Great Enlightenment. What is being said, as I understand it, is that the extent to which we are in touch with that level of our humanity, to that extent will we be able to understand, to awaken, to have insight into what in fact this might mean. Whereas if we have just little doubt, in other words, if our perplexity, our inquiry into our life is perhaps merely philosophical or psychological, it's something that's going on in our heads, it's an intellectual curiosity. I'd really like to be able to figure this out, but it doesn't really touch one's heart. then the kind of insight, the kind of understanding that one can have will be limited by the extent of one's rather shallower question.

[01:14]

And if one has no doubt, no perplexity, if life doesn't really raise these feelings in one at all, then One cannot really have any hope or any wish for seeing life in any other way. No doubt, no enlightenment. To me, this is a very crucial, a very central part of spiritual practice, is recognizing, not forgetting, what it is that inspires us to practice in the first place. And instead of perhaps having these experiences at a certain time in our life, perhaps when we leave home or when our marriage breaks down or when a relative dies, and for certain moments being in touch with this intensity of inquiry.

[02:26]

And then, as it were, rushing for some kind of palliative, some kind of salve in religion or philosophy or in counseling or in psychotherapy, and adopting a certain institutionalized response. In other words, buying into a belief system How often are belief systems just ways of disguising these questions in what seems to be a more authentic way? And how easy it is once we take on board a set of beliefs to actually forget what inspired us to seek belief in the first place. How easy is it for us to lose touch with those fundamental impulses of uncertainty and perplexity that cause us to have an interest in spirituality in the first place?

[03:43]

So to cultivate doubt, to make doubt or perplexity as part of one's spiritual path, means to constantly keep alive this sense of perplexity and uncertainty. Because that is really where the spiritual life, as it were, resonates. That is where it strikes, for me, its deepest chords. Now, I feel in all Buddhist traditions, one finds contemplative dimensions or certain teachings that are focused in on this recognition. And I think merely to recollect the Buddha's own example is probably one of the strongest reminders we have in pointing out how

[04:49]

any kind of insight is dependent upon the context out of which it arises. In this sense, practice is always a challenge to our desire for complacency. our desire for having some kind of security and comfort which is justified because it's spiritual, it's Buddhist, it's Zen, it's Tantric or whatever. Now I was very much drawn to Zen practice because of coming across a book by a Korean teacher called Kusan, in which this cultivation of doubt was very much the central theme. The traditions I'd been working in up to that point had not emphasized it to such a degree.

[05:57]

And in the teachings of Kusan Sunim, he actually provided a retreat situation, a monastic training situation in which the cultivation of such perplexity and doubt was what the whole thing was about. And so I made the decision to go to this monastery and train under his guidance in this particular form of practice. So I'd like to say something about how in this Buddhist tradition, the Korean Zen tradition, the method of practice itself is aimed at strengthening and cultivating this doubt. The main means is through the use of Kun'an or Koan.

[07:04]

And in particular, the koan most widely used in Korea today is the question, what is this? Or what is it? Imokko. This is what you then take as your object of meditation. And it is understood that what is important about the Koan practice is not getting some right answer to that question, but rather that that Koan, that question, what is this, becomes the avenue to the perplexity that gives rise to spiritual life at the very center. So that once this repetition of the koan has triggered this sensation of doubt, this feeling of doubt,

[08:13]

then that is where you stay. And the practice is one of focusing, as it were, becoming that perplexity, becoming that doubt and remaining with it, intensifying it, becoming alive to it. In the Mumonkan, when the explanation is given on the Koan Mu. It says that one should question with the 360 bones in one's body, and one should question with the pores of one's skin. And this is a very beautiful image for the quality of questioning or doubting or being perplexed that the Koan practice is about.

[09:17]

It's not about asking any questions with your mind, of saying, move, move, move, or what is this, what is this, what is this? But it's rather a question that comes out of the very marrow of your bones. It's a feeling of intense bewilderment and perplexity that is not just a mental activity, but is something that your whole being partakes of, resides in, and as it were, explores and defines. This particular koan has its origins in an encounter between the sixth patriarch, Huineng, or Ino in Japanese, and his disciple Huizhang, and in Japanese who is called Nangaku.

[10:25]

Now Nangaku came to see Ino, and upon arriving at the monastery, Ino said, where have you come from? And Nangaku said, I've come from Mount Song. And then Ino said, but what is this thing? And how did it get here? And to this Nangaku was speechless. Completely threw him off. It, as it were, cast him into this perplexity about who he was and what it meant to be here. Nangaku stayed with Ino for eight years. And at the end of eight years, he went back to him and said, I have some understanding. And Ino asked him, okay, what is this? And Nangaku said, to say it's like something misses the point. So much for intellectual clarity on that issue.

[11:33]

Now, this has then become one of the traditional koans used in Rinzai practice. But we also find a reference to this in Dogon. So in the Buddha nature section of the Shobogenzo, Dogen says, what is the essence of the world honored one's words, everything is a living being, all beings are the Buddha nature. And he replies to himself, they are a verbal preaching of what is it that thus comes. So when Dogen says that all beings are Buddha nature, he asks himself what does this mean and he gives the very question that Ino asked Nangaku.

[12:43]

What is this thing and how did it get here? Or what is it that thus comes? It's translated in millions of different ways. Now this I think is a very profound insight, something I can't claim to fully understand at all. But to me it gives a glimpse into the centrality of perplexity in Zen practice. To say that all things are the Buddha nature is somehow to make a final, an ultimate assertion about life. In other words, all things are not just trees and buildings and altars and men and women and dogs and cats. But in some profound way, they are the Buddha, the Buddha nature.

[13:44]

When Dogon asks himself, what does that mean? He says, it's the same thing as saying, what is this thing and how did it get here? In other words, again, here I'm speculating, in other words, somehow that statement resolves itself to a question. We have this tendency to want answers in nice categorical terms, in affirmations. or in nice concrete images, Buddha nature, or in Indian Buddhism, Anatman, non-self, Shunyata, emptiness, Tathagatagarbha, the womb of the Buddha, and so on and so forth. That gives us something to hold on to, some concept whereby we can

[14:50]

as it were, circumscribe reality. We can define reality. Dogen is suggesting that perhaps the most we can say about our life, about our being, is that it is a question. That life itself poses it, life poses itself to us as a question. that if we make that shift in our thinking from defining things in positive terms to considering life as an interrogative, as a question mark, perhaps we are getting closer to the edge of what we can say. Perhaps the term, what Dogen calls verbal preaching, of the word what, or why, or how, these noises, these articulate sounds, perhaps get as close as we can to articulating in language the mystery of all beings being Buddha nature.

[16:20]

In more Western parlance, we could say perhaps that we are opening up to the mystery of life, the mysteriousness of being. That when we sense how extraordinarily uncanny It is to be, to exist, to breathe, to smile, to frown. We touch what we might articulate as mystery. And mystery surely also contains this notion of questionability. We cannot really say what it is. All that we are aware of is that it is mysterious. It is something we do not know, and yet it is alive. It is something that moves us, something that moves us very deeply.

[17:26]

And the expression, what is this, is the way in which that mysteriousness of life finds words. And so we come back here again to this practice in Zen of working with the koan, what is this? We're not working with some antique Chinese riddle. We're not trying to come to some traditionally approved answer. But we are using the question as an avenue to awakening our own perplexity, our own doubts, our own uncertainties about what it means to be alive. And that is the practice. Again, it's a practice that has nothing to do essentially with sitting on a cushion, with formally meditating,

[18:38]

But it is an attitude of mind that as we practice, as we activate and intensify this sense, carries through into all that we do, into eating and walking, bathing, everything. That's all I have to say about the practice of doubt. But we still have 20 minutes or so, and I'd be very happy to respond to any questions or any comments, and I'd be very glad to hear of anybody else's insights or comments on what has been said. Yes.

[19:44]

I began practicing the Zen tradition, and now I remember I've done that too. I'm very drawn to both of them, and I'm experiencing a lot of what feels like the unhealthy gout with the tantric practice right now. I wonder if you could speak to continuing tantric practice without, how it feels right now, without a teacher. On one level, this is something we'd have to talk about personally. I mean, this is an issue that is very much your issue and it's difficult for me to generalize. Is the main question you have that of being without a teacher,

[20:58]

and the difficulties that that gives rise to? Or is it about the practice itself? I experience a lot of doubt. Well, it feels like a healthy doubt about the practice. I don't doubt it. It has more to do right now with a lack of focus in the community. And it's a difficult practice I'm doing. I know it's hard for me. without a sense of strong guidance at this point? Well, the Vajrayana tradition itself emphasizes very much the need to have a close rapport with a teacher. Perhaps of all the Buddhist traditions, it's the one that lays the greatest emphasis on that teacher-disciple relationship. Now, In my experience, that does not necessarily mean that the teacher actually be living.

[22:06]

That, in a sense, the presence of the teacher should not be confused with that teacher's physical existence. And you find, for example, in Milarepa that much of his practice was sustained by his relationship with his teacher in a more, let's say, spiritual dimension, a spiritual way, without actually being physically present with the teacher. And as I understand Tantric Buddhism, the teacher is, as it were, just a cipher or a symbol, an earthly symbol for the Buddha, the Buddha nature. So trust in the teacher need not be confused with trust in that particular physical manifestation of the teacher. That the teacher is, as it were, present in spite of his physical absence or her physical absence.

[23:14]

So that may be one way to help sustain the connection with the teacher, would be to see it in that way. But in purely practical terms, we do need physical teachers to give us physical instructions. We do need a supportive community of women and men to sustain our own resolve and our own commitment. And if that breaks down, then we are, as it were, deprived of a ground upon which to feel comfortable and which to feel secure. And that is a great crisis in spiritual life, and one that is not easy to work through. But I feel if, again, these questions really have to be resolved from within yourself, that there's no general answer that anyone can give you to answer them.

[24:19]

So really, that's all I can say. yes uh... Maybe I should say something about the way in which the koan is used in Korean practice, or at least in the practice that I was taught. And that is that the koan is something that once you take it on, then you take it on for your whole life. You don't have the idea that you pass it and then you move on to another one.

[25:22]

And again, the koan is really just a means to connect you with this sense of perplexity. So in a sense, once you've got this sense of perplexity centered in your practice, then the form of the koan is quite irrelevant. In my own case, I find that working formally with the Koan in meditation retreats, in Sesshin and so on, that of course is a situation that is very conducive and very helpful in deepening that sense of doubt. But on the other hand, the practice cannot really be integrated in life if one cannot sustain it outside of particular retreat situations. So on the one hand, I feel that the initial intensity of that practice is not so strong with me as it was, say, when I was in Korea.

[26:33]

But I feel also that it is something that has become so much part of my life that it is present for a large degree of my time. It's something that's always with me. I think going back to your point also, the teacher who embodied that process, that his presence also is, as it were, alive in the practice itself, in that sense of doubt that I call it. And in that sense there is a very strong connection, although he also has died. Yes? What do you think the connection between doubt and gratitude is? Gratitude? doubt in the sense that you're talking about.

[27:37]

I don't think I've ever thought of it in those terms. Do you mean gratitude in a kind of gratitude for being alive? Gratitude to a tradition or a teaching? Feeling of gratitude. I suppose you could say feeling of connection, but a gratitude for a connection that one feels. Connection with life, you mean? Connection with life? Yes. or letting go of smaller doubts. I certainly feel that this doubt that I've been talking about is something that has a connective quality to experience, to being in this world.

[28:50]

It's not a dissociating state of mind. It's not, in a sense, like a Cartesian doubt, that, you know, you make this clear distinction between the doubting mind and the things that are doubted. It's not separating in that way. And you could say, for example, when we ask, what is this? In a sense, we're asking, what is it, what is this that asks, what is this? And it kind of has a, almost an infinite regression to it, that you're always thrown back upon where that question is coming from. And the deeper that you are thrown back into its origins, the more one perhaps feels more connected. But connected is, is a problematic word because I think also the recognition of your not knowing, of your ignorance, of your confusion, is an acknowledgement of disconnection.

[29:58]

So I feel it somehow focuses the tension between connection and disconnection. Yes? has something to do with the previous one. The connection between doubt and faith. Can you give us some thoughts on it? You have in Zen this idea that there are, at least in Rinzai Zen, this idea that there are three pillars or three main foci of practice and they are great doubt, great courage, and great faith. So faith and doubt are clearly seen as mutually supportive. And I think by putting them together, as it were, helps understand them both.

[31:03]

That faith, that is just, that refuses to acknowledge doubt. In other words, what I would call belief, a fixed belief, a blind belief, that for me is not faith. For faith to be genuine, it has to be open to the deepest doubts. Faith, as it were, is forged in the midst of doubt. It is not a denial of doubt. And likewise, doubt is not a denial of faith. The doubt is in relation to faith just as faith is in relation to doubt. The two are, necessitate one another. There is no such thing as intrinsically existent faith or intrinsically existent doubt. They are mutually dependent.

[32:04]

They come into being because of each other. one cannot really have one without the other. And the acknowledgement of that, both theoretically and in practice, I feel is very important. It prevents on the one hand a kind of fanaticism or a kind of narrow-mindedness, sectarianism. If one's faith is always open to doubt, always acknowledges doubt, then that kind of closed-minded sectarianism has very little ground to grow on. And if one's doubt is contextualized by faith, then I feel one is preserved or saved from the dangers of cynicism, nihilism, atheism even, that one is not liable to spin off into, well, it's all meaningless.

[33:13]

Yes? Yes, you've made a really interesting case about doubt, actually. But as I was thinking about it, particularly in the context of how you first brought it up, which was as one of the hindrances. My understanding of the hindrances is that, well, it's one way to look at them, is that we all have different aspects of all of the hindrances in us, and maybe one of them is particularly the other ones. But couldn't the same case, couldn't a good case be made that any of the tendencies has an other side? I mean, and couldn't each of those be, you know, couldn't there be great anger, great enlightenment, or great sloth and welfare? You know, you have to fill out the case.

[34:21]

Well, I think what you're putting your finger on is the tantric tradition, which says precisely that. That in Vajrayana, the whole anger, desire, jealousy, all these things are recognized to be not things that are essentially bad in themselves and to be somehow sort of booted out, but are essentially energy. And energy can be transformed from a kind of negative neurotic aspect to a transcendent enlightened aspect. And so you have these deities in Indian and Tibetan tantric Buddhism, which are the wrathful manifestations of the Buddha. And very often they are associated with these very so-called hindrances that you speak of.

[35:27]

And in that sense, I also feel that the practice of doubt in Zen is a tantric practice. because I feel that most Buddhist traditions have a tantric dimension to them at some level, but not all traditions of Buddhism actually have a formal tantric schema of actually saying, yeah, we are doing this tantric practice of transforming this, that, and the other. The Tibetans and in the Shingon you have it as it were articulated into a system but I feel the principles of transformation that are key to tantric practice are found certainly in Zen and probably in most or many other traditions as well. How it's different or how it's the same?

[36:40]

Or both? There are differences when we say Zen. There are cultural differences, Chinese, Korean, Japanese, and often the relationship to the teacher has both a spiritual core and um... cultural formalities as well so we have to be clear about what aspect we're speaking of i'm more interested in i understand what you're saying i'm less interested in the cultural tradition and i'm more interested in the spiritual core in that sense i feel that uh... mahayana buddhism in general I think all genuine spiritual relationships have this same core, which is one of trust, openness, conviction, honesty, and at the same time that

[37:48]

that interpersonal context being the medium for the transmission, another difficult word, the communication, let's say, of insights that the tradition carries from generation to generation. I think what I'm asking is that Tantra appears It looks to me, from where I'm sitting at this point, as though there's more to do. There's more to do? In Tantra, that it's more broad, that there's more sort of practices than in Zen tradition. And I think what I'm asking is that there seems to be a different vehicle. Maybe it's not different, maybe it's the same, that's what I'm asking. Does it appear a certain way and actually Well, that's certainly an issue you have to address, yes.

[39:01]

The Tibetan tantric traditions do tend to give you more to do, but I don't really think, when it comes down to the nuts and bolts of practice, that one is more or less difficult than the other, that spiritual practice involves a complete dedication of oneself. whether you are simply focusing on a koan, you know, what is this, or mu or something, or whether you're trying to visualize the entire mandala of Guhyasamaja. Now, I personally find that the complexity of the Tibetan tradition was one that tended to sort of augment my own neurotic complexity. And what I really felt I needed in my life was simplicity. I think that's part of what I'm asking. I think what I'm saying is that it looks to me as though the emphasis is different and that in Mahayana the ball is constantly being hit back into your side of the court.

[40:08]

It's constantly going back to you and there's a reliance on the Sangha. Right. On your own. Okay. Yes. Again, I'm sorry, I was slightly confused as to how you're using the word Mahayana. Right. I think that's probably true. Yes. Yes? So, really, I just, I think our practice is actually grounded in that type of question.

[41:21]

Yes, good. Yes, sir? Well, I'm struggling with either understanding or not understanding what you've been saying about doubt. And I'm wondering about the merits of understanding doubt. Well, however clear the explanation is, that does not necessarily translate into a clarity of what you actually do. And if the explanation is clear, then perhaps that might inspire you to actually do it, and then the explanation would have been fruitful. If it's been so clear that you go away thinking, oh, now I understand that,

[42:24]

It probably hasn't been a very good talk. A residual confusion. Yes, well, perhaps even more than a residual confusion. Okay, I think we have to stop in a minute. Just one more question? Could you say a little bit more about the tantric aspect of Zen? I think I said more or less everything. It comes down to really the extent to which Zen utilizes the principle of transformation. we transform doubt or perplexity into enlightenment. To say great doubt, great enlightenment seems to be a very, is a transformative concept. And to the extent to which that transformative dimension is incorporated into practice, to me that has, if not formally, at least informally, a tantric quality.

[43:35]

Okay?

[43:36]

@Text_v004
@Score_JJ