I vow to face the truth and not to talk just words. Good morning. Good morning. I just wanted to say that if you, if you have a, if you left a backpack on the porch, I would go and get it. It's okay to leave your shoes out there, although sometimes, it's been long, They've been known to disappear, but backpacks, you shouldn't leave out there. Okay, so we have the one backpack. There's not much of value in it, I think. There's not much of value in it, of course not. Well today, I want to talk about my good friend and teacher, Maezumi Roshi, who

[01:24]

My good friend and teacher, Maezumi Roshi, who died, I think it was the 12th of May in Japan. I haven't had a chance to talk about this since that time. So today I want to say something. And I don't want to talk about the history of Zen in America, but I'd want to give a little background. In the past, there were Zen teachers that came to America, but Zen wasn't really established in America until, well, Nyogen Sensaki was maybe the first prominent Zen teacher to come to America.

[02:38]

And he lived in San Francisco and Washington, the coast. And he went to the East Coast also, but he was a kind of pioneer. And he used to go to the public library in San Francisco and read and Golden Gate Park and all the familiar places. This was before the Second World War. And he had what he called a floating zendo. He would rent a place, a storefront, and invite people to come. And they would sit in chairs. I don't think he ever had people sitting across like that. He was very gentle with Americans and encouraged lay practice. And he was a very fine teacher.

[03:39]

And he was here for a long time. He was the Dharma brother of Soenroshi, who was a very wonderful teacher. Soenroshi And he would bow to each other across the ocean on New Year's at a certain time. He was a very sincere teacher. And another teacher was Sokeon Sasaki, who settled in New York in the first Zen Institute. developed around him as a teacher. And he was the husband of Ruth Fuller Sasaki, who became a Zen priest, actually. But I don't want to talk about too much history.

[04:41]

I don't want to get into it too deeply. But the First Zen Institute is still going. And then, after the war, In the early 60s, Suzuki Roshi came to America and developed Zen Center. And Edo Roshi came to New York and started the Zen Study Society. And Sasaki Roshi came to Los Angeles, started the Cimarron Zen Center and Mount Baldy. And Maezumi Roshi came in the early 60s as a young man and developed the Los Angeles Zen Center. And these were the main Japanese teachers in America.

[05:44]

But the last group, really got Zen going in America. And this was in the early 60s. So when Maezumi Roshi came, I met him in 1970, 1967 or 68 at Tassajara. And I don't think he had started, he was just beginning to start the LA Zen Center at that time. And He was very successful, very successful. He was very intelligent, and he had very good students, and he knew how to develop his students. And just around in the early 80s, in Los Angeles, they had a block, almost a whole block, city block,

[06:55]

that belonged to the center. There was only maybe one or two houses left to go on the whole block, and the center of the block was like their grounds. You know, they just took away all the fences, and I often thought how wonderful that would be, you know. I remember when I was living on, when we had the Zendo on Dwight Way, how nice it would be if all the Zen students had the houses, and just took away all the fences in the block, and had a park. That never happened, but it did happen in Los Angeles. Up until a time when they had a kind of crisis and Maezumi Roshi started to have affairs with the students and then it blew up. This was just after Begaroshi's big crisis at Zen Center, which was a significant problem.

[08:07]

And so then it put a big damper on the center in Los Angeles, and they started losing their property, and people left, and it became much smaller. I remember him coming to me and I was consoling him. He and I were very good friends, actually. He always helped me. After Suzuki Roshi died in 1971, I was kind of isolated, in a way. I had big problems with San Francisco Zen Center, of which I'm now the abbot. But at that time it was very difficult and he was always a very good friend to me and always encouraged me and validated me and that was a big help to me.

[09:16]

So I always did my best to help him. And so I said to him, I think my advice to him was don't make any excuses. Don't try to justify what you've done and don't try to rationalize it or escape from it, but just acknowledge and repent, which he did. And because he was so sincere, the students gave him another chance. And he continued his habit and continued to develop himself. Not that he never made any other mistakes, but as all human beings do, he did. That was a big turning point for him.

[10:24]

He was going so strong, and the center was going so well, and it looked like there was no hindrance in sight. And then suddenly, boom. And the same thing happened to Zen Center San Francisco about the same time. As Maezumi Roshi developed, he had some very good students. Joko Beck was one of his Dharma successors, and Tetsugen Glassman in New York, and Dai Dolori in New York. and Chozen, many good Dharma successors who are independent and have been developing their own centers and finding their own way, each in a different way. So, Mayasumi Roshi made a really great contribution to Zen in America and had many difficulties himself, personally.

[11:41]

Although he recovered and the Zen Center recovered from his problems, it was a slow progress. And in the last couple of years, I felt that he was becoming more and more, more mellow and more settled. And there was a time when he was kind of pushy, you know, a little bit arrogant, a little bit pushy, but that kind of faded away. And he always wanted to have a connection with the Soto school, Soto Zen school in Japan. Suzuki Roshi kind of gave up on it, but he was always connected and he wanted One of his goals was to have the Soto School in Japan recognize the American students on the same level as their Japanese teachers.

[12:55]

And just before he died, they did that. We think. You never know for sure. But that's our understanding. And so he said, we had this session with our Japanese counterparts at Green Gulch just a month ago. And at the end of which he said, I feel like my work has been accomplished in America. And then he went to Japan and suddenly died. So I don't know, a heart attack or stroke or something. He seemed to be in pretty good health. He was the same age as me, maybe a year younger.

[13:57]

And we would talk about our health, you know, and he told me he was in good shape. Little back problems. You just never know. Suddenly you're walking with somebody and then you turn around and they're not there. So, big surprise. So, the legacy of our Japanese teachers is very important, I feel. I myself had six or seven Japanese teachers And when I was studying with Suzuki Roshi, Suzuki Roshi was always happy to invite other teachers from Japan to Zen Center. And so I learned something from every one of them.

[14:59]

And there was Suzuki Roshi himself, and Katagiri Roshi, who was Katagiri Sensei at the time, And Suzuki Roshi and Katagiri, Katagiri Roshi came to Zen Center by the same time I did, just a little before that. And he came to help Suzuki Roshi establish his teaching. And he was more like a student at the time. And so he was an example of the student, and Suzuki Roshi was an example of the teacher. and they were on stage for us. As a matter of fact, the altar at Sokoji in San Francisco on Bush Street was very long, you know, and all of the bells and the mikugyo and the teacher sat there and kind of Giriyoshi sat there and so the altar took up a lot of space and it was raised and so it was like a stage.

[16:05]

And Suzuki Roshi would lecture from there, and Kadogiri Roshi would sit zazen while he lectured. And at that time, in the early 60s, 1964, it was a fairly small group, and nobody had much experience in sitting. We didn't have the precedent that people have today. You know, you come into the zendo and you see all these people sitting zazen real well, and so you do it too. But in those days, not so many people could sit zazen, so Kadagiri Roshi was like this model. While Suzuki Roshi would lecture, Kadagiri Roshi would sit there and not move. We were all so impressed. And Kadagiri Roshi would do the service, you know, to Mikugyo and the bells. He did the whole thing, and Bidokogyo as well. long time and little by little they let us do some the bells but only after a long time so we would watch how they interacted how a teacher and the student interacted and they set up this either consciously or unconsciously or both model system and we observed and participated

[17:38]

And then Yoshimura sensei came for a year, and he was another kind of model. Very wonderful, kind person. And then Chino sensei came, and he was a different kind of a priest. You know, each one of these priests participated in the same kind of practice, but each one was different. And each one had a different way and a different style. And so we could observe the various styles and ways that these people practiced. And it was very informative for us. And then Tatsagami Roshi was invited to Tassajara, to set up the monastic practice. Even though we had Tassajara since 1967, it wasn't until 1970 that we set up the practice at Tassajara the way it is today, the formal practice.

[18:53]

And that was a whole other way of practicing that we didn't know about. So there are many teachers. I think the thing about having those teachers is that their sincerity and their understanding was so strong that it sustained a practice. And sometimes people say, they'll come to this answer and say, well, how come we have all this formality and we have priests and we have robes and, you know. It's very important to have something very strongly established and to have individuals who are devoted to the practice in a way that is unshakable.

[20:03]

If that doesn't happen, then it may look like the practice is going, but as soon as the big wind comes, everything gets blown away. And we've had some big winds, but I think there are bigger winds to come. And we think this is something that's going on, it'll always go, it'll always be like this, but it won't always be like this. And what sustains the practice is those people who are completely devoted and sincere, and they have some role in making the practice work, no matter what happens. And these teachers had that kind of sincerity. And I think this is Suzuki Hiroshi's main teaching. Not all teachers are like that.

[21:05]

I think Suzuki Hiroshi really stands out among all the teachers. He never got into any trouble. And, you know, he used to talk about how Women were always trying to seduce him. And he finally had to bring his wife over. And it was very hard for him because, you know, he liked being seduced. I mean, you know. I mean, this is not something against women. I'm not saying that women should try to seduce men and men don't try. Men and women try to seduce each other. We're all equal. But this was a problem for him, even though he was an old man. Now that I look back on it, he wasn't so old.

[22:19]

But he withstood, you know, all that temptation. and very clean and very devoted. The main thing about his teaching was devotion and not allowing yourself to get blown away by anything. And Maizumi Roshi, although he had problems and allowed himself to succumb to his desires, The main thing about him was that the most important thing was the Dharma. The most important thing to him. And so, no matter what happened, he was always there with teaching and practice. And he also had a little drinking problem. In Japan, most of the men drink. I don't know about the women, but

[23:20]

They drink on the side. But the men drink together, you know. And it's just the thing that you do. And the priests, you know, are part of the party. And not everyone, but... And it's hard to... When everybody's having this kind of camaraderie, it's hard to stay out of it. Hard to be aloof. And so there's a drinking problem in Japan. And there's some denial about it as well. Because I think a lot of Japanese men are alcoholics without knowing it. And Maezumi Roshi was part of that. And he, when he, no matter how much he would drink, he'd always be up in the morning. No matter how late he went to bed, he'd always be up in the morning in his endo. And when he had this crisis, he went to a detox center for six weeks or something like that and got cleaned up, which was pretty good to be able to have that kind of humility.

[24:36]

given his position and how he was falling. So he made a big effort to save himself and he did it. So little by little we're losing our original Japanese teachers. And, you know, Suzuki Roshi died in 1971, and Zen Center has been on its own since then. And we're into third generation disciples already. And so Zen Center is kind of a leader in establishing our own practice in America. And of course, Maezumi Roshi's disciples have already been out on their own for a long time, most of them.

[25:50]

But losing Maezumi Roshi will change, I think, the Los Angeles Zen Center. And I just hope that our teachers in America will have the same sincerity and the same dedication from one generation to another as these teachers have. Otherwise, it won't make it. So I think that was, when I say Suzuki Roshi's main quality, I understand it very well. And that ability to stand up in the face of, to continue no matter what's happening, is our enlightened practice.

[27:03]

People say, well, what is enlightenment? Where is our enlightened practice? That's where it is. the ability to stay with, to see this, what you're doing through completely, no matter what's happening. So there was a funeral service in Japan on the 20th. And there will be, I think from now until the 2nd of July, there's some kind of service that's going on in Los Angeles. And then there will be a big memorial service at some later date.

[28:06]

I don't know exactly when that is. But I haven't spoken to any of my Zumi Roshi disciples since since this has been going on, so I'll find out about that later. But anyway, is there anything, do you have any questions? Yes? Can I share a small story? I have an experience with my son, Hiroshi. Yes. It's small, but it actually affected my whole life in many ways. It's a few weeks back. I was an academic student at Temple Sahara. It was about 82. And I had super-groshi and mega-groshi. A few teachers had come to Tosahara, which was a big, major event. And I had been singing zazen and was feeling great anguish in my heart, and I cried. But I cried without making a sound, but I just wept.

[29:07]

So when the period was over, I walked off into some trees, and I wept. But all of a sudden, I felt this incredible stare behind me, and I was almost scared. I turned and looked, and Mark Zubergrosch was about maybe 30 feet away. And he wanted to know that I saw him. And then he quickly disappeared like the wind. He was just like a little fairy or something. He just, boom, gone. So we went to, a couple hours later, we were in the woods. The door slung open and I said to her, she ran in, sat down, stunned everybody, no one was prepared, so we're all shocked. And there was also this weird thing, there's this weird thing you just kind of make up in practice places, but there was this feeling that if you watched a teacher eat, you'd die.

[30:13]

There was this feeling that you didn't stare at people, you just kept quiet. said, is there any dishonor in the Zen master dropping his chopstick? I said, no sir. And then he said, and there's no dishonor in a young student's tears.

[31:16]

And he turned around and he walked away. I was all right and gave me permission to keep crying. So I will always have a very precious place in my heart. Thank you for being here. Thank you. You said that there are greater ones to come. Can you elaborate on that? Something will come. I don't know what, though.

[32:23]

It just seems fitting that you talk about your friend on Memorial Day weekend. I want to say thank you. I love it when you tell your stories. Do you have a picture of Aung San Suu Kyi? Do I have a picture? Yeah. I mean, there are pictures. Sangha addresses the problems here, because I came from a tradition where similar things happened, and there was a lot of covering up and secrecy, and it destroyed the Sangha, in my opinion.

[33:24]

And I really appreciate coming where human frailty is acknowledged, and we just keep on practicing. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah, that's important. Thanks. Did Aizumi Roshi ever visit here? Well, he did visit here, but I don't think he ever gave a talk here. He liked coming here and offering incense. I think he wanted to have more relationship between Los Angeles and San Francisco, you know, and Baker Roshi was always very, you know, in those days, In the early days, the sanghas, as they grew up, were very exclusive because each teacher had students and they didn't want the students to go shopping around, you know, stay here and just practice here. And all the sanghas were like that.

[34:26]

And then in the 80s, people started going back and forth a little bit, you know. And I remember his two students, Tetsugen and Genpo, were great buddies, came to San Francisco Zen Center with a bottle of champagne. And they were not well received. But that's when I got to know them. And that was kind of the opening, you know, for getting to know them. But there was never much interaction. And I think that disappointed Maizumi Roshi a lot, because he really liked San Francisco Zen Center a lot, you know, and he liked the students, and he was always promoting everybody, you know. And there was never any feeling of, our center's better than yours, or something like that from him, you know. He was always upholding San Francisco.

[35:32]

I always liked that about him. And he also wanted to exchange students, which never happened. But, you know, it's just something about when sagas are doing the same thing. That closeness, there's this kind of barrier in the closeness, you know, because you feel if you start mixing too much then your uniqueness will be watered down or something, or dissolved into one thing. And people don't want that. Everybody feels this is our place, this is our way, even though it It's like your way, it's not the same, you know. So there's something about preserving your individual thing. And so it's very hard for songs that are that close to merge in some way.

[36:40]

But it's not impossible. And I really like my Zumi Roshi students a lot. And I think the students can do that more easily than when the main teacher is there. And there's actually more interaction now between his Dharma heirs and Zen centers. So I think there will be more interaction in the future. Do you know who's going to take over? No, I don't. I have no way I have no idea. I mean, I have some idea, but I don't want to speculate. No, they haven't decided yet. I don't know. I'm sure that they're all in Japan, you know. Something must have come out of, you know, their getting together in Japan, but I have no idea what it is.

[37:44]

Oh, yes. They just came to show us. I'm a little perplexed about something.

[38:57]

It seems like we speak about affairs in this context in a way that is a little upsetting to me. Because it feels like this kind of blanket over over something that's very specific, but I don't... I can see why it could cause incredible problems and difficulties. But I think there's a way that we speak about it that says, oh, having affairs is bad, you know, and makes me uncomfortable. Well, having affairs with teachers is bad. Why? Because the relationship the person has with the teacher has to be... cannot have any self-interest in it. You cannot have self-interest in your student. You cannot want something from your student if you're a teacher. And it's the same in psychiatry, in therapy.

[40:04]

It's exactly the same thing. There's a certain separation that's necessary in order to play ball. If the gap is closed, you can't do that. So there's a certain impersonality that has to exist. And when that's not there, you know, it just becomes a messy As you were speaking about Mayazumi Roshi, and I appreciate the sense that you've given me, I started to think back to the morning service where we talk about, we list Daiyusho, and that those names started to, I started to have a sense that those people that we acknowledge had a sincere practice that allowed

[41:11]

us to be here today in this group. Yes. That's right. And that Mayuzumi Roshi's name will be added, I imagine, at some point or in some way to that list. I don't know. How does that work? It will be in his sangha, where Suzuki Roshi's name is added in our sangha. But I have to say that in their service, they include Suzuki Roshi. So, I have to think about that. Mayazemi Roshi always had a very generous feeling about people, and the way that he He was very concerned about people's families and he was very concerned about honoring teachers in a way that our tradition didn't develop.

[42:32]

So that's something to think about. When I used to go to Los Angeles, it was such a different feeling. Of course, Los Angeles is different than San Francisco, right? We're the cool ones in the North, and they're the loose ones in the South. It's true. And the South is like that. The North is like this. And when I'd go there, it'd be such a different feeling because everybody was so loose and friendly, you know? And when people come to the North, everybody's a little loose and uptight and so forth. So it's always wonderful to go there. It's kind of a great relief. I think that helped me, actually, in developing here a looser feeling, a more friendly feeling. I think that influenced Crepe North.

[43:40]

We are numberless.

[43:51]

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