So how was your discussion? Who'd like to show me some of your discussion? Okay, please. We were the English speaking group, so I started in English. It was a very interesting discussion. If you can, I'd prefer you speak in German first. Okay. That was a very interesting discussion that we had. And, as everyone said, what... No, no. Okay. That means, from the beginning of the experience, how you came to Dhamma, and from that experience you have this feeling of responsibility,

[01:16]

the responsibility to continue this path or what you felt, to continue working on it and to continue this path. For the others, for many from the group, it was also closely related to the topic of family. That means to take care of your own family and above all, the love that you give your family, your children, the love as one of the most important tasks. Good. And we also had interesting I would like to ask an interesting question. What is the responsibility in the world? What is the world? What does the world mean to you?

[02:29]

How do you define this world? And accordingly, can the concept of responsibility change or be interpreted in different ways? Someone has also said that for him this feeling of responsibility is above all that one takes the world as it is, that is, how the world presents itself, that is, on the conditions that the world sets for him and not to set any own conditions or that one tries to add something to it. Well, I think it's essential. Yes, exactly. And that was also an interesting question, this word, responsibility, the answer. Many people understand that with a negative touch.

[03:39]

What do you have or define the responsibility as? Above all, the responsibility for the mistakes that one has made. And that's why you have to get rid of such terminology or deal with the term responsibility. Why don't you add later and you start in not in Russian, please, English. Okay. So it was a very interesting discussion and like... Everyone shared his opinion about the word responsibility in the world. He also discussed a little bit about the definition of the word responsibility, but also about the definition of the word

[04:51]

How do you define the world? And accordingly you can define the responsibility in a different way. Especially because for many of us the word responsibility has a kind of negative touch. In German or in English or both? Both. Also in English. In Russian too? in terms of responsibility for the mistakes you did in that sense in this sense right And for some of us the answer to this question was to continue the way starting from this event of starting from what happened that one realized or got a glimpse of Dharma.

[05:57]

So basically starting from this point than just to continue to do this way, to get as far as possible on this way. For others, the word responsibility or the answer was to take care about their family, especially to give love to the family and especially the kids. For another answer was also, what does it mean? It means to accept the world on its terms, not to add something from yourself or not to try to define the terms by yourself. Yeah, so this was... Okay.

[06:58]

Thanks. In our group we also talked about the term. and it came up in a similar way that responsibility for most of us meant something that is brought to you from the outside that is like a burden as if we had to fulfill certain standards and then that's what we call responsibility And also that it has to do with a decision you make or determination whether you want to take on responsibility or not.

[08:01]

And then we also looked at the word responsibility or, yes, it's the same, Verantwortung also has the part response in it in both languages. To respond, yes. So that it is somehow related to this word response. In this sense there is also the possibility to understand this term as its own activity. to seek an answer or a response. And then it's not so much something that's brought to you from the outside that you're burdened with but something that we do. that it then loses the aspect that it has nothing to do with us or can be perceived as a burden.

[09:25]

And that then it loses this aspect of having nothing to do with us. And that we are burdened with it. And through that we can also understand what responsibility really is by experiencing it. And in the discussion one aspect that was added to that was also that the connection to other people becomes important and that through that maybe we can understand better what their responsibility is. and next to many other examples someone brought up the example of suicidal persons and the connection between the therapist and the patient

[10:38]

And the responsibility that goes along with that, who is responsible for somebody who kills himself. And I remembered at that point the example that Roshi once brought, or this description that Roshi once brought, This example that you once brought up, Roshi? About the Chinese mentality on suicide? Also the view to the future, that you actually don't help a person who wants to end his life until the last moment. That also has to do with looking into the future that with someone who wants to kill himself that until the very last moment you don't interfere with it in this Chinese mentality.

[12:01]

So that the person until the very last moment has the possibility to decide for him or herself to decide to live. And with this example, the aspect of trust also came in. And that responsibility, as we often understand it, also has a lot to do with a sense of security. And in what extent are we ready to give up this security? And to what extent are we willing to let go of that seeking security? Thank you. Yes. I was in the same group, so I'll add one more aspect that I noticed.

[13:06]

I was in the same group, so I'd like to add one aspect. In my experience, I feel a pretty strong separation, as David already implied, between what is being applied to me as a responsibility from society or from my parents and my actually felt responsibility. which is that I experience a sharp difference or a sharp almost conflict between what is brought to me as what I'm supposed to do or my responsibility and that which I really feel is my responsibility. And that where I feel that I have a responsibility, I don't really look for it, but I suddenly have it and I can Ich kann die bemerken oder ich kann die nicht bemerken, aber ich merke das nicht bemerken. and that which I feel being my responsibility I don't think I'm choosing that but somehow there's this through a connection or through a situation I feel something well this is my responsibility now and it just comes to me and then I can notice it or I cannot notice it but really once I notice it I don't really feel that I have a choice about it anymore

[14:40]

And where the term responsibility is very alive for me lately, is when I notice that someone trusts me. That this is an automatically felt inner responsibility for the situation or for this aspect of someone he trusts me with. And where I... You understood that already? Where I feel responsibility and where the word becomes very alive for me recently is when I feel somebody trusting me. When I feel in this situation somebody is trusting me with something and then I can't help it but I feel responsibility for that. And it somehow comes out of a connection and I feel responsibility for the situation or for that aspect that the person is giving to me. Sorry, one more sentence.

[15:45]

That it has more an aspect of taking care of something than that it's a burden. Yes, thank you. I would like to add one aspect from our group and maybe others can then out of our group add to that. We also talked about the word responsibility and as we've also said there's the part response but I think it's not just response but also to answer in it. This very simple question, how do I answer, and do I answer at all, and am I able to answer?

[17:08]

That was just one of the aspects from our book. Thank you. Yes? Yes. I was in the same group with Atma. And now I can only speak for myself, but basically I feel responsible for everything that I encounter. But in the end it's impossible to also respond or answer to that. Because decisions have to be made all the time. Decisions, what is to be answered to and what I just leave to the side, default.

[18:11]

And somehow I feel this differentiation, for myself at least, of what I call responsibility and what I call, which is a little bit harsher somehow, obligation. Because if I've become familiar or intimate with a group or a situation or a person so that somebody can rely on me, then making the decision of whether to answer to that or taking care of that, that's something different then. And since all of this is so complex, it became very clear to me that taking responsibility or answering is always a momentary decision.

[19:31]

that in taking on responsibility or in responding or answering, there is always this moment of decision. And the similar situation could, under particular circumstances, look very different today than from what it looks like tomorrow. And it seems to me to be very important what are the main lines or main forces in the background mind. Like, for example, obligations that you have taken over in a way, or in a stronger sense something else now, the vows that you've taken.

[20:56]

So that this is something like a compass which points into a direction? Even though it might not always be possible to decide entirely for that direction as you might want to or wish to. But that through that there's always a tendency into a particular direction. I don't think so. That's all I can say to that. Okay. Yes? I'm trying to get this together because a few wonderful things were said. The responsibility for yourself feels good. I thought that

[22:06]

Sometimes if you pay attention to the Dharma then you may get into conflict with everyday life. That was one of the aspects that appeared. And the answers that came for that were that you didn't fall into the life that you're living now, but that you chose it. And that if you become aware of the fact that you've made this decision, that then you like to live the way that you're living. and that then the Dharma is part of that and that you always have your Zen monastery with you. You doing sex?

[23:38]

Oh, you want to help? Yeah, I don't know. Can you say it again? About the sex? OK. We need six pillars from you. Six paramitas. Six paramitas. That in daily life is to practice that every morning and after to practice the six paramitas outside of the dojo. Sounds good. But you said them and you said them in a really good way for everybody. I thought that would be useful. I said generosity, forgive. Patience. I didn't pick up so much. Little amount of discipline. Some amount of concentration. and I forgot the energy at the last moment I forgot the energy which to continue day after day with the backsliding and the wisdom also to do what we have to do our best without expecting of being attached to the reserves

[24:53]

Why is the French accent the best one? Why is the French accent the best one? I'm just sick to meditate. You make a good team here. Yes, Suzanne? David summarized everything very well, but I would like to add something from myself. I realized early this morning that there have been many things in my life, also in relation to what we discussed yesterday, which have appeared in our lives.

[26:12]

I realized this morning and was struck by it that we have already talked about many things. That this morning during the lecture many things appeared in what you said. and that related to my life and so that I'm very struck by the fact that all these things have already happened in my life and that I didn't pay attention to them. And when the question was about responsibility, I came up with the idea that maybe I could start taking responsibility for myself.

[27:30]

Yeah. In Ottmar's group we had a lot of topics that have already been talked about but we had this particular topic which is whether to be a vegetarian and then how to deal with it. And then there were experiences from different people, how to deal with animals yourself and what kind of relationship, what kind of relationship you have with animals. And that some of us have very intense relationships with animals, like, for example, with birds, so not only roosters and cats, where the relationships are anyway tight, but also with other animals. And that out of this feeling that these animals are personalities, a different relationship is built about the feeling whether you buy a piece of meat or a piece of wing in the supermarket.

[28:59]

And a lot of people talked about their experiences with animals and we talked about the connection people have with animals and the relationship to animals. And not just about the relationship to a dog and a cat where it's quite clear that there is an intimate relationship, but also to birds and other animals. And that if you feel that an animal has a particular personality, then it's a very different thing to be in a supermarket and buy a piece of meat or poultry, is that the word? Poultry, yeah. Poultry, yeah. And, for example, when you see trotters in the supermarket, there have been several films that have shown how these poor animals are tortured when they are pulled up. And that it is something that grows in you and that can make the decision easier from time to time, if you have an appetite for a piece of meat, to say no. Is trotter turkey?

[30:07]

And particularly we talked about turkeys also, because there have been all these films about how turkeys are treated and how they're mistreated actually, and that then when you really have an appetite for a piece of meat, if you are aware of these films and the treatment of these animals, that then that may really alleviate your decision in the sense that you say, no, I don't want to have meat. Then we also had the topic that it is also a topic for many people, for some of us, to have the feeling that one takes too little responsibility and that one puts pressure on oneself and thinks, you actually have to do more, You can actually do this and that, so then the example came up of you, as you say, how this iron rod went down, so that you actually wished that you could make such hard or such clear, clear decisions and that it makes such a pressure.

[31:24]

And then we also talked about the fact that many of us feel that we don't take on enough responsibility, that there's the sense where you know how to do all these things and you're capable of doing this and that and then you don't do it. We talked about your example of the iron wall that came down and how we wished that for some of us as well, that there had been the ability or well-know that we had made such a strong decision in this way, or a clear decision also. And the conversation was also about learning to give yourself more space and to let things develop and mature, because under pressure nothing can happen anyway that is fruitful. And for us it came up that you have to give yourself some space then and allow things to mature and to ripen because under pressure there's no way that anything can develop at all.

[32:37]

And that you then just say, I'm doing my best and that that can be a very important phrase. Thank you. Someone back there? Yeah. Yeah, go ahead. We had a very diverse discussion, I think, because we understood the word responsibility in different contexts. We had a discussion with many levels and many hues because we understood colors, because we understood the word responsibility from so very different perspectives. Assuming that the outside world does not exist, then it leads to us having responsibility for our perception.

[33:45]

Given that the world out there doesn't exist but just in our perception then that leads to us having responsibility for our perception. And then there is this perception of the present, past and future. But then there's also this perception of past, present and future. And then in relation to perception that adds a very different kind of language to it because then you have to speak about what you should do and what you must do or something. And it was also difficult to figure out from what stance or point of view we were talking from. Someone gave a good example.

[35:01]

Yes, that goes too far. But it was also about that someone as a boy already had these three parts. There he was with his perception, there was an object, There was this example of someone having already as a child these three parts of, well, there's the child, and then there is his or her perception, and then there is the object, and that between these things some dynamic, something was happening. And how from that process this person developed a responsibility out of the process for himself. Manuela, not Manuel, Manuela, Thank you.

[36:19]

What became so clear to me, and I was also in Atma's group, is that this opens up a huge space. verantworten oder zu können. That I think we can't really take on responsibility and we can't take on responsibility for. We can't? We can't take on responsibility for. Für den großen Raum. For this huge tremendous space. Es sind so viele Ebenen und Türen und ich glaube, There are so many levels and there are so many doors in it and now I'll limit myself to what I experience on the cushion. in these moments.

[37:50]

And that relates to Katharina also that the perception and the experience that I'm making in these moments but maybe I can transfer to everyday life more and more. But here I have the responsibility and can decide whether I respond to what I perceive and experience. Doesn't that include everything else? Doesn't it include my fellow humans, the other spaces, the other worlds, the other people?

[38:55]

And then the question that I have to ask then is, doesn't that also include everything else, like the other people with their huge spaces, when I start with myself? Because when doors open, when you encounter Manuel's world with my world, when an exchange takes place, then I can imagine that in a larger context. Because, just for example, if my world and Manuel's world encounter and there are doors that are opening and there is an exchange happening, then I could also imagine that in a much bigger picture.

[40:01]

Yeah. And that's why I ask, if I take the responsibility for myself, for my perception, for my experience, do I also have the responsibility So that's why I'm asking this question. When I take on responsibility for my perception and for my experience, then do I have responsibility or that's, I mean, she said it as a statement, then I have responsibility for everything else. You mean, by taking responsibility for yourself and your immediate situation, are you also taking responsibility for everything else? At that moment? Yeah. Well, that's what the koan says. Because it says you lift up one grain of sand and everything is lifted up. Over here?

[41:02]

Yeah. I would like to take one very simple aspect from our discussion. Our first responsibility in the sense of taking care of is to take care of surviving, staying alive. And in order to stay alive I have to engage in the metabolism with the environment and with the world.

[42:06]

And to me, there's this very clear conclusion with no alternatives, that if I have to take care of myself, then I have to take care of the entire world. I think that in the history of humankind that kind of awareness existed and that at least now it seems to be lost quite thoroughly And how you deal with this taking care of them, I think only everybody can decide that for themselves and within their biographies. Yes. Yes. I also cannot speak for the entire group, but I would like to.

[43:44]

Nor can I. But I would like to point out one aspect that's important to me. the term or the word responsibility changes very quickly for me when I step out of the concept of inner world and outer world. When I just see my relationship with an object or a person as real. then I can take on responsibility at each moment, all the time. I think that this lost responsibility that Peter has alluded to is a consequence of this distinction between inner world and outer world.

[44:46]

Because that immediately brings up the problem for us that we have to do something for the world and we can only be desperate about that. Yeah, I'd like to go on, but maybe I should say something. This koan is a kind of fulcrum, like a seesaw. It's kind of fulcrum. The first three koans are, you know, the teaching and the bodhidharma and prajñatara, etc. And this koan brings you into it. And it tries to present your potential action first of all just in terms of Buddhist history in the biggest sense

[46:13]

And not just related to the kind of big scale of Buddhism. But to emphasize its importance. It says in a scale of world periods, innumerable world periods, what is the most important thing that can happen? Now let me come back to using the idea of a human space. Yeah, so we can, because it gives us an experiential sense, yeah, because it's not usually said, it gives an experiential sense of our circumstances. Circumstance, what stands around us, what is around us.

[47:48]

So there's sentient space. Yeah, we put it in scientific terms, the... fossil record goes back about four billion years. Fossil in English just means what's dug up. So there's a fossil record, so, you know, biochemical, chemo fossils or something like that. Anyway, so there's this sentient space which has developed. And in this sentient space a human space has developed.

[49:07]

So this koan is asking what responsibility do we have within this human space? There couldn't be a bigger question. And It's a question so big and so hard to comprehend or relate to, we avoid it. But how can we comprehend it? In English, comprehend means to take hold of. So this koan is asking us to take hold of it in some way. Okay. Now, as I said, this is a question that is so big or so hard to manage in our own life, we put it aside.

[50:11]

But this koan is saying we can't really put it aside, and in fact we don't. Now, Freud has a famous phrase connected with Freud, the return of the repressed. In other words, what you repressed in the past, jealousy or anger or whatever, comes back in your activity. Oder in anderen Worten, das, was du in der Vergangenheit unterdrückt hast, deine Eifersucht oder deine Wut oder so, dass das zurückdrängt in deine Aktivität hinein. And a quite unusual man named Jacob Taubes.

[51:31]

Und ein sehr außergewöhnlicher Mann mit dem Namen Jacob Taubes. Was a teacher of mine in college. Das war einer meiner Lehrer im College. Yeah, and he was a Gnostic Rabbi philosopher. Gnostic Rabbi philosopher. He was a very unusual man, funny man. But I won't tell you anecdotes about him. But he talked, for him the idea of the apocalypse was extremely important. But of course the apocalypse is not Buddhist teaching. That the world will be destroyed, the righteous will be saved and so forth. But Christianity, more than any Christianity in Judaism, more than any other teaching, brought the end of history into the world.

[52:53]

The end of history into the world. Okay, thank you. It's not an accident that all of the world uses the Western calendar, which starts with a person, Jesus. It's somehow the beginning of history. Okay. Well, Buddhism, this whole sense of world history, Periods is history, the world as history. And if the world is a story, stories have beginnings and ends. So what you do makes a difference.

[53:57]

I mean, decisions become critical when there's an end to history. And an end to your life. So the story ends, the big story ends, that we're in the midst of, and your life ends. So this koan is asking you to go into that. So, anyway, Taubes speaks about the return of the repressed. And also the return of the mythic he would speak about.

[55:02]

As I said this morning, our thoughts and ideas ride on our language. And it's not only that the repressed returns in our life, but as Thomas would say, the mythic returns in our life. It's very difficult to get free of the mythic underpinnings of our society, of our life. And that's the drama and the power of the second noble truth. And that is the drama and also the power in this second noble truth. And that is the second and the third. That it has a cause. And because it has a cause, it can also have an end. Therefore, there can be a freedom.

[56:04]

And then we have the path, the fourth noble truth, that it starts with perfected views. Right views and completed views. It sounds almost impossible. How do you straighten out your views? So I would say that this koan is not... just about, it's not particularly about the return of the repressed or the return of the mythic, though it's rather about the return of the mythic. It's also, to use Suzuki Yoshi's phrase, it's also about the return of the innermost request. Because what's probably more repressed than abuse or abandonment, etc., is our...

[57:31]

for the world to be the way we want it to be. And that's expressed in the Abhaya Mudra of Dipankara. Fear not. You are safe here. You know, that maybe sounds a little corny. But what do you want to tell your children that they're safe here, they're safe with you? And I saw a bit a while ago on some French comedian who was, no, Scottish comedian. I saw this Scottish comedian a while ago who was beaten a lot by his father.

[58:54]

And he said his escape was either suicide or humor. Yeah, we know what he chose. But he said the worst thing about abuse is not the physical abuse, but the loss of love, the voidness you have. And in that sense, what is abuse? But you're not safe. You know, a few days ago some of you may know that Marriott Hotel in Islamabad was completely blown up.

[59:54]

And, of course, what did people want? The most simple thing they wanted, they wanted to be safe. And, I mean, a level of greed that I can't imagine is this powdered milk stuff in China. They stretched powdered milk, not with milk, but with a poison that gives a high protein reading when you test it. I think so far they only know about four or five babies that have died. But to the extent to which China admits what's going on, at least 60,000 babies are in hospitals.

[61:19]

I don't know how bad the poison is, but potentially a whole generation of babies in China could have brain damage or something like that. And this is greed and stupidity at an unimaginable scale. Of course, the whole world's financial situation is on the edge of collapse because of greed. I talked to a friend's financial advisor in New York the other day who runs a fund for ethical investing. And I said, these people are too smart not to know who run these other, these big, you know, Bear Stearns, Morgan Stanley, et cetera.

[62:41]

are too smart not to know what was going on. So they may, but somehow they may not have known it was really, that the whole thing was rooted in greed. And he said to me very simply, it was greed. Okay, here we have the world financial system collapsing. We have these babies, who knows how many, poisoned out of greed. Yeah, and we live in a system where lots of people aren't safe and don't even have food enough to eat in the world right now.

[63:53]

The majority. Well, we also have, even not faced with that, or even not faced with that, we have the return Of the repressed innermost request. That we want to react to. We want to find some way to respond to it. We want to find a way to respond to it. And I think this koan asks us to go into, what should I say, the dark of our own history. And, you know, we take a word like responsibility. And it carries all kinds of stuff along with it.

[64:57]

Maybe the question should have been not what is our responsibility in the world today, but how do we respond to the world today? Maybe it's better to say responsibility because we have all this accumulated stuff about what we're responsible for, obligations and so forth. I know what I made, the decision I made when David McCain said, you know, if we really knew what we were doing, we'd just practice Buddhism the rest of our lives. I didn't have to make any effort to make that decision. It just happened. It happened out of a lot of circumstances, but it happened. And it gave me tremendous freedom.

[66:24]

I didn't have to think too much about what to do anymore. Just boom, that's it. All that accumulated stuff was gone. So the Buddha's way is endless and I'm following it. And you're following it. And we're following it together. I mean, it's just a few of us, but it's extraordinary. So this koan puts this decision to your safe here. Fear not.

[67:25]

And we should feel that this sanctuary, Yohannesau, we're safe here. And safe with each other. And hopefully we can find a way to feel safe with every person, each person we meet. So the koan puts this question of how do we respond to the world in the context of Buddhism and in the context given importance of eons of world periods but with the sense that these periods have a beginning, middle and end.

[68:39]

And it's of course important that each of these periods a Buddha appears in. Now, is that real? Is there going to be a Buddha? Is Maitreya going to pop out of Yonasov one of these days? You know, he's back in that little room in the back. No, the sense of it is that what's repressed in us, from the point of view of this koan and in fact, is we would like a Buddha to appear. Let's face it, let's be idealistic and unrealistic. Then impractical and silly and people would laugh at us.

[69:49]

But in fact we'd like a Buddha to appear. You don't have to repress that. So we can live so that a Buddha might appear. Suzuki Roshi was always very clear to me and to others that he lived so that a Buddha might appear. This is one person who did that. Just one little guy from a country temple in Japan. Yeah, he was a nice guy and all that stuff. But what made him different?

[70:53]

He actually lived as if a Buddha might appear. And he's actually influenced thousands of people, and us here. So transmission is to live as if a Buddha might appear. To spread your hair in the mud. And this koan, it also has the world-honored one smiled. And that's clearly a reference to what we could call the first koan. That mythologically starts the Zen lineage.

[71:54]

The Buddha held up a flower. And Mahakasyapa gave a slight smile. And the Buddha said, someone, basically he said, someone has inherited the true Dharma eye. Dogen's book, Shobo Genzo, was the true Dharma eye. And one thing I didn't realize just recently is that his fascicle on the three times our mind is really a fascicle parallel to this koan.

[72:57]

And what I haven't noticed until recently is that his essay about the three, we have it for the German title, three states of mind of the time, or three times, in any case, three, please? Say it again. Three worlds are only the same. so it's not that the Buddha is the teaching it's it's the It's the transmission which is the teaching. And the transmission isn't that it's the continuation of the teaching, it's that the transmission itself is the teaching.

[74:01]

It's not that the teaching is transmitted. That's nice. But it's the transmission itself is the teaching. It's not what you learn here it's the activity we're doing right now which is the teaching. Which is not me teaching, it's us teaching. It's us actuating the teaching. Mm-hmm. So this question is put in the context of Buddhist cosmology and the concept of deep time and maybe the deep present

[75:17]

But it's also emphasizing that history is a story in which decisions make a difference. And then how does that decision become our responding? And that we... then this sense of deep time is also our own experience. So it's not just about the importance of this decision in relationship to this human space we are producing. Also geht es nicht nur um die Wichtigkeit dieser Entscheidung in Bezug auf oder in Beziehung zu diesem menschlichen Raum, den wir hervorbringen, sondern es geht darum, wie treten wir in diesen menschlichen Raum ein und werden auf eine Art und Weise Mensch, dass man das Buddha nennen kann.

[76:38]

Well, that's probably enough of a big topic. We can do this. We can do this. We can have these feelings. open ourselves to these feelings and find ways to act on them. And that's the point of this koan. Okay, thank you very much. Since I brought the bell, I hate to see it unused. Let me ring it. Since I brought the bell, I hate to see it unused.

[77:55]

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