I would like to talk about a koan from the Blue Cliff Records. This koan is koan number three. The way that I like to look at koans, particularly in lecture situations, is the koan is something that is a case, is a little story that we can study and that we can consider. It's something that's helpful for us. And it's not so important if we have, if we understand it.

[01:17]

And there's a kind of a pressure, I think, to want to get the answer to the call, to want to be able to know what the solution each of these enigmatic kind of um, puzzles are. We'd like to have the right answer. It's a natural desire. But these, these koans, the answers, aren't like the usual kinds of answers. Because it's not a matter of having an intellectual answer or an idea. An idea isn't the answer for these stories.

[02:25]

And usually when we solve something, we have some idea about it. So it puts us in this kind of quandary. On one hand we, as Zen students, we're involved with koans, although with the Soto school not so much, but nevertheless, they come up. And we would like to solve them, we would like to understand them. But it's very unsatisfying because Usually, we don't feel like, oh, we understand this. This is it. We really got the answer to this koan. So it gets kind of mushy. So I would like to suggest that we consider these koans as something to study or to consider without feeling like we have to get the right answer.

[03:34]

And then it's much more enjoyable. There's not this pressure to succeed, or the pressure to be right. It's more, it's something that can help us to inquire. So that the inquiry is the important thing, not whether or not you're good at it, or whether or not you've got the right answer. It's like a sharpening stone. It's like we're the sharpeners and also we're the knives. And the Kong is the stone. And so we can hold ourselves to the stone and sharpen ourselves at our own rate of speed. So the Blue Cliff Records are one of the main Koan collections and it was put together in China in the 1100s.

[04:41]

And it was put together by a monk named Setsho. And he collected these stories or these examples of teachers' dialogues together into a collection And because he was also a poet, he put his own poem along with each of the koans that he selected. And he left it at that. And then about a hundred years later, another monk came along, Engo, and he added a commentary to Se Cho's poem. And because Ngo had a, in his room, his quarters, Ngo had a calligraphy on the wall that, I don't know the exact meaning, but it said like blue cliff.

[05:53]

That was this nice calligraphy framed on his wall. Because he had this in his room, he just decided to call the collection the Blue Cliff Records. So, this case number three involves Matsu, who is also known as Baso. Matsu is like a grandson of the Sixth Patriarch. The Sixth Patriarch had several important disciples and one of them was Nangaku. And Nangaku's disciple was Matsu. So he was like a grandson of the Sixth Patriarch. So the case is very simple. Matsu is very sick and may be dying.

[06:59]

And the head monk comes to him and says, Teacher, how is your health? And Matsu says, Sun Buddha, Moon Buddha. And that's it. And what you need to know is that there is a Buddha scripture that has hundreds of different Buddhas within the scripture and the Sun Buddha lives for 1800 years and the Moon Buddha lives for one day and one night. So, it's like he's saying, if I live for 25 more years, that's fine.

[08:12]

If I die tomorrow, that's fine. Either way, right now is the most important thing. That's the kind of intellectual meaning behind what he's saying. A long life is good, a short life is good. And then there is a poem, Setsho's poem that goes with this is, Sun Face Buddha Moon-faced Buddha, what kind of people were the ancient emperors? For 20 years I have suffered bitterly.

[09:14]

How many times I have gone down into the dragon's cave for you? This distress is worth recounting. Clear-eyed, patrolled monk, should not take it lightly. So I'll come back to that poem in a couple of minutes. I think the first thing to do when I look at a column like this is to put myself into it and not to feel like that these are special people who are extraordinary with their insight

[10:36]

and their concentration and their wisdom and so forth, which they are, but not to be intimidated by the extraordinary quality of the characters in these koans. That we have to be able to step right into this little story ourselves and put ourselves into the story, into the situation. Otherwise, what's the point? These are not designed. They're designed to be sharpening stones. They're designed to help us. We don't need to help Matsu, but we need to help ourselves. So, it's quite okay to put yourself with all your warts and frailties right inside the story. And if you could imagine yourself to be dying, it's pretty hard, I think, unless you actually, we can only imagine what that would feel like until we're actually in that situation.

[12:03]

But still, to try. or to think of some time when you've been under extremely difficult circumstances, and this is something that everybody has experienced, when something has completely fallen apart in your life, when somebody that you know has died that you really loved, when some dream that you have had just falls apart, it doesn't work, When some relationship falls apart. When your finances just fall apart. When somebody abandons you who you trusted. Everybody has been through some situation like that.

[13:10]

And in that situation, how do you find your balance? How do you find your equilibrium when that happens to you? This case isn't really necessarily about disaster or death or catastrophe. It could be just, it's a very domestic situation. It's an everyday situation. But the context that they put it in is within a more dramatic emphasis. Here he's very, very sick. He's really, the pressure is on him. He's feeling great pressure. He could be dying. So when we're under really great pressure, how do we find our equilibrium?

[14:21]

And Matsu seems to find it by by realizing that the circumstances of his life are not the most important stuff of his life. That's the implication. That underneath the circumstances Who can say what's underneath? We could call it Buddha or Buddha nature or true self. We can call it something. Whatever we call it doesn't do justice to it. But something, there's something that is more than just circumstances or our attachment to our circumstances.

[15:32]

And when the circumstances that we really count on the most fall apart, that's when we have to deal with that and see if it or not. And I guess when you know that you're going to die soon, that's the ultimate coming to grips with your circumstances, the circumstance of being alive. So, how many of us, if we were confronted with our death, eminently, or something that felt catastrophic, could say, Sun Buddha, Moon Buddha, and really genuinely mean it?

[17:01]

More than just, it's not a philosophy, it's an expression. And I think that's what the koan is pushing us towards, that gritty... grittiness. The koan is pushing us towards that grittiness of You have to deal with what you actually are right now, regardless of your circumstance. So if you put yourself into this con, you have to ask yourself, how do you handle this?

[18:13]

And then in a more domestic way, how do you handle it every day? Not when there's just a big drama. or when you're completely up against the wall. But when things are going nicely, does this disappear? Does this not count? When everything is just pretty good, where does this case go? Where does this koan go? It sounds very poetic, almost romantic. Sun, Buddha. Moon, Buddha. But if you think about it, it's really gritty. It's very, it's like really direct contact.

[19:20]

It's not poetic. It is poetic. It sounds poetic. But the underlying expression is just direct. So it should explain this poem to you Just briefly, I won't go into it too much, because these Blue Cliff Record poems are sometimes confusing, and they just make us discouraged, because you don't understand all the... They're very sophisticated, and the Chinese, they like to have lots of allusions to other texts, other sayings that we're not... It's not part of our culture, so we're not familiar with.

[20:48]

This one is fairly simple. But even this one has reference to something, some other poem, that we don't know what it is. Sun-faced Buddha, Moon-faced Buddha, what kind of people were the ancient emperors? This is an allusion to another poem. And the other poem is called, I think it's called, The Barrens. It's not necessarily a Buddhist poem. And this poem goes, clothed in brocade and fine embroidery with falcons on their wrists, pet falcons, you know, the aristocrats carry it around. They go about at leisure, their manner scornful. They know nothing. of the difficulties of sowing and harvesting.

[21:52]

What kind of people were the ancient emperors? So, this could be interpreted in different ways. The way I interpret it is basically that the ancient emperors in Chinese history are something that we don't really have an equivalent for in American culture, because in Chinese history there venerated almost like gods. The almost mythical founding emperors of the Chinese civilization are seen more as gods than actual historical figures. So it's like with great reverence and pride that, at least in the past, the Chinese people have considered their ancient emperors The way I take this to mean is something like in comparison to these aristocrats of nowadays who go around and are scornful and don't really know what it's like to work and endure hardships, in comparison to these present-day aristocrats

[23:15]

The ancient emperors were not like this. They were actually the real McCoy. That's what I get from it. However, interestingly, after this coen was printed or published, one of the later emperors in Chinese history had it censored from the collection because he felt it was derogatory. He read this poem as being derogatory towards the ancient emperors, and in fact, I think it's actually complimentary. Am I right or was the emperor right? So to say Sun-faced Buddha, Moon-faced Buddha, what kind of people were the ancient emperors? has the meaning of it's like a compliment towards Matsu that we can compare Matsu to the really genuine article quality of the ancient emperors.

[24:38]

For 20 years I have suffered bitterly practicing, you might know what that feels like. And how many times have I gone into the dragon's cave for you? The dragon's cave, I would say it's his own ego. For you could be for us, or his students, or it could be for Sun Buddha, Moon Buddha. clear-eyed, patch-robed monks should not take it lightly. That's pretty direct. So this case has this feeling of just, like a lot of them do, but in particular this one of just being, there's no fooling around. You don't have time to worry about your circumstances.

[25:44]

and you have to apply yourself. So we could talk about Sun Buddha, Moon Buddha, dying, being very sick, 20 years of bitter practice and so forth. But again, I always like to kind of bring it back to the domestic quality of our practice, which is basically it's about being self-centered. You take all these enigmatic koans and all the angles of light that they're shining, that they shine in the different aspects of life. Somehow it constantly comes back to challenging our self-centeredness.

[26:50]

When you're self-centered, you want to live naturally. You want to live a long time. unless you're enduring a lot of suffering, then maybe you want to die. But again, that's equally self-centered. So maybe these koans, what they do is they show us different aspects of how we're self-centered. They just show us little views of the same condition that holds us back from really growing. And I would say that 95% of Zen practice, of Buddhist practice, is genuinely coming to grips with our own self-centeredness.

[28:30]

And there's no, you can't wear gloves. It's messy. So a lot of what we do here as we're sitting together and as we study together and as we talk together and as we sit quietly together is just mutually waking up to the pervasiveness of our self-centeredness.

[29:47]

understanding how it works in a direct way. And hopefully without being too judgmental about it, about thinking that we or somebody else are just wonderful because we're not so self-centered or that we're horrible because we are more self-centered. Because when the judgment comes into it like that, like good and bad, like you're a good person or you're a bad person, then it gets very poisonous. There's not much room to breathe. So even though it doesn't feel so good to recognize that we're self-centered, to see how pervasive it is, Nevertheless, because we all are in the same boat, it's easier, because it's something that we share.

[31:00]

And this is something that everybody deals with, not just Buddhists. But as Buddhists we have a kind of a practice that helps us to understand how this works and to see it clearly. And our, at least in Zen, the method is mindfulness. And mindfulness is a big umbrella. There are different ways of being mindful. And in that sense, I've been thinking that it's like medicine, that we can We have to choose our own medicine within the overall umbrella of mindfulness, but we can choose which medicine works for us according to our personality.

[32:29]

So I don't want to go off into mindfulness as a topic, and just leave it at that. Ultimately, mindfulness is the way that we can deal with and grow within our self-centeredness. Because it seems as if self-centeredness causes suffering. And when we actually see that, it's natural to start to let go. But in order to see that requires attention, it requires mindfulness. So that's what we work with. But mindfulness of breathing might be good medicine for one person.

[33:49]

Mindfulness of emotions might be good medicine for another person. Feeling your body for somebody else. There's many variations. Basically, it comes down to just paying attention, to really paying attention. So, when you're Matsu, when you're in this story, and you may be dying, you may be in great pain, and your friend comes and asks you, how do you feel? You might realize that

[34:51]

how you feel as if each moment is all you've got. Period. and so you give your attention. It's very simple. So for some reason it feels, I feel like this is very heavy.

[35:56]

I'm not sure why. And I hope I haven't made you feel heavy. But you might like to say something. Yes? You said also that there was commentaries Yes, well, no, I didn't go into, in this particular case, there is a commentary by Ingo that I didn't talk about. It gets more elaborate. It's hard to, in a lecture situation, it's hard to do that. But yeah, you can study it, you can read it, and there's more. If you really look around, there's plenty of commentaries, not just by the original characters, but by current teachers.

[37:05]

I think there's a little bit of confusion that comes in the idea of intuition to a self-centered that either you have a separate self, which is pain, which is suffering, you have ontological amnesia, a self-centeredness that is unique in the moment.

[38:13]

In other words, from being created by everything in the poly-universe to an expression and every gesture creating everything in the poly-universe, you have this abyss that is you, that's this centered self. If you're in that moment, you're swimming in the blue of the moment. You are self-centered. That's what it is to be self-centered. What I'm talking about is selfishness. The emotion of selfishness. Do you know that feeling? Yeah, you mean separate?

[39:16]

separate or you mean also group? No, I just mean selfishness. You know the emotion of selfishness? That feeling. Okay. What brings us to the realization that all we have is this one moment? Pressure. Because without pressure we'll just drift forever in dreaming, at least in my experience. And so pressure is really important and we don't like it and we need it. And it is from that pressure that the energy is available for attention?

[40:25]

If it's constructive. If it's destructive, then we just fall apart. When pressure builds, I guess that's why people have nervous breakdowns, is that the pressure is destructive instead of constructive. Or Mark gave a talk on Monday and he mentioned depression, or sensitivity and depression. When it's not creative or constructive, it becomes overwhelming. And that just becomes depression. So, that's part of what this scheme is all about.

[41:33]

You know, during a sasheen, a sasheen traditionally is very rigid. Very disciplined and very rigid. And it's a pressure. It creates pressure on us. And we don't like it, to some extent. And when something goes And that's why in these situations where your life falls apart, that there's great pressure when that happens. It doesn't make it feel particularly good, but I'm just, maybe one more? You're saying that when the poet used the images Sun Buddha and Moon Buddha, why did he choose these?

[42:43]

Was it because of lightness and darkness and time having to do with time? Why did he use the image? Well, these were like traditional Buddhas that already had been established as Buddhas. Buddhist writing. He didn't sort of invent these. These had already been sort of set up. But you know, in Chinese and Asian in general, but particularly Chinese, sun and moon are like opposite. Yang, yin and yang, or both moon and sun are both representative of those opposites. So those are some really traditional kind of opposites in Chinese culture. Okay, one more. This is just a quickie. Two things. You said things seem heavy, and I think things seem a little heavy because sometimes these guys like Matsu are a hard act to follow.

[43:44]

It puts pressure on us. It's a hard act to follow. And the other thing is that last night I was reading a talk by a pair of children, and she said, you know, these days we talk about being addicted to alcohol and addicted to abuse and addicted to this, that, and the other. But what we're really addicted to is ourselves. And that really kind of put it into perspective for me, and I bring it up because of self-centeredness, that what we're really all addicted to is ourselves. And I don't know how to compare cultures. I don't want to put American culture down, but I certainly have more understanding of how Americans really go about that. You know, our emphasis on individuality, and opportunity, and individuality, and opportunity, and choice, and going for it.

[44:49]

I imagine other cultures have their own versions, but that's what we seem to be desiring.

[44:57]

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