Jan Nottier was supposed to be responding to mine, and I don't think you have to do anything with it yet. But oracularly, Richard is going to channel Jan. Actually, she was kind enough to fax her comments. So we have Jan as a respondent. And I had the benefit of hearing the response before I presented. So I will try, I will address it directly after Richard reads it. One of the main points was my use of the word influence. So I will appropriate her comments to not use that word, since she quite rightly points out that it's Dogen who's the actor in relationship to the Lotus Sutra rather than vice versa. But I'll start with that as one of the topics of what I wanted to present, which is just the range of

[01:03]

sources that Dogen appropriated or used in some way. And that part of what I wanted to say is that the Lotus Sutra is important in that, and Mahayana in general, along with the koans and the Japanese aesthetic tradition, and of course the Chan tradition and so forth, and the Japanese Buddhist tradition. So and of course the Lotus Sutra is part of that and Jan also rightly pointed out that I was a little bit careless or at least imprecise about which about some about which things were Lotus Sutras specifically or just Lotus Sutra influenced Japanese Buddhism. So anyway Richard will read that and I'll say a little bit more. Actually the main point, though, that I wanted to talk about had to do with this aspect of the Lotus Sutra, which I'm calling self-referencing or self-referential, and how that's how Dogen, in some sense, appropriates that in terms of one aspect of his of his discourse style.

[02:18]

So, So the point about the Lotus Sutra, while many Mahayana sutras refer to themselves and refer to the merits from reciting and copying and remembering and preaching this particular sutra, the Lotus Sutra really excels in that. So as George and Walton obviously say in the introduction to Lotus Sutra in Japanese culture, the preaching of the Lotus Sermon promised in the first chapter never takes place. The text, so full of merit, is about a discourse which is never delivered. It is a lengthy preface without a book. Lotus Sutra is thus unique among texts. It is not merely subject to various interpretations, as all texts are, but is open or empty at its very center. So, and there's so many examples in the Lotus Sutra where it refers to Buddhas and Bodhisattvas coming to hear the Lotus Sutra, of Lotus Sutra being preached at some time in the past, in the distant past or in the distant future, hopefully. And so what is the Lotus Sutra?

[03:23]

So, and then just going back to Kamakura, of course, the uses of the Lotus Sutra, you know, varied from Nichiren, for whom it's the icon, to Shinran, who is a Tendai monk, but barely speaks of the Lotus Sutra. But Dogen refers to the Lotus Sutra more than any other sutra. But I think that the way he uses the Lotus Sutra is subtle and that this aspect of, I think there's also an overlap in terms of worldview and cosmology, which I'm working on in other contexts. But in terms of discourse, this rhetorical style that Dogen takes, I think it does echo that quality of the self-referential quality. So I have some of the Jodos from the Hikoroku

[04:25]

where he, for example, says, today, this mountain monk, Dogen, gives a dharma discourse for the assembly. What I have just said, I offered all the three treasures in the 10 directions. So we've been talking about language in terms of signifier and signified. Here, what is signified, I would say, is not that there's nothing there, but it's certainly between the lines. It's almost in, it's a kind of performance. So I think the performative aspect is here. So he goes on in that Dharma discourse to talk about, in that Jodo, to talk about, you know, just having said this, that he offers to all of these, to Zen implements and to the ancestors and so forth, and to all Buddhas in the ten directions. And then in some of those kinds of Jodos, he actually, he specifically references Well, before that, there's some of the words specifically that references the Lotus Sutra, but there's another one on page seven.

[05:31]

As this mountain monk, Dogen, today gives a Dharma discourse, all Buddhists in the three times also today give a Dharma discourse. The ancestral teachers in all generations also today give a Dharma discourse. And then he says, skipping ahead, already having given a Dharma discourse, what Dharma has been expounded? So as I point out, that's kind of like this, and obviously asking, well, where is the Dharma and the Lotus Sutra? It's not explicit. It's in the performance or in the ambience. And Dogen does this, I think he does it at times in Shobo Genzo too. It's clearer in Eikoroku. But this kind of style of proclamation, where the proclamation is the message in a sense. There's one place where he explicitly does this explicitly with a reference to the Lotus Sutra. So this is Jodo 24 and 1240 on page 8. In the entire universe in 10 directions, there's no Dharma at all that has not yet been expounded by all Buddhism in three times.

[06:38]

Therefore, all Buddhists say in the same manner that all Buddhism in three times expound the Dharma. So now I also will expound the Dharma without differentiation. which is a quote from the, from chapter two of the Lotus Sutra. And then he, and then he says, this great assembly present before me also is practicing the way in the manner of all Buddhas. Each movement, each stillness is not other than the Dharma of all Buddhas. So do not act carelessly or casually. Although this is the case, I have an expression that has not yet been expounded by any Buddha. Do you want to discern it? And so there's this rhetorical style in the Hikaroku where he challenges the monks. Ostensibly these are talks to the monks in the dharma hall from the high seat. And as I understand the context, at least the traditional context from the Yulu in China, which presumably he was copying at Eheji, the monks are standing rather than sitting in the dharma hall. And frequently it says, after a pause, Dogen says, In the same manner, then he repeats the quote from the Lotus Sutra in the same manner that all Buddhism three times expound the Dharma.

[07:41]

So now I also will expound the Dharma without differentiations. So he's called this a, an expression that has not yet been expounded. It's almost like he's, you know, doing the Lotus Sutra or reenacting the Lotus Sutra. So, so this is a kind of this, this rhetorical style, it seems to me is, a performance. It's a kind of reenactment. It's, uh, there's no, the, it's not that there's any doctrinal Dharma that, that he's, that he's putting forth. It's he's, he's proclaiming something. Um, so in some sense, I think this is, uh, related to this, uh, self-referential style of the Lotus Sutra. And then I, uh, refer to William LaFleur's discussion of this in the Karma of Words and use that as a kind of take-off point for most of the rest of the paper. Well, I'll just quote LaFleur, the surprising feature of the parables in the Lotus is that they are simultaneously the vehicle and the tenor of that vehicle.

[08:51]

In a very important sense, the parables of the lotus are about the role and status of parabolic speech itself. They are what I would call self-reflexive allegory. Their trajectory of discourse behaves like a boomerang. Much like the dharma described in the crucial section of the Hoban chapter, they are characterized by the absolute identity of their beginning and end. So this is this He calls it self-reflexive allegory and refers to the parables that way. Now I got into a discussion here about Le Fleur's view of Hoban as modes and Jan talks about that and maybe we can talk about that after her comments. And that's not really the point of the paper but the whole question of Hoban or Upaya and It certainly can be a kind of strategy for upholding the Lotus Sutra as the Supreme Sutra and everything else is provisional.

[09:53]

And it's used that way sometimes in Tendai and Nichiren. I think LeFleur is presenting another reading of it, which I think is interesting. It's not necessarily how Dogen's reading it always, but when he talks about it, his modes. But anyway, we'll talk about that after Jan's comments. Again, there are other examples I'm not reading of Dogen's discourse using this self-reflexive or self-referential style of discourse, which, again, I think is performative. I also talk about the whole, in Muchu Setsumu, he talks about dreams in a way that I refer to, and it's a good example of him turning a source material. So, and again, there's a handout actually that Jan sent that looks at that in some detail.

[11:01]

And we can see how Dogen is actually using passage from the Lotus Sutra in a particular way. But basically there's the idea of the dreaming as opposed to awakening. Dogen in Muchisetsamo turns that around to say that that dreams is dreaming is exactly that Muchisetsamo could be translated expressing the dream within the dream. So just to read the passage on 14, without expressing dreams, there are no Buddhas. Without being within a dream, Buddhas do not emerge and turn the wondrous dharma wheel. This dharma wheel is no other than a Buddha together with the Buddha and a dream expressed within a dream. Simply expressing the dream within a dream is itself the Buddha's ancestors, the assembly of unsurpassable enlightenment. So this is a kind of rhetorical thing that Dogen does in a lot of cases. Kuge is another example. I don't mention it here. But flowers in the sky, which are traditionally sometimes translated as cataracts, these are obstacles to seeing clearly.

[12:03]

And he says that these are the flowers in the sky of Buddha, the flowers of emptiness. He kind of turns that to make it positive. So in the last part of the paper, I talk about several Jodos, which are sprayed sort of as dreams. And I mentioned Bernard's work with Kazan. Certainly, Dogen doesn't use dreams in any way near the way that Kazan does, or Mioe, for example. But still, the little point I wanted to make there is that there is this kind of Mahayana worldview that includes visions and dreams and the fantastic, as Tanabe talks about, which I've mentioned here, which is part of how Dogen's operating, too. It's part of his worldview. And I think it's easy for us to overlook that. So there's a difference between Dogen and Quezon in terms of this. But I'd say it's more a matter of degree. So I'm interested in Bernard's comments on that. I mentioned, well, I give three parables.

[13:06]

how they, again, they're Jodo, and I'm calling them parables, and they're not exactly dreams, or maybe they were, he says, in a couple of cases last night, and then he proceeds to talk about these kind of wild visions of stepping on a piece of shit, which pops up and says, my name is Shaki Mooney, going back to Yunmin's koan where he says that Buddha is a shit stick or a piece of shit, depending on how you translate it. There's also this other Jodo where he turns the rhetoric of the introduction to the assembly of a Buddha and talks about it in terms of broken wooden ladle to Togata, who has a country, the Buddha field named clump of soil, Kalpa is named fist. The true Dharma age and semblance Dharma age are both 12 hours. So he's playing with the rhetoric of the sutras. Then he has this other one, and again, I won't go into it in detail, where he talks about Avalokiteshvara coming to him in his vision and trying to buy from him the sesame cakes in the sky that have now become vases and eyes to fulfill Avalokiteshvara's iconic aspect.

[14:29]

But maybe that's enough to start with. I'll say some more after Richard reads Janz, but what I'm really most interested in, what's most interesting to me in this paper is the aspect of the Lotus Sutra as self-referencing and what is the content of the Lotus Sutra and how that's, in some ways, Dogen echoes that in his style of, in some of his discourses. Maybe that's enough to start. There are two handouts that... I'm not sure if there's enough room. So Jan writes the following comments on Teigen's paper. She notes that it is very useful to point out that Doven made significant use of scriptural texts stereotype, and also in particular that he used scriptures such as the Lotus that we don't ordinarily associate with Sotah Zed.

[15:41]

Bringing this to our awareness is an important contribution. A second important contribution of this paper, bringing the whole idea of influence into consideration. To begin with the second point, I would like to start by drawing on the comments of Michael on what he calls the curse of art criticism. In a discussion of the supposed influence of the paintings of Cezanne on those of Picasso, Boxendel writes, influence is a curse of art criticism primarily because of its wrong-headed grammatical prejudice about who is the agent and who the patient. It seems to reverse the active-passive relation which the historical actor experiences and the inferential beholder will wish to take into account. If one says that X influenced Y, it does seem that one is saying that X did something to Y, rather than Y did something to X. But in the consideration of good pictures and painters, the second is always the more lively reality.

[16:44]

It is very strange that a term with such an incongruous astral background has come to play such a role, because it is right against the real energy of the lexicon. If we think of Y rather than X as the agent, the vocabulary is much richer and more attractively diversified. Draw on, resort to, avail oneself of, appropriate from, have recourse to, adapt, misunderstand, refer to, is on quite a long list. Everyone will be able to think of others. Most of these relations just cannot be stated the other way around, in terms of X acting on Y rather than Y acting on X. to think in terms of influence blunts thought by impoverishing the means of differentiation. In the case of Cezanne, Boxendal is arguing it is backwards to suggest that this deceased painter influenced the subsequent work of Picasso. Rather, we will see much more clearly if we think in terms of how Picasso actively viewed the work of Cezanne, adapted parts of it, appropriated from it, and so on.

[17:49]

We can follow his lead in examining relationship with the lotus, asking questions such as, how is it that he read it at all? That is, why should he, or why would he? Through what frames of reference did he view it? What parts did he appropriate? And perhaps most interesting of all, how did he mobilize the sutra? That is, what did he do with it, and what points did he use it to make? Regarding the first question, addressed by Taigen on page two, simply a part of his excuse me, the reference is simply a part of his Tendai training. And Jan notes that we might call this influence in that it was not voluntary. But Dogen could have rejected the lotus as Nichiren did the three Pure Land scriptures, for example. So already we see Dogen in an active mode as appropriator or a user of the lotus. A second question regarding frames of reference. One way to approach this would be a comparative reading.

[18:51]

Look at the text of the lettuce itself in Kimioji's version and see what Dogen seems to be adding or subtracting. Then ask if these appear to be his own interpretations or part of the larger environment of ideas current in Japan at the time. On page two, Taigen gives a list of four themes in the lettuce that Dogen frequently refers to. This is the top paragraph on page 2, along with many direct allusions to the parables from the Sutra. Dogen frequently refers to such lotus teachings as skillful means, hoben, the importance of fundamental enlightenment, hongraku, the single cause for Buddhas appearing in the world, that is, to bring suffering beings onto the path of awakening, and Buddhahood in this very body, sab-shin-ze-butsu. Does Dogen claim that these are in the lotus? Or is this your, Taigen's, own connection? Whether it is Dogen who is reading the Lotus in this way or Taigen who is, as author associating these themes with the Lotus, we need to make two observations.

[19:55]

Numbers one and three, that is, Ho-Ben and Buddhas appearing in the world to alleviate suffering, are not at all peculiar to the Lotus. Though the Lotus does have a different understanding of Ho-Ben than some earlier Mahayana sutras. Numbers 2 and 4, that is, Hongaka and Sokushinzeibutsu, are not there at all. Where would Dogen have gotten numbers 2 and 4, if not from the Lotus? This is a question for Japan specialists, but presumably the proximate source is the Tendai doctrine of the time. Again, who first made these connections between these concepts and the Lotus explicitly? Probably not Dogen. The Lotus still talks about becoming a Buddha, not being one already. And even the Dragon King's daughter must change her body into a male one and travel to another world system before becoming a Buddha. One particularly striking point to this reader, that is to Jan, is the idea that according to Dogon, the phenomenal world has a liberative reality, and that this idea is in the Lotus.

[21:05]

page. Never having seen this or anything like it in the Lotus myself, I decided to follow the trail. Le Fleur, cited by Teigen on page 10, claims that the Lotus affirms the complete reality of the world concrete phenomena. That's a quote. Teigen goes on to say that Le Fleur's analysis focuses on the Lotus Sutra's radical non-dualism. But is the Lotus a non-dualistic text? Read in its Indian context, definitely not. The bodhisattva vehicle is real. Others are just upaya. That is, there is a hierarchical conception. Those who accept the lotus are good buddhists. Those who reject it are chap, from chapter one. So where does this idea come from? First, where does Lefleur's idea come from? In her analysis, it is a clear misreading of the Chinese text. And she refers to handout one, where she has set up in parallel Kumarajiva's version, Lefleur's rendering from Karma of Words, a literalistic rendering of her own, and then a freer rendering.

[22:25]

In contrast to Lefleur's, one may seek in every one of the ten directions, but will find no mode other than the Buddha's. Jan's translation would be, excuse me, in the freer version. Therefore, even if you look everywhere in the ten directions, you will not find any other vehicle than the Buddha vehicle, aside from those created by the Buddha's skillful means. But a more interesting question. Why does he want to read it in this way? does he think it should be non-dualistic? Now we're back to the second question for Japan specialists. Were Dovin's Tendai teachers reading it this way? Presumably, yes. That is, non-dualism is seen in the Lotus through active rereading in a context where the idea of non-dualism is valued. One last note on context, the idea that the whole

[23:32]

archetypal story of the Buddha is said to occur in a dream, page 15, bottom paragraph, suggested that it foreshadows chapter 16, the Buddha coming into the world already enlightened, just showing attainment as Hobbit. This idea would be, it would be interesting to know more about how Dogen uses this citation. In the Lotus itself, though, it's not about a dream in reality. but the rewards have come to one who preaches the lotus, or who recites the lotus. Here she refers to handout two, which gives the Nimada translation. I'll comment on that. OK. In other words, She points out that, in other words, followers of the Lotus will have auspicious dreams, period.

[24:36]

So Dogen goes on to say, in effect, that Buddhahood is a dream, does he? This is a major contribution or interpretation on his part. There's much more that could be said about this rich and stimulating paper, but Taiten has clearly drawn our attention to several important things. First, the extent to which Dogen's thought includes elements or assumptions common to Japanese Buddhists, especially Tendai thought in general at the time. such ideas as Hongaku, non-duality, etc. Second, the challenge of sorting out the things that represent original contributions or interpretations of Dogen's part, which requires, ideally, knowing everything else that was going on in Japan at the time. And third, the importance of not letting our knowledge of these Japanese, especially Tendai, assumptions lead us to misread the modus, as Le Fleur has done, or Dogen himself. The task of stating what Dovin does not adopt from his larger environment is even more difficult unless he explicitly argues against something. In sum, a careful analysis of the rich tapestry of unquestioning acceptance and of appropriation, strongness, reading, and so on can help to provide not just a painting, but a more three-dimensional image of Dovin.

[25:49]

Many thanks to Taigen for this stimulating and provocative paper. And thanks to Jan for her comments. I already mentioned that her point on influence, I think, is very well taken, and I'll try to rephrase that. So the question then is, what are the sources that Dogen uses? And obviously, the Lotus is one of them. And how does he use them? And I think she's right. The project is to see how he particularly appropriates or creatively re-reads the Lotus. One point on just a little point she mentions, and I acknowledge that I was careless about differentiating the Lotus Sutra from the Lotus Sutra-influenced world of Japanese Buddhism. But in terms of Hoban and a single cause of Buddhas appearing in the world, that Dogen does quote that directly from the Lotus Sutra. So he is directly citing that in those two cases anyway. And then as to, yeah, I think the whole thing about skillful means, again, that wasn't the main point of the paper.

[27:04]

And I think LaFleur is creatively rereading it in some sense. I think that the whole idea of Ekayana and Hobet can be looked at in various ways. There's definitely a hierarchical aspect of it. There's definitely an inclusive aspect of it. LaFleur is choosing to rephrase it in the most inclusive, non-hierarchical way, which I think is kind of interesting. But certainly the lotus root itself and the response by Nietzsche and Dogen and so forth is not. hierarchical, or all-accepting, or all-inclusive. Just to point about, in the second handout, this is actually a good example of Dogen's re-appropriation and creative re-reading of the Lotus. He quotes, towards the end of which you said so, he quotes verbatim the section of the handout number two that Jan provided. He quotes the last, the bottom two-thirds of the second page.

[28:09]

looking at the Buddhas in the ten directions, all of whom have golden bodies, and a few lines down, he picks on this line, they will also dream about becoming the king of a realm who abandons his palace. In retinue, the highly pleasing desire of the five senses. So he picks on that to talk about, so he actually, let me see if I can However, on hearing the words in the passage, in the dream you are made king, people in the past and present mistakenly think that, thanks to the power of expounding this foremost Dharma, mere night dreams may become like this dream of Buddha's. Thinking like this, one has not yet clarified the Buddha's discourse. And then he goes back to the rhetoric of Munchusetsamo, in which he talks about the Buddha assembly existing in a dream and expressing the dream, or expounding the dream. A few lines down, he says, this being so, the Buddha's path of transforming the Saha world throughout his lifetime is indeed created in a dream.

[29:14]

So that's why he doesn't explicitly relate it to Chapter 16, but the way he uses it certainly does kind of seem to relate to that. Let's see, any other comments? Maybe that's enough. I'm interested in hearing anybody else's comments as well. Can I ask, please, what do you understand about the word mode? I find it rather unclear. And how that changes the meaning for you, mode, as far as? I think, well, I'm sorry, I don't have a copy of Karma of Words with me. And what is he trying to do? He's talking about instead of expedient means, or instead of that all of the different teachings are simply modes of ekayana.

[30:16]

They're different approaches, different means, different modes. So he's trying, I understand him to be taking it out something that might direct or actuate the true teaching from the provisional teachings. And I apologize for not having a copy of this. In other words, the original, rather than a distinction between true and provisional, everything is a mode. Everything is the sum, yeah, so it's more of a horizontal interpretation. And he does, he talks about that, and I really, I'm sorry that I don't have a copy of it. I can't see substantial differences between LaFleur, LeVendor, and Wayne James. Yeah, I feel the same way. It's a little different, but is this really substantially different? Yeah, I don't think it's, I think it's a different interpretation. I think it has to do with the, and I talk about this in the paper, that you can read Hoben as expedience, expediences, you can read it as, you know, there's a way to hear it.

[31:18]

I actually had a student in a literature class, that I taught at GTU, who was actually a Buddhist practitioner who got very upset at the Hoban chapter, because this was differentiating. But that's what the sutra does. But also, it was very manipulative. I mean, I think that was her upset. And I think that reading it. So I agree with you that there's not that much difference. And I think Jan is coming also, I think, from, and I'm sorry she's not here, from the study of the Indian Sutra. And I think how it's, there's a range of how the whole idea of Bhovan is used in... Do you see that when Lafleur is doing this, that in addition to saying everything is a mode, is he actually also erasing the true versus provisional distinction? Because how can he do that? That's such a big part of the Sutra. He's de-emphasizing it anyway, I think. so that what the sutra called the sadharma is just a mode.

[32:20]

Well, it's the ultimate mode of the modes. Preferential mode. It's been a long time since I've read that, but is Lefleur saying that that's what Saigo is doing? Can you see, if you do me a favor, and see if William will swear to the karma of words If I remember, he does have an argument that he puts forward explicitly about why he's using that. Yeah. In any case, excuse me. We can push this back to Dogen. I mean, do you see LeFleur's arguments being relevant to Dogen's perspective on the Sufi? That's, I suppose, a better question. Yes and no. Yes, in the sense that Dogen uses it creatively. that Duggan is using, you know, and the whole idea of inverting fugue, inverting, you know, dreams as opposed to awakening. And so the main part of LeFleur's argument, as I talk about in the paper, is that he says that this is to, he goes in, I didn't read it in presenting it, but he talks about

[33:34]

Well, I'll read this quote. The narratives of the Lotus are not a means to an end beyond themselves. So again, this is in the context of the self-reflexive, as he calls it, or self-referential discourse. Their concrete mode of expression is not chaffed to be dispensed with in order to attain a more abstract, rational, spiritual truth. The Lotus is unequivocal on this point, quote, one may seek in every one of the 10 directions, but will find no mode, oban, other than the Buddha's. But that's the passage that Janice unpacked. This accounts for what may seem to be an inordinate amount of praise directed by the sutra toward itself. It also implies that within the sutra, there is an unmistakable philosophical move opposite to that in Plato's Republic, a move to affirm the complete reality of the world of concrete phenomena in spite of the fact that they are impermanent. So whether that's the Lotus Sutra or Japanese Buddhist interpretation of Lotus Sutra, that certainly is something that Dogen uses when he's talking about the concrete phenomena as expressing the Dharma and coming back to that.

[34:44]

That's referential to Buddhism, not to the Lotus Sutra. And isn't that what this is saying, that if you seek the sun direction, you'll find no wholeness other than the Buddha. That's not saying that you'll find, it's not referring back to the same sutra. It's saying Buddhism is the only wholeness, the only means to liberation. Which is sort of a general religious statement. I don't see that as being particularly self-referent except, you know, the religion saying that we have the truth. Well, it's in the context of, in the Lotus, thanks for trying, in the Lotus, that there is this kind of discourse where it's talking about itself all the time. So, again, this goes back to things we've been talking about, about text as performative, text as... Well, in this case, it's not that there's nothing signified, but what is signified is not explicit. And that's, as Tanabe says, really most heightened in the Lotus.

[35:46]

It's not that it's absent elsewhere. an obvious message. That is the content of the Lotus Sutra, namely the Buddha's revelation that there is a Buddha vehicle. And that the other vehicles are Buddha.

[36:48]

And everybody who has read the sutra virtually, and I'm sure including Jan, in their Tanabes, you know, in their rhetorical mode, recognize that that's what the Lotus, that's where the message, that's what was revealed. Not to mention the entire Tendai tradition, which is based on splitting the thing into the first half and the second half, the Oden half and the true teaching half. I mean, that metaphor goes on and on and on so many times. How could you come away and say there's no sermon here? skillful means are used in a negative pejorative sense. So it certainly wouldn't be the case in the Professional Wisdom Sutras. It certainly wouldn't be the case in Vimalakirti.

[37:49]

So there's a whole tradition after this where there's pejorative connotations. If something's only a skillful means, then it's not the true way. But prior to the Lotus, or well, depending on how we're dating things here, I don't see any pejorative connotations at all. I'm not sure there is much prior to the words. So we may be talking about simultaneous sutures, but that would be to say that from the very beginning of the discussion of skillful means, we have two tracks. One referring to that as what the bodhisattva ought to embody in the deepest sense as something an excellence. Another saying that that's essentially something to be discarded. So there's an ambiguity that runs through the whole tradition if the Lotus Sutra is as early as any Mahayana Sutra.

[38:52]

It's close anyway. I've heard Jan talk about this actually that in the Indian Sanskrit Lotus Sutra and in early sources it's very clear that hovet is not something that that is not a practice for anyone other than Buddhists. Whereas clearly later in Japanese context, you know, and I think in some of the sutras, Bodhisattvas use Hōben, practitioners can use Hōben. I mean, yes, there's a police at that side, it's coming down to help, and then to help whom? Certain beings who are using it to get up. So, of course, depending on which side you stand, I mean, from which side you're looking at it, then it's either valued as skillfulness, I mean, or as a footstep toward truth, right?

[40:05]

paramartha satya, in the sense of the sum, you talk about hoven and samvritti satya, it's not wrong, it's true, it's true, it's just not the ultimate truth, but it is truth, you know, and that is not pejorative, certainly. I mean, the Lotus Sutra certainly uses hoven in both ways, in a positive sense and in a pejorative sense. That is one of the ambiguities about it, but I mean, it's certainly, It's not ever difficult to understand the message, it seems to me, if you read the sutra. To return to Karl's point about the fact that the Lotus Sutra does, whether or not the Lotus Sutra does have a content in us, I mean, it delivers a message, even if we could say that it does, but in a way that about, you know, we could still claim that it does something, and I think that's Scott's point.

[41:17]

But, okay, assuming that there would be a certain reluctance, say, to express the ultimate truth and do it in strange, funny, you know, rhetorical ways. That's the case. Even in that case, I believe that this is quite different from, so assuming that Luke Sudra doesn't tell the story he's supposed to deliver, right, doesn't deliver it. It seems to me rather different from the kind of chant tact that Dogen is taking, you know, saying, I'm going to tell you, and then, you know, silence. You know, typical chant rhetorical mode here. I already said it, you know, kind of. It seems to me, you know, you put them together. I think there are different tactics. I don't see them as doing exactly the same thing. Or, there is no tactic in the Lotus Sutra. Right. And it's more likely to go back to Vimalakirti's Thundering Silence or something like that.

[42:18]

You expect some spoken word and you are left with silence. Except that it's not quite silence. I kept you long enough, thank you, goodbye. Frustration. It seems different. I mean, it's my just, you know. Yeah, I definitely agree that this does, is, certainly does call on the whole Chan style of, which also has its indirect style, I mean, questions about language. But, you know, he does have the place where he actually does this and quotes the Lotus Sutra, and then after the pause, after the silence, says the line from the Lotus Sutra as if it's the first time. Is that quoted in the Tibetan? Yeah, it's the one on page eight. that quote in Beijing, Jodo 24. And these are actually earlier Jodos, most of them. and the nature of the Buddha.

[43:54]

And so when we look for the metaphysics of Tendai and two levels of truth and all these kinds of things, then we say, hey, it's really sort of tricky here. It's not saying it directly. Well, it isn't saying it directly. of the Lotus Sutra. And are there any people in Japan, medieval Japan, earlier that perceive it that way? Because if we're the only ones reading it that way, then maybe there's a problem. But if there are other people, if there are people who are reading it that way, why don't we slow it through? And I mean, this is where it's pointed towards the interpretation. He does make it, I mean, it is happening. He is quoting the lotus sutra and there is that dynamic in the lotus sutra. So we can't say that they didn't interpret it that way necessarily.

[44:58]

I have another question about, I'm sorry I'm kind of confused in the morning, but. Not all in the morning. Well, I tried anyway. One of your points was, I can't remember if you got this from Le Fleur also, It's kind of a Tathagatagarbha thing about the phenomenal world is the truth or something. It seems to me also kind of a very forced reading of the Lotus Sutra. I mean you... I certainly don't see the Lotus Sutra operating in that. Well, that's the forced reading. Yeah, I mean that's a... Now, certainly that's Dogen's view of the world, but I would hesitate or question about linking that to the Lotus Sutra, even though that's maybe Le Fleur's reading of it. That's certainly not a standard reading of it. I think that that's what's behind the detail of Jan's translation of that particular phrase.

[46:03]

of what LeFleur does with it, his way of rendering it makes it possible to then go on and make that claim about the motorcycler. Whereas if you have the way that she renders it, it's less plausible to go on and make that claim. So there's enough of a nuanced difference looking at the quote from LeFleur, what he does with it then. I mean, certainly a lot of other scriptural precedents I mean, there's certainly a lot of other scriptural precedents or authoritative statements or expressions of this kind of dharma-dhātu-tathāgata-dharma approach to the world as sacred that Dōgen could draw from and obviously did draw from. But I don't think the Lotus Sutra would be certainly prominent or at all in that group. That's true, I think, but although the Lotus Sutra wouldn't be anything like Dogen's almost pantheism in a sense, all the parables do use parts of the natural world.

[47:19]

So the world around you is always revealing something. Some truth is being revealed through the rain and the sun and the plants and on and on. So there are elements of it. the rain and the plants. I mean, are you suggesting then that because those are the images used in the allegory, that therefore there's some implicit validation of the phenomenal reality despite its occurrence? Yes, but your point may be that what's revealing is the parable about them and not the things, and that's a good point too. But still the things are set up in some way such that they are revealing, I think. But only in that limited sense. So Mark's point is important. I think there's a huge difference. The Lotus Sutra doesn't do anything like that. And just one more point.

[48:20]

And I think the big difference on both of these points is that the doctrine of Shunyatai is of no importance in the Lotus Sutra. So that emptiness is not there in the world. It doesn't care about that. It doesn't care about ultimate truth. And that's the reason it can take a negative take on upaya. and there's one non-empty means, then you've got to set up for negative pejorative put-down on other means. Okay, sorry. Go ahead. And my impression was that Karma of Words was an early work that started looking at Hongaku seriously in English, and so there may be some confusion there in Le Fleur's thing where he's not being clear. What's Hongaku? What's Lotus? What's Tendai? What's this? And so a lot of stuff is going on, and since then we've In other words, should we spend that much time on that floor? Now, I would suggest, I don't know, but to me, it would be much more interesting for someone to pursue the Kedong Sutra, the Avatamsaka, as long as I'm joking in this sense.

[49:41]

I mean, we can think of it as appropriation. Oh, yes. The availability of the thought, I mean, for example, one can think about the awakening of faith, or one can think about the Nirvana Sutra, and those are obvious sources that speak to Dogon, okay. But the Kegon Kyo, you know, because of the Dharma Dattu concept, which is very close to this, but a little bit different in some sense, is very phenomenal and very universal and very pantheistic, you know, and a lot of implications. I would really like to see somebody write on that. I think that might be... But that connects my letter, the Tamsaka influence.

[51:21]

Connects this to what you were saying about, you know, about miyoi, about kind of the use of miyoi and the influence of, and the question of visions. I once reviewed this book, and if I recall, Much of the criticism I had was the fact that he would emphasize that really Miue's visions were directly a product or directly influenced by the Avatamsaka's fantasies. My point was, well, those are two really different things, I believe. In the first case, we have a kind of literary trope. When we talk about it, we're talking. And he was saying that all the Avatamsaka images, parables, fantasy, and all that, derived from visionary experience, which is really, I think, open to question. There's a certain literariness there.

[52:25]

What do you mean with parables? What do you mean with fantasies? Or to use allegories, right? And those have their own dynamics, in a sense. I mean, I'm not claiming there's no some kind of visionary element at some point there. But the full-fledged development clearly is not the straightforward rendition of the visions you had last night, you know, and it's kind of empty. They are meant for, you know, the playfulness of emptiness, images, flowers in the sky, kind of, right? So there's a certain freedom and certain almost irrelevance to that, which is very different, I thought, from the kind of visions, deadly serious vision, a Muay or Kaizen had, where, you know, a guy dreams he saw that such-and-such kami or such-and-such arahant in his dreams last night talking to him. You listen to, you know, and that's really serious. You really have to act upon it. There's not this kind of, you know, unbearable lightness of being. You can't put the Vatamsaka's visions there. So I think there are two different phenomena.

[53:26]

I'm not saying they are totally unconnected, but they are different. So how much can you speak of an influence in a Vatamsaka when you dream of the Arab, you know, Madhraputra or whatever, because you have seen some golden palace or because somehow it happens to be, you know, this and that palace. Yeah, of course, these visions, these dreams are informed, too, by the cultural context. But at the same time, there's something else different, I think. So that's the same point here, you know. The question of influence. Yes, you dream of something, a very vivid, serious, life-engaging dream. It might be informed by your readings of the day before. Freud would explain. But on the other hand, they are altogether different categories. They stand on their own. They are really your own personal experience with reality. of influence is mood at this point.

[54:39]

What I'm saying is when we say, visions here, fantasies here, visions here, okay, those visions were directly inspired by Lama Tsong Khapa. What I'm saying is we are really overdoing it. We are creating a link that is very thin. I mean, in reality, it's probably very thin and doesn't explain the way, should not explain the way the kind of authenticity of the personal experience of vision. So we are overemphasizing the notion of influence here, I think, and certainly its sources, these textual sources. Yeah, I think there's a matter of emphasis, and I agree with you. But going back to what Karl was saying, part of what's going on in Kamakura is this context of, and you know, how much of it derives from Kagan, how much of it derives from Lotus and Tendai developments is complicated.

[55:42]

But there's this context there that supports And I think that's underlying some of Dogan, not in the same way as it does Cajon. So I'm interested, actually, Bernhard, in how you, you know, in terms of Buccio Sessimo and Dogan's, you know, compared to Cajon, very scant references to dreams, but I think it's part of the same milieu. Right, right. Do you think Dogan had good dreams? Yeah, we're saying that Dogen looks to his dreams as a source of religion. No, I'm not saying that. I'm saying he's actually, I don't know. We don't know. But he's actually phrasing these as, last night this happened, as if it was, it's a rhetorical device for Dogen, maybe. I don't know.

[56:43]

We don't know. He's a creative writer. He's a creative writer. Yeah. I mean, just to use a dream religious event as an authoritative and waking, is of course very important, not just Japanese, but obviously, you know, that's a real statement about what Buddhism is in this particular context. Right. But it's clearly there from Yo-En Keizan, right? Right. Well, so if you read me always, you know, recorded dreams, I mean, what is really striking is how weird and bizarre they are, like dreams are. Yes, for sure. Yeah. And you say right away, that's a real dream. I can, you know, I know when I see one because I have some too and this is exactly. The other stuff is clearly, you know, I mean, don't get scared. So if a dream, sometimes dream can have a didactic content too, of course, but when you have too much, Well, of course, there's also been editing in the lab. But when you have too much didactic content, where it fits too nicely the kind of framework of Buddhist theology, I don't know. Yeah. Maybe it's rhetorical device. I'm not sure. But it's certainly.

[57:44]

But there are some dreams. We know, like, Dawkins, you know, dream on what? Where he dreamt that, you know, He's a guy who dismisses dreams on a kind of Mahayana ground, saying those are not really ultimate truths. And then suddenly he receives a Dharma from a Dame, a Dameshan in China, and takes it. I mean, obviously, he's stupid, he's very silly. a dream. Now he's not dismissing it as being just a delusion. It's really, he was, you know, very serious. So you feel that he has had some, that really, yes, in that sense, he was close, I think, to the kind of cultural context of Kaizen and Miue, and it was one of his time. More than we want to admit most of the time. About dreams generally, I think we also need to recognize that sometimes claims of dreams are used to It means that you really accept that.

[58:51]

When you are on the other hand disclaiming it, saying those dreams are no good, and suddenly you have to admit that or you want to use it now as an authority, you either contradict yourself or you either have a dream that somehow pushes you to jump. Well, here he's playing with it. He's doing this obviously. In a child iconoclastic context, You know, making, on some sense, making funny documentary about the Kiddushwara. Do we know that last night means in a dream last night? No, we don't. No, I'm just saying it's suggestive. Maybe he actually got up and actually stepped on him. No, he could have been referring to something that happened in the temple last night. That's right. It's possible. But the way, but there seems... Someone said something, he said something, and then he described it the next morning as, I always refer to that guy as the little shit. On page 14, could I ask about a line, you have a line, he has a quote. Right below the quote, you have like two lines before that, those who have great realization of delusion are Buddhas.

[59:57]

Now, I don't know who wrote that, but That's kind of an ambiguous sentence. I wondered what it meant to you. You seem to be using it, maybe this is what it's supposed to mean, in the sense that realization of delusion, as if delusion replaces the word enlightenment. Those who have great realization of the truth are Buddhas, or are you, does this mean, those who realize that this is delusion are Buddhas? It's from Getcha Koan, and I don't know if I can, those who have, great real those who have great delusion about realization are sentient beings. Those who have great realization of delusion are Buddhas. So realization, he's talking about being awakened to delusions as opposed to having,

[60:57]

Delusions about enlightenment. Awakened to the truth of delusion? No, awakened about. I understand it as awakened about one's own delusion. Delusion. In the sense that Shinran is giving. It is ambiguous. It doesn't mean that it plays back and forth. But that's what they're doing. Is it Chinese or Japanese? No, that's coming in. Or how he understands the relationship, put another way, of the charm that he's bringing to Japan and the native tradition centered around the lotus.

[62:17]

That's a ten nine one. Do you have any thoughts on that? If we're looking at, before we consider that question maybe, people really put a lot of emphasis Tendai place.

[63:27]

So now, I remember a few years ago visiting Eheiji and I met this local historian there who took me around and it was really nice and showed me just across Eheiji, much closer than Heisenji, which would have been the Tendai stronghold, just across the river down the valley. So really, at the entrance of the AEG, on the other bank, where you only rise through, was a major Shingon temple. I forgot the name of it now. I have some reference to that. It's been destroyed during the Jogyan's time, this Shingon temple. Yeah, it was there. So that's really, I mean, using the same line of argument, you would say, you know, clearly you couldn't build a temple there. a heiji or whatever, you know, without being friendly with those guys, you know. So the Shingon influence would just have been us, you know, and you would then expect also to have Shingon references, which we don't have.

[64:37]

What about the family that supports him? Isn't it the Date or some of the family that gives him a big chunk of land? Now, what was their affiliation? Well, those guys, you know, I would expect that that would also may have an impact if they're, you know, have sons or they have, you know, some financial relationship with the liaison or something, that maybe they, maybe he's... Not with the liaison probably, but probably with Pakistan. I mean, there was some tension between that Tendai up there, apparently. And the liaison. And the liaison. This is what mean they're up there. Yeah, so Shinran and Nichiren are the two extremes.

[65:49]

They'll get us somewhere in the middle. So the point here was that if really, I mean if we use this line Carl's line of argument, saying, no, because Tendai, I mean, media... But if we say, because of these people there, because of the Tendai people, therefore Lotus Sutra, then we should also say, well, because of the Shingon people, there should have been also reference to what, Mahavaira, you know, the Jyotish Sutra, and it's not there. So somehow it should work both ways, and it doesn't. Since he's beholden to them, he has a great obligation to them. They're essentially supporting him and allowing him to really establish his new base. Maybe they had personal... But there's so many other reasons why someone like Bill Yes, everybody knew it.

[66:53]

The people who were speaking to it would understand what the references are. I mean, part of that, I think, part of the felt need for such an explanation is, Dogen is a Zen master. Dogen is a Zen master. He shouldn't be citing all these Zen texts. Why is it that he cites commentaries by Jang Rao? He's supposed to have converted. So there's a sectarian sense of, sectarian purity is being violated here. by the Zen master. And that's part of one of the back meaning by us or by sectarian, you know, sometimes sectarian history, but then the question becomes, what was his self-identity and how did he see the relationship between what he was introducing and the broader community? That's what I... Well, that's, if I can respond to Carl's question, and you put it in the context of today, so I don't know what to do with that. No, no, no, not today. Okay. Yeah, I think, I mean, he does cite the Lotus Sutra more than the other sutra, clearly. Hokaten Hoke, which in Shobo Genzo, which is explicitly, well, it goes to Guine, I mean, he does, obviously, he cites the Chan lexicon, you know, all over the place, much more than he does the Lotus Sutra or other sutras, but still, Lotus Sutra is most important, he calls it the king of sutras.

[68:08]

Hokaten Hoke, I'm not sure if that's after Echizen. Now I can't remember, it's 1244, I'm sorry, I can't, It's in there somewhere, but definitely lotus suture more than any other sutures. I'm not sure if this is an answer to your question or not, but there are places in the Lotus Sutra that I think resonate for Dogen, that he uses. I mean, he cites chapter two the most, the Hoban chapter, and in particular that Yudh Vatsyogus, who only abutted together with the Buddha. Now this could be taken, and actually Jan pointed out that Kumara Jiva changed, added a character, or added something in the Sanskrit, it's only Buddhas. and can't fathom the depths of this Lotus Sutra. Kumaraji added a character which makes it clear that it's only Buddhas with Buddhas, together with the Buddha. This could be a rationale for the whole Dharma transmission. Menju uses it that way in Menju, face-to-face transmission.

[69:14]

So this is a Lotus Sutra context which validates this Chan practice or Chan activity. That's just one thing. I'm actually working on chapter 15 and 16, and now I have to rethink it based on all these comments, but that... Of the eight-year chronicle? Oh, no, of Lotus Sutra. So the image, and this is the place where the cause, and this is the pivot from the cause section to the effect section of the Lotus Sutra that is cited by Julie and everyone after him. the image of Bodhisattva is emerging from the ground. I mean, I think this does have a reference to, that's one place in the Lotus Sutra where there is a reference to the phenomenal world as representing the Dharma. And that leads right into, so this is a whole other topic, but that does lead into the, whatever you want to call it, Everlasting Shakyamuni, the Inconceivable Lifespan in Chapter 16.

[70:16]

So I'm actually interested in looking at the worldview implied by that and how, not it influences Dogen, but how Dogen picks up on something that's a cosmology implied by that. Now, of course, it comes from also from Kegon and Tendai and other sources. But this is not, you're finding things that Dogen might like. You can come in and you can cite all sorts of things in order to demonstrate, to get your point across, or to validate your tradition. And most of what he cites are these texts from abroad. He's charm masters. He's not... I mean, you read him alongside Esai, and you'll see tremendous... Esai cites very few. the case because in the Vinnia it says, or in, you know, Joghe doesn't do that.

[71:32]

Well he quotes the Vinnia sometimes, but that's not really where the action is in this enormous body of material that the other people don't have. I'm not sure that I can add anything to what's been said, just that there are places in it that do fit with John, that it is the prominent sutra, well, except not in the Pure Land, but in Tendai Buddhism, it's the sutra in Japan. didn't know he was years ago.

[72:40]

I guess he did it at the same time. The importance of the Lotus Sutra on early Chang. You know, everyone says it's all by Yan, it's by Yan, and so. And certainly in the rhetoric of the materials from Dunhuang, you can see a lot of Lotus Sutra influence and the very notion of the Buddha vehicle, the supreme Mahayana. A lot of that kind of... We're getting, you know, one last question. Shinran, the Lotus Sutra, I think, is really important for Shinran, but he doesn't mention it by name. And he's appropriating concepts out of it, like the one being. And so I think we've seen that you don't have to explicitly quote the sutra to show that you're appropriating from it. And so just to me, scarcely mentioned by Shinran makes it seem like it's not important. I think it's extremely important, but politically, he's not mentioning it by name. He's saying the one Dharma ocean of the true vow. So the vow vehicle becomes the Ichijo, the one being I can say not mentioned by Shinran, but somebody showed me a copy, you know, one place.

[73:44]

Right. If it doesn't mention it, it may mean that you're appropriating from it. No, of course not. So that, to me, makes it seem like Shinran is not important. And he may not be scarcely mentioned explicitly by Shinran, but it's still really important. Yeah, I'll talk to you more about that. I'm interested in that.

[74:05]

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