It's another beautiful day out there. Thank you for being here. We're in the morning of the second day of a three-day session. There are about, I think it's about 30 of us today who are doing it. Is that right? Something like that. So we sat Friday all day today and then tomorrow until about dinner time. It felt to me this morning just unusually deep and settled and quiet all morning while I was here. And so I sensed that people in Sishin are working hard. They're really practicing, really trying to stay as completely present with themselves as they can be moment to moment.

[01:08]

I was thinking yesterday about this sentence from Blake, which is that the road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom. So this practice is about living in the palace of wisdom, but I think what we have this weekend is excess of upright sitting. That's kind of a Zen student's notion of excess. But still, there's some joy in that. So I hope that those of you who are coming just for lecture can appreciate the effort that people are making and kind of get a feeling in the room. I remember, actually, before I actually sat a seshin, when I had first come here, I came during, for evening zazen, during a seven-day seshin, like, I don't know, the first or second day, and

[02:19]

I came in and people had been sitting all day from five in the morning and I just, I realized, oh, there's something different in this room. There's some different energy. So I hope that that energy will be a little contagious for you and that you'll find it encouraging and that you'll give your encouragement back. Well, yesterday, I gave a talk from the recorded sayings of Zen master Zhao Zhou, or Zhou Shu. And I'll just, I'm not going to recap the whole thing, fortunately for you. But the dialogue went like this. A monk asked Joshu, during the 24 hours, how is mind put to use? And the master said, you are used by the 24 hours. I use the 24 hours.

[03:23]

Which of these times are you talking about? So I think that sort of reflected a tone that I wanted to set for myself. during Sashin, and I thought I would continue talking about Joshu. I wanted to sort of recap some historical detail to give you a context. There won't be a test, but I want to give you a context so you can get a feeling for some small feeling for where these words are coming from, but the important thing is in the spirit of the exchanges that are recorded, and in the spirit, the really important thing is in the spirit of our exchanges, of our meeting ourselves and meeting each other, doing the best we can in those exchanges.

[04:31]

Sometimes sometimes hitting it right on, sometimes failing, but just going on again and again. So I think that's the important thing that I get from the record of Joshu, and also that the words, if you're not attached to them, the words themselves convey teachings. So, Zhou Shu, or Zhaozhou, lived in the Tang Dynasty, which was the golden age of Zen, and he lived reputedly 120 years from 778 to 897. And he had lots of, it was a time when there were lots of great teachers about and they were visiting each other and their monks would kind of

[05:37]

visit back and forth, and if you read the cases and exchanges, they'll be citing each other, and you can see the monks comparing their teachers, and it must have been a very, you know, really lively and creative time to be practicing in China. Joshu was a country boy, came from a rural setting, and he took up the practice in his late teens. I think he had, at first, a local teacher, and then he found his root teacher, Nanchuan, or Nansen. And when he found it, he was very steady. He stayed there for 40 years. So he stayed there from the age of 18 until the age of 57 when his teacher died. And even then, he didn't feel that he was ready to teach yet at 57.

[06:40]

So he actually wandered for 20 years. and didn't begin formally teaching, didn't settle down in his temple, Kuan Yin Yuan, until he was 80. And at age 80, he still had another 40 years of teaching. He has a kind of iconic status as a Zen master that we admire. But also, we admire him because he was a very warm, you could see he was a very warm and grandfatherly teacher, even though he was tough-minded. If you read other records of the period, what you see is they seem to be punctuated with a lot of yelling and hitting.

[07:51]

Grace talked about this last week. If you read the record of Lin Chi, Rinzai, who was contemporary, A monk will say something and then she'll take a stick and he'll just whack him off his seat. Or the monks will get into one, pull the chair out from the other. It's kind of raw compared to what you find in Joshu. But he was not a slouch. He was totally challenging to his students. So when I was looking yesterday when I was reading, I realized that there are four cases in the Blue Cliff Record. The Blue Cliff Record is a collection of koans, which is kind of seminal Zen teachings.

[08:56]

They're basically dialogues. Often they are stories that culminate in one party's enlightenment, although not in every case. There are a number of sort of key collections, and the Blue Cliff Record is one of them. And I was surprised, I hadn't quite realized it before, there are four cases in the Blue Cliff Record in which Joshu, who is far and away the most He populates the Blue Cliff record more than any other Zen teacher. About 10% of the 100 cases are dialogues involving him. But these four cases all go back to a single Chinese poem. They're a commentary and a gloss and coming at it from different ways. And I think that this fits in quite well with the practice that we're trying to cultivate here this weekend and ongoing, so I'd like to talk about that a little.

[10:05]

But I just wanted to say something about koans before I do. There are a couple of different approaches to the koan tradition that are still extant. And broadly, there is one approach, which is characterized as the Rinzai approach, where you're You read this case, or you study this case, and I'll read you some of these cases so you'll see what I'm talking about. You demonstrate your understanding of the case by making a presentation. That presentation is usually not in words. It's with your body. It's with your body-mind. That's one approach. It's not at all discursive.

[11:11]

It's not necessarily logical. It's not subject to interpretation. And usually the way it's done is that a student will face a teacher one-on-one in the Sanzen or Dokusan room. She or he will recite the case, and then they'll be asked to present their understanding. And they'll do it, and the teacher will ring the bell, and they're out of there. And this will happen again and again until they convincingly convey their understanding of the matter at hand. It's quite wonderful. In the Soto tradition, which is more our tradition, also, I forgot to say, people, they sit with these koans. One sits with them. One takes a core phrase from this koan and keeps it in mind in a deeply, deeply concentrated way until it unlocks.

[12:24]

It unlocks itself. It unlocks your mind. You unlock. And there's a rather long and elaborate curriculum of these koans. In our tradition, the Soto Zen tradition, Suzuki Roshis and Sojins, we don't We rarely or we don't usually sit with a koan, certainly not in the same way, not as a concentration practice. And so there is a tradition of commentary and a kind of parsing of the meaning and the thrust of these koans. And that's more usual in our school. I would say that both of these schools or both of these approaches look on the other with some suspicion.

[13:31]

One thinks the other is too flabby, too weak, and the other might think that the school of presentation is too ritualized or too gimmicky, not intellectual enough. So there's often a kind of wariness between them. My own feeling from having done some practice in both. I'm just, I'm drawn in both directions. My home is sort of here, and this is what I know how to do, but there's something really wonderful and vigorous about being called to account by somebody who's just sitting here. I think this is somewhat what Grace was talking about last week. And that can give your practice a grounding and an energy that is very useful.

[14:37]

Nonetheless, I'm going to endeavor to at least point you in certain ways. And as Suzuki Roshi said, I'm going to risk making a mistake on purpose, because that's what I know, that's what I've learned. So I'll blunder on, and if it's useful, great, and if it's not, forget it. But please come and sit anyway. I have a great affection for Joshua because he plays freely with language, very much like Dogen, whom we study, in a way. But I try to be careful, and we should all be careful, this is not just wordplay. The monks are usually trying to trip him up, you know, they're trying to sort of chop logic with him or trap him in, well, you know, you said or, you know, how come you're always saying this or pointing out the inconsistencies.

[15:50]

What they see is the inconsistencies and he is almost, well, I've never seen him caught. except in that story about the worm which I told yesterday. You missed all the good stories yesterday. You got them on tape, right, okay. But his responses and the teachings, it's not just wordplay, it can make a difference in our lives. So they're really living and potent. So let me read you this case two in Blue Cliff Record, which is kind of where it starts off. And I would just point out that by virtue of its position in the Blue Cliff record, one would suspect that this is a case that has a particular prominence.

[16:51]

I mean, it's the second case, and so, you know, it's right up there in front as something that sets a tone. Joshua's the real way is not difficult. Joshua spoke to the assembly and said the real way is not difficult. It only abhors choice and attachment. With but a single word there may arise choice and attachment or there may arise clarity. This old monk, speaking of himself, does not have clarity, does not have that clarity. Do you appreciate the meaning of this or not? Then a monk asked, If you do not have that clarity, what do you appreciate? Joshua said, I do not know that either. The monk said, if you do not know, how can you say that you do not have clarity?

[17:51]

Joshua said, asking the question is good enough. Now make your vows and retire. So the source, what he was quoting and what he quotes through these four cases, is from a 7th century Chinese poem called Song of Faith and Mind, or Relying on Mind, by the third Zen ancestor, Sengstan. And I'll read you the first lines of this. It's just, you know, slightly different rendering. In this translation here of the case, it says, the real way is not difficult, it only abhors choice and attachment. Actually, I sort of like this one better. The supreme way is not difficult, it just precludes picking and choosing.

[18:57]

The supreme way is not difficult, it just precludes picking and choosing. Without yearning or loathing, the way is perfectly apparent, while even a hair breadth difference separates heaven and earth. To see the way with your own eyes, quit agreeing and disagreeing. Like that, to see the way with your own eyes, quit agreeing and disagreeing. The battling of likes and dislikes, that's the disease of the mind. So that's the way this poem starts. It doesn't mince any words about what the practice is. The great way is just life of harmony, the life of following the Buddha way.

[19:59]

It's the life that one leads if one observes the, it's the Noble Eightfold Path itself. You could say, noble path is not difficult. It just precludes picking and choosing. So it's very conventional Buddhist teaching boiled down to this fundamental human tendency, the tendency we have to pick and choose, the tendency we have to like and dislike. And that's, it's very challenging. So that's the poem.

[21:01]

But Joshu, he added it a little bit. He added a little bit to it. So he would add, the great way is not difficult if one avoids picking and choosing. And then he says, with but a single word, there may arise choice and attachment, or there may arise clarity. That's his extension of what Sangsthan is saying. And I think it's a very useful extension. The poem, the Sangsthan poem, is just Very straightforward. Just avoid picking and choosing. What Joshu, I believe, is saying here is that with but a single word, there may arise choice and attachment, or there may arise clarity.

[22:15]

Well, the single word is our stepping into the world. You know, it's not just our sitting in emptiness facing the wall. When we speak a word, one presumes there's someone there to hear it. When we act, there is an object, there is something that we're relating to. So speaking a word is about relation. So when you speak a word or when you step into relationship, when you dare to do that, which it's not a matter of daring actually, you don't have choice. If you're living, you have no choice but to do this. So when you do it, there may arise

[23:18]

choice and attachment, or there may arise clarity. So there may arise, roughly speaking, delusion as what is conventionally, I think thinking of picking and choosing conventionally as delusion or as suffering, let's say. If you think of the Four Noble Truths, the cause of suffering is desires of different kinds. Desires are picking and choosing. So there's suffering on the one hand, and there's clarity, which is conventionally construed as enlightenment. But he goes on and says, this old monk does not have that clarity.

[24:21]

And the monk who's questioning him says, he says, does not have that clarity. Do you appreciate the meaning of this or not? So are you getting what I'm saying here about clarity? And the monk asked, well, if you do not have that clarity, what do you appreciate? Joshua said, I don't know that either. And the monk said, if you do not know, how can you say you do not have that clarity? That is wordplay on the part of the young monk. And Joshua says, good. You did good up to this point. Now just bow and go away. And that's the end of the case. So let me read. So that was case two.

[25:28]

Then there are three cases together which come at this from different angles. Case 57, 58, and 59. So in 57, a monk asked Joshu, it is said the real way is not difficult. It only abhors choice and attachment. Now what are non-choice and non-attachment? Joshua said, I alone am holy throughout heaven and earth. The monk said, it is still choice and attachment. Joshua said, translated in various ways, one way that I like is Joshua said, you stupid oaf, where are choice and attachment? The monk was speechless. The other way it's translated is, you country bumpkin, Same difference. I alone am holy throughout heaven and earth.

[26:31]

These are the words that it's recorded that the Buddha said upon attainment of his enlightenment after sitting under the Bodhi tree for six days. Joshu's response to the question, now what are non-choice and non-attachment? His response is enlightenment. just his being, that one must own it for oneself. It's not that, not really alone. Mel likes to use the word, when he quotes this, I alone am holy, alone, he'll extend it a little bit into all one, or at one.

[27:37]

But the point is that each of us has to embody this for ourselves. Case 58. A monk said to Joshua, you so often quote the words, the real way is not difficult, it only abhors choice and attachment. Isn't that your point of attachment? Joshua said, a man asked me the same question once before, and five years later, I have still found no justification for it. Another translation is, five years later, I still can't explain. So they're aware that this is, I think the monks are aware that this is a key point in his teaching.

[28:45]

And, you know, I'm not sure if it's unfortunate or fortunate. It's fortunate for us that they kept trying to trip him up. Perhaps unfortunate for them, or maybe not. Maybe it was just fine for them. But I like his response. His responses are immediate. They're not calculated. They're not composed. A man asked me the same question once before, and five years later, I still have found no justification for it. In other words, there's no ground on which he's standing that he can make an argument for this. It's just something that he knows, and he lives with every fiber of his being. The final case to this.

[29:50]

A monk said to Joshu, the real way is not difficult. It only abhors choice and attachment. If you say a word, there arise choice and attachment. How then can you go on helping someone? Joshu said, why don't you quote it to the end? The monk said, I have only this much in mind. Joshua said, you know the real way is not difficult. It only abhors choice and attachment. So what is the end? What's quoting to the end? What does he mean by that? I think this is an important question. It's like, how do you put this verse into your life and really make it your own.

[30:56]

I actually, I really like this exchange because, well, I appreciate it because it doesn't seem that the monk is being positional. It seems to me that I'm getting a feeling of real, of a deep sincerity and really wanting to know. And Joshua is kindly helping him. I mean, the monk is saying, he says, I only have this much in mind. I think he's saying, I'm stuck here. You know, it's like I have a sense of what you're talking about, but I'm not there yet. And Joshu is saying, well, you know, the real way is not difficult.

[31:56]

You know, only abhors choice and attachment. So this is our challenge. How do we do that? What is it like for us? I think that's a question I keep trying to raise for myself. How do I use this? How do I use this exchange? How do I use a conversation that I may have with any of you? How do I use the moment of just facing the wall? How do I use the moment of my own distraction? you know, of having my concentration or thinking I have it, you know, having my clarity and then falling into picking and choosing. What do I do about that shift?

[32:59]

Talking with people yesterday, in practice discussion and observing my own body and mind, It felt like collectively we saw that our preferences were like a bubble rising in a glass of soda water. It rises right from the bottom. What I like, what I don't like, it just comes up. It's not like I have to produce it. It just comes up by itself. And then if one can let it rise, it just rises, comes to the top of the, glass and just go, and ready to go. Now, a lot of times when we're sitting, depending upon our states of mind or body, We can feel these likes and dislikes. They're not just like bubbles of gas.

[34:05]

They're like steel bubbles. They're really solid. And they may float, but they sure aren't going to go burst. They're just going to kind of float around on the top of the glass. And we believe in them. But if you watch them, you see that they're just states of mind. That these preferences or likes and dislikes are just states of mind. I like, in Sengstein, he said, the battling of likes and dislikes, that's the disease of the mind. Well, one of the things to remember about disease is that We don't blame ourselves for it. We don't blame ourselves for being ill, for having a disease.

[35:06]

We just have it. There are causes and conditions that bring it forth. So there are causes and conditions that bring forth our likes and our dislikes that cause us to have these diseases. If we then, on top of it, blame ourselves, it's very unlikely we're going to have an easy time finding a healing or being free from it. So that's the challenge, is just having, is not turning not looking at, and this is what he was saying in one of the causes, he said, choice and attachment over here, suffering over here, clarity or enlightenment over here, be very careful that you don't prefer one over the other.

[36:08]

As soon as you prefer that, then, you know, you've turned your enlightenment, you've defiled it. You've turned it into a preference. You've turned it into something to like or dislike. And then, it's just gone, like any other bubble. But, it can come back whenever it wants. It's there, and so are your preferences. So how do you act with freedom in the middle of preference? How do you act with freedom in the middle of clarity? How do you live a life of freedom? This is the question that we face as we sit here, every time we sit down. I mean, this is a laboratory for working on that. But actually, this is the question that we face every moment, every moment of our lives, every time we face ourselves, every person we talk to, every exchange, every time we pick something up.

[37:28]

How do we do it? with freedom, even in the midst, whether we're in the midst of preference, like or dislike, or clarity where it's just where your, clarity where there is no boundary between yourself and other, no boundary between yourself and there's nothing called a thing. It's just all being. So this is our challenge. And if we have clarity, then we plow it back into our everyday activity. And I think that's really the essence of, that's what Joshu was saying. I think that's what we've heard, what we hear Sojin saying over and over again. It's what you hear Suzuki Roshi saying. You plow whatever you have back into your life.

[38:33]

so that you can meet things being upright, and you can meet things being upright even if you're like Clay, who's upright lying down. Upright is not a physical position. Upright is a way to configure your mind. So we meet things being upright and meet each other being upright, then we can really be truly helpful to ourselves and each other. And that's what I think we're about. And I think that's the warm thrust of all of Joshu's teaching. He keeps trying to help the people that he meets.

[39:38]

And he does that by being free and being completely himself and free even in his preferences, his likes and dislikes. What is it? What is that state of mind? How do we live like that? So I think I'll stop there. Let's take a few minutes for questions or comments. Fata. I go, well, that's okay. I mean, that's a great gift, though, you should remember, you know, because they were given something for that blow or that tweak or whatever that's, you know, it was theirs alone anyway, but it's priceless, so.

[40:55]

because he doesn't want to set it up as something to attain. And also because if he had it, that would imply he had it and they didn't. And what he has is his. what he knows is his, and whatever anybody else is going to know has to be theirs. In one of the commentaries, it pointed out that Zen teachers never take responsibility for, they never take credit for another's awakening. There's pecking and tapping, there's helping, but it's your deal. If he were to claim something, I think he thought it might have the effect of taking something away, being perceived as taking something away from someone else.

[42:19]

That's my sense of it. I get really confused when we talk about choices and preferences life and dislike when it comes to the mundane daily world. What came to mind when you were talking, Ellen, was just on a simple level, let's just say I decided about 10 years ago that I didn't like a certain way of working, so I created my own deal. And I'm happier because I made that choice and I noticed my on a deeper, more life-threatening level, there's people every day who are in abusive marriages and wake up and choose to leave because they prefer not to be abused. So I'm confused about those types of scenarios.

[43:23]

Choice becomes really important and helpful. I think that's an important question. Yeah. Well, it's not about passivity. or about just a kind of mute acceptance. It's about, you know, this is about freedom. And there is no way, that's why he says, with a word, with a word, you raise choice and attachment and clarity with a single word. So you have no, you actually don't have a choice but to make choices. And the question for us is, what's the basis of that choice? Is the choice running to something or from something? Or is the choice based on a life or principle that's wholesome and helpful and unifying?

[44:28]

You have to make choices. Yeah. And I think that's a mistake that people, you know, people sort of characterize, well, they sort of generally characterize Eastern religions as, ah, you know, it's like, well, it ain't like that. That you're sort of deeper or bigger or beyond it all. Right. But you're really, we're all so in it. Well, I haven't met anybody who's beyond it all yet. Sue? I want to thank you for your talk. I found it astonishing in a lot of ways. And I think Joshua is saying, I love what you said, that it's up to each one of us to get it for ourselves. And it comes and goes, and it changes, and it's not set. So I can't cling to this understanding that I have.

[45:32]

because the circumstances change and what's needed has changed and my understanding of intentional living is something that I have to live with. It's not an end product. It isn't an end product. And I found it very exciting, so thank you. You're welcome. But there is something you can rely on. And what is it? What is it? That's, again, that just throws you back on yourself. You have to find that. I kept thinking about the Dharma gates and the delusions, the inexhaustible delusions being the same. That's what we have to work with. Well, you know, on New Year's Eve, when we ring the bell 108 times, the way a surgeon describes it as well, it's 108 delusions and it's 108 dharmagates, each one.

[46:42]

I think it's time for maybe one more question, comment, a serious one. I was just thinking maybe we don't get to choose any of the big things. We just get to choose little things. We don't get to choose how we're born or who we're born to or where we're born. And mostly, we don't get to choose how we die. And if we give birth, we don't get to mess with smell. That's a question. I remember a whole lot of choices that were involved when my kids were born. We don't know. We don't know, actually. We don't know that there's no choice involved in birth.

[47:43]

And there are choices. I mean, all of the teachings, all of the teachings, suggest that there are choices involved as you approach your death. And there may be, I've been, This is a whole other story. There was an execution last week at San Quentin, and some of us went out there. And I had been thinking about that and working with it in myself, because I was left very unsettled by it. And found, as I was looking through this book of liturgy from Shasta Abbey, which is basically Soto liturgy, There's this ritual called the Eight Exhortations. These exhortations that you read as a person is dying, so as they approach death, as they actually physically die, and then for a period of weeks periodically afterwards.

[48:54]

And each one of these exhortations is about make your choice now. You know, choose freedom. Don't choose to hold on to your past life, your past actions. So, at least in that literature, which I think is not so unusual for Buddhist literature, there are choices all the way along the line. But the choice that we're making moment to moment, right now, is very big. And it makes a difference. It makes a difference in possibly immeasurable ways. So we should keep that in mind. Thank you very much.

[49:44]

@Text_v004
@Score_JJ