I vow to taste the truth of the Tutankhamen's words. Well, first of all, we do have some homework. At least one homework product. Who has homework? Two people. Do you want to begin, Rebecca? It was made by a child who came to the last class I gave here. But I've spent a lot of the last couple of days hollowing out sculpture made by a variety of people. And it's pretty interesting to hollow out the inside of Prajnaparamita or Buddha or feel them from inside. Well, make space inside. Actually, we're going to be reading about that tonight. And that's exactly, but I really, I don't know, I'm not, I've enjoyed this a great deal because I'm sort of one of those people who believe there's enough magic and supernatural in the world to not worry about, you know, that just universe is so incredible.

[01:20]

And, but I've sort of really gotten into the things about magic and I've been digging out these things. I really felt like I was getting, you know, somehow inside Buddha's head or whoever. But also doing this, I mean, I don't know, just a funny sort of a way. And this, we saw some slides before we did this and The children, there were about three children in this class, and each one of them immediately knew the movement they wanted to do. And this is the stopping fear, and this, what was it? I've got to do the stopping fear. Can I? Can I? Can I do that? And when I was doing this, I was thinking about him, and also, you know, as I was digging around inside here, in thinking about what we read last week and we talked about humility and humiliation and I was thinking about fear and the way the Buddhists divide fear and one of the fears is the fear of being made a fool of and wondering if that's some part of

[02:42]

all those people that we were reading about who come to Dhimma Kirti. But anyway, it was really interesting sort of mining inside of these and sort of an emptiness inside the form, kind of. And what is the fear mudra? It's a little bit... I think it's probably... Well, it's, you know, stop. And actually, our Buddha in the Zen-do is a variation of the fear mudra, but it's so delicate, you know, it doesn't have the force of some of them. So it's the left hand up and the... No, I think it's the right one.

[03:43]

And the other hand is doing what? The meditation position. Yeah, yeah, it's... I see. I think the fingers are usually together. I mean, it's the same thing the policeman does. A British policeman, believe it or not, is directing. So, Andrea, could you present your homework? Well, this is an image that had come to me during the lecture, the last session. I just wanted to see if the image could work, so it's really more of a sketch. She's talking about this painting. The Sticky Flowers, which actually, it came out of the goddess chapter, which I don't know if we're going to have time to get to it, but please. It's beautiful. I'm interested in looking at the Judeo-Christian concept of sin as a relationship to attachments and desires.

[04:49]

So, in a way, after seeing the premier show, I'm sort of playing with symbols, but I really haven't completely thought out what I'm going to do. I just put down... And I'm trying to let go of realism. I'm a hardcore realist. So, for me, to start letting go and opening up to another types of reality. Very interesting. Aha! Well, you're really engaged with this sutra. Did anyone else bring homework? I brought some. I couldn't come last week because I was sick. Did you get my message? I noticed your absence, but I'm glad to see you. I left a message. Yeah, I had the flu. So I have been reading, but I did... You know, what occurred to me was that I... Because I pain all the time, and so I felt that in a way for me to do something special or different was...

[05:55]

kind of antithetical to the sutra because the idea of like Buddha or this transcendent place being in everyday thing, just anything, in anything. But I did, I did an image, I did, I've been working with Chinese, so I just did this image of this monk. I really don't think this is Finnish, but I just had this kind of image. Oh, yeah. Oh, thanks. Thank you. Yeah, so it looks good next to Suzuki Roshi. Just really simple, just ink and some ink. So I don't know, I had kind of an image of wanting to put more colors in, but I didn't have time to do that. So I don't know what I'll do. I may work with this image again. But there is a way that I feel like, you know, what we do just, you know, if it doesn't have to be with a monk, I mean, it worked with figures and things, but just like, just if you really put yourself into it, then that's, you know, that's the... Your practice is that.

[07:06]

Yeah. Well, it's wonderful to see imaginations working. Anyone else? Does a told story count? Yes. I wanted to turn it into a poem, but I haven't had time, so I will work on that. The part of the reading for this week brought back to me an experience I had on the BART train. Actually, it's not unique, but coming home from a sashim at Sonoma Mountain, I was on BART coming across from the city, and I frequently draw drunks, especially after sashim. And so this really rather lovely young black man who was clearly very, very drunk, or at least acting, manifesting drunkness,

[08:15]

was trying various people to find the person who would listen a little, and so he came to me. So we entered the train together and sat down. I don't shut down, I don't, you know, so the spiel was going. And I was listening and heard past, it was a poor me recitation, all of you would understand how hard life is. And something in me heard pass to the very same intelligent person behind this stream of words. And I heard the words that were almost like a rope that he was throwing out, wanting somebody to catch the other, just to connect. All he was asking was not wisdom or So some words came out of me. I think it doesn't matter what I said, but it came from a place of just catching the end of the rope.

[09:20]

And there was a moment as I caught the rope when his eyes met mine in the most complete soberness. I mean, the drunkenness was totally banished. It was simply a recognition. And it was a wonderful moment, and then I continued to hold the rope, and as we rode the rest of the way. And when we got out of the train, it was at 12th Street, where you race across to get on the other train, to get on the return train. He came with me across the platform, and then he just said, may I kiss you? And so here I was embracing this apparently drunk young black man in the middle of the station with all my bags and double and the whole thing and we had a nice kiss and then he took himself off down to another car so that it's almost like honoring this connection he did not insist on prolonging it he had no attachment and I sat on the train knowing that I had touched a bodhisattva I mean and so reading this part tonight the end of the liberation thing

[10:24]

people who take the bodhisattvas who come back in forms bearing incredible austerity. They come back in poverty and sickness and horror and everything to exercise liberation in skillful means. And I really felt as if I had touched such a one, but I often do. I mean, that's my story. wonderful beginning to the Chapter 5 on Consolation of the Influenced. So, as we know, the various spiritual giants, Bodhisattvas and Arhats, have not wanted to come and speak to Vimalakirti.

[11:31]

And so Buddha asked Manjushri and you know Manjushri is the Bodhisattva of wisdom and he's almost always on an altar in a zendo holding a sword, holding a sword which is the sword that cuts through duality, representative of wisdom. So Manjushri replied, even for him it's difficult, Lord it is difficult to attend upon Vimalakirti. And now we are going to have another list of bodhisattva qualities. He is extremely skilled in full expressions and the reconciliation of dichotomies. We've been talking about this teaching of dichotomies. We'll come to more.

[12:34]

His eloquence is inexorable, imperturbable intellect. He is skilled in civilizing all the abodes of the devils. He plays with the great super-knowledges. He is skilled in granting means of attainment in accordance with the spiritual faculties of all living beings. That's skillful means. He has attained decisiveness with regard to all questions. Thus, although he cannot be withstood by someone of my feeble defenses, still, sustained by the grace of Buddha, I will go to him and will converse with him as well as I can. You mean the dharma combat, that's a nice perception.

[13:40]

You mean between Vimalakirti and Manjushri, between everybody? Yeah. It's the kind of fear of confronting Vimalakirti or being with him because of his overpowering brilliance. Well, he might show me up. He has shown me up. Yeah. There's a kind of shame about that. You had another position that I remember being struck by, something you told me, when I mentioned that. Do I? Well, I'm sure there are many ways of looking at it, but I think it really is harping on, over and over again, how difficult it is, even for the greatest of us, to be free from some self-interest, particularly in our image.

[14:43]

Yeah, here's all these great artists out there, fearful of being shown that. Yeah. Which, you know, when I was reading that also I thought, but is it not And then the thought that came to me was, well, Vimalakirti is almost at the level of Buddha, perhaps he could speak with Buddha. And so what is being recognized here is that there is yet much more to know and to learn and, you know, to be by each of these other people that they're saying, I can't go speak But yeah, but I got the sense that all of the corrections that Vimala Kirti is making, it could have been corrected the opposite way too. I mean, no matter what the person could have done, there could have been a Dharma argument on the other side.

[15:49]

So that I was wondering why they were so... surprised, or it seemed that this was the pattern. Well, I think all these points are well taken. This particular paragraph that I just skimmed through, in fact, it's talking about Vimalakirti's Buddha-like qualities. The distinction between a Bodhisattva and a Buddha is very blurry here, which is And then, of course, every argument has a different argument. And Dimal Akirti's tendency is to take the wisdom argument. You say it's this, but I say, of course, it's not this. That's usually his position. And that goes on and on and on and on until finally, at last, he's silent. He shuts up because of that.

[16:50]

So in a way, it's leading to his, all of this talk, talk, talk, talk is leading to his final silence. And then hearing this, the audience is very impressed and everybody wants to come in here. Everyone, all over the world, is involved. Meanwhile, Vimalakirti thought to himself, Manjushri, the crown prince, is coming here with numerous attendants. Now, may this house be transformed into emptiness. So, that's pretty clever. If you're going to actually entertain the Bodhisattva of Wisdom, what can you do better than just Make your house empty. Then, magically, his house became empty.

[17:53]

Even the doorkeeper disappeared. And except for the invalid's couch, upon which Vimalakirti himself was lying, no bed or couch or seat could be seen. Then Vimalakirti saw the Crown Prince Manjusri and addressed him. Come, Manjusri, you are very welcome. There you are, without any coming. You appear without any seeing. You are heard without any hearing. So we're kind of, this is echoing the Heart Sutra. If you really are no eyes, no ears, no nose, then you come without seeing and so on. There's no residue of neurotic personality. It's a simple presence. The Bodhisattva is just here with no hindrances.

[18:56]

That's what's meant by no ears and no eyes? Yeah. He's present, but there's nothing that is limiting. There's no thought construction. that comes through eyes or ears or nose that is limiting his point of view. So his protest in the first chapter was only a formality. He's saying, I have such a wise man, and who am I to dialogue with such a wise man? It was only a formality. That's right. That's right. But he does. So, then Manjushri finally asks Vimalakirti about his sickness. Good sir, is your condition tolerable? Is it livable? Are your physical elements not disturbed? Is your sickness diminishing?

[20:00]

Is it increasing? The Buddha asks about you if you have slight trouble, slight discomfort, slight sickness. If your distress is light, if you are cared for, strong, at ease, without self-reproach, and if you are living in touch with supreme happiness. So this is sort of an idea of the way a Bodhisattva should be sick. Householder, whence came this sickness of yours, and how long will it continue? How does it stand, and how can it be alleviated? Vimalakirti replies, Manjushri, my sickness comes from ignorance and thirst for existence. It's craving on the, the wheel of, in the dependent origination, the wheel of existence which goes from no old age and death to ignorance and some kind of story of our lives.

[21:09]

The cycle of suffering begins with the link between feeling and craving. That we're okay as long as we're just... Is it feeling or is it the link before feeling? Yeah, so the decisive moment is the space between feeling and craving. Is a craving feeling? Not quite, not quite. It's dealing with a little something extra. That's right. It's a subtle and extraordinarily important difference. Because just feeling is just feeling, but craving is you're suddenly in the world of duality. So what would be the origination of that feeling, either external or internal sensation?

[22:13]

Well, it would be contact. Contact stimulates feeling. And so far we're karmically neutral pretty well. It gets very complicated, but so far it's all fairly neutral until craving enters in. So... My sickness comes from ignorance and the thirst for existence. And it will last as long as do the sicknesses of all living beings. Were all living beings to be free from sickness, I also should not be sick. Why Manjushri? For the Bodhisattva, the world consists only of living beings and sickness is inherent in living in the world. were all living beings free of sickness, the Bodhisattva also would be free of sickness. For example, Manjushri, when the only son of a merchant is sick, both his parents become sick on account of the sickness of their son.

[23:17]

And the parents will suffer as long as that only son does not recover from his illness. Just so, Manjushri, the Bodhisattva loves all living beings as if each were his only child. He becomes sick when they are sick and is cured when they are cured. You ask me, Manjushri, whence comes my sickness? The sicknesses of the Bodhisattva arise from great compassion. So, that's quite lovely. And it is dropped a level beyond the initial idea of what a Bodhisattva's sickness is. It's entering into something that does have a real quality of sickness. So is the tape saying that he's taking on the sickness of the world? Yes, that he really is. It's not as if he's playing sick. He's really taking it on. The sicknesses of the Bodhisattva arise from great compassion.

[24:24]

I have a friend who's actually in the base group who's done work for many years. She set up a hospice in Vacaville Prison. And there are now over a hundred people with HIV positive and AIDS in the prison. And there's something like 40 workers who are also prisoners who he is trained to be volunteers and minister to the people who are sicker than themselves. It's a real situation of sick Bodhisattvas consoling one another. And she was saying that last weekend she'd had, she just suddenly dropped into a really sort of immobilizing depression for a couple of days. She just couldn't go out, couldn't do anything. She was sick. And that she also could watch herself, she knew she was, she could watch herself being sick.

[25:29]

And she also understood that it was not a personal sickness. She's done her therapy, and you know, she's really studied herself, and she knows what her numbers are, but she had just, she was just sick with what she was taking on. And by Tuesday, she was ready to go back again. I think it's a nice example of a bodhisattva with a good practice, taking on the sickness of the world. And then we have another dialogue between Manjusri and Vimalakirti about emptiness. Why is your house empty? And Vimalakirti says, Manjusri, all Buddha fields are also empty, and so on. And Manjusri, on page 44, asks, Householder, where should emptiness be sought?

[26:37]

And Vimalakirti says, emptiness, Manjusri, emptiness should be sought among the 62 convictions. Now that, there's a note on that, and if you look it up, you see that the note says that these 62 convictions are wrong views. 62, wrong views. So Manjusri is saying that emptiness is sought amongst wrong views. Now this is another dichotomy teaching. Where should the 62 convictions be sought? And Vimalakirti says they should be sought in the liberation of the Tathagatas. And Manjusri asks where should the liberation of the Tathagatas be sought? And Vimalakirti says, it should be sought in the prime mental activity of all beings. That's a pretty dense dialogue. It's a lot in there. So first of all, emptiness should be sought amongst the 62 wrong views.

[27:49]

Well, the note refers to the 62 convictions as falling into the categories of nihilism, is that how you pronounce it, or extremism. And in my experience of trying to listen to people without jumping in too fast, I hear a kernel of something real in those conversations. Especially during presidential campaigns, you can hear a lot of those convictions. There's a kernel in there. The thing that probably makes them the wrong views is the same thing that's making Vimalakirti sick. Well, you know, it also reminds me of, um, like if you do work on yourself or whatever, that, you know, like if you have a wound or there's some, there's something, you know, something like, we call it the wound, like the wounded part.

[29:11]

And then to heal it, you have to go directly into it. I mean, this could be like, not just physical, but it could be like psychological or something. You go directly, so you seek your cure by going directly into the place where it's, most painful or where it hurts most or where it's most tender or vulnerable and then, you know, you go through the middle of that to the other side. Right. Sounds a little bit like that. Right. Right. Right. Yes. Would you say your name again, please? Olga. Olga. Yes. What complex does emptiness use? I feel like emptiness is good. It is. I don't know, I don't understand. Yes, well, it's, it's, the 62 convictions are some kind of wrong views. So how is, how is liberation, how is the freedom of liberation, the freedom of emptiness to be found in wrong views?

[30:15]

It's very puzzling. Yeah, I don't understand how her statement relates to that. It's, thank you, yeah, it's, The idea that you go into the average life in all the wrong views. The liberation is right within the mud. It's right within all of that. I don't know if it goes to identification. I just have a sense that there is liberation in the midst of any of that. mixed mash, mixed up mash, mish mash. A wrong view, if you've got, if you're perceiving it as a wrong view, is disturbing. If you're seeing, if somebody else says something and you feel it's wrong, you're upset in some way. And If you can, as Sue first said, if it's a politician speaking and you're upset by what's being said, and you move towards it instead of just disassociating, you necessarily have to find a kind of space where you're just accepting that.

[31:43]

You hear the clinging, you hear the craving, you hear the enemy making, you hear the kernel of why that person is attracted to that viewpoint, that there's some reality and truth for that person in that kind of viewpoint. Yes, yes. And to go from there into these next couple of lines, because I think that leads right in, 62 convictions be sought? They should be sought in the liberation of the Tathagatas. And where should the liberation of the Tathagatas be sought? It should be sought in the prime mental activity of all living beings. That prime mental activity. Now that's like the beginner's mind. It's like the bare attention. Somebody said, the first arriving thought is the moment of awakening.

[32:45]

The first arriving thought is the moment of awakening. That, or you could even say the first arriving feeling is the moment of awakening. That, when the thought or the feeling just arises before anything is made of it, is the moment of awakening. So it should be sought in the prime mental activity of all living beings. And as Sue was saying, if one can go beyond, as Junko Beck talks about this, that we're so alert to ours and other people's behaviors, and we're so reactive, towards other people's behaviors, that what comes up triggers us in some way and this kind of, some kind of dualistic struggle situation.

[33:48]

But if we can get beyond the, below the behaviors to the level of just experiencing, that's where the spaces, and that's where compassion is. Well, your experience, I'm sorry, I don't know your name. I'm Catherine. Catherine, you were talking about on the bar, you know, you're holding the rope on the other end of Drunk's lifeline there to connection. And I think that was a magnificent example of penetrating The wrong, the 62 convictions. All the drunken behaviors. Yeah. When you mentioned the footnote, the two extremisms are nihilism and externalism, and for me those words... Extremism and nihilism. They're two extremisms, and one extremism is nihilism, and the other extremism is externalism. And I want to... Can I say what I think that means, and have you correct me?

[34:51]

The externalism, I use that term, even that word, when I'm imagining that the external world is all important. All my inner psychological dramas get played on, and I really think it matters whether or not that guy is drunk, or whether or not I'm, you know, etc. And when I get... Extremism is believing that all of this is so real and so solid that that's all there is. And the other extremism is, to me, the danger of Zen, which is nihilism, which is believing that none of it's real. And when I just extract myself from it and try to get peace by believing it doesn't matter, it's not there. And those seem to me the two poles that I could get trapped, swinging between, where I wake up in the morning and this has just got to be this way, or no, I want peace and so nothing matters and I flip through. And both of those are kind of unrealities. Eternalism.

[35:53]

Oh, I love my way of thinking. Oh, thank you. Yes, I'll do that question. Yeah. Okay, so eternalism. I'll have to work it all through again. That's a great proof for you. That's what he was talking about in the introduction. That's what Darwin was talking about in the introduction, wasn't he? About... I mean, that was the part I didn't understand. I mean, I thought what he was saying was that at one and the same time, this is all there is, in the sense that Thich Nhat Hanh says, if you can't be happy right now, you can never be happy, because right now is all there is. But in another level, it isn't all that big a deal. So it's both. It's the middle way, it's the middle way. So that's why emptiness will be found between us by embracing both of us.

[36:56]

You don't say nothing and you don't say whatever the other one is. You have to have it all. That's right, that's right. And dualism. sort of self-aware of the neurosis that we go through. So then with that, it's like we begin to see the mud, and then once we see the mud, we can see, oh, here's the mud, and here's something that's clear, so that we then have, it's almost the opposites that lean on each other, that when we recognize one, then we recognize the other. Yeah, so you're talking, actually your remark, that remark seems to me to be particularly addressed to the prime mental activity.

[37:57]

And finding the, also finding emptiness in the 62 convictions. You know, the note says that it consists of all views other than the right view of selflessness. And so then the 62 convictions would all be about self-grasping. Yeah. Except that when you can look at the mud and be aware of it, then you can become free of it. Yeah. Applying what we're talking about to what we're reading, I find that one is really stuck in at the major dilemma, because you can be somewhere in the middle road, you can say, well, I can't understand what this is, and you can try to put in your best effort, but you still are sort of sitting in the mud, and you realize, it's sort of, it feels like an insurmountable

[39:09]

to try to understand the teaching. So you wonder, well, should you just be self-accepting or do you use this as some kind of a motivation? I find reading things like this extremely challenging because it does bring up everything at once. Yes, yeah. How do you read something like this? Slowly. Slowly. And repeatedly. and kind of get used to it and paint it. All those things. I mean, you have to, it's not, you know, it's, you can't just read it with your mind. You have to really let it sink in. This is levels of understanding. And, you know, sometimes I read this and I think, I just don't get it, you know. And then other times, oh yes, and then I forget what the oh yes is.

[40:14]

You just have to keep doing it. Those optical illusions, you know, where you have to uncouple your vision so that your eyes look parallel and then you can see, you know what I mean? Then you see the gestalt. Yeah, then you see the teacup in the leaves or whatever, or you have to cross your eyes. You have to look differently and then you see. You see this stereoscopic image. Your painting was a little like this. I feel like I get like a ping-pong ball on a ping-pong table. I'm getting a little bit back. Well, not quite that bad. Sort of like pushed back and forth. Like, well, it's like this. Well, no, it's not. It's just kind of like so that I can never really find a place to be still or rest. And it's not that it's... Yeah, it's like not unpleasant or violent, but it's just like you just can't get too comfortable, I just can't get comfortable with any one idea.

[41:14]

That's right. And then you go back to Dogan, and Dogan is explicitly not allowing you to rest in any position. That's right. And the whole Zen business of mountains and rivers, that's just the way you're supposed to take it. Okay, good. That's fine. I'd like to read just a couple of paragraphs from Everyday Zen on this whole subject that we've just been talking about, about compassion and the prime mental activity, that moment of just arising. Nearly always, we view other people as just behavior. We're not interested in the fact that their behavior can be divorced from their experiencing. With ourselves, we get it to some degree, but not totally. In Zazen, we see that only a fraction of ourselves is known to ourselves.

[42:21]

And as that capacity for experiencing increases, our actions transform. that they come not so much from our conditioning, our memory, but from life as it is, this very second. This is true compassion. As we live more and more as our experiencing, we see that while we have a body and mind that behave in certain ways, there is something, a no-thing, in which body and mind are held. We intuit that everybody is held in this way. Even though the behavior of another person may be irresponsible and while we may have to oppose that behavior firmly, yet we and he or she are intrinsically the same. Only to the degree that we live a life of experiencing can we possibly understand the life of another.

[43:22]

Compassion is not an idea or an ideal It is a formless but all-powerful space that grows in Zazen. So then we come to this tremendous question. Manjusri asks, householder, how should a bodhisattva console another bodhisattva who is sick? How does one sick bodhisattva console another? And now we're going to hear a lot of this teaching of dichotomy, the two neither

[44:27]

the two extremes. He should tell him that the body is impermanent, but should not exhort him to renunciation or disgust. He should tell him the body is miserable, but should not encourage him to find solace and liberation. That the body is selfless, but that living beings should be developed. That the body is peaceful, but not to seek any ultimate calm. He should urge him to confess his evil deeds, but not for the sake of absolution. Well, then why confess? That's the point. Why indeed? And why even mention evil deeds? Oh, yeah. Well, the whole issue of evil is coming around the corner very soon. That's right. If everything's empty, why the evil deeds? That's what's good and evil in this scene. I'd rather not get to that yet, because it's coming up very directly.

[45:30]

But your first question, why confess if you don't want absolution? It's like acknowledging in the Bodhisattva Sangha, the twisted karma, I now fully avow, but nobody says, But not for the purpose of having being absolved. Yeah, but for some other purpose. No, no. It's the purposiveness that I think he's after. For all of these. Not to do anything because you're trying to make something happen. state of mind, a rather heroic one, but a private confession.

[46:47]

See, for what we, Greg, we are talking, we're not talking about human beings, you and me. We're talking about Bodhisattvas here. Now, it may not be a difference, but this, we're talking about the Bodhisattva point of view. That my point of view might be, if I'm really very guilty, I would just love to confess and really hope that that'll do the trick and I won't be bothered anymore. That's my human point of view. But the confession, could that be just simply a recognition of what is? In other words, coming to recognize that in itself is just... The note is interesting and I think if it's in the... if the bottom line of the Bodhisattva way is There's something to do with compassion there. That's also some key for me. But it said, you know, absolution is not practiced in Buddhism. It's not effective. Karmic effects cannot be avoided in any case.

[47:51]

And the important thing is to cultivate the states of mind that refrain from wrongdoing. So there's a track that one is on, a path, that I think involves compassion and a commitment to refine one's behavior. That's right. It's coming back, the main point, to the bodhisattva intention. And if you don't know what you're doing, because you're not looking at it or acknowledging it, then it's very difficult to be on a path. As I hear it, as I try to reflect it in my own life, it's like sometimes just recognizing without a desire in any one way causes a transformation. That brings about the transformation. But if there is a desire for achieving something, the transformation is not going to happen.

[48:56]

That's right. That's right. That's the difference between the human principle of action some resolve, and the Bodhisattva principle of action, which is just doing. Thank you, it's very clear. But just doing with right intention, and with complete awareness, leaving nothing out. But then there's expecting a result. But it's like the road to hell is paved with good intentions. We talk about intention all the time. And I guess the intention's good. But those are unfulfilled intentions. I mean, the road to hell, that means people, you know, are misusing it. Self-serving intentions. But there's always a bodhisattva there.

[50:10]

He should encourage his empathy for all living beings on account of his own sickness, his remembrance of suffering experienced from beginningless time, and his consciousness of working for the welfare of living beings. He should encourage him not to be distressed, but to manifest the roots of virtue, to maintain the primal purity and the lack of craving, and thus to always strive to become the king of healers who can cure all sicknesses. Thus should a Bodhisattva console a Bodhisattva in such a way as to make him happy. So, you know, it's a very difficult... I think we all work with this. It's a very fundamental issue in our practice. And it's hard... Maria put it very clearly just now.

[51:20]

And it's very hard for us really to believe. We're so attached to wanting results. that it's very hard to believe that just awareness is enough. But gradually, in our practice, in the life of our practice, we do come more and more to believe it. I think we trust it. And we come more to trust it. That's right. That's right. That's right. That something's uncovered that's there that I didn't do anything for. It's just there. Yeah. And then occasionally I can touch it and it's very solid and trusting, trustful. That's right. You know, in Dead Man Walking, somebody asks the nun, somebody says to the nun, well, Sister, you have such great faith. And she says, it's not faith, it's work. And then all these good questions come up.

[52:36]

Now, well, sir, how should a sick bodhisattva control his own mind? That's the rule. Give me the recipe, please, for mind control. A sick bodhisattva should control his own mind with the following consideration. Sickness arises from total involvement. in the process of misunderstanding from beginningless. Ed Brown once said, life is one mistake after another. It arises from the passions that result from unreal mental constructions. And hence, ultimately nothing is perceived that could be said to be sick. So, you know, you have one And then you have the other which is very different. And so there's no position that we can take that we're going to rest in comfortably.

[53:37]

And then there's a little discourse on the impossibility of our minds. The body is the issue of the four main elements. And in these elements there is no agent and no owner. There is no self in this body. This body is an aggregate of many things. When it is born, only things are born. When it ceases, only things cease. These things have no awareness of feeling of each other. It's quite a wonderful description of our inner state. These things that arise and they may have a relationship with each other. You know, we do a lot of work in therapy and we try to figure out what our life story is and what the basis of our neurosis is and get some kind of good psychological history down. A good story that ties it all together?

[54:40]

A good story that ties it all together but it actually, it can't be tied together. Because it seems that your mind has a pattern the way a Buddhist would look at it and so you may give your unhappiness this name and you may work that out, but then your mind's going to go right back and find something else. It's just going to find a new language, but it's the pattern that keeps recreating itself. You mean a certain self-habit or neurotic pattern? It's a self-habit that helps you find language in terms of neurotic. But it's really, it seems to be a pattern that your mind has. It's like the layers of an onion, but you notice as you keep going deeper and deeper and deeper, it's still the same pattern.

[55:47]

So how do you control the mind? Well, we're coming to it, the bottom of the page. The sick bodhisattva should recognize that sensation is ultimately non-sensation, but he should not realize the cessation of sensation. So actually that's very convoluted, but we're coming back again to this moment of prime mental activity. although both pleasure and pain are abandoned when the Buddha qualities are fully accomplished. There is then no sacrifice of the great compassion for all living beings living in the bad migrations. Thus recognizing in his own suffering the infinite sufferings of these living beings, the Bodhisattva correctly contemplates these living beings and resolves to cure all sicknesses.

[56:56]

So we're coming back to this experiencing and compassion. Can we really... How do we control our own mind? It's just staying with our own experience. And how do we relate to someone else? It's still staying with the moment-to-moment experience. That passage felt very important to me and I think it was because the danger of hearing equanimity as meaning taking you out of compassion, out of development. And that passage just really brings you right back down. It says if you really achieve equanimity and detachment and all those lovely sounding things, it doesn't remove you from, but it brings you to becoming a healer. That's right. and compassion.

[57:59]

That's right. I skipped that paragraph above it where it says, what is equanimity? It is the equality of everything from self to liberation. So when you get rid of dualism and your equanimity comes to knowing you're all one thing, but so does your compassion come from there. That's right. So you don't lose your compassion when you achieve equanimity. Yeah. Yes. Equanimity is very embodied. Boundly embodied. I have this image of the yin and yang symbol. As soon as you get into the situation of the sickness and its meaning and its existence in the human experience, then you're taken out of it into

[59:00]

back into the selfless state, which you can only stay in so long before you have to again enter the play that's happening, because if there's not that back and forth, then you have the extremes, right? Yeah. And it sort of helps my, to see it as a, you know, in the moment of its fullness in either place, one must be drawn back without getting left there or caught in the idea of it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. To be willing to just be in that great current. Yeah. Yeah. It's a constant current. This is difficult stuff, but... Are we staying with it?

[60:10]

I mean, I can go... Yeah, it is. We could go on a little here. I'm not quite sure what to do. It's so much the background of our practice here. It's so much. And this next paragraph about... As for these living beings, there is nothing to be applied and there is nothing to be removed. One is only to teach them the Dharma for them to realize the basis from which sequences arrive. What is this basis? Well, I think let's move on. There are things there that could be said about toes on and so on. Yeah. I have this thing, I sort of got stuck on it in my mind.

[61:14]

I think I got it. Her name is Pachin Lamo. She's a character in Tibetan Buddhism. Her husband is a cannibal king and teaches their son to be a cannibal. Shiva threatens them, if you don't stop, I'm going to kill her on the sun. And they don't stop, and she does. And she flays his skin and uses it for a saddle blanket. And then she goes out into the world and starts, of course, like the Gorgons, as a beautiful young thing, but then goes out and takes upon herself to eat all the sickness in the world. But then there's more sickness than she can eat. So she has this bag in which she carries the extra sickness. And when there's no other way to deal with the evil in the world, she takes a little bit out and causes epidemics.

[62:25]

But somehow this whole... To me, it's just an incredibly strong, you know, because it is, it's, you know, sacrificing the thing that we might think is, you know, your only son and breaking that bond and then... Well, the connections are obvious. Well, I wanted to say that a couple of things. One is that the last wind bell, there was some comments by Suzuki Roshi about being ill, and he said, I should enjoy my illness. I should enjoy being sick in bed. And I thought, yeah, and having spent the last week myself, half of it sick in bed and still not quite up to snuff.

[63:30]

I'm thinking, I'm not there. I'm not there. But there is a point about being ill that does seem to peel off some layers. For one thing, you're just too tired to put on a certain act, and a certain clinging sort of drops away. And there was a perception of, in a different way, and I just wrote a few words about it. I just wondered if I could drop them into this space. And just saying that I'm not ready to consider my life as just miserable and empty and selfless and impermanent. I can get some of that, but I hate to label it as miserable, even though I don't feel well. The oak outside my window sparkles in the rain. I have time to see the gray sky, perhaps because I'm not feeling well enough to clean the dirt off the glass.

[64:39]

It pushes you out. Illness pushes you out of a certain self-habit. Yeah. But usually when people are ill, and this is the scary part, you lose your equilibrium and you lose your perseverance and you lose a lot of your strength. And so, unfortunately, most people, even strong Buddhists, when they get close to death, it was sad to see them slip into all of the things that they could hold it vague. Yes, you can watch people get worn down. It reminds me of those photographs, the two photos that you showed at the very beginning of the class, Harold Brodky, is that his name? He was a young person then. When he was older, he was going to die soon. Just that kind of, I mean, that's what reminds me of sickness.

[65:54]

It's like that, there's something that, some kind of qualities, personalities, like something more essential or something lighter or something that just doesn't follow. I think, I mean, it's not really, you wouldn't say it's more permanent, but there's just something that goes away that it's like not holding up that act anymore. And then there's just this something there, you know, something is left there. So I mean, people do, you know, maybe they get crankier Also, there's a way that... I mean, I had a friend whose mother was dying, and she would have these moments of just being like this really cranky old person that you wouldn't want to know, and then she'd flip into just the most wonderful person you would ever want to meet. And so, it really was these two... there were these two things going on, and sometimes she would just come out with something. you know, the next minute she didn't like the food on her plate and she wasn't making, you know what I'm saying?

[67:02]

Right, you and I had a friend who died that way, aren't we? Yeah, yeah. So you really, you see how in a certain way, you know, one part of the personality doesn't know another part. There's this tremendous dissociation that death or illness really can accentuate. But I get older and have more physical problems and then they go away. And I suddenly say, oh, I feel like myself again. And I realize that every time I'm in bad condition, I have to drop. that idea of who I am. That's a good point. And then I keep watching, saying, oh God, here I am, clinging to this person with my self-desire. That's a good point. It's really a good teaching on selflessness. You can remember it for more than 15 minutes.

[68:05]

Seconds. Maybe we're all like that drunk on the subway. Yeah, yeah. Well, I think that we should just move on to Chapter 6 and get at least a little of that. So now we come, perhaps even the author has felt that the last chapter was quite weighty and is coming back to a more personal situation. because of Shariputra's worries. There is not even a single chair in this house. Where are the disciples of the Bodhisattvas going to sit? And of course now Vimalakirti with the Buddha's omniscience reads the thought of venerable Shariputra and says, Shariputra did you come here for the sake of the Dharma or did you come here for the sake of a chair?

[69:08]

Or Shariputra. And Shariputra says, I came for the sake of the Dharma, not for the sake of a chair. And then he gets a lecture. That's for sure. I see you always seeking in the heart. But don't you wish we could all get these lectures? Yeah. Right. Right. It would be wonderful. I would be fine. He's like the youngest son at Seder. Yeah. It's cool to ask questions so that everybody can hear. Yeah. So he gets this lecture on emptiness again. The Dharma is ultimately without formulation and without verbalization and so on. Reverend Shariputra, the Dharma is calm and peaceful. Furthermore, Reverend Shariputra, the Dharma is without taint and free of defilements and so on and so on. Thereupon, Reverend Shariputra, if you are interested in the Dharma, you should take no interest in anything."

[70:16]

Now that's beginning to get a little bit on the extreme side. So, when Vimalakirti had spoken this discourse, 500 gods obtained enlightenment. But not Shariputra. And then Vimalakirti says, Manjushri. Then maybe Vimalakirti notices that he's gone a little bit to one extreme. So he says, Manjushri, you have already been in innumerable hundreds of thousands of Buddha fields throughout the universes of the ten directions. In which Buddha field did you see the best lion thrones with the finest qualities? Yes.

[71:20]

Thank you. That's very nice. That's very nice. There's some consistency here. You know, Shariputra's wanted a chair. And he's been told, no, you can't have a dumb thing. But now he's going to do something even beyond Shariputra's wildest imaginations. And that's, this is the chapter on inconceivable liberation. And the theme of the chapter is that liberation is beyond one's wildest dream. So, Manjushri tells, as if in a fairy tale, where you can go to get the best lion throne. And at that moment, Vimalakirti, having focused himself in concentration, produced 3200,000 thrones. These thrones were so tall and spacious and beautiful that the great Bodhisattvas and gods and other gods had never before seen the like and so on.

[72:26]

And although these enormous thrones came, the great city of Vaisali did not become obscured, neither did the land of Jampadeva, that's the human realm, or the four continents. Everything appeared just as it was. So here's this extraordinary and ordinary, the convergence once again, the extraordinary and the ordinary. The extraordinary happens and yet it doesn't distort what is. And so Vimalakirti says, Manjushri, let the bodhisattvas be seated in these thrones, having transformed their bodies to a suitable size. So the bodhisattvas can sit in these thrones, but again, Shariputra... And Vimalakirti says, Shariputra, take your seat upon a throne.

[73:30]

And then it's sort of like the three bears, Goldilocks and the three bears. Good sir, the thrones are too big and too high and I cannot sit upon them. And then Vimalakirti says, Reverend Shariputra, bow down to the Tathagata, whoever it is who produced them, and you will be able to take your seat. You know, it's interesting, there's a lot of playing with time and space and relative size Yeah. That's right. Very playful. Very playful. And everything's being turned around. And then Shariputra is astonished that all this can happen. And then, this is the real point of the chapter, the Malakirti replies, reverend Shariputra, for the Tathagatas and the Bodhisattvas, there is a liberation called inconsistency. and then all the feats that can be achieved.

[74:38]

Now once again, Catherine's story, you know, it's sort of an ordinary story and it's very believable and we've all had versions of it. And there's an inconceivable element built in. So that's being emphasized in these in these enormous metaphors. And then on page 54, Then the Patriarch Mahakasyapa, having heard this teaching of the inconceivable liberation of the Bodhisattvas, was amazed and said to the Venerable Shariputra, Shariputra, if one were to show a variety of things to a blind person from birth, he would not be able to see a single thing.

[75:53]

Likewise, Venerable Shariputra, when this door of inconceivable liberation is taught, All the disciples and solitary sages are sightless like the man blind from birth and the one who cannot comprehend even a single cause of this inconceivable liberation. Now this, see, Shariputra and Mahakasyapa were both disciples in the Theravada school and they had not come to this, this has not been their teaching. And they're hearing this teaching. They're hearing the teaching of another school. And it's wonderful. And they know that they can't grasp it. As for us, whose faculties are deteriorated like a burned and rotten seed, what else can we do if we do not become receptive to this great vehicle? We, all the disciples and solitary sages, upon hearing this teaching of the Dharma, should utter a cry of regret that would shake this billion world galactic universe.

[77:05]

This great sadness that all of our life we have worked and we've worked in this for this path of liberation, and yet we haven't gotten, we've missed the point. Missed it. It's like the city in the Lotus Sutra. Something or other city, I can't remember, you know, that was on the... It was a mirage. Yeah, that was a mirage on the long hard road. That's right. That's right. You work and you work and you work and you're just about to get there. But it's like that. I mean, it's that kind of a Mahayana. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And it's also, you know, it's also an aspect of our own practice that sometimes there's a kind of, there's a real discouragement that

[78:10]

is a useful place to be, but a very, very sad place that maybe I've just missed it. Maybe I just haven't gotten it. The conjured city. The conjured city, yes. Yes, it is that. And then more people are enlightened. Yes. And then, Vimalakirti says to Makakasyapa, and here we are diving in again to a very difficult topic. Reverend Makakasyapa, the Maras, that Mara is the god of delusion, who play the devil in the innumerable universes of the ten directions, are all Bodhisattvas dwelling in the inconceivable liberation, who are playing the devil in order to develop living beings through their skill in liberative technique.

[79:24]

So again, there's a kind of rhythm here, you know, that somebody, like Maka Kashyapa, expresses profound regret and sort of despair. And then it's responded to with a message of major encouragement. And this is a strange, but message of major encouragement. That the very devils who play with the innumerable universes of the ten directions are all bodhisattvas dwelling in inconceivable liberation, who are playing the devil. in order to develop living beings through their skill in liberative technique. There's opportunities for growth. Yes, exactly. You know, the Tibetans go on and on, Shantideva, the Dalai Lama, about the value of the enemy. How important it is for us to have an enemy who really confronts us

[80:31]

paralyzes us. It's even a bit like illness. It's another major confrontation of the self habit. And puts us in a place where we just have to be defeated or enlarge our understanding, And it raises, of course, all sorts of questions about what the Mahayana ethics are about. If, in fact, evil is just Bodhisattva's dwelling and playing in all directions in order to develop a skill of understanding, it's still an awful lot of suffering in the world. Yeah, that's true. I have something else to say about the last paragraph in the chapter. Okay, go ahead.

[81:37]

You were talking about the encouragement of Maha Kasyapa. In the last chapter, it seemed like a tremendous encouragement to all the Bodhisattvas that Vimalakirti has zapped, forgotten to. just as a donkey could not muster an attack on a wild elephant. This is the last paragraph. Even so, Reverend Mahakasyapa, one who is not himself a bodhisattva cannot harass a bodhisattva. Only one who is himself a bodhisattva can harass another bodhisattva, and only a bodhisattva can tolerate the harassment of another bodhisattva. I like that. I know I found that sort of encouraging somehow. That we're all, you know, somehow gotten at one time or another and irritated by people and it, you know, it can be looked at as sort of semi-Bodhisattvas being irritated by other semi-Bodhisattvas.

[82:42]

Yeah, yeah. But a Bodhisattva has an unshakable quality. Yes. It sounds to me like this is kind of insurance against cynicism, and if you don't take that view, then you're very pessimistic. Yes. Yes. If you don't take the view that all of the difficulties of the world are in fact opportunities for teaching us, then you suffer. You suffer without reason. But there are some things that don't fit into that.

[83:45]

You know, there are some things I don't think, and that's, for me, always been a problem. There's some situations that are so unresolvably painful that the pain is not going to subside until those people, you know, lifelong suffering. That is, that doesn't quite fit in. There's not a place you can learn. I think that people have undergone incredible transformations under the most unbelievable conditions. But there are many who don't. Right. But just to say that everything can be an occasion for learning or an occasion for practice doesn't mean everybody's going to do it. Yeah, as Nina's saying, it's a point of view. It's not the only point of view, but it's a very wholesome point of view.

[84:53]

It's kind of a way out, in a way. It's a way of dealing with it. Yeah. I wonder if what you're... Tell me your name again, artist. Me? Andrea. Andrea. falling into this sort of blame the victim or you can almost get callous because you're saying, oh, of someone else's extreme ordeal, you're saying, oh, but that it's an opportunity for growth and you will develop your soul. And if you're really suffering and being down about it, it means you're not seeing it properly. And it's that thing of what we're saying what other people can do with their suffering. It can really sound insensitive. It can be And it's not for me to say to my spouse who suffers from chronic fatigue and is enormously weak and in tremendous pain and whatever.

[86:08]

And she does, in fact, share this view. I mean, she has used her illness to strip away. And she's constantly growing. And many, many times a day and many, many times a week, she needs to simply be able to say, I can't bear this. than she is, who must feel sometimes, I can't bear this, this is too much for me. And for anybody to preach at them, this is an opportunity for growth, you're supposed to be able to bear it and grow from it. That's untenable. So when we're talking about this, I guess I'm hearing Andrea say, I can't accept in my heart that I could ever pronounce about a certain person who's in extreme agony, that somehow this is good for them. I don't want to find myself in that position that I can say, oh, isn't that person lucky? And yet actually there is a level on which, and I think the part we skipped over in the last chapter actually really addresses that, when it talks about the sentimental compassiveness, the sentimental compassion, the compassion that says,

[87:25]

Oh, yes, you can't bear this. I wish it were different. And that there's another compassion that really does embrace and allow even the most extreme and horrible thing. But it is a compassion. It's not a lack of compassion. But I do think there are some situations. I'll just give the example I'm thinking of. A 16-year-old girl, perfectly healthy one day, gets struck down with brain stem encephalitis. She's now paralyzed from here down, only her brain. is left. She can't talk. She has a computer now that helps her communicate. She's 16. Her parents weren't Buddhists. Her parents weren't even religious in any way. This child will live a complete life, but she's not had any chance to develop, and she's stuck with this. And the parents are destroyed. The family's going to be destroyed. not just financially, but, you know, a marriage that can survive something like this. You know, there's some things that I don't see.

[88:31]

I see as, there's nothing to be learned from this. This is not, this doesn't have an end. People do die, children die, horrible things happen. There's an end. But there's some suffering that goes so far beyond, you can't explain it karmically. I mean, I know three generations of this family. I don't know what happened, you know, or generations behind us. But anyhow, it just seems that there are some situations that do test this faith. There aren't that many. This is really the only one. I think there are many. I think there are many. Get to test it constantly. Yes. Yeah. And recently I had an opportunity to see the documentary on Stephen Hawkins. I don't know if you know who he is, the physicist. But he was an adult and a brilliant one. But you understand, he too, and here is the mind, here is a mind who is speculating about the beginnings of the universe encased in a body that doesn't respond.

[89:39]

You know, which is just incredible to me. And this man is perhaps the most brilliant mind currently. considering these issues about astronomy, the beginning of the universe, and what happens on the 10th to the 16th second before it all happens on the 7th. You know, it's just incredible, and he's doing it. And I heard his mother talking, because she gets... it's a documentary, it's on video now, and it's about the... it has the same name as the title of one of his books, and his mother is being interviewed. And interestingly enough, she says, well, of course, one doesn't want this ever to happen to anybody. But in a certain sense, it's very lucky that it happened to him, because he has such a good mind that he can still work with his mind. She still has a life. I just felt like, my God. You know, I didn't have to happen to anybody. Right. But there are ways of, it's interesting how I think when people say to me, oh, there's an opportunity to learn and grow, it's just trying to comfort me that something's failing.

[90:50]

And they're trying to comfort me in their way. It doesn't help a bit. I can imagine that same statement being said in a way that can be very helpful, depending on how you are with that person. It's also a difference between what you tell yourself and what you tell other people. Yes. There are some things you can never tell another person. Yeah, and I can say for myself that I find it helpful to look at situations

[91:57]

And I have gotten inspiration from people who have been transformed by incredibly difficult situations. That's not the same thing as saying to the person who's going through it, oh, what a wonderful opportunity for growth for you. And it doesn't do anything, we suffer a great deal when we see somebody who's laid low, who's just slapped down, as this girl is. That makes us suffer. And this In a certain way, we do suffer about that. And there's nothing we can do about our suffering. I mean, it's real. It's appropriate. It's real. But we can walk away. You wonder, though, the person who has been struck down with such suffering and didn't yet have any chance to learn to prepare, the family didn't. You know, we have mechanisms that will the pain will decrease so that we can function. But you wonder, how do people who are struck with that suffering and will not, if this will not let up, how?

[93:06]

How? Can they? But that's what you don't know. But that's exactly what you don't know. And what I hear myself doing sometimes when I hear something like that and sort of fixate on the horror of it is go into a space where I'm saying, I believe they can.

[93:25]

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