After the bodhisattva ceremony, where we acknowledge our ancient entangling karma and renew our intentions to practice, it's appropriate to talk about the precepts, which dovetails into I wanted to talk about the precept against killing anyway. So that's what my subject is today. The first precept of the 10 clear mind grave prohibitory precepts is not to kill. Refrain from taking, willfully taking life. there are many ways to talk about the precepts, and the precepts are on various levels of understanding.

[01:10]

And one level of understanding is the literal understanding that something can be killed, and don't do that. and the Bodhisattva understanding and Buddha nature understanding. In the Dharmakaya, nothing can be killed. There's no such thing as killing. But I'm not going to talk about that. understanding of not killing as compassionate action. Even though life itself cannot be killed, we refrain from killing people and killing things and killing the Dharma and killing our minds and killing truth.

[02:20]

If you've been reading the newspapers and listening to whatever you listen to, I'm sure we've heard about the case of Kevin Cooper, who is going to be executed, or is about to be executed, probably, on the 9th of March. 10th of March. February, I'm sorry. This Monday, I'm sorry, February. So I've been asked to say something at a church. Three to four minutes to say something. So I've been thinking about this. In the past, as this subject comes up, And most of the people I know are against killing, against executions.

[03:39]

And I've always had a little doubt in my mind as to whether there should never be any executions. And, you know, when I see people do drive-by shootings and killing innocent people, the emotional response is they should be done away with. That's emotional response. But it's not a thought-out response. And I think that When we see brutal murders, hear about them, we have a gut feeling and an emotional response that one's vengeance, one's restitution, one's justice.

[04:43]

And Then there's the other side, which comes up, the thoughtful side, which says, but simply acting out on revenge, the emotion of revenge, doesn't satisfy anything. Doesn't satisfy the people who were murdered, doesn't satisfy the people who are left behind, and doesn't satisfy the person who is executed. So when I was asked to say something, I jumped in and I said, okay, and then now I have to really think about how I really feel and how I really want to respond to this. in a strictly Buddhist sense, taking of a life is forbidden, actually.

[06:02]

Whether it's for revenge or for restitution or for, no matter how justified, it's not an example of Buddhist practice. And if you've read the old sutras, you read about how Buddha, in a former lifetime, this is of course a fantasy, but in a former lifetime, was under a tree, he was a prince or something, there were a lot of ladies of the court around him and some of them belonged to this Duke or Maharaja, you know. He got very furious and he came over and wanted to hack the Buddha to pieces. Buddha said, well, if you can hack me to pieces, the gist of the story is, but I won't feel bad about you.

[07:12]

I won't you know, I won't feel emotionally, I won't feel vengeful toward you. I don't like it, you know, but I refrain from retribution. So this is the attitude actually, that's very extreme, you know, I wouldn't expect anybody to do that, very extreme attitude. But the message is, how do you redeem someone rather than how do you punish them? Punishment satisfies something. It satisfies our lower urges, but it doesn't satisfy our higher aspirations. You know, all religious practices, as far as I know, most religious practices, one of the central themes is redemption.

[08:33]

All of us transgress. all of us make these errors. We make small errors, we make small mistakes and we make big ones. In the case of Kevin Cooper, it's a very controversial kind of case because there's as much weight for his innocence as there is for his guilt. And it's right there on the cusp. And it's easy, you know, for the governor to make a judgment to please the people who, the law and order people, people that now are safer because he's dead.

[09:37]

We're not any safer at all because Kevin Cooper is dead. Matter of fact, we're less safe. It's of course a proven fact that those states that don't have the death penalty have less murder problems. It doesn't inhibit. Killing murderers doesn't stop murder. So this whole thing is very debatable, but when I think about it deeply, my tendency is no matter how much I feel someone, my emotional response would be that I would just want to get rid of them.

[10:48]

I can't go along with that. I have to stop that emotional response and use the emotion, transform the emotion into redemption. the emotion of revenge into the feeling of redemption. How do you, it's not like maybe turn somebody around, but maybe so. One of the arguments I heard was, or read was, if he escapes, no, if he is freed, or if he is not, condemned, then he'll be freed to be out in the street. This does happen. It does happen. So anyway, it's cheaper to keep a person in life in prison than it is to execute them.

[11:55]

So that's not a good excuse. But Some people are totally remorseless and may never transform themselves. But most people at some point are capable of understanding their crime if that's what they did. But if they didn't do it, then whoever it is that executes them is themselves a criminal. So when someone is executed, somebody else has to kill them. So killing itself creates karma. Killing is a karmic act. And then there is the result and the fruit of that act, which will always be with the person.

[13:00]

the person that does the execution may not have any, you know, maybe a kind of, not a very deep feeler, and just kind of do it, you know. But that person is killing somebody, no matter what they did. You know, it's, in a war, we kill thousands and thousands of innocent people, somebody drops bombs on them, somebody machine guns them, somebody burns their villages down, and they're called heroes. Someone else shoots somebody on the street, and they're called criminals. So, it's, My conclusion is taking life, period, of somebody else is a criminal act.

[14:22]

War is a criminal act. I mean, it's the biggest, the biggest criminals go out free. The smallest criminals get it in the behind. So, in the Nazi war crime tribunals, many of the Nazi perpetrators were hanged or executed. Now, we may think, that's justice. That's right there, and is that right or is that wrong? It's still a question. So it's very complicated.

[15:23]

But I think in this case, when there's not enough evidence that it's not completely understood, then to go ahead and execute someone without all the evidence is criminal. What's wrong with waiting? We waited 20 years. What's wrong with waiting a little bit longer? Until things are really clear. And then, why not just keep the person for life? And give the person a chance opportunity to redeem themselves if, actually, they did it. And if they didn't, to give that an opportunity to come out.

[16:26]

There are too many people with too many doubts to go ahead and do something like that. I think that there's a lot of, right now, Buddhists especially, are going into prisons and teaching people to do Zazen. And people are so grateful for this opportunity. To the people in the prisons, it's just like drinking clear water. It's like drinking a drink of cool water to have this opportunity presented to people who would spend their lives just in the dreariness of prison without any means of redeeming themselves.

[17:35]

or turning, creating an opportunity for transformation. As we know, our prison system is the worst and getting bigger and bigger. And as we privatize citizens, privatize prisons, means that somebody's making a lot of money off of prisons. And then we have to keep putting people in the prisons. And it's the poorest people that go there. And so it's easy to find excuses to put them in rather than let them out. I want to read you a nice Zen story. This is a story about turning around.

[18:49]

Zenkai was the son of a samurai who journeyed to Edo. That's the old name for Tokyo. And there he became a retainer of a high official He fell in love with the official's wife and was discovered. In self-defense, he slew the official, and then he ran away with the wife. Both of them later became thieves. But the woman was so greedy that Zenkai grew disgusted. Finally leaving her, he journeyed far away to the province of Buzan. where he became a wandering mendicant. To atone for his past, Zenkai resolved to accomplish some good deed in his lifetime. Knowing of a dangerous road over a cliff that had caused the death and injury of many persons, he resolved to cut a tunnel through the mountain there.

[19:56]

Begging food in the daytime, Zenkai worked at night digging his tunnel. When 30 years had gone by, the tunnel was 2,280 feet long, 20 feet high, and 30 feet wide. This is a true story. Two years before the work was completed, the son of the official he had slain, who was a skillful swordsman, found Zenkai out and came to kill him in revenge. I will give you my life willingly, said Zenkai, only let me finish this work. On the day it is completed, then you can kill me." So the son awaited the day. Several months passed and Zenkai kept on digging. The son grew tired of doing nothing and began to help with the digging. After he had helped for more than a year, he came to admire Zenkai's strong will and character.

[20:59]

At last, the tunnel was completed and that people could use it and travel to safety. Now cut off my head, said Zenkai. My work is done. And he said, how can I cut off my own teacher's head? Said the younger man with tears in his eyes. So the real work is, we say, to save all sentient beings.

[22:02]

And we say every being has buddha nature. You know, there was a concept at one time in Buddhism of the ichantika. The ichantika was someone who had no Buddha nature. There was a, you know, people used to discuss this in the old days. Is there someone who doesn't have Buddha nature? Are there people that don't have Buddha nature? And then some people said yes and some people said no. but then someone discovered that in the nirvana sutra it says all sentient beings without exception have buddha nature so all the Mahayana buddhists accepted that and Dogen says all sentient beings are buddha nature. He kind of gave it his own characteristic twist but if all beings are buddha nature

[23:18]

then it means that everyone can be redeemed. Redeemed means re-entered. Re-entered into the purity of their own nature. So it's easy to write people off and it's harder to actually work, just continue doing that work, much harder.

[24:24]

It takes more dedication and it's a lot more trouble. But it's far more rewarding. And this is the work of, this bodhisattva work, actually, to not write off anybody. But do you have any questions? Andrea? Army biker? Well, I've seen a lot of people, a lot of people in really difficult karmic circumstances turn their lives around in an extreme way.

[25:33]

And so I wonder, is that karma too? Is that their karma too? Or... Well, you know... You know, our karma is our actions. Karma means action, and then there's the result. We always have the result of our actions, but being in a difficult place, you know, that's the place where you really have to face yourself, and you have the greatest opportunity. When you hit the bottom, when you hit the very bottom, that's when you have the greatest opportunity. You know, I know people who have done great transgressions, but they never allow themselves to hit the bottom. They're always defending themselves. You know, I didn't, oh, I didn't, blah, blah, blah. If they just let themselves get all the way down to the bottom, then they'd be, there's no place else to go. Once you hit the bottom, there's no place else to go, and then you have to, have to face your life and,

[26:40]

It is an opportunity to bring out all of your energy and spirit and turn around and find yourself. Most cases of sudden enlightenment are where people hit the bottom and then the nut cracked open. So it's a great opportunity. It's the worst place to be, it's the greatest opportunity. I think we have to really understand that. People whose backs are against the wall have great opportunity, but it doesn't always look like that. So it looks like this is the end of the road, but it can be the beginning of the path. It's interesting that in criminal cases in other states, the names of those cases are state versus John Jones, whoever.

[27:52]

So it seems to me that we're all responsible for that in some way. We have deep responsibility for it. And it's part of our twisted karma. So I guess my question is, how do we deal with that twisted karma? Is there anything that we can do? How does that twisted karma work? What do you mean? What do you mean, our entangling karma? Our entangling karma, right. All of ours. Well, in some way, we're all responsible, right? Yeah. That's very, yeah, that's right. In some way, we're all responsible. So, you know, what, it's very interesting because what happens on the bottom of society, so to speak, is influenced by what happens on the top of society.

[29:29]

We look at what the government does, what the government leaders do, and people are influenced by that. And then when you see a lot of crime on the lower level of society, well, of course it's because of what's happening on the top. So we have to change what's happening on the top. so to speak, or maybe that's what's on the bottom, the foundation. Look at the foundation. When people vote, mostly, most people, I think, vote for their own special interest, like a union person will vote for a union interest, and this person will vote for that interest, but very few people vote for the for the interest of the whole society, taken as a whole, given all its parts, and what's really best for society, people and politicians cater to people's special interests.

[30:41]

In this state, we talk to people about this, and in that state, we talk to people about that. Instead of getting people to think about what's best for the whole society, That interest was, in the best interest of society, there'd be much less crime. We wouldn't have to worry so much. Our streets would be safe. I never used to lock my door, ever, until about 20 years ago when Reagan was in, excuse me. And then people were coming down the street, kicking in the doors, literally. There were people walking down the street kicking in the doors. Then we started locking the door. Not just my door. I hated to have to do it. We never locked the doors. I never locked my car. Now I can't go out of my office without locking it.

[31:44]

Yeah. The wise leader is wise because the people support him, even though they don't know that they support him. But it's because the people have a kind of moral or ethical value. And if they don't, then maybe the leader is not so wise. I just want to say one thing that we can do. This is by way of announcement. When these executions take place in St. Quentin, a lot of people, several hundred people, come and just sit.

[32:48]

And that sitting, that's really trying to face the bottom. at the gate, facing the gate, looking at the prison. And all we can do is sit there. I'd like to just invite people to come. It's a very, it's a powerful experience of creation of our own difficult situation and stay right there.

[33:56]

So if you're interested, we're going to carpool from here. There's more information on the board and I'm happy to talk with people afterwards. But that's something that we can do in the same way that you made a choice. emotional response. None of us, I think, is purified of those responses. But that's not what's going on. Right. Jane? This discussion, I feel a little nauseous. And I feel kind of torn. I do feel like that to kill someone to prove to people or to show a lesson that killing someone is wrong is not a good idea.

[35:03]

And I think that, especially in this case, there is no doubt. There is a reasonable doubt about his innocence or guilt. I think that that's a whole other factor. To kill someone who is in this case or to execute him, I feel like that is an act of revenge However, the whole time you've been talking, I've been sitting here thinking, we participate in this stuff all the time. I mean, how many of us have leather shoes? Some cow's been killed for those leather shoes. That's a lie. You know, even if you're a vegetarian, you probably have leather shoes or a leather belt. And then you go home and ants are swarming your kitchen or mice are in your kitchen. You know, do that. And it's not necessarily an act of revenge. It's just an act of you know, doing something, and I guess that I just, you know, there's a story I read that, I'm pretty sure I read it, I might have made it up, I don't know, but about some captain who's on this ship, and this one guy wants to have a mutiny, and he, the captain knows that if this guy mutinies, then everybody on the ship's gonna die, because this guy didn't know how to drive a boat,

[36:21]

And so the captain has to make a decision, and maybe he kills this guy, and I think maybe he does. And it is a karmic behavior, or whatever it's called, but he saved all these other people. And I guess the whole, sometimes I feel like it's like, oh, killing is, you cannot, you should not do it, you cannot do it, and it's an act of revenge. And I'm not completely, I mean, killing for revenge is very different than, I mean, I think that there's different ways of, I don't know if I have a question, I just know that this gets... Well, it's a complex problem and it's an endless discussion and that should be. And there's a question, is there justifiable killing and so forth, so that's always been question throughout history. And it's very true. When is it justified and when is it not? That's the question.

[37:24]

So, you know, if someone's on a rampage and they're shooting all these people and then you kill them. because that's the only thing, unless he can do something else. So, before they, you know, kill everybody. So, that's the thing, you know, it's like, when is it justified and when is it not? Because to say that it's never justified, that's too extreme. And to say that it's always justified, that's too extreme. So, It's all in the middle, all this stuff is in the middle, you know? And you have to make your decisions and your choices based on what's really appropriate. Yeah? Last week, after I went home, there was a woman walking around the neighborhood with these long voter registrations, and she also had a vote yes on Proposition 56.

[38:33]

She knocked on the door, and I said I'd already read, of course, I'm a voter. And anyway, we got to talking, and she gave me a fistful of these voter registrations that I thought I could give to people, and I did. And I had some left over, and I read them, and they were different, they weren't consistent. Some of them said, and these are people in my neighborhood, which is kind of a low-income neighborhood, some of the people I gave these things to, Some of them said, some of them wanted a social security number. They needed a birth date, because you have to be 18. They wanted a driver's license. It just seemed so hard to get these people. So I called the local registrar of voters. And I said, I'm looking at two different kinds of registration forms here for the people. I said, it just seems like it's not easy for these people to register. I forget when I did. decades ago at a grocery, I think. Don't give anybody your social security number.

[39:40]

No, no, we never, you know. And she laughed, and she said, oh, they're all screwed up. And so we talked, and she said, yeah, there are all kinds of forms out there. And I said, well, you can call the Secretary of State. But maybe I'm making too much of this, but I always think if people voted, you know, if we could get some of these people who really, you know, would benefit. That's right. And they make it hard, you know? I mean, this made it hard for them. I wouldn't want to, you know, I'd look at one of these things and I'm just, I wouldn't want to fill it out. Okay. I was just going to, this was such a helpful talk and I always wanted to comment about the idea of people redeeming themselves and to just notice that a lot of people aren't going to redeem themselves and aren't going to turn around and probably maybe most people in prison aren't.

[40:46]

But that isn't a reason to not have the responsibility for allowing the possibility because some people do. And to just kind of underline what you were saying about that and in England, it might have been the Quakers or somebody or other, that they renamed prisons penitentiaries. And now we just hear the word penitentiary and we think, how horrible. But really, it was a whole new idea about prison as a place where people could be penitent, become penitent. And that's kind of what you were talking about, and that we really have to make that, open that way for people. Right. And also, the Youth Guidance Center, It used to be called the Reform School. But both of those names have real bad connotations. When I think of penitentiary, boy, it sounds like Iron Gates to me.

[41:50]

But still, originally maybe the idea was you know turn around but it's hard to you know you should turn around you know you can't do that you know you have to it has to come from inside not from outside so that's the problem it doesn't seem to me that because i'd like to find somebody to kill i mean if they do something bad but the more you look at the background of people who kill it's like once you've investigated their background you're like well maybe we shouldn't kill this that's right and if there was a where, okay, but you never find that, now this is the person we kill. That's right. Maybe George Bush, I mean not George Bush. It's like there's nobody to kill because it seems like I'm waiting for that, this is the person. That's very good, you know, there's really nobody to kill because behind that person is, you know, it's

[42:52]

all this powerful stuff that's forcing this person to do this act. And you kill that person and this stuff is still there. It doesn't disappear. Each one of us is a transmitter of something. We're like radios. We receive and we transmit. And we receive all kinds of stuff. And if you look at your television, people are receiving all kinds of stuff. violence on television is about 90% of what goes on. And then there's the question, does violence on television really cause violence in society? Duh. It's like 10, 12, 24 hours of free advertising. People pay $100,000 for three minutes of advertising. And here you have all this free advertising of violence. Well, of course, people are going to take that way out because everything is an influence.

[43:59]

Everything that we see, hear, or digest is an influence. Unless you go against the mainstream, you absorb that influence and go along with it. So in some sense, people are responsible, but in another sense, they're not really. What's that word again for a person who doesn't have Buddha nature? What's that? Echantika. And they're saying there isn't anybody. Only the Bodhisattvas, they're called great Echantikas. No Buddha nature. That's a go on. Yeah. I want to thank you so much for addressing us with this issue, because it might not be the most wonderful thing for some people to listen to, but I really appreciate it. And I just want to appreciate you for that. And then also, I've heard an interview on NPR of somebody who was one of the injectors.

[45:02]

And after, after years of doing this, he started to have nightmares of people's faces of all the people he killed. So we wonder about, you know, the causes of uh... when people come back from war and such as we have ten thousand people who are ill now uh... from the war who have already been in the last year and their cause you know that the post-traumatic aspect which is our consciousness repeating the storehouse images of what they saw and did and so it's all connected somehow of reasons why we might not want to kill if not necessary absolutely necessary Thank you so much. Yes? Way back there. Yeah. I just wanted to speak to what... You have to speak up real hard. I wanted to speak a little bit about what the woman in the front said about redemption. And I'm totally against capital punishment.

[46:06]

And I might be able to join you on that. But one of the things that I see that troubles me a lot is it's about redemption because I don't think many people because of their circumstances and how entwined they are in their lives and their backgrounds and the difficulties that brought them to the place of killing that I feel so sympathetic. But I also feel a lot of sympathy for the person maybe whose daughter was raped or murdered And I have never been in that place, and so I don't like to be judging that person for having the revenge ideas. Oh, no, we don't do that. But in addition to that, one of the things that I find really troubling is that many people that do commit heinous, horrible crimes are released and let out. And they do commit crimes again, so that builds up.

[47:07]

and everything, and I do think that many people maybe should be in some kind of prison-type situation for the rest of their lives, but not necessarily hideous and punitive, but more like where they work on the land, or they help, you know, provide food for other people, and that kind of thing. Right, so that's called lifer. You're in for life. It doesn't mean that just because you're not executed that you're out on the street. So it's possible to keep people who are irredeemable criminals or who society feels that their punishment is such, but instead of killing them, we keep them there for life. They're kept there for life. And there's no way There have been instances of relatives of people who were murdered by somebody who actually went to that person who murdered them and created a relationship with that person to help them with their redemption.

[48:40]

instead of indulging in revenge, they actually went, visited that person and had to create a relationship so that the person could understand and allow themselves to be remorseful and whatever. So they created a bond which was on a higher level than simply maintaining their positions. That's, you know, remarkable. But when you see those things happening, you see that there's a lot of possibilities.

[49:28]

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