It's been a rather dramatic New Year so far in Northern California. The subject of my talk is not the flooding, but I do want to mention it because I don't want to ignore it. Two years ago, I think it was two years ago, when I was at Tassajara in the spring, it was a similar situation. The flooding, it wasn't quite as dramatic as this year. But we were, it rained considerably and the road was completely covered with landslides. Nine landslides on the 14-mile road.

[01:05]

And the creek, Tassajara Creek was rising. And it just kept rising and rising. And when you see something like that, the tremendous force of the water going by. You can see how fast it's going when you see a log going like that with tremendous speed and force. And so you're living right there with this dynamic power going by. And Tassajara Creek goes through the side, there's a mountain, and the creek is right along the mountain, and then Tassajara is on the other side of the creek, in a very narrow valley. And then there's another, and then there's a road that goes, this is the creek, and then there's a road going this way, coming into Tassajara this way.

[02:22]

And then there's a gate here. And there's another creek that crosses under the road and comes back around and flows through Tassajara to this creek. And just about 200 yards up from the gate is where it goes under the road. And there was a landslide which diverted the water from the creek, and it started coming down the road, but we didn't know that. And someone said, gee, it seems like an awful lot of water coming down the road, inside the gate. So we went up and opened the gate, and the water, the road was the creek, and it was piling up behind the gate. So it was a kind of situation where you walk, you step outside thinking you're going someplace and then suddenly you find you have a shovel in your hand and you're moving mud.

[03:32]

And this kind of situation is very, you have to think very quickly and respond very quickly and let go of whatever it is that you think you are doing and just take care of the situation at the moment. Mark was there. It was fun. Floods are not fun. But it was kind of a wonderful, energizing experience. Now, how are they doing this season down there with all this rain? It's not so bad. But that was, we had to divert the creek, divert the road, the water of the road into the other creek. Anyway, I just don't want to let this go unnoticed.

[04:34]

To talk about something when there's so much going on, to talk about some other subject Last month, December, some of us were invited to go to Robert Aiken Roshi's retirement ceremony in Honolulu. Robert Aiken is 79 years old. He's been involved in Zen practice since the 40s. He lived most of his life in the islands.

[05:39]

In 1941, I think he was on Guam, one of the islands, and he was captured by the Japanese. He was a civilian. He was in a concentration camp. during most of the war. And he studied with some of the earliest teachers, earliest Japanese Zen teachers who came to America. Nyogen Sensaki, who came very early and was a Dharma brother of D.T. Suzuki, was one of his teachers. And it's interesting that during the war, Nyogen Sensaki was in an American concentration camp, and Ekenoshi was in a Japanese concentration camp. And for the same reasons.

[06:45]

They just happened to be in that place at the time. Yasutani Roshi was one of the early teachers to come to America, who was one of his main teachers. In those days, it's interesting how the teachers influenced the students and the practice of the students continues in the same vain as the teachers, even though there's modification and change over time. But Eken Roshi's teachers, like Nyogen Senzaki, had what he called a floating zendo. He didn't have any special place, but he was here before anybody else.

[07:47]

And so he would just travel around from place to place And when there were people who wanted to practice with him, he would find a place and they would practice for a while and then he'd go someplace else. So he was just kind of introducing practice to America in some way. And people sat in chairs. He never asked anybody to sit cross-legged. And he was very sympathetic to housewives and businessmen and ordinary people and didn't want them to feel they had to act like monks. And Yasutani Roshi, we used to call him the Jet Roshi. Not Jet Set, but... Because he used to jet around from one place to another, doing Sashins. He was in his 80s, I think, when he was doing all this.

[08:50]

Very energetic guy. This is back in the 60s. And so Eiken Roshi's practice has some of that quality. Although he always had a practice place, a temple, the Sangha life was not such a strong aspect of his practice. Whereas Suzuki Roshi, our teacher when he came to America, emphasized Sangha And when he came, he settled in one place and stayed in one place and didn't go anywhere. Totally the opposite. So that's one reason why Zen Center practice places have such a strong Sangha practice.

[09:54]

and a pretty solid foundation in sangha and a place to practice. Maybe the definition of sangha would be helpful. Oh, yeah. Sangha means the community, the people who practice. And Suzuki Roshi's practice was daily practice. daily practice has always been the emphasis. And for someone like Yasutani Roshi, although daily practice is important, Sashin, sitting intensive periods of Zazen, was most important. So these two ways of practice developed, I think, and continue to develop, from the teacher's influence in that way.

[10:57]

Meikin Roshi just got finished building a brand new practice place called Pololo. Alan was there working on it for just last summer and now he's retired. And he does have a successor who will take over the place, but he doesn't live there and he will only fly there for three or four times a month a year to do Sashin. So I don't understand that kind of... I understand it, but it's hard for me to... deal with that a little bit, because I like the energy, the daily practice energy. But it's a different way.

[11:59]

And Akin Roshi has been a very influential teacher in America and in the West. He's written many of the best books, and his insights are very good. I think their tradition also depends more on koan study, where our tradition depends more on daily zazen and how you live your life according to zazen as zazen. So, different emphasis. And although we all get along well together, there's sometimes a little bit of friction because of the emphasis in our practices. But that friction is good. It sends little sparks sometimes.

[13:03]

So, there was a wonderful Chinese dinner and then there was a very nice ceremony of stepping down. It wasn't as stepping down as a retirement ceremony. And Egan Roshi will go to the big island, Hawaii, where his son lives, and write his memoirs and more books. I think that's what he's really into, is writing books. Now, not dealing with the day-to-day complexities of running a Zen center, dealing with people's lives and stuff like that. Which brings to mind that I will be having a stepping down ceremony at San Francisco Zen Center.

[14:14]

I've been Abbot, co-Abbot of San Francisco Zen Center for nine years. And at first it was four years, and then extended to three years, which is the term now for San Francisco Zen Center Abbott. And then they wanted me to stay two more years. I said, OK, even though I didn't particularly want to. So now, January 29th, we'll have a stepping down ceremony. It's not a retirement ceremony. I'm not retiring. Essentially, people are thinking about that we should start thinking about my retirement, you know, which I think is good. One of these days, you know,

[15:16]

find myself in a wheelchair or something, suddenly. But I never thought about retiring. It's something that never occurred to me. Well, it occurred to me, but I never wanted to be in a position where I had a job that I retired from. Because I always wanted my life, my work to be my life. And how can you retire from your life? We should think about this, and I'm happy to think about this. And sometimes I think it would be nice to step back a little bit in order to make a transition, a very easy transition. Most of the transitions that I've seen of teachers and students had been very bumpy, not very good.

[16:24]

Suzuki Hiroshi's transition, when he asked Baker Hiroshi to be abbot of San Francisco Zen Center in 1971, was very difficult. The transition itself was difficult. Whenever there's a transition, a lot of people leave, because they're very much attached to the present teacher and the present teacher's way. And then when someone else takes that place, there's no connection. And so they go away. That is very common. Kadagiri Roshi made no transition plans. and Minnesota is falling to pieces. Anyway, it's always a problem.

[17:28]

It would be nice to have a transition where it happens nicely and smoothly and everybody feels harmonious. That would be nice. But I'm only 67. And so I will continue here as long as I can, because this is my life. But I also am interested in making space for other teachers and bringing teachers up without being competitive. So this is kind of what I'm looking forward to from now, is to develop teachers

[18:47]

and people that we all trust, so that we have enough teachers and not have to worry. So this is a... When I do have my stepping down ceremony at Zen Center, January 29th, I will still be practicing with Zen Center, doing teaching. But I won't have any administrative duties. And my focus will be Berkeley Zen Center. As my, you know, not like it has been over the last nine years. And I'd like to know what you feel.

[20:00]

It's important to have a tradition. The one thing I felt about Suzuki Roshi was that when he came to America, He planted himself as the root. He just screwed himself into the ground as the root. And then the plant grew out of the root and flourished because the root was so strong and so healthy. And so we do have this touchstone in this tradition. But There's also the development and the flowering of this practice. And if we stay too close to the root, we become, we don't move very much, become kind of stodgy.

[21:07]

And if we blossom too quickly, we become like these big flowers that get very heavy and then they fall off. So, how to keep a balance between our traditional practice and our development in this country and with the people we have, and keeping up with the times. You know, we're always a little bit behind the times, which is okay, but we shouldn't be too far behind. Otherwise, we become a kind of anachronism. we have to stay healthy and in tune with the changing, with how things change, and religion changes. I think one of the biggest problems people have with religion is thinking that religion should never change.

[22:14]

It should always be exactly the same. while everything else changes around it. And there is a quality of that that's true. But Suzuki Roshi, I remember, always used to say, the reason why Buddhism is still viable is because it's not finished. So in every generation, we have to know how to adapt ourselves to it and to adapt it to ourselves so that it is meaningful for us in this time. And I think that's what we have to work with. So what I'm saying is, what do you think we have to work on?

[23:20]

What do you think we have to work with? What should we be focusing on from here on? Is that a rhetorical question? No, it's not a rhetorical question. human brain.

[24:23]

And around that now are all these studies that, you know, I mean, a hundred some years ago, psychology, psychiatry was, you know, data. Some people call it science. But, um, Buddhadharma has a tremendous amount to contribute along those lines. I just don't know how that should be approached, but the potential is just unbelievable. Well, it's a very interesting question. The biggest problem that I have encountered is the problem of proof. In science, everything has to be proven.

[25:28]

And in Buddhism, everything should be proven as well, right? But the way we prove something is like if you have an apple And you say, what is this? The scientist will say, well, cut it up into a piece and put it under a microscope and all that. But the Zen student will take the apple and take a bite out of it. It's an apple. I know it's an apple. So there's knowing and there's knowledge. Science is knowledge and Zen is knowing. But there are just different ways of proving something.

[26:37]

How do you prove what Zazen is? By doing it. Yes. But I have these books. that were data that were collected in the 60s by Japanese scientists who tested out the Zen masters, the Zen students. And I think Dali was involved in that. And they took all this data, you know, trying to find out what it was that was involved. And the data is there if you want to read it. But nobody reads it. If you want to know what Zazen is, you sit. So we know what that is, but we can't.

[27:46]

You can't write it down. It's like dissecting the cat. It does not tell you what the cat is. extended to Fridays, afternoons, as well. See, we have a morning sangha and an afternoon sangha. We have two groups. And sometimes they meet, but mostly they don't. Saturday they meet. And every Monday morning we have a talk by somebody.

[28:49]

But the afternoon just kind of is Zazen. And in the past couple of years, during practice period, I have a tea in the afternoon on Friday. And so we decided that we would have student talks and my tea on Friday. And I think people love that. So that's an extension. And it gives the afternoon people something similar to the morning people. the ritual and all of the studying about the history and so forth.

[29:55]

Something about why we are here and what we're doing. Self-revelation. I would call that. You reveal yourself. And that's very important. People get what we call way-seeking mind talks. After a person's been here for a while, we ask them to give a way-seeking mind talk. What were the events in your life that led to your doing this? So it's a little bit of a historical talk, and people get to know you that way, and then somehow you feel easier about being here. But self-knowledge, Yes, that's the goal of practice. Self-knowledge. Knowing that you have no self.

[30:59]

and perhaps choose a profession. Yeah. Well, that's the saying, by its fruits shall you know. By its fruits shall you know. By its fruits, yeah, yeah.

[32:33]

But it seems to me that in our Sangha we have a nice array of expression of the different forms of Buddhism and women, Buddhism and psychology, the relationship between priest practice and lay practice. It seems that we already have those, all those elements that And also the relationship between Buddhism and science, we have scientists also. So it's a very fertile time. Rebecca?

[33:33]

And I hope that there's still that room for us to funnel one. And I mean, just watching something change, like being able to recognize the names of women who have developed, or the idea of women. I mean, it's awkward. is how many people miss music terribly in our practice. I mean, there's the... Oh, I see what you're saying. We don't have the organ. I didn't hear you. We don't have the organ. Thank you. And it's come up at different times.

[35:21]

And I thought of it at Christmas time. You know, and for ever since we had a family thing with some friends. I mean, all those Christian songs have been going through my head. You know, like my wife always says, the Christians have the music. No doubt about it. What would you like us to be open to? Just working on our rituals and our things.

[36:22]

Musically? and leaving room for some things that aren't Japanese. Developing our own music. Is that what you mean? Without saying so? simple things that are really based on playing songs. And it can be read, you know, very, very easily. And I know that Yvonne is beginning to do that. And it isn't necessary. Maybe it's just looking at what other people do with children. I think there's some money for it there.

[37:28]

OK, I hear you. I mean, you could just bring your recorder down there. I spent a little time at the Shasta group, Roshi Kenneth's group, and what they'd actually done was set the chanting of the Sutras to some of the unused Gregorian chants, and it was extraordinarily beautiful. And they didn't have anything fancy, they just had a little electronic keyboard just to play each of the parts, and it was really easy to learn it. I think for me it was the most extraordinarily beautiful part of their whole ceremony. Somebody else in the back had their hand up. Yeah. Speaking of just Abby, I mean, there's another transition on the way.

[38:34]

I don't know in terms of difficulties. Well, see, for someone who is not Anglican. That would seem very foreign. As foreign to me as the Japanese would be to somebody else. The Japanese are much more familiar to me. Although I like Gregorian chant as Gregorian chant. I don't like it. I don't know if I like it as... But that's just my opinion, you know, as Buddhist chant. Yeah, she does.

[39:50]

I think she has a successor, but it's difficult. And also Master Hua. Master Hua? Oh, probably. The city of 10,000 Buddhas. Oh, yeah. That's also a difficult transition. Thank you. To offer another candidate, I was just reading about two virtual reality and augmented reality. So I say, how about Buddhism and the Internet? Well, that's already happening. Yes, but it's only the very beginning. Yeah, it's the beginning. Where is it going? Well, I'm not asking you to prognosticate. Computer won't reach it.

[40:51]

Too weak. Is there a budget request now? practice here Suzuki Roshi. There's a kind of edge of practice that they have.

[42:14]

At Palolo, even though they have a weak community, those people who are practicing practice with a kind of intensity. And a lot of people here practice with a lot of intensity. And somehow, to build on that intensity, which I think we've been doing with dharma groups, we've been doing with social action power of carrying our practice forward in daily life, that's really what we can, I think we can build on that. I think that's something that you've been really working with over these years. We do it within a container of form, and to a unclear, sloppy, perhaps compared to the Japanese.

[43:18]

really acknowledging everyone's lay practice, that seems to me really powerful and important. I'm finding my mind worrying and I'm getting very anxious about this expansion idea because it's scary but it's also very exciting. You know, what comes to mind are ideas of Buddhism having a profound impact on the politics of this country. And my fear would be that lay people would get so far away from the ground and just hear that they'd fall off like the overblown flower that we talked about. I think about at another loft, where are we going to put people?

[44:50]

I have a sense that this is such a profoundly supportive environment that people are going to be pouring in and where do they go? Do we need to start looking at a Berkeley Zen Center business? I don't know how this will And I don't worry about, you know, is this big enough or something. When it's too small, then we'll worry about it. When it's become too small for about five years, then we'll worry about it. But I don't think, you know, it's like the little Chinese restaurant that people stand in line to get into. people, you know, want to get up in another restaurant.

[45:56]

I want to articulate this as best I can, sort of adding on to what everyone said. I personally would not like to see the chants anglicized, and I like chanting in Japanese, and I like the tradition. I like the simplicity of it. I don't care about the internet. When I come here, I just want a simple practice. And I'd like it to be as close to the tradition as possible. And I know that the wonderfulness of Zen is that it changes, or Buddhism changes, according to the culture in which it is being practiced. But I would like to adhere to the tradition. I see a lot of the forms deteriorating, personally. Over the years that I've been here, it's gotten really sloppy, and I don't think we should be rigid. I like the flexibility here, but I just see simple forms deteriorating because they're not being reiterated, and when new people come, they don't know what to do. And I think we should pay attention to sort of maintaining the structure of the whole thing.

[47:08]

And people do come. I think that's a good analogy. The little restaurant becomes large, And then people stop coming, and the beauty of it gets diluted. So I just wanted to throw that out there. Melody? Well, I'd just like to say something about the importance of the role that you play as Abbott. I think that what Raoul said about all the diversity, or things going on, and all the growth, and that's all true. I feel like it would all just spin away to nothing if you weren't here to guide us and be the container and teach us the forms and be our leader. And so when you talk about retirement and everything, I feel very insecure about that. And I wanted to ask you a question. I wasn't here when Suzuki Roshi was here or when he died.

[48:12]

Do you think that he did that made it so that you all knew to go on when he died? Integrity. Integrity. That was the main thing. He just had this integrity and simplicity. And during that time when he was abbot, people felt that Zen Center was a place that had more integrity than any place else that I'd ever been to. So, it's a rare and wonderful quality, and hard to maintain. But he invoked it in others. He invoked it in others. Yes. Yeah, well, yes. Namely yourself. I do. My point is, like Melody's, I think it would be very beneficial for all of us to have you hear more, regardless if you lead us or follow us, just that you're with us.

[49:32]

And I look forward, maybe as a representative of the Afternoon Sangha, to see you. And to that end, a little further, that one of the things that helps me bring the Dharma into my daily life is design and study and I feel I would love to see you teach more classes and more of the classes continue. And a lot of what Alan said, I would underscore the dharma groups, but also things like, I'm forgetting the name of the ceremony now, I can't believe it. What do we do? Shosan, more Shosan, where people sort of exercise their Skipping with you and sort of bringing forth the dharma. That sort of thing, I think, for me, keeps me up on the edge of my game, so to speak. And having you around more makes all of that more lively. And it brings more of the daily quality back.

[50:33]

So, welcome back. And I think that'll be it. Julie? Yeah, I just wanted to... I think the Dharma group idea is really good, and it may not have worked terribly well this first semester, so to speak, but I think it's really worth pursuing. And if it didn't work, have to figure out why it didn't, and to make it work. Yeah, I think that's really important. Two other points. It seems to me that Buddhism in general is flourishing, and I think it would be really nice, I love it when we have teachers from different communities come in, it's kind of add salt and pepper and what have you. And I think it'd be nice to have more relationships with other Buddhist communities, and maybe you could go and talk to them, and they could talk to us, just so there would be more of a more general Buddhist community. And sometimes I get the feeling that Zen is considered this terribly esoteric, weird thing out there in left field of Buddhism, you know, when you consider all the Buddhist communities,

[51:39]

It really doesn't need to be seen in that way, I don't think. And the third thing is, I think it would be nice if the practice committee, and I speak from some ignorance here, but if the practice committee felt more inclusive, if people felt who were not necessarily regular members of it, that they could go, it would be a good idea to go. Yeah, we always say that. But maybe it just needs to be reiterated. It just needs, people need to feel that yes, they're welcome. Yes, come. Yes, it's safe. I think in response to your question, I think what you said is very important also about starting to create a space for a successor, even if it's 30 years from now.

[52:48]

It doesn't matter. The space is what's important and, you know, somehow to encourage people to look at that, you know, and to consider that. But also I think what you said about discouraging competition or somehow Not too mysterious.

[53:53]

Okay, well, this is a lot of food to chew on this year.

[54:06]

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