For more information on Ancient Dragon Zen Gate, please visit our website at www.ancientdragon.org. Our teachings are offered to the community through the generosity of our supporters. To make a donation online, please visit our website. It's Mr. Astrofan and Wonderstar. It is perfectly magnetic. Even a hundred thousand million kalpas. Now I can see and hear it. Good morning, everyone. Welcome. Good to see you. I have all of you on Zoom, and I've heard who is in the Zendo.

[01:18]

And it's good to see you, Joanne. It's been a while. And Jerry, it's nice to have you here. So yesterday afternoon, I did a two-and-a-half-hour seminar on this chant, the Song of the Jewel Mare Samadhi, Hokyo Zamae, in Sino-Japanese. So this morning, I'll just do some highlights of that and introduce the text. It's one of the chants that we do very regularly at Ancient Dragon. And a very important text for Soto Zen, attributed to Dongshan Liangjie, who was considered the founder of this lineage of Soto Zen, called Xiao Dongshan in Chinese. So this is a very important text. And one of my favorite chants, one of my favorite songs.

[02:20]

It's called the Song of the Julemer Samadhi. We have the text of the lyrics. The melody has not survived since the 800s, but anyway, I always mention that depending if you are musicians and want to try and compose the melody and rhythm for this lyric, please feel free. So just to introduce this text a little more fully, this was considered a transmission text, a text for transmitting the Dharma in Soto or Zhaodong Zen. And that changed, and that has a big effect on the first two lines that I'll talk about. In the early 1700s, Menzon, one of the great scholars and performers of Sotozen in Japan, made it available.

[03:21]

Before that, it had been a kind of secret transmission document. So there are many themes in this. So I want to just mention some of the themes in this text. It starts by talking about the Dharma of suchness. So the teaching, the reality, the truth of suchness. suchness is, uh, the topic of this whole song of this whole lyric. So when it, when it talks about it, it, it's referring back to this teaching or reality of suchness. Suchness is, uh, a, um, more positive way, uh, of talking about what's also called emptiness. The reality of the ultimate reality, uh, of our lives and of our world and universes. And I see Nyozon is here. I believe he's in Hawaii. His name is Suchness Mountain. So suchness is, again, the topic of this whole poem.

[04:28]

And suchness just means what is. Everything it is, what we see when we face the wall, what we feel in our body and hearts when we face the wall, when we're sitting Zazen, and when we get up from Zazen and go out into the world and try to respond to the world helpfully, including our own families and neighbors and our own body, mind, and all of the difficulties of our lives. Difficult, challenging society. So, suchness is the topic of this discussion. verse I wanted to mention I said I did a two and a half hour seminar yesterday about this and I'm just going to be able to do highlights this morning if anyone I believe you can still sign up on the ancient dragon website for yesterday's seminar in which case you will receive a recording of the whole seminar yesterday so if you can do that in the next couple of days and thank you to Ruben for recording this so there's a few people here who were at the seminar yesterday

[05:37]

But again, highlights. So just to mention some of the major themes of this song, this verse, this teaching poem that recur throughout the teaching poem. So again, there's just the teaching, the reality of suchness. of seeing things as it is. We could see this as bare attention awareness, but facing the reality of just this, as we'll talk about, that Yunyan said to his student Dongshan, So, suchness is one theme, but also how to share suchness, how to keep it, how to preserve it well, how to take care of this teaching and reality of suchness is a major theme throughout this. Another theme is the use of language. How do we use language? What are the problems of language?

[06:39]

So, this is very much part in this verse. Also, the principles of response, how to respond from suchness, from our communion with suchness, which all of you have received through Zazen, and then how to express that in the world. So how to respond to the world. And then another major theme in this whole series, uh, teaching poem is the teacher student relationship. There's a lot of ways in which that's discussed in the, in this poem. And then, uh, also just, uh, the energy or spirit arising from stillness. So one of the more provocative lines, and this is about the wooden man and the stone woman, and there are lots of other, maybe we'll get to that line this morning, but how energy and awareness and illumination arise from stillness.

[07:44]

So this is very important to our practice. And we sit still and upright in zazen and commune with this ultimate reality, and then how do we share that with the world? So this is very much the emphasis in Soto Zen. It's not about... Reaching some ultimate state. It's about that's the starting point So we all start from some connection to the ultimate to the universal reality But then how do we express it in our lives each of us individually in our own context? so how we sit Like Buddha we talked about this yesterday as the Vajrayana aspect of soto said we sit in upright and still expressing Buddha in our own body mind. And then, yes. I'm going to interrupt you for a moment.

[08:45]

Would you please let us know at what point you would like us to project the text? Okay, I will do that. Yes, thank you. So this is just background on this text and how important it is and what the themes are. And the last theme, so in addition to how energy and spirit and illumination arise from stillness, this text... initiates the the central teaching of soto zen of the five degrees or five sometimes called the five ranks the five positions um these spots so there's a whole section of the song of the that talks about fiveness and and various fives and this is because this um In this jewel mare samadhi, Dongshan introduces what's later called the five positions, or sometimes it's called five ranks, but it's really not about stages of progression or exaltation or something like that.

[09:51]

It's the five-fold relationship between the ultimate or universal reality and the particular phenomenal world, our own place in the phenomenal world of perception and the particulars of all beings. And so this relationship between the ultimate and the particulars is central to, is the central philosophy of Soto Zen. It's also important in Rinzai Zen, but again it's I prefer the translation five positions rather than five ranks. It can be seen as stages of development, but primarily it's ontological. There's five, it's a five-fold quality to the nature of the relationship between the universal ultimate reality and the particulars of phenomenal reality. And I will be doing another online seminar with Ancient Dragon Saturday, March 15, just on the five degrees or five positions.

[10:59]

And you can see that on the website and sign up for that too. Okay, so... You can now screen share the text, because I'm going to start going to just selected highlights from the text. And then we'll have some time for discussion or questions. And if you have questions about other lines that I don't get to this morning, we can do that too. So the first two lines, the dharma of suchness is intimately transmitted or conveyed by Buddhists and ancestors. Now you have it. Preserve it well. So, again, it starts with this reality, this dharma of suchness. Suchness is nyozen, Sino-Japanese, ta-ta-ta. I love saying that. That's the Sanskrit word for suchness. And it's a way of seeing reality.

[12:01]

It's kind of the flip side of emptiness teaching because it's expressed in more positive terms. But just this, this suchness, is the topic again of this whole verse. And this suchness is what is... intimately transmitted or conveyed by all Buddhas and ancestors. Now, the next line is, well, again, this was kind of secret, but since Menzon in the early 1700s, now you have it, preserve it well. So we chant this regularly, and that means that all of you... have access to, are part of, are expressions of this suchness, and then preserve it well. How do we take care of this suchness? So the whole rest of this teaching poem is about how to preserve it well, and it refers back to this reality of suchness. And there's a story behind these two lives. Dongshan studied with a teacher named Yunyan,

[13:04]

And so Tozan and Ongan in Japanese. So Dongshan's study with Yunyan, after some time, he was about to go and leave Yunyan's temple and go out wandering around. And this is something that was common in China and Japan and now in America that Zen students, after some period of practice, you know, go out into the world. And, of course, at Ancient Dragon Zen Gate, we're all already out in the world. We all have regular, you know, we are not in a monastic, residential situation. So, how do we express suchness in the world is what preserve it well means. And the story about this is that Dongshan, when he was about to leave his teacher, Yunyan, came to Yunyan and said, later on, if somebody asks me, what was your dharma?

[14:08]

What was your teaching? What was your reality? What should I say? And Yunyan paused for a while. And then he said, just this is it. Just this. This is a reference to suchness. Just this is it. Dongshan didn't know what to say either, so he left, and as he was going, he was wading across the stream, and he looked down in the stream and saw his reflection. And we're going to talk about the lines in the middle of the first page that relate to this. But just to say, when Yonyan said, just this is it, that could be understood in a couple of ways. This pronoun, it, just this is it could also be read as a personal pronoun he or she or them or whatever um uh so i don't know i didn't see if anybody was using their pronouns and came on the zoom but um the current billionaire regime is trying to outlaw the use of other pronouns besides he and she i mean they're actually talking about doing that but anyway um

[15:26]

Now you have it, preserve it well. But also when he said, just as it is, he meant just this person. So this relates to the reality of self and the reality of teacher and student. Okay, so that's the background for this first line. The Dharma or teaching or reality of suchness is intimately conveyed or transmitted by Buddhism ancestors. Now you have it. Now you are it with suchness. Take care of it. Preserve it well. So our whole practice, after deciding to come to practice, after deciding to, after taking on bodhisattva practice, how do we take care of this reality, this dharma, this suchness? So, Dongshan, if you can scroll down, please, to the middle of the first page, Dongshan was... Hold on.

[16:30]

Yeah. Like facing a precious mirror, form and reflection behold each other. You are not it, but in truth it is you. Okay. So when Dongshan... So just stop there. That's fine. Thank you. So when Dongshan was wading across the stream, he looked down in the stream and he saw his reflection. And at that point... You find the exact verse. He had this awakening. And... Let me see if I can find the verse. Let me get it right. So all of this is from my book, Just This Is It. And... Dongshan, the practice of suchness. So Dongshan saw his reflection and he wrote this verse.

[17:33]

Just don't seek from others or you'll be far estranged from self. So nobody can tell you how to be Buddha. Each of us has our own particular way. And he said, I now go on alone everywhere I meet it. It now is me. I now am not it. One must understand in this way to merge with suchness. It now is me, I now am not it, is how Dongshan said it when he looked into the stream. And of course, since this it can also be personal, the second line might be, I now go on alone everywhere I meet him, referring to Yunyan in this case, everywhere I meet my teacher. The teacher is everywhere once one realizes this. And he said, it now is me, and I now am not it. In the Song of the Jewelmare Samadhi, it's kind of reversed. It says, you are not it, but in truth it is you. So just that line is enough.

[18:36]

If you remember just one thing from Zen, You are not it, but in truth it is you. That's the whole of Zen. That's the whole of Soto Zen. That's the whole of relationship to suchness. You are not it, but in truth it is you. So this has to do with this interrelationship of self and other, of self and suchness. You are not it, but truly it is you. Later on, Dogen, in the 13th century, conveyed this lineage and this teaching from China to Japan. In his Genjo Kōan, one of his most famous essays, he commented on this. He said, to carry yourself forward and experience myriad things is delusion. That's Dogen's definition of delusion. And that's you are not it. When you carry yourself and your ego and so forth forward and project it onto the world, that's delusion.

[19:39]

And that's what we all do, how we get through adolescence to adulthood. You are not it. But in truth, it is you. And Dogen said, when myriad things come forth and experience themselves, that's awakening. So awakening is that everything arises together, and we are part of that. Each of us is part of that, of that totality of the myriad things arising together. So that's it actually is you, or in truth it is you. So again, just as you are not it, in truth it is you, just that single line contains the whole of Zen. You are not it. But in truth, it is you. So we're included in the interdependent co-arising of all things. And this is what Dongshan saw when he looked into the stream and saw his reflection. And saw his reflection looking back at him. So this also has to do with the wonderful, sensitive...

[20:50]

subtle relationship of the particular person or the particular situation and the ultimate universal reality. Okay, so I could stop there. Just remember, you are not it, but in truth it is you. But I'll talk about a few other lines from this wonderful teaching poem. A little further back up, Dongshan says, the meaning does not reside in the words, but a pivotal moment brings it forth, I think that's the translation that we have. The meaning does not reside in the words. So again, the language, the difficulty of language, this cannot be expressed completely or fully or even accurately in language. Language is inadequate to totally convey this. We convey this with our body and mind, with our body and heart. So we preserve it well, but language is limited.

[21:59]

In English, we have subject, verb, object. So we imagine that the world outside us is a bunch of dead objects. We violate the first precept by killing the world. everything so there's a story of Dongshan meeting Yunyan and I'm not going to have time to go into it today but this is about non-sentient beings expressing the Dharma this was there's a very very complicated old Zen story that is that is that context for Dongshan's first meeting Yunyan. So the meaning does not reside in the words. We can't fully express it in words. But a pivotal moment brings it forth. This pivotal moment is the character Qi in Sino-Japanese, which has many, many meanings. One of the problems of translating from Chinese texts is that all these Chinese characters, many of them have a whole array of overtones and subtle meanings.

[23:03]

So a pivotal moment brings it forth. This key also means universal reality. It means energy. It means a loom, like in weaving. It means movement. It means an occasion. So this line has been translated as The meaning does not reside in the words, but it responds to the inquiring student. So inquiry, questioning is part of what this means. So this... The meaning... can't be fully expressed in words, but it does respond. It does come forth at a pivotal moment, and it talks later about this jade pivot as the context of the shifting between the universal and the particular. So the meaning does respond. The next line is also interesting. very helpful, practical move.

[24:04]

And you are trapped in this and you fall into doubt and vacillation, turning away and touching are both wrong for it is like a massive fire. So when we, when we wiggle around and we try to, when we try and escape who we are, we can, we can be trapped. We can fall into a pit is another way to translate that. And, um, But if we miss it, we kind of question whether just this is it or not. We fall into doubt and vacillation. Trying to get a hold of it, trying to run away from it, turning away, and trying to grasp it or grab it, trying to touch it, hold it, are both wrong. Because this Dharma of session, this is like a massive fire, one of the later People in this lineage talked about how all Buddhas sit in the middle of fire. So in your zazen, you may have had some experience of just from physical pain in your knees or wherever, feeling like you're in the middle of fire.

[25:10]

But it's also, maybe the fire is stronger even. With all of the stuff, all the emotional stuff, baggage from our ancient twisted karma that is present in our sitting. So we can't run away from this fire. We have to tend it. We can't get a hold of it because it will burn you. So we sit in the middle of fire. Okay. and then the next line, just, just to portray it in literary form is stains it with defilement. So here, this is this very wonderful literary verse, but it's again, talking about the problems of words. So I want to get a little bit further in this, um, before I have to, I want to take time for discussion and question. Um, I want to go to the middle of the next page, um, led by there. And so, um, i'll take the background um outside still and inside trembling like tethered colts or cowering rats so this again is like outwardly still we're not moving in zazen but inwardly trembling um i think chris cadden is here and he told me when he was recently in january intensive he felt like he was wiggling around completely but one of the one of the um

[26:36]

teacher was sitting facing him and she told him how still he was sitting. So, outwardly still, but inside we're trembling. This is a common experience of Zazen. The ancient sages, all the Buddhist ancestors, grieved for them. We're sorry about all the suffering beings and offered them the Dharma. So this is where this teaching of Sessions comes from. Led by their inverted views, they take black for white. When upside down or inverted thinking stops, the affirming mind naturally accords. So this affirming mind naturally accords. Actually, Douglass is here, I believe, in the room. And his Dharma name is from this line, the affirming mind and natural accord. So how do we say yes to suchness? How do we say yes to all of this, to everything? Everything in our life, even the things that we regret or feel ashamed of, everything that ever happened in your life and everybody you've ever met is exactly a part of what is on your seat right now.

[27:51]

And when we can say yes to all of that and to all the difficulties in our world, um, especially now in these troubled times, um, then there's a natural attunement and accord, and we can find a way to respond respectfully to difficulties. I'll talk about a couple more lines, and then we'll have some discussion. Towards the end, a little further down, there's this wonderful... line the wooden man starts to sing the stone woman gets up dancing it is not reached by feelings or consciousness happening involved deliberation we cannot realize this dance between the ultimate of the universal and the particular the phenomenal through calculations or deliberations it's not a it's not a matter of intellectual analysis i mean a Of course, deliberation and intellectual analysis is very useful and can be very helpful, but that's not how we get here.

[28:58]

But the wooden man starts to sing. The stone woman gets up dancing. This is a wonderful line. And it refers to something that is, there are many expressions of this in Zen. The wooden man and the stone woman are like non-sentient beings who actually can't express the Dharma. There are many other lines like this. There's one that's dear to our Sangha, the saying, a dragon howls in a withered tree. Dogen wrote a whole essay about this line, which was from one of Dongshan's successors. A dragon howls in a withered tree. So, you know, and now... I think the ozone's in Hawaii, and people live in California and New Mexico. Here in the Chicago area, it's very cold right now. It was colder earlier last month, but anyway. And I imagine, Joanne, that it's also cold up in Wisconsin.

[30:01]

But a dragon howls in a withered tree. We can see this as an expression of spring and the seasons. But now I can see trees outside my window, and there's no leaves. They're not completely withered, but there's this sense that out of stillness, something emerges, something wonderful emerges, a dragon singing. Another line that Dogen uses, he says, the plums blossom on the same withered branch as last year. So the plums are the first blossoms of spring, and they blossom on branches that seem to be dead and withered. So life coming from stillness is another theme for this. I want to stop and have time for discussion, questions, responses. I'll just mention one more line. This is near the bottom of the first page.

[31:06]

like the taste of the five-flavored herb, like the five-pronged vajra. This is, again, about the fiveness of the five degrees. Then, wondrously embraced within the real, within the true, within the ultimate, drumming and singing begin together. So this drumming and singing is about response. And the characters used here could be translated as drumming and singing. They also mean question and response. So question and response arise together. It's not that one is before the other. The response is right in the middle of the question. It also could be read as hitting and yelling. begin together so uh if someone is slapped they might yell and they slapping and yelling are both there together so our usual sense of time our usual sense of cause and effect is provisional uh that's what this is saying and this is wonder wonderful wondrously embraced within the real this reality of uh

[32:08]

the simultaneity of things coming up to question and response coming up together, of drumming and singing beginning together, are within the real, within the ultimate, within the true, the universal. Okay, I've just touched on a few major lines, and there's so much more, and again, I think if you want to hear the whole seminar from yesterday, you can still register on the Ancient Dragon website, and you'll get a recording of it. But I want to stop babbling now and hear your responses or your questions or um if there's other lines in this song in this in this poem that you would like to ask about that's fine too so if you could take down the screen share uh now and i can if you raise your hand or do the raise hand function online i can see you and jerry would you please uh call on people in the room so please feel free comments, responses.

[33:14]

David has something. I know you talked about many of the different lines, but I do want to, I have a question on one line. In the middle or towards the bottom third, the first page, this is like a newborn child is fully endowed with five aspects. No going, no coming, no arising, no abiding. That's four. And then we come to the famous line, Baba Wawa. Is that anything he said or not? Baba Wawa is the fifth. Is that really in saying that Baba Wawa is saying that what he said earlier, that words aren't sufficient? Right, so going, coming, arising, abiding, and speaking are the five. And this is used in the section that follows it. There's various other references to five, and this is about the five... positions or five degrees that is the heart of this uh teaching uh that's that is kind of cryptically first expressed by dongshan it's attributed to dongshan in this song of the zhomer samadhi and this particular version of by it like a newborn child um

[34:35]

So this goes back to the Prajnaparamita Sutras, or maybe it's the Mahaparinirvana Sutra, where it talks about an infant sees the suchness of the world and reality as unified. For a newborn child, they don't distinguish different objects, different things. Eventually, a child bonds with... their mother as a source of nourishment. And then the whole process of ego formation that happens in adolescence that is necessary to become an adult is about seeing differences. So this Song of the Jewelmare Samadhi is a kind of sequel to the Sandokai, another important text in Soto Zen by Shito or Sekito, one of Dongshan's predecessors. Part of the founding of this Sao Domo Soto lineage, who talks about sameness and difference.

[35:39]

So distinguishing all the particulars of the world, that's the side of the phenomenon or the particular. The side of wholeness or oneness or the ultimate or universal reality. is the other side, and they have this five-fold relationship. But this particular expression of the fiveness is about how a newborn child sees all of it as one, and then eventually sees five differences. So thank you for the question, David. Other comments or questions? Joanne Lindberg, I see, online from Wisconsin. Hi, Joanne. Good to see you. Hello. I have to speak because if you recall, in one of our spring practice periods, I think it was, you asked us which lines were our favorites. And, of course, I picked the one you just talked about, about the baby, because of the work I do.

[36:45]

I love babies. And I just had this thought also that what happens to us as we grow older, we become the baby again. And it's so wonderful if you look at it that way, because we have this negativity about aging in this culture. Tell me about it. So I love those words. And that goes right into the five, the five, the five. I, of course, you know, if you recall, I'm a five element shiatsu practitioner and I've been doing it for 30 years. So when I see these lines, I live this. I live this. And the other day I remembered I had a Vajra in my drawer. Someone gave me a Vajra. And I started using it. And it's been very interesting, very interesting. I, too, have a great love for this sutra.

[37:52]

And I also say it, you know, in my own little practice. And so I'm happy that we're talking about that again today because it just brings me great joy. Thank you, Joanne. So Joanne is a professional midwife and takes care of women prenatal or postnatal. Actually, I'm a birth consultant. I am not a direct midwife. I actually help people find midwives. help them plan for their births because there's a lot of decisions that have to be made. And I like them to be prepared rather than get run over by the truck. And so, um, yeah, I still do those things less now that I'm aging happily, but I'm still able to do some of it. So thank you. Thank you. Yeah. So both for birthing and for dying, there is preparation that is needed that is helpful.

[38:54]

I have to say, I wrote an article. I do op-ed pieces for my local paper in Verona, Wisconsin. And one of them was birth and death matter. And it was so adored by my editor that he put it in the, um, insert that goes out quarterly to specifically focus toward the elderly. It was, it was, they of course had no idea what I'm talking about really, but it, it was well received. I was surprised. It was so well received. For you. I want to just to, to, to add, to say to that, that, um, part of what our practice is about after we have become adults and although there are people who start practicing very young but our practice and zazen and all of our practice is about actually having made having differentiated all the different things of the particular to come back to

[39:58]

The ultimate or the universal. But the universal that the baby sees is not yet right. Having grown up and seeing difference and particulars and differentiation, then coming back to the ultimate or universal is... is what practice is about, and then how do we share that or express it. So thank you for the way in which you do that, Joanne. So we don't have much time left, but I want to, if there's an online or in the room, Jerry, any more questions or comments or responses or questions about other lines in this? And if there's nobody in the room, I can see people online if you want to respond. Can I come over there? Can you hear me, Tygen? Yes, who is this?

[41:01]

This is Paul. I don't know if you can see me. I'm like around the corner. I can't see you, no. Can I come over? Sure. Sure. Let me see. Approach the laptop. You can't see from this one because the camera's turned off. All right. You can actually see from that one. It's okay. I can hear you, Paul. All right. Well, I'll just, yeah. Tanya, I thank you very much for your talk. This has always been like a personal favorite. I'm sorry. It's always been a personal favorite. And I was curious about, Both about, I've always wondered about the line, like a battle-scarred tiger, like a horse-gashanked skunk gray. If that's referring to the, you know, the sage contemplating the tree for ten kalpas? Yes. And then if I can also just sneak a second one in, the translating masters among masters at the end, I'm like more familiar with the host within the host translation that they read it, like SFDC.

[42:12]

And I was just curious, those sound different to me, like host to the host versus master to the master. I was just curious. Yes, those are both reasonable translations of the original Chinese characters. This thing about hosts and guests, which particularly in Renzai, they talk about hosts and guests, but those are metaphors for teacher and student. But there are also metaphors for the ultimate and the particular, the universal and the phenomenal, and host and guest. And the host within the host is just like the ultimate of what the fifth degree is, where there's no separation between universal and particular. So I don't have time to go into the five degrees now, but I will be doing a seminar on that. March 15th in Ancient Dragon online. So either is a good translation. I've translated it different times in both ways. But since host and guest is sort of specialized jargon and Zen, the host within the host.

[43:19]

I've also translated it as the master within master. So it means mastery. Just to do this continuously, just to share, to express it well, to express this dynamic is practice of suchness, the practicing of suchness, of reality. To do that continuously, Dogen has an essay in Shogun Genzo about continuous practice. Everybody here has had some context. Even if this is your first time here, I don't know if that's true of anyone, or if you're new to Zen or to Ancient Dragon, but we have some context of the ultimate. Just sitting Zazen once, I taught my first Zazen instruction long time 50 years ago i i i experienced fullness in a way that that i knew i was going to sit every day from then on uh and so the first time you sit or the first time you think about practicing spiritual practice and really seeing the heart of what the meaning of our lives uh

[44:32]

It's there. The ultimate is there. So mastery, master among masters, happens when you can do this continuously because it's very easy to get distracted. So, yeah, with Chinese characters, there are very good, reasonable translations that are accurate and different. I'll give another example. I talked about this yesterday. the last line on the first page, you would do well to respect this, do not neglect it, talking about the whole process of penetrating the source, traveling the pathways in the previous line. This is, seeing the ultimate and in the phenomenal, it says you would do well to respect this, do not neglect it. The word that I translate as respect, that's my preferred translation. However, That word respect could also be... That character that I translate as respect could also be translated as mistake or missing it.

[45:43]

So I think Kaz Tanahashi translates this Jomar Samadhi as... making mistakes is auspicious. And Dogen talks about this too, that in terms of learning skillful means, we do need to make mistakes. We do make mistakes. It's trial and error. Maybe a Buddha, a complete Buddha, is omniscient and knows exactly how to respond differently to different people, appropriately in each situation, including in the difficulties in our society now. But for bodhisattvas, for bodhisattva practitioners like all of us, It's trial and error. We make mistakes. And it's great if you can make helpful, good mistakes rather than harmful mistakes. But we have to be willing to make mistakes. Zen is not about just being calm and still and quiet and never responding to anything.

[46:49]

Zen is not about getting rid of your anger or your desires, it's about seeing through them, to studying the self, as Dogen says. So the point is, how do we use our anger? uh that that many of us may feel about our society today and the billionaire regime how do we use that to express that and to respond so um it's i think i'm out of time now i don't know if there's time for one more comment or question asian i don't know either Okay, not knowing is nearest, so most intimate. So maybe we can stop there unless somebody insists, somebody has a major comment or question they want to make. David Weiner would like to make one last comment. Can you say that about mistakes that I made? Thank you. About mistakes. I think it's important for me, and then I'm taking that to everyone, to remember that Buddha did not walk out of the palace to become enlightened.

[47:56]

Buddha had to wander in a forest for many years, nearly dying, and had to be revived by a milkmaid in order to find his ultimate reality. So I think for all of us, we're all on the path that Buddha took, and it's not necessarily going to be a straight, easy path. That's right. Yes. So facing the wall, facing reality, facing our lives, facing all of our regrets and shame and mistakes we've made that we regret and so forth is the wholeness of suchness. All of it. All of it. is right here, right now, and our practice is to just be with that, to see the suchness of all of it. So thank you, David. I think it's time for Asian closing chants and then announcements or whatever. So let's chant our four bodhisattva vows, which are in your chant card.

[48:59]

We chant these three times. Easy means a lot of numbers. We give out to great animals, particularly children of our greatest source of all. We give out to cut-throat animals. That's a number that is a lot of numbers. We give out directly to animals. Religious play is unsurpassable. We vow to realize it. Deeds are numbers. We vow to freedom. Delusions are inexhaustible. We've got to cut through them. It's down below our gates, our boundless. We've got to enter them. What a nervous way to unsurpassable hope.

[50:03]

We vow to realize it Beings are members We vow to breathe them Delusions are inexhaustible We vow to come through them Down on the gates of our wild little city, we vowed to enter heaven. No matter what this way comes or paths flow, we vowed to realize it.

[50:40]

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