Good morning, everyone, and welcome to Saturday's program. I'd like to welcome our speaker today, Denkei Raul Mankayo. Denkei's practice began over 30 years ago in Paris, on a visit over there. And he was established at Deshimara Roshi's practice place. And then he came to America and studied to become a psychoanalyst in the Lacanian School. And he began practicing at Berkley Zen Center and was ordained by Sojo Roshi as a lay practitioner. And over the years he fathered two children and he's been commuting over the three bridges. He lives in Marin. He practices here. He works in San Francisco at Mission Mental Health as a psychologist. And last year he received Dharma transmission from Sojo Roshi in a breaking new ground, the tradition of dharma transmission is typically held at the monastery in Tassajara, but we held it here during the interim.

[01:06]

And that's actually taking place again this year with two other students. Dan Katie has published a number of books on psychology and Zen, and he has a few books, I believe, at the table, which he'd be happy to talk Nice to see everybody here this sort of warm summer Saturday morning. So today is the last day before our summer break. I don't know if the sound is OK. It's OK? A little loud. A little loud? No. It's good. It's fine. It's fine? Yeah. So this is the last day before our summer break. And as Ross said, during the summer break, a couple of people are going to be receiving Dharma transmission.

[02:12]

And also this weekend is San Francisco Zen Center's 50th anniversary. And Baker Oshi actually is giving the talk in San Francisco this morning. of the Zen world. And he came to Burpee Zen Center many, many years ago, remember 1980. And it's also Baika's. Baika was a priest ordained by Sojun Roshi. and Ross's former wife and she's inaugurating today her new Zendo in Pleasant Hill.

[03:15]

So some of us are going to be going over afterwards for that. We also wish her well. And then this morning when I arrived, Hosen, who's on his way to New Mexico to teach there today, he was sending off his daughter Sylvie, and Lori, I think, was driving there. And he was kind of sad, so we hugged him. He was being a papa, seeing his daughter off. So appropriately with that, the talk topic of the talk for today is mother and father in Zen practice which is also another way of speaking about birth and death and for the speaker giving a talk it's also kind of birth and death the intensity of the experience and for the

[04:26]

Sometimes you're born, sometimes you die. You never know which one's going to be. But whether you're born and feel elated into some new life, eventually you'll die again. And if you die, then eventually you will be reborn again. So for the audience, sometimes the talk will awaken you, and sometimes they will put you to sleep. So whether awake or asleep, because sleep is a kind of awakening, and awakening is a kind of dream, as Doving said. So whether we're born or we die, whether we're awake or asleep, it's all contained within Buddhist practice. So I'm going to start with a case 123, lots of koans in the Rinzai tradition, of the Sound of One Hand koan collection.

[05:42]

The Sound of One Hand. That's the name of the koan collection in the Rinzai school. So it goes like this. Prince Nada, which is a mythological figure, tore off his flesh and return it to his mother. Broke up his bones and gave them back to his father. Then he revealed his original body and exercising great magical power preached the truth for his parents. And then the koan gives an answer to the koan. This is in the book. And the answer goes, You must be tired. Shall I rub your shoulders for you? So Prince Nada, it's like, in Spanish, Nada is nothing.

[06:44]

So Prince nothing, Prince of nothing. realized that his flesh and bones were empty and carried himself and that of his parents across to the other shore. Or his parents carried him across to the other shore, beyond suffering. So, Mother, you must be tired. Shall I rub your shoulders for you? So he touches the self-nature. The mother is the self-nature, Prajnaparamita. And the self-nature of being tired, and of ire, or anger. When we're tired and sleepy, we easily get angry.

[07:48]

Like a child, who's sleepy and tired, but wants food. So he cries and asks for food or for an ice cream. I don't know if you saw there was this one picture on the web of a little child falling asleep on his ice cream. So this anger, this ire, this tiredness, this sleepiness, is our nature, our self-nature. So this koan shows us different aspects of the parent-child relationship. Traditionally, a child has to make sacrifices and renunciations

[08:57]

And then that's in the Torah or the Old Testament. It's part of the Ten Commandments. And then in contrast, in the Gospel or the New Testament, it features Jesus throwing his mother out of the house of his father in heaven and not having any relationship to the father that raised him. He rejected his biological father. so Jesus was a kind of rebel so that's the other side to honor your father and your mother and yet there's this fierce independence on the other and so the gospel says if anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and his mother his wife and children

[10:04]

his brothers and sisters, yes, even his own life, he cannot be my disciple." Luke 14, 26. It's pretty radical. We'll see this as echoed in the Mahayana and Lankavatara Sutra and in the Rinzai teaching. And Tozan, the founder of Soto-sen in China, also closed the door on his mother, when in her old age, she came knocking, asking for help. That's outrageous. How could you do that? Which mother are you closing the door on? Is this Prajnaparamita? Which mother is it? How many mothers do we have? And after she died, Tozin had a dream where his mother in the dream tells him that thanks to his response of closing the door on her, she was freed from attachment and was now living in one of the heavenly realms.

[11:23]

Thanks a lot. That's a consolation. So in traditional Buddhism, what we call filial duty, filial duty on our father and mother, was an important obligation for laypeople. This is also part of traditional Buddhism. However, the monks have to abandon their families. And for them, the sangha, becomes their siblings and their teachers become like their parents so those are different mother and fathers of different parents so the father and mother as we usually know them are the progenitors of the karmic body this body that we all have is our karmic body And, in case you didn't know it, the body is conceived in a sexual act of, hopefully, passion and desire.

[12:39]

Although, there's some debate about that. Like, Orthodox Jews, when they conceive, they're doing a mitzvah, and they do it without, they're supposed to do it without desire, and they put sheets between the two bodies. so that they won't feel any desire, so there won't be any sin in the procreation. But that's a little extreme. So father and mother and desire, is it one or two? And this act from which we come from, otherwise known as the primal scene, is a proto-fantasy of human beings. It haunts our unconscious imagination. So, according to the early Buddhism, every birth, every existence is an act of karmic retribution, resulting from previous actions done in previous lifetimes.

[13:50]

And then Vasubandhu, who is the second ancestor of the Mahayana, He went as far as saying that in between lifetimes, humans even choose which parental sexual act they will join for purposes of being reborn. Now isn't that a fantastic fantasy theory? Oh, they seem to be having a lot of fun over there. That's where I'm going. Why not? Better be born to fun and love than to something not so lively or deadly. So on the one hand, a human birth is the result of good karma. So we're told, be thankful that you have a human body because that's good news, because now you can practice the Buddha Dharma.

[14:57]

On the other hand, Buddhists are supposed to have ended, the whole realized Buddhists are supposed to have ended a long series of deaths and rebirths. So that's another aspect of traditional Buddhism that I'm kind of conveying to you in a kind of playful way. Some of this is, you know, we know it's part of the tradition, Whether we believe it or not, we don't need belief completely, although Dogen says that belief and practice are one piece, but we also have a teaching of not getting attached so much to the beliefs we have in Buddhism, and the practice is more fundamental or essential than whatever we may say about Buddhism. So this raises the question of, well, what happens to Buddhas after they die?

[16:05]

And we know that the Buddha was not interested at all in the afterlife, and he considered this a kind of metaphysical question. So Buddhism is not metaphysics in that sense. Buddhism also proposes that even though Buddhas are not reborn, Buddha nature is neither is born nor dies. So there's the reality of the unborn and the undying. So although we're born, we're all born. Buddha nature is not born. And although we die, Buddha nature doesn't die. So Buddha nature, in that sense, is a form of infinite life that neither is born nor dies.

[17:14]

But when we're born as a human being, as we all do and have, this means we also will die as a human being. And this is part of the wheel of samsara, the cycle of birth and death and the wheel of suffering. The body is impermanent and subject to illness, old age, decay and death. So this is the reality that Siddhartha discovered when he left the palace. He had lived this sheltered, protected life of a prince. But he didn't want to be a prince. He wanted to be Prince Nada. A prince that is no prince. So he went out and lived with the ill, the old, the decaying, and the dying. And right there he made a vow to find a way to end suffering.

[18:23]

And people often criticize Buddhism for being idealistic or unrealistic, for wanting to put an end to suffering, as if you could have a body and be alive and not suffer. People often look for death to find an end for suffering. Oh, OK, I'm suffering, but I'm going to die. Or I'll just, you know, do the best I can and then in the end, if it doesn't work out, I'll just do myself in and that'll be the end of it. Or I'm glad this veil of tears that we call the world is going to be over at some point. God forbid you would live forever. Who would want to live forever? But this other shore is found within this shore.

[19:32]

This other shore beyond suffering, this gate of death, this promise of peace that will come after death. In Buddhism, the bet is that it's right here. It's not over there somewhere. We're always passing through that gate, right here, moment to moment. So we don't need to find the fountain or the elixir of youth, of eternal youth. But right within this world of birth and death, we find the non-existence of the unborn and the undying. Because this is what we're calling the unborn and undying. It neither exists nor doesn't exist. What is it? It's a God. So this Buddha nature that is unborn and undying can't be separated from human nature or even from animal nature.

[20:42]

And without birth and death there wouldn't be any human life. So when a Buddha is said that a Buddha doesn't die, or is not reborn, whatever that means, we know, or intuitively know, that one of the ways we can understand that is that this unborn or undying aspect of the Buddha or a teacher is transmitted within the lineage. aspect of the Buddha, lives on in this unborn and undying quality of the disciples. And we have a story of Tozan that points in this direction.

[21:47]

In his early 20s, Tozan visited Nansen. Nansen was the disciple of Matsuo Baso. And they were going to make offerings to Matsu, who had already died. And Nansen asked the assembly where they thought that Matsu would come. What do you mean he's not coming? He's over here because he died. This is the wonderful, strange way that Zen teachers speak. The community was speechless. Nobody said a word. And Toza said something. He said, Matsu will come as soon as he finds his companion.

[22:49]

So the presence of Matsu in life and in death continues through the presence of his spirit in his disciples. And Nansen said, in response to what Tozan said, he said, although this man is a youth, he is excellent material to carve and polish. And Tozen responded, let not the venerable abbot debase a free man into a slave. So Tozen is pointing to the inner self that is no-self and doesn't need any carving or polishing. The Maksu is saying, well, I'm going to carve you and polish you. But actually, that's the right. both of the right responses.

[24:01]

So one side is sort of the honor your father and your mother, because your father and your mother will carve you and polish you. And the other side is the son or the daughter saying, I don't need any carving or polishing. My nature needs no carving and polishing. Don't make me into your servant or your slave. I'm nobody's. You're not the boss of me. How many parents have heard that one? So you can interpret that dualistically or non-dualistically. So we have to interpret that challenge non-dualistically. They're expressing their nature rather than rebelling against your authority. If you take it that they're rebelling against your authority, like we all do as parents, then we have a big problem. Then we enter into the proverbial kind of power struggles. So since students are untamed, they are in accord with their nature, just like the lion and the elephant here.

[25:15]

Yes, the lion and the elephant. So the Bodhisattvas are not taming the lion and the elephant. They're in accord with their nature. So it's about being natural and free, and yet in accord with our teachers. So this is how the father-son and the teacher-student relationship differ. and more free from the teacher than a son or a daughter will ever be. That's why we need a teacher beyond our father and mother to teach us what being a father and mother really is about. So going back to this now,

[26:23]

because I'm kind of going back and forth between mother, father, birth and death. For Nagarjuna, who's another one of our ancestors, the thought of enlightenment. What is the thought of enlightenment? It's not an idea about getting enlightened. It's not that. No, what is it? of birth and death. And impermanence here means that we manifest different life forms or different appearances. A dog, a horse, sometimes people's faces look like dogs or horses. Or you can see the intersection between a human face and a dog face or a horse face or a fox face.

[27:26]

or you have an encounter with a fox and the face of the fox is a human being and the eyes of the fox are a human being and the kindness of the fox is a human being's kindness so we manifest different forms different appearances as a human being or as a layperson or as a monk, or this culture, or that culture, or this race, or that race, and once we manifest that appearance in this moment, then we completely exert that manifestation as a layperson, as a monk, as a parent, as a son, as a daughter, as an animal, this moment, and then we completely drop it when we have to completely drop it so we can manifest the next moment if we don't drop it then we're still manifesting the previous moment and we're not ready for the next moment to arise so that we're not in the moment we're still in the previous form

[28:51]

And this is something that is happening moment to moment. So this is how we understand birth and death in Zen. We don't need to think of past lives, this life, next life, just this moment, the next moment. Birth and death, appearance and manifestation, total exertion in this moment and the next. And then dropping it off completely. No tricks. So we're ready for the next manifestation. And Dogen says that this is the Bodhisattva with 10,000 arms that permanently has the same mind within impermanence. During our past practice period, Sojin spoke about the permanence of impermanence, or that the only permanent thing is impermanence.

[29:58]

And then at the end of one of his talks, he quoted Suzuki Roshi saying that the mind of the Bodhisattva is always the same. And then I asked the Shuso the question about what is the mind of the Bodhisattva that stays the same? And she said, perseverance. It's total manifestation in the moment. So then I wondered, after the ceremony, about perseverance and impermanence. Is perseverance then impermanent, meaning that sometimes you persevere and sometimes you don't? which means a kind of imperfection rather than perfection, and perseverance is supposed to be one of the perfections of a bodhisattva. On the other hand, perseverance cannot be something permanent in the sense of something eternal, not subject to change or impermanence.

[31:10]

So this kind of And so then I was reading Dogen and I found the answer to the Koman in his fascicle on Moon image. So it's wonderful that we have his writings left behind for us so many centuries after. So this perseverance within impermanence is how we manifest a mind and a body in this place or that place and completely exert ourselves in that situation. And then we drop that body and that mind of that moment, whatever it may be, pleasant or unpleasant, like or don't like, completely drop it so that we're ready for the next person, for the next moment, for the next situation, for the next activity.

[32:19]

So in any of these forms and activities, the enlightened self is in the changing activity itself, that is without self. How are we doing with time? You have nine minutes. Nine minutes? OK. So I'm just going to end quickly by saying a couple of more things about mother and father. So I mentioned the mother as Prajnaparamita, the first example of the self-evidence of things. Mother is not an object outside of me. She is a self-object. Not an object, but myself.

[33:27]

Self-object in that sense. Not an object outside, but myself as Other. And all things are like this. This is Prajnaparamita. And this self-evidence of things is given to us immediately in intuition. So a good enough mother knows what the child wants as a subject, like her, but not as her object. And this is similar also to how a teacher and student or student-teacher practice Sendada. The student has to figure out what the teacher needs or wants with using intuition in the same way that a mother does with her child. And the child is, like I said, a self-object, rather than an object-self, or an objectified self, or the mother's self as an object.

[34:33]

That's the dual mother, when the child becomes the mother's object, rather than the mother being the child's nature, or self-object. And this is the difference between intuition and empathy and Prajnaparamita is the mother is the non-dual intuition and compassion that doesn't see the other as an object to please her or satisfy her in some way and so the mother is this first self object unfortunately we don't stop at this realization that the other is me and the realization of the self-nature of things, which is first there were mountains and rivers, then there were no mountains and rivers, and then there are mountains and rivers once again.

[35:34]

So when there's no mountains and rivers, when we lose this sense of the self-evidence of things, then we get attached to our reflections or to the special object that we are to our mother. That's the life of karma. And there are many such stories that represent the attachment to a false self, using the example of a monkey trying to grasp the image of the moon reflected in the water. It's like getting attached to the moon or to the self as a reflection, rather than the nature of things. And the father, like the Buddha, represents the helpful function of wisdom that cuts through attachment to self and attachment to the mother in that sense, the dual mother. So the father has to cut that attachment to the dual mother and help the child separate from the mother and from the small self, from the ego.

[36:40]

So both mother and father have dual manifestations. And the dual manifestation of the father is ignorance. Thinking that rules and the laws and how you're supposed to behave and so on and so forth, the priesthood, are like a head on top of your head, something outside yourself. And that's what needs to be gotten rid of. That's the appropriate place for rebellion. Not that you live without rules or laws, but that you have to find that as your own ludonature, not as somebody else's, some other boss who's telling you what you're supposed to be doing. And you don't want to incarnate that kind of boss for other people either. So you have to find, your children find their own way of steering them, but without becoming this kind of overlord.

[37:47]

The dual mother leads to creating an ideal ego, and the dual father leads to creating an ego ideal. The shoulds, what you're supposed to be doing. Oh, I should be doing this. Oh, I should be doing that. No, I shouldn't have done that. No, no, I shouldn't. All that kind of thinking, you know, back and forth, kind of regret and guilt and anxiety, right? Or the ideal ego is, oh, this is who I want to be, or I need to be this person so the other person will love me. Or I'm attached to this or in love with this part of myself, like Narcissus, right? And it's this dual aspect of the mother and father that needs to be killed. So this is part of the teaching of both Jesus and Tao Tsen and Rinzai. And I'm going to end quoting you a quote of Rinzai.

[38:58]

Followers of the Tao, if you encounter a Buddha, kill the Buddha. When you encounter a patriarch, kill the patriarch. when you encounter your mother and father kill your mother and father only in this way can you arrive at ultimate liberation then you will be not attached to anything thoroughly independent and free thoroughly yourself so this is kind of this radical independence of Zen but of course Rinzai is following this is a teaching from the Lankavatara Sutra And the Lankavatara Sutra comments on the five deadly sins within Buddhism. And the five deadly sins are murder of the mother, murder of the father, murder of the arahat or realized monk, disturbing the peace of the sisterhood or the brotherhood, and making the Buddha bleed due to an evil motive.

[40:06]

So these are the worst no-no's. So the Lankavatara Sutra does a non-dual teaching on these precepts, turns it on its head. So yeah, of course we don't... literally, from the dual side, these are the worst things we can do. But on the non-dual side, that's precisely what we need to do is drop this dual ego, this dual attachment to self, this dual attachment to the father that we are sad and angry with because they're bossing us around or whatever, right? Or the dual mother that we can't be separate from. So dropping that is called the slaying of mother and father. But of course, if we slay the mother and father, then we actually may have a decent relationship to our mother and father.

[41:12]

Then we may, as the koan that I began, ask our mother, there you go, can I rub your shoulders for you a moment? Are you tired? How are you feeling today? then we, in fact, may actually just do something as simple as that. Thank you very much. Questions? Comments? Yes? Thank you, Raúl. You're welcome. idea that in your work life as a psychoanalyst and in your life as a priest, that you're there to help people. And I see from your talk, there's so much room to fall off on one side and fall off on the other.

[42:13]

So when you're helping people, do you see that they're off on one side and then you tell them to go on the other side? Or do you ever see that they're in a perfect balance and that they can maintain that? Or do you understand my question? It's a little hard to put into words. How can one help or how can one know that you're in the right place? Or do you just forget about it and just drink your tea and eat your cookie? Well, you can't think too much about it, right? I mean, you have to just act. And sometimes you act duly and sometimes you act non-duly. And sometimes you leave some traces and sometimes you leave no traces. and uh meaning sometimes you're on and sometimes you're a little bit off target and but i mean off target is because you have to have empathy or compassion but if you always please people meaning often people just want you to tell them what they already know or what they already think of themselves

[43:26]

and they just want to say, uh-huh, that's right, that's the way it is. Sometimes compassion is about being compassionate with somebody's feeling, you know, they're feeling hurt, they're feeling this pain or that pain and so on. Now, what led to that pain or not, that's a different question. But you can still be empathic or compassionate with somebody just for the feelings they're having. But whether they're creating their own pain or not, that's the more difficult question. And you risk alienating or creating a rift with the person, depending on what you say or not say. If you say something, you risk a rift. If you don't say anything, you just leave them in their pain. You being supportive in that moment is a nice relief for that moment, somebody understands, but is still stuck. but if you're not compassionate with their defenses sometimes you have to be compassionate with people's defenses you can see that the way they're thinking about something is a way that they're holding on to something or defending but you can't go against those defenses because then they'll get really upset at you and with children it's the same thing somewhat so you have to know when

[44:49]

to be empathic with somebody's way of seeing things and leave it at that. And other times, you have to risk not being apparent as compassionate at all. And so, they may be saying, this guy's a real, you know, this or that. And it's a calculated risk, sometimes a calculated risk, sometimes you just stumble on it and that's what happens and then people are upset and then you have to kind of work it out afterwards. And I think both ways are the way things go. I'm not sure that's a compliment. Please. Thank you very much for your talk. You're welcome. I want to say, first of all, so many opportunities to go wrong. And I'm reminded of an old mentor of mine. that I was asking about how to do the best to help someone in a difficult situation.

[46:12]

And she said, well, first you pray, or open yourself up, or whatever. And then you do what you do. Which makes sense to me. Yes. Thank you. One more? And then? OK. You spoke about the mother and some about the father. In a real family situation, could you speak a little bit about the mother and the father together? Yes. Well, they're like an equation. Numerator and denominator. It goes together and there are functions that are not always the same as the gender. Mother is a function.

[47:15]

Father is a function. Sometimes the mother is the female. Sometimes the mother is the father. That happens in families. Sometimes the father is the mother. and sometimes the female is the father. So it happens in those combinations and permutations. So it's like good cop and bad cop. Traditionally the mother is the one the child can always go and find solace and comfort. and the mother has great patience and understanding. It's like, okay, you're hungry or you're sleepy or what? You want ice cream? You're going to fall asleep on your ice cream, right?

[48:17]

And the father function is the sort of wisdom separating you from that object of desire that you think you want so much, but you really don't, and you really want to sleep. So, no ice cream, go to bed. Period. No, but this and [...] that, you know, and then you start arguing, you know, arguing and so on and so forth, and they can run you a very long way with arguments. And we're all like that. Yeah, with our teachers too. And the father has to hold the line at some point and say no. No means no means no. What part of no don't you understand? The end part or the old part? And so ideally those two have to work together. When those two don't work together, then we have a big problem.

[49:19]

But even if they work together, even in the best of families, we'll have our dual self and our suffering anyway. So there's no prevention for suffering in life. Even if you have the most ideal family and parents, you're still going to have the problem. But the problem can get a lot worse when that equation is split apart. And then the two start fighting each other. And then the kids can run a truck through that division.

[49:52]

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