So this afternoon we are going to have a lay ordination, so I'm going to talk a little bit about that and about the precepts. Lay ordination is based on the precepts, our 16 bodhisattva precepts. So today, Matt Haug and John Lake, I'm ordaining, and Hosan is ordaining. Tim Lane. Tim Lane. So, What is ordination, lay ordination?

[01:03]

We call it ordination. Ordination means something like the office, taking a certain office. You're given responsibility for a certain office. So we're given the responsibility of acting like Buddha. So 16 precepts, there are the three treasures, Buddha, Dharma, Sangha, and then there are the three pure precepts, to avoid doing evil acts, to do acts that are beneficial, good acts, and to devote our life to helping people, to helping people to be free from themselves.

[02:05]

And then there's the 10 prohibitory precepts so-called, but we call them clear mind precepts because they're not just prohibitory, they're also positive. Not just don't do this, but also do this. So this is prohibitory, don't do, and this is permissive, do this. So our precepts are actually both prohibitory and permissive. I have a little list. So actually precepts are to help us to find our own freedom. It seems like rules and regulations, sometimes people feel that they bind us, but actually they help us.

[03:12]

given without rules or some kind of way of controlling our behavior, we destroy ourselves. And as you can see, the world today, people are destroying themselves because they're not being careful about their behavior. We're not being careful about our behavior. So lying, has become the norm. As George Orwell said, it would be, it is. Lying is called truth. That's way beyond what we would imagine. So precepts are to give us some guidelines in freeing ourselves. Sometimes people feel that our practice is a little rigid or lacks a certain kind of freedom.

[04:34]

But in our understanding of freedom is entering a small door in order to have a vast freedom. So the entry to our practice is really a very small door. It's probably the smallest door because we put ourselves into this pretzel position where we sit still, we don't move for long periods of time. And that looks like some kind of rigidity or some kind of confinement, but in order to have the greatest freedom, we put ourselves in the strongest confinement. This is the small door that opens up to the greatest freedom. In a Japanese tea house, traditionally, you crawl into it.

[05:43]

That's a very small door, and you don't just walk in, you have to crawl in on your hands and knees. And when we have dharma transmission, when a priest has dharma transmission, there's a crawling part where you become an infant, become a baby, and it's called infant crawl. to receive something from your preceptor. So our practice actually is to become not childish, but childlike, meaning having total freedom without any boundaries. So in order to have that total freedom, we have to crawl through the little door. And if you're too big, you guys will just crawl.

[06:55]

We receive the blame. So the 16 precepts begin with the three refuges. You know, we say, I take refuge in Buddha, I take refuge in Dharma, I take refuge in Sangha. So, Buddha, what is Buddha? We also say, I return to Buddha. You can also say that, I return to Buddha, I return to Dharma, I return to Sangha. So, to take refuge or to return or to, means, to find our place in the cosmic order on every moment. This is Buddha. To take refuge in Buddha is to find our place in the cosmic order moment by moment. So, in the ancient world, when the nightly paths were not lit up,

[08:09]

People didn't have electricity. There were no street lights. There were no cars with all their lights. Or the city, you know, Tokyo is really an amazing lit up city. I think more than any other city, they depend on lights at night. You don't see the sky. So we know about the sky, you know, and we look at the sky and the weather, but it's not like we live in our city life in a cosmic awareness. Our vision is always turned very close to us rather than open to the cosmos. And then we think of the cosmos as something apart from us. But actually, it's not. We're always walking in the sky. We say, I'm an earthling, which we are.

[09:16]

But we're also cosmic people. But sometimes we think, oh, cosmos, that's some kind of, you know. We just don't think of ourselves as cosmic people. We just think of ourselves as earthlings. The cosmos is out there and we are here. Somehow we don't fall off the bottom because we're stuck. But to have a realization of our place in the cosmos in a deep and all-encompassing way is to be awake. Doesn't mean I have to see all the stars all the time. But when we identify with ourself as a separate being, we're ignorant of our cosmic existence.

[10:28]

So when we identify with nature, as a part of nature and an expression of the cosmos, then we begin to understand the meaning of birth and death. So, not to figure out the meaning of birth and death, but to be know how to go with it, how to go with life as life and how to go with death as death, as inevitable. The true meaning of life is how to deal with death. The true meaning of death is how to deal with life. So this is Buddha.

[11:35]

To take refuge in Dharma means to take refuge in our wisdom mind. Wisdom, which is beyond our thinking capability, but when our thinking is motivated or supported, by our cosmic relationship with our world around us, wisdom arises. So delusion is what covers wisdom. That's why we're always talking about not getting rid of delusion, but seeing through delusion. When we can see through delusion, our wisdom mind reveals itself because it's always, it's our natural endowment.

[12:45]

And taking refuge in Sangha means to realize that we are one with our species and one with our nature. all life, actually. The larger Sangha is just all life. The immediate Sangha is people. So, the three pure precepts avoid what is evil. Evil has various meanings, but in Buddhism, evil is ignorance, actually, caused by ignorance. We don't focus on evil, we mostly focus on ignorance, because the arising of evil is based on ignorance as its foundation.

[13:47]

We don't realize how self-centered we are, and cruelty It's evil. I think of evil as being cruelty, when we delight in the suffering of others. To me, that's a definition of evil, when we delight in the suffering of others, like lighting the cat on fire and stuff like that. That happens a lot, more than you know. But it's a metaphor for how we treat each other. And then our vow is to help others see through their delusion in order to free themselves.

[14:50]

And so that's why we're always working on our own delusion so that we can understand the delusion around us and others. and then we can help others to free themselves through our influence. But it's really hard to help people. But we do it anyway. So Bodhisattva way, you know, path, the three pure precepts, is even though we can't accomplish all this, we do it anyway. So then there are the 10 Clear Mind Precepts, which most of us are familiar with. I just go over this for everybody. We have to keep reminding ourselves. Sometimes people say, how come you never talk about this, or how come you never talk about that? And I think, well, jeez, you know, I did that 20 years ago. How come you don't remember?

[15:55]

So I just want to say that the study of Buddhism, the Buddhadharma, study of the Buddha way, is to be in harmony with the cosmic order, and it's both intellectual, intuitive, and devotional. So our practice has these three aspects. Intellectual, you know, we don't ignore our intellect, our study, and thinking mind. And we pay attention to our intuition, which is directly touching the basis and acting out of that. That's wisdom. Wisdom comes actually through intuition and informs our mental structure. And devotion means to be sincere about what we're doing.

[17:07]

It's not devotion to a deity necessarily, but it's devotion to our wisdom mind. Zen is sometimes called the wisdom school, wisdom mind school. which means that we allow wisdom to come forth and take off the cover of delusion so that wisdom mind can come forth and inform delusion. So we can actually use delusion instead of delusion using us. Usually people think, well, we get rid of delusion, we'll have wisdom. Which is so, except that you can't get rid of delusion. Many people tried doing that. Some of the early Buddhists tried getting rid of delusion so you could have wisdom. So you don't do anything, you just ignore the delusional world.

[18:12]

But we live in the world of delusion, so we have to, that's where we live. So we have to know how to deal with it. So we can use delusion instead of delusion using us. That's called wisdom. So here are the 10 clear mind precepts. to vow not to kill, but to cherish life. So, but it does not mean to be attached to life. Resolving not to kill, you know, each one of these precepts is a koan, because whatever side you say is correct, the other side is also there.

[19:18]

So we have to be careful not to think that because we make some resolve that we can just forget about the other side. So resolving not to kill, how can you live without killing? There's no way one can live without killing. Matter of fact, life exists because things die. Life does not exist without dying. That's the main teaching, so you can all go home now. As my old teacher used to say, The only real truth that you can rely on is everything changes.

[20:22]

So we're killing all the time. But what it means is to be careful how we treat things. In the course of birth and death, I don't use the word death, or life, excuse me. Life is like a coin, and death is one side, birth is the other side, or vice versa. When something dies, so to speak, something else takes its place. There's always something to take your place. You're dispensable. Something will take your place. It may not look like you, or act like you, or think like you, or remember you, but something will always take your place. There's something about Life doesn't like a vacuum. Nature abhors the vacuum. Nature abhors the vacuum, yes. So birth and death, how we maneuver, how we live our life through birth and death is what we're doing.

[21:36]

That's our task, our life. But life includes both birth and death. So I resolve not to kill. It means don't be mean. Be careful about what you do. So cherish life is the other side. I mean, take care of life as your own head, as your own... When alive, be totally alive. And when you're dead, be totally dead. So, but life and death, birth and death are happening on each moment. Everything is history. This moment is already history. Everything is history. And the future is just an idea.

[22:38]

You know, we think that well, tomorrow we could do this, or from now we'll do this, Next moment, I'll still be breathing, but it's just an idea. And the past is irretrievable, except that we have some memory of something called the past. And even though this room is still here, just like it did a minute ago, what we saw a minute ago is history. So there's only this moment. Don't kill means don't kill this moment. Live this moment fully, but this moment is replaced by this moment, replaced by this moment. So that brings in the whole idea of what is time, which I'm not gonna go into. Each moment is an eternal moment because that's all there is.

[23:45]

There's only, oh, just this moment. We say, oh, just this moment. Well, what happens in this moment? If there's a future and there's a past, and where do they come together? They come together in this moment, but. It's a big koan for us. This is the koan of birth and death. Don't kill, be compassionate. So we bring up our compassion And our compassion, through compassion we realize that the whole universe is our self, our true self. Can't be otherwise. So we realize that others feel the same way we do. And we nurture what needs to be nurtured and let go of what needs to be let go of.

[24:47]

If we cling to life, we suffer from life. If we long for death, we suffer in death or in life. So just let things come as they come and go as they go. Nurture life and realize that birth and death, life, birth and death are the same thing. Just two sides of the same thing. and we worry about it because we don't want to lose consciousness. Then, I resolve not to steal. That's the second precept. Not to take what doesn't belong to you. And to see everything as a gift. Everything as a gift. If we want to see everything as a gift, we have to be generous. The more we give, the more we receive.

[25:52]

So being stingy, sometimes it's called not being stingy, but then we close ourself off. So being generous and not taking, everything else already belongs to us, so there's no need to take anything. When you really think about it, I own this and I own that, and I owned Mar-a-Lago and all this. That's baloney, nobody owns anything. It's just that because of our meanness and our fear, actually, and our inability to settle or to know who we are, or know who or what our surroundings are. And insecurity, we do these things. We want to own, but nobody owns anything.

[26:57]

Nobody owns anything. But we create a big problem with ownership. And so we don't want to create that problem. So we resolve not to steal. This is, Suzuki Roshi, remember he was talking about his glasses, you know, he said, I know I don't own these glasses, but I appreciate that you're letting me wear them because for my old tired eyes, you know. And Akin Roshi saying, you know, I don't own this typewriter, but I really feel grateful for you letting me use it because I need it for my writing. So we really don't own anything, but we cause a lot of problems. through the delusion of ownership. We do own certain things, yes. We own our speech.

[27:59]

We own our delusions, basically. But it's hard. Life is hard. That's why it's a koan. Yes, this is mine, but it's not mine. It's mine, but it's not mine. That's the koan. This money is mine, but it's not mine. It's not yours, exactly. So I resolve not to misuse sexuality. That's very kind. Usually the origin of the precept is no sex, because precepts basically are for monks. In the Soto school, the precepts for monks priests and lay people is the same, but not in ordinary Buddhism, monastic Buddhism. Monastic Buddhism, there are five precepts, sometimes eight precepts for people, lay people who come to the monastery for a period of practice.

[29:04]

Then they take the five precepts or the eight precepts. But they're very simple. But for the monks and priests, you know, 250 precepts. But for Soto school and most schools in Japan, 16 precepts. So these are the major precepts, not the minor precepts. So lay people and ordained people or monks, priests, take the same precepts. So this one, basically, in the old school, the monks were celibate, no sex, don't touch, for men, don't touch women, for women, don't touch men. There were no precepts for women and women and men and men. But the meaning is the same. So, you know, sexuality is

[30:12]

All interaction is somewhat sexual. But sexuality is based on desire. So desire is important. You know, one school will say, get rid of desire. But our school doesn't say get rid of desire. It's how you use desire instead of desire using you. So what the problem is that we let desire use us and we don't really realize it. We hand over our freedom to our desires and then we get caught by our desires and then we suffer. So precepts are to help us get out of suffering. But it's really hard. So when our practice came to America, we didn't decide something.

[31:22]

It just worked out because of who we are, that men and women practice together. Women and women practice together. Men and men practice together. We don't make distinctions. I mean, it took a long time for us to go through the process of not creating big distinctions. between men and women and sexual stuff, which is still going on forever. This will always go on forever. The problem of sexual desire will always go on forever because it's not resolvable. So the way we approach this problem is to not be promiscuous, if possible, And if you're going to have a relationship, to be public about your relationship and to be serious about your relationship. But underneath, you know, there's all kinds of stuff going on all the time.

[32:25]

Even in the monastery, there's always stuff, you know, going on in the middle of the night. So, If you have celibacy, then you have the problems that go with celibacy. If you don't have celibacy, then you have the problems that go on without celibacy. So you just choose your problems and deal with them, yes. So that just worked out that way. It's not like we decided something. I resolve not to lie is the next precept. So be truthful, right? Communicate the truth, but communicate the truth. So negatively, don't lie, but positively, be truthful, right?

[33:35]

As much as you can. And that's a noble precept that we all like, but it's hard to do, because we don't even know if we're not being truthful all the time. We're not sure, always. So I resolved not to sell or use the wine of drugs or delusion, but to polish clarity. Dope can be medicine, because most medicines are kind of dope derivatives. Poison, actually. We derive our medicines from our poisons. But if we use the medicine in ways that are not appropriate, then we're actually taking poison, and it becomes poison.

[34:38]

So opiates can cure us and they can also kill us. And food can nourish us or it can kill us. So the key to the Middle Way is to have a button that you turn that is appropriate, that makes the fire of desire appropriate to the occasion so that you are always in control. Many of our teachers have said something like, Sex is kind of like candy.

[35:42]

It's okay to have candy, but if you get addicted to candy, it can kill you. So you have to be careful how you control your emotions and your feelings and your thoughts. So having that It's not a button, it looks like a button, but it's like the stove, the button on the stove, the control thing. You turn it so that it's maybe simmering, but when you turn it up too much, it burns up the pot. And so it's so easy to burn up the pot. And we don't even know that's happening. We just turn over our freedom to our desires. We think that's what we're supposed to do. We really think that's normal, that's natural. And it's also normal and natural to suffer.

[36:43]

But it's not always necessary. So how to find our freedom? That's what our teachers have always been teaching us, how to find our freedom from ourself. Not to blame others, but to look into ourself and see where am I giving myself away? I mean, giving yourself away is good, but not into someone else, some other person or circumstances' tummy. So then there's, I resolve not to dwell on the mistakes of others. This is behavior with other people. To always give people a chance to, if we think they're doing something wrong, to reform.

[37:51]

So we get out of form, we get twisted out of form, and then we want to get back into form. That's called reforming. We used to call it reform school. We don't use that term anymore. We see the faults of others, but if we dwell on the faults of others, we're also at fault. There's a wonderful poem by the sixth ancestor about this. If we dwell on the faults of others, we ourselves are also in the wrong. But it doesn't mean that we should ignore the faults of others. So I resolve not to dwell on the mistakes of others, but to create wisdom from ignorance. How do, we don't actually create wisdom from ignorance, but we release ignorance.

[39:14]

We release wisdom, which is covered by ignorance. I think that's better. Ignorance covers wisdom. So when we realize what ignorance is, that's wisdom. And it allows wisdom to come forth. So I resolve not to praise myself without great others. So sometimes, in order to raise ourself up, we put others down. We should be careful about that. Anyway, I resolve not to withhold spiritual or material aid, but to share understanding, giving freely of self. And I resolve not to harbor ill will, but to dwell in equanimity. And I resolve not to abuse or disparage the three treasures, respecting the Buddha, unfolding the Dharma, nourishing the Sangha.

[40:20]

What is that banging? So, I can see people getting sleepy. So, that's kind of why I went through fast. Not you. So, let's see. There's time for a few questions. I just want to clarify. Sangha is, you used the word, life. Oh, in a wide sense. Because, yes, in a very wide sense, universal, yeah, sense. And I wanted to confirm if it's even wider. Is the word beings sentient and insentient the same? Beings? Sentient and insentient. Oh, that's a good, yeah. Is sentient and insentient the same thing?

[41:23]

Well, it's not. And it is. When we think about it scientifically, well, there's sentient and insentient, right? There's life, like the moon is a dead planet, right? But the moon can't be a dead planet. It's only dead in relationship to what we think of as life, in a dualistic sense. In a non-dualistic sense, the moon is teeming with life. It's life itself. So everything, the moon, is a representative of life. It's a form of life. So when we say sentient, we use it in the sense of everything is a sentient. rather than in a narrow sense of comparison between sentient and insentient.

[42:27]

So everything is sentient in that sense. So that one world, I mean one universe, sentient, even whether it has feelings that we recognize as feeling or not. So we think of sentient as according to our senses, But our senses are so limited. Hearing, seeing, smelling, tasting, and touching. That's such a limited way of observing the world. But we think it takes in everything. But, I mean, there are universes in between each one of us. teeming life in between each one of us that we don't even, we just walk through it every day like dust, you know, it's like when the light comes in at a certain time of the day, you just see the whole room is full of dust, right? These are universes that we don't really pay attention to.

[43:31]

Megan? Could you say something more about disparaging the Dharma? Yes, don't. That's it. It's like, you know, don't speak ill of, don't, you know, discourage people by saying, oh, you know, dharma is all a bunch of lies. And, you know, it's the dharma. You should try Christianity. So that's disparagement, right? Well, you can do it if you want. But the reason it says that is so that you don't harm yourself. So there's a saying, if you disparage the dharma,

[44:34]

is that you're creating your own karma, which will come to haunt you later on, maybe. But nobody... Nobody does that? I just can't see somebody really disparaging the Dharma. It's okay, you know, you can do that. But the precepts says don't. And I remember Suzuki Roshi talking about that precept, and he said, well, that sounds a little bit self-centered, doesn't it? When we get discouraged, we might blame our teacher. We might blame the teaching or somebody in the community. That might be more relevant. Yeah, that's good. Also getting into these little intellectual debates between religions and One's right, one's wrong. Mine's better, yours isn't. Yeah, that's right.

[45:37]

Alan? You know, when you're wearing a robe or a rapsu and you have people see you as an expression of dharma and then you act or speak in ways that are jarring to them or What do you mean by that? What do I mean by that? So I'm wearing this robe. other people.

[47:15]

So it's because without them, you know, we're kind of, we could do anything. We have good and bad within us. We might get lost. Right. So this gives us a way back. Right. Exactly. The 11th precept, the 11th precept is don't argue for the sake of argument. Yes. I think you did this really well, but could you say something about the letter versus the spirit of the precepts? Oh, good. Okay. This is the last thing. The letter of the precepts, the rote precepts, are to give you a foundation for guidance and behavior. The spirit of the precepts is how you actually act.

[48:18]

in accordance with the reality before you. So, the literal precepts are like stones on the path, and your activity is organic. Life meets you, and you meet life moment to moment, and how you actually, you don't think about what precept is this, you know, when you're confronted with something. You just improvise, but you know what the precepts are, and that's your foundation. But acting, you know, we're always improvising. That's our life. So that's called live precepts. The ones I just read are called dead precepts, but they're not really dead.

[49:24]

Just like the moon, they're really alive. But, you know, they give us a foundation but you shouldn't follow them. The live precepts are the way we extend ourself. The main precept, there's only one real precept, and that is act like Buddha. That's taking refuge in Buddha, Dharma Sangha. Act like Buddha, that's the fundamental precept. Like George Bush used to say, what would Jesus say? He never respected that, but. Oh my God.

[50:28]

Oh my God. But what would Buddha do?

[50:34]

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