Good morning. So to review on this middle day of our Rohatsu Sesshin, and for those of you who are just joining us today, and for those of you who've been here for a long time, working with, enjoying Dongshan's song of the Jewel Mirror Samadhi. And we're enjoying it as a koan text. So you have these two pages. This is a primary text in the Soto or Cao Dong lineage from the 9th century, which we chant and we'll be chanting in midday service every day.

[01:01]

And many of the lines in this song work as turning phrases. that you can use as koans that you can sit with. You're welcome to just sit zazen throughout the day and just ignore this, but you're also invited to allow any given line in this, and many lines in this are very rich, sit with you to come forth in your zazen and inform your zazen body and mind. So we've talked about how koans work.

[02:05]

And again, it's not about figuring them out or thinking about them. It's not about discovering some meaning or getting some answers if there are riddles. These are aspects of your practice body and you can allow them to explore you and explore your practice and become part of your practice. So I've talked about many of the lines in this text. And then also yesterday we talked about some of the lines in this that are particularly Zazen instructions and are about Zazen in some very deep elemental way. And I haven't mentioned all of the lines that work this way, either as koans or zazen instructions.

[03:13]

But I am focusing on two of the verses, which are really the keys to this whole long song. I want to say something more about all of this today, but I wanted to review some of the, well, first the two key lines. The very first line, the dharma of suchness, is intimately transmitted by Buddhas and ancestors. Now you have it. Preserve it well. So the teaching, the reality, the dharma. of suchness, of just this, has been and will be intimately, tenderly, caringly, lovingly transmitted by all the Buddhist ancestors.

[04:15]

This is what all the Buddhist ancestors transmit, this teaching of suchness, which is another way of talking about the teaching of the ultimate, but also how the ultimate is in this crazy world of ours. And it's, you know, as I said, it's another way of talking about the teaching of emptiness. It's not really different, but it's another way of talking about it. Just this. as you face the wall, as you face the floor, as you face yourself. The dharma of suchness is intimately transmitted. Now you have it. Preserve it well. This is not something you need to figure out or acquire, not something you need to understand, not something that will be realized later in the future after you've

[05:24]

studied many books and sat many sessions and so forth. It's here now. In and around your seat. Preserve it well. So our practice, our lifelong practice is how do we take care of it? How do we keep it alive? And of course, the story about this is that Dong Shan went to his teacher Yun Yan and as he was about to depart from Yunyan's monastery, and asked his teacher, Yunyan, well, if someone asks me, what was your dharma? What's your teaching? What should I say? And Yunyan said, just this is it. Just this. This suchness. Just this. So it's enough to just sit all day today and practice with just this, or this suchness, this dharma of suchness.

[06:35]

What is it? Here, now, on your seat. And Dongshan couldn't say anything. Yonyan said, now you are in charge of this. Please take care of it well. Please carry it on. Don't let it be cut off. So this is the transmission. This is this lineage, this practice, teaching tradition that we have inherited, carried across cultures by Ehei Dogen and Shunryu Suzuki Roshi, now in Chicago. Now you have it. Preserve it well. And since we chant this, I have to say, now you have it. Preserve it well.

[07:36]

How do we take care of this? So that's the first key line of this song we're singing this session. So that's kind of the topic for the whole song, the whole text. So when there is an indefinite it in the rest of it, it's referring back to this dharma of suchness. So just to portray it in literary form refers back to this dharma of suchness. And darkest night, it is perfectly clear, refers back to this dharma of suchness. This is the topic for the whole rest of the song. So that's the first key line. The second is, like facing a precious mirror, form and reflection behold each other. You are not it, but in truth, it is you.

[08:40]

So we face the jewel mirror, we face the wall. Form and reflection behold each other. The form of whatever it is on your seat and reflection from the wall behold each other. The wall is looking at you, kid. What does it see? And vice versa. Form and reflection behold each other. You are not it, but in truth it is you. Simple line, but everything is there. You are not it, but actually it is you. And actually this is, This is about the Dharma of Sushnus, but also these pronouns are tricky in Chinese.

[09:52]

They can be understood in lots of ways. This song is also about language and the use of language and the misuses of language. This is also about the relationship between teacher and student. It's about many things. It's also, well, it's about inclined and upright in the process. I'll come back to that. But this could be understood as you are not him, but he actually is you. Or you are not them, about Dongshan's teacher, but they actually are you. So there's a lot going on in this text. Maybe we could do a whole practice period just on this song.

[11:04]

And there are many lines here that you could spend the next three days on. One of the things that's going on is talking about the process of inclined and upright interact. And there's a five-fold process that is introduced in this song and then it develops into the Tsao-tung Soto teaching of the five degrees, sometimes called the five ranks. But it's about the integration of the ultimate, the universal, sometimes called the upright, and the phenomenal world, the inclined, the partial, particulars.

[12:12]

So, our experience of the dual Mara Samadhi, our experience of upright sitting, our experience of Sashin, allows us maybe even just one period of Zazen. Well, according to Dogen, definitely one period of Zazen. Allows us some taste, some glimmer, some sniff of something very deep, some ultimate, universal wholeness. But our practice isn't just to, as the Harmony of Difference and Sameness, which we're also chanting, says, quote the translation we're using, I should say.

[13:33]

According with sameness, according with the ultimate, is still not enlightenment. So reaching some experience of the universal, of the ultimate, of Godhead, some traditions call it. That's not it. That's not enlightenment. Our practice is about the lifelong practice of integration of this ultimate into our everyday activity? Inclined and upright interact. How do we integrate our taste of the upright, the universal? Or perhaps it's a more or less digested taste. our experience of this universal, into our everyday experience, into our interactions in this declining world, in this difficult, challenged world.

[14:40]

How do we integrate these? And the song of the Jalmera Samadhi suggests a five-fold process of this. So that's also part of what's in this song. So there are many, many lines here that you can use as koans or that you can use as other instructions. Turning away and touching are both wrong. It's like a massive fire. You can't ignore it, but you can't get a hold of it either. And in terms of receiving the instructions from the past Buddhists, one on the verge of realizing the Buddha way contemplated a tree or contemplated the wall for 10 kalpas. right at the edge of full, total emancipation, full Buddhahood, just staying there, staying at that edge, facing the wall, facing a tree, for 10 kalpas.

[15:42]

And that Buddha, by the way, after he finally did, take one toke over the line and become a full Buddha. He had 16 sons, and the youngest of them later on would become Shakyamuni Buddha, it says in the Lotus Sutra. Anyway, one on the verge of realizing the Buddha way contemplated a tree for 10 kalpas. We haven't talked yet about when arrows meet head on, how could it be a matter of skill? But, you know, the wooden man starts to sing and the stone woman gets up dancing. It's not reached by feelings or consciousness. How could it evolve to liberation? So don't try and figure this out. Don't try and think about this and get some understanding of it. That's not the point. But whether these, you know, teachings and approaches are mastered or not, reality constantly flows.

[16:46]

beyond your ideas about it, beyond any theories, beyond any philosophies. Reality constantly flows. Or maybe that's a plural. In Chinese, it could be singular or plural. Maybe there are realities that constantly flow anyway. So there are many lines here. that we can say yes to, and the affirming mind naturally accords. So all of that's just been a review of the past couple of days. I want to say something else now. So one of the things we said yesterday is that there was the question that Ko brought up about this funny filial piety stuff. What does it mean to obey? What does it mean to obey your parents or for ministers to serve their lords?

[17:58]

Well, our Bodhisattva precepts, our Bodhisattva practices means that we do try to help. There is something we need to obey. This is part of what this Teaching is about, you've got to serve somebody. So, there's a whole process here of diving down into the deep koan, that is, the song of the Jewel Mirror Samadhi, of this Jewel Mirror Zazen. So I want to talk today about

[19:12]

It's the bottom of the first page. Wondrously embraced within the reel, drumming and singing begin together. So there's this immediacy to this process. Call and response, drumming and singing. Pain and ouch begin together. The wooden man starts singing. The stone woman gets up to dance. There's a process. There's something going on here. Something's happening. You don't know what it is, but it's happening. So penetrate the source. Get down to the bottom of it. So with each line, this is not the same as figuring it out. deliberations. It's just arrow points meeting in midair.

[20:19]

Penetrate the source. Travel the pathways. What's going on? Embrace the territory and treasure the roads. How is this functioning? How is the pivotal moment bringing it forth? What is this mysterious pivot that response to your energy, your inquiry. And you can do this with any of the lines here, or many of them anyway. So, you can take a line from this song, or a couple lines, and just allow them to penetrate down to the bottom. and embrace it, treasure this process. And it's not that actually you can do this.

[21:33]

Allow the song to become you. It's going to be irritating when a song gets stuck in your head. Sometimes it's nice. Sometimes, you know, it's good to have a song stuck in your head. Some songs are actually like Dharanis or mantras and, you know, they're songs I've used as Dharanis and, you know, sang to myself as a way of penetrating the source. Even in Saza, I confess this to you. And it's fine, you can do that. And then there are other songs. I mean, even like television commercial jingles that get stuck in your head. Oh my God, aha! But this is a song you can trust.

[22:36]

So, if one of the lines or a couple of the lines, we don't know the melody. That's been lost since the ninth century. We have the words, we don't have the melody. But if the lyrics stick in your head, allow them to penetrate the source that's sitting on your cushion, on your seat. Embrace this territory. Embrace the space. of the koan or instruction that comes forth when this drumming and singing begin together. You can actually memorize the whole thing. It's possible. I'm not saying you should spend your time this session trying to memorize this.

[23:42]

But it is possible to memorize the whole thing. I've done it. Actually, I did it with the original translation we had. from Tom Cleary, and then we did this other translation. Actually, this is the official Sotoshi translation, a slight variation on it, which I helped produce. And once we had these other translations, a lot of the people at Zen Center hated them because they weren't the ones they'd memorized. But they're actually more accurate. And they're OK to chant, because we're going to do that. Treasure the roads. Treasure the pathways. You can just sing one line over and over again. That's OK. Or take a few lines. But you would do well to respect this.

[24:43]

Do not neglect it. So I want to talk mostly about that line. Aretha Franklin sang about it. You would do well to respect this. So I talked yesterday about the precepts in terms of updating ministers serve their lords, children obey their parents. How do we, as bodhisattva practitioners, serve the Buddhists and bodhisattvas and the ancestors? How do we obey? teachers and bodhisattvas and bodhisattva guides. And he would do well to respect this, do not neglect it. In this case, in this line, this is talking about respecting this whole process that I've been talking about, this whole, or that this song is talking about.

[25:52]

You are not it, but in truth it is you. You are not the Buddhists and ancestors, but actually they are you. I know that because you showed up here. And I would say that the R16 Bodhisattva precepts Well, one of the main parts of them is, it's not explicitly in the Sixteen Precepts, but just respect, universal respect, radical respect, respecting all beings. Talk about benefiting all beings. It also means respecting all beings. Respect the teaching of suchness.

[27:00]

Respect preserving it well. Respect zazen. Respect yourself, even. That doesn't mean praising self at the expense of others. It means respect whatever it is that's on your seat right now. Which includes, you know, everybody you've ever known. Everybody who's ever known you. Everybody who's ever known you, especially those who you've forgotten. Well, maybe also the people who you haven't forgotten. Or the trees and Wildflowers, you haven't forgotten, whatever.

[28:02]

But it happens that this line, so we talked a little bit about translation and all the different ways in which Chinese characters can be interpreted. This particular line, it happens, is the most difficult to translate in the whole song. or is subject to the most different interpretations in the whole song. So I also want to respect the people who will join us in the next two days and, you know, I don't know, I'll have to think of something else to say about this. That's a problem for another day. So the first character in this line, well, the first two characters in this line are a compound that means respectful or reverent.

[29:39]

So the first half of this line literally It means respectfulness. Respectfulness is fortunate or auspicious. So you would do well to respect this. Respecting suchness itself and the whole process. of the unfolding of respectfulness, of suchness, which is what the first half of the song previously described is about. And of course, it's worthy of respect. The second half of the line, do not neglect it, could be read more strongly don't stubbornly or obstinately violate or disobey or transgress it.

[30:42]

So the characters could be read more strongly than just do not neglect it. But the first half of this line has been translated very differently. Some other translations, some of you might have seen. The first character of the compound, In Chinese, two characters together as a compound have a meaning, but the characters separately may have different meanings. The compound that together means respect or respectfulness, this character separately, the first character by itself also means to miss or to make a mistake or to be wrong. So this line has been translated. by translators who I respect. It has been translated as, if you miss it, that's a good sign.

[31:48]

Don't neglect it. Or to be wrong is auspicious. Do not oppose it. And I don't think that really fits in the whole context of the Jewel Marrow Samadhi myself. That's just my opinion, but anyway. But you could hear that as warnings not to hold too strongly to any one interpretation or to any one of the five degrees in that context. or that it might be a mistake to get stuck on any particular understanding or interpretation. And again, this is after talking about the five-fold interaction. So just to say that.

[32:49]

And also, there are... and has lines in which he talks about making mistake after mistake. So that's also maybe in this line. What's that, Susan? One big mistake is auspicious. Yeah. But even that, you would do well to respect. respect the whole process. And it's not about, you know, one particular understanding of it. It's not about some perfect, you know, it's a process. the interaction of inclined and upright.

[33:56]

It's about both the drumming and singing. It's about both the wooden man and the stone woman. It's not about being perfect or having some perfect understanding. And as I've mentioned to a couple of people, you know, there was a great American yogi who said, if the world were perfect, it wouldn't be. So anyway, this sense of this Koan text and this Zazen instruction text as being about a process and about being about respect. And how do we obey that? How do we help that, and even to do this continuously?

[34:59]

So this is what's happening. And right within causes and conditions, right within time and season, even in Chicago winters, it's serene and illuminating. So this integration means that we find, even within our time of grief and chaos, how do we find that which is serene and illuminating? How do we find that space where the affirming mind naturally accords? How do we find that chord, that magical chord that Leonard Cohen sang of? So, okay, I'll leave a little bit to say tomorrow and the next day.

[36:13]

We have just a little bit of time if anybody has something to add. Douglas. Well, let's see, I'll probably stain it with defilement. Oh, good. We need that. So it seems to me the poem is, there's a lot, but a large part of the poem is about coming to this directly, finding ourselves in the world of suchness, And that's not something we come to an understanding of or a relationship with purely by thinking and explaining and describing. Right. So in that sense, we're looking for an intimate relationship and realization. And in that regard, this finding ourselves in the world of connection and relationship helps make sense of the references at the end to our relationship to the world of justice as one of parent and child, Lord and minister.

[37:31]

It's a world in which it's a situation in which the world in relation to us has a claim upon us. When we hear the cries of the world, the world has a claim on us to respond. That's how I'm reading it for now. Good. Thank you. That helps a lot, I think. So in some ways this is about intimacy and relationship. Yes, thank you. Dale. Not a little bit, but that's a particular, so this, how many of you know anything about the I Ching? Okay, so there are 64 hexagrams which means six lines and it's used as divination but more deeply than that it's a way of seeing, well literally it means the book of changes, it's a way of seeing

[38:51]

different aspects of particular realities. So there are 64 sets of six lines, and this is one of them, it's number 30. So they're made up of trigrams, which are three line sets, each of which is associated with a particular Chinese element. Tom, who's an expert in Chinese to go through that, but fire, water, wind, earth, sky, wood, lake, anyway. Mountains, right, thank you. So number 30, the illumination hexagram is number 30, which is double fire, which is made up of lines that are either solid or

[39:56]

or open, and this one is solid, open, solid, and doubled. Anyway, and so that particular, so quoting the I Ching in ninth century China was like us quoting Shakespeare. People just knew The I Ching, it was part of Chinese lore going back a couple thousand years from then or more. So that particular hexagram, the commentary on it is sort of relevant to this. But more than that, it's just used here primarily as a kind of, because of its relationship to the number five, because there is a five-fold, there was a way of working with the trigrams and the hexagrams that, it's complicated, but there was a way of playing with them, working with them, that in that particular hexagram uniquely was five-fold.

[41:09]

And that's probably why it's cited here. But it's also fire and it's also illumination and it's also... You know, there are other things in the commentary, and there are layers of commentary in the I Ching that were mostly from Confucian sources, but it goes back, the I Ching text, the original text goes back long before Confucius. So that's a little bit about it. I don't know if anybody wants to add anything to that. Yes, Susan. Yes, right. Clinging. Clinging, yes, yes. That's interesting. I mean, he didn't use that word here, but if you think about the relationship between momentary grasp and release in fire, that fire comes from wood. I mean, thinking of fire, anyway.

[42:13]

But there's this moment of brilliance, like a momentary... I mean, it's not really a grasp, it's an appearance. So, I just find that fascinating in that particular picture, because it's illumination, it's brilliance, it's... And it's also the fire depending on clinging to the fuel, so the fire clinging to the wood. So yeah, yeah. There's an extended commentary on the meaning of the illumination hexagram here on in my book, Just This Is It, Dongshan and the Practice of Suchness, on pages, there's several pages about it, just about that, about that excerpt, so you can find it.

[43:32]

But yeah, there are particular references in this song that the, Newborn Child and Baba Wawa is a particular reference to something in the Prasanna Paramita, for example. So this is referring to stuff in Buddhist lore as well. But we can use it as a, you know, it may be fun to understand those things. For example, Yi, The archer ye who hit at mark at 100 paces and the arrows meeting head on. Maybe I'll talk about that tomorrow. Any other questions or comments or responses? Oh, Dylan, hi. to be ready to meet any of those teachers in unexpected times, in unexpected places, in unexpected contexts.

[45:06]

An example I'm thinking of is when I was a teenager, when I was in high school, a professor projector that was part of the syllabus in some way. And they had this very, very old dog at the house who just sat on this bed and stuck. And the dog and I just looked at each other for a while while I was there. that it was close to death. And it was like just a conversation that was happening while we were looking at each other.

[46:11]

So just that intensity of talking about that, those teachers can be, those teaching contexts and those teachers can show up in unexpected places. And maybe a practice of mine is just trying to be ready for when those contexts show up. Yeah. To be ready for such an event. Yeah. To meet an old dog. Somehow, you reminded me of Something my teacher said to me, Rehoboam said when I was, soon after I was priest ordained, you know, we priests have this zogu, this bowing mat, which you're supposed to use whenever you do a prostration.

[47:21]

And, you know, sometimes, you know, priests come into the sendo and they know there's no prostration scheduled. So, well, you might think you don't need to carry your zagu, but Rev said you should always carry your zagu when you're wearing your okesa, because you never know when Dogen or Tsukuyoshi might walk in. So, I don't know, somehow I thought of that one.

[47:51]

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