Today we had a bodhisattva ceremony which is acknowledging our karma or our twisted karma. Not our good karma. Acknowledging our bad karma and renewing our intentions or renewing our vows to practice So that's what this ceremony is. And then we have precepts. We recite the precepts. So this reminds me that next week at Green Gulch there's a conference sponsored by Green Gulch and Columbia, scholars at Columbia University on the Vinaya or Vinaya. Vinaya is for Buddhist practitioners.

[01:06]

And Vinaya has always played a very important part, a fundamental part in Buddhist practice, as you all know. There's some question about what is the proper mode of Vinaya in the modern world, given a changing world, and the migration of Buddha Dharma to various parts of the world, and Buddhism being practiced in various parts of the world, how does the Vinaya get transformed or transmitted, and what is archaic about it, and what is relevant in our modern age.

[02:16]

So this is a very important topic. So the title of the conference is something like Vinaya in the Modern Age. As we know, in Shakyamuni Buddha's time, it looks, if you study the history of Buddhism, it looks like there were a lot of rules, but actually there were no rules in the beginning. Buddha did not impose rules on the Sangha. But little by little, people would bring him some problem. The monks would say, you know, there's this problem with this monk down the road, and he's keeping a monkey that he had sex with.

[03:21]

Is that right? And they would bring the monk and talk it over. And he said, I don't think this is right, and I don't think that as Buddhists we should do that, or as practitioners we should do that. So that became a kind of precept. So one thing after another, little by little, there was a kind of code of ethics which governed the Sangha. And then when people were ordained into the Sangha, then they would have to abide by the code of ethics. So, as it ended up, there were some major precepts and many, many minor precepts. The major precepts were precepts which were very

[04:24]

The minor precepts were not so important, but they played an important part in people's conduct, so they kept these precepts. And when Buddha was on his deathbed, Ananda said to him, well, Master, should we keep the precepts? I mean, what should we keep? How about the precepts? And he said, well, I think you should keep the major precepts. Do we have to keep all those minor precepts? And he said, no, I think it's okay if you don't keep the minor precepts. And then Buddha died. And when they went to a council to discuss later what was the, to agree on what was the teaching, they asked Ananda, who of course is very brilliant, who remembered everything, they said, So you ask him about this, and he said, you don't have to keep the minor precepts, but which minor precepts was he talking about?

[05:39]

And Ananda said, well, I forgot to ask him. And then Mahakasyapa said, well, you forgot to ask him, and since we don't really know, we should just keep all the precepts. And this kind of set a tone for a certain style of Buddhism Just keep all the precepts. And that's what the Buddhists did for a long, long time. For men, 250 precepts. And this was very much part of the practice, was just to keep the precepts. And for women, 500 precepts. Not because women are worse, but more complicated, complex. And Suzuki Roshi says, men more simple, but because maybe we're simpletons.

[06:48]

Men are kind of simpletons. So they don't need so much. Anyway, whatever. This was the rule of the day. And when Buddhism came to Japan, in China they pretty much kept the precepts, the 250 precepts and the 500 precepts. But when Buddhism came to Japan, there was some effort to synthesize the precepts, to condense the precepts. And Saicho came up with 16 precepts for his monks, which was accepted by the government.

[07:56]

In those days, everything had to conform to, you had to ask permission to change things from the government. And he would give his monks 16 precepts, which is very close to what we do today. And that kind of set the tone for Japanese Buddhism, except for the Vinaya schools. The Vinaya schools still kept the 250 precepts and the 500 precepts. But in Japan, people think, well, the Japanese Buddhists don't care about precepts. They're not interested in precepts. It doesn't mean so much to them. In a sense, that's true. In a lot of ways, the monks in Japan did things which monks in other Buddhist countries wouldn't do. But I think the real deeper understanding is that

[09:02]

Precepts is not rules that you impose on yourself. Precepts is not a straitjacket to make you walk in a certain way. But precepts are our own inner request for order and our own logical consequence. or our own logical way of living our life. Actually, there's really nothing sacred about precepts. But if we think about precepts one by one, or as a kind of list, you know, the ancient, the old Buddhists were kind of very analytical in India, the Buddhists are very analytical and they came up with like the Abhidhamma, you know, great analyzing something down to nothing, to its very core.

[10:15]

And so the Buddhists have long lists of things and they like to keep long lists, like 75 an orderly mind. And so they also like to have a long list of precepts to keep, you know, so they'd have an answer for everything. But the Buddhists in Japan were more Mahayana and especially Zen-oriented. And precepts in Zen is more positive side. Not so much don't do this and don't do that, but do this and do it this way. More like presenting a positive attitude.

[11:16]

Not only don't kill, but nourish life. This kind of attitude. And if we look at precepts in a positive way, that we don't have to worry so much about the negative side. Although, precepts are usually expressed in the negative. Don't do this and don't do that. Like you talk to children. Or like people talk to children. You know, don't do this and don't do that. And when we talk to children, if you talk to children too much about don't do this, don't do that, you realize that If you listen to yourself, you realize that you're always speaking in the negative. And then children don't like what you're saying. They don't like it at all, because you're always speaking in the negative. Sometimes I hear myself, and I can't stand it, because I'm saying, don't do this, and don't do that, and I'm saying one thing after the other.

[12:26]

Don't do this, don't do that. But when something is expressed more in the positive, which is much harder to do. Kids respond better. And they don't think that you're always after them. And they can see some purpose. They like to see a reason. They like to see a reason in what we're doing. And although we may feel there's a reason in our no, no, no, they don't see it at all. It's just not logical. And it's true, it's not logical, because our society is built based on a certain kind of logic in order to keep everything in a certain pattern. In order to keep our life together in a certain pattern, that pattern has a certain logic. But it's not the logic of life. They go by the logic of life, and we go by the logic of patterns. You know, the way life is constructed out of our mind.

[13:27]

They don't pay attention. That doesn't mean anything to them. They're into logic which is based more on their inner request. So, I feel that the Japanese Buddhists have that kind of attitude in a certain way. More, instead of following rules one by one, you try to make a positive effort in your life. And then the don'ts support the do's, or the don'ts support the does. I want to read you the precepts as Kepler wrote Rochester Zen Center, where when they take the precepts, recite the precepts, they recite both sides.

[14:42]

So the first precept is not to kill. So they say, I resolve not to kill, but to cherish all life. I resolve not to take what is not given, but to respect all things. So if you feel that you want to cherish all life, then it's given that you don't want to kill. And if you respect all things, then you don't take things. You don't take what's not given. And I resolve not to engage in improper sexuality, but to live a life of purity and self-restraint I resolve not to lie, but to speak the truth. I resolve not to cause others to take alcoholic liquors or drugs that confuse the mind, nor to do so myself, but to keep the mind clear at all times. I resolve not to speak of the misdeeds of others, but to be understanding and sympathetic.

[15:49]

I resolve not to praise myself and downgrade others, but to overcome my own shortcomings. I resolve not to withhold spiritual or material aid, but to give them freely where needed. I resolve not to become angry, but to exercise control. I resolve not to revile the three treasures, Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha, but to cherish and uphold them. And Suzuki Roshi talked about precepts a bit, but he didn't talk about them as rules. And when we were practicing with him, we didn't have rules, except we did have, of course, certain tradition that he brought, which we attempted to follow. And actually, within the traditional way of practicing, the precepts are embedded right within the traditional way of practicing.

[17:05]

So if you practice that way, you're actually acknowledging, studying the precepts. So precepts have many faces. One is as a code of conduct and as a way of studying the Dharma. and each one of course is a koan because it reaches from our life of interaction to the very core of our being. Some people need to have really strict rules and every once in a while we all need to acknowledge some strictness in our lives in one place or another. So when we come to a point where we're kind of falling down in some place, we can use the precept to help us.

[18:18]

But if we think that precepts are a straitjacket or you know, something imposed, then that's, as Suzuki would say, that's heresy. Precept has to be our own wish. And sometimes when we have ordination, people personally say, well, I'm not really ready for ordination because I can't keep all the precepts, but no one can keep all the precepts. To think that someone could possibly keep all the precepts without violating them is more than anyone would expect from anyone. So precepts is always more than our ability, always exceeds our ability to keep them.

[19:26]

That's why precepts are very good, because they're always a little out of reach. And it gives us some way to go beyond ourself. Something to reach for. even though we take precepts and can't keep them. It's just like sitting zazen with your mind wandering. People say, well, I can't, I'm not ready to sit zazen because my mind is always wandering. But mind wandering is part of zazen. It's impossible to sit zazen without mind wandering. And in the same way, it's impossible to live our life without violating precepts.

[20:31]

We're always violating precepts. But if we have precepts, we know what violating precepts is. So it's not always a matter of good and bad. Violating precepts is this side. Not violating precepts is this side. But violating or not violating, we're always in the middle. If we think always of good and bad and right and wrong, then we just fall into duality. When we do something, which is on this side, then we just get back up into the middle. And when we do something that's too good, it may not be so good. Doing something too good may also not be so good. So we come back to the middle. And we're always coming back to the middle. And it's just like Zazen. We have a right hand and a left hand. Right side and left side.

[21:35]

But we're always coming back to the middle. We don't fall into one side or the other. So, when we do something wrong, just to acknowledge what we did and to come back. This is how we maintain precepts and how we maintain practice. Not to think we're so bad that we can't come back or we can't practice. The only thing to do when we fall off is to get back on. This is how we maintain precepts. It's not even a matter of good and bad. One of the hindrances, one of the five hindrances is being attached to the result of our, or being attached to

[22:51]

blaming ourselves for something, criticizing ourselves for something too much. Just to acknowledge is enough. Acknowledgement is necessary. Awareness and acknowledgement is necessary. And then maybe we feel that we need to do something to repent. That's OK. But the best repentance that there is, is just to get back on. So violating the precepts, or we don't say violating, we say staining, which means you kind of discolor the precept. To actually violate the precept is very difficult. There were in the 250 precepts,

[23:56]

There are four precepts which meant expulsion from the order. One was sexual misconduct because the monks were celibate. And the other was not telling truth. And one was killing somebody or causing someone to be killed. And the other is claiming certain things about yourself which you don't have. Like making exaggerated claims about yourself which aren't true. So those are the four most prominent violations One of the interesting problems that we have nowadays, in our modern saga, is that people have sexual relations much more easily than they used to.

[25:18]

Not more easily, but... and then they're married priests, which is a kind of Japanese phenomenon. So that kind of problem is one that people are dealing with, or have to come to terms with, because it wasn't allowed in the Strictly speaking, in the Vinaya. So what is our modern Vinaya? Suzuki Roshi said we should create our own precepts. Given the circumstances of our life and our place and time, we should create our own precepts.

[26:20]

Precepts that work for us. But that doesn't mean to just do away with the old precepts. But I think maybe we, since we don't have minor precepts, maybe that's what we need is some minor precepts. And also to look at the precepts and decide how to express them. The precept about sex is still there, but it's expressed in different ways. Instead of saying, don't have sexual relations, says, we say, don't misuse sexuality. And that can be taken in many different ways. And the positive way to express it is remain faithful in relationships. So it doesn't say not to have relationships.

[27:29]

This is our American expression, actually. because we don't have actually a celibate sangha in very few people. There are some, but largely speaking, the sangha in America is not a celibate sangha, even among priests. So, given that that's so, and given that otherwise we'd all be excommunicated, How to take care of that in a positive way, I think, is what the Sangha in America is working toward, leaning toward. How to take care of relationship in a positive way, in a meaningful way. But it's hard to tell how things might go, you know? Maybe there'd be a big movement someday. for the priests to all be celibate or something like that.

[28:35]

In many ways it's a lot easier. But when you have... Everything has its easy side and its difficult side. So we have to remember that something may look a lot easier than what we're doing. But when you do it, you find out that it has a hard, very difficult side, just like we have now. So my feeling is not that we have to change our equipment or change over to something that seems to work better, but make what we have work. Otherwise, we never quite know what our footing is. Keep shifting around our footing. So I think some of these kinds of problems will come out in the Vinaya Conference. On Wednesday night at Zen Center in the city, there'll be a discussion.

[29:42]

I put a notice on the bulletin board which people are invited to come to a conference of some of the people in the conference. Do you have any questions? There's a lot of ways for me to ask this question, and I've thought about it in a lot of cultural and historic ways. But I guess the best way to ask it is, why does sitting Zazen give rise to ethical behavior? It seems to do that, and yet there doesn't really seem to be anything inherent in Zen There is. But I don't think those are necessarily Buddhist things, right?

[30:59]

There's a culture and then there's the Japanese religion, right? And they do go together, but they also are not necessarily the same thing. So what Blythe does is he sees the good side and he also sees the bad side. And like I said, everything has its good side and its bad side. So Zen also has its bad side. That's why it's good to have precepts.

[32:02]

So that you can recognize when you're falling off. And sometimes That was one of the kind of difficulties that Japanese Buddhism has had. And, you know, kind of ignoring precepts sometimes. And also, one thing we have to remember, the Zen The samurai class went to the Zen teachers for guidance. And when you have a bunch of people coming with swords, whose intent is to kill people, then how do you handle that? How do you teach them some code of ethics?

[33:09]

And the Zen people did make that effort to teach them a code of ethics. But at the same time, they couldn't necessarily turn them all around. So they made a code of ethics which was compatible with their warrior-like nature. And it's not Zen, it's not Buddhism, but it helped. I think my question is connected to that. It seems to me that the question of rules has a lot to do with individuals, and then it also has a lot to do with the collective, and that those two things often don't work together so well. So when the group is small, like when Suzuki Roshi first started teaching us, it was very particularized, and he seemed to respond to people in terms of what he perceived to be

[34:13]

right for them and to try and point him in the right direction. As the group got larger, and particularly after his death, then it became more administrative. And so somebody, you know, the monk down the road would do something and then somebody would make a rule about it, rather than somebody having a relationship with that monk and trying to make something happen in a particular way. And we see that all the time. in the workplace and in the government. If you have a small group and a good leader, they take care of things one at a time. If you have a large group and or a lousy leader, then, you know, we make a rule and then the person that we made the rule about may not even get it. And so then we just have all these rules and it doesn't help anybody. Well, this is what happens in, you know, At first, things work because somebody's around that is the center for it.

[35:18]

You don't need much rules. You can take care of things one by one. But after, you know, Shakyamuni Buddhists, they said, well, who is your successor? This is according to one tradition. There are several traditions, right? But according to one tradition, who is your successor? Well, my successor is the Dharma, the Vinaya. Just follow the rules. And then, you know, but he didn't mean that completely, but, you know, that's an emphasis on just do it, follow the way, you know, in the correct way that's set out in the Vinaya, and then you will have a way to go. But, you know, after the teacher dies, then people have to put together a lot of rules in order to keep things together, because the rules is a kind of substitute for the teacher. So when you have a teacher and a small sangha, you don't need so many rules. But when you have a lot of people on their own, without a central focus, like a teacher, then you need to have the rules.

[36:29]

And it becomes more bureaucratic. And then you have a religion, and so forth. inevitable. That's the way things go. But what's nice is when there's smaller, when things break down into smaller groups with good teachers and people have a more intimate way to practice together. But that's not the way things go. So sometimes you need to have strong rules and sometimes it doesn't matter. I think they're both right. I don't think it's one or the other. They're both right, depending on the circumstances. So, it's wonderful if we're not bound by rules, or don't think that we have to be rule-bound. On the other hand, without being attached to rules, to understand ethics,

[37:37]

To understand what's ethical. And ethics is kind of like the study of morality. But they're both associated with each other. I like to use the word ethics better than morality because people bark at the word morality. So I like to use the word ethics. This whole discussion is so paradoxical in terms of not being dualistic on the one hand and then having all these roles. And in the Tibetan Buddhist group that was headed up by Trungpa Rinpoche, I mean, that was pretty wild. I mean, I don't know how they interpreted this precept about sexuality because it was really very promiscuous sexual behavior by Rinpoche himself and his lieutenants was rampant.

[38:43]

Tremendous amount of drug use, alcohol use, and people being obviously inebriated regularly. Yet very thoughtful, spiritual people would discuss these things as though having any kind of bad reaction to that, was dualistic. And in a sense, it is. And that behavior was described as living life in a very vulnerable kind of fully throwing yourself into everything, not treating it as a poison. And it was very confusing because I can see that, I mean, I can see the logic of that. Right. Well, logic has a certain rationale, and so we call it rationalizing. Well, that's how it seems to me, but why isn't that dualistic?

[39:50]

It is. It's like saying, well, you can make an argument for anything you want, and you can say, well, we're not doing anything at all, And then you go along for a long time and see, we're not doing anything wrong. We're not doing anything wrong. And then, boom, reality hits you. Then you find out what you're doing. When reality hits you, you find out what you're doing. And then you can say, well, maybe it wasn't so good after all. Maybe my rationale for all that wasn't so good. So it seems like Some people have to prove something to themselves before they'll get it. I mean, you may have to jump off the roof ten times before you break your leg and then realize that, oh yeah, that can happen. there's a kind of crazy wisdom, right?

[41:04]

Which is like, you know, just reverse everything and go into kind of indulgent states. But I think that's just exactly what it is. It's crazy. Some people seem to need that. But, and then they, some people say, well, that's just skillful means. But we have to be very careful with skillful means. Because skillful means, in that extreme way, is also rationalization. There are times when you have to go into hell to rescue somebody, and then you take on all the characteristics of hell. But to use that as a way of life, You could do it as a way of life, you know, you can do it.

[42:12]

But it's not something that you take a whole Sangha into, who are not trained, you know, and say, this is the way to go. I don't think so. I don't understand that. Because I agree with what you're saying. The picture is very crazy. It seems crazy. And yet, they were very close. He has a picture of Suzuki Roshi. Oh yes, they always keep pictures of Suzuki Roshi on their altar. And I understand Suzuki Roshi sent a picture. I mean, it stood in a studio. But that's, you know, I think that Suzuki Roshi did like Trungpa. I like Trungpa. That doesn't necessarily mean that everything that Trungpa did was the way to go. when they get elevated to the level of teachers, stop their own learning process in a very interesting and rather unconscious kind of way.

[43:24]

And the question I'm working with is, what don't I want to look at now? What's really interesting is there's always something there. Right. In a certain kind of way. That's right. Right there is where he practices. Right at that point. What is this thing that's making me uncomfortable? Or what is it that I'm not quite looking at? You know, there was something about the Buddhism in the 70s, I guess it was, that where a lot of teachers felt that they wanted to just completely integrate the society into Buddhism. And it didn't work.

[44:28]

It really didn't work, as we found out. And, you know, they didn't want to kind of steady an interest I think a lot of it has to do with what certain leaders seem to need and so forth. And we know a little about the problems of the leaders in the 70s and the 80s. They had a lot of talent, but also a lot of needs. And they weren't so mature. Even Trump was very good. in a lot of ways, but also very immature in a lot of ways. Yeah. There's a guy named John Bradshaw who writes about addictions, and when he writes about the 12 step, he talks about spiritual leaders, and he's talking more about Christians, but he talks about the fact that sometimes they haven't worked through their shadow side, and inevitably it's going to pop up.

[45:49]

Oh yes, what's not there will pop up. Definitely. So, it's not that you have to have always worked through everything, because you're always working through everything. The person who stopped working through everything is not something wrong with that person. So we're all always working through something. But the point is to know that we're working through something. The one that says, I don't have to work through anything because I already have it, is the one that really needs to work, has something to work through. I think you have to recognize that you have a shadow side. Oh, absolutely. Just like, you know, precepts are good, but they're also a side. Everybody says, oh, you're so good, and you're so nice. This is terrible for a teacher.

[46:49]

People shouldn't say, oh, you're so good, you're so nice. Shouldn't say that to a teacher. They should always say, well, what about this? You should. What? You should. That's what you want to do. They do it. They should do that. Otherwise the teacher can't... It's hard for the teacher to be honest. It's really easy for the teacher to think that they're really good. Especially people keep telling them that, you know. And they start to believe it. What do we accomplish?

[47:51]

I mean, there's never an end. We can't draw closer to anything. There's, you know? Yeah. We keep accomplishing. What we accomplish is becoming more and more real. There's never an end. There's no end. No end. What we accomplish is to be right where we are, which is probably the hardest place to be. Yeah, we don't need to accomplish that. So accomplishment is a kind of non-accomplishment. But if we accomplish what we are in this moment, then the next moment will bring what it brings. So we don't really We don't really accomplish, you know, to get enlightened.

[48:53]

It's not something that we can accomplish. Enlightenment is something that... I don't like to say is given because that presupposes a giver. But which appears when we're not looking too far ahead or too far behind. Just take care of the reality of this moment, and then the reality of the next moment, and then the reality of the next moment. So our accomplishment is to be present right now, completely, in this moment. And then, if we can take care of this moment, then we can take care of the next moment. No need to worry about down the line.

[49:55]

Yeah. It is. Yeah. Well, Krishna already said something interesting along those lines once it relates to precepts. He said that the desire for non-violence is violent, or the idea of non-violence is violent because it takes us out of what's actually where we actually are, which is often violent, at least in the mental way, and projects into this ideal of some state. And to me, that's the danger that I see in precepts, is that, you know, because I think we are trying to be more and more real with ourselves and with each other. And you were saying that, that precepts are not intended to be sort of a set of shoulds or a straitjacket or a form of conditioning or something, but I think it's a real trick, you know, to walk that line where they don't, where they function the way you were talking about as the innermost request or as a way of seeing whether you've slipped off or something, you know what I mean?

[51:28]

not trying to be somewhere else. I don't know about the first thing you said, but... What was that? Krishna Murthy? He said something like that the desire for non-violence or the idea of non-violence was violent. Well, if you think of non-violence, then you have to think of violence. They go together. But just to think of non-violence isn't necessarily a violent idea. Well, you know, it was that it was the sort of the root of violence is the fact that we're never where we are. We're always thinking of being somewhere else. It's kind of a radical way to think about it. Violence is like violate. To transgress. but across. I'll think about that.

[52:35]

Thank you.

[52:37]

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