Good morning. So I want to talk this morning, as I guess I always do, about zazen and the dynamic transformative aspect of zazen, our sitting meditation practice. But also, it happens that today is the 40th anniversary of the assassination of John F. Kennedy. And maybe because of the time and because of my age, I was 13 years old then, reflecting on it this week, I realized that in many ways, I'm up here and I'm practicing Zen because of that event or in response to that event. And in some ways, my Zen practice and teaching is a direct response to that.

[01:01]

So for people who don't remember that event, the killing of John Kennedy was a deep shock in a way that I don't think you can understand if you don't remember it, but it was really just pulled the rug out of everybody's idea of what the world was. So for me, I think in the year afterwards, I started a process of very deep questioning of everything. So that led through existentialism and to the Quakers and pacifism and to involvement in the anti-Vietnam War movement and to psychedelicism and then reading a few books that existed at that time on Zen practice.

[02:14]

There were a handful or less. And all of that time, I could say I was searching for Zen. And I even made a trip to Japan and went around to send Buddhist temples in the old capital of Kyoto for a few months. And then I became a documentary filmmaker and worked in TV news, which kind of was born, in a way, with the response, with the event of John Kennedy's assassination. Anyway, finally I met my first teacher who was a Japanese Soto Zen priest in New York and for almost 13 years now I've been sitting Zazen every day after that. So we now know a lot of things about Jack Kennedy that nobody knew then. We know that he was a womanizer. an occult warrior, he was very slow to support the civil rights movement.

[03:19]

We also know now that he was in great pain most of the time. His health was very bad, which nobody knew then. Some people think he would have ended the Vietnam War more quickly. We just don't know. he was able to defuse the Cuban Missile Crisis and start a nuclear test ban treaty. And our government now is trying to promote usable nuclear weapons, on the contrary. In some ways, Thinking about John Kennedy's assassination, I also immediately think of several other killings that were maybe more consequential in some ways. Bobby Kennedy and Malcolm, John Lennon, Martin Luther King, Jr. So if any two of them had lived, I think this would be an extremely different world in many, many ways.

[04:24]

Anyway, here we are. But of course we don't know what those other parallel universes would be like. But within the year before he was killed, Bobby Kennedy had what seems to me now in retrospect was a great conversion. He had been a kind of tough guy lawyer and worked for Senator McCarthy, of McCarthyism. But he had become a good friend of Cesar Chavez, who was a great spiritual activist. And Malcolm also had gone through a great conversion through Islam and through visiting Mecca to seeing that he didn't have to hate all white people. Anyway, we probably will never know who killed the Kennedys. Despite what the pundits on the various mass media networks are saying now, if you look at all the evidence and the nine directions that Oswald's boat would have had to travel or whatever and all the people who were, all the potential witnesses who died mysteriously shortly thereafter, it doesn't seem very likely that

[05:50]

that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone, but who knows. So our Zen practice, one of the essential aspects of our Zen practice is to just live upright within questioning, to be able to live with questions, all kinds of questions. What is our world now? Who are we now? Big and little questions. And it's not about getting some answer either. So it's OK that I'll never know who killed the Kennedys. I can live with that. And yet, I live with that as a question. And of course, many other questions. And I probably haven't thought about that question so much. But today, it comes up. So I was going to say, if you think Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone, I have a bridge that goes to the East Bay that I'd like to sell you.

[06:56]

But anyway, the main thing I want to recall today, though, is why it was such a shock and what the difference was. And it wasn't exactly in anything that John Kennedy did. But he spoke. quite eloquently, to my generation's hope and idealism. He inspired and challenged people to act from that, to believe that America meant something and that this could be a better world. So maybe those of you who don't remember him can't understand really believing in the American dream with intelligence and with a sense of possibilities. So the feeling before John Kennedy was shot in much of the country was about hope.

[07:59]

And individuals felt their life was about hope and possibility. And today I think our dominant feeling in this country is fear. So I want to talk about hope and fear today and how we practice with hope and fear and other delusions. So the expression I've been using most recently to talk about the practice of zazen and the practice of hope and fear is a writing by the founder of Soto Zen, this branch of Zen in Japan named Dogen, who lived in the 13th century.

[09:04]

And I've translated many of his writings, but this writing is something I translated with Kastanahashi, called The Awesome Presence of Active Buddhas, or Gyōbutsu-igi in Japanese. So this is about active Buddhas. It could be translated practicing Buddhas. It's about what is the active aspect of our Buddha mind, our Zazen mind, are turning towards awakening. Buddha just means the awakened one. What is the active Buddha? So Dogen says that all Buddhas are active Buddhas. He said this is not about some particular kind of Buddha, but that actually there are no Buddhas except active Buddhas. So you might think that this old Gandharva, beautiful Buddha statue, ancient, ancient statue here in this Buddha hall is made of stone.

[10:09]

And you might think it is dead. And if so, then it's not an act of Buddha and we should just throw it away. But actually, I think it's an act of Buddha. If any of you are inspired by it or look at it and see the possibility of just sitting upright, then it is an active Buddha acting in this world. So Dogen says in this writing that it's not true that only humans, only human beings can be active Buddhas. He also says that what marks active Buddhas, the activity of active Buddhas, is what we translated somewhat flamboyantly as awesome presence. It also could be translated as just dignified manner, dignity. So active Buddha is not about understanding something.

[11:19]

Active Buddha is about a way of being, a kind of presence. We could say a majestic or awesome or dignified presence. So Dogen says, know that Buddhas in the Buddha way do not wait for awakening. So there are various spiritual practices which might get you something. that might lead to something, that we think if we sit long enough, well enough, if we study enough, that then eventually at some point in the future there will be this thing called awakening, Bodhi, enlightenment, however you want to say it. But fundamental to this practice in this tradition from Dogen and that we do here from Suzuki Hiroshi is the sense that this practice is the practice of awakening, that there's no separation between practice and awakening, that whatever first led you to try to do such a strange thing as just sitting upright and breathing and being present and watching reality arise,

[12:33]

Right there, in that first impulse, is awakening. Or if this is your first time here, and you just had your first Zazen instruction today. Just something in the first thought about, oh, I'm going to go to Zen Center and hear what they have to say. For some reason, if you're here, this is about you. And we don't wait for awakening, because there's no practice that's not the practice of awakening. And there's also no awakening or enlightenment that's not put into practice. If there was, then it would be just some abstract idea. It would not make any difference in the world. It would not matter to your life. If there was some awakening that would happen at some time in the future or some time in the past, or if, you know, anyway, it's here now, or else it's not at all. Now, of course, everything that's ever happened and everything that ever will happen in some ways is here now.

[13:39]

So I'm talking about something that happened 40 years ago. and yet it still affects us now. So Dogen continues and says, know that Buddhas in the Buddha way do not wait for awakening. Active Buddhas, only active Buddhas, fully experience the vital process on the path of going beyond Buddha. So this is a vital process. This is a path. This is something we experience. It's not about understanding. So some of you read Dogen and are confused and think you can't understand him. And that's not the point. It's not that it's impossible to have some understanding or even a very good understanding, but the point isn't about getting a hold of some answer. Can you fully experience the vital process on the path of going beyond Buddha? So not only are Buddhas active Buddhas, but Buddhas are always going beyond Buddha.

[14:46]

If you have some realization of Buddha, that's great. But then what are you going to do when you get up from your cushion? What are you going to do next week? Active Buddhas are constantly going beyond. whatever Buddha is right now. This is a vital process. This is a dynamic, active, creative practice. So we don't know what Zen is in America in the 21st century. We're making it up. In each moment that we inhale and exhale and try and see, how do I take care of this world in a way that comes from my own experience of this vital process? How do we keep turning back and taking refuge in this awakening mind that we get some taste of, some glimpse of, in our Sazen practice?

[15:50]

So we make it up as we go, but of course we have this tradition. So I'm reading words from a 13th century Japanese guy, and here we have a statue of somebody who lived in India 2,500 years ago, and yet they're active Buddhas right now. Otherwise, there'd be no point in talking about them or reading their words. Because active Buddhas manifest awesome presence or dignified manner in every situation, they bring forth this awesome presence with their body. This is something physically that we do. It's not about some idea or some abstraction. How do we actually put into action in the world in our own lives, in our own hearts, in our own society, this dignified presence, this possibility of great dignity. So thus, these active Buddhas, in their transformative function, their transformative functions flows out in their speech, reaching throughout time, space, Buddhas, and activities.

[17:11]

So even though this is not about getting some understanding or reaching some particular state of mind or state of being, this reality of this active process of active Buddhas, of the creativity of our zazen and our practice, has a transformative function. It does have an effect. in our own lives and in the lives of those we know, the people around us, and also in the world. And we often can't see that. And yet, there is this transformative function. And if you sit for a while or you know somebody who sat for a while, maybe you can see something going on. And it's not something that we can name necessarily. We can't control it or define it or take a picture of it and put it up on the wall.

[18:19]

And yet, something's going on. Something's happening. And we don't know what it is. So Dogen also says, this awesome presence or this dignified presence of active Buddhas right now is beyond obstruction. Totally encompassed by Buddhas, active Buddhas are free from obstruction as they penetrate the vital path of being splattered by mud and soaked in water. So I will stop to soak my throat in water. So this zazen is not something, this vital path is not something that happens just on our cushion.

[19:20]

Active Buddhas penetrate the vital path of being splattered by mud and soaked in water. The vital path of considering the problems of the world, considering the problems on my own cushion, considering the suffering of friends and family and people around us. So active Buddhas are active because they're willing to be splattered by mud and soaked in water to come back from this awesome presence and to bring this awesome presence back into our ordinary everyday activity. So again, an important point is that not that we have some fixed understanding of this, but that we learn how to play with it.

[20:31]

we give ourselves to the activity of active Buddhas, that we get out of the way of the transformative function, that we find our own particular way, and each of us has our own way, of expressing this dignified presence. So it's not about copying some great Zen teacher. It's about how can you be you? So it's not something that we have to force or, again, not that we have to understand or figure out. But thoroughly practicing, as Dogen says, thoroughly clarifying is not forced. It is just like recognizing the shadow of deluded thought and turning the light to shine within. So this turning the light to shine within is the basic instruction in our zazen practice, just to turn our attention within, to see how it feels to be sitting upright, taking the position of a Buddha.

[21:52]

Breathing, feeling thoughts arise, feelings arise, sounds of the cars driving by, the colors on the wall in front of you or whatever. We turn the light to shine within and feel it and how it feels in our back, our shoulders, and our knees, in our sadness, and in our fear, and in our hopes. Turn the light to shine within. This is the practice that we do on our cushions. Jogend goes on, the clarity of clarity beyond clarity prevails in the activity of Buddhas. This is totally surrendering to practice. So totally surrendering to this practice has to do with just trusting, beyond clarity. It's okay to not know who killed the Kennedys. It's okay to not know. how my life is going to be next year or next week.

[22:56]

It's okay to not know how to take care of the problem that you are sitting with today, whether it's your own problem or your friend's problem or the world's problem. It's okay. And yet we can trust that this clarity of clarity beyond clarity prevails in our activity and the activity of active Buddhas. That's what it means to totally surrender to practice, to take care of the world, to take care of our sitting cushion, and our house, and our friends, and our family, and to trust something beyond our understanding. And we can be clear about this. We can trust this. We can feel our hearts open to this clarity beyond clarity. So our Zazen mind is dynamic, creative, active.

[24:00]

And it's expressed most fully just in acting with dignity. So we emphasize posture and we emphasize forms. in Zen practice and in Zen training. But it's not about getting the forms right. It's not about being perfect. It's not about doing it right as opposed to doing it wrong. Those are just ways of seeing this possibility of presence. So when you learn the forms, they're just tools to see how do we carry ourselves with this dignified presence in the middle of this period, in the middle of this life. And then again, it's not just studying it in ourselves. So on our cushions we see how it feels. We study this presence. Let go a little bit of our ideas of ourself, and we also do that by studying ourselves, by being very familiar with the kinds of habits and patterns and thoughts and feelings that do come up in this body, in this mind.

[25:13]

But it happens on three levels. It happens on our cushion, and then when we get up from our cushion, when we go out and do our life with our coworkers, our family, our friends, all the people around us throughout the week. So somehow our practice is expressed. We don't have to think about it and walk around and try and be little zenies or something. Just by naturally being able to feel this dignity, this possibility of being present in our life, of not running away from our life. Something happens, and it does get communicated, and we can interact with the problems that we have with family, friends, coworkers, and so on. So that's the second level. And the third level is the society as a whole. So I believe that our spiritual values and our precepts apply not just to what happens on our cushion or in our week-to-week life, but also that they have something to say to our society and to our world and to our country.

[26:28]

So Jefferson, Tom Jefferson, introduced this idea of the separation of church and state. But he never meant that to be that we don't apply moral values or ethical values or spiritual values to what's going on in our country. What he meant was that there should not be one version of spiritual values that's imposed on everybody. He meant this to, And it has been the established principle of this country that there's no one right way for you to express your spiritual values, that you don't have to do it the way, I don't know, whoever, the Pope or the Dalai Lama or John Ashcroft or whoever says you should do it. So maybe the fact that I used to work in TV news relates to my willingness to speak about current events from the Dharmacy compared to many of my Zen teacher colleagues.

[27:39]

But I do believe that our teaching applies to our practice in the world, not just on our Christians. They're not separate. We don't wait for awakening to express this dignified presence, this ability to sit upright and face our lives in the world. So I want to come back to this problem of practice with hope and with fear and the difference between the two. So I think the most important thing about John Kennedy and the most shocking thing about his being killed was that he spoke so inspiringly to the people around him, to his country, about hope and about idealism. And that's kind of out of fashion now. So I feel like I have to say that today's government, instead of trying to inspire hope, tries to encourage fear.

[28:49]

And we have endless terror alerts. This isn't about politics, but for me it's about precepts and my responsibility to speak the truth about what's going on and to support non-killing and non-lying and non-thievery. So I feel like this, I believe and many historians believe that this current government is the most corrupt in American history. Of course, it's not only our government, it's the culture of greed and corruption in our corporations, in the stock exchange, in many places in the world, in our business life. So this fear has to do with the greed and the fear in our own hearts. And my disclaimer, which I try to say now whenever I talk about this, is that honestly, I do not hate George Bush or Mr. Cheney.

[29:50]

I really don't. I personally wish them well. I wish they would find the path to become Buddhists. But I am appalled at their actions and policies. So I feel that I have to say a little bit. Just the most recent examples this week, the current proposed energy bill promotes pollution in many ways and it gives away, I've heard, $23.5 billion or $26 billion to energy corporations. And this is not a matter of Republican or Democrat. It really isn't. There are plenty of Democrats who have supported this government, and there are many honest Republicans, like Senator John McCain, who voted against this bill because he called it the leave no lobbyist behind bill. And there's actually hope because yesterday, thanks to a filibuster from Democrat and Republican senators, the bill installed and they're going to try and bring it up again.

[30:55]

But it's really incredibly corrupt and will increase pollution. And of course, all of this increases the incredible disparity of resources in our culture and our society now. And I don't feel like I can not talk about that when I know so many good people are out of work. And then again just this week, I was reminded of John Kennedy when he was president going to Berlin. And this was at the height of the Cold War. And he went to West Berlin in front of the wall and said, I am a Berliner. So this week, George Bush went to London to promote the Halliburton War, the Iraq War, whatever it is. And the US government formally requested of the British government that Bush's entourage of 700, or maybe it was just the 250 armed guards, be given total immunity before the fact if they shot any British protesters.

[32:09]

So I don't know that that was reported, that any of you heard that, but that was a formal US government request. So unlike John Kennedy speaking of hope in the world, the arrogance of our government alienates all of our friends. And the mayor of London said that he believed that George Bush was the greatest threat against life on Earth in history. So anyway, what do we do about this? So I talk about this here because we're dedicated to this practice of dignified presence. And all of you, through the practice of zazen, are connected with this transformative function. So what do we do? I want to say that there's not one right thing to do, that each of us has our own way to respond from our own sense of our own dignified presence.

[33:17]

And for some people, it might be calling your senator and saying, please don't vote for that energy bill. For some people, it might be just sitting and being aware of the problems of the world and feeling that wish, may all beings be happy. which is what Buddhism is about, really. May all beings be happy. So what do we do with this hope and fear? How do we face them? Technically, from the point of view of Buddhism, they're both delusions. They're both about things that might happen in the future. They're not about this present right now. So whatever it is that you're afraid of, whether it's losing your job or the terrorists or our government or something more personal, that's not happening right now.

[34:28]

Right now you're just sitting here listening to me babble about the dharma. And yet, that fear about something happening in the future, that's here. That could be here. But what you're afraid of is not here. It's just something that might happen. And the same thing with our hopes. We might hope for a return of hope and idealism to our country. But that would be something that would happen in the future. The fact that I can hope for it now means that it's a possibility here, that it's part of our present. And just as the imaginary things we fear in the future, our fear of them is right here. So I think the practice is that we face those. both fear and hope. So my good friend Lou Hartman used to say anyway, I don't know if he says it these days, but he used to say that there should be a sign over the Zendo that says, abandon all hope you who enter here.

[35:41]

Okay, so yes, the hope that we have now is a delusion. But I want to respectfully disagree. I think in our practice of true dignified presence, we are willing to face everything. Sometimes a little bit at a time. Sometimes you need to take a break from facing reality. Sometimes it's just too much. and you need to go to the movies or, depending on what movie it is, or go for a walk or take a little break, get up for kin-hin. But our practice is not exactly to abandon hope, but to see what is that hope. Because the transformative function of hope is that we see. our aspirations, our dreams, our thoughts of the possibilities.

[36:58]

And based on those hopes, we might actually get up from our cushion and do something. We might actually smile at somebody. We might actually say a kind word to somebody we've been having a hard time with. I don't know. You might call your senator. You might, um, who knows what you would do. There's no one right thing to do. Whatever you do, can you bring your dignified presence, your uprightness, your courage to face your hopes? Then our hope becomes part of transformative function. The same thing with our fears. So in some ways, of course, both fear and hope are fantasies. But if that's what's happening right now, use your imagination.

[38:04]

As John Lennon said, you might say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one. So we have to face our fantasies about the future, our fears and our hopes. If we try and run away from them, they'll come up and bite us in the back. We do have hopes and we do have fears. And I think that in some ways, acting on our hopes is part of our practice. So, to say a little bit about fear, you know, we all have fears too. And the practice is not about being fearless. Awesome presence is not about being fearless. Courage is about facing our fears. Courage is about being willing to just sit upright in the middle of this fear.

[39:12]

And this one. To look at it. Again, it's not about figuring anything out. It's just, can I bring my dignified presence, my Zazen mind, to this sphere? And then we're slow to act. We don't react. We respond when we see something that we can do. So, you know, it's always safe to sit. You're probably not going to hurt anybody too much by just sitting Zazen. And if you're careful about your knees and your back and so forth, you probably won't hurt yourself either. How can we not be afraid of our fears? This is the practice of fear. To be willing to be afraid. To be willing to tell your friend, I'm afraid. To be willing to acknowledge it to yourself, first of all. It's okay to be afraid. It means you're a human being.

[40:13]

But I think it's also that also we have to not be afraid to hope. It's a delusion, of course. But that's our practice. Our practice is to enter the mud and the water of the wonderful delusions of our life, including hopes and fears. So I think, you know, maybe we should have the sign say, don't get fooled by your hopes. But I would look at them, too. Anyway, that's what John Kennedy was about. And, of course, we could say, well, look what happened to him. But I think it's possible to have hope as the basis even of our Zazen practice without being sentimental, without having illusions, without also turning away from the reality of our own and the world's human greed and pettiness.

[41:28]

You might say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one. Things happen. We don't understand this transformative function. We don't know how things suddenly change in our life. Suddenly, one Saturday morning, you get up and decide to go and hear a Zen talk at Zen Center. Who knows how this happens? We fall in love. Who knows how this happens? It's not rational. The transformative function is working. in our life and in our world, when we're willing to express and share and meet our own dignified presence. And things happen in the world too. So that wall that John Kennedy stood next to, suddenly the Berlin Wall came down many, many years later. It seems suddenly. A few months before, nobody could have predicted it.

[42:34]

So how did that happen? We don't know. Many causes and conditions, probably including whatever John Kennedy did. Many things. Suddenly, in a way that no one could have predicted, apartheid entered in South Africa relatively peacefully. How did that happen? This transformative function works beyond our ideas. Suddenly, the Soviet Union dissolved relatively peacefully. The Cold War was over. How did that happen? We don't know. So our Buddhist practice is based on the idea of Buddha nature. This practice in the Bodhisattva way is about the universal liberation of all sentient beings. It seems impossible. You might say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one.

[43:41]

We have in our country this ideal of liberty and justice for all. Not so different from the first Bodhisattva vow. So, this idea of Buddha nature is that all beings, everyone has this potential to see this possibility of dignified, awesome presence right now. Everybody has the possibility of finding their own way of practicing this and expressing it and sharing it and making it part of the transformative function of the world. Yes, we have fears and hopes and greed and massive corruption and confusion and so forth.

[44:44]

And yet there's this possibility which some part of each of you has recognized, or else you wouldn't be in this room. And things do change. Everything changes. So the last thing is also that we must face sadness and regret. So I don't know what the world would be like if John Kennedy hadn't been killed 40 years ago. I know I wouldn't be sitting here. Just a closing word from Mr. Dogen.

[45:52]

He says, while the everyday activities of active Buddhas invariably allow Buddhas to practice, active Buddhas allow everyday activities to practice. This is to abandon your body for dharma, to abandon dharma for your body. This is to give up holding back your life and to hold on fully to your life. This awesome presence not only lets go of dharma for the sake of dharma, but also lets go of the dharma for the sake of mind. Do not forget that this letting go is immeasurable. So when we're willing to fully meet our life, we can let go of holding on to our ideas of how it should be. We can allow the transformative function to work in us and in our world. And we can allow everyday activities to practice. So when you bring this dignified presence to ordinary, everyday activities in your life, they become practice.

[47:11]

So we don't know how the world transforms, but just by bringing our own deepest sense of dignity and kindness and caring and attention and hopes and fears and facing our hopes and fears to our life, something happens. So please continue doing this.

[47:40]

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