to see what kind of identity we do have. And in other ways, and primarily I'm just trying to follow where you're leading. For example, this is the seventh Sashin in Europe. And I think there's seven new people in this Sashin. And I think only Eric, you know, Ulrike and myself have done all seven of them. You're going to get a little seven stars in there. Some of you have five.

[01:08]

And this, you know, I'm trying to figure out how to make space for new people to come to Sashin's as well as having older people come. And some people have been on the waiting list for two or three years. So this time what I did was, Ulrike and I did, was we mostly accepted the new people who were recommended by sitting groups. So this is a way of actually giving more identity to the sitting groups. Mostly it happens through my getting to know people in seminars and then they come to Sashin. But now I'm more and more taking the recommendation of the Dhamma Sangha Europe community and not just my own recommendation.

[02:18]

Okay. So all of this is a way of talking with you about... About Sangha. Because it's a kind of identity which has faces like sitting groups and so forth, but it is a kind of identity that I think is quite new to all of us. And I'm trying to speak about this, as I said, not only from my own experience, but also from the point of view of this koan about the rhinoceros fan. And I'm also trying to work with the feeling we already have.

[03:32]

Which... which is partly the fact that everyone here except Randy and me and Mike Boss is either German or Austrian. And I didn't choose you, you chose yourself. And you also didn't choose each other. You chose practice. Now, some of you are friends, but the friendship between you is not sufficient cause for your being here.

[04:38]

The only sufficient cause for your being here is practice. So you've gotten to know each other because you've all chosen practice. Okay. So now I'm not just speaking about the Dharma Sangha Europe Sangha, or the larger Buddhist Sangha here, which participates in this Sangha, among others. I'm using the example of us as a baby sangha to look at, try to understand what is this identity called sangha. So, how do I give you a feeling of this?

[06:00]

Let me read to you the introduction to this rhinoceros koan. I want to read you the introduction to this rhinoceros koan. This is, as I said, it's the same koan, but two different versions of it. And the first version in the Book of Serenity. Oceans of lands without bound. are not apart from right here, are not separate from right here, are not apart from right here. The events of infinite eons past Die Ereignisse von unendlichen Aeonen in der Vergangenheit sind alle in der unmittelbaren Gegenwart.

[07:14]

Versuche ihn oder sie von Angesicht zu Angesicht zu präsentieren. Try to make him or present it face to face. Present it to... Yeah, I understand the words. Somehow I don't get the clue. Make him present it? Make him present the understanding face to face. And then to turn it into this koan it says, and she means probably won't be able to, and she won't be able to bring it out in the wind. Okay, so that's one. Now the next one is to, if I can read my own handwriting here, to transcend emotion, To detach from views.

[08:33]

So this has to be kind of read or accepted quite slowly. Imagine if you could do these things. Imagine if you could transcend emotion. Could detach from views. Could remove bonds beyond ears. Could dissolve sticking points. Could dissolve sticking points. And further, to uphold the fundamental vehicle of transcendence. To uphold, to put forth, to manifest the fundamental vehicle of transcendence. and support the treasury eye of the true Dharma.

[09:49]

You must also, to do all these things, you must respond equally in all ten directions. To do all these things, you must respond equally in all ten directions. You must be crystal clear in all respects. And directly attain to such a realm. and directly attain, realize such a world or such a realm. And then this brings it home, but tell me, are there any who attain alike, who realize the same thing? Are there any who attain alike, realize alike, die alike, and live alike?

[11:06]

So probably every time I read something to you guys, all the energy goes out of the room and I should go home. It would be nice if you had it open for one week. We get the context. What do you mean, one reading altogether? You read this one without translation. Read it all together, so you get the context, and the reader gets the context, and then put it into verse. Okay. Well, shall I just read it quickly through in English? Mm-hmm. What? Maybe not so quickly. Okay. I'll do the second one first. To transcend emotion... detach from views, remove bonds and dissolve sticking points, to uphold the fundamental vehicle of transcendence and support the treasury eye of the true Dharma, you must also respond equally in all ten directions, be crystal clear in all respects, and directly attain to such a realm.

[12:30]

But tell me, Are there any who attain alike, realize alike, die alike, and live alike? And the other one. Oceans of lands without bound are not apart from right here. The events of infinite eons past are all in the immediate present. Try to make her present it face to face, and she won't be able to bring it out in the wind. Now, when I study a koan, I'm not just trying to get, you know, the kind of dramatic points, but trying to get at what are they really talking about. Hmm. So why do they put in, are there any who die alike, live alike, attain alike?

[13:47]

Why is that in there? And what do they mean by attain such a realm? Because they're clearly talking about Sangha here. It may not be so clear to you, but that's what they're talking about. When you're talking about attaining alike, realizing alike, dying alike, this is how we... What is our larger being in which we realize enlightenment together, die together, are in the same lineage together? This is Sangha. And it says this is a kind of realm, this is a kind of space in which you live. And to realize this, you have to be crystal clear or clear. What is this clarity? And why do they bring in the space of ten directions, the four cardinal points, the in-between and up and down?

[15:12]

And they call this a fundamental vehicle of transcendence. And then the other one, it's to present it face to face. This is also Sangha. And then the oceans of lands and infinite events of the past are all here. What are they talking about? Okay. Now, this is a task perhaps we won't solve today. But maybe today and tomorrow we can, if I'm I can feel my way into it.

[16:23]

We can try to give you a sense of what this sense of Sangha is. But I'll start with some observations. Again, you didn't choose each other. Und noch einmal, ihr habt euch nicht erwählt. You chose practice. Through practice you've come into association with each other. Ihr habt die Praxis gewählt und durch die Praxis habt ihr Verbindung miteinander aufgenommen. So you know each other through... So you don't know each other through your personalities. Und so kennt ihr euch eben nicht durch eure Persönlichkeiten. It's not your personalities which attracted you to each other. And if I I would suspect that some of you find each other rather annoying in your personality. But

[17:24]

Again, it's not our personalities which attracted us to doing this together. So the practice of sangha is to look to the being of each other person, not their personality. To more feel the being of each person, as I said, and not the personality. Now, Time in the ordinary, time as a dimension separate from space, is for Buddhism a delusion. In the...

[18:47]

But space is a sacred dimension in Buddhist culture. Or space is the dimension through which we understand time. From my window, in my little room here, I can see various of you walking on the paths across the lake. And for me to go over to where you are, even though you're there simultaneously, would take time for me. So the distance between us is time, because it would take time for me to cross the distance.

[20:08]

So the physical world, in the way we tend to perceive it through yogic practice, is... is a spatial world where time is a dimension of the distance of space. I can't explain it more than that. Right now, I'm just trying to give you, again, a sense of this spatial physicality that's emphasized all the time, as I, again, often say.

[21:20]

And again, space is interactive. It's not a passive receptacle. This stick has its own space. And my arm has a space. And we're in the space of this room. Physical space, it's also a kind of being space. Is that a new tape? Now I have to say something. Hmm. I don't really know if I can this afternoon make this any clearer.

[22:44]

I may have to wait till tomorrow. Because I have to find the way of speaking about it that gives you a feeling of what I'm talking about. Mm-hmm. But lineage from Buddha to us is considered to be a kind of passing of being space. It's almost like the physical world was seen as a stream of stuff. which you actualize.

[23:49]

Dogen Zenji starts out his main teaching with a classical section called the Genjo Koan. And the genjo koan means the actual situation as a koan. And this has quite a few meanings. But the emphasis is on making your actual situation manifest being. Or to make your actual situation manifest the teaching. Or make your actual situation the soil of your life.

[24:55]

Okay, now part of this is emphasizing space as connecting rather than space as separating. So as soon as I think about you, your personality, I'm emphasizing space as separating. As soon as I discriminate about you, like Mahakabe is a computer programmer. I may have a great affection for computer programmers. In fact, I'm extremely dependent on them. But still, when I think Mahakali is a computer programmer, I am separating him from me. So it may be that I may be as positive as I can be in this discrimination, but it still separates us.

[26:16]

So, and these things are important. When I get to know you first in seminars or in doksan, say, I may ask you, what kind of job do you have? Are you married? And so forth. Because these details, you know, are important. And also, as you can see, many of the koans start with the teacher asking, where do you come from, or what do you do, or something. Mm-hmm. So, on the one hand, I'm genuinely interested in whether you're a computer programmer or something else.

[27:31]

At the same time, I want to know you in ways that don't discriminate you as separate from me. Okay, now when you practice mindfulness, you're also practicing clarity. Okay, so if I'm angry with someone, and anger then is a... actually an expression of a connection with someone. Or I may have some affection for you as well as being angry. So this anger and the affection are expressions of a connection with you.

[28:40]

But they're also expressions of a connection which separates us. Because do I love my little finger? Well, sort of. But I don't have to love my little finger because I'm not separate from it. I'd love my little finger more if it got away. So if I practice mindfulness, though, I'm just noticing that I'm angry. Or noticing that I feel affection. And so forth. And what is the quality of that noticing that I'm angry or feeling affection or whatever?

[29:43]

There's a clarity in that noticing. Do you understand that? There's anger and there's clarity, right? The anger connects you and the clarity connects you. So the clarity becomes another way of connecting that doesn't separate. So the practice of mindfulness creates a clarity in which you can accept things. Now, Randy and I met a guy from New York who came to Creston. And he has very complicated theories based on the most recent physics about how we're actually all connected.

[30:53]

And more or less I agree with his ideas. Und mehr oder weniger stimme ich diesen Vorstellungen zu. I met him in New York first and he came to Creston to visit. Ich habe ihn zuerst in New York kennengelernt und er kam dann nach Creston zu besuchen. But there's something, although I agree with him, there's something also very aggressive about his theories that were all connected. Und obwohl ich irgendwo fast zustimmen konnte, so ist doch etwas sehr Aggressives an seiner Theorie, dass wir alle verbunden sind. What did you say, Randy, after he stared at you in the greenhouse? Well, first of all, I said it was in the line. But the feeling was that he was cracking into me, cracking into me. He was staring into it.

[31:54]

Yeah. Yeah. He kind of tramples in and says, hey, we're all connected, you know. He does it with his eyes and not with his body. So he stares at you till he feels he's established the reality of this oneness. And you feel, this is oneness, I have a little more two-ness, please. So we all like our two-ness. So this clarity is not one in which you're kind of forcing a connection on anyone or anything.

[33:01]

We're already connected. You don't have to do anything about it. All you have to do is let it happen. You have to create the space for it to let it happen. And that's one of the main subjects of this koan. How you create the space to let it happen. It's even in little things like the sense of the cleaning, wiping cloth in the eating bowls. You pick it up from your bowl. And you pick it up by one corner. And then you just let it fall. And it usually falls in a pattern of two units, and then you wipe the bowl with those two units.

[34:20]

You don't spread it over the bowl. You can do that. But the style is, you hold it by one corner and let it, give it the space to do whatever cloth does. So there's a little moment which you let the cloth be cloth. Then you wipe your bowl. So this little moment is very much like sangha space. We're all letting each other have that moment to do whatever we do. Because the connection is already there.

[35:22]

Now, in this koan, one part I didn't tell you about, Yang Kuang was distantly related to the imperial family. Which reminds me, by the way, you don't have to, when you bring in the food, you know, you don't have to carry it way up here. That's only when you're offering it to the Kaiser. In certain ceremonies you do hold things way up, but generally it's more in here. Okay, so anyway, Yang Kuan was related distantly to the emperor.

[36:35]

And one of the heirs to the throne was in hiding because, you know, the imperial family in various countries kill each other all the time. Because it's so nice to be on the throne and be a murderer. So this guy's cousin, one of the heirs of the throne, was being pursued by his nephew who was on the throne. So he came disguised as a Buddhist layman to hide in Yang Kuan's temple. By the way, I'm not going to talk too much more, but if you want to change your position, please do. I already changed mine. I can go on for another hour. Whatever. Anyway, so he stayed and practiced with Yang Kuang for some time.

[38:01]

And when he left, Yang Kuang said to him, the time has come, don't stay curled up in the mud any longer. And this guy went on to become the emperor and to end the persecution of Buddhism which his predecessor had been pursuing. Now, this little story is put in this koan Because what it's trying to communicate is that the government of culture is understanding and practice. The government of your memory and your mind and your body, the government of your wisdom observing the perfection of wisdom in action, is wisdom or teaching.

[39:43]

So it's So the point this koan is making is that this person went on to be the emperor. And what governed the emperor was his understanding. This is just a way of saying that what actually governs a culture is actually the way people understand themselves and each other. A person in Germany or Italy or America is a person who lives their own culture as well as their own individuality. And you realize your own individuality and your culture through understanding.

[40:49]

Through wisdom, through enlightenment. So this koan is quite, the more deeply you look into koans, they reach throughout Buddhism. But what this koan is saying is that culture rules individuals and society. Cultures become less primitive, become civilizations, become enlightenment cultures, cultures which support individual enlightenment through The understanding of each individual.

[42:11]

Through the matured, developed understanding of each individual. which isn't just that individual's own accomplishment, is also dependent on teachings that have been developed through the past and passed on. So you manifest the teachings of the past in your present life, And bring them to a new stage. And hence culture is developed. And hence each of you are a kind of emperor in your own culture. As Yang Quan was the emperor of the emperor who became the emperor. So, and the generating realm to attain to such a realm is realized through this clarity of, he says, to make things crystal clear.

[43:18]

Das wird jetzt erreicht durch diese Klarheit, wie es in dem Koran heißt, durch Kristallklarheit. It's realized through this clarity that connects us. Durch diese Klarheit, die uns verbindet. That allows acceptance, that allows us to accept each other as beings. Und dies uns auch gestattet, uns gegenseitig als Wesen zu akzeptieren. As the historical Buddha is one kind of Buddha. Der historische Buddha ist eine Art Buddha. Who has a particular life that's different from yours in a different time period. Und der hatte ein ganz besonderes Leben, das sich von eurem unterscheidet und er lebte auch zu einer anderen Zeit. But the Mahayana Buddhas are pervasive Buddhas that are appearing in everything and in us. Aber die Mahayana Buddhas sind solche durchdringende Buddhas, die in allem in Erscheinung treten und in uns. Whose life is not different from ours. So Sangha is that group of people, a kind of mandala, a family practice mandala, in which we recognize each of our own individual personalities,

[44:41]

And we also recognize our beingness that is wider than our personalities. And we also recognize the Buddha of each of us. Now, this is a new kind of identity. I mean, you establish a certain identity with your parents. And then you have friends and associates and so forth. And perhaps the first major kind of identity, larger identity than ourself we experience is with our mother and father. And hopefully that was a pretty good one. And the second kind of identity, which is a difference in kind, is probably falling in love.

[46:09]

And a third kind of identity that Buddhism is trying to develop is this identity of Sangha. Where you begin to accept people on some deeper basis than their separate personalities. And when you start finding you're doing that with a group of people, You actually will see it starts changing your relationship to your friends. Changing your relationship to your friends. In a subtle way, even though they may not realize it, you begin to see them as a member of the Sangha, even though they don't see themselves as.

[47:21]

And it may change your relationship to your parents and your children. And this sense of sangha even starts affecting how you see strangers on the street. They're still strangers, but they're no longer separate from you in ways that they might have been before. So Sangha is seen and emphasized in this koan as a treasure of identity that produces and develops culture and produces the conditions of enlightenment and produces the kind of person who could recognize a Buddha if he or she saw one. And hence produces the kind of situation where enlightenment is possible in a culture and in individuals.

[48:43]

And that's as much as I can say now about Sangha. So you can ask yourself this question among us. But tell me, are there any who attain alike, realize alike, die alike, live alike? As we say, we may be born in the same lineage, but we die in different lineages. But still, that difference and similarity is Sangha.

[49:43]

But this difference and these similarities, that's Sangha.

[50:05]

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