Well, it's just right to begin this class with that chant. Because so many of our chants like that have a real Mahayana flavor. You know, it's a big chant. And it's a little bit awesome to be the speaker. Opens one small mouth afterwards. But that's Mahayana. And so, we are going to be reading and discussing the holy teaching of Vimalakirti, which is a Mahayana Sutra. And we don't too often take these Indian Mahayana Sutras on. They're very much in our background, very much in our chanting, in our services, and in our background in quieter ways, but we don't very often take them on.

[01:07]

There's something about our Zen school which is more manageable. It's plain and not so ornate and down to earth. So it's interesting to see, to go to the background of our school and to let ourselves course in this great background. Does anybody else need a Xerox? Okay, the Xerox is just, It's the first part of the Sutra. Were you going to buy the Sutra, Marilee?

[02:09]

Were you going to buy it? We were going to decide after the classes. Oh, that's good. That's a good way. Alright. Do you have a copy of the Sutra, Howard? The Sutra, Howard? Yeah, you have the library copies? Oh, yes. So you probably don't need... We're a little short. What do you have? I don't think you've got... It says the Holy Teachings. Yeah, no, I guess you do. Yeah, I see. You do. I'm sorry. Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, many of you have had a chance to look at it, I hope, and, uh, uh,

[03:11]

begin to take it in. I'm not going to say too much in the way of introduction. Robert Thurman has written a really good introduction, and between the books and the Xeroxes, you've got that. Just to say that it's one of the Mahayana sutras. We used to think that they were written significantly after the first earliest sutras which had to do with the historical Buddha. But now people are beginning to think that they are so, the dating of all of the sutras is so uncertain that it's hard to know. what came before what. But it's quickly evident in this that the Buddha is not the historical Buddha as portrayed in the earlier sutras. This Buddha appears and he is the non-historical Buddha and we'll be looking at that

[04:20]

So what is special about the Vimalakirti Sutra? For one thing, Vimalakirti is a layperson. The name means stainless stain, Vimalakirti. That he is a layperson who lives in the world and who acts in the world. And it's in great contrast. He's the first lay person who's been the hero, the central character of a sutra. Other central characters have either been bodhisattvas or some kind of noble arhat or some very earnest seeker who's undoubtedly moving towards a monastic life. But Ramana Kirti is emphatically not moving towards a monastic life.

[05:28]

And this is a sutra about being in the world. How to be in the world. And it's also a sutra about the tension between the ordinary, our ordinary life and our extraordinary life. Very big Mahayana theme, the tension between the extraordinary and the ordinary. And as we're thinking about, as we're exploring these themes, we always want to really feel what our experience of them is, how our own experience fluctuates and is sometimes in the realm of the ordinary and sometimes in the realm of the extraordinary. I'm very indebted to not only Robert Thurman's introduction, but a course, a long course he gave some years ago at San Francisco Zen Center on this sutra.

[06:36]

And a friend of mine took notes and she also taped it. And so I've listened to six, maybe 12 sides of tapes and read through her 70 pages of notes. It's been a wonderful experience. I don't know how many of you have experienced Robert Thurman. He's a professor at Columbia and a very ardent Tibetan practitioner and close to the Dalai Lama. The Dalai Lama is really his teaching and he's very involved not only in academia but in the whole process of bringing particularly Tibetan teaching to the world and helping the Dalai Lama and so on. and he has a very large motor and a huge mind and it has been wonderful to absorb whatever I've absorbed that he said about this sutra.

[07:37]

And the two major points he makes are this tension between the extraordinary and the ordinary and how this sutra is about our self habit and what we do with our self habit. Self habit being not only what we how we personally construct ourselves, our history, our experience, our being. Not only how we think about our parents and what they did and who we are because of that and all that sort of thing, but how our culture, how we incorporate ourselves within the culture, how our language gives us our self-habit, how every cause and condition that we are in is assisting us in building this kind of enclosure that we have, and he likens it to a kind of computer software.

[08:52]

Our self-habit is like our internal software, and as soon as we put on the switch, which actually is never off, night or day, this software, this self-habit, is turned on. And so, of course, the path is the path of recognizing the self-habit, using the self-habit skillfully, and acquiring some degree of freedom from it. So that's what this sutra is very largely about. So I'd like to begin just reading through it. tonight through the first chapter and perhaps into the second chapter of the book.

[10:00]

No, the book you'll have to get at Shambhala. Now there are, you can either buy it or I'd make you another Xerox next week. How many people would like to have Xeroxes from now on? One, two, three. You mean of the chapters you're going to read? Yeah. Yeah. Which of course will be selected, but... three. Okay. Well... If I can't get the book, I would love to... Oh, you can. If you go to Shambhala, Shambhala has the book. Okay. Well, that's nice. Yeah. Okay. So I'd like to begin on just looking at page ten. And I think what I'm going to do is talk for a while and if any questions come up as I'm talking, feel free to raise your hand and then after a while I'll stop talking and we'll see where we are.

[11:06]

So, purification of the Buddha field. A teaching is about to begin. So what do we do? How do we prepare ourselves? How do we get ready to receive a major teaching? That's what this chapter is about. How do we ready ourselves? So, first of all, we reverence to all Buddhas, Bodhisattva, Aryasattvakas, Pracheka Buddhas in the past, present, and the future. So we offer appreciation to the great practitioners who have come before us. I don't know what Arya Sravakas, oh they must be, oh I see, they're great, they're arhats. So these different categories, the Buddhas, and notice already Buddhas is in the plural, they're well beyond the first Buddha.

[12:20]

Bodhisattvas, the Bodhisattva is what this sutra is largely about, the enlightening beings, Uchyana Roshi says. A Bodhisattva is an ordinary person walking in the direction of Buddha. And in... Otherwise, they're called enlightening beings, whose life is devoted to the four Bodhisattva vows, the first principally of vowing to save all beings, the Paramitas. And then the third category, the Shravakas, the Arya Shravakas, are the great Arhats, the Theravadan saints who extinguished all their roots of greed, hate and delusion. And then finally, a category that we don't mention much, the Pracheka Buddhas. They are the people, the individuals who have somehow found

[13:28]

enlightenment, rather by their own, by themselves. And because they aren't part of any lineage, they don't teach. But for me, that's a valuable category because, you know, we're Buddhists and we study the Dharma, but then you look around and there are plenty of people who often don't belong to any religion. and one feels like bowing to them. So there's always this other category. Thus I have heard at one time. So all the sutras begin with thus I have heard because it's Ananda. It's Ananda speaking. Ananda memorized the sutras as Buddha spoke them and then was the vehicle for their transmission. So, the Lord Buddha was in residence and all of the, so here are all the people who are coming, people and saints and great beings.

[14:39]

The Sangha is gathering. And the Sangha in this in this context is the gathering of saints. That's the original definition of Sangha, the gathering of saints. And then it broadens out to include all of us. And it includes all of us, us, who are saints and not saints, but who belong in the Sangha as long as we have aspiration. of the Buddha path. So, there are the bhikshus, all saints, free from impurities and afflictions and all had attained self-mastery. These are the arhats. Their minds were entirely liberated by perfect knowledge. They are calm and dignified like royal elephants.

[15:42]

They had accomplished their work, done what they had to do, cast off their burdens, attained their goals, and totally destroyed the bonds of existence. They had all attained the utmost perfection of every form of mind control. Well, this is an interesting description, and it's just given. And we're going to hear a lot of overt and covert criticisms the sutra goes on. So that's the old school. And then there are the Bodhisattvas, the 32,000 great spiritual heroes who are universally acclaimed. And listen how this is all very different. They're dedicated through the penetrating activity of their super great super knowledges. They were sustained by grace of the Buddha.

[16:47]

guardians of the city of Dharma. They upheld the true doctrine and their great teachings resounded like the lion's roar throughout the ten directions. Without having to be asked, they were the natural spiritual benefactors of all beings. They maintained unbroken the succession of the three jewels, conquering devils and foes and overwhelming all critics. And then in the next paragraph, when you talk about Bodhisattvas, you almost immediately talk about Paramitas, and the Paramitas are listed. And more descriptions of the Bodhisattvas. Their voices were perfect in diction and resonance, and versatile in speaking all languages. They had crossed the terrifying, third, fourth paragraph, they had crossed the terrifying abyss of the bad migrations and yet they assumed reincarnation voluntarily in all migrations for the sake of disciplining living beings.

[18:05]

This is a defining difference between the Bodhisattvas and the Arhats, the Shravakas. The Shravakas, the Arhats have done all their work, they have attained self-mastery, they're free from liberation, they're finished. But the Bodhisattvas, across the terrifying abyss of the bad migrations, the Bodhisattvas are willing to go on and on and on, because their vow is that they do not stop their own development until everybody's development is complete. The bodhisattvas are entirely worked into the fabric of the whole world. And then the bodhisattvas are named. Now we come to the first of some wonderful imagery in the sutra.

[19:23]

Thereupon the Licchavi Bodhisattva Ratnakara with 500 Licchivari youths, each holding a precious parasol made of seven kinds of jewels, came forth from the city of Vaisali and presented himself at the grove of Amrapali. Each approached the Buddha, bowed at his feet, circumambulated him clockwise seven times, laid down his precious parasol and offering, and withdrew to one side. So one can visualize this crowd coming in with their precious parasol. As soon as all these precious parasols had been laid down suddenly, By the miraculous power of the Lord, they were transformed into a single precious canopy so great that it formed a covering of this entire billion-world galaxy. The surface of this entire billion-world galaxy was reflected in the interior of the great precious canopy, where the total content of this galaxy could be seen.

[20:35]

Limitless mansions of suns, moons, and stellar bodies. the realms of Davis and so on, king of the mountains, all the great oceans, rivers, bays, torrents, streams, brooks, and springs. Finally, all the villages, suburbs, cities, capitals, provinces, and wilderness. All this could clearly be seen by everyone. and the voices of all the Buddhas of the ten directions could be heard proclaiming their teachings of the Dharma in all words, the sounds reverberating in the space beneath this precious canopy. Hi. Do you have a seat? So, That's quite a beautiful, that's quite a beautiful image. See, one thing, now we've talked, I talked a little bit about self-habit.

[21:37]

I'm not sure I'm ready yet. Our self-habit mind sort of recoils in front of a scene like this, or is interested, but what do you do with it? There it is. So how do we work with it? The parasols coming in, each one of us as we come into the Zen Do, say, bring in our Buddha nature, or our aura. Some people see auras.

[22:39]

I'm told I've never seen an aura, but they are. Each of us has... When we enter a room, we bring something special along with us. We bring something extraordinary with us. And as we sit together in a room, what happens to the extraordinary quality that we brought in, all of us, with our parasols? What happens to all of these parasols? Well, it's a canopy. What I make of it is this canopy that, in fact, reflects everything. this great scene of reflection and inclusion and enjoyment that happens when we practice together.

[23:44]

And this is what's happening in this preparation of the teaching. People coming together and this Big inclusion, mirroring. Now also, this image begins to teach us, begins the teaching of wisdom that's going to continue throughout the sutra. That what is real? What is real? That everything in a certain way is reflection. What seems to be real, you look at it in another way, isn't real. That you just, you don't know what reality is.

[24:53]

Reality has this very surprising and tricky nature. Now let's go on. So now, at this moment, everybody, all these diverse people are thoroughly unified and ready to receive the teaching and this great gratitude that's expressed. at this vision of the magnificent miracle affected by the supernatural power of the Lord Buddha, the entire house was ecstatic, enraptured, astonished, delighted, satisfied, and filled with awe and pleasure. And then comes this poem, which is a poem of gratitude. And a poem of gratitude and encouragement.

[26:03]

And I just want, on page 14, to note the verse of it. The poem about ingratitude to Buddha, to this knowing that people now feel close to, Although the Lord speaks with but one voice, those present perceive that same voice differently and each understands in his own language according to his own special needs. This is the special quality of the Buddha. From the leader's act of speaking in a single voice, some merely develop an instinct for the teaching, some gain realization. Some find pacification of all their doubts. This is a special quality of the Buddha.

[27:05]

So this is an introduction to skillful means. There are two methods of teaching that are going to be exemplified here. One is skillful means. And the other is what Thurman has described somewhat in the introduction, the teaching of dichotomies. But this is the skillful means. And this is in contrast to the style of the Theravada style of the older teachings. You know, and when we talk about the older teaching, the Theravadan, it's not a different teaching. It's all part of our tradition and it's all part of the way we learn. But the Theravadan teaching is a teaching that's very laid out with many lists and a great deal to memorize and there's a very clear quality about it and a very purposeful quality about it.

[28:13]

And the purposefulness and the clarity is really comforting. And then you get into this Mahayana teaching and it's anything but clear. Nobody understands it. And it's very upsetting and disquieting. You're going to have a lot of that kind of response. So how do you teach? something that cannot be understood. What is the basis for teaching? So this skillful means is the essential teaching vehicle that the Buddha always knows where, exactly where everybody is at, where anybody is at. And the Buddha meets that person exactly at that point. And so we have the Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara with a thousand arms to help and a thousand hands and each hand has an eye so it knows exactly where to go and what to do.

[29:28]

This is the teaching of skillful means. So it's not a teaching that fixes or explains, it's a teaching that meets. and the efficacy is in the exact meeting. So, although the Lord speaks with but one voice, those present perceive that same voice differently, and each understands in his own language according to his own needs. This is a special quality of the Buddha. And indeed, you know, tonight, Each of you will be struck by something a little bit different, will remember something slightly different. The experience sinks in exactly where there's a place to receive it. And for each of us, it will be different.

[30:28]

It is. It is omniscient. Yeah, and he's in all worlds at the same time. Yeah. Every atom. It is. And so the question is, how do we understand it? And how do we use it? And how do we accept it? when you were, you know what I mean? You mean became inflated? Yeah. Yeah, right. That's a big danger. And it often happens. And it's responsibility, you know, we talk about that a lot. And what is the responsibility of the Sangha? And how is that corrected?

[31:56]

Yeah. It's very grand stuff and it certainly is subject to misuse. And they will not be violating the students. Yeah. It seems to me one way to look at it is to call it omnipotence, but that's kind of looking at it from a kind of ego-centered, misused kind of way. And it seems to me another way to look at it is... I mean, it's equally a fantasy to me, but to... To think of someone who has so progressed themselves that they are free of self-distortion, so that they are able, in some sense, in each moment, to see clearly.

[33:08]

And so they're able to know, in each moment, what to do. And that, to me, is like the complete opposite of that sense of omnipotence and ego-centered know-it-all-ness. Yeah. Thank you. That's nice. That's nice. Well, and it also occurs to me to ask, like, where do I meet the teaching? I mean, certainly the teacher will meet the student somewhere, but I feel like it's also up to me to know, you know, what I bring, how much of myself I bring to the teaching, how willing I am to meet it, or how, you know, how much of myself I can put into it. That's right. That's right. And that is what this chapter is about. It's exactly what it's about. How do you... How do you aspire? How do you long for? And what do you cultivate in yourself to make yourself ready? Thurman was saying that we take...

[34:10]

we're given the precepts and we're given the precepts. But there's a ceremony to give the bodhicitta, the thought of enlightenment in the Tibetan tradition. But then there's a ceremony before that which says, may I be willing to receive the thought of enlightenment that's given. And that's the kind of, that's the first. So one is aware of all one's ancient twisted karma again and again, and how do we make ourselves ready? Okay, that was a good question. So now, and I think this, actually this next, what we're going to talk about proceeds exactly in that area. The young Licchavi, having celebrated the Buddha with these verses, further addresses him, Lord, these 500 young Licchavis are truly on their way to unexcelled perfect enlightenment, and they have asked, what is the Bodhisattva's purification of the Buddha field?

[35:27]

Please, Lord, explain to them the Bodhisattva's purification of the Buddha field. Upon this request, the Buddha gave his approval to the young Licchavi Ratnakara. Good, good, young man. Your question to the Tathagata about the purification of the Buddha field is indeed good. Therefore, young man, listen well and remember, I will explain to you the purification of the Buddha field. So they set themselves to listen. The Buddha said, noble sons, a buddha field of bodhisattvas is a field of living beings. Why so? A bodhisattva embraces a buddha field to the same extent that he causes the development of living beings. He embraces a buddha field to the same extent that living beings become disciplined. He embraces a buddha field to the same extent that through entrance into a buddha field living beings are introduced into buddhanosis knowledge and so on.

[36:39]

And then, yet, Ratnakabba, a bodhisattva's buddha field is a field of positive thought, a field of high resolve, of virtuous application, and so on. So this Buddha field, this idea of Buddha field. A Buddha field is the, technically is the field of influence of a particular Buddha. And then it's all of this virtuous activity, field of positive thoughts. It's a field where something happens, where some Buddha-knowing exchange happens. So, every morning in the Zen Dojo, what do we do first of all? We put our robes on our heads.

[37:46]

Now we open Buddha's robe, a field full of far beyond form and emptiness. But to target his teachings for all beings, we put our Buddha fields on our heads. And then we sit. It's a very nice addition of the wind bell. And now has an article in it about what it was like to be the first priest, the first American priest. I had a chance to read it. And how baffled he was about what he was supposed to do. He hadn't asked to be one. He was one. How should he behave? So he was just always kind of trailing Suzuki Roshi and asking, figuring, trying to figure out. And so one day he said, well, what is this business about now I open Buddha's robe, putting it on your head?

[39:00]

And Suzuki Roshi just smiled and he said, what does it mean? And he smiled and he said, it means love. So your question is really how do I enter? What is my Buddha field and how am I there? And how do I open it? And because this is a sutra about doing, about the activity of Dharma and the basic understanding that others' development is never separate from one's own. The Buddha field, as described, is one of outgoing activity.

[40:09]

And then it comes, and then we have here the second statement of the Paramitas. the Paramitas are the attributes of the Bodhisattva. And just... I'll read them. And each Paramita has an active quality to it. A Bodhisattva's Buddha field is a field of generosity. That's the first Paramita. When he attains enlightenment, living beings who give away all their possessions will be born in his Buddha field. A bodhisattva's Buddha field is the field of morality. That's the second paramita. When he attains enlightenment, living beings who follow the path of the ten virtues with positive thoughts will be born in his Buddha field. A bodhisattva's Buddha field is the field of tolerance.

[41:12]

When he attains enlightenment, living beings with the transcendences of tolerance, discipline, and the superior trance will be born in his Buddha field. So you see, none of these paramitas, none of these qualities are personal qualities. They're all interpersonal events. A bodhisattva's Buddha field is the field of effort. When he attains enlightenment, living beings who devote their efforts to virtue will be born in his Buddha field. A bodhisattva's buddha field is a field of meditation. It's the fifth paramita. When he attains enlightenment, living beings who are evenly balanced through mindfulness and awareness will be born in his buddha field. And the last paramita. A bodhisattva's buddha field is a field of wisdom. When he attains enlightenment, living beings who are destined for the ultimate will be born in his buddha field. So those are the paramitas. And the last one, prajnaparamita, the wisdom paramita, is like the eye of all the others.

[42:19]

Without wisdom in them, all of the other qualities, the generosity, the effort, the tolerance and so on, can be unbalanced and misused. But with the eye of wisdom, they are pure qualities. All right, now, on page 18, we come to one of the first of these nice Somebody is going on and on and on about the Bodhisattva-Buddha fields all through page 17 and it's a lot. It's a lot of very high-minded stuff and the purity of the Buddha field and so on.

[43:21]

And the purity of this transcendental practice reflects the purity of his own mind. Shariputra is here and he listens to this last frame. Thereupon, magically influenced by Buddha, the venerable Shariputra had this thought. If the Buddha field is pure only to the extent that the mind of the Bodhisattva is pure, then, when Shakyamuni Buddha was engaged in the career of the Bodhisattva, his mind must have been impure. Otherwise, how could this Buddha field appear to be so impure? The Buddha, knowing telepathically the thought of venerable Shariputra, said to him, What do you think, Shariputra? Is it because the sun and the moon are impure that those blind from birth do not see them? Shariputra replied, No, Lord, it is not so. The fault lies with those blind from birth and not with the sun and the moon.

[44:24]

And Buddha declared, In the same way, Shariputra, the fact that some living beings do not behold The splendid display of virtues of the Buddhafield of the Tathagata is due to their own ignorance. It is not the fault of the Tathagata, Shariputra. The Buddhafield of the Tathagata is pure, but you do not see it. Then the Brahma Sikkim said to the venerable Shariputra, Reverend Shariputra, do not say that the Buddhafield of the Tathagata is impure. So on. Shariputra is getting a lot of high talk. And now he's annoyed. Then the very venerable Shariputra says to Brahma, Seek him. As for me, oh Brahma, I see this great earth with its highs and lows, its thorns, its precipices, its peaks and its abysses, as if it were entirely filled with odour. Garbage.

[45:25]

And the Brahma replies, the fact that you see such a buddha field as this, as if it were so impure, reverend Shariputra, is a sure sign that there are highs and lows in your mind and that your positive thought in regard to the buddhanosis knowledge is not pure either. Reverend Shariputra, those whose minds are impartial towards all living beings and whose positive thoughts towards the buddha knowledge are pure, see this buddha field as perfectly pure. So Shariputra is going to come back quite a lot in this sutra. Shariputra was the smartest one of the original disciples of Buddha. So he comes up for correction. You know, even in the heart sutra, Avalokiteshvara, After all this large sort of cosmic talk, how important the doubt is, how important it is for small mind to arise and honestly express its misgiving.

[46:39]

So, Shariputra is puzzled, as we are puzzled, about why it is that all this sounds so grand and often looks so miserable. And first he's given the kind of party line, well, you know, if it looks miserable, it's because that's the way your mind is, that's all. But that's not a very satisfactory answer, is it? So Buddha ups, he ups the level. Thereupon, Lord touched the ground of this billion world galactic universe with his big toe. And suddenly it was transformed into a huge mass of precious jewels, a magnificent array of many hundreds of thousands of clusters of precious gems, until it resembled the universe

[47:48]

of the Tathagata, something rather, called something else. Everyone in the entire assembly was filled with wonder, each perceiving himself sitting on a throne of jeweled lotuses. Then the Buddha said to the venerable Shariputra, Shariputra, now do you see the splendor of the virtues of the Buddha field? And Shariputra replied, I see it, Lord. Here before me is a display of splendor such as I have never before heard or beheld. And the Buddha says, Shariputra, this Buddha field is always thus pure. But the Tathagata makes it appear to be spoiled by many faults in order to bring about the maturity of inferior living beings. And then several thousand people in the crowd were enlightened.

[48:51]

And then the Lord withdrew his miraculous power and at once the Buddha field was restored to its usual appearance. And both men and gods who subscribed to this disciple vehicle thought, ah, all constructive things are impermanent. So Buddha is really playing around big scale. And this seesaw between the ordinary world, our, and it's, remember, it's an ordinary Buddha field. Whatever it is, ordinary or extraordinary, it's always a Buddha field. And Buddha is extending his big toe and really making it looking like nirvana, and then pulling out his toe and bringing us back to the ordinary Buddha field.

[49:55]

So there's an interesting ambiguity here. First, Shariputra doesn't get it, and the reason he doesn't get it is that his own mind is sort of impure. But now, Buddha's really also going into his miraculous mode and producing nirvana on call and everybody sees it. And then withdrawing it. And so we're, actually we're watching a very dazzling display of skillful means. The teaching of now you have it and now you don't is a pretty powerful teaching. I want to go back to the Buddhafield on page 16 in light of what you just read.

[50:58]

I hope it connects. The Paramedics, Presidents of Bodhisattvas, When he attains enlightenment, living beings who are actually participating in the Mahayana will be born in this Buddha field. And so on, you know. Ten virtues with positive thoughts will be born in this Buddha field, and so forth. I guess it's going to take me a couple of weeks to go over this part. But it seems like if you're a teacher and you are on the Buddha track, that you want to have people born into your Buddha field somehow, whatever that means, that you want to have an impact. Is that what this is talking about? I don't think that it's you.

[51:59]

Well, I hope that everybody, you know, I'll say what I think, and then other people say what they think, because, you know, this is not understandable stuff, really. But I don't think it's a matter of wanting, the teacher wanting. I think it's a matter of the teacher being. And the power of the teacher being is having its effect. Does that speak to what you said? Well, it's... Yeah, it's that... You teach, and we all are teachers to some extent. We all are teachers, yeah. And that people, we sort of show up as having an influence. I mean, we recognize at times that people around us have been influenced by us in a way that we, you know, that seems to be enlightened.

[53:05]

And the problem is that For me, I want to have more of that influence. I'm attached to that. You know, recreating that. That's right. And I guess that in order to employ skillful means is you just have to go back to your own, you know, your own practice and not worry about the effect it has on other people as long as you're, you know, That's right. [...] Yes it is. That's... it's perhaps the fruit, but not the goal. Yeah. before they even got this far.

[54:10]

For lifetimes, right. Right. So, you know, this is, this is DeMille Square. Yeah. Yes. Big stuff. Right. Well, then what does it have to do with us? Well, for instance, Mel was talking about, I forget if this was a lecture or where I heard him talk about it, it was fairly recently, about how he gives practice discussion. How does a bodhisattva give practice discussion? He says, he just keeps, he keeps himself within the realm of his own practice and he waits. And people come in and they experience, he experiences some kind of contact some kind of meeting with them, you know, there's a Buddha field, something happens, there's a contact, and then he waits, and they go off and they do whatever they need to do, and they come back periodically, and when the time is right, he's there, sitting in his own practice, and they come, and they've learned something.

[55:29]

I can't see. I think that's a very ordinary kind of example. Ordinary and not ordinary. I'd like to just read a little bit. There's a lovely talk in this latest windmill by Suzuki Roshi. Understanding ordinary mind is Buddha. Well here we are back in our good Zen language. Right, right. So when you sit, and this also echoes what I was talking about with Mel, when you sit you are independent of various beings and you are also related to various beings. When you have perfect composure in your practice, it means you include everything.

[56:39]

You are not just you. You are the whole world or the whole cosmos and you are a Buddha. So when you sit, you are ordinary mind and you are Buddha. Before you sit, you may stick to the idea of you or the idea of self. That is fear or ordinary mind. But when you sit, you are both ordinary mind and Buddha. The Buddha in its true sense is not different from ordinary mind. Now again, remember the scene of the world changing back and forth. The Buddha, in its true sense, is not different from ordinary mind. So ordinary mind, in its true sense, is not someone who is unholy or who is not Buddha. This is a complete understanding of ourself.

[57:44]

So when we practice Zazen with this understanding, that is true Zazen, you will not be bothered by anything. Whatever you hear, whatever you see, that is okay. But in order to have this actual feeling, it is necessary to be accustomed to our practice. Intellectually, we may understand ourselves, but if we haven't had the actual feeling along with it, then it is not so perfect. Even though we can explain what Buddhism is, if someone does not have the actual feeling along with it, you cannot call that person a real Buddhist. So it's the experience of non-duality. And it's the feeling. The feeling. Yeah. Yeah. And we move in and out of that. You can't hold on to it. You can't hold on. It doesn't belong to you.

[58:46]

That's the difficulty. I'd like to say just a little more. Do you have a question? I'd just like to present a little bit more on this same topic. When Robert Thurman taught this class, he came back and back again to a quotation which you probably all have heard of by one of our ancestors, by the ancestor Seigen Gyoshi or Weishin. Before I studied Zen, to me mountains were mountains and waters were waters. After I got an insight into the truth of Zen through the instruction of a good master, mountains to me are not mountains and waters are not waters.

[59:56]

But after this, when I really attain the abode of rest, that is enlightenment, mountains are really mountains and waters are really waters. Actually, I came across this quotation on the calendar when I was in college before. I guess I'd heard of Buddhism, but it meant nothing. And this really stuck in my mind. Well, Donovan stole the lyrics from that. He did? There's a song about it? First there is no mountain, then there is no nether. Really? Well, it grabs us, you know, no matter where we are, it grabs us, because we know something about it, but what on earth do we know? To me it's curious that, I would ask, so first you see the water of water in the mountains, mountains, and then something happens where you don't see it that way anymore, so there has been a transformation here.

[61:09]

that which is transformed now sees water as water, and mountain as mountain, is somebody or something different from the original. Absolutely. Absolutely. You know, it's like something has happened, there is a transformation. That's right. That's right. That's right. We all know that that is possible. We don't know exactly what that is, but we know it's possible, and it really grabs us. And in a certain way, The tragedy of it is that just hearing of it, one becomes very curious. One wants to experience it, but does not. It almost feels like the wanting to experience it brings up that which makes it almost impossible to experience. It arises, ego arises, and whatever. And it keeps you from it. That's right. It leads you towards it, and it keeps you from it. It's entirely mixed. Yeah, yeah. You can't get it by wanting it.

[62:13]

Yeah. You can't get it by wanting it. Although, if you don't want it, you won't get it. Not necessarily. I don't know. I'm not interested. That's true. It is interesting. Yeah. If you're not ready for it, you won't get it. If you're not ready for it, you won't get it. It just comes out of the process. That's right. But you do have to be ready. I think that's the best way. Or you may not recognize that it's there. Yeah. Did Ross want to say something? Yes, yes.

[63:54]

So the way this verse is usually explained in a text like this is that originally we think mountains are mountains. We are enclosed in our conceptual world. And I'm me, and you're you, and we have these understandings, these conceptual understandings that we live in. The software. and then we practice some and that software is unsettled and we begin to really experience more our interbeing condition where we're not the concepts, the separateness that we've counted on isn't there so much And so what you call my wife is a being, just a being, a woman.

[65:07]

I was reading an article today on how children learn and it said that a child learns a language within the first year of their life. There are certain circuits that are hooked up, and if they haven't heard Japanese and are not going to hear the subtlety of Japanese, it would be hard as a second language, etc. And I wonder, the circuits that you are trying to go with on your path, if there are times where your mind can go that way, and times where it's fairly closed, there are certain times when there are openings. There are certain times when there are openings, yeah. Right. Right. Because, like the dead man walking for that one moment. Yes. You could see, but of course it would close up. Yes. That's right. That movie is so much to talk about. It's such a good context for talking about all of this stuff.

[66:17]

That's right. An ordinary person doing her best. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. For whatever reasons. Yeah. It's so dark. Yeah. Back to what you were saying about ready. Open. That's the way I think of it. Sometimes I have the feeling it's all there. You just have to listen. You have to be willing to listen. You have to be open. That's what being ready means. That's what abandoning preconceptions means. You just have to open to it and see what happens. You just have to be open to it. Another thing, it was Michael May who gave this very nice talk And at the end of it, he asked a question. He said, what does coming home mean?

[67:20]

And Ross answered. And then Michael, who's 70, said, well, for me, coming home is coming home to the open heart. We do so much about closing, controlling, restricting. the heart. And so the practice of being ready is just the opposite direction, opening the heart. And so the work of opening the heart is this mountains are not mountains. The work of watching the thought and seeing that the thought is only a thought, and it's not me, and gradually moving from the total belief in thought and preoccupation with thought, moving from that to the process of thought, the process of mind.

[68:31]

That's the opening work, that is just strenuous, unremitting work. And as Suzuki Roshi says, there's one more thing I want to talk about. As Suzuki Roshi says, this work, there has to be feeling, the feeling in it. Feeling as in compassion or feelings as in passions. There has to be a feeling about the work, a commitment to the work of development, a rededication. Well, you know, practice is just the move from karmic life, life of desire, to life of intention. And so we're all engaged in that move. And little by little, a kind of feeling about

[69:40]

the life of intention and the life, which is not just my personal life, begins to grow. And I just would like to show you a picture, really. There's a poet, Harold Brodky, who died January 26th, and he was a wonderful writer. And he kept a journal. He died of AIDS. He kept a journal called The Wild Darkness. And this is two or three pages of the last journal entry. And... Well, I'd just like to read one paragraph at the beginning. And I'm reading it because for me it's an example, it's a very personal example of how one moves from the I am me, the mountains are mountains, to this larger sense of what I this is.

[70:55]

Being ill like this combines shock This time I will die with a pain and agony that are unfamiliar. This is also how much we don't want to do this practice. You know, how much we don't want to live in a world where mountains are not mountains. Being ill like this combines shock. This time I will die with a pain and agony that are unfamiliar that wrench me out of myself. It's like visiting one's funeral Like visiting loss in its purest and most monumental form, this wild darkness, which is not only unknown, but which one cannot enter as oneself. Now one belongs entirely to nature, to time. Identity was a game. It isn't cruel what happens next. It's merely a form of being caught. Memory, so complete and clear, or so evasive, has to be ended, has to be put aside, as if one were leaving a chapel and bringing the prayer to an end in one's head.

[72:10]

It is death that goes down to the center of the earth, the great burial church the earth is, and then to the curved ends of the universe, as light is said to do. as light is said to do. And then it is death that goes down to the center of the earth, the great burial church the earth is. And then to the curved ends of the universe as light is said to do. And on the subject of how how hard this is and the feeling. There are two pictures here of the man. Here he is, I don't know, 20 years or something before his death. It's quite a charming man.

[73:12]

With a Siamese cat behind him. He's a charming man and an attractive man. and maybe slightly a seductive man, I don't know, but his personality, the I am, is there. Same guy? Same man, just before his death. It's like the Rembrandt stuff. And how old was he when he died? Middle 50s. Yeah. I think he's older than me. He wasn't that old. I'm pretty sure he was in his 60s. 1930, yeah, right. 1930 to 96. I think that first picture says he was 28. Yeah. So, that's the work. No, I'm not saying he looks better, I'm saying he looks different.

[74:30]

Doesn't he look different? Right, there's a whole change of presence. But he's wearing a suit, you know. Well, how does somebody look if they're enlightened? That's interesting. He looks like he's suffering. He does. He does. He looks as if he's asking, he looks as if he's questioning, and he looks as if he's suffering. I think he looks very good for having it. And each eye looks different. I mean, it's a very complicated expression. You can't say what it is. There is a quality there. It's like if I went into the Zendo and I held this picture up next to the picture. So, what have we been talking about?

[76:05]

We've been talking about receiving the teaching and what we need to do to be ready for the teaching. and how we prepare ourselves to be ready for the teaching. And we've been talking about the Buddha field and what that is, what we put on top of our heads. And we've been talking about Shariputra's questions, you know, this sense of what looks good, what looks enlightened, what looks ordinary, looking back and forth. And we've been talking about the self, the boundaries of the ordinary and extraordinary.

[77:15]

So, I think what I'm hoping is that there can be little homework assignments and that we'll be willing to take, find out when we go home what parts of what we've talked about stay with us and kind of settle into us. write a little statement or we have some artists amongst us make a little picture or you know bring some reflection back that would be very that would be very nice because all of this is so large and our business is really quite urgent business is is to find where our own voice is in all of this, what it means to us, what these metaphors mean to us.

[78:30]

Yes? In the little bit of reading that I've been doing in the past few months, it seems like One is the experience of the clear mind or the Buddha mind. It seems to be named differently by different groups. But it's an experience, it's a taste, it's a feeling. And the other is this sort of intellectual study. And recently, a book I read, Le Brun Pochet said, once you have tasted that feeling, sit and meditate so that you can taste it more and more, and you can come more easily back and forth with it, and that that's what's really important. So, if that were true, what is the importance of this study?

[79:38]

Yeah. Well, that's a nice question. And that ties exactly into the plot of this whole Sutra, which in fact has a plot. And just in a small nutshell, Vimalakirti is going to be sick. He's going to take on the sickness of the world, and people are going to visit him and investigate the Dharma. And in the end, he asks, people, what's the gate of liberation? And then finally the wisest of the Bodhisattvas, Namjusri, asks Vimalakirti, what's the gate of liberation? And he's silent. And that's Vimalakirti's great roar, the silence. So, what is all this teaching?

[80:39]

What does it come to? That's a very sad response. You have to figure it out for yourself. You can beat them over the head, you can hold a gun to them, but they won't tell you. My experience is that there's something wonderful about the teaching and very attractive. And you know, you get sort of greedy and it feels good and you read and you read and then suddenly, oh, it's enough. Stop, stop. And then you stop for a while. And then the appetite resumes. That's my experience. That's right, it really challenges one's sensible sense of self.

[82:01]

It's very challenging, you know, it's silly. I do want to say in a certain way we've come through the the most, the grandest part. And from now on, there's more dialogue and variation.

[83:03]

What should our next reading be? Just read through the whole thing. Oh, the next, no, the chapter two, and, well, if you've got a Xerox, I've only Xeroxed, I only Xeroxed what? Chapter two, and and chapter 3 but I'm going to skip a lot you know if you have if you have so next time next time we'll do chapter 2 and chapter 3 and skip much of chapter 4 which is sort of repetition and yeah So we'll do two through four next time. And there is a lot of repetition. And also, if you can just read it 10 or 15 minutes a day, sort of quietly, just letting it come in, that's a nice way to do it.

[84:18]

And do a representation of something? Yeah. Yeah, of what, now probably everything is just, it's a seed, but tomorrow, the next day, you will remember certain things. And what did you connect with? And it's a very nice exercise to do for oneself, and if you're willing, read them together. Okay, well why don't we just, is there any more responses, questions? I have a request. When I read the first line in the introduction, I thought, yes. What was the first, read the first line. Matter is not void because of voidness.

[85:22]

Voidness is not elsewhere. This is very reminiscent of emptiness is formed from this emptiness. Yeah, it is. It's a different translation of it. It is. Well, we will come to that. We will come to that. Don't worry. That's the middle way. You know, the next statement says this is the middle way. That's the ninth edge of the middle way. And we will definitely come to that. All right, why don't we end by chanting once the Four Vows.

[86:01]

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