It gives me great pleasure to introduce our speaker today, Denke Raul Mankayo. Denke grew up in Chile, was introduced to Zed in Paris, and after 30 years in 2015, retired from serving as a psychologist in the Latino community at San Francisco's Mission Mental Health. He came to BCC in 1978. and at the invitation of Sojin Roshi in January 2019 established Blue Mountain Zendo El Cerrito. He recently completed a book on Lakan and Chan Buddhist Thought with Chinese and Korean colleagues that will be translated into Chinese and Korean. Den Kae is a Zen teacher as well as a practicing Lakanian analyst and the father of two grown-up sons. Please give a warm welcome to Denke. Thank you, Ross. Can you hear me well?

[01:01]

Can you hear me well? No, you can't hear me? I'm muted. We can hear you. If you can turn up your mic just a little bit, but don't waste any time doing that. Most of us can hear you just fine, Denke. Okay. The microphone is all the way up. So, okay. So it's a pleasure to be here with all of you and all friends from Berkeley Sense Center. And thank you for your introduction, Roz. And I want to start with a minute of silence for the war that's going on. It's a serious war. So let's observe a minute of silence and take peace.

[02:13]

OK, thank you very much. So today, let me move closer to the computer. I want to use as a segue for my talk from Not Always So, Suzuki Roshi's fascicle pure silk sharp iron. Last week, one of the Sunday school children saw me sitting Sazen and she said, I can do it. She crossed her legs and said, now what? Now what? Now that I have the physical posture, now what? I was very interested in her question because many of you have the same question. Now what? What's happening in my mind or in my heart? You come here every day to practice Zen and you ask me, now what, now what?

[04:28]

I don't think I can fully explain this point. It is not a question that can be answered. You should know for yourself, what, what is it? What is this? By the way, The title of my talk is like this, like this. So we sit in a formal posture so we can experience something through our bodies. Not by my teaching, but by your own physical practice. So physical practice is not a... Zazen is not a physical culture, but it means that the meaning of the teaching is in our own bodies, in our own body-mind, but we experience it with our bodies.

[05:36]

After you have full experience of mind and body, you will be able to express it in other ways as well. So without sticking to formal posture, even though formal posture is important, you naturally convey your mind to others in various ways. So we have to use various ways to convey our mind to other people. You will have the same state of mind sitting in a chair or standing, working or speaking. It is the state of mind in which you do not stick to anything. This is the purpose of practice. Yesterday, a Japanese visitor was speaking about Japanese literature. Japanese people have been studying Chinese characters and Chinese culture since about 600 or 700 AD. So that's the time of the Tang Dynasty, which was a cosmopolitan center for the world.

[06:46]

And that's where Xuansang brought the the Mahayana Sutras from Nalanda University, and everybody celebrated. It was a great celebration for the people. And so everybody was drawn to Chang'an, which is the modern city of Xi'an, including the Japanese. And after using Chinese characters, they established their own way of writing. The same thing will happen here with our practice. 100 years after the Japanese government stopped sending students to China to study Chinese culture, we had an exquisite Japanese culture. So will we have an exquisite American sense culture in 100 years? That's what's at stake. It's been 50 years. So we need another 50 years.

[07:49]

How are we going to make it there? Meaning how will we continue the lineage and not let it die? So there was a lot of freedom. So there was a lot of freedom in Chinese and Japanese culture at that time. All the artists and scholars were free to study the arts, philosophy, and religion. And they tried various disciplines. and they had good teachers. So they tried various disciplines. They studied the arts, they studied philosophy, and they studied religion. And that mix led to a wonderful Japanese Zen culture. The work that followed the Fujiwara period was not so good.

[08:57]

According to my visitor, some of the later calligraphy was too formal and shows too much of the artist's ego. We cannot see any personality in their calligraphy. The personality we see in art should be well-trained without much ego in it. I think you can understand the difference between personality and ego. Ego is something that covers your good personality. Everyone has character, but if you don't train yourself, your character is covered by ego. And then you cannot appreciate your personality. So it's interesting, you know, because over the years, we've talked about the teacher's personality and the teacher's dharma side. But here, Suzuki Roshi, is saying the personality is the Dharma side, and the ego is the ego side, or what we call the personality side.

[10:04]

Maybe it's just semantics. But personality has double meaning, because it can mean mask, so that's the ego, or it can mean personat in Latin, which is to sound through. The sounding through of the Dharma. That's the personality that Sasuke Roshi is speaking about. So through long practice and training, we get rid of ego. And we don't like that expression so much, get rid of ego. But the next thing he says, puts it in place. A word in Japanese that expresses his training is narrow. Narrow is how we refine silk by washing it many times so that the threads are white and soft enough to weave. We also use the character for iron. We temper iron by heating it while it's hot.

[11:08]

You know, the expression, hit the, what is it? Hit it when it's hot or when it's hot. Oh, it's the, what's the object? Strike when the iron is hot. Strike when the iron is hot. Thank you. So that's what we do in Sashin. In Sashin, we strike when the iron is hot because then we're melting. I remember one time in Sashin, I went to Dokusan and Sojin was melting. So we're like iron melting. That's like an egoist, stubbornness, you know, iron. So it has to melt to transform and turn at the basis. But when we have conversations with people, sometimes we have to strike when the iron is cold.

[12:17]

So only in Zazen, we strike when the iron is hot. because it's just with ourselves. Buddha is helping us transform. So there's nobody else you're striking, hopefully, because if you strike at somebody else when the iron is hot in sashim, not so good. So it has to be contained. The energy has to be contained without leaking. If you leak, then it creates problems. So through training, you rub and wash your ego, rub and wash your ego, you become quite soft like pure white silk. So our mind becomes like quite soft, like pure white silk. That's very beautiful. Even though you have strong desires, you may still have strong desires, but you don't cling to the objects of desire.

[13:23]

That's what we, with practice, we learn not to cling. So the problem is not so much that the desire is the cause of suffering. The problem is that the clinging to the objects of desire is the cause of suffering. When you don't cling to the object of desire, desire turns into a pure form of desire, which is the same as Dharma, compassion, emptiness. Even if you have strong desires, if you temper them enough, you will have strong sharp iron, like a Japanese sword. Well, it's sort of wisdom, it's not a physical sort. The physical sort is conditioned.

[14:30]

The sort of wisdom is unconditioned. So that's why war is not glorious anymore. That's how the world has changed. It's not glorious to go to war anymore. There's no pride for men to go to war, to fight stupid wars. And the whole world is waking up. I'm not saying there won't be any more wars, but I think that there's a change in how we think about war. and how we think about aggression and aggressivity. Not so proud anymore of power and aggression. So this is how we train ourselves.

[15:37]

This is not something you'll need to talk about, but something I must show you by my everyday life. And here's Suzuki Roshi. So sweet. He says, this is not something for me to talk about, but something I must show you by my everyday life, which is not so good. So is our everyday life any good? Or do you mind it the way? That ordinary mind, everyday life, not so good. So how do we bring, how do we enlightened? How do we, uh, Break all of our, not all maybe, it's too radical. Break some of our bad habits in daily life. That's what the monastic training does because you're all practicing together and you're all seeing each other. So you're kind of watching each other out, you know. But when we practice at home and with other people, we have to do that.

[16:45]

for ourselves. And then he says, I'm afraid you will study only my weak points. I don't think we spent too much time talking about Suzuki Roshi's weak points. Maybe he spent more time talking about Sojin Roshi's weak points, which he didn't hide. He didn't hide his weak points. Maybe some, sometimes he did. But The koan that Sojin Roshi left us is the practice of perfection that includes all our mistakes. There is no practice of perfection without all the mistakes, as we know, as Dogen said. But the fact that it's a big mistake, and there are degrees of mistakes that teachers make, okay, grant you.

[17:54]

But within reason, if we go after a teacher's mistakes, we make a lot of serious mistakes in life later on. So we have to give our teachers and our parents the benefit of the doubt that just because they make mistakes, that doesn't give you the right to not respect them. And if you do that, and many of us have done that, we make more serious mistakes in life. So we have a situation where the kids are running rampant and the parents are in timeout because of some mistake of the parent.

[19:01]

And that won't lead to a successful culture, I believe. Plus you add the aggression and the guns, you know, and then disaster strikes. We should know why we practice Sazin and we should be able to tell the difference between something that is good and something that just looks good. The just look good is not the same as good. And sometimes the good doesn't look good. But there's a big difference. Unless you train yourself through hard practice, you will have no eyes to see and no feeling to appreciate something that is truly good.

[20:09]

Only when many people have the eyes to see or to feel something good will we have good teachers and students. This is mutual practice. Buddha was great because people were great. When people are not ready, there will be no Buddha. So when Bodhidharma went to China, the emperor wasn't ready. So he went off and sat for nine years until they were ready. And then four students came. That's hard practice. I don't expect every one of you to be a great teacher, but we must have eyes to see what is good and what is not so good. This mind will be acquired by practice. Even in the Fujiwara period, Chinese culture and calligraphy were far superior to Japanese.

[21:18]

The Chinese people had various brushes and always used the brush more than the Japanese people did. The Japanese had fewer materials to make brushes. We had lots of bamboo, but few sheep or animals from which to make brushes. So our training in caliphany was more limited than that of the Chinese people. Historically, Buddhists have been very sincere about this point. That's why we have Dharma transmission. Chinese masters especially put strong emphasis on transmission. It is necessary to master the teacher's way completely before you're free from it. That is very hard practice. That is why it takes such a long time to be a Zen teacher. It is not knowledge, it is not some power, it is not some privilege.

[22:26]

The point is whether a person is trained enough to be like pure white silk and very sharp iron. So Sojin died about a year ago. I think it's recently was his anniversary a few months ago. And I think today Khosan announced the date for the Green Gulch ceremony. And recently also Thich Nhat Hanh died. So the question that arises, is how we continue to practice after the teacher has died. Dong Shan, who's the founder of Soto Zen in China, Chao Dong Chan is called, Soto Zen is called Chao Dong Chan in China.

[23:37]

Dong Shan announced the end of his life several days before the event and used the opportunity to teach his students one more time. in response to their grief, he told them to create a delusion banquet. And after a week of preparations, he only took one bite of the meal and telling the students not to make a great commotion over nothing, went to his room and died. So it is normal to love and grieve the teacher And at the same time, we need to find the teacher in ourselves and in others. Meaning, excuse me, we need to find a teacher in ourselves, not be looking outside. That's the teaching of the lineage. But other people or a second teacher may help you do this.

[24:46]

Otherwise, we become dependent on others and we're not a free person. So the poem of the Blue Mountain says all day long, they're together all day long, depending on each other without being dependent on each other. So we depend on others, but we're not dependent or clean. So when the Buddha was 80 years old, he was very sick. He knew he would not live much longer. And he was visiting all his disciples and going around giving talks. Dharma talks about practice, recommending different practices. And he knew that he was dying. And so he told them, you shouldn't take refuge in anything except yourself. But of course, yourself means your true self, not the ego of isolation. And Thich Nhat Hanh used the Pali sutras to talk about how we need to return to the island of ourself, where it is peaceful.

[26:15]

So you go home to yourself. So the Buddha knew that his disciples relied too much on him. They depended too much on him. And what would happen when he was no longer in the world? What would happen to his students and their need of him? So he wanted them to rely on themselves. And that's why he said, Be a lamp unto yourself. So the thing is, Suzuki Roshi would have said, go back to the island of no self. That's the real you. Because if you say go back to the island of yourself, people may... misunderstand and think that as a kind of retreat from the world, or as a kind of selfishness.

[27:26]

So, because no person is an island. And islands actually, that's just, it looks like it's an island because of the water, but it's not really an island. It's still interconnected. So there's this two sides of practice. seeing completely through yourself and practicing with the teacher and with other people. And so the, you know, in the Theravadans, I think they do sashin, everybody in a little hut, right? So they don't have the... tradition where we all sit together in a zendo or a chantang. They sit in little huts. So that's the island of self. But I don't think they understand that as being isolated.

[28:32]

So when Dongshan took his leave from his master Yunjian, Yunjian asked him, Where are you going? Although I'm leaving you, I have no idea where my next stop will be, replied Dongshan. Are you not going south of the lake? Yunyan asked. No, said Dongshan. Then are you returning to your native town? asked Yunyan. The answer from Dongshan was again no. Then Yunyi said, come back here soon. And he added, after you leave here, it will be very hard for us to see each other again, said Master Yunyi. And then Dongshan turns that upside down. And he says, in fact, because he was just talking about, we won't see each other, our physical presence, right?

[29:44]

So he was talking on the relative side. But Dongshan turns it on the absolute side. And he says, it will be very hard for us not to see each other again. In fact, I will constantly be seeing you, even though you're dead. And then he says, after you passed away, how can I answer someone if he wants me to describe what you were like? And that's where he said the famous words. Just say to him, this is... or just this, or like this. So just this, what does that mean? I'm not gonna explain it, okay? But the one thing I will say that is not a particular, this cushion. Well, it is a particular, this cushion as form is relative

[30:47]

And as emptiness is absolute. So just this is breaking the duality of form and emptiness. What is it? Dongsheng kept silent for a while. Then Yunjun said to him, you must be careful as you're carrying this great teaching or this great thing. So being careful. That's very important. The teacher has to be very careful, both in body, speech and mind. Because words have consequences. Dongshan was puzzle and later when he was crossing a bridge, he saw his image reflected in the water and saw himself as water. So he didn't see his specular image. It's not the image of the body in the mirror.

[31:49]

It's the wider body. It's water, body of water. And he suddenly understood the teaching of union and he composed the following gatha. I go my own way, wherever I go, I meet myself. This is the real you, whether practicing alone or with others. Another translation of it is when alone, I proceed through myself. Again, that's not isolation or selflessness. I meet him wherever I go. He is the same as me, yet I am not he. So that's a kind of koan of identity.

[32:54]

The teacher is you, is in you, but not as something, although some teachers have this dialogue, right, with their teacher, or they talk to themselves, right, as if the teacher was talking to them. But that's not what we mean. We mean that the teacher's in you as you. As you being completely yourself, you're being completely yourself, you're completely the teacher. That's the koan. Or, your father is in you, but I'm not my father. Your mother is in you, but I'm not my mother. I am me. But as me, I am my mother. As me, I am my father, and so on. So we find the teacher in ourselves. He didn't go anywhere.

[34:01]

No coming, no going, just this. Be yourself. And be kind to others. Thank you very much. I wanted to, before we open question, I just wanted to say something. We're in the practice period at Blue Mountain, as I think I sent an email to the larger Sangha. And James Kenny is our Shuso. And as you know, Sojin gave him the name Dainin and I gave him the name Doshin. Dainin means great patience. Like Suzuki Roshi said, one of his shortcomings was impatient, being very impatient. So he developed great patience. So Sojin gave James this great koan with his name.

[35:07]

And I gave him the name Doshin, which means way of heart. And so I just want to mention that we'll have the Shuse ceremony. We have to change the date. April 1st, April Fool's Day. So it'll be interesting how the Dharma Fool manifests. And it's Friday, April 1st at 10 a.m., and you're all invited. We do have, you know, we require vaccination. And if we're going to be a lot of people who come in person, we should wear masks. But otherwise, you're welcome to join us in soon, too. It will be a great occasion. And I also want to say, Ross said our center is called Blue Mountain Zendo, which was the original name.

[36:15]

And that's what I wanted. But we had a complaint from the East Coast, from another Zendo, it's called Blue Mountain. And so I talked with Jose and various people. And so we decided to change the name so that it wouldn't be because they said that we were infringing on their rights or whatever. So we changed the name to Blue Mountain sense center of El Cerrito. So that's the official name now. Although we're more of a Zendo than a sense center, but we had to change the name. So anyway, welcome your questions or comments. I invite you, Gudsanga, to raise your hand, digital hand. We encourage brevity and get to the point. And provide, if you often ask questions, perhaps waiting a second and let others step forward.

[37:22]

In addition, all the information about Raul and all of our information, Denke, his Zen center and books will be in the chat at the end of our conversation today. Blue hands, please, or questions in the chat, which I'll read. While we wait for the questions, one thing I forgot to say, my name is Denkei. Sojin gave me that name. Imo Denkei. And Denkei is the, Den is the Chinese character for field. And Hue is the character. We thought it was blessing, so Sojin gave me the name Denkei or Denkiei, but in researching it now, I found out that it doesn't exist in Japanese, and it doesn't exist in Chinese.

[38:33]

So I'm still using it, but the character... for blessing is the character of we, which is the weineng. But weineng in the platform sutra, when you read it under different translations, is not blessing, but is beneficence or something like that. So my Chinese students have given me as suggested, as the correct Chinese name for the characters that Sojin gave me. So I just wanted to share that. I invite Jeff Taylor to unmute yourself and ask a question.

[39:41]

Thank you, Denke. You were talking about when a teacher or a parent makes a mistake that might cause a child or a student to question respect and that we must give respect in all of these cases. How does the teacher or the parent understand their mistake? Well, first, we should know that the history, the story of Zen teachers, one mistake after another. And the people who are all pointing fingers at the teacher often are not free of blame themselves. And Wineng said, if you are yourself wrong and you point other people's wrongs, you will be evil or you will create evil.

[40:45]

So first we have to correct our wrongs and the teacher should be aware what their shortcomings are. Just like Suzuki Roshi said, he was aware of his shortcomings. He was impatient. He was absent-minded. He was distracted. Those were his mistakes. Sojin had other mistakes, but so do we, and so do groups. And it's part of the relationship between the group and the individual. And so the teacher, the Buddha lifts the Sangha, but the Sangha has to also lift the teacher. If the teacher has the concern of the Sangha after most, and the students overrun the teacher, that eventually is not gonna,

[41:50]

produce a good outcome. So I'm talking about small mistakes. I'm not talking about big mistakes. So big mistakes have to be dealt with differently. So it doesn't mean to give the authorities of the parents a carte blanche, but it's hard to parent. It's very difficult to parent. Parents are struggling with all kinds of difficulties. So sometimes when they lose their cool, yeah. Now, that doesn't go into abuse, of course. That's what I'm talking about, something different. But there are a lot of gray areas. And in the gray areas, I think that the culture would do better to give the teacher that otherwise we respect the benefit of the doubt and encourage them to work on themselves. And the teacher should continue to work on himself or herself. whether in practice, whether talking to another teacher, whether going into analysis or therapy. There's no shame in self-exploration and growth.

[42:52]

I was thinking about the nature of entre nous between us. The nature of what? Between us. It's a French term. It's between us. So in our relationship between teacher and parent, between teacher and parent and student and child, when I make a mistake, how do I understand that mistake in terms of what happens next? What do I do? And in thinking about the nature of the relationship, you pointed at Sangha and you pointed at individual relationships. How do I behave and what is my understanding? And how do I use that as a teaching moment? both conditioned and unconditioned teaching moments. Well, for example, you say to your child, I ask you to do something. And ask you twice, ask you three times. And then the parent loses their cool and starts yelling. Right? That's a mistake. You shouldn't lose your cool, but people do.

[44:09]

So... Sometimes, if it's too bad, they should apologize. And sometimes they just lose their cool, they're human. We have to forgive that. Sojin lost his cool with me. He hit me. He got angry sometimes. But I knew that that was just the moment. Maybe he shouldn't have hit me. That's part of Japanese culture. In India, the Buddhists didn't hit. The Buddha didn't hit anybody. But it's part of Japanese sin. But I gave him the benefit of the doubt. I was angry, pissed off. You this and you teacher this and you. But the next day, I was angry and he wasn't. He talked to me normally.

[45:11]

I was still angry holding the grudge. So I knew that I had to work on my grudge, not go after him for what he did to me. Does that answer your question? Thank you, Raul. There is a question in the chat. Denke, can you say something about your return to the land of our ancestors, bringing American Zen and Lacanian analysis to China? Yeah, well, the thing is that the Chinese need their culture to understand Western culture. So the Chan, the Zen, also helps them appreciate their culture.

[46:17]

but also an inroad into Western culture. And on the other hand, the Chan makes a little bit of Lacan perhaps more accessible. But there, they don't have that split. The same audience, I can go, Talking from Chan to psychology, psychoanalysis, philosophy. It's not broken down, the audiences are not broken down in the same way that they're broken down here. So I have a, so there's two vehicles. One is with my students, I've established a center in Beijing.

[47:22]

And then there's a chan lay teacher in China who has chan tang, sendos in different cities of China. And she also has them together with health clinics. And the health clinic provides both Western medicine and Chinese medicine. So I've been invited to come and lead sashimi there. But I'll have to... not wear the robe. Because in China, you can only wear the robes in designated monasteries.

[48:26]

And the designated monasteries, the hierarchy of them, have to be in accord with the government. I don't judge that. I think there's a lot of complex reasons. But on the one hand, the government has adopted Buddhism. That's a big historical step. The government has adopted Buddhism and Judy Woodruff had a program on it. You may see it on YouTube. So they've made a big move. But they also want Buddhism to support the government, to support the goals of socialism, to have the welfare of the people uppermost.

[49:40]

There's some, you know, not that difficult from a Buddhist point of view. to have the people, because that's what all the Chinese teachers said, Lao Tzu, Kang Tzu, you know, all the Winang, you know, all the teachers, all they said, the leaders had to be kind to the people, have the concern of the people, that's the Chinese, you know, that's the ancient Chinese. So, so if you, if you practice, in a Chantang that's not in a monastery, then you can't wear the robe because they wanna separate religion and the state. So I'll have to wear, but they're also into recovering Hanfu, the traditional clothing from the Tang dynasty.

[50:45]

So the Chinese are starting to dress like the Tang dynasty. And the Tang dynasty, the dress was a kind of variation of the robe. It's a kind of making lay the Buddhist rope. That was the clothing of the Chang dynasty. So now they're starting to wear that. So I'm fine with sitting with a Hippari and a Raksu. So that the practice can be useful to people and be accessible to people. So I'm not going yet because China's not open and there's a quarantine of a month and you have to be in a hotel, isolated. So I'm not gonna do that. So I'm gonna go once they open it up. Does that answer the question?

[51:53]

Of course. Any other questions? We have time for one, maybe. Hozan Sensei, please. Thank you, Denkei. Really fine and deep talk. I'm curious, you know, my Dharma name, Kushiki, was also subject to some questioning on the part of our Japanese Soto friends. But it didn't say it wasn't a name. They said it was a very unusual name. But I'm wondering, in your case, I'm just curious, do you have an intention to revise Denke to use a different name?

[53:04]

Well, I'm... Which I can completely understand. I'm comfortable with Denke now. Okay. And I'm comfortable with, in accord with Sojin's intention in giving me that name. So I would be in accord with his intention if I did anything to change the name, because I think he would understand. But I don't know if I'm going to do that, but I'll have a Chinese name for the Chantang, Tianhui. It's interesting in some places what people are doing are they're using their, the translations of their name. Like I think she's here now, our friend, Luminous Heart. uh and you know you would be field of blessings uh and we also have you know so anyway i'm just i just as curious it's a conundrum uh i wouldn't translate into english no i wouldn't i wouldn't do that myself either but i'm just saying that it's done and i like denke you know it feels good in the mouth yeah um

[54:16]

Yeah, I think in China, you know, I'll use a Chinese name, Tianhui. And are the characters the same? The characters are the same. Because the characters are Chinese, right? So the Japanese names are Chinese characters. So the den is a field, and it's the character of a field, a square. And then the Wei is a really complex character, but... So it means field of beneficence. Actually, in the translation of the Platform Sutra that I've been studying with Chinese students, there's a different translation, right? So he says that it's not a blessing because he has a negative view on blessings. He thinks that asking for blessings is gaining mind. Yeah. That's what the Bodhidharma was, the emperor was seeking blessing.

[55:22]

So that's why Bodhidharma turned him down. And so actually it's interesting that Wineng has a kind of critical perspective on, so he doesn't, the character is not translated as blessing, is translated as beneficence. It has many meanings, but among them, beneficence and literary benevolence. Right. So I guess in this name, and I would think as Sotian intended it, whether it's blessings or beneficence, it's the active principle that is generated from you, not received by you. Right. Very good. But anyway, I mean. The active principle you're saying is that that's a kind of renomination that the name has to be in accord with the active principle that comes forth from you. Yes, exactly. So just one more question, which is that, so the two characters, those work together.

[56:28]

Those are not problematic. No. Okay. The first two, Imo. Yeah. Imo would be, Chinese would be Uchi, Uchi Tianhui, but they're the same characters. Yeah. The suchness doesn't change. Thank you. You're welcome. Thanks for your question.

[56:52]

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