I vow to chase the truth that does not justify justice for others. Morning. This morning I was going to talk about a practice period which is coming in next month. But given the events of the last few days, with the heavenly gate But we should talk about this. I think many probably want to. So this is a kind of shocking event for many people. 39 people taking their lives in order to ascend to a higher state. You can't hear me. In order to ascend to a higher state, this is, you know, the combination of religion and fantasy is a deadly cocktail.

[01:16]

If these people did the right thing, then we should all do the same thing. And if they didn't do the right thing, it's a deadly mistake. In the old Buddhist texts, They name, they point out 16 hells. And these hells are really very imaginative. But the hells are not meant to be taken literally. They're just pointing out, if we do certain things, there'll be suffering.

[02:28]

And, of course, the suffering is very exaggerated, but they're meant for self-reflection on these things. But the first one, actually, the first hell is for people who sacrifice their life in order to reach a heavenly realm. And the fires of this hell are 16 times greater than the fires of any other hell. And there's the inside fire and the outside fire, and then there's a third fire. And the third fire is the fire of regret. So this is apparently

[03:30]

the ancient Buddhists had experienced this kind of phenomena before. And very likely it was not uncommon in those days for people to sacrifice their lives in one way or another in order to reach some higher spiritual realm. And It's interesting because people, you know, we're so used to mass executions that it's taken for granted that people always continue killing each other in large numbers.

[04:36]

But for people to kill themselves in large numbers is more unusual. I was thinking we could, when people have wars, instead of killing each other, they could save a lot of grief by just killing himself, each side just killing themselves. But actually, there are many forms of mass suicide. The Battle of Gettysburg was a kind of mass suicide. So this kind of madness actually is part of our human experience. And since one doesn't really know for sure what happens when, after one dies, exactly, it's totally fantasy to

[06:02]

think that you do know, and to base your demise on a fantasy. As long as we're here in this world, we have to do our best to create our life where we are. One of the biggest problems with suicide is its influence on other people. Because suicide means that the life that we have is not worth living. And there's no way to make it, to improve it, or to make it, or to find a meaning in it.

[07:11]

And that's not a good influence for other people. So, when we look to various people as role models, we look to parents as role models, and if a parent commits suicide, then the child says, well, where does that leave me? So, although it's a difficult thing to do, it's an easy way out if you have big problems. So when people experience something like this mass suicide, what kind of model is that for everyone else?

[08:17]

And what kind of model is that for the spiritual side of people? So that's why fantasy is a big problem. especially for spiritual practice. You start believing in UFOs and people calling you. I know people who've been called on the telephone and the person on the other end said, I am from outer space and we've landed and You have been chosen to come with us to Mars or something. People believe it. Come Wednesday at such and such a place and we'll take off.

[09:22]

I know people who have actually had these telephone calls. And I kind of wondered if maybe it wasn't really true. So it's really easy to believe certain things. And if you think about, there's something wonderful, though, I must say, about the acceptance of death. In this whole scenario, there's something wonderful about the easy acceptance of death. because you feel, well, you know, we're really leaving this undeveloped place and going to the true, the real place. And so it's not a problem. This is why religion has always created a kind of, most religions have created a heavenly place so that the transition, you know, the end of your life can be easier.

[10:32]

And you won't feel so much regret at leaving. But it's still fantasy. It's still fantasy. And the problem we have is, how do we live our life in reality, how do we live our life and death in reality without the aid of fantasy, without thinking or relying on a dream state to comfort us? So this is everyone's quest.

[11:43]

Mostly religion and spiritual practice is a combination of spirituality and fantasy. And how do you reduce the fantasy so that you have the pure reality and are able to live with it. How can you say, I don't know? But, and accept that. I don't know what the next step is, but it's okay. How can you let go of life at the right time. How can you let go of this existence at the right time and step off into the unknown without regret?

[12:54]

So religious practice does take some faith, but Faith and fantasy is also a problem. Just faith. Let it go at that. If we realize that we are born into this world and the life of this body-mind continues, continually changing, continually transforming, and trust that transformation. We want to trust something stable, or something that doesn't change. But we must trust the change. We have to trust the transformation.

[14:03]

And on each moment's transformation, accept our life. And totally be one with each moment's transformation. Then we don't have to worry about some future place. Because wherever we are is the right place to be. Whether it's easy or difficult. whether it's pleasant or unpleasant, whether it's so-called right or wrong. Anyway, if you have some... would like to say anything about this or bring up some questions, It seems to me that there is something in

[15:10]

Yeah, dying and rebirth, you know, it's something that happens moment by moment. So we tend to think of our life as one thing and our death as something else. And the period from birth to death is the life of somebody. And this is close to the idea of permanence. That there is a person that's born and after so many years dies. And that's one person. But actually this one person never existed as one person. It just seems like. There is a one personality. It is birth and death from the moment of conception. Each moment we're born into a new self, which is gone the next moment, and appears on the next moment, and is gone the next moment.

[17:12]

So this birth and death are continually, they're both alternating and happening at the same time. is a moment of death. A moment of death is a moment of arising. And you can study that by following your breath. A moment of inhaling is inspiration. And a moment of exhaling is expiration. So we're born on the inhalation and we die on the exhalation. So, birth and death are continually going on. They're going on on a minutest level and entering the world and departing from the world is just a different manifestation of that same process.

[18:23]

It's just a different way of looking at it. Emptiness is not nothingness. Emptiness is not nothingness. Emptiness, not in nothingness. We have to let go all the time. Continually let go. In order to be present, we have to let go. But in emptiness, no eyes, no ears. Emptiness means that all things are related for their existence.

[19:26]

There is no, you know, we say, there is Mel. sitting up here giving a lecture. Actually, even though there is this appearance, and Mel feels like Mel, what you're seeing and hearing is empty of its own being. In other words, what you see here is dependent on everything else for its existence. It's not an entity that's separate. It's a part of the flux and flow of this universe. It's contained. It's like a flash, a momentary flash in the area of existence.

[20:29]

And it seems kind of like an odd thing. Together we create meaning. We have this capacity for creating meaning. But it can also become a consensus reality where we have this group think that happens. And because of our human nature it seems like Society is one of these realities that we create and agree on. We all agree that this is real. That's what makes it real, is that we agree that it's real. The dollar bill is just a piece of paper. It says, in God we trust. And it has a little pyramid and a mystical eye on the top.

[21:59]

And we believe in it. As soon as you don't believe in the dollar bill anymore, it's worthless. It's all a matter of agreement. We agree that this is reality. in particular it does, because religion is necessary, you know. Religious, it's a humanity in the effort to find its place in the universe, you know. And it's all mixed up with morality and ethics and

[23:04]

mystique and mysterious and the unknown. So it's the most necessary thing and also the most dangerous thing. Totally dangerous. You know, life is dangerous. And so it has these two sides. One is the side of great comfort and security. And the other side is total madness. Religion can be total madness. So, in some way, I was thinking that because fantasy has been such a companion of religion, in the evolution of religion, I would hope that science would somehow come together to be the companion of religion as a checkmate.

[24:12]

I'd like to say something. I've raised my hand twice now and there are four others in my mind. I teach the world's religions in a university and very often I have Christians who feel And they don't consider it a fantasy, nor do I. I can say I have not perhaps had the same belief or experience, but since I don't know, I can't say that such an afterlife may or may not exist. I read a little article the other day in a magazine called Guideposts, which is primarily a Christian magazine, in which they talked about a little girl who was dying of a disease. And she asked her mother, Mother, when I die, are you going to come with me? I'd like to know how someone who follows the Buddhist practice such as herself would answer a question like that.

[25:16]

Are you going to come with me? Well, I think if I was asked that by someone... A little girl. Yeah, if I was asked that by a little girl, and she said, Are you going to come with me? I would say, I'll come later. Well, the mother's answer was, the part of you that you need, if you need me, we'll be there with you. Yeah, that's very nice. I thought so too. Yeah. I'm struck, to me, that fantasy arises from imagination, which I think I don't think that's the real problem here. I mean, that's human and it's the creative source. I think we have to look at this situation where people are looking for a leader who has answers. And, you know, in all of these situations there's some leader in this one also.

[26:20]

people leaving their biological family and seeking sub-union with this group and looking for the word from this leader. And this is true in religion, it's true politically and in many other fields. That's kind of how I'd say it. Yeah, well, that's a good point because we should all be our own leader. But even though we're all our own leader, we still look for leadership. And we cannot get away from looking for leadership and wanting leadership. And so it's important to have leadership, but it's important to be discerning. We should know how to follow. So that's what's so difficult. we can easily be misled.

[27:26]

So you can say, well, let's not have any more leaders. But that doesn't work. But also, I'm not so sure that, you know, People go where they go and do what they do. And you cannot save everybody from doing what they're going to do. And there's some regret. And I think what we can do is look on something like this as a lesson, to be careful. Melody?

[28:31]

I was looking at the comet last night, and there was a particularly bright view of it. It was kind of a dark night. I was kind of hoping that they could follow the comet to someplace nice. There's a kind of longing, you know, I guess. Yeah. thinking about them. I think it's really easy to think of them as really different from us, except, you know, I keep always comparing things where people are looking at a leader like that, calling a leader, to the fact that almost my whole adult life, our whole country and most of the world had invested in to destroy the whole world, just by pushing a button or something. And how we just kind of gave that over, you know? I mean, a lot of us didn't agree with doing that and saw the folly in that.

[29:32]

But most people, we live with that situation, completely kind of in a suicide pact with our own leaders. And I don't think we've really examined that and that part of ourselves since the Cold War ended. Well, yes, one of the things that I always think about is, why are our leaders never psychologically evaluated? Did you see the president's analyst? No. The president's analyst? No. The president has an analyst? trust to do the evaluation. You! Well, my thought is along the lines of Melody.

[30:41]

Actually, what was really shocking to me in the news, I was really disturbed by this and disturbed neighborhood. Like, that's really aberrational. Whereas if it happened in a poor neighborhood, how are we going to understand this? And I found that troubling, but what I found more troubling, because in a sense I just found this is like, as you said, if this was in these early Buddhist texts as probably people were doing, which means probably it was in human nature. It's something difficult to accept, and one wishes one could talk with those people and see what their direct experience was, but it happened.

[31:48]

I'm wary of saying this to shift the discussion, but what I found where the prisoner was executed, his mask burst into flames and a foot-long fire leaped from his head. That was done in irony. That was not people taking it upon themselves to follow some higher vision. The Attorney General for the state said, well, this should give murderers pause. That was his answer. In fact, he's right, because it gave the governor of the state pause to say, gee, maybe we should look into this as a, perhaps this is not such a humane way of taking life. But I found that much more shocking, and also human, and also historical.

[32:53]

So these events in my mind This isn't a line that Alan was saying, but it's fine. One of the things which has disturbed me about the coverage is it seems to confuse belief and faith. I think in our practice, we have to rely a lot on faith. We don't worry a whole lot about beliefs. But when something like this happens, people to be non-believers, which sometimes translates into losing faith. And that can be very discouraging. And before I came to this practice, I had problems going to any religion, Faith seems to have more to do with being willing to not know and just meet whatever comes with some acceptance and openness.

[34:35]

Did you hear what he was saying? That the difference between belief and faith, to have a difference between a belief, having your beliefs, and actually having a basic faith in life itself. There's some actual difference there. Somebody once explained that And they said that they had faith in the law of gravity, because they had already experienced gravity and they knew that if they dropped the, you know, whatever they were holding, their glass or whatever that they dropped, they'd definitely fall. And therefore, from direct experience, they built their faith. On what? On gravity. On the fact that gravity exists.

[35:38]

They have to, they talked about believing versus faith, faith being based on direct experience, on knowing, and therefore you have to believe that the law of gravity will continue to operate even though you don't have to test it every time. But it's still a physical law. So it's on this side, you know, there's emptiness and form. Emptiness is form and form is emptiness. Form is form and emptiness is emptiness. And on the phenomenal side is where the law of gravity operates. On the non-phenomenal side,

[36:40]

is, what can you say? It includes the law of gravity, but is not bound by it. So, you know, religion spirituality, it's about the non-phenomenal side and the phenomenal side. Whereas scientific faith is always on the phenomenal side and only deals with what it knows. So there is a kind of faith which comes from what you know physically on the phenomenal side through experimentation. But there's the non-phenomenal side, or the side which is beyond the phenomenal side, which is the cause of the phenomenal side.

[38:03]

And that's the more intangible side, where we have to be able to have faith in nothing. When I say nothing, I mean in not knowing. Because when our life is over, the phenomenal side is gone. The so-called phenomenal side. And then what? Right? So that's where religion begins. With the non-phenomenal side, as well as the phenomenal side. But with the non-phenomenal side. We have to get beyond the law of gravity to the great mystery.

[39:06]

How do you have faith in the great mystery? Not belief, but faith in the great mystery. Can you get beyond the law of gravity without going Well, we all know it. The law of gravity determines everything that happens in this world. Everything in this world is determined. Nature is determined by the law of gravity. But don't we often act as though we don't really? Well, we're oblivious, yes. But, you know, if I go like this... The reason, the way I do this is determined by the law of gravity. You know? It just is. Everything that we do is... And the center of gravity, you know... One Zen master said, Buddha is the center of gravity.

[40:09]

So, what is the center of gravity? So in this phenomenal life, to always be at the center of gravity is to find trust and faith. To find trust and faith at the center of gravity. That's what Zen practice is about. It's about being always at the center of gravity. And that's where you find the phenomenal and the Newman will come together. That's a good point. Today is what? Holy Saturday, you know. Oh, yes. So, therefore, you're talking about the great mystery of faith. Christianity is based on life, death, resurrection of Christ, and that seems to me like a very strong belief in faith.

[41:27]

Not everybody saw him. You know, just the people who followed saw his resurrection. Then everybody else afterwards is basing their faith on that one, their experiences. So, could you make some comments on that? I will. I don't want to talk about Christianity, but I will. Because the problem is that everybody's looking outside, you know. There's the statue of Jesus, you know, and Jesus was somebody who lived 2,000 years ago, almost 2,000, right? 2,000 years ago. But each one of us is Each one of us has the Christos within us. And each one of us has to resurrect ourself.

[42:30]

That's what resurrection is, not Jesus coming up from the grave 2000 years ago. It's about each one of us being reborn within ourself. That's what that's about. So, you don't have to be Christian. you live and you die every moment. But it seems to me like his death, resurrection might be a little bit bigger moment than the ordinary. Well, it's celebrating. The holiday celebrates that, you know, and creates the pageant and so forth. So that's nice, you know, pageantry and it's a reminder. But if you start getting too literal, that's where fantasy takes over and becomes misleading, actually.

[43:46]

And people start believing literally in the Bible. and then become dictatorial and intolerant because they want to, they believe something. So that's not faith, it's belief. Faith is very personal and doesn't have any supports. Belief is full of supports, you know, You take a whole bunch of stories and put them all together and then you have all these crutches, you know, and this big support system to bolster your opinions. But faith is very lonely. Very lonely. Somebody hasn't asked a question. the fact that you don't have a substratum

[44:50]

The spiritual world includes it, but it's coming out of the spiritual world. So it seems that you're setting up here an Aristotle step ladder, so to speak, where you're saying that there's an ultimate reality, and that there's a secondary reality of the big mind and the little mind. And if it is, if we are in this, say, independent personal faith, and things are a process, How do you reconcile that with the idea of the ideology or the belief in certain categories that you set up in Buddhism? It seems to me, even though it's very bare, it still seems to be a belief system. There are no categories of belief in Buddhism. There's no belief system in Buddhism.

[46:24]

Buddhism is not a belief system. Buddhism is a way of letting go of all views and opinions and beliefs in order to stand in the naked reality. But if you're saying there's a certain reality, in other words, If I'm completely independent and spontaneous and I'm meditating and I'm coming up to my reality as a coming into being, then I could say, for instance, why would I say The matter is more than the spirit.

[47:29]

There's both involution and evolution going on simultaneously. And that's our idea of what good and evil is. When people from the spiritual world are going into the material, think that the people who are from the material world are the spiritual evil, and vice versa. So there's some resolution, but there's no real second banana. There's no big minds that should dominate or should direct little minds. or that the spirit world is creating the phenomenal world, there's no substrate. In other words, what I'm saying is, once you set up, this is in deconstructionism, once you set up a ultimate reality, out of which other realities come, you're setting up a Aristotle category, and you're setting up an ideology or belief system. And with no belief system, in other words, you wouldn't have this hierarchy, you know, this permanent hierarchy that you would find in a closure that you find in theology.

[48:34]

There's a little bit of a closure. I'm not saying that this is erroneous. Maybe we're on to some kind of structuralism that is true. But I'm not saying it isn't. I'm just saying that the very fact that you set up some form of a hierarchy that That makes an ideology, that makes a belief system. Now, if you don't, if this is not important, then why do we keep expressing this? Why do you keep expressing this reality? Well, I'm trying to accept the idea. Excuse me. My big mistake. I'll never make that mistake again. Well, I may make it, but...

[49:28]

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