Good morning. It's an honor and privilege for me to be here today, speaking at this Zen Do, which, even though I don't practice here regularly, I feel like I know this Sangha through Mel Weitzman, who trained me as Shuso at Tassajara last fall. So, thanks Mel. He's off at San Francisco now leading a one-day sitting for the practice period, so it's been switched. Without this Sangha helping and supporting the San Francisco Sangha and letting us have Mel come over to San Francisco our lives wouldn't be what they are today. It's really made a difference to us.

[01:02]

So, on behalf of the San Francisco Zen Center, I want to say thank you to everyone here. Thanks. Today, I have kind of a heavy subject and I hope that I can address it in a not so heavy manner. The topic that I'd like to speak about today is death. It's not because I'm particularly enamored of death. I don't really like the idea of my own death or other people's death very much. But because events in my own life have forced me to look at the topic, to look at this subject over the past few weeks and months. While I was at Tassajara this past fall, the day before Sashin, my husband decided that he didn't want to be married to me anymore.

[02:07]

And our relationship at that point died. Rest in peace. And then various other things happened, but a couple weeks ago, a very dear friend of mine died of AIDS. He was a long-term survivor, and he suddenly got pneumonia, and before we knew it, no more Neil Stansky, that was his name. And so I feel like I have to say a few words about something that's been on my mind for some time. Death isn't usually a happy subject.

[03:11]

Nobody wants to die. Nobody wants to cause somebody else to die. When we think about death or see something, a dead thing by the side of the road, a dead person, or think about our own deaths, If we're sitting zazen, we may notice, or if we're accomplished meditators or even not so accomplished meditators, we may notice our minds shearing off away from that subject. It's very hard to think about, very hard to contemplate. And I find in my own life, when I think about or contemplate death, I tend to do it in a kind of intellectual or detached fashion. It's not really real to me. nor could I necessarily expect it to be real because I'm alive, I'm not dead so how could I know what it is to be dead? The fact is, in Buddhist thinking we've all been dead many, many times we all can speak from experience about death and about life

[04:31]

not just from our own limited existence but from the point of view of the entire the whole smear, you know from the point of view of all beings or at least the ones that we've been from the point of view of the entire universe we can speak. And this is what we sit satsang to connect with In the Genjo Koan, Dogen Zenji says, firewood, you know, we don't speak of firewood as becoming ash, nor of ash becoming firewood again. Firewood, first you see firewood, then you see ash. Firewood is a time of itself and ash is a time of itself.

[05:36]

It's like winter and spring. We don't say that winter turns into spring or that spring turns into summer. Winter is winter and spring is spring. Life is a period of itself and death is a period of itself. We don't say that life turns into death precisely, but first that a person is alive and then that a person is dead. But somehow when we think about, you know, when I think about my friend Neil Stansky dying, I think of this person, Neil Stansky, who is very precious to me. And I think of his personality. And I think of, somehow I have the idea that Neil has turned into this dead Neil and is floating around someplace. You know, in my own life I kind of feel like, what I feel in my own life is a big enormous absence of this person in my life.

[06:38]

But somehow at the back of my mind, I have the idea or the suspicion, I keep talking to him like, How would Neil feel about this? Or how would he feel about that? Or, Neil, it's time for you to do this now, it's time for you to do that now. I think of Neil as having turned from alive into dead. Actually, once I found out that Neil had died, you know, after I got through the initial shock and crying and screaming. I realized I had to go to the hospital morgue and sit with his body. So I did. I took a couple of friends and we got to the hospital and they had pulled out the drawer with his body on it.

[07:44]

I don't know how many of you have ever been to a morgue. But they have, in most of them, there's like these little compartments and then drawers where they have people's forms arrayed in these little drawers, and then you pull them out. Anyway, they'd cleaned it all up for us, but the only one which was actually out was Neil's, and the rest of the doors were closed. Pulled up a chair and sat there. And there he was. He had obviously died on his side. The blood was in one side of his face and his leg was bent. And so they had pulled him from a reclining position to a regular lying down position. And he looked asleep except that He wasn't breathing, but of course, in my emotional situation, I kept seeing him take breaths.

[08:49]

I kept wanting for him to be breathing. I kept not accepting that he wasn't breathing. So, out of the corner of my eyes, I'd see him taking these breaths, and then I'd look, and of course, he wouldn't be breathing. He'd just be there. And I kind of see his eyes moving. But when I looked, his eyes weren't really moving. And then I would kind of feel the force of his personality. As a matter of fact, I heard him saying words to me. And I heard him laughing the way that I had heard him laughing the day before. Of course, he wasn't laughing. He was just lying there. And I found it very, very difficult, even with the fact of this corpse lying in front of me, obviously dead. I found it very hard to accept that my friend was indeed dead. I had to actually sit with the fact of his death.

[09:54]

visually in front of me, touch his dead body, smell the smells of the morgue, and listen for the sound of his breathing and not find it, just find silence. I had to verify it through all my senses. Even then, I found it difficult to accept. How much more difficult than that is to accept the fact of my own death, which would happen at any moment? you know, at any moment the earthquake could come or actually I've been in car accidents where I've just been riding along I was once in a car accident just riding along my car stalled in the middle of an intersection another car smashed into me at 40 miles an hour and as my car went flying through the air in a great arc I thought, this is it at that moment I was able to accept my death because I thought it was happening But today, just sitting here with you, it seems distant, it doesn't seem like something that's right here.

[11:04]

How can I accept my life if I can't accept my death? Often when we hear religious people speak in these terms it kind of sounds like fire and brimstone, you know. Everything that you've ever done is going to catch up to you, you better watch out, you better not cry, you better not pout, it's going to come. And so you better live each moment as if it were your last and really enjoy everything because here we are You know, it sounds like a story. It sounds like a real story. But it isn't a story.

[12:07]

It's happened to me personally twice in the past three months. You know, that something that I thought was very much alive surprised me and all of a sudden was dead. It isn't a story. It's a real possibility. I don't think I'm particularly unusual in this. I think everybody, you know, everybody here has suffered. Everybody here has had something which you thought was very much alive suddenly vanish, not be what you thought it was. These little deaths are happening to us all the time. You know, even in zazen, when you think you're straight, when you think you're sitting straight and somebody corrects your posture and it turns out you were leaned a foot and a half over to the right and you didn't even know it, that's the death of something, it's the death of an idea of straightness, which you had.

[13:08]

This happens to us all the time in little ways. When I said ways, that moment is now dead. constantly flickering into a new life each moment. And the little death that we feel each moment, if we really let that moment go, isn't different from the big death that we firmly avert from. This is a book by Buddha. It's called the Dhammapada, and you probably have seen it or read it.

[14:09]

And for people who haven't, this is a collection of some of the earliest words of the Buddha, and I highly recommend it. probably the most personal of the sutras for me. It has the most personal tone, the one that I can most easily relate to, except for stories about the mustard seed and stuff like that. Okay. And there's two chapters today which I'd like to just read. One is called Beyond Life, and the other one is called Life. Okay, chapter 11. So we're talking about a chapter 11 of life. How can there be laughter? How can there be pleasure when the whole world is burning?

[15:14]

When you are in deep darkness, will you not ask for a lamp? Consider this body, a painted puppet with jointed limbs, sometimes suffering and covered with ulcers, full of imaginings, never permanent, forever changing. This body is decaying, a nest of diseases, a heap of corruption, bound to destruction, to dissolution. All life ends in death. Look at these gray white dried bones like dried empty gourds thrown away at the end of the summer. Who can feel joy in looking at them? A house of bones is this body. Bones covered with flesh and with blood. Pride and hypocrisy dwell in this house and also old age and death. The glorious chariots of kings wear out and the body wears out and grows old. but the virtue of the good never grows old, and thus they can teach the good to those who are good.

[16:23]

If someone tries not to learn, he grows old just like an ox. His body indeed grows old, but his wisdom does not grow. I have gone round in vain the cycles of many lives, ever striving to find the builder of the house of life and death. How great is the sorrow of life that must die. But now I have seen thee, house builder. Nevermore shall thou build this house. The rafters of sins are broken. The ridgepole of ignorance is destroyed. The fever of craving is past, for my mind has gone to the joy of the immortal nirvana. Those who in their youth did not live in self-harmony, And those who did not gain the true treasures of life are later like long-legged old herons standing sad by a lake without fish. Those who in their youth did not live in harmony and those who did not gain the true treasures of life are later like broken bows ever deploring old things past and gone.

[17:39]

Told you it would be heavy. Okay, so this is, you know, on the surface it seems like fire and brimstone, okay? How could there be any joy in this disgusting mass of corruption and sins and flesh and diseases and so forth and so on? Consider it. Know the truth of that. Know the truth of our bodies which turn into sickness, well, which are sick, which are old, which die. Know the truth of that, look at that, don't avert from that. Everything wears out, everything ends. And then, if you don't read it carefully, if you don't think of it carefully, it looks like, you know, there's a great way out of this sort of thing, which is called nirvana. So this can't bother me, I've gone to nirvana.

[18:45]

But, no. The way to nirvana isn't to escape from the understanding of death, but to see something, to see the builder of life and death, to break the ridgepole of ignorance, to break the fever of craving. And then there's a little exhortation. Those who in their youth, let's say we're all in our youth, okay? It says, those who in their youth did not live in self-harmony and those who did not gain the true treasures of life are later like long-legged old herons standing sad by a lake without fish. Those who in their youth did not live in self-harmony and who did not gain the true treasures of life are later like broken bows, ever deploring old things past and gone.

[19:48]

Okay, so we don't want to be like long-legged old herons standing in a lake without fish. We don't want to be like broken bolus, deploring old things past and gone. So, do this other thing, okay? Live in self-harmony. Gain the true treasures of life. Okay, the other side of the coin is life, okay? All beings tremble before danger. All beings fear death. When you consider this, you don't kill or cause to kill. All beings fear before danger. Life is dear to all. When someone considers this, he doesn't kill or cause to kill.

[20:54]

He who for the sake of happiness hurts others who also want happiness shall not find happiness. He who for the sake of happiness does not hurt others who also want happiness will find happiness. Don't speak harsh words. Once spoken, they return to you. Angry words are painful and there may be blows for blows. If you can just be in silent quietness, like a broken gong that is silent, you have reached the peace of nirvana and your anger is peace. Just as a keeper of cows drives his cows into the fields, Old age and death drive living beings far into the fields of death.

[22:01]

When a fool does evil work, he forgets that he is lighting his fire wherein he might burn. He who hurts with his weapons, those who are harmless and pure, shall soon fall into one of these ten evils." And it lists the ten evils. Neither nakedness, nor entangled hair, nor uncleanliness, nor fasting, nor sleeping on the ground, nor covering your body with ashes, nor squatting, nor sitting, nor chanting, or anything else can purify a person who is not pure from doubts and desires. But although a man may wear fine clothing, If he lives peacefully and is good, self-possessed, has faith and is pure, and if he does not hurt any living being, he is a holy Brahman, a hermit of seclusion, a monk called a bhikkhu.

[23:12]

Is there in this world any person so noble that he ever avoids all blame, even as a noble horse avoids the touch of the whip? Have fire like a noble horse touched by the whip. By faith, by virtue and energy, by deep contemplation and vision, by wisdom and by right action, you shall overcome the sorrows of life. Those who make channels for water control the waters. Makers of arrows make the arrows straight. Carpenters control their timber. and the holy control their soul. Okay. If there's anyone in this room who isn't comfortably able to listen because your legs have gone to sleep or are killing you or something, please feel free to adjust yourself. Okay.

[24:16]

Don't be ashamed. Because this is important, it's probably the most important thing that I'll ever speak about in my life. To be driven by the threat of death is different from actually realizing right now the reality of life and death. you know, to act heedlessly thinking that our lives are going to last forever. And you might even say, or I might even say, well, I don't think that, I don't think my life is going to last forever. But can we act in this moment as if we're going to die at the end of this moment?

[25:20]

Can we really take our life into our hands right now? You know, right now. Otherwise, all the pain of this existence, the pain of having relationships end and people die, you know, is just meaningless pain. And the pleasure that we experience without really tasting it isn't really pleasure either, you know, it's just a thought of pleasure. So, if we can do zazen

[26:34]

with this spirit, then zazen will do us some good. You know, if we can't if we just do zazen, if we do zazen or anything else you know, any sort of fasting or purification or dokusan or psychotherapy or shaving our heads or anything else without understanding the reality of birth and death forget it, it's not going to do any good. So, let's just do it. That's all I have to say. It's not any easier for anyone in this room than it is for anybody else. So, thanks for joining me in considering life and death and what we can do about it now. Does anyone have any comments or questions?

[27:38]

I think you mentioned sort of in a contemplative meditation mode like Dazen offers it, where you are letting go, practicing to let go moment by moment. That's all death is. And you've said that. Perhaps as we've said it, as we practice letting go now, when the time comes for our physical body to die, perhaps it will be easier then. So I think it encourages us to live. Live wholeheartedly. Live and realize and to practice living. I'm letting go, and maybe it'll be easier. I don't know what my times are. What do you mean, easier?

[28:50]

Well, I have a better understanding, I think. That as I press and let go, I hope things will attach to this form. Because I find I'm doing this often, is letting go of forms. When you say that, I really respond to it from... I've been trying to write a memorial service for my friend, and reading through the Tibetan book of the dead, the main teaching of that book, well, as far as I've gotten, okay, I just have to read the book, I don't know what the main teaching is, but... So I'm reading the Tibetan Book of the Dead to my friend who died. And the, wow, it's pouring.

[29:50]

The Tibetan Book of the Dead says, when a person dies, The first thing that's going to happen is that they'll see a luminous, a very sharp, piercing light that's so sharp it hurts to look at, it hurts to confront it. And then also at that same time, they'll see a soft kind of nice light that will be easy to approach. and will have various sorts of apparitions and beings in it. It says, at that time, let go of the apparitions, let go of the beings, they're just your own projection and go towards the sharp luminous light that is, the sharp penetrating brilliant light that's difficult to look at. That the

[30:57]

health states that we create, the various realms that we may end up being, are all the results of our own projections and what we're drawn to, and of turning away from the actual penetrating awareness that's present with us right at this moment. So what Zazen is, it's like a drill, you know, it drills your body. You know, when you're in the army, they drill you to salute. And when you're in college, they drill you to be able to understand French verbs. So it's the same sort of thing, that Zazen is a drill. It's a drill, a rehearsal practice in living life. And that's what Yusei brings up for me. Two weeks ago, I was able to watch someone die.

[32:03]

I was taking public care of someone who was dying of cancer. And I had never experienced that before. It was an incredible experience. For one, I thought, why is it that I got as old as I am and never saw anyone die? On the other hand, being the first time, what made it easier for me, I wasn't attached to this person for too long. So we didn't have a certain attachment bond. There was something there, you know, we were going on each other for two months. So it made it easier on me in a way it was a gift to experience something like that with an attachment. I was able to sit with her the last hour and breathe with her. And then I had to sit with the body the hour after that.

[33:04]

For a first experience, it was a privilege, really. The teachings had really sorted it out for me. It was a wonderful opportunity to have this happen. Yeah, it's like, the way I feel about it, I feel the same. I kind of I feel like being able to participate in people being born and people dying is one of the great experiences that life has to offer. Do you have something to add to that? Oh, okay. Yeah, I just... I don't know, it feels like in our society we're rich enough so that if we avert from something we have the means to actually avert from it so we can build these huge social structures so that we never have to understand that garbage rots and people die and stuff like that.

[34:14]

The classic example of this in our society is the flush toilet. You know, if we understood death, if we understood, you know, we say innumerable labors brought us this food, we should know where it comes from. We should know where it goes to also. And, you know, so we have these flush toilets where we're using billions of dollars so that we'll never have to see that we shit. So that's our society, that's what we do. And we do that with people who die too. It's like this big surprise to everybody that they have to die because they've never seen it. I think this, but you're next. Okay. Yeah. way up.

[35:24]

It's more towards life being really busy and active. Something that seems to be very alive, doing a lot. And realizing that stopping all that doing, I can see a rhythm of dying, death. It seems like I'm not really moving and changing. I am being changed, but the tiny microseconds older, and I thought we were going to do things as well as I knew it, and people around me died, my friends and my family, and slowly, slowly, we took away, and not being able to do anything, and then finally God said, dash and slowly, but that way, That, my dear, is the question that is, you know, the calligraphy on the Han that we strike for Zazen,

[36:43]

It says, birth and death is the most important matter. You know, it's the most important, it's the koan. And I don't think that there is a single person in this room who has an answer to that koan. You know, when we recite the Heart Sutra, the mantra at the end, gate, gate, paragate, parasamgate, bodhi svaha. Gate, gone. Paragate, gone beyond. Parasamgate, completely gone beyond. Bodhi, awake. Svaha. Svaha, so be it. is a mantra that I feel talks about being alive and also talks about being dead.

[38:13]

Because gathe, gathe, paragathe, Well, the person is, you know, gone in a way that we can't understand. We're gone, or even the us of a second ago is gone in a way that completely we can't understand. But who doesn't understand it? You know, who can contemplate it? That person, if we can be that person, bodhi, svaha, Bob, you had something to say. Just to put it in perspective, I was raised, my parents had a lot of friends, and family was very large. Back in, I remember going to funerals and trying to get into it.

[39:32]

I didn't even know these people, and I tried to come out of it. I couldn't do it because I really had no relationship with this. It was kind of, you know, to be crying. It's something, you could laugh about it or really be light about it, but I never could find myself getting depressed about it. You better just leave it. I saw him at Christmas and I was really... I used to tell him because he never could get behind me. And I used to tease him. I said, when you die, don't be surprised if there's a part of you that doesn't fall. And he would laugh. Not laugh at the funeral, but laugh at that. And I walked into his room and he just stopped breathing.

[40:32]

But everything else was still functioning. His body. acknowledging that there was something that didn't belong. And it was very late, and two days before that I had walked in and he was struggling with sort of the itch of death. And my mother asked if I wanted to stay, and I said, not sure, because he's not available, he's not even here. He's right at that line, you know, he really didn't want to cross it. So when I went back, he had just about just two minutes to pull it off there, and he helped me cross the line, and was grateful for it. And I could feel the release Because he had so much stuff that he never left off. And it's out of practice. It's like we're a bag of stock. And we just kept pulling out bits and pieces and parts and whatever. That doesn't support us. That doesn't really add to the quality of our life.

[41:34]

It kind of limits us and weighs us down. And we just keep letting those things go until eventually there's nothing but the sack itself. But it's time to let that go. It's not something you can put all the rest of it down. In my experience, it wasn't really depressing at all. It was just different. Really quite different. It really is. The final part of it And except that, we have to get used to it every single day. You were saying?

[42:39]

What about coming here, especially when you say something like this? A lot of times I think it's like, you have to be in control of yourself. You don't have control of my friends' lives, or relationships' lives, or my life. Maybe that's something, maybe the Navy movement is about it. You don't want to control it. I think that's a difficulty. It's not that it's... I can't understand. Having no control over where you're going and the alternate course of events. It's very difficult. You know, it's not... It's my fault.

[43:43]

It's incredible, it's the hardest thing there is, but at the moment that you said it, you did it. So it's also the easiest thing there is. You know, you did it by saying that, you did it in this room. If we don't avert from what you're saying, if we stay with what you're saying and totally accept your point, we've already done it before we even thought about it. Anyway, I feel like the knees in this room are kind of saying it's time to end, so maybe we can take this up over tea a little bit, in a little bit, okay?

[44:41]

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