Before I begin my talk, I have a few announcements. Thanks for opening the window. I'm the kind of person who really likes a lot of ventilation. Tomorrow, after the Shuso's talk, as soon as possible while you're leaving, for 15 days. So I have to take care of business in Berkeley and San Francisco, and my family. And a pension sensei is in England, so I'm going to be the only abbot around. And I'm probably going to do some focus. I was going to leave the 21st, but I found out that my son Daniel was having a piano recital at 3 o'clock in the afternoon on Sunday, which is tomorrow.

[01:12]

So I'm leaving a day early and coming back a day earlier tonight instead of 10, which is the mid-practice period. So I'll come in time for the skip. Last time he had a recital, which was his first one, I was in Oregon attending the Zen Teachers Conference, and I had it all planned out so that the plane would take off early in the morning and I'd have time to go, but the plane was delayed about an hour, and then it takes about 45 minutes to taxi up to San Francisco. And then the shuttle was about an hour late. Now it's pacing up and down. And finally I got there just after it was over.

[02:16]

So this time I want to be on time, so I'm reading as soon as I can. I said that we were studying the five ranks of And we haven't had a chance to do any study yet, so I'll do the study when we come back. But I want to present a very nice case in the booklet record, and I'll introduce a little bit, basically, by ranks within this commentary. So the title of his case, this is case number 74 in the Brooklyn record, and it's called King U Osho and the Rice Pale.

[03:19]

So Ngo introduces the case, and he says, the baku-yu sword in hand, he cuts through all complications. The clear mirror hung high, He himself utters the words of Bhairavachana. In self-mastery, he quietly puts on his clothes and takes his meal. In mysterious and playful samadhi, what will he do? See the following. And in the main subject, Setjo says, at every midday meal time, Kinyu Osho would himself bring the pail of boiled rice, and in front of the kitchen, dance and laugh loudly, saying, Dear Bodhisattvas, come and take your meal. Setso says, although Kinyu did this, he was not simple-minded.

[04:29]

Another translation is, Although Kenya did this, he was not just being kindhearted. And then later, much later, a monk asked Choke, he said, the ancient word, he said, dear Bodhisattvas, come and take your meal. What does it mean? What did he mean by that? Choke said, He seems to observe reflection and thanksgiving before the midday meal. And then Sitcho has a verse. And in Sitcho's verse he says, from along the white clouds, laughter rings out. He brings the rice himself to give to the monks. If gold inherits, they will follow him even thousands of miles away. There are various translations, but mostly they're eclipses.

[05:41]

So, Engo introduced the subject, and he says, the Bakuryu sword in hand. This is very common in the introduction to these cases for Engo to say, the Bakuryu sword in hand. The Bakuryu sword in hand, he cuts through all complications. Bakuryu sword is like an ancient mythical sword which cuts through various complications, but in this case he's using it as a metaphor for Manjushri's sword. Manjushri is pictured with a sword, often, which cuts through all the complications of duality. Each one of us should take hold of Munjushri's sword and cut through our complications. This is the goal of Zen practice.

[06:47]

Each one of us has Munjushri's sword and we see so many complications and we try to figure our way through the complications. But at some point we just say, and free ourselves. It's also called dropping body and mind. God, all this time I was worried about that. And then he says, the clear mirror hung high. He himself utters the words of Vairochana. Clear mirror is... Vairochana's mirror is our clear mirror mind, which sees everything just as it is, without interpreting or without partiality.

[08:02]

the first glance. You know, sometimes if you walk down the street, downtown, you look in the mirror, you look in the glass, and suddenly you see your reflection. And you think, that looks familiar. It looks familiar because you're not thinking about who that is. Something very familiar about it. But then you look again, And you recognize, oh, that's me. And then your mind starts to shape the image of the way you want to see yourself, the way we want to see ourselves. So we look in the mirror once and see the real picture. And then we look again to see what we want to see. So we kind of shape reality according to our picture. But the clear mirror, at first glance, before thinking is the real picture, before partiality or desire or the way we want to see.

[09:19]

He says, the clear mirror hung high. He himself, that is the words of Vairagyama, In other words, this is the universe seeing. Not just me seeing, but the universe is seeing. Buddha nature is seeing. Buddha nature. In the transmission ceremony, there is a part where the person who is receiving dharma transmission sits in Bharo Chandra's seat. speaks from the position of Bhairavachana Buddha. He says, in self-mastery, he quietly puts on his clothes and takes his meal. So he's talking about the person of achievement.

[10:32]

The person of achievement wields his sword, which cuts through all complications, and also has the clear mirror of wisdom, which sees things just as they are. And his activity is reflected in putting on his clothes and taking a meal, in the simplest activity of life. In self-mastery, he quietly puts on his clothes and takes his meal. Our old teacher Suzuki Roshi has this quality. We just watch him put on his clothes and take his meal. In very, nothing special way, but there was something very special about it. I can't, which we can't describe it, but it was very special. And then he says, in mysterious, playful samadhi, what will he do?

[11:42]

Playful samadhi. Samadhi is moment-to-moment presence. The present moment as it's continued without interruption. So one who has this self-mastery, has a playful attitude in the world. The world is that person's playground. The world of suffering is that person's playground, in the midst of suffering. So this kind of refers to King Yu, who seems very playful.

[12:44]

King Yu is expressing this kind of playful samadhi. Old King Yu Roksho has this playful way of behaving. Very unusual. It would be kind of unusual for the Tenzo to bring the pot out and say, come on Bodhisattvas, take your meal. Well, he says, main subject, at every midday mealtime, King Yudho Sherwood himself brings the pail of boiled rice. And in front of the refractory, he'd dance and laugh loudly, saying, dear Bodhisattvas, come and take your meal. Setcho says, although King Yud did this, he was not simple-minded or not just being good-hearted. I would take that to mean not just being a good boy.

[13:49]

Something deeper than just being a good boy. A kind boy. And then a monk, later on, a monk asked Chilke, The ancient worthy said, dear Bodhisattva, come and take your meal. What did he mean by that? And Choke said, he seems to observe reflection of Thanksgiving before the minting. Gratitude is the fundamental expression of enlightenment.

[14:55]

A person whose activity expresses enlightenment is always expressing gratitude. Whether things go well or don't go well, gratitude is always the expression. Sato Zen, someone said, After we were having our Soto Zen Sashin, someone remarked, you know, Soto Zen practice is, the biggest part of Soto Zen practice is bowing. Constantly expressing gratitude. Until you're sick and tired of gratitude. It's subtle. Whether we like it or not, we're always put into a position of expressing gratitude.

[16:02]

For what? For whatever. Without discriminating. If we're handed something good, thank you very much. If we're handed something unpleasant, Thank you very much. Same thing. This is called freedom, great freedom. But until we can fully accept, we don't think of it as great freedom. King Yiu seems to have this wonderful attitude of great freedom.

[17:09]

His expression and his dancing and his gratitude comes out of this great freedom. How we express this freedom has to be our own way. This is a kind of test, you know, of someone who has freedom, is that you have to be able to express it in your own way. And you can't make it up. When we come to practice, we give up all our individual ways of expressing ourselves. When we come to Tamsara, we leave our music at home, we leave our art at home, we leave our radios at home, or someplace.

[18:21]

And we just come with nothing. give ourselves to the form and to the practice and put on black clothes. And we're all covered with one blanket of black clothes, of black cloth, but our faces and our hands stand out against the background of this black cloth. And each one of us has some independent individuality. stands out against this black background. Even though we all do the same activity and, in a sense, we're all the same person, at the same time, each one of us is completely individual and unrepeatable. Sometimes I see people

[19:25]

I see the students, and I see us all as one person. And then sometimes I look and I see each one of us as an individual, completely unique. So when we give up our acquired uniqueness and put ourselves into practice and allow ourselves to be matured in the practice, little by little our true uniqueness comes forth. our real face.

[20:32]

Every once in a while we say, oh, so-and-so has really become themselves. It's not a breakthrough. It's like a coming to maturity. One day we just say, you know, become themselves, their true face. And their activity comes from their own deep wellspring. Their expression comes from their own deep wellspring. And even though this person has a problem, they have the ability to eat everything that comes in front of them.

[21:48]

It's gratitude. This, I would say that our King Uroshio expresses his practice from the point of view of the fifth rank. Tozan expressed non-dual practice from the point of view of five positions. Practice can be expressed from the point of view of lots of different positions, but this was his formula, using these five positions of the absolute and the relative.

[22:57]

And I don't want to get too far into explaining this because it's better dealt with in the class. But I do want to just explicate it. The first position is called the apparent within the real. The apparent means the phenomenal world, and the real means the world of the absolute. In Sando Kai, we talk about the dark and the light. The dark is an expression of the absolute. where no phenomena is distinct from anything else. And the light is an expression of distinction. When we shine light, then everything becomes distinct. But at night, it's all in the shadow. It's all in the darkness. So the first rank is called the apparent within the real.

[24:10]

This is the dark side, expresses the dark side. The second rank is called the real within the apparent, which expresses the revealed side, or the light side. You could say Zazen expresses the first rank, the apparent within the absolute, or within the real. You know, in Genjo Koan, Dogen talks about when one side, with the moon reflected in the water, and he says when one side is illuminated, The other side is dark. So this is a case of when one side is illuminated, the other side is dark.

[25:13]

When the dark side is illuminated, so to speak, or comes in the forefront, when the Absolute is in the forefront, the relative is in the shadow. So in Zazen, it's called unconditioned activity. We don't pay much attention to our surroundings. We're completely absorbed in the absolute, in the unconditioned dark side, where everything is equal. And then when we step out of the zendo, everything, the relative side comes to life. The absolute is in the shadow of the relative. So we just take care of business, birds, trees, human relationships, activity, going to work, going to the kitchen, chopping vegetables.

[26:32]

This is the absolute, hidden within the relative. Even though we're chopping vegetables, it's an expression of Big Mind. This is what we always have to remember. Working in the kitchen is an expression of Big Mind. If it's just work as usual, then we're missing the point. The third rank is called the coming from within the absolute, or coming from within the real. It has the feeling of, from the basis of reality comes forth our activity. in an integrated way.

[27:38]

So it's like the synthesis, the synthesis of the absolute and the relative. And it's expressed as the activity of a well-developed zemstin who has perfect calmness and equanimity in all situations. and is not attached to anything. And in all the activity of that person, they're always standing in the absolute, in the center of Buddha nature. Dōgen expressed it as swimming in the waves of the ocean and at the same time walking on the bottom of the sea.

[28:45]

With your feet on the bottom of the sea. And then the fourth rank is called Arrival at Mutual Integration. In this rank, this position expresses a mature mistress or master of the Dharma, who sets up the banner of Dharma, whose example, and by their example, teaches others. developing their own practice ceaselessly, completely immersed in Dharma, and whose whole life is immersed in practice.

[30:04]

And then the fifth rank is called unity attained. And in this position, this is the position of someone who has gone beyond even thinking about Buddhism or Zen, and who is so immersed that they don't even, if you say Zen, you might say, what's that Their whole activity just comes, is unique and creative and comes completely naturally. They don't have to think about right and wrong.

[31:11]

compared to that. So I feel that King Yu is coming from the fifth rank, where his expression is just his expression. There's nothing to do with what he's learned. He's completely given everything away. He owns nothing. He has nowhere to go and nothing to do. And his whole life is just an expression of gratitude, unselfconsciously. His great happiness is in his generosity and making people happy.

[32:30]

These bodhisattvas exist all over the place. Somebody was telling, it was at There were a couple of people who were talking about this little cafe on Dewey Street near the ocean. And there was this woman, I can't remember the name of the cafe. Louie's. Louie's Cafe. And this wonderful woman. When you walk into the cafe, she had just made everybody feel like a million dollars And of course she had her own problems, but she'd bring them up. I used to know people like this. I've always known people like this. And they existed in their cafes.

[33:30]

When I was a taxi driver, I used to be a taxi driver for about six years. And certain places, they were just reeling lights, you know. But, you know, it feels good when, after you, when you go in and come out, you feel renewed. And people, unselfconscious, this is just their mode. Somehow they've reached a certain state of gratitude and unselfconsciousness. And their whole life is just devoted to that. Satcho's verse, in his verse he says, from among the white clouds laughter rings out.

[34:36]

The white clouds could be steam from the rice. He brings the rice himself to give to the monks. Now this word rice, you know, is also a kind of metaphor. He brings the rice to the monks. What's the rice? You know, when we have food from the kitchen, we eat the food, right? And there's nourishment in the food. But there's something else that comes along with food from the kitchen. And it's not rice. It's some kind of spirit that with which this food is prepared, which is actually maybe the most important ingredient in food.

[35:39]

We can eat the most nourishing food, but if it doesn't have the special ingredient, we don't really get nourished. So it's very important to have selflessness and love in a kitchen, and a sense of generosity, because this is what actually we eat. This is our real nourishment. And it combines with the food and the ingredients. to nourish our body and mind.

[36:43]

And then the way we receive it makes the connection back to the kitchen. So it's not just one way. It goes in a circular manner. It comes from the kitchen and we eat. Then our receiving it picks it back very important. This is great practice. Some of the most famous Zen masters were cooks in the kitchen. Seppo said that he used to carry a big ladle around with him when he went from one monastery to another. And he always worked in the kitchen. Then he says, if gold inhered, it will follow me.

[37:54]

Gold hidden is a lion, you know, a Buddhist lion, a Buddhist child, even thousands of miles away. There's another interpretation of that verse, which is, They would have seen the deception from 3,000 miles away. But you know, deception, this is the way that these guys talk to each other, about each other. They always say something like, ah, he's just a senior ass, which means he's telling the truth. They always say the opposite of what they mean. You have to kind of know that. Otherwise, you think, It's all deception. So, it's important, actually.

[39:09]

It looks like we're all doing the same thing. In one sense we're all doing the same thing. But it's important that each one of us find their own way. The actual meaning of this practice is that each one of us must find our own way. When we've found our own way, it doesn't mean to try and do something different. If you look at the state of modern art, everybody's trying to do something different in order to look unique. There's not a lot of uniqueness out there. But we have to do something different in order to be unique, in order to be recognized. And there's a lot of contrivance.

[40:17]

Here we are, in Europe. In China, everybody used to paint the same picture. Then that got kind of old. Art goes like that. Everybody paints the same picture, and then after a while, everybody says, you have to do something different. And then everybody starts painting a different picture. But each side, each extreme has got some problem with it. How do we find our own unique way without contrivance? It takes time and patience and steady practice and our uniqueness will appear. We have to have faith that our unique way will appear in each one of us. After 20 years, they're like, yeah, so-and-so has got their own way.

[41:29]

And yet, their own way is in conformity with the Buddha way. That is their own way of expression, and it's true. It's true to the Buddha way. Which brings us to another koan. I won't keep you long. This is case 93. In case 93, it just happens to be about case 74. So in case 93, there's no introduction. And a monk asked Paiko, what is the meaning of Chokei's words? He seems to observe reflection and thanksgiving before the midday meal. Tycho performed a dance. The monk made vows.

[42:33]

Tycho said, what moves you to make those vows? Why do you do that? Maybe the monk did his own dance, and maybe he did a contrived dance. Maybe he just kind of thought, well, you know, I'll just throw something out there and see if it works. But we don't know this. You might give the right response, and the teacher will say, you fox devil. So you have to know whether or not your response is right or not.

[43:39]

If you're just waiting for the teacher's approval, you may say, that's not it. Then you have to know, well, this is it. Then you have to come back and say, this is it. Otherwise, the teacher would say, I'm sorry, and you'd say, well, see now. So a good teacher would give you a good problem. So you have to know. So in Citro's verse, he says, one arrow glanced off, and the second one struck deep. The first arrow was the dance.

[44:44]

The second one, you fucked devil. That arrow really went into the lung. Don't tell me yellow leaves are gold. If the waves of Soke were all the same, Many would drown on dry land. Yellow leaves, you know, are used to, it's an expression of, if the child is crying, give them yellow leaves and say, this is gold. The child is not crying. It's just a human gesture. When a child grows up, they know that it's just yellow leaves, it's not gold. He says, if the waves are Soke, the waves are Soke. Soke is Eno, the sixth patriarch. And all of the teachers of Zen are descended from the sixth ancestor, Soke, or Daikon, Eno. And the waves of Soke are all of the students, all of the people, all of his descendants.

[45:48]

So if the waves of Soke were all the same, many would drown on dry land. So if the students end up the same as the teacher, then they'll all die on dry land. So they have to teach the students to find their own way. But first they find the teacher's way. So when we come to Tassajara, you find the teacher's way. You find the Tassajara way. And we conform to that. And after we mature, then our own way will naturally appear. You can't force it. It works here like so. And it may take 5 years. It may take 25 years. All you can do is practice day by day, wholeheartedly.

[47:03]

And the most practice is giving up. Okay, fine. So I've given, you know, bibliography for studying the five ranks.

[48:45]

And you'll find, if you study these various commentaries, that each one is a little bit different. So if you want to find conformity in the commentaries in the five ranks, there is some. But there's also a lot of divergence. The five ranks of kozang is influenced by sandokai and is expressed in the jubilement of samadhi. The five-flavored herb is the five ranks. There are many different ways to express the five lengths.

[49:48]

So this is what we'll look at when I come back. So, we will have the big videography and you can look up as much as you can during the next 15 days.

[50:11]

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