So, the Mahayana, the earliest Mahayana texts that we have that were written down aren't much earlier, aren't much later than the earliest Theravada texts. So we don't really know so much about the early history, but anyway there was this kind of shift from this meditating to work on oneself to Mahayana way which was the idea of the Bodhisattva working to awaken everyone, but actually Mahayana includes the other one. So the Bodhisattva ideal includes also that part of that is working on oneself. And the mastercism was also important in Mahayana. But Mahayana had some more emphasis on lay people actually practicing. So anyway, that's... Well, they're all the middle way. All of Buddhism is the middle way, but where the middle is is different in different traditions.

[01:01]

Everywhere from the Theravada monastics meditating under trees, and I saw it when I was in Thailand last January, I went and visited a Thai monastery there, wonderful, wonderful people, but they had these little huts for the monks to meditate in and they were on stilts about this high and they were literally about five feet long and about three feet wide and about three or four feet high, so you couldn't stand up. So this was where the monks would spend their time sitting and sleeping. So anyway, it's a, yeah, yeah, so anyway, I forget what the question was. Anyway, this is... So Zen is a branch of Mahayana, but this includes a lot of the great Indian Mahayana teachers. Anyway, the point is that there are these Zen stories, so which are particular to this, to the Zen tradition.

[02:02]

And up to the sixth, all of the Zen that survives up to the sixth is the same lineage up to the sixth ancestor. What we're going to start with tonight is there were two main disciples of the sixth ancestor and then many more after that. So this particular lineage is the one that went to Dogan and then to Suzuki Roshi. No, after the sixth ancestor, they stopped, they stopped. And that was specifically because, well, there were too many, at that point, there were too many different teachers and more lineages spread out. And later on, they developed into, they call them five houses in China. So the Soto, which starts with Tozan, and that's, we're going to go from the sixth ancestor to Tozan in these talks. That's the Soto, or Dong, Cao Dong is how you say it in Chinese. That was one of the five.

[03:04]

Rinzai was another one of the five. Eventually they all just, the other ones combined into Rinzai, and that was just Rinzai and Soto. What about Tendai? Tendai? Yeah, that was, that was not Zen. That's another brand, that's a, that's another form of Chinese Buddhism that tried to combine all of the different Buddha's teachings. And that was the background in Japan out of which Dogan and other Japanese 13th century movements started. So anyway, I don't know how much of all this history you want. I'm happy to talk about it, but I wanted to talk about the stories and what they mean in terms of our own practice. But you know, I mean, I think, I mean, I'm personally very interested in Buddhist history and find it fascinating. But you know, I don't necessarily think that everybody is, and it's okay if you're not. But I'm happy to talk about it.

[04:06]

But, and we can come back to that, but let me say a little bit about Sagan Gyoshi. And there's not as much to say about him as there is about actually the others that we're going to talk about. We don't know so much about him. But he was a student of the sixth ancestor. And in this, I'm mostly for this, for these talks using this book called Transmission of Light. There's a couple of translations of it. And this is by, this was written by the fourth ancestor in Japan in this lineage. So Dogen is down from Sagan Gyoshi, one, two, three, four, five, six lines. So Tendon Yojo is the Japanese name of his Chinese teacher, Ehei Dogen, whose chant, we just chant, we chanted before the ancestors, one of his chants. We chanted a number of his things. He brought it from China, Japan, to Japan, he was a Japanese monk. And then next was Koen Ejo, Tetsubikai, and Keizan Jokin is also very important.

[05:06]

And so this book was written by Keizan Jokin. He founded the other main training monastery in Japan. And he goes through this list. And there's some, you know, we don't know, you know, the whole thing, the other thing about history, just to say this, is that historians try and look at what can actually be documented from other sources. There obviously was some oral tradition too. And a big part of what the monks did was memorize chants and memorize stories. And so there was this kind of oral tradition in all religions, you know, before they had printing and before there was a lot of writing. In Europe too, monks memorized texts and kept them alive through memorizing and reciting and chanting them. So that's part of the function of chanting is to remember it in a different way. Anyway, so there are these stories and he has these stories that go back from these

[06:06]

particular people. So I don't know. Anyway, but the story about the sixth ancestor, after he became the sixth ancestor, Hui Neng, and Seigen Gyoshi is the Japanese name. In Chinese, it's Ching Yuan Xing Si. So I'm going to say Ching Yuan and that means Seigen Gyoshi. He's the first one in our lineage after the sixth ancestor. So he went to study with Hui Neng and he asked him, what work is to be done so as not to fall into stages? So most of these, each of these generations, each of these stories of generations starts with a meeting between the teacher and the student and it's usually the key meeting and often it's the first meeting. In the tradition, when monks were traveling around visiting teachers, they'd come to a monastery and the first thing they'd do would go and see the abbot, see the teacher and there'd be some discussion. So Ching Yuan came to Hui Neng and he said, what work is to be done so as not to fall

[07:07]

into stages? And Hui Neng inquired, what have you done? Bless you. Ching Yuan said, I do not even practice the holy truths. Hui Neng said, what stage do you fall into? Ching Yuan said, if I do not even practice the holy truths, what stages are there? Hui Neng recognized his profound capacity. So that's the story. And there's some other little commentary on it which I might get to, but this basic issue is particular, very particular actually to the Soto lineage in a lot of ways. What work is to be done so as not to fall into stages? So in Buddhism, in many forms of Buddhism, there is a map of the path, actually the fourth noble truth. When he says I do not even practice the holy truths, I'm not sure but he might be talking

[08:09]

about the four noble truths. Do you all know those? These are from early Buddhism. The first is that there is suffering. And we can say suffering, but it also, it just means things are not satisfactory. Things aren't what we think they should be. We have things we don't want. We have terrorists and we have all kinds of terrible things that we don't want. And we have things we want that we don't have. So this is the basic fundamental situation, this existential situation. That's the first noble truth. The second is that there's a reason for it. There's a cause of the suffering and it has to do with our desires and our grasping after our objects of desires and the things we want, the things we think will make us happy. So it's, but it's not irrational. There is a cause. And everything we do has results. So there is a kind of lawfulness. There is some order to it.

[09:10]

We can't see it all because it's so complex, but it's there. The third noble truth is that there's an end to suffering. And this doesn't mean that there's an end to old age, sickness, and death, but it means that there's an end to our suffering about it. There's an end to our unhappiness about it. There's an end to our being caught by our conditioning and our grasping. And then the fourth noble truth relates particularly to this issue because it's the path, the eightfold path. So that's things like right effort and right view and right livelihood and right action and right meditation, right, right, right. But in Buddhism, there are many different systems of stages and models of paths. And if you do the practice, you do this thing, and then at some point, you're ready to do this thing. And there are ways, you know, in Mahayana Buddhism, too, there's ways, there's 52 stages

[10:12]

of Bodhisattva practice, and there's 10 stages, and there's all these different models. And they each have associated with them particular practices sometimes. So there are practices that you can do that have to do with stages. This is kind of fundamental to Buddhism. And yet what this guy is saying to the sixth ancestor, and just to go back to the sixth ancestor, what he said when the story about the sixth ancestor is that this other guy at the fifth ancestors who was considered to be the head monk there, wrote this poem about his understanding that the mind is like a mirror, the body is like the Bodhi tree, we must wipe it clean so that no dust lights on the mirror. And the sixth ancestor, Huining, who became the sixth ancestor, said that Bodhi is basically not a tree, the mirror is not a stand, fundamentally there is not a single thing, where can the

[11:15]

dust ever go? So this radical emptiness is the teaching of the sixth ancestor. But now Ching Yuan, or Sagan Gyoshi, is talking about that in terms of our practice, our actual practice. So this is kind of difficult, and this is the basis, actually, of this idea that we have in Sotus that I'm just sitting. So maybe all of you, in one way or another at different times, have asked me for techniques. How do I practice? How do I know I'm practicing? What should I do now? And what Sagan Gyoshi, or Ching Yuan, is saying is something that goes beyond all of that. He's talking about really just being here and being awake. And it's hard to do that because we want some program. We want some technique, we want some method, we want something that makes sense to us,

[12:19]

and we can figure out, and then we can also figure out where we're at in the, how high are we in the, because we have some idea of spiritual practices about getting high, actually. In my generation, we came from getting high in other ways to spiritual practice. So we wanted to, and I think our consumerist society also is about when people in our society come to do spiritual practice, we want some practice that will get us somewhere. We want to get enlightenment, we want to get something that we can measure and assess and know where we're at on the chart. And this is saying something that's pretty radical, and that's other than that. I hasten to add that I think that one can do this, and in the context of this, actually do use techniques. So I do actually give people breathing techniques

[13:26]

or koans or ways of practice, specific instructions and techniques almost, and there are practices that we can do, but in this Sotalini is, basically this is the background. There's no stages. There's nothing to practice. He doesn't even practice the Holy Truth. He doesn't practice. So this whole question of falling into stages, falling into partiality, partly has to do with recognizing the immediacy of just this, and we'll talk about that when we get to Dongshan or Tozan, the founder of Sotalini, he goes into it more. But there's this sense of really being present in our lives beyond any categories, beyond any qualification, beyond trying to figure out which box to put ourselves in, which box we're moving through.

[14:29]

All of those things are kind of skillful means. They can be used at times. At times, they're helpful. But fundamentally, Tsingyuan is saying, if I do not even practice the Holy Truth, what stages are there? And the sixth ancestor recognized that. So I'll read a little bit about what Keizan says about this story. So this is all just commentary now. Tsingyuan became a monk as a boy and used to keep silent during discussions of the way. Subsequently, he heard of the teaching of Zen master Huineng and went there to study. He asked, what is to be done so as not to fall into stages? And the Zen master recognized his profound capacity. Although Huineng had many disciples, Tsingyuan was the foremost. It was the same as when Bodhidharma said that Huike had attained his marrow. That's the second ancestor. Even though Huike said nothing in response to a question about what he had realized. So that's referring to another story. Bodhidharma had four main disciples.

[15:34]

And I don't remember their other names, but they're in some of the stories. One of them was a nun, so there were women teachers all along. But one of them, Huike, he asked them to say, to express their understanding. And three of them did various things, all of which were good. But then Huike just came and did a prostration and went back to where he was. Went back to his seat. And Bodhidharma said to them, you have my skin, you have my flesh, you have my bones, you have my marrow. And Huike was the one who had the marrow. But then Dogen later on said, they're not four different stages. They all completely have Bodhidharma's skin or Bodhidharma's flesh or Bodhidharma's bone or Bodhidharma's marrow. But traditionally it was understood as different levels. Anyway, that's what that story is about, what that reference is about. And it's just a way of, Keizan is just praising

[16:37]

Qingyuan there. And actually there was another main disciple from whom the Rinzai lineage came who was also great. Anyway, one day the Zen master Huineng said to Qingyuan, since ancient times the robe and the teaching have been passed on together from teacher to apprentice. The robe represents faith while the teaching stamps the mind. Now that I have found suitable people, why worry that they will not be believed? Ever since I received the robe of this being the sixth ancestor, I have had a lot of trouble and there will surely be even more competitiveness in later generations. Therefore the robe will be left in this monastery as a keepsake. You should spread the teaching and not let it die out. So that's the answer to the question about whether he was the seventh ancestor. There's no more numbers after that. There are just many of them. Qingyuan's practice refraining from discussion of the way with others, keeping silent was truly extraordinary. With this power of directed attention, he asked Zen

[17:39]

master Huineng, what work does not fall on stages? He truly had subtle insight and was free from contrivance. So this thing about silence, you know, we sit silently, we just sit. And silence is a kind of way of seeing what's beyond, this beyond stages. And Keizan praises Qingyuan for his practice of silence, which is interesting. In some ways, Shakyamuni Buddha is said to have taught through silence. Sometimes he emitted light from his forehead or, you know, other people would speak for him. The great Bodhisattvas would speak for him. But the sitting in silence is really important to this idea of, or this practice, this awareness of going beyond stages. So just to note that Keizan does. So Huineng wanted him to arrive at realization

[18:45]

quickly, so he asked him what he had done. So this goes back to the story when Qingyuan said, what should I do to not fall into stages? And Huineng said, what have you done? What have you been doing? Qingyuan's acuity manifested itself as he replied that he did not even practice the holy truths. This is hearing what is hard to hear, meeting what is hard to meet. Even if contrivance ends, there is still some preservation of the self. If you are like this, you make the mistake of falling into the deep pit of liberation. So this state has always been called religious attachment. Yunmen referred to it as the two kinds of sickness of the spiritual body. So what he's talking about there is that holding on to no stages, holding on to emptiness can become a stage, can become a thing. So

[19:47]

when Huineng said himself, not a single thing exists, that also doesn't exist. So this is kind of subtle and it's hard to see how this fits into this idea of not falling into stages. But the first part of the dialogue he's kind of establishing is not falling into stages. And then when Huineng says, what stage do you fall, what do you do? He says, I do not even practice the holy truths. It's moving him out of this kind of attachment to emptiness. So even if you practice, even if you can stand, even if you can practice, even if you can to just sit and come and do Zazen for 40 minutes without any idea of what you're doing or that you're even doing anything or that there's some particular practice you're doing or that there's something you're going to get out of it, at some point you have to come

[20:51]

out of that too. It doesn't mean that you fall into stages, but you're willing to engage in the fact that there's also stages. So this is this two sides of our reality that we're always dancing between. This one side is really, you know, it's kind of scary. It's like this steep cliff. It's like the wall that you face. It's like total aloneness. It's that from the beginning, not a single thing exists. No stages. There's nothing to get. There's nowhere to go. Here we are. This is it. Just this is it. And then as we're willing to face that, and it takes sometimes, you know, and we've all faced it actually, but it can take, one can spend years, Bodhidharma said to have spent years in meditation. You can

[21:54]

spend nine years facing the wall in a cave in northern China. One can spend years refining that and clarifying that and really developing the willingness to actually meet the reality of our lives, where not a single thing exists. Even so, one has to come, not be caught in that as a thing, but actually deal with the conventional realities of our life. So, what Quezon is saying is that Hui Neng pulled him out of being attached to that emptiness by asking him what he had done. And even though he said, I've not even done the holy, not even practiced the holy truth, that's kind of coming back into being willing to practice. So, he's not falling, so it's kind of subtle. He's not falling into stages, and yet he's

[22:59]

willing to be alive. So, there's one of the dangers, and I don't think this happens so much for lay people. It's one of the advantages of lay practice. But if you go into a monastery or if you go sit for seven days in Sashina, you can really get pretty deeply into, you can really experience this wall, this not a single thing exists, this stageless total awareness. And it can be very seductive, and it can be very blissful, and you can get attached to that. And that's already falling into stages. So, if you fall into not falling into stages, that's kind of, you get kind of caught in the stage there. So, this is kind of tricky

[24:03]

and subtle. And the point is, again, how do we practice and not be caught by feeling like we're a beginner, or feeling like we've actually learned something in our practice, or feeling. Some of you are pretty settled in your practice already. Some of you have actually, actually all of you have some strength in your sitting, very clearly. But then, that's a little dangerous because you might think that, oh, I've gotten to this stage. At the same time, you actually have to do your life, and you wind up here on a Wednesday night sometimes, or if you sit at home, whatever you do, there's the particulars of it, too. This is kind of subtle. Maybe that's enough for me to say, except I'll read Khezon's final, let me just read a couple more things that Khezon says about this.

[25:03]

In the twelfth book of the Mahabharanirvana Sutra, it says, although innumerable saints fully practice the six ways of transcendence and the ten stages of enlightenment, they still cannot see their inherent Buddha nature. Therefore, the Buddha has said that they lack perception. Thus, even if the state of saints has reached the tenth stage, they still do not clearly know or see the Buddha nature. How much less can disciples or conditionally awakened people see it? This is also in the sutra itself, talking about stages. There's this ten stages, and the ten stages, just short of being a Buddha, almost the same awareness of a Buddha, but not fully a Buddha yet. He's talking about very high beings, and yet in the sutra it says they don't see the Buddha nature. Zen is talking about how we start to express Buddha right now, even in our baby stages. We can see the stages, we can see

[26:10]

the stages too. This is why Sukhya Rishi talked about beginner's mind, because it's coming back to not having attained anything, no stage, just beginner. It's like Buddha. So, Kesan says, without relying on seeing and hearing, not being involved in knowing objects, try to see what is underneath. There will be an alert, awake knowledge that is not gotten from others. You will unexpectedly have spontaneous realization. So this is this awareness that is very close to us when we're just willing to just be here, and not try and make it into a stage. No, it's much deeper than epiphany. It comes out of the ground. It's not an idea. It's something that we experience in our muscles and cells, and maybe we experience

[27:11]

it in our awareness and mind too. So it might have, an epiphany might be a little part of it. Now, how can I add a word to the story? Kesan says, coming to this point, if you can add a word to the story, then you can make a tongue-less person speak. If you can hear this principle, then you can make the transcendent being within you hear without ears and not in understanding. And his closing verses, coming and going on the bird's path, there are no tracks. How can you look for stages on the mystic road? So anyway, this teaching of Ching Ruan is, again, subtle and a little scary maybe, but actually it's also good news. We don't have to get anywhere in our practice. At every stage it's totally open. At every point in your practice, right now, the whole truth

[28:13]

is right here in front of you. And if you can be silent and watch it and be present with it, then you are interacting with this truth that does not fall into stages, where you're not trying to practice something to get something, where you're just willing to face the wall or the floor or each other or your own life. So, this is one of the stories of the ancestors. Questions or comments? Yes, very good. Yeah, and actually when we get to Dongshan, Tozan is the last one I want to talk about. We'll spend some time on him. I've been talking about him in the Wednesday morning group too. His main story of awakening has to do with the idea that even insentient

[29:16]

beings speak the Dharma, much less other forms of life. So grasses and trees and birds and dogs and cats and horses and even bricks and slabs of concrete also can speak the Dharma. So there's a story, a complicated story, which I'll try and go into about Dongshan, who's the one who founded Soto Zen, about that very issue. Yeah, that's right, exactly. We're talking about something that's not psychological in the way we think about it, usually psychology. That's part of Buddhism too, is to study human psychology and to study ourselves. But this fundamental reality is beyond even our human consciousness. I mean it's obvious that dolphins for example, who we know are very intelligent in some way that we don't understand, they

[30:17]

must have awakening too. That one would be pretty easy to imagine. But what is the awareness, what is the enlightenment of, well maybe horses and dogs and cats might be able to imagine that. What about birds? What about trees? Have any of you had a tree that you had a particular relationship with in your life? You were kind of fond of it. Yeah, well, okay. So anyway, there's some, if you say, I don't know, I don't know if

[31:26]

you hang out there, there's a couple of, actually one in China and one in Japan, famous old Buddhist meditators who have pictures of them sitting up in a tree where they used to sit. So and then there's of course Julia Butterfly. So yeah, but it's also something that we, it's not inhuman because we actually, we as humans also have our way of relating to it. Yes sir? Good. And I think that's what the Buddha taught us. And I think everyone should practice it. Sure. Good. And part of going beyond stages is just to confess that like you just did.

[32:29]

And to study that. So part of this is to see the stages we do imagine. To see the things we do want. So part of actually seeing this reality that I've just been talking about is actually seeing how we have some relationship to some idea of the ultimate. And some idea of wanting to be good, or wanting to help others. So I mean, this is not contradicting the bodhisattva, the idea of the bodhisattva vows of wanting to help beings, of caring about particular beings. In fact, that was part of the point of the story, that he had to say what it was that he had been doing. And what he'd been doing is not even practicing the holy truths. That was a kind of practice. So he had to confess that. That his aspiration was to go beyond stages. And it turned out that he was pretty deep into reality. But he was also there, and he ended up

[33:40]

teaching others. So he was taking care of something. I thought he was bragging. It sounds like that, right? So you can brag about your... I mean, actually it's kind of Zen style to brag about how bad your practice is. It's kind of shameful to talk about your accomplishments. Well, because accomplishment is actually subverts attainment, or vice versa. So this is tricky, mind-boggling stuff. But the point, one point, I think what you're bringing up, Doug, is a really important point, that we do have aspirations. And it's not that those are bad.

[34:44]

We do have the intention to whatever. And it's not about that you should have some particular intention, like I want to save all beings, or whatever that means. It's that we each have our own particular things we want in this life. That's natural. We have desires. So how do you actually recognize, not some intention you think you should have, but the actual intention you have, and to see what's really important to you in that, and to look more at that. And what is that about? And that's the actual practice that goes beyond stages, is to actually really be clear about your intention. And then you're not really falling into stages. So I don't want you to get attached to this idea of being beyond stages.

[35:46]

If you're at a certain stage and you practice great. And in fact, we all have, you know, there's a rhythm to practice. There are times when it feels kind of jazzy, and so there's something about it that's kind of neat or cool or whatever. There are times when it's kind of boring, and sometimes there's stuff going on that's actually really rich, but you just don't see it. There are times when you reach some plateau and you can sit or do something in a kind of way, and things are going pretty smoothly. Then there are times when it's just hard to count to three, you know. It's hopeless. You can't sit still, or you can't bring yourself to get to the cushion. But it's not about sitting, actually. It's about in your life, when everything seems chaotic. And given everything that's happening in the world, that's very available right now. Yeah? Yeah, that could help you.

[37:02]

So I'll tell you, so the next person, Segyen Yoshis, or Ching Yuan's main student, who we'll talk about, not next week, because next week, we're going to have a sitting next Wednesday night, even though it's the night before Thanksgiving. Now I'm going to talk about Thanksgiving. So it'll be in two weeks that we'll talk about Sekito Kisen, or Shito Shichan in Chinese, who's the one who wrote the Harmony of Difference and Sameness in the Song of the Grass Hut, which we chant sometimes. And he's very important. But at the same time that he was, in the 8th century, one of the two leading Chan masters in China, Segyen Yoshis' Dharma brother, who was also a student of Huining, had a student named Mazu. So I'm going to tell you a story about him. It's actually about the same issue, in a different kind of way. Mazu means horse ancestor. And he was very tall, and he was a pretty powerful figure.

[38:03]

There are lots of stories about him. But anyway, he once said, this very mind is Buddha. So this is another longer story. I don't know if anybody has to leave or overtime. But he said, this very mind is Buddha. And that's kind of nice to hear, isn't it? Oh, and then he had a student who heard that and practiced with it and went off. His name was Great Plum Daibai. Anyway, meanwhile, Mazu later said, no mind, no Buddha. And somebody said to him, you know, before you said, this very mind is Buddha. Now you say, no mind, no Buddha. And why do you say this very mind is Buddha? And he said, it's like giving gold stars to children. And why do you say no mind?

[39:06]

And when do you say no mind, no Buddha? When they don't need any gold stars anymore. But meanwhile, Daibai, this Great Plum, had gone off and was practicing in some hermitage on a mountain. And Mazu wondered how he was doing. And he sent one of his monks to check. And Daibai, a Great Plum, said hello. And then the monk said, what are you practicing? And Daibai said, this very mind is Buddha. And the monk, who was a younger brother, a later student of Mazu, said, now our teacher is saying this other teaching, no mind, no Buddha. And Daibai said, I don't care what that guy says. This very mind is Buddha is good enough for me. And he went back to Mazu and told him, the monk went back to Mazu and told him, he said, ah, the Plum is ripe. So anyway, this very mind is Buddha, no mind, no Buddha. Do you understand why that's related to this question of stages?

[40:08]

Do you understand how that's related to your question? Correct. So this very mind is Buddha means that we have stages, we have practices. No mind, no Buddha is like not a single thing exists. So the same teacher is saying both things. And at different times, you need both of them. So any of you who want particular practices just suited to you, mantras or koans or breathing techniques, talk to me. I can give you that if you want. What's that? Oh, sure. Sure, you can do that if you want. Oh, I don't know. It won't hurt you. But then you have to figure out what it is that you're looking for from the biofeedback. Okay, good.

[41:10]

So the practice of this is looking at what it is we think we want from practice. Stability, good. Calm, peacefulness, settledness. All those things, that's good. And you can think about those in stages if you want to. And you can practice techniques that will get you towards those things. But it's okay to do that if you remember that there's no mind and no Buddha. And that you're just playing a little game to help you not get too bored. So this very mind is Buddha, we have to take care of that. But in this lineage that I'm talking about, there's this huge, vast context. No stages to fall into, much less not falling into stages. So if you know that, then it's okay to practice in stages.

[42:12]

In fact, it's a good thing. If you know that there's not a single thing that exists, it's a good thing. Come back and do all of the practices and follow all the stages and learn about them. Because you might find some of them helpful. Or you might find some of those practices helpful to somebody else. To one of your friends who is having a hard time, you might be able to help them. It's actually very good to practice all the stages very thoroughly. Once you know that there's no stages. So let's close with the Bodhisattva Vows and a few announcements. So the Sixth Ancestor story really kind of emphasizes that he was an illiterate woodcutter in Canton, in the south of China. And again, I talked about this a couple weeks ago, but he overheard a monk walking by,

[43:16]

quoting from the Diamond Sutra, which is one of the Perfection of Wisdom Sutras. There are a number of them. And he heard the line, to abide in the mind, or to activate the mind that does not abide anywhere. And just hearing that phrase, he had some great awakening. And he inquired of this monk and was told about the Fifth Ancestor, who was in northern China. And so Hui Neng, again, who was this humble, illiterate woodcutter, lay proclaimant, not a monk, he went to the big monastery that the Fifth Ancestor had up in the mountains. And when he arrived there, as was the custom, he went to meet the teacher. And the Fifth Ancestor said, where are you from? And he said, I'm from the south. And the Fifth Ancestor said, what did you come for? And he said, I came to become a Buddha.

[44:17]

And the Fifth Ancestor said, don't you know that people from the south don't have Buddha nature? And the future Sixth Ancestor said, amongst people there's north and south, in the Buddha nature there's no north and south. And the Fifth Ancestor was very impressed and had him go work in the back of the kitchen pounding rice. So sometime after that, the story goes, and this part of the story, as I said, is probably spurious and fabricated by one of the disciples of the Sixth Ancestor. But anyway, the Fifth Ancestor said that he would pass along the ancestry, the patriarchy, the golden bowl that symbolized being the main teacher of that generation, to whoever would write a poem that clearly expressed the truth of awakening. And all of the other monks in the monastery, and there were many of them very learned monks,

[45:21]

automatically assumed that the head monk, Shenshu, would be the next one. So they didn't even bother to write a poem. Meanwhile, according to this version of the story by one of the Sixth Ancestor's later disciples, Shenshu was very concerned and stayed up all night and worried and didn't know what to write. And finally wrote on a wall something like, the body is the Bodhi tree, the tree of awakening under which the Buddha had awakened. And the mind is a mirror bright. Wipe it clean again and again and don't let any dust to light. So this is a kind of usual idea of practice. So in Buddhism we have the idea that there is this Buddha nature which we fundamentally all have. So when we bow down to the Buddha, we're not bowing to a statue or a piece of wood or even a historical person. We're bowing to the possibility of awakening in all of us, in all beings, in ourselves and others. So the Fifth Ancestor saw this poem and said,

[46:28]

oh yes, that's very good. You should practice that. You'll get lots of merit from that. And so the monks went around reciting it. And then Hui Neng, who was back in the back of the kitchen pounding rice, heard that and said, what's that? And the monk told him about this poetry contest and this poem. And Hui Neng said, let me see it. Can you show me where it's written? And he saw it and he said, would you write one for me? And the monk was kind of perplexed and said, well, what do you mean? You can't write this. And Hui Neng said, that's a very nice poem, but it's not perfect. I have another one. Awakening is not, there is no Bodhi tree, nor is there a mirror bright. Fundamentally, not a single thing exists, so where could any dust align? So, I'm going to turn the tape over, excuse me. This is the basic teaching that we were chanting about.

[47:31]

Maybe there's no tape in here either. Oh, I guess it's still going. I thought it stopped. Excuse me. So, there is no tape in it. What's that? Maybe that's what happened automatically. Okay. So, obviously this poem by Hui Neng just undercuts the whole thing. There's no Bodhi tree, there's no mirror. Fundamentally, there's not a single thing. This is the basic teaching, so that heart sutra that we chanted says, no eyes, no ears, no nose, no tongue. And then it goes through all the great Buddhist teachings, saying there's no cause, no cessation, no path, no the four noble truths. So, in the heart sutra that we chanted, it's kind of a distillation of all of the teachings of Buddhism. Yet, the style of this kind of teaching is this negation, this emptiness teaching. It's both a description of reality, but it's also a way to practice.

[48:40]

And Hui Neng is sort of the master of that. And he says, fundamentally, there's nothing. Not a single thing exists. And so, there's a kind of very, you could say, tough side to this teaching. A very radical side of just cutting through any idea we have, any delusion we have. Any ideas we have of enlightenment, any ideas we have of what spiritual practice is. This is one kind of teaching within Zen, and Hui Neng represents it. So, you know, I often quote Dogen saying that enlightened people are enlightened about their delusions. Deluded people have delusions about enlightenment. So, basically, whatever idea we have of who we are and what the world is, this kind of understanding is to cut through that. Not a single thing exists. Now, there's another side of that, which is to see the world in its freshness, in its rawness, in its suchness.

[49:48]

But we sort of have to move, we have to enter through this cutting through our delusions. Cutting through our ideas of who we are and what the world is. So, that's actually more difficult than just the funny posture and crossing your legs and sitting still for 40 minutes. But we do see, when we're sitting, all of these things arising in the mirror of our mind. And what Hui Neng was saying in that poem is that there's no enlightenment, there's nothing that exists. So, where could there be any dust? So, when the other monks saw that poem, they were quite impressed and went around. And then the fifth ancestor came and saw that and said, now that's no good, erase it. But then, secretly, he went to the kitchen where Hui Neng was and tapped his staff three times. And Hui Neng shook the rice he was sifting three times and understood.

[50:53]

And then in the third watch, which was midnight, he went to the fifth ancestor's room and received the Dharma transmission from him. He became a sixth ancestor. But he was still a lay person, he was still illiterate. And the fifth ancestor said, you should get out of here because people are going to be upset when they find out that I gave you this robe and bowl. Because there was this whole community of monks who had put all these years into practicing. Anyway, there's a kind of criticism of establishing a community like that implied in the story of Hui Neng. Maybe that people can become too attached to their idea of what the community is and where they are in it. At any rate, he went to the south. And part of the story that I didn't mention, I think, last time is that one of the monks, actually a bunch of the monks, when they found out that the fifth ancestor had given the robe and bowl to this illiterate southerner,

[51:56]

were shocked and upset and went after him to bring the robe and bowl back. And they just assumed the old man had gone senile or whatever. But one of them, whose name was Hui Neng, caught up with the sixth ancestor. And the sixth ancestor put the robe and bowl, the robe which supposedly was the robe of Buddha going back 2,500 years to 500 BC in northern India, and his bowl, put him on a rock. And Hui Neng, who had been a warrior, a general, was a very big, tough guy. The sixth ancestor said to him, take them if you want. And he tried to pick them up from the rock and they wouldn't move. He couldn't lift them. So there are all kinds of stories like that. But anyway, at that point he was kind of stunned. And the new sixth ancestor said to him, did you come for the robe and bowl or did you come for the teaching? And Hui Neng said, no, I came for the teaching, I came for the Dharma. And so then Hui Neng said to him, please, you know, reveal to me the essential teaching.

[53:06]

And Hui Neng said, don't think of good or evil. Right now, what is your original face before your parents were born? Beyond good or evil, what is your original face? Who are you, essentially? And Hui Neng, this monk who had come to try and capture the sixth ancestor, was greatly awakened at hearing this. And he asked, is there any further secret meaning beyond what you've said? And Hui Neng said, what I've told you is not a secret. Just look into your mind and everything you need is there. And Hui Neng said, although I was with the fifth ancestor, I didn't truly realize my own likeness. Now I've received your teaching. I'm like one who drinks water and knows for the first time whether it is cool or hot. You are my teacher. Hui Neng said, if that is so, if it is as you say, then your fifth ancestor is your teacher, but you should go back to him.

[54:14]

So, that story is actually one of the koans in the collection of the Luang Kon to get this barrier. And again, this question, go beyond your ideas of good, bad, good and evil. Right then, what is your original face? So, this practice we do in this lineage is basically just sitting. Allowing all the things to arise and just being present with whatever comes up, including your own thoughts and feelings. But there are many different techniques that you can use to help you settle, to help you really find your deepest being as you're sitting. So, one of them is to use these old stories. So, these old stories, the point of talking about them a thousand years later or whatever is that they show us about ourselves. So, you can actually take some of these stories and let them be present with you while you sit.

[55:19]

This is called koans or teaching stories. So, that's one thing you can do while you're sitting. You could also follow your breathing or count breaths. So, have any of you done counting breaths? How many of you have done counting breaths? You've obviously sat somewhere before, where have you sat? Yeah. Oh, at Green Conch. At San Francisco's, I'm sorry. Yeah. Great. Great. Yeah. Yeah, so in Zen, basically we sit with the silence. But sometimes for some people it's helpful to have some particular technique. So, the counting breaths is at the end of each exhale, silently. One and two, up to ten and then start over.

[56:22]

You could just say one each time. So, focusing on breath. And there are various ways, particularly in the Vipassana tradition, there are many techniques for using the breath. And in Zen, we can also use mantras. So, the mantra we said at the end of the Heart Sutra, is a teaching about letting go. It's actually a teaching about emptiness. So, you can just say that to yourself silently all the time. Or you could say beyond good and evil, beyond good and bad, what is my original face right now? So, these are all kinds of ways of finding the silence. So, if you need those, please use them. But the basic practice is just not a single thing exists. And not a single thing exists means whatever arises, whatever thing appears in your mind, whatever sound or feeling or sensation that comes, just see through it. And there are different ways to do that.

[57:23]

But basically, just to meet each thing and see. Letting go of it. So, anyway, the story about the sixth ancestor, I told more of last time. He was told by the fifth ancestor just to go to the south and hide himself and not teach for some time. And so, he went and spent ten years as a cook for hunters in the forest. Then one day, he came to a temple. He was wandering around and maybe he had gone to look for Buddhist teachers again or Buddhist practitioners again. And he went to this temple and heard two monks arguing. The banner was flying over the temple banner. And one monk said that it was the banner that was moving and the other one said, no, it's the wind that's moving. Guanyin looked at them and said, no, you're both wrong. It's your mind that's moving. And so, their teacher, the head of the temple, Yinzang, heard about this and was kind of amazed.

[58:27]

And he asked the fifth ancestor, who was still a layman, still anonymous, who he was and who his teacher was. And then the fifth ancestor, the new sixth ancestor, Huining, whose name means wisdom capacity, he told him the story. And so, this master, Yinzang, invited him into the temple and had him ordained. But then at some point, Huining went and found his own temple. And his temple in Chinese is called Soke or Cao Xi in Chinese. And that's where the first half of the word Sota comes from, Sota language. It starts with the sixth ancestor. So, there are a number of teachings in there. When he became a teacher, he talked about this perfection of wisdom, about this prajna, a lot.

[59:30]

And he talked about the oneness of samadhi and prajna. So, this wisdom, this prajna means wisdom, but also means insight, is the insight into emptiness. So, emptiness doesn't mean nothingness. We say not a single thing exists, but it's really kind of that whatever thing we look at is empty of separate, substantial, fundamental identity by itself. So, we chant in the Heart Sutra, form, that which is form is emptiness, that which is emptiness form. So, this basic teaching is what Huining emphasized. Form itself is emptiness, emptiness itself form. Form does not differ from emptiness. Emptiness does not differ from form. So, when we talk about this wisdom or insight into emptiness, it's not that emptiness is something somewhere else. Emptiness is the way all of this is. Emptiness is the absence of any fundamental, essential thingness to whatever it is, to each of us and to whatever phenomena, whatever being in the world you look at.

[60:48]

So, another way to talk about it is interconnectedness, relationship. We're all deeply connected. So... Yes, Ken. Uh-huh, good. The question is how the person seems to have a particular genius, a particular consciousness that helps out the practice. Ah. Uh-huh. Okay, good. So, I'm wondering how that relates, if not so, in this moment in time. I don't know how that relates to our practice and the Sangha, because I know that the Sangha,

[61:59]

whether it be practice, whether it be the ritualized form, is the only way that leads to that. And... And... It is. Well, there's two different things you're pointing to. There's one thing, which is this way in which the story is kind of funny. It's warning about the dangers of too fancy a setup, maybe, or of taking on some ritual form and just taking on the ritual. So, the point that... So, there's a lot of aspects to the story of Huineng. So, it's good that we talk about it.

[63:02]

It's not that he... You know, we could say that he had a particular genius. But part of the story is that he's very humble, that he's nobody. He's from the South, he's illiterate, he's just a woodcutter, very humble. So, this prajna, this wisdom, is available to anybody, anytime. He just happened to be aware of it. Now, the one way that one might easily take the story is that he realized it's outside of practice. From the Buddhist point of view, it's hard to say that. We don't know how many lifetimes he'd been practicing before that. So, it's not that it's outside of practice, but it is outside of some attachment to the forms of practice. So, all those monks at the Fifth Ancestors Monastery, they were very good monks, you know. And they were probably skilled meditators, and they were very learned.

[64:04]

The point is that anybody can show up the first time they sit satsang and get it, very deeply. So, this is about beginner's mind, in a way. So, it doesn't mean we shouldn't have, you know, a community and gather together and sit together and support each other in this way. In fact, we're establishing this Mountain Source Sangha, and, you know, it's something to be a little bit nervous about, because there's this part of the tradition, is that you set up too much, that kind of gets in the way. But what it gets in the way of is the inwardness. So, Lienang said to this fellow who was chasing after him, it's all within you, you know. All the answers are already there. So, the sitting practice, and that's what he talked about later, about the connection of samadhi and prajna. Samadhi means concentration in meditation. So, it's right in the middle of meditation that this wisdom arises.

[65:04]

This wisdom, this insight into emptiness, or into how we're all connected, is not something we get from reading a lot of books and studying Buddhist ideas. It's not that it's bad to do that, but the point is to see it for ourselves. So, what Hui Meng said, now I can tell, it's like for the first time, it's like I'm drinking water and know for myself whether it's warm or cold. So, we have to taste these teachings ourselves. The stories can help us, though. They can be kind of guides to our own experience. They can be encouragements. So, when you hear these stories and there's something that you kind of recognize, or, you know, that there's something about it that appeals to you, or it might be something about it that bothers you, that also can be a way that the story is actually hitting something of your own inner practice. So, you know, part of how monastic communities work in Buddhism is that it's based on seniority.

[66:37]

So, there's real attention, and this is in China and Japan, and it has to do with East Asian values. But it goes back to the Buddha himself 2,500 years ago in India, and there's a way in which that's very democratic. It's not based on how talented or powerful somebody is, but it's just, you know, whoever's been practicing the longest, you know, is respected in the forms of the monastery. But if you get attached to that, you may lose your beginner's mind. So, we need to see, every time we sit, to feel like it's the first time we're sitting. Practically speaking, we don't usually do that, because after you've been sitting a while, you do become familiar with it. But, fundamentally, just sitting and turning the light within, so another description of what happens, of the essence of what happens in Zazen, sort of sounds like a technique, but it's kind of beyond technique. It's to just take the backward step and turn the light inwardly.

[67:39]

We direct our attention within when we're sitting. That's why we sit facing the wall in such a tradition, because it's not about the other people in the room, it's just you meeting the wall, facing that mirror, whatever's in front of you. So it's turning within, and in that sense, the first time you sit Zazen, it's no better than if you've been sitting Zazen for 25 or 30 years, and the very first time you sat Zazen. It's totally the same experience. Now, you may develop more of a settledness in how you meet that. You may develop more craft in your ability to be present with yourself, and remain upright with yourself. But the actual experience of turning within and allowing this wisdom to arise, you may not recognize it most of the time you sit Zazen, but that's part of what's happening. And it's just from putting aside whatever externals and just turning within.

[68:47]

Now, of course, we have to get up from our cushion and actually meet the world and express that wisdom in the world. But it's an important point that, in some way, the sixth ancestor, even though he had this understanding and actually received the transmission still as a layman, that he had to take 10 years of just digesting it before he was ready to say anything about it to anybody else. Even though I'm sure he could have spoken at any point in that time. But when the time was right, he heard these monks, and he was able to say something that allowed him to start teaching. So there's a lot in this story, actually. So it's a kind of, it should be an encouragement to us. At the same time, there's a kind of warning there. Don't get too caught in, you know, what you think your experience already is, or what the forms are, you know. So that's why, you know, I like having this kind of, this is a pretty informal, you know, setup we have here.

[69:50]

People can come in and, you know, we do some chanting and some bowing and sit in a particular way, more or less. But, you know, I like the informality of it. And it's kind of, it's tricky. Last week we did a very fancy, the fanciest ceremony we've done here for feeding the hungry ghosts. There were a lot of people, and people liked it a lot. And it's a pretty fancy ceremony. So it's nice to do those things, too. But how can we keep the spirit of, you know, just being illiterate, not knowing anything, you know. And for me, with a library full of books with all these old Zen stories, it's even more of a warning, you know. The point of the story is, what does it mean right now? So, I mean, you had a question? Yes, ma'am. Queen Anne, yeah. Mm-hmm. Right.

[70:51]

So, when you're talking about the Sixth Ancestor, it's only one, none of the other ones are going on. Yeah, so, well, he actually told them afterwards, after the Sixth Ancestor had left. Maybe they looked around and saw that he didn't have his robe and bow anymore, and they wondered what happened. But it doesn't say in the story. But he did tell them, and that's why they knew, and they ran after him. But, so, one of the other things he told the Sixth Ancestor is, after this, there'll be many people in each generation. So, after that, in China, there were many. So, the Sixth Ancestor himself had a number of disciples. He had two main disciples, and from those two come all the other main lineages. So, after the Sixth Ancestor, there was not one ancestor in each generation. There were many, many, many, and there were very many. Does that mean not accepted? Yeah. Yeah.

[72:14]

So, but the first six generations in China, there were. So, the Ancestor was afraid that they might, I mean... He just, he thought that, yeah, that they would be upset. And now that story, okay, that whole story about the poetry contest and everything, again, the modern scholars and historians, you know, suspect that the sutra that that's based on, it was written by one of the disciples of the Sixth Ancestor, and probably made a, and he intentionally made this other guy, he was the head monk, it's a different guy than the one who ran after him, and couldn't lift the roving bull. But anyway, sorry, these funny Chinese names are hard to keep track of all the characters. But the one who all the other monks deferred to, actually, historically, founded what was called the Northern School, and was a great, very well-known and highly respected teacher in his own lifetime,

[73:18]

and had many disciples, had a number of disciples, and that lineage continued for a while. So, modern scholars are going back and looking at all this history. So, you know, there's the actual history, and then there's the stories about it. So this story about this poetry contest, though, has been studied in the tradition for a long time, and so there's things about the stories that, even if they're not true historically, you know, have some meaning for us. So there are many parts of this story. So are there other questions about it? Yes. So I think that's a good question.

[74:28]

Where is the practice in this? So these other monks, you know, I don't know how many there were, maybe 500 monks at this monastery. They were all practicing, you know. They were all, you know, studying the sutras and so forth. And I think you're right. This fellow who actually caught Hui Neng, something very nice about him. He was willing, you know, there's this magical story about how he couldn't lift the robe and bowl. But once he saw that, he was willing to suddenly drop all of his competitiveness and all. You know, he had been a soldier, a general, and so he had all of this kind of reaction that maybe comes from that kind of training, to go and, you know, fight this guy, assuming that he had done something, that he had tricked the Fifth Ancestor or something like that. Which, you know, maybe is not so respectful of the Fifth Ancestor, but still.

[75:29]

But he was willing to let that all go. And of course there's this magical story that he couldn't lift the robe and bowl. So maybe it's a little bit like King Arthur being the only one who could lift the sword out of the stone. There's all kinds of stories like that. But he got it then. And he was willing to drop all of that. You know, actually, yeah, I'm here for the Dharma. I want the teaching. And then the Sixth Ancestor, the new Sixth Ancestor, this humble, literate southerner, you know, said, beyond good and evil, what's your original faith? And he got that right away, this guy. And so there was practice there, you know. So again, the question you asked before I think is important. Is the Sixth Ancestor, he just heard this phrase from the Diamond Sutra and then he was awakened. And it almost seems like he wasn't practicing. But we can't necessarily, part of the story is

[76:31]

we can't necessarily say what is practice and what is not. Maybe he was very mindful when he was chopping wood. Living a very simple life, you know. He may not have had an idea of practice. Although it was part of Chinese culture then, so probably he'd heard something. But he hadn't been particularly formally a practitioner. But there may have been something about the way he conducted his life before he ever heard that line from the Diamond Sutra that allowed him to really hear it. So part of the question about, you know, these other monks who were, you know, competitive or who were, well, actually, they weren't so competitive. They deferred to this other guy. But these monks who were, somehow, weren't ready themselves to receive the transmission, even though they'd been studying and so forth. You know, once you've been sitting for a while,

[77:31]

you might think, oh yeah, I'm a Zen student and I do Zazen and I'm practicing and I'm a Buddhist. You might feel like you're better than somebody else because of your practicing. But actually, somebody who you work with who seems like they're kind of, you know, who they're not very spiritual and they seem grumpy, it might be that in some way that you can't see, they're actually turning the light within in their own way. And they might hear a line from a sutra and really get it. So this story has some warnings about how we look at the world and how we look at practice, and not being so sure that we know all that's going on. Eileen? I'd like to add a couple of things. I have a great gift. You all know that I was born in West Africa about 10 years ago.

[78:37]

I was born in a place that we don't know much about. And from now on, I'm going to be doing practice and I'm going to talk to people. I'm going to get to know other people. And so I've been enjoying West African food tonight and a woman came in and I didn't know her. It's all about, you know, what the people say. It's a room. Well, you know, whatever you need. A small room for whatever you're saying. So I heard her say that she came last Saturday because she had a condition on her face. And so now she's here and she can make herself comfortable. So now that I can get her practice, I don't know which study, her dad, my own practice.

[79:37]

But yeah, it's been 10 years. So what did the sewing teacher say? Nobody said anything. I mean, she just said, Oh, I used to sew my rapid shoes. I came last Saturday. It was like the beginning of June. I guess that's kind of... Can I just show up? Yeah, that's a very open sign. No, but actually... No, you have to be, you have to receive permission actually from an authorized teacher before you can start doing that. So maybe she didn't know that. Or maybe she just showed up to Zazen instruction and met one of the teachers there and persuaded them that she deserved to start sewing a Raksha right away. I don't know. How about...

[80:38]

That's okay. No, that's a good story. But there is, you shouldn't forget that there's tremendous value to your 10 years in Zen. But it doesn't mean that your Zazen now, 10 years later, is any better than someone who's doing Zazen for the first time. So there's this, part of this, the idea of Bodhicitta, which is the arousing the mind of awakening. Bodhicitta in Sanskrit literally means awakening mind. So in the translation in Chinese and Japanese, it's sometimes called way-mind or mind of the way or way-seeking mind. But our first impulse towards practice has something of this aspiration for awakening, this turning towards awakening and helping others awaken. So in the Bodhisattva way,

[81:39]

in Sutras and rest of Mahayana Buddhism, we don't practice in order to get enlightened for ourselves because that's actually a tremendous delusion. It's impossible. It's an expression of awakening for all beings. So we practice for each other, with each other, even though we do that by facing the wall and turning within and just seeing this body and mind. So this has to do with the story too. It wasn't just that he, when he heard about the mind that doesn't abide anywhere, it wasn't just some understanding he had, it was some aspiration, some caring, some very deep you could say desire or passion, but it's also some deep letting go that was triggered when Huining heard that. So that's always available to all of us. And these stories and these teachings

[82:41]

and these books, again, this prasanna is not about learning a lot of things, but it's kind of this childlike potentiality of Buddha nature in all of us. So this is kind of encouragement to that. And it's said that after he began teaching, the sixth ancestor was still literate, but people would come and read him sutras and he could explain these very complicated, intricate traditional Buddhist teachings because he understood from within. So this is, you know, there's a warning there and there also should be an encouragement, you know. It's not that you have to know something you don't already know. This possibility of awakening is here right now. Even if you're, you know, from the south or somewhere like that. Sorry, Jamie. So,

[83:43]

anyway, we'll continue with the next week. We'll continue with the ancestor who was a disciple of Huining in the next generation. In the lineage, it leads to the center school. So, some announcements. First of all, we do a, we're here every Wednesday evening, so you're welcome to come. 7.30 to 9, like tonight. And the two Wednesdays of December, the two Wednesdays each year that we don't have sitting, just sort of to have a break, but also because the church is busy with Christmas things. The Wednesday after that, January 2nd, will resume. And then January 5th, we're going to do an all-day sitting here in the space, 9 to 5. And in the afternoon, there'll be a lay ordination

[84:44]

and a monthly day-long sitting this Saturday in Bolinas, out in West Marin, so I can give you instructions if anyone is interested. And that's also from 9 to 5. And I'll do a Dharma talk at 10.30. So we do 40 minutes of sitting and then 10-minute walk, actually 35 minutes of sitting and then 10-minute walking periods. It's informal, it's a block from the beach, so if you want to take a break for a period, you can do that. Commonweal? Different, yeah. There's a bunch of different Buddhist groups there. But this is in St. Aidan's Episcopal Church right in downtown, so there's a flyer there and I can give you information about it. Yes. It's there, but it's...

[86:22]

But practically speaking, that's actually a very interesting question that we don't have time to go into properly tonight. But I think it's very lovely to sit outside, and I do that sometimes too. But there's also a particular space that's created when we sit together. There's actually a particular form for the space. And having it in an enclosed space actually concentrates the energy in a certain way. And there's a certain... So the word mandala, do you know it all? There's a certain pattern of energy that happens when people sit in an enclosed space. This is the difference between India and South Asia, where they usually sit out in the woods under a tree. And starting in China, maybe because it was cold, they sit out in the woods You know, if you want to come and sit with us in the church for a little while, you can take a break every period and go and walk on the beach.

[87:23]

You're welcome to do that. Anyway, I appreciate your feeling now very much. And part of it is, part of the practice is to see that beauty of nature actually in this space. So Zen, more than other forms of Buddhism, doesn't dwell on particular philosophical discussions, but it's more about more kind of poetry and imagery and metaphor and this way of seeing, which actually fits with the trees and the waves. But we don't have to. We can actually be sitting here in the middle of the city and be open to that too. It does help to go out in those places. So anyway, thanks for the question. Comments? Other announcements? Oh yeah, I was at Tasselheim.

[88:26]

Yes, these are the names. These are supposed to be the names of the each generation from Shakyamuni Buddha 2,500 years ago to Suzuki Roshi. Now, what we know now is historically the names from the part that's in India, which is from Shakyamuni to Bodhidharma. Bodhidharma is the one who's supposed to have come from India to China. And this is the Japanese way of chanting. So it's Bodai Daruma. So this is the Japanese pronunciation of all these names. But anyway, we know now that actually when this list was put together in China, some of those Indian people couldn't have actually known each other. So we don't know. Actually in India, they weren't so concerned with lineage and history and all of that. But they were very concerned in China. So they took names of great Indian teachers they knew about and tried to figure out where they fit in the lineage.

[89:32]

And actually this is clearly not accurate. But there are stories about each of them and about their interactions. So there's the historical truth and then there's the spiritual truth. And also even historically, there were some teachers and students in each generation we just don't know exactly who it was. But at some point anyway, Bodhidharma came from India to China. And then there were these series of six that called the six ancestors starting with Bodhidharma in China to Daikon Eno or Huineng who we talked about. And so we talked about his story of coming to this big monastery where the fifth ancestor was and being this illiterate woodcutter and but having this intuitive understanding and eventually becoming the sixth ancestor even though he was an illiterate layman and even though he was from the south and all these terrible things. anyway, sure. If we were terrified, where would our

[90:34]

community break off? Probably almost at the beginning. So Shakyamuni Buddha had ten great disciples many, many more than that. But Mahakasyapa who's in Japanese in Japanese Makakasho was one of the great disciples. Ananda was another one. Ananda is the one who said who recorded all of the talks that the Buddha gave not on a tape recorder but he just remembered them. He was his personal attendant. He was also his cousin. And so Ananda actually said not to have become an Arhat not to have become fully awakened and purified during the Buddha's lifetime but then in the first council after the Buddha died and they all got together he was the one they let him come anyway even though he wasn't qualified

[91:34]

spiritually because he was the one who could remember all of the sutras. So all of the sutras begin thus have I heard at one time. And that's that's Ananda saying this is what I heard. And then he tells a place and describes the assembly and then it goes on to say what the Buddha said or what other people said to him. So anyway I don't really know the answer to your question. It's an interesting question. But certainly Mahakasyapa and Ananda would be revered by Theravada Buddhism but then these names after that don't I don't they don't probably have the same they don't have a lineage the same way. I'm sure Zen emphasizes this personal experiential lineage of teaching much more than in other branches of Buddhism. One of the names there that you know so some of these names are very famous people Nagarjuna Nagyaharajuna

[92:35]

in Japanese Nagarjuna was the great teacher of emptiness so a lot of these a lot of these Indian names are famous historical people Vasubandhu in Japanese it's pronounced Vasubandhu anyway they but there's by that time they were already Mahayana so it's pretty early somewhere between Ananda it might be right at Ananda in terms of how they would look at you know who they particularly looked up to but they would also I'm not sure how Nagarjuna is thought of in Theravada early early Mahayana so okay Theravada and Mahayana Theravada is the teaching of what's now in southern in southern Asia Sri Lanka Cambodia Laos Thailand Burma Mahayana is northern Asia Tibet China Japan Korea

[93:36]

and also Vietnam but the main difference is and there were also other Theravada was is the one of the earlier forms that survived but there were other pre-Mahayana and Mahayana means greater vehicle there's this word Hinayana have any of you heard that that means lesser vehicle and that's a kind of negative pejorative way Mahayana people called it pre-Mahayana people so I don't like to use it but the real one real difference is that the Theravada and other earlier forms the goal is the Arhat the completely purified one so that most of the emphasis in the practice was meditating to work on oneself so the Pasana is a branch that comes from out of the Theravada and the focus is in that in that branch of Buddhism the focus is more on meditating and working on yourself and in Asia it's mostly monastic and it's really focused on purifying oneself

[94:37]

of desires and attachments and delusions and you know whereas the goal in Mahayana the ideal in Mahayana is the Bodhisattva the enlightened being who is completely in the world acting to help all other beings awaken and you know we don't know we really don't know much about the history and most of what we think we know about the history is being disproved now

[95:03]

@Transcribed_v002
@Text_v005
@Score_90.77