Good morning, everyone, and welcome. So some of us have been sitting, this is the third day for some of us, and welcome everyone else. I've been talking this weekend about basic teachings, fundamental teachings about Zazen by Ehei Dogen, the founder of the branch of Buddhism we practice here, who lived 1200 to 1253. a Japanese monk who went to China from when he was 23 to 27 years old, came back, and I talked about a couple of other of his major teachings about Zazen. the acupuncture needle of Zazen on Friday and yesterday, the Fukan Zazengi, the fundamental teachings of Zazen.

[01:02]

Today I want to talk about a teaching that I've talked about a lot, so this is a review for some people and maybe an introduction for others, the self-fulfillment Samadhi. This is from Ben Dowa, a long essay, much longer essay by Dogen. Maybe the first real writing of his that expresses how he understood the meaning of this practice of zazen that we do here. So there are, I don't know, three or four major points in this. that I want to talk about. So for those of you who want to follow along, you don't need to, but it's page 22 and 23 in the chant book. And he starts out by saying, for all ancestors and Buddhas who have been dwelling in and maintaining Buddhadharma, the Buddha way, the teaching of Buddhas,

[02:12]

Practicing upright sitting in GJU Samadhi is the true path for opening up enlightenment, for opening up liberation. So he stresses in, actually, the other two teachings I have talked about this weekend also, this practice of upright sitting. The Japanese word is zazen. It just means sitting meditation. But here, there are many names for this. There are many other words that he uses to describe this. The one he's talking about here is GGU Samadhi. So just to say something about this name, here it's translated as the Self-Fulfillment Samadhi. But GGU is a very interesting term. G means self. Juyu means fulfillment, also enjoyment. So it's the samadhi, the meditation, the concentration that fulfills the self, that enjoys the self, that realizes the self.

[03:17]

Juyu, so in Sino-Japanese, two characters together has a meaning and it has those meanings I just said, fulfillment, realization, enjoyment, but separately those two characters mean to receive the function, or to accept the function. So, ju is the same as in jukai, to receive the precepts. So, in many Sino-Japanese words, many Chinese characters, there are lots of overtones. Here, this self-fulfillment or self-enjoyment, self-realization, also means the self that accepts its function. So this is the practice, the samadhi, of accepting one's function, one's functioning, one's We could think of it in terms of sesshin or in terms of a monastic setup of accepting the position that you're, that you have.

[04:31]

So for today, Dolon is the Eno and Yoson is the Dolon. Eric is washing dishes. Nicholas is serving meals. Accepting your function, which is also accepting your place in the universe in some ways, or accepting your function in this lifetime. All of that is in some ways implied in this self-fulfillment, this self-realization. So that's the name of the Samadhi. And so there are a few things he says here that are kind of instructions or basic statements But I want to talk about the end of the first paragraph. He says, from the time you begin practicing with a teacher, the practices of incense burning, bowing, nembutsu, or that's a common phrase in Japan for calling the name of Buddha.

[05:39]

But it also means just to remember Buddha, to be mindful of Buddha. Repentance and reading sutras are not at all essential. Just sit, dropping off body and mind. So sometimes this has been interpreted as, you don't need to do those things. He's not saying that, because actually Dogen himself, and here at this temple, we do all of those things. We burn incense. We bow. We do a repentance chant. We read sutras. But they're not the essential thing. The essential thing is just sitting, dropping off body and mind. That's another name that Dogen has for this practice of zazen, just sitting, dropping off body and mind, which doesn't mean getting rid of your body and mind. It doesn't mean suppressing our body, suppressing our thoughts and our consciousness.

[06:42]

Letting go. It's radical letting go. Just sit. Letting go of thoughts and sensations and some ache in your knees or your shoulders during a day of sitting. Just sit, dropping off body and mind. And this dropping off body and mind is also a name that, a phrase that Dogen uses for total liberation. Drop off body and mind. So that's kind of the introduction. The next paragraph is one of my favorite sentences in all of Buddhism, and one that I've puzzled over for decades. When one displays the Buddha Mudra with one's whole body and mind, sitting upright in this samadhi, even for a short time. So Buddha Mudra. Mudra is like our hand position, or various hand positions that sometimes you see in Buddha statues.

[07:44]

like granting or have no fear. But here he's just talking about the position of Buddha. So we look at the image of Buddha in the center of the zendo. This is the Buddha mudra, sitting upright. So mudra refers to a physical posture or gesture. But he says here, when one displays the Buddha posture, and it's not just a physical posture, it's the calm, the collectedness, maybe even the radiance of Buddha, with one's whole body and mind sitting upright in this samadhi, this concentration, this meditation, even for a short time, he says. Everything in the entire dharma world, the whole phenomenal world, becomes Buddha mudra, and all space in the universe completely becomes enlightenment. This is an amazing, radical statement.

[08:53]

This practice we do, sitting upright like this, for a period like you've all done, or for a day, or for a few days, or the beginning of December we'll do it for five days, isn't just like some self-help program. It's not about, you know, what's happening only on your cushion, although it is about that, of course. But all space, all of reality, not just on this planet even, he says, in the whole universe, in the whole phenomenal world, completely becomes awakened. So, you know, this is what Dogen says. you know, when you first encounter this sentence, you know, it's maybe beyond comprehensibleness. It's not some, you know, maybe you can't believe this.

[09:57]

And I'm not, and I don't think, you know, I'm certainly not asking you to just take it on faith because Dogen says it. But anyway, you should hear that that's what Dogen says this practice is about. I mean, I could sort of stop there and just let you sit with that for the rest of the talk. But he says more about it. And the rest of this essay, and I would say the rest of Dogen's voluminous writings for his whole lifetime are commentaries on this sentence in some ways. So I'll read it again. When one displays the Buddha Mudra with one's whole body and mind sitting upright in the Samadhi, even for a short time, everything in the whole phenomenal world becomes this Buddha posture, this Buddha attitude, and all space, all reality in the universe completely becomes awakening and liberation.

[11:11]

What he says about this is that, therefore, it enables the Buddha to Tathagatas. Tathagata is just another word for Buddha. It means thus come ones, people, the beings who come as such, as suchness. It's another word for Buddha. It allows Buddhas to increase the Dharma joy of their own original grounds and renew the adornment of the way of awakening. So this upright sitting renews the adornment of the way of awakening. So you might think the way of awakening is complete and wonderful, and of course it is. But he's saying we can renew its adornments. We can actually make it prettier. Therefore, simultaneously, all living beings of the phenomenal world in the ten directions and six realms become clear and pure in body and mind, realize great emancipation, and their own original face appears.

[12:37]

So this original face is an old Zen phrase. So this is a traditional Zen koan, which I'll just lay on you. What is your original face before your parents were born? So you can go home and sit with that one. But your own original face appears. At that time. All things together awaken to supreme liberation, supreme awakening, supreme enlightenment, and utilize Buddha body. So he talks about Buddha body here. So this is not just some intellectual practice where you have to figure out something or understand something or calculate something. This is a physical practice. Use the Buddha body. And immediately they go beyond the culmination of awakening. It's not enough to have some understanding or experience of the culmination of awakening.

[13:42]

They go beyond the culmination of awakening. At the same time, they turn the incomparable great dharma wheel and begin expressing ultimate and unfabricated profound wisdom. So the point of all this is to begin expressing this. Doga emphasizes expression. It's not enough to have some experience or figure something out or, you know, even become Buddha, how do you express it? So this is a good teaching for us, you know, practicing in this non-residential storefront temple in the middle of this big city called Chicago, where we go out into the world and whatever we're doing in our lives, we're expressing something. With this practice, Dogen says, these Buddha bodies begin to express ultimate, unfabricated, not made up, authentic, profound insight, wisdom.

[14:58]

So that's all the commentary on this. space, all space in the universe becoming awakened. He goes on to say, there is a path. I could just stop there too. There is a path. There is a path. There really is. There's a path through which the unsurpassed complete awakening of all things returns to the person in Zazen. So, you know, having express this Buddha mudra, Dogen is saying, with your whole body and mind. There's a path through which the unsurpassed, complete awakening of all things returns to the person in Zazen. And that person and the awakening of all things, in this next phrase, intimately and imperceptibly assist each other. So this is the next important part. All things and the person in zazen intimately and imperceptibly assist each other.

[16:04]

Basic Buddhist teaching. We are deeply, deeply, deeply interconnected with all things. Basic Buddhist teaching. Interdependent, co-arising. Everything arises together with everything else. Each of us, of course, is an independent self. We all have identifications. We all have lots of ways of identifying our so-called self. But one way to identify our so-called self is that you are defined by everything that is not you. Everything in the whole universe that is not Paula is what we call Paula. Everything in the whole universe that comes together and creates each one of us is how we are.

[17:06]

We're deeply connected. So each of you sitting here now are a combination of all the things that you've ever experienced or that have ever experienced you. Your third grade teacher, whether or not you remember your grandparents, your great-great-grandparents, whether or not you know anything about them, your, you know, children you played with when you were six years old, whether or not you remember them, friends, family, former lovers, Pets you had as a child. Places you've been.

[18:08]

All of those are part of what's happening on your seat right now. Beyond who you think you are. And what Dogen is saying here. is that all things intimately and imperceptibly assist each other. This is something more, that there is this relationship, but that actually there's this, well, he's going to say it further on. Well, I'll keep reading. This Zazen person without fail drops off body and mind, again, this dropping off body and mind, cuts away previous tentative views and thoughts. Now, this is something that, practically speaking, in our practice happens over time and with effort and intention to let go of all of our yucky ideas and thoughts.

[19:18]

grasping in our karmic patterns. But these previous graspings and attachments and aversions, we awaken genuine Buddha Dharma and universally helps the Buddha work in each place. So this is another important idea here, the Buddha work. Each of us here today, each in our own way, is helping the Buddha work. The Zazen person universally helps the Buddha work in each place as numerous as atoms, where Buddhas teach and practice and widely influences practitioners who are going beyond Buddha. So there's so many important Buddha utterances in here. But just the notion of the Buddha work. It's not just that Buddhas sit up there and look pretty. There's the Buddha work. we are all doing. There's the work in the world for all suffering beings.

[20:25]

At the end of this, we'll vow to awaken all beings. There's the Buddha work that Buddhas do and that Bodhisattvas do. And then they widely influence practitioners who are going beyond Buddha. So in this way of zazen, it's not enough to just understand Buddha, or figure out Buddha, or experience Buddha. We go beyond Buddha, because Buddha's alive. Buddha's not just someone who lived 2,500 years ago and we bow down to. If that was all that Buddha was, there'd be no point in having Buddhism in America. So what? It would just be some cultural artifact from India, or China, or Japan. Buddha is alive because Buddha goes beyond Buddha. And then he says, because earth, grasses, and trees, fences, and walls, tiles, and pebbles, all things in every direction in the universe carry out Buddha work.

[21:30]

So again, this is Dogen's kind of manifesto of how he understands what this zazen we're doing is about. It's not just, again, it's not just about, you know, some self-improvement or something. It's so vast. I mean, of course, it includes that, you know, you do this practice and there are personal benefits. This happens. But also, grasp the earth, the whole earth, the suffering earth. earth, this planet, and grasses, and trees, and not just the natural, so-called natural world, but fences and walls, tiles and pebbles, all things in every direction in the universe carry out Buddha work. What an idea. What does that mean? This is an astounding proclamation.

[22:38]

He's not trying to persuade you of this with some Western logic. He's just saying, this is what's happening. This is how he sees it. Everyone receives the benefit of wind and water, the phenomenal world, caused by dysfunctioning. And then here's this important phrase. All are imperceptibly helped by the wondrous and incomprehensible influence of Buddha to actualize the enlightenment or the awakening at hand. Enlightenment is not something somewhere else. It's right here. It's right at hand. This is what this practice is about. This is the teaching, the understanding, the actual practice of Buddhism that we're doing here. And yet, at first taste, I'm not asking you to believe this in some rational way, because how could you?

[23:49]

Or maybe you could. I don't know. But this is, he says, this wondrous and incomprehensible influence of Buddha. all are imperceptibly helped. So he's talking about our relationship with the environment, how we benefit the environment by paying attention, by facing the wall, by allowing the wall to face us, by sitting upright, by displaying the Buddha Mudra with our whole body and mind. Not only do we benefit the earth and grasses and trees, but somehow they influence us. They support us. This is an incredibly radical perspective.

[24:50]

And all space awakens. What does it mean? Or how can we, you know... We don't have to figure out what it means. I mean, it's not... It doesn't fit in our Western logic, but he says those who receive this extend the Buddha influence, a fundamental awakening, and all who live and talk with these people share somehow and universally unfold the boundless Buddha virtue. and circulate the inexhaustible, ceaseless, incomprehensible. We can't comprehend this. Immeasurable Buddhadharma. And he says we can't comprehend it. He says these various mutual influences do not mix into the perceptions of this person sitting, because they take place within stillness.

[25:51]

within settledness, within uprightness, without any fabrication, their awakening itself. He says, that which is associated with perceptions cannot be the standard of awakening, because deluded human sentiment cannot reach the standard of awakening. So I talked last Sunday about Genjo Koan. And in many places, Dogen talks about our limitations. Limitations of human perceptions, limitations of human intellectual understanding. It's not that those limitations are bad, but we're limited in how we can, that we can't see and feel how wonderful it is to actually just express the Buddha work and share in the Buddha work and support the Buddha work in the world.

[26:56]

Now, is this going to fix the suffering in the world? Is this going to fix the gun violence in Chicago? Is this going to fix the war in Syria? Well, maybe not. something happens through our willingness to be present and express this uprightness in our lives. And so I passed over He talks about this influences people around the Zazen person. And I've seen and heard examples of that.

[27:59]

Some of you sit at Rockefeller Chapel in Hyde Park. And one of the people who sits there mentioned one time that she was writing up elevator in her apartment building and one of her neighbors said to her, what have you been doing? Something's different. So there was some influence that her neighbor felt. And Billy was just coming regularly to Rockefeller Chapel. So we don't see it. Sometimes others see it in the way we express something.

[29:05]

So I want to have time for questions, responses. The last part, he goes on. Talks about the extensive Buddha work and the profound, subtle Buddha influence that are carried out. And again, the grass, trees, and earth affected by This functioning together radiate great brilliance and endlessly expound the deep wondrous dharma. And towards the end he says, all things are endowed with original practice within the original face, which is impossible to measure. So this is something that is available and happening and somehow, Dogen says, through what he has seen in his zazen, and what he is bringing back to Japan from China, this vision of what this practice is really about.

[30:21]

And again, he's maybe the most prolific of all zen teachers in China and Japan. There are some others who are pretty prolific as well, kind of feel like all of his writings are commentaries on this little piece here in some ways. So I could keep babbling, but I'll stop. Questions, comments, responses. I know this is hard to absorb or hard to, some of you have heard me talk about this before, but anyway, comments, questions, responses, please feel free. Yes, Wade. in the universe completely becomes enlightened? Yes. I feel like normally you would say completely becomes enlightened, instead of becomes enlightened. I'm wondering if you could gloss that. Well, yeah.

[31:25]

This is from a translation I did with Shohaku Okamura in the early 90s. And I would rephrase it now. So I might say it, all space in the universe completely is awakening, because all space in the universe completely is awakening others too. So, you know, English, this is a translation, and all translations are imperfect, even mine. But yeah, and I don't like the word enlightenment so much. I think awakening or liberation is a little better. Because enlightenment sounds like something you can get. So yeah, thank you for pointing that out. Yes, Brian. How kind of you.

[32:38]

Yeah. And at 7 a.m., I began sitting. And after one or two or three periods of Zazen, he becomes awake. So I'm thinking, you know, maybe there's a sense in which it's related to what we think of as the self. There's this thing that happens in Zazen where it's not just Brian and all these other objects.

[33:42]

It's this opening up where everything is me and I am everything. There's something that is pervasive about that nature. And maybe I'm more able after sitting to see Buddha nature manifested in Donald Trump's account. Well, you know, Duggan says very specifically that it's beyond our perceptions and ideas. So he's talking about something deeper than, you know, current events. Of course, it includes current events, but I think, you know, if we pick one person or one aspect of all the problems of the world now, you know, certain, you know,

[34:50]

there is also the karma of the world. This doesn't negate that. This doesn't negate all of the causes and conditions that led up to you know, the problems of America and the history of racism and the history of energy sources and fossil fuel and climate. You know, it's not something we can fix just by sitting Zazen for a period. But something is going on that is a wider context than what we can see. So that sentence about space awakening in the universe, I don't know what that means, but it means something. Again, I said, and it's true, I've been sitting with that sentence for decades. I confess I've been trying to get my head around it.

[35:56]

It's impossible. But I kind of feel like there's something about this that makes sense in a way to me. And yet I can't translate it to fixing some particular worldly problem. It doesn't work that way. But I also trust that there are lots of people and beings on this planet, let alone other planets, who are expressing goodwill and caring and concern, and that that makes a big difference. And I don't know how exactly, you know, how change happens is a very mysterious thing. So that's not necessarily I don't know if that helps your question. Yes, hi. Katie.

[36:57]

How do we separate enlightenment or awakening from individual perception? Because I think that that gets moved to the next point, from individual perception. Like, how do we separate those things, I guess? And also, I think maybe to rant, too, The thing that's being said is that when we sit, that there is not that there is an enlightenment of each individual, but that the space of time itself is conditioning. And so we don't have to go as far as Donald Trump, because that feels like an extreme. For my individual self, it seems But it seems like it's hard for me to understand how we move closer to awakening when it's all filtered through individual perception or mind.

[38:06]

Or like, maybe it's not, but it feels that way. Yeah. Even my attention to understanding this is filtered in that way. Yeah, so we all have individual causes and conditions, individual situations. So this, again, this is, I said it's not about self-help. It's not about personal liberation. Part of the point of this is our zazen is not just about our individual qualities. It's about how we are connected to something much wider and deeper. Now, when we start to open up to that, that is helpful to us. It's not just about me. And when we feel that, it's consoling in some ways.

[39:08]

All of my problems are in the context of something wider and deeper. master that have to do with all space. So it doesn't mean that we ignore our personal situations, but to see our life. So when we say, beings are numbless, I vow to free them, it's not that I can particularly take care of, you know, not just all the beings in the planet, but, you know, all the beings in Chicago or even all the beings on the north side or whatever. But how do we direct what we each, our own personal activity to seeing that in the context of something wider? I don't know if that. I think that you are speaking to what I'm asking, but I guess I'm more so asking how do we drop off body and mind.

[40:15]

Ah, oh good. I do, I think in some way I understand that Well, it's not not about that, but it's not only about that. Good. So dropping off body and mind, that phrase that Dogen uses a lot, He uses that as a phrase for Zazen, much more than just sitting, which we've heard. But dropping off body and mind and going beyond Buddha are phrases he uses a lot for this Zazen. Dropping off body and mind, again, it doesn't mean physical mutilation or lobotomy or something like that. It means letting go of our cherished ideas about this physical body, about our, who we think we are, our thinking.

[41:24]

So I was talking yesterday about the story about, actually the last two days, about the teacher in our lineage who was asked by a monk when he was sitting, was asked, what are you thinking of? And he says, I'm thinking of not thinking. And, well, how do you do that? And he says, beyond thinking. This kind of awareness that goes beyond thinking and beyond not thinking. It's a kind of underlying awareness. And that points towards the dropping mind part. And body and mind, of course, are not separate when we feel some ache in our shoulders. It's connected to mental tensions, too. So how do we let, so letting go, letting go of our ancient twisted karma, of our, of all of the stuff that we've been holding on to from a Buddhist perspective for many, many lifetimes.

[42:28]

You can understand that metaphorically if you want. How do we, how do we not, letting go doesn't mean ignoring. It means how do we take care of it but without, getting all jammed up by it. And that's, you know, that's practically speaking, you know, in terms of Zen practice, you know, he's talking about this as if this is something that happens, you know, he says, when one person does this even for a short time. It's all happening. From Dogen's perspective, that's actually, he says that, but practically speaking, for all of us, the process of doing Zazen regularly, numbers of times a week, and connecting with this process, There's a gradual side as well as the sudden side.

[43:32]

So time for maybe one more comment or question. Oh, Chris. So I'm about to walk into a trap here. But that's our life. We have to do that. Sometimes they're extra. In any case, I think it relates in this moment in that something I think I would like to caution against from my own saying is trying to approach this. I really love this phrase.

[44:35]

We have this tendency to immediately want to try to approach that in terms of words and ideas and perceptions, but the problem is that it's prior to that. He says it's untouchable, it's unreachable, because it's before, it's prior to ideas about it, so it's very difficult. The way you were talking about, for example, awakened versus awakening, I think they both miss the mark in different ways. In order for something to be awakened, it is receiving something. How could it possibly receive something? Yes.

[46:04]

All of this activity is prior to that thought. This original face that's talked about, it's another way of thinking of what is your face before your parents were born. Yet, before this parency becomes existence, it's already prior to that, it's already happening. Again, any more words than I say are just going to add more dust, but I think that helps. Okay. Well, thank you for all the dust. So thank you all for submitting yourself to this proclamation from Dogen. Please enjoy the rest of the day.

[46:51]

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