I vow to taste the truth of the Tathagata's words. Good morning. It would take most of the time we have here today to properly introduce our speaker today. I begin with Dan Layton. So therefore, I hope to get as many important details as possible. Thank you, Peter.

[01:37]

I'm very happy to be an alumnus of the Tassajara Bakery. So good morning. It's great to be back at the Berkley Zen Center. And I wanted to talk this morning about a writing by Dogen, or at least take that as my starting point. And this is from a brand new book called Beyond Thinking. which is the third volume of Muna Nidudra, or Kaz Tanahashi's translating of Dogen. Wonderful book. Mel and Alan Sanaki also participated in the translation. And I'm going to talk about one of Dogen's essays that I translated with Kaz called, The Awesome Presence of Active Buddhas. So this is, kind of a manual on activist buddhas, or how to be an activist buddha, or how to be a practicing buddha.

[02:40]

So the title in Japanese is Gyo-butsu-igi. And Gyo-butsu could be, we translate it as active buddha, but Gyo also refers to practice. This is practicing buddhas. And Iggy, we translated as awesome presence, and it's a great example of cause's flamboyant and at the same time deeply perceptive translation style that we translated Iggy this way. Iggy also means dignified manner. or demeanor or just dignity. But it also really refers to this, it also can be translated as majestic manner or majestic presence. So it's about how we function, how we are, how to be present as active Buddhas. So just jumping right in. So I'm going to just read a few selections and talk about them.

[03:44]

Dogen says, Dogen, for those of you who don't know, was the 13th century Japanese monk who brought this branch of Zen that we practice here from China to Japan. and founded what is now called Soto Zen, and wrote profusely. And I've had the good fortune to translate quite a bit of his work, which I started doing with KAZ. And so it's nice to continue with him in this. So Dogen says, know that Buddhas in the Buddha way do not wait for awakening. That's the first thing to say about our practice. So zazen is not some technique or some means of practicing that leads to some enlightenment in the future. This meditation, this zazen we do, is the expression of your awakening right now in this body and mind.

[04:50]

on your cushion or chair. So we don't wait for awakening. Practice and realization are one. This is the practice of enlightenment that we do. And there is no enlightenment that's not practiced and put into practice. So really, not just our formal zazen sitting, but all of our life. And Dogen emphasizes this here, is this expression of awesome presence and of practicing Buddhas, or active Buddhas. So Dogen says, active Buddhas alone fully experience the vital process on the path of going beyond Buddha. So this has kind of become a mantra for me, and it's really helpful. And if you memorize one sentence of Dogen, this is a good one. Active Buddhas alone fully experience the vital process on the path of going beyond Buddha.

[05:57]

So this practice that we do is about fully experiencing how it is to be yourself, to be the Buddha you are on your cushion, to feel the connection that is right here to this teaching and practice and ancient way of wisdom and compassion. It's a vital process and it's a path. So on this path, there is this vital process. Our practice, our life, our bodies, our minds, the bells and the cushions and the birds outside and the temple pillars are all alive. We are all together in this vital process and it's the process of the path of going beyond Buddha. So it's possible, it happens sometimes that someone walking down the street or sitting in meditation during an intensive session or even just sitting one period may realize that Buddha is right here.

[07:08]

It may be that you experience that. But this practice is not about that. It's not about arriving at some understanding. It's actually a vital process on the path of going beyond Buddha. So if you meet Buddha in someone else or in your own body and mind, that's fine. But we have to keep practicing. So sometimes there have been Buddhas, and we make statues of them and put them up on the altar. And we bow to them because they're wonderful. But actually, the life of this Buddha, Shakyamuni, who lived 2,500 years ago, is nowhere else except on your cushion right now. This is the vital process of the path of going beyond Buddha. It's something that is expressed in your life, in your difficulties, in your own struggles with how to live a decent, meaningful, sane life in a crazy, corrupt, barbaric culture.

[08:11]

How to express going beyond Buddha. So it's okay to make a picture of Buddha and put it up on the wall or make a statue and put it up on the altar. But then that's no longer Buddha if it's not a vital process, if it's not part of going beyond Buddha. So one of the teachers I practiced with in Japan told me that understanding is not important. So when you read Dogen and you feel bewildered and you can't understand what he's saying, that's fine. Don't worry about understanding. So what this teacher said to me is, understanding is not important. Understanding is easy. The point is just to continue. How do you find your way on the vital path of the process of going beyond, or the vital process of the path, either way, of going beyond Buddha? This is the whole of our practice. And of course it happens on our cushion, and it happens when we get up, and it happens in the difficulties we have with our friends and family, and it happens with our attempts to respond to the difficulties of our society, and it happens in the process of responding to the difficulties in our own heart and minds.

[09:34]

It happens in all these ways. And yet, as Dogen says, please fully experience the vital process on the path of going beyond Buddha. This is the awesome presence, the majestic dignity of active Buddhas, of practicing Buddhas. And he says elsewhere in this essay that there are no Buddhas except active Buddhas. There are many other kinds of Buddhas. There are Dharmakaya and Sambhogakaya. Anyway, there's all kinds of classifications of Buddhas, but Dogen says there's no Buddha except an active Buddha. So in whatever way you are an activist in your life, in whatever way you are engaging the difficulties of the world that you face and meet in your daily life, that's where Buddha is. Suddhodana also says, because active Buddhas manifest awesome presence in every situation, they bring forth awesome presence with their body.

[10:42]

This is not some intellectual idea. This is actually something we engage in with body and mind, with our being, in our activity. He says, thus their transformative function flows out in their speech. reaching throughout time, space, Buddhas, and activities. So even though we're not sitting to get something that we're waiting for in the future, there is a transformative function. This practice has its own transformative function in our life and in the lives of the people around us. And it works in ways that we can't quite understand or meet, and yet This is the awesome presence, the total dignity, the majestic bearing of Buddhas who are willing to get off their cushions too and step out into the world and then come back and turn and face the wall.

[11:53]

So this process, this vital process, is the meaning of our practice. So how do we express and enact this awesome presence? So one thing that Dogen says is, although the everyday activities of active Buddhas invariably allow Buddhas to practice, active Buddhas allow everyday activities to practice. This is to abandon your body for dharma, to abandon dharma for your body. This is to give up holding back your life and to hold on fully to your life. The awesome presence not only lets go of dharma for the sake of dharma, but also lets go of the dharma for the sake of mind. Do not forget that this letting go is immeasurable.

[12:55]

So again, everyday activities of active Buddhas invariably allow Buddhas to practice. So it's only through our everyday activities, through the particularities of our own personal situation, job, friends, family, home, pets, whatever, everything you do, that is what allows you to practice. So the world provides you with a practice place. including the Berkley Zen Center, but everything else that you engage in, is offering you the opportunity to express active Buddha in your own life. But not only that, Dogen then says, well he says, although the everyday activities of active Buddhas invariably allow Buddhas to practice, active Buddhas allow everyday activities to practice. When you are actively expressing Buddha, you allow the cushions to practice.

[14:07]

You allow the bells to practice. You allow the birds singing to practice. You allow your friends to practice, even if they don't think of themselves as practicing, and even if you sometimes have the thought that they are not practicing. This can happen. It's possible that people think that other people aren't practicing. It happens sometimes. Even worse, sometimes people think that some people are practicing better than others. It really does happen sometimes in Zen centers. It's amazing, but it does. But what active Buddhas do is allow everyday activities to practice as you're driving your car. Do you allow your car to be practicing? As you're walking down the street, do you allow the soles of your shoes to practice as they meet the concrete or the grass or whatever? In fact, that's what's happening all the time.

[15:10]

The world provides us with this practice place and we allow the world to be a place of practice and to engage in these practice activities. This is not how we usually think. This is why sometimes things that Dogen says or things that you might read in other Zen literature seem strange. But it's not ridiculous or nonsense. This is actually the logic of active Buddhas and their awesome presence. So he says, give up holding back your life. and giving up, holding back your life is actually holding on fully to your life. So even though you may be actively expressing the awesome presence of Buddhas, still, active Buddhas might think that they're holding back their life.

[16:14]

They might think, well, I'm not gonna do that practice. Of course, we need to pace ourselves and pause and enjoy this next inhale and exhale and find the space in our life to actually express this majestic presence. And when we do that, we're actually not holding back our life. So this letting go, this dropping body and mind, that is another name for zazen, is immeasurable. We can't figure it out based on our limited human intellectual conceptualizations and emotions. It's just, you know, we can kind of get some sense of it. We're connected to it. In fact, just the fact that you're here in this room right now means that you have some connection to this active Buddha's awesome presence.

[17:19]

All of you are sitting in your body and mind on your chair or cushion right now expressing this awesome presence, this vital process of the path of going beyond Buddhas. And yet we can't figure out figuring out is beyond the actuality of this letting go. So I have this problem when I give Dharma talks that I want to talk about too much and yet I kind of want to pause and just enjoy the awesome presence right here and now. So one of the many other things Dogen says in here that I like a lot is that he talks about how Buddhas do not appear only in the human realm.

[18:32]

So there are bird Buddhas, and of course there are dolphin Buddhas. They have bigger brains than us, but they don't have legs to cross, so we don't know how they sit saza. But they do something. And there are tree Buddhas and so forth. They're not just human Buddhas. This awesome presence is beyond our idea of who we are and how the world is and how it is to be a human being, even though just how we are as human beings is this awesome presence of active Buddhas. And it's not just that the active Buddhas sit up here and talk and expound the Dharma. So Dogen also says here, Do not regard the capacity to expound the Dharma as superior and the capacity to listen to the Dharma as inferior. If those who speak are venerable, those who listen are venerable as well. Know that it is equally difficult to listen to and accept this teaching.

[19:40]

Expanding and listening are not a matter of superior or inferior. Even if those who remain sitting and listening are the most venerable Buddhas, nevertheless they remain and listen to the Dharma, the teaching, because all Buddhas of the three times remain and listen to the Dharma. As the fruit of Buddhahood is already present, they do not listen to the Dharma to achieve Buddhahood. So if you came here to learn how to be a Buddha, I'm sorry, you can leave now. That's not how it works. You came here to listen to the Dharma because you are active Buddhas right now, even if you don't necessarily think so, even if you are caught up in the practice of Buddhas, which is to study their delusions and to see that we're also flawed, frail, damaged human beings living in a crazy world. At the same time, here you are expressing the awesome presence of active Buddhas.

[20:44]

This is the practice that we do here. This is the understanding we have. So whether you are sitting up here speaking the Dharma, or sitting out there listening to the Dharma, both are equally active Buddhas. So I might think that I would say something wonderful that would allow some of you to become enlightened. This morning, here in Berkeley, California, on a Saturday morning. And if I think that, then it's not the Dharma speaking, I'm sorry. So I don't think that. But anyway, Peter invited me, so I came, and here I am babbling about the Dharma. So please enjoy the sound of my voice, like the sound of the birds singing. So I'm just giving you some of my favorite little bits from this writing of Dogen. And I actually want to stop in time to take a question or two, but I have a little further to go.

[21:50]

Something else that Dogen says, which I think is really helpful. The teaching of birth and death, body and mind, is the circle of the way and is actualized at once. Thoroughly practicing, thoroughly clarifying, it is not forced. So we can't force Buddha to be Buddha. Buddha is already Buddha. But our usual human way of being in the world is to try and manipulate the world to be something we think it should be. So you might think that the Buddha that you are, or the Buddha that I am, or the Buddha up here, or whatever Buddha you want, is not the Buddha you think it should be. and that you have to manipulate it to be some Buddha that you think is Buddha. That's not how it works. It's actualized at once. It can't be forced. We cannot make the world into the world we think should be the world, even though it's nice to have.

[22:56]

In fact, it's good. It's karmically good to have good ideas about how the world should be. like having peace and having governments that don't lie and things like that. And we can actually work towards those good things as active Buddhists with majestic presence. This might be the way we express our awesome presence. Still, the world is what it is. And somehow in the middle of that, there is the awesome presence of active Buddhas. And maybe it's just a lot, maybe the activity of Buddhas is just to allow us to express to our government, please don't do that. Or whatever. Or to our friends. You know, maybe it would be better if you did it this way. It's okay to say that. And yet, that's not forcing Buddha to be Buddha. So he goes on, it is just like recognizing the shadow of the looted thought and turning the light to shine within. This is the basic direction of our Zen practice.

[23:59]

Turn the light to shine within. To sit and face the wall. To sit and face ourselves. To be upright and be willing to be the person you are on your cushion or chair. And to totally acknowledge and face the shadows of deluded thought, the shadows of the difficulties of being an awesome act of Buddha in this world. He goes on, the clarity of clarity beyond clarity prevails in the activity of Buddhas. This is totally surrendering to practice. So the great Zen teacher, Joshu, said, I do not take refuge in clarity. Dogen says, there is a clarity of clarity beyond clarity. So again, don't get stuck in some understanding or trying to get some understanding.

[25:01]

Allow the clarity that is already sitting on your cushion to just be that clarity beyond clarity. allow the clarity of the bird song to just be itself, beyond your ideas of how a bird should sing. So, part of this awesome presence is that we are actually alive. Stepping forward misses, stepping backward misses, taking one step misses, taking two step misses, and so there are mistakes upon mistakes. So active Buddhas in their awesome presence are not perfect and mistake-proof, according to your idea of mistakes.

[26:07]

In fact, the actual active practice, the actual awesome presence means mistake upon mistake. Dogen elsewhere said that his life was one continuous mistake. So we do make mistakes. We do fall down. And then we get up and try and see how to be present in this mistake and move forward on the vital process of the path of going beyond Buddha. So letting go of your ideas of how you think you should be an active Buddha means making mistakes. being alive, actually being completely a human being. This is a noble aspiration. How do we practice awesome presence? Right in the middle of the mistake we are. So when Peter and I were rolling out the croissants 25 years ago in the bowels of Tassajara Bakery, I don't think we could have imagined that we would end up here in this mistake.

[27:25]

Maybe, maybe we might have imagined something like this, but still, here we are. Mistake upon mistake. So the last little bit of this I'm going to read to you. And I apologize again for forgiving you too much. I should have just stopped and talked the whole time about the first sentence. But anyway, the awesome presence of active Buddhas right now is beyond obstruction. It makes mistakes, but it's beyond obstruction. Totally encompassed by Buddhas, active Buddhas are free from obstruction. as they penetrate the vital path of being splattered by mud and soaked in water. Active Buddhas transform devas in the heavenly realm, transform humans in the human realm. This is the power of opening blossoms and the power of the world arising this morning in spring. There has never been a gap in Active Buddha's transformative work.

[28:31]

So part of this transformative work is to penetrate the vital path of being splattered by mud and soaked in water. We actually enter the world of being alive as the human beings we are. We get splattered by mud. We get soaked. We engage in the difficulties of all of us Buddhists trying to figure out together how to be who we are already. So active Buddhas are in the world. This is about our practice as lay people in the world, as active Buddhas. So some of us, you know, go off to the monastery for a while because we just can't take it here in the world. And after a while, we calm down enough, maybe, and we come back out. And here we are, doing what the work of active Buddhists is from the beginning, which is to just engage the world, to get splattered by mud and soaked by water, to make mistake upon mistake, with awesome presence, with the dignity of being the human Buddha we are, in this body, in this mind.

[29:53]

So this is not about going to some exalted other place or reaching some higher state of being or state of consciousness. It's about how to fully express the awesome presence that's already there on your chair or cushion. So in a way, this is a very simple practice. In a way, it's a very difficult practice. And the difficulty isn't about figuring out, you know, what's Dogen mean by that, but just to continue, to be willing to fully engage the activity of the Buddha you are, to not hold back from the transformative function that's already going on in your life and in our world. to express our kindness and caring and awareness and insight in the world we're in, in this mud and water. So there's another saying, which I like a lot, that Dogen says elsewhere.

[30:56]

He says, the more mud, the bigger the Buddha. I find that quite comforting. There's a little bit of time, so I thought I would love to hear your comments or questions or responses or whatever. Yes? Is there a word, redemption? Well, that's an English word, but, and I haven't, I don't know if I've ever used redemption in a translation, but you know, there is, There is confession. There is renunciation. There is liberation and salvation. And maybe the whole thing is redemption. We face the difficulties of our life and the problems of the person we are. So in Genjo Koan, Dogen says that deluded people have delusions about enlightenment.

[31:59]

Enlightened people are enlightened about their delusions. So first we have to acknowledge our delusions. First we have to acknowledge our own twisted karma, our own confusion and greed and anger. And then the redemption is simply to fully experience the vital process on the path of going beyond Buddhism. Thank you. Other comments? Brian. That's great. That's good. I'll look for it. Ah, Linda. It hurts the world.

[33:40]

So it doesn't feel like just a joke. And so then I'm thinking about being in this majestic presence. That can be a kind of, in the presence of these mistakes, can be rather like a hell world, you know? Yes, it is. So, you know, let's say somebody, I'll leave it to you to imagine who that might be, experiences quite violent sensations, you know, as if the mind was being ripped or something. What would you say about the dark harmful side of mistakes and being present?

[34:45]

It hurts. And there's nothing we can do to fix it, to get rid of the shame of such a mistake. And yet we remain upright and try to acknowledge and apologize and confess our mistakes. see that this is a painful, painful, difficult world. And despite our good intentions, the ways in which we are confused by our greed and craving and anger and frustration do appear in the world.

[36:02]

and do cause harm. So the greed of our culture that, so I don't mean to be abstract, but the greed of our culture and the corruption of invading other countries and kind of corrupt corporate practices and so forth and lying. This is not separate from us. What to do with it? We have to feel, when it's me who makes a mistake, I don't know. I don't know what to do. I can't fix it. I'm trying to figure out how to confess it appropriately and acknowledge fully to myself my own flaws and limitations. And yet, I continue to sit and be present and express what I can of this kindness and compassion and caring.

[37:13]

And it hurts. Is that enough for now? I'll talk to you later. Yes. What was that, good morning? And I'm wondering how you as a translator or even how any of us can read or view these texts in such a way that we don't get trapped in the language of it and get into the concepts of it and then get stuck in this web or How do you do that as a translator? Hold it so you're not like, you know what I mean? Your mind doesn't get sunk into it. So I was just wondering that. Well, first as a reader, just to... With Duggan particularly, he plays with language a lot.

[38:22]

He's very playful. And he turns the words inside out and upside down. And so I think the way to be with it is to play with it yourself. This is kind of interactive dharma. So you should talk back to Dogen. You should turn his words around as you read them. And you know, you said, how do I not get caught in it? But in some ways, let yourself get caught in it. play with the language. Find out what you would say back to Dogen and what it means to you. Get totally be willing to be in thinking and non-thinking. So this beyond thinking includes thinking sometimes and includes not thinking sometimes.

[39:24]

It's not caught in either. It's so that this beyond thinking refers to a story that Dogen quotes where a Zen teacher was sitting upright and his monk asked, a student asked, what are you thinking of when you're sitting so majestically? And he said, I think of not thinking. Or I think of that which doesn't think. And the student said, how do you think of not thinking? And he said, beyond thinking. So beyond thinking includes awareness. We don't have to obliterate all the bird singing. We hear the bird song and know it right away before we start thinking about it or labeling it bird or whatever. So it is aware. We can play with awareness. It's not about getting rid of thoughts. So there is that pernicious American heretical school called lobotomy zen.

[40:32]

And that's not actually what this is about. If you want to get rid of all your thinking, there is that easy operation. But that's not the point of this. To actually engage in thinking and not thinking, and not get caught in either, is this beyond thinking. So you don't have to get rid of the things you know. You don't have to destroy your ego or intellect. I didn't think any of that. Oh, good. I'm so glad. But do you have a follow up question? One last comment or question. Peter? Yes? Do dolphins have Buddha nature? Do Buddhas have dolphin nature?

[41:37]

Cows also. Yes. it seems like there's no alternative. Just as, you know, if you place yourself, and if you're sitting in Sashin, in the Zen Dojo, you place yourself in a situation where there's no alternative, but simply kind of accept the discomfort that might arise.

[42:55]

In the pain of accepting a really that pain practice itself, be itself. However unbearable. So going beyond does not... Maybe to practice that mistake thoroughly. Right. To not run away.

[43:59]

So going beyond does not mean avoiding. Going beyond means completely being awesomely, majestically, dignifiedly present in the middle of this mistake. Not trying to get away from, not trying to escape from. Going beyond means to really totally be right here in this difficulty. without trying at all to go somewhere else. And our human tendency is so much to try and fix something or to try and problem solve or to want to, you know, it's biological, it's animal, you know, to fight or flight, to try and run away from the difficulties. So the signified majestic awesome presence is to actually be present in the middle of the mistake.

[45:06]

That's what Dogen is calling going beyond. Numberless.

[45:20]

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