the prayers by us, the so-called living, can help lead the so-called dead towards an auspicious rebirth. Now, whether one believes in that or not, we follow the way of our teachers and their teachers And so we observe it and it certainly gives us a marker, a point in time in which we can check in with ourselves and with each other about how we're doing in the face of this loss. So we will observe this on the 49th day is figured from the day that one passes away, so officially the 49th day would be on the Wednesday the 24th, and so we'll have a short service on Wednesday morning the 24th, and we'll have a little longer service on Thursday nights when we've been gathering to share recollections of Sojin, Thursday night the 25th of this week.

[01:27]

And I was also really I just was very touched to be able to do the memorial this morning for Moffett Hall and to have her husband and son there. I've really appreciated being able to talk and work with them over the last week after really not being in touch with Moffett for for quite a number of years. She had some really difficult and painful health issues. And now she's at peace. And I hope you will read those memorial pages. They're really, it's like opening a window on a life. And actually, this could be true for any of us, right? All of us have these very complex

[02:28]

enriched lives that others of us only know the barest outlines of. So I appreciated that a lot. So over the last couple of months I've been reading the Hebrew Bible and I'm not sure why. I think it has actually something to do with working out aspects of my relationship with Sojin, although I'm not clear I can articulate that. I was born in a Jewish family and had considerable and highly dysfunctional Jewish education at the synagogue and following by my bar mitzvah, I never really set foot back in there.

[03:32]

So I am not a Jew boo, but I am deeply Jewish in formation, not in belief systems. And I want to maybe reassure you that I'm not, I hope I'm not on the road to a a religious revival or reconversion. But what I find, I'm opening my door to the appreciation of things that are there in the tradition that I rejected. I rejected outright for reason of family dynamics, for reason of that unskillful religious education. and also for elements of the theology and scripture that are still very, they're impossible for me to accept.

[04:38]

But they're also things that are truly human and deep. It's worth noting, I think, that before he came to Zen, Sochin was studying mystical Judaism Kabbalah, and I believe that he knew quite a bit about it, and he referenced this in his talks from time to time. I'm getting a note that my volume is low. Is that true for other people? No, okay. He referenced that from time to time, and I regret that I really never discussed it with him. And that was, you know, not that I think he would have been open to it, but, uh, okay. Hang on just a second. I'm going to look at my, my, my audio settings.

[05:42]

My, how about this? Is this any better? Yes. Okay. All right. Uh, Anyway, we never discussed those traditions, and I regret it. It's really a missed opportunity. So in... Very strange, you know, I've been encouraged to... I've been slowly trying to move into Sojin's office and make it my own, and I have a lot of difficulty. I go in there, and I go kind of blank. Uh... because his presence is so thick in there for me. But I found this book on his desk, where it had been, I think it had been on his desk for a number of months, and I picked it up and took it home and started reading it. It's called The Last of the Just, and it's about, it follows a family

[06:55]

one family in which was reborn every generation, what was called one of the Lamed Vav Tzaddikim, the 36 righteous ones. And there's a, in mystical Judaism, there's a legend that there are 36 hidden wise men in the world who preserve the order of the world, however flawed that order might be. So in our Buddhist context, we can refer to these as bodhisattvas. And actually in Shingon Buddhism, they refer to the five secret bodhisattvas. And we also have the In Dogen, in Genjo Koan, we have this wonderful line, when Buddhas are truly Buddhas, they do not necessarily notice that they are Buddhas.

[08:03]

However, they are actualizing Buddhas who go on actualizing Buddhas. And I think that that is really resonant with this notion of the Lama Dvav. And finding that book on Sojin's desk was a curious coincidence. Because it leads me to think, maybe he was one of the Lama involved. A hidden wise man. Not so hidden, but still not making much of it. So to go to these two words that, to me, express a teaching of Sojin, the two words, the Japanese word that we've all heard him say again and again is, Hai!

[09:12]

You know, you knock on his door and he would give an abbreviated hai! which technically means yes but it means much more depending on the context and the tone of voice it's an affirmation a confirmation that here I am I'm responding I am ready to turn my attention to you And in Hebrew, the word appears 178 times in the Hebrew scriptures. The word is Hineni, which also has a technical translation. Here I am.

[10:17]

And, of course, means so much more than that. Hineni is how a child responds to a parent, and also how a parent responds to a child, how lovers respond to each other, how a person responds to God, and in certain instances how God responds to a person. It's a confirmation of presence. Saying, you have my full attention. And also, that I am prepared for whatever I am called to meet.

[11:22]

And I hear the mutual resonance of Sojin's Hai and the biblical Hineni. They are the same thing to me. And they have a different, they may have some different envelopes of meaning, but let me just give you some context in the Hebrew Bible so you have a sense of how it was written, how it was spoken. In Genesis 22, after Abraham has been rewarded with the birth of sons very late in his life, and that is the most precious thing to him, in Genesis 22, It says, and it came to pass after these things that God did tempt Abraham.

[12:32]

I'm not sure how he tempted him. I looked and I can't quite see. But he said unto him, and said unto him, Abraham. And he said, and Abraham said, behold, here I am. Hineni. And then God said, Take now thy son, thy only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah, and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains, which I will tell thee of. That is what the Hebrew God was asking of his servant Abraham and by saying here I am Abraham was opening himself to the possibility of anything that God might ask of him I'm gonna come back to that in Exodus 3

[13:54]

This is when Moses is still in Egypt before the plagues. He saw a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush and he looked and behold the bush burned with fire and the bush was not consumed. And Moses said, I will now turn aside and see this great sight. why the bush is not burnt and when the Lord saw that he turned aside in other words he sort of turned away because it was it was a mysterious miracle God called unto him and in the midst of the bush said Moses Moses and Moses said here I am and this is where he was instructed as to how he was to lead the Jewish people out of slavery, not of Egypt.

[15:04]

And in the third version, which is a little different, in the book of Isaiah, who is one of the prophets, Isaiah is saying to people, you will call and the Lord will answer. You will cry and the Lord will say, here I am. So this is the parent responding to the child. And I'll say just one more example of which this is... different very early in the book of Genesis after Eve and Adam had eaten of the fruit of the tree of life the Lord was in the garden and

[16:25]

looking for Adam. And the Lord God called unto Adam and said unto him, Where art thou? And Adam did not say, Here I am. Adam said, I heard thy voice in the garden and I was afraid because I was naked and I hid myself. And that starts a whole painful dialogue between God and Adam's like, well, how did you know you were naked, you know, and discovers that they had eaten of this tree that they were forbidden. So these are the biblical, these are biblical moments. And I just ask you to hold them. I'm not asking you, I'm not giving them to you as religious instruction. when one knocked on Sojin's door, if he was there, and you could, you know, you could usually tell if he was there by whether his blinds were open.

[17:39]

And I will confess that in the six weeks since his death, I think every day I look out my kitchen window to see if the blinds are open. It just... It's so... It's so deeply imprinted in me. Anyway, if he was there, he would answer, Hi! And... As I said, in Japanese, this is translated often as yes... It also means something like, I hear you. I respond to you. So Sojin explained to me once that he had made a practice for himself of responding to every person who knocked.

[18:43]

No matter what he was doing, whether he was reading or writing or eating or doing calligraphy, he would set down his task and turn himself to the person who came through that door. Now it's true that from time to time one might not feel that one had his entirely complete attention. Sometimes one's presence was an interruption, but really that was the exception. Mostly He really turned his attention to you if you came to the door. And that door was open to everybody. And just so you understand, that's actually pretty unusual. That's pretty unusual. Maybe it's unusual in our life. It's unusual in my experience with Zen teachers.

[19:45]

But it was really usual... with him and I always I really once I understood it I really admired this practice I still admire it and I aspire it to myself so I hear height or ineni as parallel expressions of readiness willingness receptivity the readiness and the ability to respond to whatever arises moment by moment. And this I think is a miraculous practice. And actually I think it's the heart of zazen. That in zazen our mind and body

[20:52]

are open to what arises to the call of each moment you could think of it also as our practice of kinyin every step in this walking meditation every time I put my foot down I have a realization, here I am, in Amy. I feel my feet on the ground and then I move forward. I think that that's what we practice in in zazen with every breath it's hinini it's I yes I am I am or I want to be open to what whatever arises and the practice of zazen I think the

[22:19]

The inner mechanism of zazen creates that capacity in ourselves. We might not have, you know, some of us, and I include myself, have quite a bit of impatience. You know, we don't, I don't want the next moment, I want something that I think is going to be better. nonetheless I'm going to get the next moment and as we practice we develop the skill not to turn away from that moment and we develop the patience to incorporate and accept that moment as exactly as it is so there's a difference I will say between what I hear as or read as Sochin's practice and the Hebrew Scriptures now this is just my interpretation I must own that I feel

[23:50]

a beginner in reading these scriptures you know it's peculiar to read these scriptures at the age of 73 to start reading them but I appreciate that I'm able to and interested in it but the distinction that I hear has to do with the nature of one's response Sojin's height was not just an announcement to the person who was knocking at the door. It was a call to himself to remind himself of his vow and practice not to be attached to the last moment. but to pay attention to the new moment, the new call.

[24:56]

And to begin again, fresh, with the awareness that that's a real opportunity, starting again and again. And I would say, once more, that is the heart of Zazen. In fact, I've heard Sojin say this, that often we think that there's something wrong with our zazen because we can't maintain our attention on our breath or because our slippery minds start thinking about lunch or work or whatever. And what I was taught very early on is that's not a problem.

[26:01]

That actually the fundamental act of zazen is returning. It's noticing. Oh, here I am. I'm thinking about lunch. Okay. Now what was it that I was trying to do? I was trying to sit upright. make sure that my mudra was was open and so it's that recentering listening to the call of one's own practice beginning again and again and again so the biblical Hineni again my understanding may be incomplete and I know that there are there are mystical ways of reading it that are probably a lot closer to what we're talking about in the context of Zen.

[27:04]

But what I see as a kind of open message of the Hebrew Scriptures is a call to be obedient to God. And that's difficult for me. I remember, did any of you ever read The Empty Mirror by Jan van der Wettering? It's an incredible book. He's a Dutch mystery writer who in the fifties did intensive Zen training in Japan and I remember I heard him interviewed by Terry Gross once and she was asking him about his religious orientation and he he shouted I want to beat up God and I can understand that

[28:27]

God asked Abraham to sacrifice his son. And only at the last minute, when Abraham has the knife raised, because he was a good boy and he was very obedient, and he was going to kill his only son, because that's what God asked him to do. Only at the last moment did God stay that. And of course, without getting into further... theology, God sacrificed his son, his own son, in the form of Jesus. You know, you just do not see this in the Buddhist tradition. What you do see in the Jataka tales, the tales of the Buddha, of the Bodhisattva before he was Shakyamuni Buddha, is that Bodhisattva sacrificing his or her own body to save other beings but not to a higher power and in fact where the Hebrew Bible if you've read it includes vast tracts

[30:00]

and passages descriptive of how precisely to do animal sacrifice, which was also very common in the Brahmanical tradition that the Buddha lived in. The Buddha eliminated animal sacrifices in his religious practice. I think we're taught to be responsive to ourself, not obedient to a higher power or another being. And that's quite unique in religious traditions in many ways. So... I just think about the sound of Sojin's voice that pretty sharp height that I always felt I always felt that it allowed me to walk in the door and I think many of us found that his door was open to was open to us

[31:31]

And this is a practice that I certainly encourage for myself, and it's a practice that I want to continue, not just in a figurative way, but in a literal way, to, and I think to some extent, Lori and I have done it in terms of wanting the door to our house to be open so that anyone can knock on it. And part of that motivation is, well, whatever somebody brings to the door is probably going to be interesting. Sometimes could be trouble, you know, but generally interesting. And Sojin was interested. He was very interested in what was going on in his students lives and I really cultivate I hold to that principle even though I may not be perfect in my attention so just say yes just say here I am say it to yourself

[33:00]

say it to those who are around you and say it to the universe in zazen so that that's the practice that I wanted to speak of this morning let me leave time for for questions and thoughts now and I'll continue with other other points of practice in the weeks to come. Thank you, Ozan. For everyone who has a question, please raise your digital hand or send a chat to the Saturday director and I'll read that for you. Thank you. Okay, I see Ben. Let's see. I don't see anybody.

[34:04]

Ben, go ahead and unmute yourself. Thank you for your talk, Hozan. Can you hear me OK? Yeah, fine. OK, great. I remember from a Dharma talk that I heard on the San Francisco Zen Center website many years ago when I first started practicing. And I think the talk focused around Ananda and Ananda saying yes to the Buddha. And I don't know if you or anyone else here knows of that story. It just came to my mind during your talk, and I didn't know if you could share anything about that. I remember the talk focusing on how Ananda was always ready to say, yes, I'm here, and how that was a good practice for us. Well, I don't remember that in specific, but that's what we're supposed to do, right? As good Zen students, we're supposed to say yes. That's not an absolute. Sometimes there are moments when you should say no.

[35:08]

But always, I think it's good to say, here I am. I am paying very close attention to what's being presented. But it's not an absolute. In some Zen settings and other religious settings, You know, if the teacher or figure of authority says you should do something, then unquestionably you should do it. But I don't feel, I never had that instruction or message from Sojin Roshi and I don't feel it. And I think we really have to, we have to hold on to our moral agency. at the same time. But the Buddha never asked Ananda to do anything untoward. I truly believe that.

[36:13]

Thank you, Osan. Linda? Hi, good morning. I just thought I'd give you a little report on the movie that went on here when you started to compare Hai to Hineni. As soon as you mentioned the example of Abraham saying that to God on that occasion, I went into a kind of molten, near-volcanic eruption because of the nature of that story. Thank heavens that I didn't explode all over you, or I didn't have to because you then actually made those important distinctions that you made later. So the biblical Hineni though you could say it sounds like I'm here, like the Zen, I'm here. I don't think I would compare it. To me, the story of Abraham is an obscenity.

[37:18]

And as you said, it's about obedience and about abandoning our sense of moral agency. So thanks for acknowledging that. And I don't really have a question. I just wanted to report what I went through. Right. Well, thank you. Let me say something to that because this is my second time in the last 10 years reading the five books of Moses. And the first time Everything about them catalyzed the response that I feel you're describing. The second time is I'm asking myself, what's going on inside me?

[38:32]

And I'm using those stories. I'm not agreeing with anything. I'm just using it as an examination. And I feel there virtually every major figure in the Hebrew Bible is seriously problematic. on a number of different perhaps moral grounds. So I don't want to get into a long discussion about it, but I think that what speaks to me about Hineni is to ask, where am I? And if I can use that, I will use it. I will use anything I can to try to pay attention to how I am and how I'm living without necessarily believing the doctrines that it seems to be attached to.

[39:57]

So anyway, we can certainly talk about this more, but I'm not... For me, there's a resonance. For you, there may not be a residence, and I understand that. There wasn't, you know, this residence for me is newfound. And I could also move through it to another place. But this is what I wanted to share today. Thank you. Good. Kurt? Thanks, Rozan, for the talk. There's a Leonard Cohen song near his death where he wrote near his death where he kind of references that. It's kind of opening himself. But the question that I had had to do with, I guess, a little bit what you might see as being self-denial in

[41:03]

obedience to something else, or it might be letting go of self. And so when you were talking about Zazen and how you may want something better in the next moment, but you're willing to just accept the next moment, in a way you're letting go of what you're wanting. Like at least when I'm practicing, I know I'm always trying to get something or i'm trying to have some state or i'm wanting to get enlightened and so in some way letting go of that letting going of trying and just sitting just being present is uh almost a it's a letting go of your own self or what you want and an opening to something larger and When you were talking about Sojin and always answering it when someone knocked, it brought to mind Shinra Suzuki, and I think it might be in one of his books, he mentions that if you're studying the sutras or something and someone brings you tea, you should take that tea.

[42:26]

Even though you feel like, oh, I'm studying the sutras now. I think he was talking about his wife bringing him tea. And he feels like saying, hey, quit bothering me. I'm doing something really important. I'm studying this. But really, the important thing is to let go of what you think is so important and just meet the present moment, which is somebody's bringing you tea. Somebody's knocking on your door. there's a pain in your leg or whatever that is. And so I've, in my practice, tried to do that, but I've also, I guess, struggled a bit with that issue of agency. And so if I'm really open to the next thing, and I guess it's like being open to the Tao or the way, then I'm willing to let go of my plans for some emerging thing which may not be exactly what i had in mind and so asking myself how open am i to that and when i think of the that story with abraham and of course i'm not i didn't grow up in that tradition but it almost seems like it's it's a testing how open are you to the next thing how willing are you to let go of you know

[43:50]

What is your agenda or most important to you? And are you really? And so is it obedience to God? Is it obedience to the Tao? Is it obedience to just the next moment? I mean, not the obedience isn't a good word. I guess it's a dropping of self and then realizing that there's no separation between you and God. It's you wanting it to be something different that's creating this space. That's right. When you let go of that space, then it isn't like I have to obey. I'm just expressing my true nature. Right, right. So there's a distinction, as I said, between obedience and response. And I've talked often about, you know, this koan, what is the summation of a Buddha's whole lifetime? an appropriate response. And where do you, I mean, if you talk about the story from Suzuki Roshi, that's what Sochin experienced.

[44:57]

That's what shaped him. It's just those kinds of teachings from Suzuki Roshi. The root of our suffering, to me, is in wanting things to be different from how they are. But this is not so easy to pin down you still have to decide you know in in a moment that arises when a thought arises of something else or a thought arises say of something that is not right that needs to be you know if you look at for example sojin roshi approaching the altar he often we've often seen this he would stop he would look he would align the the objects on the altar according to mysterious principles that he had in his mind to me it was mysterious now you could say well he wanted things to be different from how they were right yeah

[46:15]

He thought, oh, I can put this in alignment. So I have some agency here, so let me do this. So it's not just accepting, it's not a passivity. It's not just a kind of blind acceptance of the moment. You still have to have a moral or ethical agency. And the very thought that's coming up in your mind about what might be the next moment might be the thing that you need to pay attention to. You know? It's not so simple. Anyway, thank you. Thank you for that. For that question. Don't open things up. Janae? A very provocative talk. Thank you. So something you said reminded me of Baker Roshi, what he used to say way, way back in the day.

[47:18]

And it seems, I'm realizing that it's the thing I remember most from him. So it was, nobody wants the next moment. Everybody wants the moment after next. And I always thought I understood that, but maybe now I'm not so sure. I wonder if you might say something about that. I mean, I don't know because I wasn't there. That sort of makes sense. What you want is, you know, you want your enjoyment. You know, you want the enjoyment that you think is going to come from the next moment. That's how I would immediately understand that. You know, which is not the next moment itself. So maybe it's like... at some deep level, we want to keep the moment we're in, maybe not meet something that is not what we would desire, but we have a thought of the future that we're projecting into.

[48:32]

That's the moment after next? Yeah, that's right. And the thing to read there is the Buddha's first sermon where he describes the nature of suffering. And he explicates it very, very clearly. It includes wanting what we don't have, not wanting what we do have, you know, and all of these permutations of that. And you can go back to that. It's really easy to find. Thank you. I see somebody whom I don't know, and I'd like to hear from him. Chris? Is it Chris? Hi, yes. Last name is Guys. Guys, where are you? I'm in Berkeley. This is my first time joining, so thank you for the wonderful talk, and it's been a nice introduction.

[49:37]

Oh, you muted yourself. Sorry about that. So I'm curious for those maybe like me who tend to look inward often and even live inward a bit, how to respond to the moment and be attentive, present, ready to answer the call of each moment while also recognizing a need for kind of restoration i guess um i guess everybody exists obviously on a spectrum of maybe introverted extroverted is a bit too simplified but i mean yeah for those who kind of recognize a need for um kind of introspection to feel kind of whole and to be the best version of themselves in some way how might you advise someone like me um

[50:45]

in terms of identifying, I guess, when is sort of, I don't know if healthy or adaptive is the right word, but maybe more generally, just how to find that balance and how that question might be explored within Zen tradition. I think that it's explored within Zen tradition by the fact that our practice is really a path of, it's really the shape of the practice is a whole life. That it's not just that we meditate and face the wall. We eat together, we work together, we chant together, we cook together, we walk together in one kind of organism. And so gradually, you can't avoid realizing, oh, there's other people out there.

[51:50]

And that's the way we practice. We don't go in a meditation hut or a cave and just go inside. So that's what I would do. really recommend and you can you know you can do this in your family you can do this in your work and I would say what came to mind instantly was take up a practice of listening listening to your environment around you listen to notice the You know, if you're in Berkeley, you can hear the trains. You know, you can hear the birds in the trees. You can hear a motorcycle going by. Just recognize that these sounds that are so-called outside you are also part of your entire reality.

[52:59]

And, you know, I wouldn't... The thing is, I wish I could encourage you to come and... practice with us face to face, but there'll be a time for that. Yes. That's a start. Yeah. I don't know if you or anybody else is familiar with the poet David White, but he has a poem called Everything is Waiting for You. And it has a similar feeling of like, if you pay attention to the world around you, it's sort of inviting you in a sense out of yourself. Yeah. So. There are two modalities of meditation, two major modalities of meditation. One is a very intense inward focus, a kind of visualization and a kind of closing off of the world. And the other is an open awareness, a receptivity to all that is around us. And I think that's actually our orientation.

[54:02]

Thank you very much. Thanks. We're near the end. I'm sorry. There is a question in the chat box from Peter. Would you like to hear that? Surely. Yeah. He asks, could you say a bit more about the dysfunction of your early child, early Jewish education? Which Peter is this? Tell sir. Okay. I need to know which Peter because then I tell a different story for a different person, I suppose. The dysfunction was understandable. Since the destruction of the temple, which was destroyed twice, the temple in Jerusalem, finally the Romans destroyed it, the center of Jewish practice is really the house, the household. The synagogue is not a temple.

[55:06]

It's a gathering place. And I think that the assumption is that one would get the fundamental teachings at home. And then what you got by way of your Jewish education at the temple was kind of supplementary. It filled it out. And I think that part of the problem was I never got it at home. You know, it was completely secular. And part of the dysfunction also was that I was compelled to have like six years of Jewish education for the sake of a grandfather that I could hardly communicate with. And so it was sort of forced on me. it wasn't very skillful. And I've often felt if I had Jewish education and teachers who were anywhere near as skillful as the Buddhist teachers that I've had, I might have had a different response.

[56:19]

But that's setting aside the major doctrinal and theological problems that I have with with the religion not with culture but with the religion so anyway it was just it wasn't very well done and it's not that people were unkind they just weren't they didn't feel like they had to give us the basics and I wasn't getting that at home in the same way so that's about as far as I want to go I see Rondi That's the last hand I see raised. Or Charlie. Charlie. Thanks very much for an extremely engaging talk today. I have two questions about the 36 hidden wise men.

[57:24]

The first question is, Is it always the same 36 throughout time? No. I don't know. I'd have to study the legend. But in this book, in The Last of the Just, what it follows is that the just man was, one of the 36 belonged to a particular family and was born generation after generation. someone was born into that family who played that role. I understand. I don't know if that's good enough for me. The second question is, contemporary Jewish theology might include 36 wise women. Would it not?

[58:26]

I think some schools would and some schools wouldn't. You know, I mean, there's just... Well, the reason I ask that is in the realm of politics, women certainly have been leading a great, great portion of political theory and practice. So I wondered whether... that reality might carry over to Jewish theology. Well, you know, what I think is that all theology is still painfully patriarchal. And that's not just Jewish, it's like across the board. And this is what we have responsibility to change. Well, I thought of Mother Teresa as a possibility of what are these wise women holding up the world?

[59:33]

Maybe. You know, I mean, these are myths. And so I don't you to any of them. All right. Blanche Hartman, you know, maybe she was one of them. there's lots of maybe mainly, you know, anyway, we have to find, we have to find wisdom wherever it's being offered to us. Of course. Thank you. Okay. Is that it? Yes, it is, sir. Okay. Thank you very much and enjoy. the sunny, crisp weather, and we'll see you. Just remember, we're going to do the Sojourn Roshi's 49-day ceremony on, it'll be on Wednesday morning, but if you can't join us, we'll do it on Thursday evening when we have more further recollections about Sojourn.

[60:49]

Thank you. Beings are numberless, I vow to awaken with them. Delusions are inexhaustible, I vow to end them. Dharma gates are boundless, I vow to enter them. Buddha's way is unsurpassable, I vow to become it.

[61:22]

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