Good morning. It's a misty morning in April, early April. And thank you for all coming out to celebrate Buddha's birthday. Does anyone know how many candles there are on the Buddha's birthday cake? Nobody knows. You're very close, but no cigar. Does anyone want to make another guess? 2,562, but who's counting? That's presuming we actually know when the Buddha was born, which is not clear. So I'm gonna tell, this will be a shortish lecture.

[01:07]

I'm gonna tell you some things about the Buddha's birth and then we're gonna have a ceremony bathing the baby Buddha. And it's been beautifully decorated in that bower back there. We'll move it up front and everybody will have a chance to pour sweet tea over the Buddha. So the Buddha was born into a ruling family in one of the northern republics, the Shakya people were his tribe. That's why he's known as Shakya Muni, sage of the Shakya tribe. And he was born like all of us are born with a body and a mind and a heart. And when he was born, he took his first breath just like we did. And so we see him as a human, not as a God, but as a human who was born with great potentialities.

[02:24]

And I'll say a little more about that. But the story leading up to his birth is very interesting. So on a full moon night, his mother, Queen Maya, who was in the royal family, married to King Suddhodana in this Shakyamuni. area. It's really kind of like a city state. She had a very vivid dream. She dreamed that she was carried away by kind spirits to a very cool, clear lake high in the mountains. And she bathed in that lake. And after her bathing, she put on beautiful clothing and perfume and adorned herself with flowers.

[03:26]

And as she was sitting there, maybe she was drifting off to sleep within the dream where she was already sleeping. You can think about that. Uh, she had a vision of a white elephant that was holding a white lotus flower in its, in its trunk, so wrapped around the flower. And that elephant walked around her three times, kneeling a little, you know, as elephants can do as, uh, as the elephant passed in front of her each time. And she awoke from that dream, and she knew she had received an important message, as the elephant is a very auspicious symbol, a symbol of greatness. And she told the king about her dream next morning.

[04:33]

And he sent for his sages, you know, the wise men who were good at interpreting dreams. They were the psychoanalysts of their day. And they explained, Your Majesty, the dream says that our queen will give birth to a child who will become a great being. And they were very happy because they had no children at that point. So we can flash forward about nine, 10 months from the dream of the white elephant, and the child was about to be born. And she went to the king and said, my dear, I have to go back to my parents in the Colia lands. Colia was one of the adjoining city-states, kingdoms. And it was a custom in those times for a woman to go back to her parents' home and give birth there.

[05:42]

And she wanted to go because the baby was almost due. And he said, I will make the arrangements for you. And so the king sent out his soldiers to clear the road and the queen was carried on a very highly decorated and painted platform on the road between her capital, capital of Vastu, and the capital of the Kolyas. It was a long procession. They were headed for her parents' kingdom. And on the way to the Kolya country, they passed a beautiful garden, which is called Lumbini Park. and the garden is near what is now known as Nepal. That was the area, so you can picture that it was very, there were foothills and beautiful lush meadows, green.

[06:46]

This park had trees and scented flowers and birds, and they they attracted the queen. And so she thought she would take a rest there. And she ordered her procession and all the bearers to stop. And she got down and she rested under one of the trees and realized that the birth was beginning then, that she was, her time had become due. And she stood up and she reached for an overhanging branch. And as she reached up, this baby was born out of her side, which I don't know. Maybe she had Velcro, who knows. But it was born out of her side and this was a good sign.

[07:52]

Now, it gets interesting. It was already interesting that it was born out of her side. But according to the legends, right after his birth, this baby began to walk. Do you believe that? baby began to walk and he took seven steps in a circle and at each step a lotus flower appeared and he pointed with one hand to the heavens and the other to the earth and you'll see if you look at the baby buddha it's in that posture and he looked in the four directions he turned in each of the Above the earth and under the heaven, I alone am the honored one." So, not only did he walk, but he talked.

[08:58]

And not only did he talk, but he made a rather major pronouncement, which was carried on CNN that night. But it was fake news. That's not true. It was real news. Now, there's an interesting I sort of question whether our Zen tradition is very iconoclastic and there was a commentary by the great Tang Dynasty Zen master Yunmen regarding the Buddha's birth and Master Yunmen said, had I witnessed this I would have knocked him dead with one stroke and fed him to the dogs in order to bring about peace on earth. Then you can think about that one too.

[10:06]

I'm just trying to kind of give you thoughts to spur you on. So Queen Maya returned to Kapilavastu and the king was thrilled to meet his son and the news spread throughout the kingdom. And one of the people who heard was King Suradhana's old teacher, Ashta, who was a wise man and a spiritual being. And he lived in the jungle, but the news got everywhere. And he went immediately to see the king and the queen. The king was really so happy to see his old teacher and to show him his son, his firstborn son. He brought the prince before Ashta and said, teacher, my son was born only yesterday. Can you tell me what you see in his future? Ashta looked at the child and said, the prince will be a king of kings if he wants to rule.

[11:14]

If he chooses religious life, then he will become the wisest. the awakened one, the Buddha. And he was given the name, the prince was given the name Siddhartha, which means wish fulfilled or one who has accomplished the goal. But his life was marked by loss immediately Seven days after his birth, Siddhartha's mother died. And he was raised by Queen Maya's younger sister, who we chant, who was the first among the women disciples, Mahapajapati.

[12:16]

And she raised him. She had also given birth to a son on the same day. And so she fed him and she raised him as her own son. And the story says that Siddhartha could not remember his mother. So his life was marked by loss from the beginning. So that's the story. That's the outlines of the story of the Buddha's birth. I think it suggests that a couple of things. First of all, that all of us have the potential to be a Buddha within this life. And even though Buddha said, I alone, beneath the heavens and above the earth, I'm the world honored one. That was his potential. That wasn't the fact at that moment.

[13:21]

He had the remarkable capacity to see what his potential was, even as a newborn, but he still had to cultivate it and practice and develop it over the next several decades before he actually became awakened. And so we need to activate this potential within ourselves just as he did. The Buddha did not wait and see. He didn't expect someone else to do this for him or to, you know, hand him what he already intuitively knew was his birthright. He had to realize it. He had to bring it forth through his efforts and through his practice. and so he practiced quite diligently when the time had come.

[14:22]

We have this potential. This birthday can remind us of our potential and we can be born as well. The other question that, the other point that comes up for me is for those of us who are parents, what can we do to bring forth the Buddha nature of our children? Because they are also born with all of the potentials of a Buddha and we need to help them We need to help them navigate the losses and the difficulties of the world so that they can actually benefit the world. This is our responsibility as parents or as adults, as people who are around children.

[15:25]

Children are just this vital, growing aspect of our lives. And to help them be born as who they truly are. I think that's the message of Buddha's birthday is to help all of us, to help our children, to help ourselves be born as Buddhas on that path to bring harmony and peace in the world. So that's my talk for today. And in a few moments we'll set up for the Buddha's birthday celebration in here and I think hopefully everyone will find it enjoyable. And then there's an excellent Buddha's birthday cake, which probably will not have 2,562 candles. That would be too large a conflagration, I'm afraid, but the cake will be very good.

[16:34]

And also, we will have a gathering of this room full of Buddhas who can mix and mingle and talk and celebrate our birthday together. So, thank you.

[16:53]

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