The way I'm teaching, presenting and teaching koans, sometimes I think is rather unique. And sometimes people say so. But maybe nowadays it is somewhat unique. unique. Maybe nowadays it is somewhat unique. But for me it comes directly, flows directly from the way Tsukiroshi presented koans. And the way Dogon's entire teachings are woven, koans are woven in and his teachings are woven from koans.

[01:10]

And I would say that what characterizes this approach of Sukershi and what I'm doing. We're not presenting the the surface content, but we're presenting the context and the overall context of the koan in relationship to the context of your life. So I guess what I'm... is in the background of what I'm trying to do is to present the context of the koan so it merges with the context of your life and then within the context of your life

[02:39]

The content of the koan appears. It's not so much I want to show the content in the context of the koan. I want to bring forth the content in the context of your life. Then the flow of the lineage as koan teaching flows in your life. then the flow of the lineage as koan teachings, the flow of the lineage now hopefully flows in your life.

[03:57]

The hundred rivers. I almost, you know, yeah, I'm teaching things and practices and stuff. But I almost could say I'm not interested in teaching. And I'm interested in the context of our life flowing together. And flowing together, the catalyst of the flowing together is the koans and the lineage. And I think in this way, Perhaps a lay adept lineage can survive.

[05:25]

Now, let me say a few things just about the tradition of koans and lineage and their close relationship. In Zen, the presentation of the lineage is pretty much inseparable from the presentation of koans. So it's a teaching lineage. Yeah. Now the historical assumption of the lineage is that you're looking through the lineage into the face of the Buddha.

[06:30]

Breathing through the nostrils of the Buddha. Realizing the mind of the Buddha. But these koans are a very sophisticated form of literature. These koans are a very sophisticated form of literature. When I find a word like sophisticated that you can't translate into German, I think, are there no sophisticated Germans? You must have some more subtle word because you're obviously sophisticated, otherwise I would be bored.

[07:33]

Okay. Even Hungarians are sophisticated. French-Hungarians. As a sophisticated form of literature, if you, well, I could say read between the lines, that one can read between the lines? I could say, I could use the phrase, if you read between the lines. But better, I would say, maybe read every other line. This literature doubts the truth of the historical assumption. In other words, the literature, the assumption is that you're looking into the face of the Buddha.

[08:44]

The nostrils and all that. Die Nasenlöcher und so weiter. But we're also talking about Matsu's eyebrows. Aber wir sprechen auch über Matsu's Augenbrauen. Remember, there's also the story, the eyebrows also refers to Yao Shan's enlightenment experience with Matsu. Matsu says, sometimes I raise the eyebrows and blink the eyes to teach, to present the realization. And sometimes I don't raise the eyebrows and blink the eyes. And sometimes raising the eyebrows and blinking the eyes means nothing at all.

[09:45]

And sometimes I don't bother to raise the eyebrows. So this is kind of the eyebrow tetralemma. This isn't about the sutras, this is about the eyebrows. And he says in the stories that even a thousand sages, including Buddhas, couldn't know. So the koan basically is saying, this isn't so much about the Buddha. And if you read the sutras, it's not a series of enlightened experiences of disciples and so forth.

[11:02]

And here, these Zen Koan dialogues are quite different than the sutras. So they're presenting not Buddhist practice, but the practice of the lineage. The lineage meaning a teaching we can realize together. So at least in this koan, we're looking into the face of Yaoshan. And I hope we realize the mind of Yaoshan. So the koan is trying to present the mind of Yaoshan. Which is also presented somehow as the mind of Shido and Matsu and so forth.

[12:16]

Yeah. Now, why am I mentioning this? Am I just interested in history? I'm interested in how we bring these koans into our lives. And how we understand the dynamic of lineage. Because you know, the lineage, yeah, it's mind to mind, teacher to teacher, etc., etc., But if you open both eyes, it's an institutional lineage. It's the institution of Johanneshof which is establishing the lineage of the Dharma Sangha.

[13:26]

Yeah, and what is the institution of Johanneshof? It's our practicing together. Okay. Because, you know, Shido and Matsu, they represent a context of practice in temples and monasteries and not just individuals sitting in the woods saying, hi there. Also, you know, Matsu and Shido represent a practice Eine gemeinsame Praxis in Tempeln und nicht nur einfach alleine sitzen irgendwo im Wald. So the story is that Matsu's disciple Bajang established the rules and regulations for monasteries.

[14:35]

Die Regeln für die Klöster entwickelt hat. This is certainly a mixture of fabrication and simplification. Und das ist sicherlich eine Mischung von Erfindung und Vereinfachung. And supposedly before Baizhang they followed the rules of the Vinaya. Und es wird angenommen, dass vor Baizhang die Mönche die Regeln des Vinaya befolgt haben. And the story of Yaoshan is he got tired of practicing in a temple following the rules of the Vinaya and that's why he sought out Shido and Zen practice and direct pointing. And the story of Yao Shan is that he was tired of practicing in a temple with the rules of Vinaya, and that's why he went to Shirdo, a Zen master. Yeah, so Yao Shan is a disciple of both Shirdo and Matsu. And a contemporary of Baizhang, who supposedly changed the rules and regulations.

[15:46]

But I think it's historically clear that the Vinaya was continued for many generations in Zen temples. Yeah. And I traveled, you know, with Thich Nhat Hanh to Japan and China. And Thich Nhat Hanh is very serious about the... 277 and 311 rules that one is supposed to be ordained within. Yeah, so when we were in Japan together, His basic feeling was, there's no monks here.

[17:02]

Because the Japanese do not take the full Vinaya rules. And some Soto monks told him, well, Dogen substituted the monastic rules for the Vinaya. And this is, yeah, pretty much true. Und das stimmt so ziemlich. But the process happened earlier. Aber der Prozess hat früher angefangen. Because there was a substitution. You know, there's some relevance to what I'm saying. Just be patient. Also, es gibt da schon eine Bedeutung zu dem, was ich sage.

[18:07]

Also, seid ein bisschen geduldig. Poor guys have to sit there. Anyway, I'm sorry. Okay. Is that the... the... The rules you're supposed to follow, how you wash your clothes and shave and all that, were changed into the details of doing things, not what you did, but how you did things. over some centuries, I assume, in Zen monastic temples. And by shifting from not about what you do, but how you do it, they became a way to teach the dharma through articulating what you do as dharmas.

[19:31]

Okay, so all this stuff, ascending the seat, bowing, doing things with two hands. How you enter a room. How you offer incense. How we do the Oryoki. Which, by the way, one more little detail on the wisdom water, or dumping the water, the dish water. Please, you don't have to do everything. But the formal way to do it is you dump it towards yourself. And not away from yourself. Yeah, and of course you open the bowls up and you close them and so forth. They appear and then they disappear. appear and disappear.

[20:35]

Yeah, and one of the rules of the Oyoki is no extra movements. For instance, if you are using your chopsticks and you don't have to use them to signal you don't want food anymore you can sort of clean them put them down. But if you put them down on the bowl then later you can't just, oh, that's an extra movement. So one of the concepts that informs the accuracy of the Oryoki practice is no extra movements. Also ein Konzept, das die Regeln für Uryuki informiert, ist keine extra, keine zusätzlichen Bewegungen.

[21:49]

You can just, and that there's a sense of resting in completeness all the time. Es gibt da ein Gefühl von Invollständigkeit, Ruhen, die ganze Zeit. Whatever you've done, you just rest in. You don't think, oh, I'd like to put my... No, where it is, you leave it. Okay. My point here is that through the development of our lineage and through luck, I think, All these practices that look like rules, dharmic articulations of doing, of that, the A.D., Dharma articulations of doing can be part of lay life.

[23:01]

You're probably not going to learn them unless you come to Johanneshof or Crestone. But once you get the feel of them in practicing with others they can be the implicit secret structure in your lay life. As Brian DeCamp said to me some months ago we were worried about his house burning He's been doing things with two hands for some time. And he meets with a group of friends like Alexander does. Manual, yeah, like manual does. And at some point, his friend said to him after two or three years, why do you always do things with two hands?

[24:17]

So he just developed that, and it can be part of his lay life. It's natural, and yet it's noticeable. Our Gerhard can enter a door to a meeting in a way that's an articulation of Dharma practice. These enactment rituals, enacting the Dharma, bringing it into the realm of form, Rupa Datu, realm, form realm.

[25:26]

Okay. Okay. So you can see my own thinking about our practice here at Johanneshof. And its role as an aspect of lay practice. Okay. So now we're looking at this koan about Yaoshan which is about the mind of our lineage. What do you do in steadfast sitting? Not thinking. What is not thinking?

[26:31]

Non-thinking. Sometimes it's translated beyond thinking, but I think non-thinking is better. What is raising the eyebrows and blinking the eyes? And the first part of, first part of, first half of Yao Shan's enlightenment experience. Starting with Shido. It's like a mosquito biting an iron bull. Wie eine Mücke, die einen eisernen Bullen sticht. And that's the beginning and main phrase of the Shuso entering ceremony. Und das ist der Anfang und der Hauptsatz der Shuso Eingangsceremonie.

[27:32]

Shuso is the head monk and toilet cleaner and garbage man. Der Shuso ist der... Haupt, der leitende Mensch und der Toilettenreiniger und der Kompostentleerer. Yeah, so in the Shusso ceremony, the head monk says, although it's only like a mosquito biting an iron bull, give me your questions. Okay, so this expressions of this mind continue until today. And you notice I can't keep my eyebrows under control. Or that the photograph of Suzuki Roshi on the back of Zen Mind Beginner's Mind has one eyebrow raised.

[28:36]

The tradition is alive and well in the 21st century. What century are we in anyway? That's good enough. Die Tradition lebt und es geht ihr gut im 21. Jahrhundert. Okay. So Shido says to Yaoshan, words don't encroach upon it. Also Shido sagt zu Yaoshan, Worte können sich dem nicht nähern. Yashan said, yes, words don't encroach upon it. So this is your practice. To bring into the flow of intentional mind to hold this for examination in the flow of intentional mind

[29:41]

speaking within silence, silence within speaking, do words encroach upon it? Can you feel a mind in which words don't encroach upon it? And then she just says, not even here, that was great, here, not even a needle can enter it. Hier kann noch nicht einmal eine Nadel hineinkommen. And Dogen, of course, is famous for saying, myriad holes. And his disciple responding, pierced. So here we're not really talking about Buddha's mind.

[31:14]

We're talking about the mind that's been established in this lineage. Yes, it can understand the sutras. Yes, we should study Buddha's words. But this lineage has decided to study Buddha's words through this particular mind, which words don't encroach upon. where a needle can't enter. And you see, you know, this is set up so that Shido speaks, Yaoshan says the same thing.

[32:17]

Shido speaks, Yaoshan says the same thing. And so instead of needle piercing, he says, it's like I'm growing flowers on a rock. So you can put that into the flow of intentional mind and let that intention be examined through the flow of intentional mind around, between, under, over consciousness. So you see a flower. It's not growing on a rock. You see a rock. It might, but usually it's not, pierced by flowers. And whether you see a flower or a rock, it brings you back into the mind in which a needle can't enter.

[33:46]

Now several of you, much to my surprise and to my pleasure, have spoken about how it's not just what you do, but how you're done by the situation, not how you do the situation, but how the situation does you. How you as the subject becomes the subject of the object. Hey, and it's like this. This mind of immediacy. So, Yaoshan is presenting, this koan presents through Yaoshan.

[35:11]

So you can get, like you get to know somebody in a novel. There's no such person. But you get to know him and you feel connected with his or her fate. If Luke Skywalker dies at the end of Star Wars Empire Strikes Back, it's different than if he doesn't. No, you don't have to translate. Okay, good. Thank you. Because George Lucas was considering having Luke Skywalker die, and he was talked out of it. You don't have to translate that. This is part of the lineage, though. And what's the guru in... Yoda.

[36:16]

Yoda is partly based on Suzuki Roshi. This seems to be true. George Lucas lived just up the way from Green Gulch. His wife used to come to my lectures and I believe that George, I never asked him, though I know him slightly, used to go to Sukhirashi's lectures. George Lucas lived near Green Gulch. His wife came to Belkarashi's lectures. Lineage. Strange lineage. Oh! Oh! Oh! Dickie Vader.

[37:21]

I mean, Darth Vader. Sorry. So what is a mind that words don't encroach upon? The time is flying. Zeit fliegt. Zeit fliegt. Let's call it a mind of absolute immediacy. I mean, the words aren't exactly right, but it's as close as I can get. This lineage story is presenting in the figure of Yao Shan So you can get to know Luke Yao Shan in some way that you feel connected with his experience.

[38:34]

And this isn't the lineage as authority. This is the lineage as experience. You know, I have some authority, I suppose, through the lineage. But it means nothing to me. It just gives me permission to practice with you, to share experience with you. When I first came to Europe, I gave lectures and conferences, you know, on trance dance. And identity and this and that. I mean, people made up titles for me. Mostly nothing to do with Buddhism. You know, I don't know. Would you talk about that?

[39:44]

Oh, okay, why not? You're nice, I like you, so I'll talk. Could you ask me? And then some of us began hanging out together, and pretty soon we were practicing together, and pretty soon as you're honest, so... So I didn't come here as a Zen teacher. I came here just to hang out with some nice people. And what was our experience together? And for me, of course, my experience was so closely related to practice, was practice, is practice. This began to be, came to be a shared practice. Okay.

[40:44]

So if you give me a couple more minutes, if your legs will give me a couple more minutes. Yeah. A mind of absolute immediacy. Which needle can't enter. Which means comparisons can't enter. Associations can't enter. Associations, it's like trying to hit a rock. Again, I'm just trying to ask you to see if you can notice moments of mind like this in your own mind. And what's funny and interesting is that this mind of immediacy

[41:57]

which is the mind of the actuating present. So why I started this seminar with talking about the actuating present. What is the present? What are the categories of the present? Knowing the categories of the present, the durative present the presence of the present the actuating present then you enter into the immediacy of the present in which the flow of past to future and future to past Dogen says future to past is interrupted We still have a past and future.

[43:22]

We still study Buddhism. But where we live is in the immediacy of the actuating present. Which, while not open to past and future particularly, or to any idea of a lifespan, is open to the mind of immediacy, as immediacy itself, as phenomena itself, and the mind of immediacy of others. I don't know, shared, the mutual, the overlapping mind of immediacy of all of us. And this is lineage.

[44:39]

And what's interesting, it not only opens us to the mind of immediacy of others It opens up to our own mind of immediacy in the past. And strangely, I don't know how to put it, it's this flow of the mind of intention. experiences of immediacy in the past that got covered over begin to flow in the mind of immediacy and the mind of Yaoshan begins to flow in the mind of immediacy

[45:45]

And surprisingly, so many things are present. Like I said yesterday, five minutes ago, I got a cold. By noticing it in the mind of immediacy, In the actuating present. I could deactivate it. I mean, I don't know. This is my experience anyway. You feel the first click of a headache and you just unclick it. So your relationship to the health, to your health and the body and so forth, these are simple things that are different in this actuating presence.

[47:03]

So what does Matsum say to Yashan after his enlightenment and after he'd been his attendant for three years? He says something like, now that it's spread through your four limbs, you must go on a pilgrimage. It's the pilgrimage of just being in ordinary circumstances for, you know, with Yogen Sasaki, his teacher told him, ten years in working in ordinary circumstances. That's what incubates realization.

[48:06]

So it also says the bodhisattvas appear showing their whole bodies with half a verse. Langer than half a verse. Thank you very much. Langer als ein halber Vers. Vielen Dank. Thank you.

[48:44]

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