to see the ultimate. So we have to study these other two characters next, after we get based in the other dependent. That make sense? Pardon?

[60:52]

Yeah, right. Emptiness, suchness, thoroughly established, the ultimate truth. ultimate lack of own being, selflessness of phenomena. These are synonyms. Each one gives us a different little framing on this ultimate purifying object of contemplation. That's a meditation too, is to think about how these different words help you dependently co-arise with different understandings of suchness. Okay? Yes? Dependence is different than cause? Dependence is different than cause, yeah. I think cause means that the cause has the power to make the thing happen. So really I think it's more like conditions. Okay? So like, what is it? Well, for example, to make a baby you need an egg and a sperm, but a sperm is not really the cause.

[62:00]

of making a zygote, right? It's a condition, though. You could say, well, yeah, I know, the egg's really the cause. No, the egg's not the cause either. The egg's a condition. Okay, and then you have the fertilized egg, and you say, well, that's the cause. Well, Cause of what? Cause of life. Well, you already have life. But anyway, that's the cause of the later baby. It's a condition. It's not the cause. You have to have a mother around it or something. You have to have a womb for it to grow, too. And then so on. All these are conditions. So a cause means that within the thing itself is the power to make something else happen. So in that sense, there's some... I kind of feel like we really don't have causes Even though the word cause somehow is floating around in Buddhism, I kind of like to say condition. I don't really think there are causes, but there are conditions.

[63:08]

So it's like the pinnacle arising is depending on this, that arises. Depending on the ceasing of this, that ceases. It doesn't say caused by this, that arises. So certain things can only arise depending on other things, but that doesn't mean the other thing causes them. Even though the word cause somehow is floating around in Buddhism, I kind of like to say condition. I don't really think there are causes, but there are conditions. So it's like the dependent core arising is depending on this, that arises. Depending on the ceasing of this, that ceases. It doesn't say caused by this, that arises. So certain things can only arise depending on other things, but that doesn't mean the other thing causes them.

[64:16]

Just like I often use the example of sometimes when babies are born in the world, there's a fire truck that drives by outside the house. And that was one of the conditions of the birth. But that didn't really cause the birth. Everyone knows that, right? But some mothers think they cause the baby to be born. So this is a confusion of their idea about them being a cause with the dependent co-arising of the birth of the baby. So we have to be careful of causes. Careful with the word cause. We have to be careful with the word cause. Thank you. I think in the earlier chapter it says something about if the other dependent and the thoroughly established were the same, then the thoroughly established would be caused.

[65:31]

Something like that? I guess that's what I'm getting at. It's like the lack of the thoroughly established being dependent. Yeah, maybe that's the case. Maybe that's a cause. A cause might be if two things were actually the same, then the one would cause the other because they're the same thing. That would be a cause in a sense. I don't know if the sutra says that, but I think for your example, whether it's in the sutra or not, might be valid. But anyway, thoroughly established and the other dependent are intimate beings. You don't have one without the other. You don't have any dependent core rising floating around without their nice little suchness accompanying them. That's the nice thing about thoroughly established. Whatever happens, you've always got the ultimate right there. It never floats off at any distance. But you don't have ultimate floating around not having a base of an impermanent phenomenon.

[66:34]

If they were the same, then one would be the cause of the other, I suppose, if they're the same. But they aren't the same. They're different. Not completely. That's also dealt with in the early chapter of the sutra, is that the ultimate transcends sameness and difference with the dependent, the co-arisen, or with the compounded. It transcends. You can't really say it's the same or different. If you said it was the same, you'd have various problems like one causing the other or something like that. If they were different, you'd have other problems. They're really completely different. But they're not completely different, they're not completely the same. And that's a wonderful chapter in the early part of the sutra. And it's very good to meditate on that subtle relationship There's a relationship, but it transcends sameness and difference.

[67:38]

The ultimate and the conventional have a relationship, and it's very subtle, wonderfully subtle. So they aren't the same and they aren't different. They're in this middle way, because you have relationship in the middle way, independent core arising. Okay, is that enough for now? Tomorrow I intend to talk about phenomena of breathing and how that relates to these teachings and so on. And then for the rest of the day, as I said, sometimes it's good to just consider whether during the period you're going to be just basically relaxing with all the discursive thought that arises and letting it go, in honor of tranquility, or whether you're going to actually use your discursive thinking to examine these teachings and see how they apply.

[68:54]

So the teaching about non-thinking is not really a calming practice. teaching of just sitting is not really calming practice. It's insight practice. So in some ways, when you do just sitting, you're doing wisdom work rather than tranquility work. When you're doing tranquility work, you're basically working on letting go and relaxing with any words like just sitting or Dogen Zenji or Zazen's good for you. Just let go of that stuff and you calm down. Insight work is like What is just sitting? What is non-thinking? How is what's happening being given? So let's see the difference between those two types of meditation. I would suggest that you might be practical to decide such and such a period, I'm going to practice just sitting. In other words, I'm going to do wisdom work, or I'm going to just forget about all these teachings.

[69:58]

Accept the teaching about forgetting about all the teachings. And then I'm going to forget that too and take a break from all these teachings. Because more are coming. I think more are coming, so I better get relaxed and at ease for the next onslaught of wisdom teachings. Does that make sense? I get a feeling that some of this stuff makes sense, that you people are really opening to these teachings and understanding really well. Congratulations to the practice period and the people who animate it. Speaking for myself, you know, just I tell you, speaking for myself.

[71:05]

Boom, boom, [...] boom. I can do what I want. I'm in complete control. That's what I tell myself. I got a mind of my own. I'll be all right alone. Don't need anybody else. I gave myself a good talking to. No more being a fool for you. But then I see you and I remember how you make me want to surrender to just sitting. You're taking myself away, just sitting. You're making me want to stay with just sitting.

[72:13]

Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. May our intentions equally pervade every being and place with the true merit of Buddha's way. All Buddhas, ten directions, three times. All beings, bodhisattvas, mahasattvas, wisdom beyond wisdom, maha-prasña-paramita.

[73:08]

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