Should I start over? Should we chant again? One more time. Sorry. I will continue. That's okay. Yeah, I was just saying how the first line of the Jewel Mara Samadhi, the Dharma of suchness is intimately entrusted by Buddhists and ancestors. Now you have it. Preserve it well. So how do we take good care of it? How do we take good care of this teaching of suchness? And then following up on that, in the middle of the first page it says, you are not it, but in truth it is you. Well, it's like facing a jewel mirror, form and reflection behold each other. So this refers back to Dongshan looking down into the stream and seeing his reflection and saying, this actually is me, I'm not it. But in this version, you are not it, but in truth... Actually, it is you. So this line, you are not it, but truly it is you, is the core of Soto Zen.

[01:09]

If you just remember one line from Dongshan or Dogen, this is the core of Soto Zen. You are not it, but it actually is you. Dogen commented on this in the 1200s later in Genjo Koan. He said, when you carry yourself forward to experience myriad things, that's delusion. So you are not it. And you project yourself onto everything. That's not it. That's delusion. But when myriad things come forth together, that is true, and that is you. So you are part of the myriad things that are arising together. In truth, it is you. So, yeah, you are not it, but truly it is you. or you are not him, but truly he is you, you could say, or she.

[02:10]

You are not her, but truly she is you. And this would refer to one's teacher. So these are indefinite pronouns that are used here. Could be it, it could be he or she or them or whatever. So, this is, as I said, the core of Soto Zen. Dharma of suchness is intimately transmitted by Buddhists and ancestors. Now you have it. Take good care of it. Preserve it well. And then, it's like facing a jewel mirror of form and reflection. Behold each other. You are not it, but in truth it is you. So, and this will lead into the five degrees, which I'm going to talk about next week, but this is about the ultimate and the particular, or the upright and inclined, as it says in this text. Looking further back in the text just after the opening,

[03:16]

The meaning does not reside in the words, but a pivotal moment brings it forth. Or the inquiring student brings it forth. Questioning spirit brings it forth. This pivotal moment is very subtle. So, the meaning isn't in the words, but it does respond. The meaning of the Dharma of suchness. Suchness does respond. A pivotal moment The questioning student brings it forward. Move and you are trapped. Miss and you fall into vacillation. Turning away and touching are both wrong, for it is like a massive fire. So you can't avoid it, this pivotal moment, this dharma of suchness. But you can't get a hold of it either, like a massive fire. Turning away and touching are both wrong. So, and the word that's translated there as touching is grasping or gulping even.

[04:27]

Well, where does laugh like a massive fire? Pause and just say something about this. The meaning is not in the words, but The inquiring student, or a pivotal moment, does bring it forth, does bring forth the meaning. And just before the lines I quoted in the middle of the first page, it says, although it is not constructed, it is not fabricated, it is not beyond words. So like facing a precious mirror, form, and reflection, behold each other, you are not it in truthable view. It can be. It's not beyond words. but the words can't quite get it. Even these words, which are really wonderful. So, again, just to emphasize, you are not it, but in truth it is you.

[05:40]

So, I'm going to go to another line. In the middle of the next page, it talks about, while led by their inverted thinking, they take black for white. This is before that the ancient sages grieved for them and offered them the Dharma, offered them the teaching. I forget your translation, but it's basically similar. Led by their inverted views, they take black for white. When inverted thinking stops, the affirming mind naturally accords. So this is... This is an important line, the affirming mind, the acquiescent mind, I think the translation is that it can be accepting, affirming, forgiving even. So it's this character affirming the affirming mind.

[06:51]

Naturally, of course, naturally is in tune with the song of the Jewel Mary Samadhi. If you want to follow in the ancient tracks, please observe the sages of the past. So this is referring to a Buddha in the Lotus Sutra. and it says, on the verge of realizing the Buddha way, he contemplated a tree for ten kalpas, for ten long eons. He sat facing the tree. Back in India, you know, they didn't have zendos. That's sort of a Chinese invention. They got together during the rainy season in Buddha's time and gathered with him. Then they went out as mendicants and wandered around and they would sit facing trees. So sitting facing the trunk of a tree would be how they would sit face on the wall, in effect. So one on the verge of realizing the Buddha way contemplated a tree for ten kalpas.

[07:58]

In some interpretations, that's seen as... as, you know, kind of he was distracted. He didn't, wouldn't go forward to Buddha, but he was just facing a tree for ten kalpas. But in another, from another perspective, in the Bodhisattva teachings, he was being a Bodhisattva. He was encouraging all beings to just sit. So he faced a tree for ten kalpas. And inverted thinking stopped. the affirming mind naturally accords. So this is another key line here. I'm going through this more quickly than I expected, but that's okay. We'll have more time for discussion. So I want to go to a line further down.

[09:04]

Well, With this archer skill, you hit the mark at a hundred paces. When arrows meet head-on, how could it be a matter of skill? This is like the Sando Kai, when the harmony of difference and sameness, I don't know if you chant that one, but that's a precursor to this. song of Jomera Samadhi. It's also about the five-fold, well, the Sandokai is not the five-fold, it's more like the two truths, and what Dongshan did is expand that into fives, cryptically. But When arrows meet head on, how could it be a matter of skill? There's an old Chinese story about this. There was an archer named Yi. Actually, it's conflated two different archers. But anyway, there was an archer, a great archer, greatest archer in the world, which was China back then, of course.

[10:10]

And... He had a good student who realized that if he killed his teacher, he would be the greatest archer in the world. So he drew his bow back to shoot at his teacher. But the teacher knew it and sent an arrow into midair and the arrows met head on. So this is a story about meeting hand to hand, face to face. But then the wooden man starts to sing. The stone woman gets up dancing. There are lots of images like this in Zen of life coming from, well, wooden man and stone woman, birth coming from them. There's a story about a dragon howling in a withered tree. from Saoshan, or a student at Saoshan, who was a disciple of Dongshan.

[11:12]

Or Dogen talks about plums blossoming on the same old branch as last year. So there's this idea of stillness and vitality arising from stillness. like the exuberance you might feel on the third day or the fifth day or whatever of Sashin. So the wooden man starts to sing. The stone woman gets up dancing. And then he says, it's not reached by feelings or consciousness. How could it involve deliberation? The translation is a little different. But it's not reached by feelings or consciousness. How could it involve deliberation? calculations or you know thinking about it actually it just arises it's like well there's a line in previous page after all the series of fives like a newborn child no going coming arising abiding or speech and

[12:29]

the illumination hexagram, the fire hexagram, inclined and upright interact. So this is all about inclined and upright interacting. And we'll talk about that next week in the five degrees, five positions, about how inclined and upright interact. Or you could say that the provisional or conditional or conventional speech with the... permanent or the principle or the upright, so inclined and upright interact. Like the taste of the five-flavored herb, like the five-pronged Vajra, wondrously embraced within the real, drumming and singing begin together, or question and response come up together. Or slapping and yelling and paying come up together.

[13:34]

These characters have all these different meanings. Drumming and singing begin together, is what I have. But it's also, I think, you have a question and response coming up together. So it's not one then the other. It's just thing. It's just here. so wondrously embraced within the real this is like the fifth fifth degree where the ultimate and the particular the universal and the phenomenal arise together and are not so potential though um I hope there are questions because I want to discuss these more. I want to just jump to the last line. With practice hidden, function secretly, like a fool, like an idiot. So there are many stories of foolish Zen people.

[14:40]

Ryokan in the 1800s in Japan was such a person. Before Dongshan, Hanshan and Shite were foolish people. Hotei, or Budai in Chinese, was like the picture Buddha, but just the jolly laughing Buddha, seen in Chinese restaurants. Just to do it continuously is called the host within the host, the master among masters. So practice secretly like a fool, like an idiot. Practice hidden function secretly like a fool, like an idiot. Yeah, Ryokan, who was a great poet, and there are many stories I could tell about him, but he was a Japanese monk, but well-trained, went back after his training in the Aegean.

[15:52]

and just built this little hut near his hometown and liked to play with children and had kept balls in his robe sleeve and was kind of a fool. He called himself Taigu, Great Fool. So anyway, there's lots of stories about him playing with children. He was also a great calligrapher and his calligraphy was valued even in his own lifetime. but also a wonderful poet so um i want to go back to the beginning and just emphasize again that um the dharma of suchness is intimately conveyed or entrusted or transmitted by buddhas and ancestors it's not the character for dharma transmission but it's was used as a transmission text this song this song of the precious mare samadhi um Now you have it. Preserve it well.

[16:53]

So Yonyan said to Dongshan, after his pause, he said, now I give it to you. Please take good care of it. And one version of this in Japanese is a line, don't let it be cut off. So this is the transmission of the Dharma. And it's like facing a precious mirror, form and reflection behold each other. You are not it, but truly it is you. So, The you that projects yourself onto all the things of the world is not it. But truly, it is you. It is you that is all of it, actually. So, that's a quick tour through some of the Jewel Mirror Samadhi.

[17:58]

There are other great lines, but I can respond to those if you have questions. So comments, questions, responses? Okay, thank you, Tegan. I think Nora will keep an eye on the Zoom room. I'm keeping an eye in here, maybe just to get it going. I wonder, Tegan, if you would say something about, in the title, the word samadhi, Song of the Jewel-Wearer's Samadhi, if you would spend a minute or two sharing with us what samadhi is. We could talk for hours about samadhi, but anyway... Samadhi is, well, in general, in China, it was just meditation. But Samadhi is a particular kind of concentration. So there are various samadhis in the sutras with many names of them.

[19:08]

So Hua Yan, the Avatamsaka Sutra, Hua Yan in Chinese, has many samadhis described in them. Dogen writes about the Jewelmare Samadhi. He writes about the Ocean Seal Mudra Samadhi in one of the Shobo Genzo essays. There are many different names of different samadhis, and basically a samadhi is focusing on some concentration object. So you can follow your breath and focus on that. It's not exactly a soto-zen practice, but you can count your breaths too. At the end of each exhale, count silently one. to ten and then start over. Or if you lose count after three, that's fine. Just to be aware of that space at the end of the exhale. That's a kind of samadhi.

[20:09]

Paying attention to one's breath. You can pay attention to sound, ambient sound. During Zazen, earlier I was struck by all of the sounds of the birds around the North Shore's end of So I don't hear them now. It's getting dark. They were very active during Zazen. Yeah, because it was 6.30. You might hear an owl pretty soon. Frogs. Frogs, wow. Okay. But samadhi means concentration or meditation, usually with a particular object. And there's so many of them, actually. There are libraries full of them, libraries full of samadhis. But anyway, this is the song of the precious mirror, jewel mirror samadhi.

[21:13]

And those are geese. Okay. And the geese are included, too. So other lines in the Jula Mara Samadhi that anyone has questions about? Yes, John and mine. Okay, let's do two questions. You're staring at the reflection, you are not it, it is all of you. It's sort of phrased ambiguously. Does it refer to the reflection here? It refers back to the dharma of suchness. All of the its, basically, unless it's obviously something else, the it throughout this song is all referring back to the teaching of suchness. This is what this samadhi is all about. this dharma of suchness which has been intimately conveyed transmitted by buddhas and ancestors that's what that's what they convey so this dharma of suchness is that is the reference for all of the it's in the including you are not it but in truth and the other one that always uh confuses me is the snow on the silver plate and the hair and hiding in the moon

[22:41]

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, good. Okay, thank you. So this has to do with, well, I could say it has to do with Kumarajiva. I'll come back to that. A silver bowl filled with snow, a heron hidden in the moon is how my translation is. A silver bowl filled with snow. The snow and the silver are sort of the same, but you can tell them apart. a heron hidden flying across the moon. In East Asia, the moon represents the full moon, so the circle of the moon. It's best seen through the haze or through a tree or through ivy or something like that. So, yeah. Anyway, this is a heron, but hidden in the moon. The heron is right in front of the moon, and the heron is white, and the moon is white. Still, you can see it moving.

[23:45]

So... Taken as similar, they are not the same. Not distinguished, their places are known. So the silver balls filled with snow, though, goes back to a story about Nagarjuna and Kumarajiva. Nagarjuna was a great Indian philosopher and ancestor in all of the Buddhist lineages, or Mahayana lineages, anyway. We're part of the school of Kanadeva. So he had a number of many disciples, but we're from the school of Kanadeva. Nagarjuna passed a dish of water to Kanadeva when Kanadeva came to meet him. And Kanadeva took a needle and placed it in the water in the dish. And Madhvasana was very pleased. So this is like a particle in the ocean of samadhis, like a sliver of the particular in the ocean of the universal.

[24:55]

Anyway... So that's a silver bowl filled with snow. Terry is online with a question, but is there anyone in the Zendo who has a question? I think we can go. Let's go with Terry. Okay, Terry, go ahead. Thank you, Pagan, for taking this question. I know that things tend to be beyond words. But I appreciate when words can get closer and closer to the actual meaning of things, even if it is beyond the words themselves. So I had a similar question to John there about the it in you are not it. And you said your response was that it is suchness. So I was hoping you could expand a little bit about suchness.

[25:56]

I sort of taken it as the nature of reality, the non-dual reality. But can you use words to get me there, at least closer there? Well, I wrote a book about suchness called This Is It. How many pages full of words? Oh, well, it's 228 pages of words. I'll have to get the book, I guess. But no, that's just one response. So what is suchness? Is that the question? Yes, if it is what you're referring to and you are not it, then you said it was suchness. Give me the Reader's Digest version of suchness here.

[26:58]

Suchness is just what's happening now. This is suchness. Everything is suchness. All of you on this Zoom and all of the papers on my desk and all the people in the Zendo and all the leaves on the tree outside my window here, it's all happening. And yeah, so that's... uh yeah that's all um that's all it that's all suchness and suchness is also just what your mind is attending to right now but it's beyond that of course it's it's your mind and everything around your mind and everything that underpins your mind and all the experiences you've ever had um do you remember your fourth grade teacher terry Yes, I do. Mr. Wood. Great. Have you thought of him in the last month?

[28:00]

No. Okay. But you remembered him? I did. So I sometimes ask groups of people how many people remember their fourth grade teacher. Most people do, but very few have thought of them in the last month. But at any rate, they're part of what is on your cushion right now. And also everybody you've ever met, anybody you've ever, well, Sangha people, teachers, parents, great-grandparents. How many people believe that their great-grandparents are part of what you are right now? Even if you don't know who your great-grandparents were, How many know who your great-grandparents were? Do you mean meet them or know their story? Know who they were.

[29:01]

Anyway, so the point is that suchness is complicated. It includes everything. It includes all the beings in all the universes, described in the Flower Ornament Dabhatam Sattva Sutra. And on the tip of every blade of grass there are Buddhas and Bodhisattvas and so forth. And in various Dharma realms, in various universes, multiverses, there are beings. And they're all included in this suchness. And maybe you didn't know about them until I just mentioned them, but anyway, now you know, so now they're included. So it's all this. It's all this. It's just all this. And the Dharmakaya Buddha, the Vairochana Buddha, the great Buddha of the Flower Ornament Sutra, is the Buddha who is awakened in everything, with everything.

[30:08]

So I could say more, but maybe I'll stop and see if there's other questions. Then Kenho has something. Hi, Tiger and Kenho. See, I think it's because we have such an intimate song that, you know, we're close-knit in a lot of ways, but that word intimately at the beginning of our version of chanting, of course, yeah, I've always thought, you know, Intrinsic as you, we are not intrinsic as you. I've always kind of thought of two things. One being Sangha, like the way the Sangha mirrors that thing. And so then I always think about Dokusan and the student-teacher relationship and how we sit so close. All of these things are kind of firing off in my brain. Sure. Having you here and thinking about what was you, then, and Dongshan's relationship like, like, I don't know.

[31:12]

I mean, I feel my own interior things when I chant this every week, but I'm just interested in what their relationship was like. I speak to the teacher. Well, you know, this relationship was with this teacher. It's so interesting. Yeah, it's very interesting. They had this intimate relationship, but, you know, what is your relationship with your teacher? So the point of chanting this is to bring it into our time. So it's not a historical document. It is an historical document. It goes back to Dongshan, supposedly, or maybe to Yunyan. But it's also alive. Buddhism is alive. So what is your relationship with your teacher now? And how is... What is your relationship with your fellow Sangha members, as you mentioned?

[32:15]

But now you have it. Preserve it well. How do you take care of it? How do you take care of this kuching of sessions, this intimacy that you mentioned, this feeling of intimacy? How do you take care of that in your life? So this is about... These fives are about the fivefold degrees, which I'll talk about next week. But, yeah, it's... It's this process. So anyway, does that cover your question? I see Charles has a question online. Hi, Charles. Long time. Hi, Ty, and thank you. I've always liked this song and haven't studied it in many years, but I was reading it last night and looking at the two versions and like, wow, there's a lot more to it than I first realized.

[33:22]

But I think you just answered my question was, now you have it, so keep it well. It's like, how do you keep it well? And my thought was, since I've been studying more the precepts was by keeping the precepts. That's what I thought was the way to keep it. I mean, I can't, I don't know how to keep it, but this is the way I took it. Well, you do. But, okay. And actually, talking about the precepts is how Dogen talked about it. Um, and, uh, so these precepts are, um, you know, well, I mean, this whole, this whole song is about how to keep it well. Penetrate the source and travel the pathways, embrace the territory, treasure the roads. You would do well to respect this, do not neglect it. That's my translation of that line.

[34:25]

So, um, It's not a matter of delusion or enlightenment, also. Within causes and conditions, time and season, it's serene and illuminating. So minute, it enters where there's no gap. So vast, it transcends dimension. So, you know, in physics, we can look, in modern physics, we can look at how all worlds exist in very small spaces. For example, I actually, in the book, when I'm commenting on this line, I refer to my favorite American Dharma movie, Men in Black. Well, anyway, it ends with... I don't want to give away the ending. I won't say anything. It's okay. I'm going to give away the ending. it's no the whole thank you though the the okay whole universe is missing and they are looking for it out in this in space and it turns out it's in like a marble and anyway uh that and then the marbles are collected anyway um so uh it's about it's about how things are

[35:56]

and they're also large. Anyway, so minute it enters where there's no gap. It transcends dimension. All of these are ways in which to keep it well. All of these are the instructions about how to take care of this intimate dharma of suchness. So the wooden man starts to sing, the stone woman gets up to dance. So these are, anyway, great ancestral instructions. Anyone else in the room? Thank you. You're welcome, Charles. It's great to see you. Lily. Yeah. Hello. There we are. So I have a question that's more, I guess, just general about the different translations and the way that those different translations come to be. Is it more about like... the source text itself, like one word, has such richness that people can go different directions?

[37:04]

Or is it more like over time it gets transmuted into different like sects that keep going off and off in fractals? How does that those translations come to be so different? No, it's the first thing. Each Chinese character has many meanings and as compounds they have other meanings. So, for example, penetrate the source and travel the pathways, embrace the territory and treasure the roads. You would do well to respect this, do not neglect it. There's a character that could be read as neglect in the Chinese. So there's a Chinese text of it, basically. These are translations of Chinese texts. But that last line could be translated as... making mistakes is auspicious.

[38:05]

Do not neglect them. So it's complicated. There's I mean, that's an extreme example, but there are different English words to translate various things, and each Chinese character has various overtones. For example, with studying Dogen, it's good to have a couple or a few good translations to read together. and to see what the original was like. And, uh, yeah, it takes, um, it takes a while. Um, but, um, which I can recommend translations of Dogen, but anyway, the, the, the, um, The Chinese characters have these different meanings.

[39:08]

You can see, though, that these different translations actually are coming from the same source. Thank you. But there are, you know, there are like a compound, like a pivotal moment or arousing of energy or the student's inquiry. All of those could all be legitimate translations of those two characters. Thank you. Oh, she has one question out there. Hello. Hi. Oh, there you are. Since Lily asked a question about words, I have another question about words. There's so much words or phrases with such amazing imagery, like tentacle, track rat, battle star, tiger, horse with a race, blah, blah, blah, blah. So I'm wondering, I've always wanted to ask the blah, blah, blah, blah question, but I'm wondering if these are... images that were developed for the song specifically, or are there any phrases that may have meant something in a certain time and place that tie back to some sort of story that would have been well-known?

[40:22]

So there would have been implicit meaning in them? I'm curious about that. Yes, yes, and that's true. So, for example, I have like a battle-scarred tiger, like a horse with shanks gone gray, and that shanks gone gray is interpretive. It's literally a withered left hind leg or something like that. or it could be read that way, because some are vulgar jewel tables and ornate robes, because some are base, are vulgar jewel tables and ornate robes, which is fancy appurtenances to allure the... the general population, but also, you know, it could be for aesthetic purposes, jewel tables, ornate robes, because some are wide-eyed cats and white oxen.

[41:30]

This is my translation. And yes, White Oxen does have references that refers to the ten ox herding pictures, and the ox gradually gets, as the ten go, and there's a version that's six ox herding pictures, but the ox gradually becomes more and more white and less and less black as the pictures go on. So – and cats, wide-eyed – because some are wide-eyed cats and wide-awks, the cats actually could refer to a story by Nan Xuan who Dong Shan studied with when he was very young and was a great teacher. And he once said – Cats and calves know what it is. Buddhas and ancestors don't know what it is. So, anyway, there are lots of associations with cats, with ox, with white oxen.

[42:31]

So yes, there are references to Chinese lore throughout this. And you can look in the footnotes and see about those. But the song still stands by itself. Whether teachings and approaches are mastered or not, reality constantly throws, I have. Well, anyway, yeah, there are lots of words here. But they're all referring back to suchness. Thank you. So my question is about the ending of this conversation. this idea of the secret practice of the fool or the idiot. And you mentioned Ryokan, the poet from the 19th century. I remember this story about Ryokan that just sticks with me.

[43:37]

The story was that because he kind of, you know, the way he dresses and the way he kind of is in the world, He was mistaken for somebody who had stolen a whole student story. And many, many, you know, it was almost like the whole village came, and they dug a hole, and they, you know, beat him up, and then they covered him, and they were going to burn him alive. Somebody said, oh, my gosh, that's Master Ryoka. He's a great Zen teacher. And then they said, well, and I pulled him out of the pit, and they said, why didn't you say anything? And he said, if I remember it, it was that he couldn't, he said, you had already decided that I was deaf, so why wouldn't I say anything? Or something like that. But I wonder if, I mean, it's not from this, but is there any, you know, what is the

[44:44]

Is it a secret practice of being a fool? These poems are so full of beautiful poetry, but then where is the connection between the practice of the fool, the secret, the most hidden host? Right, right, yes. Yeah, practice secretly, like a fool, like an idiot. Just to do this continuously is called the host within the host or the master among masters. And yeah, Ryokan was very foolish. There's a story, though, about Ryokan that I like. His... brother had a son or something who was kind of a delinquent, had fallen in with a bad crowd and was having difficulties and they called Ryokan to try and talk to the son and Ryokan came and had dinner and stayed overnight and the next morning, and he hadn't said anything to the boy, and the next morning

[45:52]

He was tying up his traveling sandals and the boy was helping him. And he felt a tear and looked up and saw that Ryokan was crying. And from that day, the boy reformed completely. So, I didn't say anything to him. Anyway, there's lots of stories about Ryokan. There's stories about his calligraphy being valued. Anyway, there's lots of stories. So... I think Bill online had something.

[46:56]

Hello. Thank you for sharing with us. It's a pleasure to have you. My question is on the line in the middle of the first page. It acts as a guide for beings. It removes all pains. And I got a little caught up with it. referring to dustness there or to samadhi as a form of concentration and the beings is that yeah there's so many beings and is that an evangelical Well, no, it's... In darkest night it is perfectly clear, in the light of dawn it is hidden. It refers to the ultimate or universal and the particular or phenomenal. In darkest night it is perfectly clear because, well, in darkest night there's no differentiation, so everything is just black, everything is one.

[48:06]

In the light of dawn, in which you can see the particulars, it is hidden. So it's referring to suchness. Suchness includes both the particular and the phenomenal. Both the phenomenal and particular and the universal. So this dharma of suchness is a standard for all things. It's used to remove soul suffering. So how to use this teaching of suchness is the question there. And that's what removes all suffering. And yeah, so that leads into, it's not constructed, but it's not beyond words, like facing a precious mirror, form and reflection, behold each other. the form and the image behold each other. You are not it, but in truth it is you. So this it is the teaching of suchness. Its use removes all suffering. When you see that it's that you are not it, but it actually is you, you can let go of suffering.

[49:18]

But to see that thoroughly is a lifetime's work. Thank you. Other questions in the room? Anything at all. We have a couple of heads shaking. Just taking it in. I have another question. And it is truly just about Baba Wawa. Is that just baby talk or is it something else? Baba Wawa. Baba Wawa. But is something said or not? You know, I have a couple of cats. I was just thinking. One of them is very loquacious, and she's my little scaredy cat.

[50:23]

She doesn't come out when we have visitors, but she has a lot to say. She's particularly associated with food and wanting to be fed, but it's also just she has, she's, is she near here? She's sometimes, anyway, but she's very loquacious. And yet, is anything said or not? Well, yes, something is said. There's something conveyed, you know. So, you know, with her purring or with her speech, I don't speak cat. I see there's a cat there and Seiran's cat is getting her tail in the picture. So, yeah. But this is about fives. The words are not yet right.

[51:24]

No going, no coming, no arising, no abiding, and then no coherent speaking. There's five things, and this goes back to the Mahaparnavana Sutra and so forth. But And then in the illumination hexagram, inclined and upright, which is partial or provisional and ultimate, right? how they're depicted, along with various other things. I'll talk about this next week because it's Lord and Vassal and Host and Guest. Anyway, inclined and upright interact. Piled up, they become three. The permutations make five. This is about some process in the I Ching lore. Quoting the I Ching was sort of like quoting Shakespeare in China. Everybody knew what the I Ching was. And there's a process of working out the two trigrams and the six lines of the I Ching that in that particular hexagram has a five-fold thing.

[52:42]

But then there's the taste of the five-flavored herb. It's like the five-pronged Vajra. So Vajra... do you know what a buzzer is there's a it's a ceremonial thing with uh at the end at each end there are four i'm trying to do it with my hand but anyway there's there are four there are four prongs that meet a central fifth prong anyway um so um Yeah, drumming and singing begin together. Question and response arise together. So, yeah, the Baba Wawa is part of that, that section about the fives there, which introduces the five degrees. Thank you. Hi, my name is Tom. I have two questions. Is it correct, did I hear correctly that you said, originally this was... done in secrecy from teacher to student?

[53:47]

Yes. What prompted the change? And then what were the consequences of that change? Well, there was this guy, Menzon, who was in Japanese Soto Zen, was really a creator of modern Soto Zen. There's different lineages, but anyway, Menzon was his teacher. Menzon reformed Soto Zen and brought it in the early... 1700s, late 1600s, reformed the understanding of Dogen and talked about Dogen. But he also, amongst other things, popularized this text of this Jewelmare Samadhi, which may or may not have been, was maybe not a Samadhi, a transmission text at that point. But once it became chanted by people, now you have it, preserve it well, was part of, you know, Zen practice.

[55:00]

So that came to America. Thank you. So wondrously embraced within the real. Drumming and singing or question and answer or hitting and yelling. All of these could be referred by those characters. But they start together. So causation, karma. Karma is just action. It's how we act. And So we could say drumming and singing begin together. Cause and effect arise together.

[56:01]

So there's not a cause before the effect and effect after the cause. They come up together. So anyway, that's one part of this. And this is how this samadhi of suchness, this... Precious mirror, samadhi, this reflection, jeweled reflection, samadhi, works. Yongshan just looked into the stream and saw his reflection. Then everything happened. Which was happening before that, too. There's something about that, Taigen, that I don't know if I can put it into too many words, but you were just saying this about karma and not separating out cause and effect so much. There's something deeply compassionate about that. It creates a field of compassion, a whole other way of seeing how things come to be, how

[57:09]

wrongdoing happens and this is this is a real conundrum i have about understanding you know the stuff the kind of suffering that comes out as causing harm to others yes and that's what we're seeing right now on such a large scale i'm really really having it's challenging for me to because there is there has to be accountability too But it does feel important as Buddhists, or at least bodhisattvas, to keep that in mind, to keep that field of compassion close. Yes, but also to respond. So I have a class that I'm teaching in Berkeley on this, and I spoke up for anger this morning. So somebody was referring to feeling angry at the billionaires and all the things that are happening in the war that we're involved with.

[58:15]

Yeah, how do we understand that all beings are Buddha nature? And some seem to be without compassion, and maybe they should be locked up to protect themselves from creating bad karma. I don't know. How do we respond? There are ways to respond. And it's more difficult for some people than other people. And so responding by talking about it. is one way. Responding by keeping the truth of genocide alive is important work now, because there's a war going on. And yet we can feel compassion for the warriors on so-called other side, whatever that is, the people who are, you know, deporting people.

[59:32]

Anyway, it's really tough. We have to remember that there are people. And you know the song Amazing Grace? Mm-hmm. you know, the story about that song. You do. Okay. Well, then I don't need to. Some people do, Ty, again. It's worth repeating. Well, yeah, the author of that song in which he talks about a wretch like me, he was a former slave ship captain and had brought into slavery many people from Africa into slavery in Virginia and the colonies. So, yeah, yeah. So even such a person can repent. Whether they repent in time to make a difference is another story.

[60:38]

But yeah, there was a, well, this is a whole other talk, but there was a serial killer who became a disciple of Shakyamuni Buddha. Angula Mala. And anyway, so I won't tell his story, but... That's a good one. Well, okay. So he had a mala like this, and they had, I think, 99 fingers hanging from this string of fingers, and... The hundredth was going to be Buddha. He saw Buddha and he started to walk after him. As much as he ran after him, he couldn't get... And Buddha was walking very slowly, but he couldn't get close. And finally he said, stop. And Buddha turned around and said, you stop.

[61:39]

And so he did. And became an arhat. And of course he had to suffer the... karmic effect of all the people he'd killed and their children who came to kill him and so forth. But he became a disciple of one of the ten main disciples of Buddha in the meantime. Maybe he wasn't one of the ten. Anyway, he was an important disciple of Buddha. So, yeah. But how do we respond is a real question. There's so much destruction happening. So, Joan, I know you are responding. How are you responding? Well, thank you for asking. I was just kind of rallying the troops, so to speak, a battalion of artists.

[62:45]

We're going to gather. We're going to create. It's an interfaith action we're planning on the North Shore. Yeah, and it's around the act of Dignity, not deportation. Have you heard about this? There are other states also bringing forth similar ones. And so the Commonwealth of Massachusetts is working on this right now. And so we want to do a visible action. It might be a march or it might be, I think it's going to be kind of a movement. It's going to involve movement. And so we want to say tattoo with her battalion of artists, artist bodhisattvas. we're going to create, um, puppets, you know, or, um, can't, we're calling them canopies of conscience and creating several of them with, you know, each, each one will have a big word on it, like protection, you know, or dignity, something like this.

[63:50]

And, And it's showing up visibly in front of our state legislators and also police departments. I'm really into staying close to our local police chiefs and local sheriffs too. Because, you know, this feels like an inflection point right now, and I know we're at time. We're going to chant the privileges in a second. But, you know, some states are beginning to – we're really at a point where what is our local police going to do? Are they going to ally with ICE? You know, I'm speaking very frankly right now. Or are they going to ally with the people? You know, which way is this going to go? And so it feels like a really important time to keep our police chiefs and our sheriffs close. So yeah, that's one of the things we're working on right now. Excellent. Well, good. You've always got stuff going on. Want to tell us one thing before we stand and chant the refugees?

[64:52]

I sign lots of petitions online. I talk about it with people. And, you know, how do we share our awareness of what's going on? So it's challenging. Yeah. Yeah. 50501 has had some very large demonstrations up here in Concord, New Hampshire. It's been huge. Right. Yeah. Yep. Good. Okay, well, let's keep going. And for those who are able to, we will stand and we'll take refuge together as a way of expressing appreciation and saying goodnight. Dhamma Svarga Kachangri Dhamma Svarga Kachangri

[65:56]

Sa-ram, Sa-ram, Ka-ja-mi, Tu-ja-mi, Bu-lam, Sa-ram, Ka-ja-mi, Tu-ja-mi, Ja-ram, Sa-ram, Satsang with Mooji [...]

[67:15]

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