Does anybody else have? So who next has homework going around? Yes, Mary Lee. Well, I had to do this at the last minute because of other responsibilities. Can I use this little bench? Yeah. And it was a community effort. My seven-year-old daughter and my son helped me. I'm wondering if it would be possible to get a little bench or a chair from the window, or are there others in the house? I could go do that. What about any one of the lawn chairs? They're pretty dirty. It's easier to get them. Yeah. Can she use this? What? Can she use this? She could sit on that one, you know, throw it to her. So, um, This actually grew out of an image that I had many years ago that I was never able to come to completion with.

[01:05]

And so it was really fun doing it. So this is my interpretation of the Buddha field. The Buddha field? Yeah. And then we can't see, but on these feathers are the qualities that are listed, right? The paramitas. The paramitas. What are the paramitas? We're going to come to them tonight, too. They're the six Bodhisattva qualities. This is when there was this listing, you know, when the Bodhisattva comes to this, then all these people will be born out of it and into it.

[02:14]

Yeah. Yes. So, these photographs are all from a class that I did that's called The Way of the Doll. And it's called, she calls it sacred art, and really what it is, it's a journey through one's human wounds. And so, to me, that's the experience of getting to the Buddha field, is the wounding falling away, and the deities falling away, and then... And, you know, there's no sight, there's no action. Oh, hi Agnes, glad to see this. Did she do this one? She was in the class, I don't know, I can't remember, but I saw that presentation. And then feet, I'm so excited I had a picture of feet.

[03:21]

There's that Buddhist image of the foot, right? So I really had a good time sort of finally getting to do this image. Did you make the central image? Yeah. Not this week. No, these are all... You had it all. I had all of this and some of these pieces I made and some of them other people made. Or maybe you could put it back together and then after the class we could look at it more closely. It's fragile. It's taped together. It reminds me of those North Coast masks of birds and animals, how they're hinged and they have strings and during the ritual

[04:25]

you know, something in a bird's mouth underneath. And then that thing will open and then there's something else further inside, sort of layered idea that we work with there. Undoing the layers of the onion. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that's a wonderful way of thinking of it. Oh, can we leave it? Or do you want to sit on the bench? No, no, no. I was just making room for others. I don't know if there were others that weren't here, but could you tell me what the assignment was? I'm having wonderful fantasies about what it was. Well, it was just to take some theme that we talked about last week, and there were extraordinary themes, and just find out what settled for you, and to make something, or to write something.

[05:37]

That was it. So you missed the presentation of the Buddha field, and also the three, when mountain is a mountain and it's not, and it is. And the ornamented clouds. And the ornamented and the unornamented clouds. So, another homework. Jason. A poem. Plum Blossom. And that came to you out of last week? Yes, out of the scene when one man was saying how he looked around and he saw all these sort of awful things, you know, and then the Buddha turned them into jewels, thrones and things like that.

[06:44]

Aha, he saw a field of order, of garbage. And then the Buddha turned it into a jeweled piece. So there's the blossoms, these beautiful blossoms coming from the beginning of spring. And then from another standpoint, oh, you know, how I miss the wonderful winter. Yeah, read it once more. Plum Blossoms. Oh, how I miss them. Very nice. Right. I was thinking, what stayed with me during the week was how I started to relate to the visions of enlightenment and those elaborate universes that were created.

[07:47]

It's never been something that has any relationship to my experience. And I was trying to think how that would. And then I thought, well, you know, if you're living in suffering and it suddenly lifted, if the perverted views that lead to suffering are shifted, and that could be a form of enlightenment, vast expanses and vistas and ornamented clouds could definitely show up. And for me it's always been an experience of just relaxation and pleasure and just being here and I haven't had any grand visions like that. But the possibility remains. Well, it's not something I ever particularly wanted.

[08:50]

I'm not against it or for it, but it's not within my form. Yeah. Well, I wonder, you're a big hiker. You go up to Mount Jam all the time. I mean, isn't the view there certainly different than it is inside your living room? Or is it? I don't know. But it's not a magical creation, it's just I love it and it's a gift and a privilege and it's always astonishing and awe-inspiring and there's always this great, great love and appreciation that I have for it. gold encrusted umbrellas or something.

[09:50]

Yeah. So that's very nice. I think that's what these sutras can do for us is just push our imagination and push the boundaries that we think are there. Yeah. I mean to have an experience of absolutely not trusting anything and feeling like slime and having that shift into trusting the world and more enjoyment and all that. I'll take that. Thank you. Other poem books? Well, I wrote... I guess it's a poem. I don't know. I didn't think of it as that. Tell us your name. Patrice. What I was doing was, I was meditating, and I look right out on a porch, and it had been raining, and I was watching the rain on the wood, and this came to me as I was thinking, and it came more from the idea of the ordinary and extraordinary, the difference, the tension,

[11:13]

And so I wrote, to recognize a rain puddle, to name it so, that is ordinary, but to see the reflection of the world within its wetness, how extraordinary. And that's what I did. I was looking at the puddle, and I just saw the wetness and the rain, and I thought, gosh, that's a puddle. And then as I was just letting my eyes sit on it, all of a sudden I saw the world that was reflected in it. I was just like, wow, you know, and it just gave me that sense of seeing further and wider. It's like the paintings, you know, the puddle and then the world within it and the extraordinary and then back to the puddle which is now extraordinary just as a puddle. Right, right. Thank you. Anyone else?

[12:17]

Well, that was a very fertile assignment. And I hope it can be continued to next week. So as we go, please let it all settle in. Does anybody need a Xerox? Mainly the Shambhala books have no more copies. They don't? Yeah, he said that they told more of those than they had in the past six years. We don't have any. Cody's does? They did last time I was there. They had three or four. They have a very good religious section. We don't have any here. Cody has one left as of Tuesday night. The pages may be out of order, just back to front there.

[13:23]

All right, well, let's begin on page 20. We haven't even gotten up to the Malakirti, so here. this little chapter, The Inconceivable Skill in Liberated Technique, is our introduction to Vimalakirti. At that time, there lived in the great city of Vaisali, a certain Licchavi, Vimalakirti by name. And so now we're going to have this paragraph of Bodhisattva qualities. It's going to be the first of many such paragraphs. And, as you can see, there are qualities that are very much approaching Buddha qualities. He played with the great super-knowledges. He had attained the power of incantations and fearlessnesses.

[14:29]

Having integrated his realization with skills and liberative technique, he was expert in knowing the thoughts and the actions of living beings. He lived with the deportment of the Buddha and his superior intelligence was wide as an ocean. He was respected by Indra and Brahma and all of the Lokapalas or all of the gods. In order to develop living beings with his skill, in liberative technique, he lived in the great city of Vaisali. So all of these extraordinary qualities are for the point of developing living beings. And this is the bottom line of the Bodhisattva way.

[15:39]

When we say the first Bodhisattva vow, beings are numberless, I vow to save them or I vow to awaken with them. That's this vow to develop all living beings. That's in some ways a more accessible way of thinking about the vow. And it's at the root. So... We could take a minute, each of us, and think about our vow, or our purpose. And think about when it began. You know, we give these way-seeking mind talks, which are really wonderful, on Monday mornings at ten of six. Is it ten of six now?

[16:47]

That's right. So it's about then. 6.30 now, changed, anyway. And so people talk about their way-seeking mind which has something to do with their sense of vow or intention. And that sense of vow that we have changes, you know, maybe you can remember back to when you were a kid and there was some understanding or something that was born and you can sort of remember that and now here you are and that there's some continuity, there's some connection between what you understood as a child and what was in the course of years developed to what your vow is now, what your intention.

[17:52]

Sometimes it's called the sure heart's request. So it's this vow which has some generosity in it. It's not a vow for oneself. It's a vow that includes oneself in some larger context. So from one point of view, our whole development is the development of this vow in our lives. It changes year after year. And this vow is what is at the root of all this bodhisattva's work. So, then, his wealth was inexhaustible for the purpose of sustaining the poor and the helpless. Now we're coming into the world and how a bodhisattva lives in the world.

[18:56]

Actually, what this little paragraph is talking about is the paramitas. paramitas are going to be given to us several times in slightly different versions. The first paramita is generosity. So his wealth was inexhaustible for the purpose of sustaining the poor in the house. He observed a pure morality, that's Sheila, the second paramita, in order to protect the immoral. He maintained tolerance and self-control in order to reconcile beings who were angry, cruel, violent, and brutal. The third paramita is patience or tolerance. He blazed with energy in order to inspire people who were lazy, ethereal, or effort. He maintained concentration, mindfulness, and meditation in order to sustain the mentally troubled. and he attained decisive wisdom in order to sustain the foolish.

[20:04]

So sometimes the paramitas are listed in terms of just virtues that a bodhisattva has, but this list is a kind of proactive list. Each virtue is for the sake of all beings. Would you mind repeating the last two? The last two Paramitas are Concentration or Meditation. That's the fifth. And the sixth is Wisdom, Prajnaparamita. And what does a Bodhisattva in the world look like? He wore the white clothes of a layman, yet lived impeccably like a religious devotee. He lived at home, but remained aloof from the realm of desire, the realm of pure matter, and the immaterial realm. He had a son, a wife, a female attendants, and yet always maintained continence.

[21:11]

He appeared to be surrounded by servants, yet lived in solitude. He appeared to be adorned with ornaments, yet always was endowed with auspicious signs and marks. he seemed to eat and drink it always took nourishment from the taste of meditation and so on so in this paragraph we're hearing this teaching of dichotomies of teaching of opposites of being in the world and not of it which is in fact the middle way what we know as the middle way of having eyes and ears and nose and no eyes, no ears, no nose. That razor edge balance. Someone last night asked about, last week asked about form and emptiness. That's all this business, form is emptiness, emptiness is form.

[22:16]

That's, this is in that, that's a teaching of The Heart Sutra is a whole teaching of dichotomy. In order to be in harmony with people, he associated with the elders, with those of middle age and with the young, yet always spoke in harmony with the Dharma. He engaged in all sorts of businesses, yet had no interest in profit or possessions. To train living beings, he would appear at crossroads on street corners, and to protect them, he participated in government. To turn people away from the Hinayana and to engage them in the Mahayana, he appeared among the listeners and the teachers of the Dharma. It's always a little bit of rap at the older school. To develop children, he visited all schools.

[23:20]

To demonstrate the evils of desire, he even entered the brothels. To establish drunkards and correct mindfulness, he entered all the cabarets. Now this is big stuff. Pushing yourself to the limit. The older teaching had been one of restraint. If it's not a wholesome situation, you step back. You don't join. And this is exactly the opposite. You go right into it. Remember, that was very much the attitude of Reverend Piazzillo, of just not engaging with certain kinds of persons, or it was very much a loose attitude towards certain people. Because it would spoil a particular mind state. That's right. It would create improper conditions. Right. So it's a radically different teaching. Yes, the Theravadin teaching often from our point of view seems somewhat dualistic in the effort to preserve one's purity and wholesomeness of mind by restraint, but actually when you read more about it and you read

[25:08]

the works of the great Theravadan teachers, the dualistic quality begins to dissolve. But I think your point is a good Mahayana point. But it seems that a person who has achieved this would have so much power and charismatic energy it would be very difficult to stay moralistic because of the kind of charisma. And I think that's what happens to so many spiritual leaders, too, is that you tap into an energy that is so seductive. And so to be able to say... That's right. Not to be inflated in any way. Yes. That's right. That's right. Very severe teaching. So, because of these qualities, in the next paragraph, he was honored as the businessman among businessmen because he demonstrated the priority of the Dharma.

[26:17]

He was honored as the landlord. He was honored. He was honored. He was honored. You know, when people are able to move in the world freely without personal hindrances and to match every situation as it comes up exactly with nothing extra. They are met with extraordinary gratitude. I found a great deal of this rather amusing. I don't know if that was intended. and so on and then the next chapter with all these people who you know, resist going. I mean, I can't go to sea. Oh, yes. Oh, yes. It really is. It's almost a farce. I don't know whether it's in Canada. No. Oh, I think it was. It's very, very new. Yeah. Oh, I'm sure it was. I'm sure it was.

[27:18]

Yeah. Yeah. No, I think it's the wonderful aspect of this sutra. It just has so many different aspects. It's grand. It's funny. It's philosophical. It's silly. Yeah. Yeah. He was compatible with the ordinary people because he appreciated the excellence of ordinary merits. And again, he was honored by the gods among the gods because he fostered the development of all living beings. The Bodhisattvas work. So now we come to the plot. At that time, out of this very skill and liberative technique, Vimalakirti manifested himself as sick. So... He says as if sick. As if sick. As if sick. Good point. That's right.

[28:18]

Yeah. Yeah. That's right. So, and that's a real question. Is he just manifesting himself as sick, or is he really sick? We can kind of keep that question. It's a good one. In a certain way, it seems to me, it's the real, it's an aspect of plunging into the bodhisattva condition, that you do get sick. you know when you plunge into the world you do get sick and it's not it doesn't just have an as if quality you do and so he manifests himself as sick he

[29:20]

in this way, comes even closer to the suffering of beings. You know, Thich Nhat Hanh in his, I think it's the seventh precept, says, do not avoid suffering. Under all conditions, do not avoid coming close to suffering. So, the illness brings him closer. Can you say just in short sentences what inconceivable skill and liberative technique is? Yeah. Well, it's a skillful, you know, on a technical level, it's a skillful means. Which is being able to do or manipulate recreate in the world of matter that which you want to teach?

[30:29]

Yeah, yeah. We're going to have lists, you know, if you look, go on, there'll be lists and lists and lists of aspects of liberative technique. And what you said is definitely one of them. I'm not familiar with skillful Skillful means is essentially the Mahayana liberative technique as opposed to the Theravadin which is the cultivation of wholesome qualities in oneself. Skillful means in the Mahayana is knowing, being able to know where each person is and to meet that person exactly where they are. And that, that meeting is the liberation. You know, you sort of don't have to do. Something happens at that moment of the meeting. So, to inquire after his help, the king, officials, lords, youths, and so on.

[31:40]

And thousands of other beings came forth from the great city of Vaisali and called on the invalid. And when they arrived, Vimalakirti taught them the Dharma, beginning his discourse from the actuality of the four main elements. So now we are going to get a little, in the next page and a half, sort of Buddhism 1A, from Vimalakirti's point of view. So first, friends, this body is so, this is the illness, so impermanent, fragile, unworthy of confidence, feeble, so on, insubstantial, perishable, short-lived, painful, filled with diseases, subject to changes. There are the three marks of existence, that there is suffering and there is impermanence and there is no self. And so first we're getting the impermanence.

[32:48]

Body is like a machine, a nexus of bones and tendons. Like a magical illusion consisting of falsifications. A cloud being characterized by turbulence and dissolution. ownerless, being the product of a variety of conditions. All of these are quite wonderful to think about, you know, being just a walking nexus of products of conditions. It's very different than one other Buddhist tradition I remember during a tape where they talked about the pus and this and it's not quite so It's not quite so lurid. It has a more imaginative and less literal feeling. Yes. Yes, a ball of foam unable to bear any pressure. I think it's because it's not so worried about lust.

[33:51]

It quite is worried. Well, maybe. I think the other one is so, I think from traditions where they're not of the world. They're male monks. You have to fight against the natural tendency. That's interesting. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it has a very different quality. And then the next paragraph... Oh, no, here it is. Oh, there is a little lot of pus and excrement. Where? Right, right in the... Oh, it is in the filthy being an agglomeration of pus and excrement. Well, here it's general, at least in some of them, it's only the women that are exposed. That's right. pile of shit. Well, therefore you should be revulsed by such a body, but this is leading into something else. So you should despair of it and you should arouse your admiration for the body of the Tathagata.

[34:52]

And now here we come into the solution, so to speak. Friends, the body of a Tathagata is the body of Dharma, born of gnosis, wisdom. The body of a Tathagata is born of the stores of merit and wisdom. It is born of, we have the Paramitas again, morality, meditation, wisdom, of the liberations. Well, they're a little mixed up, but they're there. Born of charity, discipline, and self-control, and so on. All these Bodhisattva attributes. But this body of a Tathagata is the embodied teaching. It's a very wonderful thought that you leave going from the literal of suffering and no suffering.

[36:04]

you come to the images that we've just read to the image of the body of the Tathagata which arises out of the cultivation of the Bodhisattva qualities So how do we see, what is our experience of the embodied teaching? Compassion, I guess, that we live in this body. Yeah, yeah. And sometimes we have a certain sense of it. It's interesting to look around at faces sometimes, if you're in Bard. and just look at faces and look at them from the point of view that a Tathagata would look at them from the point of view of liberation.

[37:17]

There's another This is a little paragraph on the Tathagata's point of view, what a Tathagata sees. The Tathagata does not enter ultimate liberation until all living beings have entered ultimate liberation. For since all living beings are utterly liberated, the Tathagatas see them as having the nature of ultimate liberation. So what if you look around at faces and you just look around at faces at the nature of the liberation of each face? You can sort of do that. Look at faces and you can see the particular faces and the humanness and the lines and so on and so on. And you can also sort of see the aspiration in the face, the goodness in the face. The embodied teaching.

[38:27]

How we embody the teaching and how the Tathagatas see that embodied teaching. May we be seen by the awakened eye of Buddha. And that's one of our echoes that we chant, I guess in the morning. And I always hear that line, you know, for the rest of the day. May we be seen by the awakened eye of Buddha. I have a very different take on this, now that you've brought this up. We were at the Pet Food Express in line waiting to get cheap shots for the cats. It was a nightmare, and there was a man, for a lot of reasons, but one of which was that there was a man there, he had a picture of a cheetah, and he was prowling, and he was mistreating it, and I was terrified, and his face expressed such malevolence, in a negative fashion as well as a positive fashion.

[39:47]

If we practice violence, it shows up in our face. If we practice arrogance, it shows up in our face. If we practice, you know, sloth or something, it just shows up in our faces as well. So I just had a different take Friends, the body of a Tathagata is born of innumerable good works. Towards such a body, you should turn your aspirations. And in order to eliminate the sicknesses of the passions of all living beings, you should conceive the spirit of unexcelled perfect enlightenment. And as he was talking about this, numerous people were liberated.

[40:50]

Boy, if I'm sick, I really don't want to get mixed in. It's just a different way of being sick. Okay. So that's a thumbnail sketch of Bodhisattva. Did anybody else get this sense? What's happened to him is he's come to represent the Dharma itself, and that the Dharma is utterly fearless in all these situations, and that this litany of being in these places and being of, and really even of them. We need to be in the world and not of it. But it's as if his complete presence in all of those places

[42:00]

was for me the message that the Dharma is completely present in all of those places, and that it is uncontaminated and uncontaminatable, and that those places and things themselves are not contaminated, because it is all Dharma. And so this picture of him visiting brothels and whenever, it was just this wholeness that he embraced everything, including the face of the man I just felt that fearlessness of it. Thank you. Yeah, thank you. The fearlessness is a very fundamental aspect without any hindrances, no fears exist.

[43:05]

That's kind of the hinge in the Heart Sutra between the discussion of our human condition and the nirvanic resolution, is that fearlessness. The presence of the bodhisattva Being so fearless and so completely attentive to what is, is what transforms, is what develops living beings. There needs to be something that's not afraid of how things are. That's right. That's right. And it's not the disciples. Yes, it's not the disciples. a man coming on, big, burly worker, who was quite inebriated, and very... brought with him an aura of violence and danger.

[44:22]

And he describes going through his own sort of process of feeling that he should take it upon himself to do something about this, to protect the people on the train, and one thing and another, and he sort of gets himself just ready to intervene with his martial arts skills and a little old Japanese man basically goes up to this very frightening, very drunk, early, loud person and the story ends with the two of them sitting together and the drunk, loud, early person putting his head in the little old man's lap and sobbing about the loss of pain. Yeah, I read that story, too. And the old man says something about the drunk. He asks the drunk what he likes, and the drunk says, sake. And the old man says, well, I like sake, too. It was a wonderful, wonderful moment of the meeting. And then it was all done. Yeah.

[45:22]

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You know, there are the ox-herding pictures. Oh, you should know about the ox herding pictures. They represent looking, one's path, the search on the path, in terms of looking for an ox, losing the ox, finding it, taming it, riding it. not needing it. And finally the last picture is the Bodhisattva picture, the very ordinary sweet person just sitting around in the marketplace with bliss bestowing hands. So, chapter three, the reluctance. Then Vimalakirti thought to himself, Now he's sick. I am sick, lying on my bed in pain.

[46:24]

And yet the Tathagata, the saint, the perfectly accomplished Buddha, does not consider me or take pity on me and sends no one to inquire after my illness. Now he's really sick. I can relate. The one quality so far. I understand. Now we're getting right down to it. So was he sick as he was sick, or is he actually sick? Well, now he sounds sick to me. Well, he could be broke. It's really sweet, too, because it's like even Vimalakirti needs someone that needs some help. Notice me. Yeah, notice me. Yeah, after all the super knowledges. Well, he's in India. After 100,000 people visited him, he got the illness. of Vimalakirti. So Buddha and Vimalakirti are sort of in cahoots here in the business of liberative teaching.

[47:29]

So the venerable Shariputra answered the Buddha, Lord I am indeed reluctant to go and see Vimalakirti about his illness. Why? I remember one day when I was sitting at the foot of the tree in the forest, absorbed in contemplation. Nimalakirti came to the foot of the tree and said to me, Reverend Shariputra, this is not the way to absorb yourself in contemplation. You should absorb yourself in contemplation so that neither body nor mind appear anywhere in the triple world. Etc. etc. What does that mean? That neither body nor mind appears in the triple world. So that you're leaving no trace, that your meditation is consuming you. One hundred percent. Nothing left. Nothing to see. Gone, gone. Empty air. I don't understand. Well... No, you don't understand.

[48:34]

Right. All attachments done. Over. It's sort of the Prajnaparamita has taken over. It doesn't matter what people are doing. Vimalakirti comes along and says, no matter what you're doing, you're sitting under a tree, you're having dinner with somebody, you're teaching someone, he's going to come along and tell you. It's not right. That's right. But he's really pretty good. He really is teaching me too. He may be insufferable, but... No, that is the general point, that he's coming to every situation from the point of view of shunyata, from emptiness. And this sutra is from the Madhyamaka Mahayana school, Nagarjuna's school, which is the teaching of Prajnaparamita, the sword that just cuts and cuts and cuts.

[49:41]

It's not, it's not, it's not, it's not. So what's left? Not nothing, but not. Yeah, yeah. So that's what is being taught here. Everybody has their own practice, one way or another, and Vimalakirti observes that it is still a practice. There's no resting point for the Bodhisattva. No resting point. No. That's right. The only resting point is the bow. And that's the difference between a Bodhisattva and a Buddha. Buddha doesn't have the vow. Whatever that means. I read it. The vow keeps the bodhisattva connected. Yes. Yes. Yes. I have a brilliant insight which I have to... It's the only one I've ever had.

[50:47]

He is sick for the same reason that I would be. where I possessed of his supreme knowledge. When you have something, you want to use it. And it's really a shame not to. And here he was possessed of this incredible wisdom, and his task as a bodhisattva is to save all beings. And until he does that, he can't cross over. And so he feigns illness because these other bodhisattvas are apprehensive about facing his superior wisdom. And so the only way he can get them to visit him is through illness. I'm ill, come to me. That's clever means.

[51:49]

It's so clever. But it doesn't work. They don't show up. But they do. But I use my illness in the same way. That's why I thought maybe he might. How so? How do you use it? I'll tell you later. It's a little awkward to express in a group how I use it. I wonder, I mean, all these bodhisattvas, you know, I recognize some of the names and of course Shariputra started. There's good old Shariputra right at the beginning. Is there any connection between these little things, these little vignettes of activity with what we know about these people?

[53:05]

Well, see, I can't... There is... We're going to come to Maitreya. Yeah, with Maitreya. There is. I don't know enough about them to know that. Maybe, maybe so. I just don't know. So, he's rebuking Shariputra. Who's unable to apply the main style. when I was teaching I was Lord when I heard this teaching I was unable to reply and remain silent therefore I am reluctant to go to ask that good man about his sickness yes now there are little You know, the final event in the sutra, well it's not the final, there are several chapters afterwards, but the major happening in the drama of this sutra is that finally when Manjusri is going to ask Vimalakirti what is the ultimate technique of liberation, Vimalakirti is silent.

[54:20]

And that's called Vimalakirti's Roar. But there are several instances of smaller silences by people who are baffled. And these smaller silences are very different from the roar of Vimalakirti's silence which is going to come. So this is one of the smaller silences of the defeated. And then the big miracles begin on page 26. 800, well I guess they began before that, but 800 householders in the crowd conceived the spirit of unexcelled perfect enlightenment and I myself was speechless. Now going back to the nothingness of this teaching on 26, the bottom of the fourth paragraph, the long paragraph, where Malka Kasyapa is reluctant to see Vimalakirti, and Vimalakirti is correcting him,

[55:52]

You should accept alms by not taking anything. You should see form like a man blind from birth. Hear sounds as if they were echoes. Smell scents as if they were winds. Experience tastes without any discrimination. Know things with the consciousness of an illusory creature. That which is without intrinsic substance and without imparted substance does not burn. And what does not burn will not be distinguished. That's a nice example of this. Not, not, not, not. What does it mean that that which is without substance and without imparted substance does not burn? There's nothing that wisdom can do. Please, other people respond to this. If there's nothing there, there's no activity.

[57:06]

There's no desire. But you have to realize that if it's not there, you have to be aware that it's not there. You have to be, yes. That's right. That's why there is something going on. Even though there's not this, not this, not this. What is going on? That's the question. What is it? Our big fundamental question. Is this a universal question? Just going on? In other words, paying attention? Yeah. Yeah. There's this simple little saying, when the mind is quiet, the heart listens. Sort of, when all this stuff has finally worn itself out, [...]

[58:14]

Something's still going on. I'm having a lot of blankness around some of this, I must admit. One should. But the piece that I see into, out of my own experience here, you should dwell on the fact of the equality of all things and you should seek alms with consideration for all living beings at all times. I'm involved in, at times, you know, going out to people and saying, this is important, and it's the benefit of living beings, you know, I want you to participate, or would you participate, in various ways, with time or money, and the only way to do it that doesn't leave traces or scars or however you want to put it, is to have that place of respect, and really, you, You should accept all by not taking anything. It's just crucial that a no is accepting all.

[59:21]

If somebody says no to you, it's not... To be able to take that as a gift, as much as somebody who dumps a bag of gold or something in your lap, is that place to have. Thank you. Yeah, it's a very difficult point to come to. And without it, there's just endless failed expectation and burnout. Yeah. Well, so now there's a nice little story about Subuti on page 27, who's also reluctant, because one day when I went to beg my food at the house of Vimalakirti, he took my bowl and filled it with some excellent food and said to me, Reverend Subuti, take this food, if you understand the equality of all things.

[60:41]

by means of the equality of material objects. And if you understand the equality of all attributes of the Buddha by means of the quality of all things, take this food if, without abandoning desire, hatred and folly, you can avoid association with them. That's very good. If you can follow the path of the single way without ever disturbing the egotistic view. That's really the heart of it. Can we have our egotistic views that are necessarily, you know, that are our human nature? Can we have them and also follow the path without ever disturbing them? If you can produce the knowledges and liberations without conquering ignorance and the craving for existence, if by the equality of the five deadly sins you reach the equality of liberation, If you are neither liberated nor bound, if you do not see the four holy truths, yet are the one who has not seen the truth.

[61:52]

If you have not attained any fruit, yet are not the one who has not attained. If you are an ordinary person, yet have not the qualities of an ordinary person, if you are not holy, or yet unholy, if you are responsible of all things, yet are free from any notion concerning anything, take this food, and so on, and take this food, and so on, and so on. Lord, when I heard these words of Vimalakirti, I wondered what I should say and what I should do, but I was totally in the dark, leaving the bowl. I was about to leave the house when Vimalakirti said to me, Reverend Subuti, do not fear these words and pick up the bowl. What do you think, Reverend Subuti, if it were an incarnation created by the Tathagata who spoke thus to you, would you be afraid?

[63:00]

I answered, no, noble sir. And then he said, Reverend Subuti, the nature of all things is like an illusion, like a magical incarnation. So you should not fear them. Why? All words have that nature and thus the wise are not attached to words, nor do they fear them. So the whole construction is made about are you such-and-such and such-and-such and such-and-such a person and Sabuddhi is totally defeated and very ready to give back the food and then Vimalakirti says it's all just words. What are words? What I don't get at this point is why, you know, it seems like Sabuddhi has come to the point where he recognizes his his failings, his human failings.

[64:05]

And Vimalakirti is, you know, that he's confronted them and he's at that point where he's uncomfortable about them. In fact, all of the Bodhisattvas, I mean, they're just right here. But then Vimalakirti, and I haven't looked at this, read this carefully enough to check this out, but he's just given him the step into his liberation. I mean, he's just said, you know, she's alive. And then he takes it away. See, that's... No, by reassuring him, by some, you know, the compassionate reaching out, where, you know, I sort of rubbed his nose in it, and the guy is, you know, he's not confronting his humanness in that one aspect, and he's embarrassed about his humanness. You know, he feels like he's failed because he's had his human condition uncovered. And then he says, no, no, it's just words. And at that point, you know, it seems like, so good he could say, oh, and have the shift, and it would all be, oh, and then eat the food with great enjoyment, and it'd be a joke. Yeah. But he can't do that.

[65:09]

He's not ready. He's not ready. He's not ready. The disciples have a very hard time. He really shakes them up. And it's really pride. All of them have so much pride that they can't confront that peace. Yeah. We all have that. I mean, I think there's points where we just get up to the wall. I have trouble with thinking of it as pride, and maybe it is, and maybe there's a wonderful... between pride and... What I couldn't figure out in each case is whether they fell silent out of humiliation or out of humility. Well, they're confused. It's all about appearance and reality, you know. And they're confused. They don't know. But when you fall silent, you're confused and you've been taught and you've been... you know, had your illusion that you knew something stripped away, which is great, and then you left. No, I don't know. I'm not who I thought I was. I'm not a great teacher. I'm not able to do all these things. I didn't know I was doing it wrong. That's all falling away. And then there's this core of you that's left, like this beam of light, and you're just there.

[66:12]

And what I don't know is when they fall silent and then feel that because they fell silent, they have nothing to say to him, and therefore, you could read it, are unworthy to go as the emissary to comfort him in his illness. It's like, who am I? I have discovered, thank you, that I am without virtue, without truth, whatever, and the Dharma has come and waked me up. And they're stripped of all notion ability to do anything for this great being. It's almost as if you could either read it that they're stripped of their arrogance and therefore quite properly feel that they are not the ones to go. And so you could see it all as a very great acknowledgement of that. Or you could see it that it's the flip side of their egotism, that they don't want to go unless they can be somebody who could... You know, and I don't know how to read it.

[67:18]

I think it can be read both ways. Do you feel the opposition? Well, I just think that it's another form of arrogance. So if you go down to the basement with it, I'm not good, so therefore I'm slime. Yeah, that's the flip side. And that you're not going to go visit somebody who's sick because you're not good enough is, you know, not... Yeah, and I had that reading, and then I had this other reading, and so I was sort of holding above. Yeah, well I think one can hold them both. But, as you say, they can't do anything. They really don't have anything to do. They can't do. Except when we get them. Manjushri knows what to do, which is interesting. Yes, Manjushri. Because they don't get it that they can go do what Manjushri does. Yeah. Yeah. Because there's nothing to do, and who they are has been challenged. perhaps they don't know how to be in his presence.

[68:22]

And so that creates discomfort or a paralysis almost, that someone who has gone as far as a path might be paralyzed in that moment and no longer knowing. Their beingness has been shaken. Yeah, their self-habit. And when the self-habit is too assaulted, you just have to sort of stand there. Yeah. But if this is supposed to be a lesson on how to be an ordinary person, and there are these great bodhisattvas who are extremely human and vulnerable here and paralyzed because they don't know how to proceed, it's certainly... I can relate to... I mean, how... I think most people feel, how can we help others when we don't even know ourselves? So it is, in a way, the same dilemma. It seems that this tradition has a lot of teaching responsibility.

[69:27]

And so, how can you teach if you don't understand? If you don't have faith or don't have... If you're off base in some way. Yes. And you have to keep going. Yes. I'd like to read a very nice little piece in the Wind Bell by Gil Fronsdale, who was just given Dharma transmission recently. He's a priest in our tradition and also the Vipassana tradition. when after a person receives Dharma transmission they make a little kind of way-seeking mind talk at Tassajara. And this is speaking to the point. One of the most profound things I would like to teach now that I am starting to be a teacher in the Soto tradition, very modest, he's been a teacher for years, is that the present moment is trustable if you are present for it.

[70:40]

If you can be fully, wholeheartedly, non-reactively here for what is going on in the present, then the present moment is trustable. If you are not present, if you are not worrying about the future or are preoccupied about the past, then maybe the present is not so trustable. When we are really in the present moment, then we say that. It responds to the inquiring impulse. It's a line from the Sandokan. If we are present for this wonderful interconnected reality of our present experience, then the inquiring impulse is present, and what responds is trustable, even in the midst of great difficulty. Is that hard? Yeah. Well, these Bodhisattvas have been, these great teachers have been shaken up.

[71:43]

And they can't trust the moment. Well, I wish, I don't have my hearing aid, but some of the things that some of you said were so interesting, I won't forget next time. But that isn't what I want to say. And I hope I'm not just repeating what people have said, but I couldn't help thinking when he said, it's just words, what he was saying was, I have blanketed you with a lot of words which you have been thoroughly intimidated, and you probably don't even understand them. But what you see is that you have relied on words and not on what Gil was saying. On being present and you have allowed me to create anxiety so you can't even hear.

[72:50]

You probably don't even know what I'm talking about and that isn't even important. My words are not important. It's the condition of your mind when you're suddenly rattled, I'm sure. I couldn't help thinking of when I was overwhelmed by a master chess player, how I was rattled, and I couldn't even play at the elementary level that I knew. There wasn't much difference. No, that's not a good comparison. Never mind. Drop that. But that's a very good summary of the dialogue, I think. Yeah. Very clear. What I kept thinking about when I read this one section, when I love the meal checks, except I always resisted, let us consider whether our virtue and practice deserve it. I was thinking this.

[73:50]

And then Mel, I, you know, had this conversation with Mel Bond and said, this, you know, goes way, way back to the, begging bowl and when your practice is, you know, only to take what is given, then you really do have to consider. That's the literal bottom line. Bottom line. Yeah. So... Yeah. Yeah. Well, just in that sense, maybe no one ever And so if you're not trusting the present moment, you can never eat in that way. That's right. That's the way of Buddha. That's right. That's right. And when we don't trust the moment, we don't eat.

[74:53]

You know, we're hungry ghosts. We're always hungry. Yeah. Yeah. But I mean, in that sense, it doesn't depend on your virtue, because you have to eat to sustain life and practice the way of Buddha. Otherwise, you can't practice life and sustain the way of Buddha. Yes. Yes. Yes. That's sort of the grace of Buddha. Yeah. Yeah, well, you know, subuddhi, You're all fucked up, but go ahead and eat the food anyway. Maybe it'll help. Yeah. I think that my experience this last week of how easily rattled I am by criticism or the thought of it, it's really apt. Right. Oh, it's ten of nine. And we do have... And then a sort of analogous story in 32 of Ananda going to inquire.

[76:19]

And Ananda's story about how Buddha asked for some milk, said that Buddha was ill and asked for some milk, please. And Ananda was going on his way to give Buddha some milk and Vimalakirti caught him. and said, what are you doing, Reverend Amanda? Ananda, the body of the Tathagata is as tough as a diamond. Having eliminated all the instinctual traces of evil and being endowed with all goodness, how could disease or discomfort affect such a body? Reverend Amanda, go in silence and do not belittle the Lord. Do not say such things to others. It would not be good for the powerful gods or for the Bodhisattvas coming from the various Buddha fields to hear such words. And so on and so on. Do not bring shame upon us, Reverend Ananda, but go in silence. And so, he reduces Ananda to, when I heard these words, I wondered if I'd previously misheard and misunderstood the Buddha.

[77:30]

And I was very much ashamed. And then I heard a voice from the sky saying, Ananda, the householder speaks to you truly. Nevertheless, since the Buddha has appeared during the time of the five corruptions, he disciplines living beings by acting lowly and humble. Therefore, Ananda, do not be ashamed and go get the milk. This is one of the places where the story fits the person because Ananta is the one who was supposed to remember and memorize all the sutras and never forgotten anything. I mean, I previously misheard. Yes. Misunderstood. That's right. You're right. It completely fits. Yeah. Yeah. Where is the voice of this time coming from? The Buddha. Well. Well, let's hear it. A superior place. It's one of the miracles that this story is embedded in.

[78:33]

You know, it's sort of like a kaleidoscope. You're never going to get a real grasp of where reality is in here. It's just going to keep shaking and shifting and voices from the sky and... Like the lotus sutra when you keep saying, here comes the teaching. Also the levels of reality presented in this teaching where So both are true at the same time. Yeah, it's a skillful means again. Buddha says in the Lotus Sutra he's going to die because it's a skillful teaching. If he stayed around, people would be dependent on him.

[79:35]

It's better if he leaves. Well, and then the reluctance of the bodhisattvas. All 500 of them that were left. And then on page 36, another statement of the Paramitas. And this statement is a little bit, each one is a little different. It is a seed of generosity because it has no expectation of reward. This statement is more like the traditional statements of the Paramitas which are more focused on just virtues. virtuous behavior. It is the seat of generosity because it has no expectation of reward. It is the seat of morality because it fulfills all commitments.

[80:36]

It is the seat of tolerance because it is free from anger toward any living being. It is the seat of effort because it does not turn back. It is the seat of meditation because it generates fitness of mind. It is the seat of wisdom because it sees everything directly. And then there's a very interesting story which we don't have time for. But it is very interesting about this Jagatindhara reluctance because one day when he was going home, page 37, the wicked Mara disguised as Indra and surrounded with 12,000 heavenly maidens approached me with sounds of music and

[81:48]

I, thinking he was Shakra king of the gods, said, welcome. And Mara said to me, good sir, accept from me these 12,000 divine maidens and make them your servants. And I replied, oh, Ashoka, don't offer me, who am a religious and a son of a Shakya, things that are not appropriate. And no sooner had I done that than Vimalakirti comes and says, noble son, do not think this is Indra. This is not Indra, but Mara come to ridicule you. And Vimalakirti said to Mara, evil Mara, since these heavenly maidens are not suitable for this religious devotee, a son of a Shakya, give them to me. And then now Mara is really upset and suspects that Vimalakirti has come to expose him. So he tries to make himself invisible, but he can't.

[82:51]

And then a voice resounds in the sky, evil one, give these heavenly maidens to the good man Vimalakirti. And then, only then will you be able to return to your abode. And then Mara is even more frightened and, much against his will, gives the heavenly maidens to Vimalakirti. And Vimalakirti, having received the goddesses, says to them, now that you've been given to me by Mara, you should all be liberated. And he teaches them in the joy and the pleasures of the Dharma. and gives the usual lecture about considering the sense media to be like an empty town and the pure virtues. And then Mara says to the goddesses, now come along and let us return home.

[83:59]

Mara really wants to keep his goddesses. But now the goddesses have been instructed and converted and transformed. Well, they were maidens, but then they turned into goddesses when they heard the darlings. Then Mara said to the goddess, Goddesses. Yeah, now they're goddesses. They once were maidens and now they're goddesses. And now we should enjoy the delights of the Dharma and should no longer enjoy the pleasures of desires. They were heavenly maidens. They weren't just any maidens. No, I don't think so. I think that they were for the service of their man. Well, for us in heavenly maintenance. Well, there's certainly a lot of play between enjoying the delights of the Dharma and no longer the pleasures of desire.

[85:00]

I think there's been a conversion. And so Vimalakirti says, OK, Mara, you can have them back. And they go back with Mara. They convert, transform everybody. Likewise, Sister, a single bodhisattva may establish many hundreds of thousands of living beings in enlightenment without his mindfulness being diminished. So they have the ability now to, even though they are in Mara's harem, so to speak, they themselves have become virtue-bestowing creatures. So this is sort of a slightly funny and weird little story. that perhaps has to do with the, with how we approach our own, how Bodhisattvas, this is what Catherine said towards the beginning, of how Bodhisattvas, as Bodhisattvas, we can go into any of our qualities.

[86:23]

that when our illusions arise and when the knots the various lusts and temptations and so on that come up we still can go into them and as we don't fear them but can just accept and entertain and be slightly amused and generous with They turn in their character. Generous with? Generous with. Well, Vimalakirti was fairly generous with Mara. First he took... Oh, I thought you meant with the passion. Well, yes. And I'm also talking about the passion. Yeah. Yeah. It doesn't mean indulging them. It's... Well... You're running out of time. Well, you can say it's... It's a subtle point, it's not easy to say.

[87:28]

There's a tale, and maybe you know the name of the Zen master or student of Zen. He lived in a cave and he was just a hermit for years and years and cleared up all of his stuff. But he kept having, the last thing that attacked him were these demons from his mind. he kept vanquishing them and they kept coming back and it got worse and worse and when he fought them they got bigger and bigger and finally he invited them in and offered them cake. That's that. That's right. Universal story. Yeah. That your stuff that you're fighting and trying to rid yourself of when you make a big enough pasture for it to kick up its heels or when you open to it and allow So you're not acting it out, you're not indulging it, you're not being identified with it, but you're letting it be. And in that moment of embrace, when you fully attend to it, fully understand that you have that in you and you have no desire to pretend that you don't, in that moment it loses its power.

[88:34]

And you really, you befriend yourself and you allow it and it's not ... you don't have to act it out anymore. Not if you're Jewish. Actually, I think that that story, first the demons come, and first he preaches to them, and that does no good. And then he gives them food, and they all leave except the worst one. Except the worst one stays, right. That's right. And then finally, he opens his mouth, and he says, he invites the worst one in. In. Yes. Thank you. Yeah. I couldn't resist it. Yeah, it is. It is. So, that's probably enough to think about. And we will begin next week with the very Buddhist-Jewish chapter, The Consolations of the

[89:36]

We have two more weeks? This is the second week. Two more weeks, right. Well, actually, we're going to end. I'm not going to talk about, I think, the chapters after nine. That's what I think now. But we'll see. So, yeah, we'll read the Consolation of the Invalid and the Inconceivable Liberation. And then the last week, I don't know if we'll, you should read the Goddess, I did talk about it in a lecture, and it's a wonderful chapter, about the family of the Tatagatas is also very We probably will skip the goddess chapter with just a little reference to it.

[90:56]

So if people can, again, let what we've talked about sink in and do some homework, that would be very nice. And let's end with the chant. Beings are numberless.

[91:21]

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