It's the 50th anniversary of Suzuki Roshi's death. He died on December 4th, 1971, during the early morning, during the first period of Zazen in the Rohatsu Sesshin that they were having at San Francisco Zen Center. And... So we're remembering this and also noting that this is the first Suzuki Roshi memorial ceremony that we're doing as a Sangha that's not being led by Sojun Roshi, his disciple. Sojun Roshi led the last one a year ago. And I believe that we actually set it up so that the ceremony was conducted from his house. as he was ailing, and then it was online, so everybody presented their words or their vows online, as we'll do today.

[01:10]

So what I'd like to do this morning is basically tell stories that I've gleaned about Suzuki Roshi. And most of them are drawn from the recent writing that we've been collecting by Sojin Roshi. So they're his impressions, his first impressions of his teacher. But I'm going to begin with another story. Like many of you, I did not have the opportunity to meet Suzuki Roshi directly. But we know him through his students, through his living students. We know him through Sojin. We know him through his son, Hoitsu Suzuki Roshi, and through his students like Reb Anderson, Yvonne Rand, Paul Disco, Peter and Jane Schneider, Ed Brown, and many others, including

[02:26]

members of our Sangha who also practiced with him in the 60s. I'm thinking about Fran and Al Tribe who both had believed they had lay ordination from Suzuki Roshi in the only lay ordination that he did. And they were very close to him. And what we see is a kind of composite picture of Suzuki Roshi. Each of his students carries something of his teaching, of his character, of his way. And it's really good for us to look for that. And also for us to try to continue it ourselves as best we can. So earlier this week, I was speaking from Dogen's fascicle gyoji, continuous practice, which is really a compendium of Dogen's stories about the ancestors, about the great Zen ancestors.

[03:49]

And somebody commented me that, commented that the people in these stories seemed beyond reach, that their practice was so strong and so beyond what they could imagine. And what I responded was, two things. First of all, the stories that we have about our teachers and our ancestors are generally the stories of their enlightened activity. There's not a lot of stories about, say, our contemporary ancestors sitting around in the evening and watching television.

[04:51]

or doing crossword puzzles, you know, which can also be enlightened activity, but somehow it doesn't make it into the books. Those stories are not so often told, and somehow they're often not remembered or they're put into the shadows. But... These ancestors were not saints. They were and are human. Suzuki Roshi was not a saint. He had flaws and his son, Oitsu, strongly and emotionally cautioned us against that kind of idealization. So we admire They're enlightened activities.

[05:54]

And it's important not to construe all of their activities as necessarily enlightened, but to look into whatever they do or whatever they say to try to see, is there enlightenment here? Is there something that I can learn? So when you read these stories, of the great ancestors, of the contemporary ancestors, the important thing is to be encouraged and not daunted. We should feel the same way about Sojin. We should feel the same way about our teachers now. And I think Dogen spoke to this in... his Ehei Kosu Hotsu Ganmon, his vow of awakening. And he wrote, Buddhas and ancestors of old were as we.

[07:01]

We in the future shall be Buddhas and ancestors. Revering Buddhas and ancestors, we are one Buddha and ancestor. And in the same piece, he quotes Master Lungya, who said, Those in past lives who were not enlightened will now be enlightened. In this life, save the body, which is the fruit of many lives. Before Buddhas were enlightened, they were the same as we. Enlightened people of today are exactly as those of old. And even though we may have some doubt about this reality, I think we can take it to heart, in Dogen's words. So that's kind of the preamble. I want to start with a story. This was presented, I think, a few weeks ago at a talk or at a meeting here, and I apologize.

[08:13]

I can't remember who offered it to us, but it bears repeating because it speaks to Suzuki Roshi's way and character. So this comes from a conversation, notes from a conversation that took place between Hoetsu Suzuki, Suzuki Roshi's son, and a few of Suzuki Roshi's disciples, Western disciples, Peter and Jane Schneider and Carl and Fumiko Bielfeld. And they were meeting with, they were talking about a meeting they had with Kochen Noiri Roshi. Noiri Roshi was younger than Suzuki Roshi. And they were both, both studied intensively with the Dogen scholar Kishizawa Ian. And Noiri Roshi was reflecting on a meeting that he had, an encounter that he had with Suzuki Roshi.

[09:19]

And he was talking about the stillness at the center of Suzuki Roshi's being. So one instance in which Noiri Roshi felt very strongly the feeling of this stillness in Suzuki Roshi, when once at Yaizu Station, Yaizu is the town that Rinso is in. In Yaizu Station, they happened to pass each other and Suzuki Roshi gave a quick greeting and went by him. And Noiri Roshi felt that deep, profound stillness in Suzuki Roshi at that time. And as he watched Suzuki Roshi go up the stairs to the platform, he had a strong impression of him that he can still recall today. In that greeting, although he just said hi and went bye, the impression was that Suzuki Roshi was in that very simple way encouraging his own practice. Noiri Roshi was very busy at that time.

[10:25]

He just published a book on Dogen's Ehei Kouroku, so he was very busy, was dashing past Suzuki Roshi, and it was the contrast. He had just finished publishing this work, and in Suzuki Roshi's greetings, what he felt was a kind of Gokuro-sama, a thank you and encouragement for the work he had done. Suzuki Roshi didn't say, you did a good job. He just said, hi. But Nowiri Roshi felt Suzuki Roshi recognized the effort he had made and was not congratulating him, but encouraging him. They go on. We American students had probably also felt the same kind of thing, a very special stillness and peace in Suzuki Roshi. whether he was alone, sitting, walking, or in the middle of a crowd, that same kind of peacefulness about him.

[11:30]

This kind of peacefulness is the enlightenment of Dogen. And we as students of Suzuki Roshi should continue this tradition and maintain this kind of still Nirvana enlightenment. So, all these years later after this interview was set down, I would say this is the same thing. This kind of peacefulness is the enlightenment of Dogen. And as students of Suzuki Roshi, as students of Sojin Roshi, as students of our tradition, we should continue and maintain this stillness, even in the midst of our activity. So I'm gonna read you a few, as I said, I'm going to be storytelling this morning. And these are drawn from some of the pieces in Sojin Roshi's memoir and in his lectures, in his asserted lectures.

[12:45]

So he writes of his first encounter with Suzuki Roshi. One day in the fall of 1964, I walked through the double doors of Sukoji Temple at 1881 Bush Street in San Francisco and took a seat on a round black cushion. My friend Daniel Moore had said, you know, I go to this Zen temple. I go early in the morning. At that time, Zazen was at 540 a.m. We walked up Fillmore Street, At five in the morning, I had my little black dog with me and we went to Sagoji. We went in and there was this bare room with tatamis around the edge, around the walls and an altar on one side. We went in and sat down and faced the wall. Somebody came up behind me and adjusted my posture with one finger pushing back on my chin, the other hand pushing forward my lower back. gently adjusting my posture into a perfectly upright sitting position.

[13:53]

And he showed me how to hold my hands, not saying a word, just all feeling, all touch. It was Suzuki Roshi, of course. I was sitting there, and it was just wonderful. I thought, here I am, sitting all by myself, with nothing else but this wall, this seat, and this place. And it just felt like coming home or something, you know, because right there. So that was my first time at Sagoji and my first encounter with Suzuki Rochi, who was to become my teacher and the most influential person in my life. I was 35 years old. As I became more familiar with Suzuki Roshi, he became a model for my practice. He inspired all of us with his qualities of steadiness, perseverance, calmness, balanced energy, enthusiasm, patience, relinquishment, non-attachment, kindness, firmness, gentleness, inner strength, intelligence, knowledge,

[15:17]

and humility. I'm sure that the list could go on, I imagine. And he had the ability to meet everyone right where they were. It occurred to me one day that Suzuki Roshi embodied those qualities that I had been looking for in a Hasidic master. He seemed to know more about us than we knew about ourselves. So this quality that... that he had of meeting everyone is something that I feel like I've heard everyone who encountered Suzuki Roshi seemed to come away with that as a very powerful, just a very powerful impression that he had this ability to communicate to allow people to feel completely seen, which is a rare ability.

[16:24]

And also to put people at ease. Everybody, when they were in his presence, they seemed to feel at ease and at home and fully seen. And It's interesting because then you look at some of these people and you see that sometimes when they were outside his presence or after he was gone, they were not always able to see each other so clearly. But they all had this... impression of being seen and held and really understood. So Sojin goes on. During Zazen, he taught us to sit up straight.

[17:28]

He encouraged us not to move. I remember sitting through those early sashins with my painful legs. The more I wanted to move, the more painful they became. And Suzuki Roshi, in his gentle but firm way, admonished us. Don't chicken out, he said with a twinkle. He taught us not to become victims, but to see our difficulties as opportunities. I was encouraged not to be controlled by my self-centeredness, but to open to big mind. I feel grateful to my teacher for introducing me to this simple way and encouraging me for the seven years I was with him. Seven years. Doesn't seem like so long. We were fortunate to have Sojin Roshi for more than 50 years here in Berkeley.

[18:38]

And many of us... were here and practiced him 20, 25, 30 years or more. But in seven years, Suzuki Roshi planted a very strong root. On Wednesday night, there was zazen followed by a talk and a discussion. We would place the chairs around in a circle while tea was served by Mrs. Suzuki. Suzuki Roshi would ask for questions. One time I asked, what is nirvana? He looked at me and said, seeing one thing through to the end. This is a wonderful compression of Suzuki Roshi's teaching and of Sojin Roshi's teaching. Those of us who were here in the year or more before Sojin's death, we see that he put this completely into action.

[19:58]

He saw his practice through to the end. not compromising, not chickening out, you know, not finding necessarily the easy way, but finding a way to set himself at ease, but continuing his practice to the end. So what is nirvana? Seeing one thing through to the end. Master Dogen said, our practice is like one long rod of iron. Suzuki Roshi once said that Soto Zen practice is like sucking up one endless Zen noodle. Not quite a rod of iron, but tasty nonetheless. I think of this long distance runner who forgets about the finish line.

[21:03]

rather than the sprinter who runs as fast as possible in order to receive a medal at the end. We didn't call him Suzuki Roshi. We just called him Reverend Suzuki. Later, I think it was Alan Watts who said we should call him Suzuki Roshi. But as I got to know him, I began to really like him a lot. I felt... that after I'd sat at Sukhoji for a little while, I'd felt that I was sitting, that when I was sitting, this was samadhi. It was a certain kind of feeling that I had, which I can't describe, but I thought, this is samadhi. It was just my idea, you know, and Suzuki Roshi never talked about samadhi. But anyway, that's what I thought. And I said, I'm just going to keep coming back and do this. So I started coming to Zazen every day.

[22:07]

I'd come to Zazen in the morning. I'd come to Zazen in the evening. I was very regular, and I realized this was the most important part of my life. I was 35, and I said to myself, I know this is exactly what I've been looking for, and if I don't do this now, it'll pass me by, and I'll be lost again. I really devoted myself to sitting. Suzuki Roshi seemed to like me and he would adjust posture. His way of teaching was very subtle. He always adjusted posture. Every day he would adjust posture and he would never let anybody sit slumped. He talked about Zazen a lot. During Zazen he would say, you're like loaves cooking in the oven. Just keep cooking. Little by little, there grew to be enough students to form a Zen center.

[23:16]

The Japanese congregation, which Suzuki Roshi had been brought to San Francisco to minister to, allowed this to happen. They were tolerant and generous. But they had reservations for various reasons. There were a lot of strangers. entering and leaving, many of them hippie types in unwashed, unconventional, or occasionally outlandish attire, which was sometimes offensive to the Japanese congregants. Some were barefoot and sometimes had long matted hair, which was seldom washed. They sometimes didn't smell so good either, but Suzuki loved them and was never critical about their attire or their lifestyle. He was sensitive, But he was sensitive to the concerns of the Japanese congregation. Once after evening service, while everyone was waiting to leave, he said something like, we should be careful about the effect we have on our neighbors when we sit.

[24:20]

Before you come to Zazen, you should bathe or wash your feet. A little deodorant is okay. I sometimes use it myself. He said this in a sweet diplomatic manner, trying hard not to hurt anyone's feelings. Everybody knows about Suzuki Roshi now and about how plain and simple his practice was. One of the most important things that I feel is that he never saw himself as apart from us. He treated everyone as himself. I felt that he always looked for the light in the person. And that's why everyone loved him so much. He once said, when our practice is neither Japanese nor American, then we will have true practice. Although he had introduced Japanese practice to us, he never expected us to be Japanese.

[25:26]

He was always trying to bring forth the best qualities of our culture In our inherent nature, he said, when you are you completely and thoroughly, then Zen is Zen. He didn't say when you are like me. He said when you are completely you. When you are you, Zen is Zen. This, I think, is a koan for us. We tend to think of a mantra as a phrase that we repeat over and over in order to evoke or maintain a certain concentrated or pure state. But when I observed Suzuki Roshi, it seemed to me that the way he lived his life was as a mantra. His life had a very obvious form. Every day is Sukoji, Zazen, and service.

[26:30]

Every day he did the same thing, which was amazing to me. I had never seen anyone do that kind of an activity before. His whole life was devoted to sitting zazen, bowing, lighting incense, and the various other things that he did. When there were so many other things to do in the world, here was this person simply doing these things over and over again every day. And he'd been doing that most of his life. I never thought of myself as doing anything like that in what seemed like such a narrowly disciplined way. I was impressed by this. And after a while it occurred to me that his life was a mantra. Every day he had these tasks he would do. He was always concentrated and went about his activity in a light and easy manner. from another piece where Sojin talks about his introduction to sitting zazen.

[27:50]

Suzuki Roshi would say that for most people, it takes about six months or a year to find confidence in your posture. That's very, very generous of him, I think. And I think that Sojin thought that too. During that time, the student usually experiences some pain and discomfort. Let's say that can go on for a lot longer than six months, alas. This is the time when one learns how to accept thoughts and feelings as they arise, how to harmonize with breath. Suzuki Roshi said, once said half jokingly, that this practice is for those of us who are not smart enough to do it any other way. That may be true. Suzuki Roshi would like to say that we are Buddha on the one hand and an ordinary human on the other.

[29:11]

We are like two siblings under one roof. Sometimes one leads and sometimes the other. Often when one is dominant, the other is in the shadow. Suzuki Roshi liked to say, I'm sorry, he always emphasized no gaining mind. And I think that was also one of the marks of his teaching and the marks of Sojin's teaching. No gaining mind is the fundamental foundation of zazen. Dogen Senji says, let go and it fills your hands. I remember running across a passage in one of Edward Kahnsey's books where he quoted a sutra that said, a monk delights in giving up. That statement has stayed with me and seems to epitomize the essence of

[30:12]

Suzuki Roshi Zen practice. Zazen is not a stepping stone to something else or a means to get something. It's rather a letting go of dependencies. It's how we make of ourselves an offering to the entire universe and how we find our fundamental position in the universe moment by moment. It's like a spinning top that looks like it's standing still until you touch it and it goes careening away. Suzuki Roshi at Tassahara. By this time, Suzuki Roshi had been diagnosed with liver cancer, but he felt well enough to spend time at Tassahara in the summer of 1970. When he arrived, He said he wanted me to be his jisha, his attendant.

[31:15]

It was a wonderful opportunity to be close to him in such an intimate way. Suzuki Roshi wanted to make a stone retaining wall in the creek just below his cabin. Other students also helped from time to time. I made a tripod out of three inch metal bars and attached it to a winch. which we used to raise the large heavy stones, many of which we hauled out of the creek. Collecting and hauling those rocks and building that wall with Suzuki Roshi was hard and satisfying work. The average temperature in that time was 100 degrees and more. I would carry a wet washcloth and periodically soak it and put it on Suzuki Roshi's head to cool him off. Suzuki Roshi worked at full capacity, even though he and we knew that it was draining his energy. He was also giving his Sandokai talks in the heat of the evening.

[32:21]

Those talks are later published under the title Branching Streams Flow in the Dark. It was amazing to watch him move heavy rocks with his frail body. For those of us who worked with him in that intimate way, It was a highlight of our practice. And the last time he ever did anything like that. We might spend all day moving one or two heavy stones into place. And if it didn't fit just right, he would have us start all over again. His wife, Mitsu, whom we called Okusan, which means the one who walks behind, would occasionally come by and complain that he was working too hard. When he knew she was coming, he would stop. And when she walked on, he would start working again.

[33:22]

One day in San Francisco, Suzuki Roshi called a small number of his disciples into his room. He was sitting up in bed. He told us that he was diagnosed with cancer and that it was a relief for him to know that. He knew that it was not curable and he made a little joke saying, now I can eat whatever I want. In a very moving ceremony, Suzuki Roshi turned over the leadership of Zen Center to his chosen American Dharma heir, Richard Baker. Then the disciples went up to Suzuki Roshi's room. It was a wonderful feeling, a love samadhi.

[34:36]

And we were all crying, knowing in our hearts this was the final communion. On the morning of December 4th, 1971, as we began the traditional seven-day Rohatsu Sesshin, Suzuki Roshi passed away. We sat through the first period of Zazen, and the bell didn't ring for Kinhen, walking meditation. I knew instinctively that Suzuki Roshi had passed away. Then Peter Schneider came and asked a few older students, including myself, to come upstairs. I had a gut feeling about why which was confirmed when I entered the room and saw Suzuki Roshi's body lying on his back neatly on the floor with a quilt on top and on his chest, his rakasu in its envelope.

[35:50]

All day long, people came and filed through the room to pay their final respects. In the late afternoon, we carried his body down the stairs to the vehicle which took him to the funeral home. I remember carrying his feet and noticing how bright yellow they were, a symptom of his liver cancer. There was nothing to do but finish sishin. Any morning we had to do was absorbed into zazen. There was a general unspoken feeling that Roshi had planned it that way. How typical of him and how kind. So these stories

[37:03]

These are stories about Suzuki Roshi, but I also, it's also clear to me that they're Sojin stories about him. Our late teacher, whose passing is still very clear in our memory. and very vivid. Just as he brings Suzuki Roshi to life for us, reading his words brings Sojin alive to us, both of them together. You know, over the abbot seat, or next to the abbot seat, we have the founder's altar.

[38:16]

Now, on the founder's altar, there's a diptych. There's a frame with a photograph of Suzuki Roshi and Sojin Roshi because they are our founders. But previously, it was just this photograph of Suzuki Roshi. And I remember speaking to someone who had come to the Zendo for the first time, Satasazen. This person said, this was a wonderful experience. But I thought it was strange that the teacher had a photograph of himself next to his seat. He obviously saw Sojin sitting in that seat as looking like Suzuki Roshi in that picture.

[39:23]

I thought that was pretty interesting. But I also think that as much as anybody that I met of his students, Sojin carried, he carried that stillness in activity that Noyuri Roshi remarked on in the first story. Generally, that's what he carried. And that's something that I admire and aspire to. Although in the spirit of no idealization, I don't think it carried over into his way of driving a car.

[40:26]

But, you know, we each have our own ways. We have our own, we have places Each of us has a place where we're still and deep. And this is, you know, there's two ways of looking at the Dharma. We look at nirvana as stillness. As I was saying the other day, as this empty receptive center in the middle of the way ring. And we also look at it as what Dogen called Zenki, total dynamic working. These are not, to me, they're not in any way contradictory. They're just different angles of perception.

[41:38]

So the universe in a way is still and looked at from another angle is always in motion. Our zazen is still. And at the same time, we are constantly making small adjustments to our body. And even within the stillness of zazen, our heart is beating, our lungs are filling and emptying, our blood is circulating. So we have the circle, the circle of our veins and arteries within this still space of zaza. And I think that this is a teaching that both of them shared and they've been handed down to us.

[42:49]

So let's keep it and transmit it to those we encounter, not just in the Zendo, but in every aspect of our life. Can we meet them? in something like the spirit that Noiri Roshi felt met by Suzuki Roshi. That's really a challenge for us. And as I said also at the beginning, you know, as Dogen says, enlightened people of today are exactly as those of old. So let's be that, let's express our enlightenment. So just to say once more before we take time for some questions and comments, we'll have this ceremony, Suzuki Roshi Memorial Ceremony at 3.30.

[44:02]

And if you show up at this link, The Zendo manager, Hannah, will give us instructions on how to proceed. And everyone is invited to acknowledge and meet, bow, or speak to Suzuki Roshi. So with that, I'm going to hand things back over to Gary, who will conduct the call on people for questions and answers. And thank you. Let's celebrate together. Good morning. So it's Q&A time. And if you raise your digital hand in the participants box or send me a message in the... Or you could raise your digital hand if you have a question. And you could also send me a message in the chat box if you would rather not say it.

[45:06]

and we'll wait for some questions. Thank you. Lori, you'll unmute. Hi. you know when you were talking I and I was feeling just trying to understand what people were talking about that they receive from from Suzuki Roshi so directly from his body and his how he held himself how he carried himself somehow and then as someone recently described Sojin's Kinhin in the zendo like that he would stop.

[46:07]

It was very visceral to what this person described and how you just, how centered he was. And like, I just wonder is my effort to imitate something or to find something within, you know, like, I don't think I have, I, you know, I don't think I have these qualities that people are talking about from these teachers. And is my effort to find something within or sort of try to channel, you know, something. Maybe those aren't two different things, but it feels like they are. That's a really good question. I think it's some of both. I think we have to figure out, first, what is it that we value about this person? You know, so what I'm hearing you say, and I feel similarly.

[47:13]

So first of all, I would say this quality of being able to meet each person and set them at ease is, to me, that's kind of this fundamental quality. And then the... the stillness, the way you describe Sojin's Kin'in is not something separate from that at all. So if I think about how I've learned to play music, that we watch these masters and sometimes we have the opportunity to encounter them in person and sometimes We listen to them. And we have the similar opportunities parallel with our practice. And first, there is this imitative, important imitative dimension.

[48:23]

If you're playing music, you want physically to know how something was done. And you try to do it like that. It's like my... my great uncle who published a version of Casale's Bach Cello Concertos with Casale's fingering. So how did he finger it? How did he actually do it? And so this is the imitative side and you move through that until you really embody it and make it your own and then you can't stop there because that's just imitation. You then have to move through to your own way. So that's what I would, that's what I feel about that. You know, almost everything that I've ever learned of any, you know, of any sort of direct expression in the world, I've had to, there's been an imitative dimension to it.

[49:33]

I can see, you know, for example, I can see Sojin's, I can see his kinin. I can see Shoto Harada Roshi, because there you face the center of the room. I can see how he paced like a cat, how he paces like a cat when he's carrying the Kyosaku. You know, it's like, I can really, I have this visceral bodily sensation. So we do that, we embody it until we make it our own. But the point is to be able to, I think the spirit and the point is to be able to meet each person and put them at ease. And we may not be able to do it exactly like them because our bodies are different and our minds are different, but still we wanna approach it. So that's what I say.

[50:54]

Linda? Unmute, please. Thank you. Hi, haven't seen you for a while. Well, you said you quoted Nirvana is following something through to the end. Do you think there's an end? I think everything has an end, which is a new beginning. You know, I mean, I think what that means to me is You know, there's activities that we complete. So one way that I take that, and I think the example that I would give is just like, say I'm doing something, I'm sitting down, doing something at my desk, and all of a sudden, for some spurious reason, my attention goes to something else, and I really want to turn my attention to this other thing.

[52:05]

You know, and to see it through at the end means like to actually tell myself, wait, let me complete this activity. And then I will turn my attention to this next activity. And so the end, you know, again, Sojin is a wonderful example. He had a very difficult practice, practice that was very difficult for me, which was... to allow himself to be interrupted. If somebody knocked on his door, that was, he would say, hi. And he would turn his attention to the person coming through the door. And that was, so that was the end of one activity and the beginning of another. So that's the way I think about it. And as how that applies to people, The scale of our life, I don't know yet.

[53:11]

We'll find out. I found it helpful at some points to see there's no end, you know, or to see that every time I try to imagine the end of something, I'm going to lead myself astray. But sometimes, but you know, so you're a writer, sometimes you have to declare, this is over, I'm turning it over to the publisher, and it's not, so an end doesn't necessarily mean completion. Well, it's like you saying a few minutes ago that in response to Laurie's question, I think, and I can't quite get it, but you said it's both.

[54:20]

Whatever it was, you were saying that it's both. Yeah. So my feeling is there's no end to what we call practice. And at the same time, certain things, certain habits of thought and and behavior can end. But anyway, that's enough talk from somebody like me. No, no, it's fine. I love hearing somebody like you. In fact, I love hearing you. But I think another way to answer that question might be, what does Nirvana mean? You might say to do one thing at a time completely. Okay. Work on that for the next 100 years. Yeah. Okay.

[55:31]

Okay. Judy, go ahead and unmute. Thanks, Gary. Thank you, Hozan. To follow up on this thread, I'm wondering how you see this as connecting to continuous practice as the whole world, as the Sangha body. Sojin Roshi has died, still feel the heartbreak at the same time that there's the ease, if you will, the putting at ease that here we are continuing to walk. And when I walk in him, I sometimes feel Sojin walking beside me and sometimes I feel that Sojin is walking in this body that includes me and we're that same body.

[56:44]

So I'm wondering how, I guess how you might encourage us as Sangha practicing continuously. And that complete thing you were talking about, complete practice. For me, the Sangha is... Can I say everything? And you can see that in the way of... this sangha is everything, or everything is sangha. You can flip that. But... I feel that that's a... In the context of my practice, that's an explicit principle.

[57:51]

And I think it was... More conventionally, it tends to be an implicit principle. But it's what I observed, what I drew from watching Sojin for all those years, is that by taking care of his practice, by taking care of each person's practice, he was also taking care of the community. And by valuing and including and accepting each person, generally speaking, he created a situation in which we were subtly trained to take care of each other. And that's...

[58:58]

And what we're doing now is we're actually trying to expand that. So not just trying to take care of, we are trying to take care of our little circle, but we recognize that that circle is the circle of the way is vast. You know, it's much vaster than what occurs just within. the zendo, especially since we haven't been in the zendo much, or the walls, the fences of the grounds, but it's much larger. But we can't neglect, if we neglect the immediate for the vest, then we're probably going to serve neither. So there's this... you know, what I like to say, there's moving from the inside out and from the outside in.

[60:01]

And you have to be flexible enough to do that in both directions. And I think that that's, if you look at, if you look at Suzuki Roshi's life, even going back to Japan, what's interesting is that he built these, he built communities. He built a community at Rinsowin. He built a school and an orphanage in Yaizu. He built without necessarily, certainly without burning himself out, there's something about his nature that catalyzed the activity that arose to become Zen-centered. And so that's taking care of the immediate and taking care of of the vast scale at the same time.

[61:02]

So do that. We have time for one more, I believe. Somebody put in the chat a comment. One more in Heather then. The comment says, thinking of Lori's question, I remembered a Hasidic proverb. I don't know if I'm going to say this right. Pico Liver quotes in his book on the Dalai Lama. You must invent your own religion or else it will mean nothing to you. You must follow the religion of your fathers or else you will lose it. That's good. That's great. You know, this is what I, again, I often come back to my, my life as a musician, you know, just very briefly, you know, growing up, you know, a secular Jewish kid in a New York suburb being drawn to this really resonating strongly with music from the American South.

[62:27]

And it's parallel to, here we are, mostly Westerners drawn to this Japanese rooted, Asian rooted tradition. And you learn it as closely, you learn the religion of your fathers, you learn the music of your ancestors as closely as as you can. This is my approach. My approach is, you know, the modern approach is like, oh, this looks good. This looks good. This looks good. I'm going to take these different elements and because they're all kind of cool and put them together and that'll be my religion. That's not what I believe in. What I think is like really try to enter a tradition as deeply as you can and also recognize that there's something unique in each of us that ultimately has to manifest in an original way.

[63:36]

And this is exactly what Suzuki Roshi was saying, looking for the time when the Japanese root and the American culture merged and created something fresh and new, which is, I think, what we're trying to do. We're trying to bring that in without discarding the roots. So this is a wonderful, to me this is like a very interesting life engaging project. So maybe Heather and then we will have to end, yeah. Good morning, Hazan. Good morning. So I was about two and a half months old when Suzuki Roshi died. So I did not have the good fortune to meet him.

[64:39]

But one of the things that drew me to Zen practice was, from what I can tell, just endless humor and wit and cleverness in the way that he engaged people. And just the... the idea of sucking an endless noodle as spiritual practice. There was so, there's so much to it. I just wonder if you can comment on how you understand humor and practice and what you've been inspired by in that regard. Well, my experience has been that, and it may be what I prefer. you know, my predilection, but many of the awake people that I've met in any tradition have a lightness to them.

[65:40]

You know, and sometimes we think of Zen or we think of religion as a very stern business. But, you know, Suzuki Roshi, if you listen to his tapes, he laughed a lot. Sojin laughed a lot. Dalai Lama laughs a lot. Mahagosananda laughed a lot. You know, these, you know, the expression, to me, the expression of their enlightened nature was they had light. They had lightness to them and they enjoyed life. So enjoying life, this is I was telling somebody, you know, this has been a real challenge in my own life because I think I just, I had a hard time or gave myself a hard time. And I didn't think that, perhaps I didn't think that I deserve to enjoy life.

[66:46]

And I felt To be useful was what was important. And that is important. But if it's utility that does not include enjoyment, it's not sustainable. So, yeah. So enjoy yourself. I will. Thank you. Thank you. So I thank you for your... Questions and comments, and we will close now. And again, you're invited to the Ceremony of 330.

[67:32]

@Transcribed_UNK
@Text_v005
@Score_96.95