morning. I've been gone for two weeks. The first week I went to Chapel Hill, North Carolina, because one of our members from San Francisco Zen Center was invited to be the priest for a small Zen group there. And there were nine people who received lay ordination. from that group. So it was a very good week. And the ordination and that process over the week, I think, really gave a lot of strength to the group. They'd been going, actually, for nine years without any teacher or any priest. So having a priest is coalescing the practice. And many people from the whole area So Chapel Hill is a kind of oasis of some kind for the South.

[01:19]

And Jesse Helms, who is the senator from North Carolina, says we should put a fence around it and charge money to look in. It's a little bit like Berkeley. A kind of mini Berkeley. Very beautiful. People live in the forest. Houses in the forest. And then I went to the mountains. And so while I was there with my 10-year-old son, we'd stay up late at night and talk about the Dharma. He likes to ask questions about the Dharma.

[02:23]

He'd say something more about the Dharma. So during the day, one day, my wife had made some tapioca pudding. It was time for dessert, and he served himself. And before he served himself, I said, when you do that, serve your mom and me first. And he just served himself. So I got really angry with him. We had this big fight about being selfish. So later that night when we had our arm out, He said, you know, it's too bad there's nobody in the world that's enlightened. And I said, well, you really threw me, you know.

[03:39]

And I said, what are the degrees of enlightenment? Some people are sort of enlightened, you know. But I tried to think about it and I said, well, the way you can tell if someone is enlightened or not is whether they're selfish or unselfish. But it was not. I wasn't thinking about Because that is the truth. If you want to test someone to find out whether or not they're enlightened, just look at whether or not they're unselfish or selfish. Because selfishness is a manifestation...

[04:40]

Unselfishness is a manifestation of selflessness. Selflessness is enlightened. And unselfishness is its manifestation. So if someone is claiming to be enlightened, you can test them to see how selfish or unselfish they are. how self-centered or not self-centered they are. And then he said, and then I said, you know, Buddhist monks don't have anything. And they only eat one meal a day. And they take whatever is put into their bowl. And he said, well, I guess you can't ask for seconds. That's right, but you can ask for seconds, as long as you make sure that everybody else has seconds first.

[05:55]

And he understood that. So that was the first question about enlightenment that came up this week. And another question came up in one of our members. And it seems like when you read the Platform Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch, Daikon Eno, there's a famous gatha, two famous gathas, or poems. And when the Fifth Patriarch, Daimon Konin, was trying to find his successor. He asked the monks in the monastery to write a poem or gatha about expressing their understanding.

[07:07]

I'm sure you all know this poem, very famous poem. head monk, Hsinchu, who was rather an old man and a Buddhist scholar and practitioner, wrote a poem on the wall of the monastery. According to the story, he wasn't sure about himself, and so he wrote the poem thinking that if the didn't like it, he just wouldn't say anything. And if he did like it, he'd say, oh, it's mine. This is the story. As you know, Zen stories are not necessarily true stories in the sense of fact.

[08:11]

There is always some element of fact. But the stories are meant to tell, to express, understanding of the Dharma. So, the Daikan Eno, who was a young man and supposedly illiterate, saw his gatha and he said, at the gatha, the fifth patriarchs, I mean the Shinshu's gatha went something like, The body, our body is the Bodhi tree, tree of truth, reality. The body is the Bodhi tree. Diligently, and sitting on a mirror, on a bright stand, it's like a bright mirror sitting on a stand,

[09:18]

And hour by hour, we wipe the mirror, letting no dust alight. And when Daikon Eno saw the poem, he said, oh, I have another poem. And he asked somebody to write it down for him, because he was illiterate. And his poem went something like, there is no, Intrinsically, there is no Bodhi tree or bright mirror on the stand. So, what is there to wipe away? What dust is there to wipe away? So, when we read these two poems,

[10:25]

Of course, the fifth patriarch, when he came along and he saw that second poem, said, oh, that's pretty nice. But he really praised Hsinchu's poem. But later, he brought Daikan Eno to his room and made him the sixth patriarch. Usually we think of these two poems as one is enlightened and the other is not. And the first poem, our body and mind is a Bodhi tree sitting on a bright stand of a mirror, like a mirror on a bright stand. Carefully we wipe away keeping it clean.

[11:29]

This is a gatha about how we practice. But Daikon Eno's poem, intrinsically there is no mirror, no Bodhi tree or mirror. Where is there for the dust to alight? This is speaking about ultimate reality. But if you look carefully at these two poems, ultimate reality is what everyone has to discover. Each one of us has to discover ultimate reality within ourself. That actually there is nothing. But this nothing is everything. Everything is a manifestation of this nothing.

[12:34]

But these two poems actually complement each other. In the history of Zen, it looks like Hsinchu, his poem didn't quite come up to Huinong's poem, which is true. But these two poems complement each other. And there's been a lot of confusion, actually, about these two poems in the history of Zen. Because someone will say, well, if everything is ultimate reality, why do anything? If in ultimate reality, There's nothing. Why do anything? But, and this has always been a kind of problem.

[13:43]

Why sit zazen? See, it looks like you sit zazen in order to gain enlightenment. But actually, When you look at the poem of Hsinchu, Bodhi, our mind, our body is the Bodhi tree, like a bright mirror on the stand. This is the mind. The mind is a mirror of reality, a clear mirror of reality. And we must keep it clean all the time. so that it reflects reality as it is. This is called practice. The first poem is called Understanding, and the second poem is Practice. So Dogen, Master Dogen, brought it all together by saying, ultimate reality manifests itself through practice.

[15:01]

It's not that you practice to gain enlightenment. Enlightenment is the manifestation of practice. So as long as we think that we go from practice to enlightenment, these two poems fall apart, stand apart from each other. But if you realize that We start from enlightenment and practice the practice of enlightened practice. Then these two poems complement each other. We all practice from enlightenment. Our practice proceeds from enlightenment, even though you may feel that if I practice long enough I'll get enlightened. That's true too.

[16:04]

It's true too. Enlightenment seeks enlightenment. Who is it that seeks enlightenment? Enlightenment seeks enlightenment. The reason that we have interest in practice is because we have enlightenment. If we didn't have enlightenment, Practice wouldn't interest us. We would just not be interested. There would be no spark. So we start actually from enlightenment, our intrinsic enlightenment. That's the beginning of practice. But we don't have realization. Our practice begins with enlightenment and proceeds as practice toward realization.

[17:17]

And when we have realization, then we realize our self, what our self is. We realize that our self is no self. no special self. Ultimate reality is no special self, but everything is the self. So in order to gain the self, we drop the self. if we think that I come from ignorance, start through ignorance and practice in order to gain enlightenment, we'll be very discouraged, because we only see practice as a means toward enlightenment, which means that we can't appreciate our moment-to-moment activity, because we think that

[18:41]

The real thing is out there in the future. But the real thing is right here in our moment-to-moment practice. But we don't realize that because we have some idea about what enlightenment is. We don't realize that enlightenment is in our every step. So what is practice? Practice is the realization of selflessness. Practice of no self. No special self. And its manifestation is unselfishness.

[19:47]

If we want to know how our practice is going, we just look at ourselves. What am I doing? Not so hard. But we should be very honest with ourselves. The hardest thing is to be honest with ourselves and to be clear about ourselves. What am I doing? or how is this, how is what I'm doing manifesting my intention? So it's easy to Actually it boils down to very simple

[21:30]

interact with people. You want to realize how simple it is. But, not easy. Not easy. The simplest things are the most difficult. how to manifest ultimate reality, the realization of ultimate reality, in our moment-to-moment activity. That's Ginjo Koan, the koan which each one of us is practicing. As Dogen says, Master Dogen says, to study the Buddhadharma is to study the Self.

[23:08]

There we have it, the self. So what's the self? To study the self is to forget it, to drop the self, to drop self-centeredness. So if we drop self-centeredness, then what do we center on? That's a big question. Supposing I do drop this self, what do I center on? Where is my center? Well, it is here, but that's not good enough. And to drop the self is to be enlightened by the self, which is the ten thousand things, the ten billion things.

[24:25]

When there's no self-centeredness, everything enlightens us. We're enlightened by everything. Because when we drop our little self, we become our big self. Nobody stands in the way but ourself. And then he says, and to be enlightened by the 10,000 billion things is to free yourself. Be free from ourself and allow others to be free from themselves. And this freedom continues without a trace.

[25:36]

One enlightened moment after the next. Do you have a question? Can you say something about how one might do that in one's daily life? Sometimes I seem to... Last night I was thinking about something at work and I realized as soon as I get to work, there I am in defensiveness and self-protection. Well, one question that you can ask yourself is, what am I defending?

[26:45]

That's a great koan for everybody. What am I defending? When you find something coming, you know, this defense coming up, what am I defending? Just keep asking that question. What am I defending? And see what happens. Yes, that's a good point.

[27:50]

So, if you're completely selfless, that means that you allow the animals to eat you up. There are many stories about Buddha, fairy tales about Buddha, and the Jataka tales especially, where the monks actually and Buddha in his former lifetimes right in the Jataka tales would often come across like a hungry tigress who was feeding her cubs and who doesn't have anything to eat so he'd throw himself to give himself to the And actually, many monks did this, but that's very extreme.

[28:53]

But the example, you know, is not having anything to not hang on to anything. But practically speaking, in our daily life, we have to also count ourself as somebody. So selfless means to also be aware of what this self needs. Not so much in a subjective way, but in a way that takes into account that this person needs something, too. So, it's like the ten monks. one monk to count to see how many there were. And every time he counted, he'd get up to nine. And one of the monks said, fine.

[30:02]

He said, well, you know, you have to count this one, too. You have one person that you can be accountable to, and that's this one. So you have to be accountable to this one, and not neglect it, and take care of it as an example, if nothing else. So the way we take care of ourself is also the way we take care of each other, and we have to be included. So there has to be a time when you say, no. You know, Hakuin, who was a great Zen master, and he made a lot of, he was a really good artist. And one of his drawings or paintings, he has a picture of Avalokiteśvara sitting on a rock by a

[31:12]

placid pool, you know, with the water, little waterfall, and the water flowing. And it's a very idyllic scene. And he says, in the caption of the picture is, even Avalokiteshvara has to take a break sometimes. This is some of the territory that we've been discussing in class. mostly are models of the absolute, like when Sekito was asked, what is he practicing? He said, I'm not even practicing the Four Noble Truths. I'm not doing anything in stages. So you were suggesting to Daniel that there are degrees of enlightenment.

[32:14]

And my question is, How do we practice with degrees of enlightenment without a gaining idea? Right. So, in the Platform Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch, the discussion at that time was about, that everybody was discussing at that time in the Tang Dynasty, Sudden Enlightenment and Gradual Enlightenment. And Sudden Enlightenment was the attribute of the Daikan Ino school. And Gradual Enlightenment was the attribute of the Shenshu school. Actually Shenshu later became a very famous Zen master. But these two, this problem of

[33:19]

sudden enlightenment and gradual enlightenment was the topic of the day. Enlightenment in Zen is sudden enlightenment. There is no practice of stages, which is called step-letter Zen. Step-letter Zen is When you get to this stage and then you study some more and you get to this stage, it's kind of like going to school. You start at the first grade and you graduate at the twelfth grade. Zen is not like that. Zen is you just keep working and all of a sudden everything opens up for you all at once. But actually, Practicing little by little is not gradual.

[34:21]

That's not gradual practice. Sudden and gradual actually go together. How long is a moment? You can say, in one moment, I saw everything. That's very good. But there is still, if you say there are small enlightenments and big enlightenments, and usually it's called Kensho. We have a Kensho experience, which is our mind opens up and we see clearly how everything is connected, but it's still not great enlightenment. So it's not like there are gradations of enlightenment, or stages of enlightenment. There are gradations of enlightenment. It's not that you work up from a small enlightenment to a big enlightenment.

[35:33]

It's just that your understanding is this, and sometimes your understanding is this. But it's not stages. It's not planned that way. It's just the way it falls out. So everyone has some degree of enlightenment. Some have big enlightenment, some have small enlightenment. The Sufis have an idea, they talk about state and station, and I was just wondering if this idea of gradual enlightenment Might be something like that or how it would differ from that but in a state you Might you would have some understanding or you would be in a certain state, but you wouldn't actually Stay there for very long. We had experience and then just kind of go back to normal life and then but the station would be where you actually Experienced that at all times and you were stationed in that's true, too.

[36:40]

Yeah, there are stages of Or, you know, like when something opens up for you and you see clearly, but you don't maintain it. That's quite common. As a matter of fact, that's kind of what keeps people going, in a way. You know, you have some insight. It's maybe called insight. A stage of insight. But it kind of fades, you know, because you're not at the place of your insight. but that keep practicing, with that as an inspiration. That's like wiping the mirror, in a way. But we don't wipe the mirror in order to get to some other stage. We just wipe it. The characteristic of our practice is that we wash the windows, whether they're clean or dirty.

[37:45]

We sweep the floor, whether it's clean or dirty. We don't sweep the floor to get it clean. We don't wash the windows in order to get them clean. We just wash the windows. We just sweep the floor. In the process, they get clean. But even if they aren't clean, we still wash them. Not because they're dirty. It's the impression. Which is hard for us to understand, you know, because we always have to have some reason for doing things. But if we only have this utilitarian reason for doing things, then we never get to understand ultimate reality. Which has no reason. Or its ultimate reason. I mean, it seems that, you know, you talk sometimes that in a way the...

[38:48]

So in a way, for an enlightened person then, you've talked about it sometimes as it is, that eventually there isn't much difference between the sacred and the secular, or practice in the Zen Dojo or practice outside the Zen Dojo. And yet it seems that even for an enlightened person, That's correct. The enlightened person sometimes looks like a dodo. It's true. But the difference is that the enlightened person knows that. Did I say that?

[40:23]

They're not perfect or imperfect. The enlightened person is aware of their imperfections. They're not trying to be perfect. Not trying to impress anybody. What? Not trying to impress anybody or anything like that. Not trying to impress anybody. Yeah, not trying to impress anybody. That's another characteristic of an enlightened person. Not trying to impress anybody. And when somebody says, you're stupid, I think you're right. And if somebody says, oh, you're very wonderful, my prayers say, thank you very much. Whatever you say.

[41:27]

It's hard to recognize an enlightened person because a truly enlightened person would just blend in with everyone else and not particularly stand out.

[42:02]

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