We've never had the room configured like this. Can you hear me back there? Can you hear the only real voice? Obviously, it's wonderful that you're all here. It makes me happy. To... appreciate this new Zendo and this Quellenweg Johanneshof Sangha practice center we made in recent years and this Johanneshof Quellenweg this practice center that we built in the past years in 20 years particularly the last 4 or 5 years And although I would call this a monastically inspired Sangha practice center, it's primarily a Sangha practice center.

[01:04]

open to whoever wants to come and practice here whether you're ordained or not ordained or age or etc. The assumption of a center like this is that practicing together is probably more powerful and effective individually and societally than just individual practice. And practice in the West is going to be and is already primarily a lay practice.

[02:27]

Perhaps a lay adept practice for those of us who make practice our commitment. So anyway, this place exists so that we can share practice with our friends and with our society. The basic vision of societal and individual vision of Buddhist practice the fundamental vision, the social and individual vision of the Buddhist practice is that we live in a world, a human world, in which it's possible for transformation and awakening to occur.

[04:02]

After all, the Buddha story starts with this historical person who realizes enlightenment. And in this case enlightenment means not just some particular experience but to live in the feel that this is a potential for all of us. That this transformation is possible to various degrees. and is a concept and feeling that makes the teachings work.

[05:17]

So the first is to live within the feeling that the potential of enlightenment is real. Und das erste dann ist, in einem Gefühl zu leben, dass das Potenzial für Erleuchtung etwas echtes ist, dass das wirklich gibt. It's not about worrying if this is the prize at the end of the rainbow. Und dabei geht es nicht so, als würde man sich Gedanken darüber machen, als ob der Topf Gold am Ende des Regenbogens wäre. So the second dynamic of Buddhist practice and teachings, is that it's actually possible to be free of mental and emotional suffering.

[06:23]

Now, what that means and how you develop the craft of practice and wisdom so that this becomes more and more obvious and possible is a view and teaching that makes the teachings work. Das ist eine Sichtweise und eine Lehre, die dafür sorgt, dass die Lehren wirken, dass sie funktionieren. If you don't think this is possible, have the concept that this is possible, then the teachings won't root into you or effectively work in you to make this more and more likely and finally possible.

[07:24]

Wenn du nicht glaubst, dass das möglich ist, wenn du nicht das Konzept hast, dass es wirklich möglich ist, dann können die Lehren nicht ihre Wurzeln in dir fassen und auf eine Art und Weise in dir wirken, dass sie dich grundlegend verändern können. And third, that it's possible to live in a way that's beneficent to all sentience and our insentient world as well. There's a compassion and confidence if you feel that somehow it is possible to live in a way that's beneficial to us and to the planet. This can become a dynamic of our attitudes and actions.

[08:26]

And it also makes our own practice reach more deeply into us. And the fourth is to live in accord with how things actually exist. It's possible to live in an evidential world. Es ist möglich, in einer Welt der Tatsachen zu leben. If I have a glass here of water, and I can pour it into the other glass, gravity makes it happen.

[09:31]

And my body knows that. I don't have to tell my body to do that. It just aims at the glass. I'd have to be awfully sleepy to miss. So that's really to be in accord with how things actually exist. Gravity is an example of that. Now, as you know, and anybody who's practiced knows, anybody who's thought about it knows, that consciousness' job is to make the world predictable.

[10:34]

And it is relatively predictable, but not fundamentally. The main teaching of Buddhism, of Zen, is interdependence. And that's inter-independence, that's inter-emergence, that's inter-actional relations and so forth. And it's possible with this understanding, this wisdom, that the interactional interdependence of everything is you know it as well as you know gravity and the teachings we hope that pervade this center

[11:56]

and pervade the dynamics and forms of our practice, is to locate us in the engaged interactional immediacy. Excuse me for sounding, I don't know what, but like that. It begins with, as most of you know, really noticing that we see things as predictable entities and not as activities. So part of one emphasis, a big emphasis in Zen practice is to just develop the view in everything you do that everything is an activity and not predictable entity.

[13:31]

The predictable the predictable entity Entityness of the world is one truth, a practical truth. But the fundamental truth is to really get to know that everything is impermanent. And a field of interdependent activity. And this sounds, at first it's just words, but it can become embodied through practice.

[14:57]

So we could call this the hall of inter-independence. While Lenny and Matthew have tried to build a building a room in which we can practice some predictability of interdependence. So implicitly by establishing this center and by building this sendo, Implizit, indem wir dieses Zentrum etabliert haben und diesen Sendo gebaut haben, Implizit nehmen wir damit an, dass dieser Sangha überdauern wird.

[16:00]

Wir haben bereits eine zeitgenössische Sangha entwickelt. And now, implicitly, we we've decided as a Sangha that we're also building, developing a generational Sangha. As long as, at least as old as those trees are in the Zenda. Zumindest muss sie so alt werden, wie die Bäume alt geworden sind, die in den Sendl eingebaut wurden. Well, we're already in our, whose practice is here, a multi-generational Sangha of ages up to mine, if not many older than me.

[17:01]

Basically, our practice works through the dynamic and alchemy of commitment. And that's the main dynamic which makes practice work. So the challenge for a lay practitioner who has a lay life and family and obligations Can your commitment to these four, the potential enlightenment, the freedom from mental suffering, to live in a way that's beneficial to the world and in accord with how things exist,

[18:12]

And by the way, any... Yeah. And by the way... Oh, I'm sorry. And... um, This individual commitment to this practice as a layperson needs to be equivalent to or a powerful relationship to all your commitments.

[19:47]

And ideally becomes the feel of these four become a part of all your actions. And By the way, again, any teaching that meets these four criteria is a Buddhist teaching, even if it never existed before or isn't in any Buddhist sutra, etc. Asanga is rooted in this first commitment of each person to their individual practice. And Sangha is also rooted in a commitment to practice with others.

[21:04]

And the third commitment is to how to create a practice that can last not just as a contemporary Sangha, but can last through generations. So I think implicitly we've made this decision. And are making these three commitments. And now with this new Zendo and today and tomorrow we can think about how to make these commitments explicit. And so from now on, the development and evolvement of this Sangha is going to be up to you.

[22:19]

The tradition has brought us to this point. But the way in which Western Zen practice is already a lay practice is a game changer. Das verändert den Namen des Spiels komplett. It's a watershed in the way the conception of Buddhism is and practice is going to develop in the future. A watershed is a big change.

[23:20]

Das ist eine riesige Veränderung in der Art und Weise wie der Buddhismus im Westen gefasst werden kann. So I'm half retiring and letting you do everything from now on. But I'll stay around to help. Thank you very much.

[23:44]

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