Application of the Practice - Feminism and Buddhism in the Diamond Sangha

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congressman
keep up into a friend that amazon would lose their for conference on christianity
sam smith as child
on as susan has been very kind
talk with the son of life has been happening at scientists on the wrong on
women bosoms feminism was my

once you pass the on
i've got to hand out and i didn't realize just so many people so if you could share them maybe three or four door car kit i won't be are referring to the right away but
i will get to it in a while
when i can i get to that i'll read it aloud to in case people end up without cartons

when i'm gonna begin by reading a bit of to talk that i gave roper until this public sunshine and the ah ah after that i'm hoping that we can have a quite an open discussion
but i want to do is is is israeli to help address issues that your sanga hands of her
that have come up during the people here on and i thought i'd do that by just introducing some of the areas that we've we've touched on and integrating feminism and good as miller and songs on
she dies before leaving honolulu i was speaking with a woman has been working with roy the journal that island michelle and sometimes david and others self cut out and she's fairly new to the practice and our sanga ah
she has been speaking to me and about about an experience that she had while sitting in meditation and the conflict have arisen for her as a woman's sympathetic to feminism
she described herself as sitting on the in meditation and experiencing her body as being like an empty shell
one of the show was the form of shakyamuni buddha
her immediate sense was that it didn't matter that the buddha was a man
afterwards that led her to wonder though what are how she could want to advocate women role models how could she integrate her experience and meditation and her feminism
i shall do so on ensuring a swiftly the on she was a touching at the heart of something that we're attempting to address in our work and practice in the donald sanga
while recognizing that words don't convey the fact we say in the heart sutra form is emptiness emptiness is form for miss no other than emptiness emptiness no other than corn
we use these words form an emptiness as metaphors for experience of the world's
my friend sarah who had sat in meditation and as the beginning students and as they had experienced herself as being the buddha was expressing what we might call the empty world the world of no form no categories no man nor woman
questions come up for her when she steps away from her meditation seat and carries that into the world that we would call the world of form of colors categories of distinctions in a thinking
most of the most of us know in this room are people who have experience of meditation and so it isn't hard for us to understand you know this is a the concept some a form an emptiness
a character is to concern or in present practice as well as in history or has been dialogue or interactions as a teaching device and sound a in speaking of the world of form and emptiness or i would be probably told to wash my mouth that if i if i if i spoke to swell and
instead i will be presenting it and so i might ask what is this
and i'm doing that i'm asked me to show me the role of their horns
one friend back in honeymooners and realizes that shares the buddha
this isn't something esoteric it's something that we realized in our practice and that we all understand some degree and a only a little bit
there is a con or from the recent issue of her watch a series that odd thomas cleary centers are the first of schrage were it not received the cohen is called a woman living in a hut in that come on a much a monk approaches a woman hermit and ask
sir to have any followers she said yes the monk said where are they she said the mountains rivers and earth the chance and trees are all my followers the monk asked are you a nun she said what do you see as amongst said a lay person
she said you can't do a monk
amongst that you shouldn't mix up buddhism she said i'm not big mixing up buddhism amongst the aren't you mixing up buddhism the one
she said you're a man i'm a woman were has there ever been in a mix-up
this woman is clearly experienced her own emptiness and the emptiness of all things so she can quite clear the express the fact you're a man i'm a woman
the the table the chair the mountains the rivers the cool summer day in san francisco
oh there's a kind of idealism among meditators on the belief that meditation has known nothing to do with the world of form and that the buddha dial can somehow be quarantined so that ideas and isms or emotions are some our the relationship between the sexes somehow don't touch it
no events on this idea for example some people feel that emotions are kinda isn't are not okay
ah but either way the identifying characteristic of this view is a desire for separation between practice and life a desire for sanctuary are longing to rest in the empty world and then we say that such a person has died but has not yet come back to life
ah
as i blanch said i've just come from a four day symposium was held at naropa institute and there's i was very impressed with a number of women that i met our women coming or not only from tibet practice that often to model and zen practice from minnesota and texas and san cisco
as well as such colorado
and on what struck me about the women that i met from europe itself was that many of them had been very strong feminists in the past but had given up their feminism and coming to practice and so for example we had a to of the women that i got to know fairly well who were organizers of the conference when his name is joe
curtis was on the organizer and director of a red cross us under here i think in san francisco for three years this is our number of years ago ten years ago and she ah initially was working with women who had been raped and did that and counseling for several your period and realized of
actually that she needed to work or with the rapist themselves and so began going into prisons and working with rapists and what she realized in that experience of working in the persons with the rapist was that her own aggression towards the rapist was no different really than the regression of the rapist toward the women that the that they were thing and so
from that experience turn into practice on marilyn was another very impressive women with a very strong background in feminism who had been active in the early days in new york in the early shift in the midst bit late sixties
in the feminist in our the that kind of emergency and feminist movement again and she was one of the editors of off our backs when it first fineness publications on and what she found was that on md or rather dogmatic
of collectivity that grew up or at that time were no expertise with allowed no division of labor was allowed within the collective that onge eventually the whole thing self destructed and from that experience or turned to buddhism and also sent me a rather
a hierarchical on form of buddhism or
in a triplet so situation in our dozer on but what i found was that the women are though they are the women gave up his particular women gave up their feminism for personal reasons that it was also encouraged our by the teacher that feminism be given up and
that this conference represented the beginning or like the tip of an iceberg of a kind of re-emergence or integration or for women in that sanga for bringing together these disparate size of themselves or to house of themselves so that was really wonderful for them
our own experience in the diamond sangha has been very different because women like myself who has come to the practice when very strong background in feminism have been encouraged or rather than the opposite in or feminism
we've had about five years of experience
in a diamond sangha in consciously integrating reminiscent into the practice or and this effort has reached into many dimensions of the practice on
represented on the intuition that and feminism are very much alike
bush began not with theory but with experience or both speak of liberation and that liberation or extends are in the best seller and as available and relevant to both men and women's or deliberation that has spoken out in both boston and in feminism
it means embodying the teaching it means expression an ordinary everyday lives are in in the kitchen in the bedroom in the workplace and in our relationships with each other and finally both employer respect and gratitude for all life buddhism teaching us the way to realize our true nature and there
for the nature of all beings and feminism by helping women to become women and men to become men are shown that con you're a man i'm a woman's feminism helps us to realize that
what i want to do then is to look at from a close that we've gone trying to integrate feminist and in buddhism how immigrants in are aspects of the practice and medina sanga and what i thought i'd do is to or show to of the guy earliest things
or speak about to the very earliest things that we did and then more or less list a whole lot of other areas that which touched and then i hope that people may be confined from that list story them from your own experience here what's most our current irrelevant in your sanga and are we can talk about thing
things because some i found it europa that i could have talked about four hours and and i want to touch on what's most relevant for people here
so on one of the first things and this was about five years ago that we did was on we began to look at the searchers that we chanted on it was a a natural place for us to begin because it happens at a conversion and a number of people in our song are very interested in lang
which we have a couple of poets are a number of pilots at a number of riders people were just very interested in language and poetry and so on
this are you know turning to sutures are as a place to begin was a really a with the impetus for this came from one or two from one or two women it wasn't a and a general song of movement by any means but just a couple of women who were disturbed by the sexist language in the searchers
so if people have a look at what i thought i've patched up
we do a very ah
we have very little ritual on and we don't do a whole lot of searchers in our sanga who do about fifteen minutes of chanting a day or in morning service in an evening service at the end of thousand and then two times a week we have a half hour your service
now in dot half hour service we do ten searchers that was a a collection put together by a rush and of those are those are some like a the purification like the for vows of that have no gender references at all and so a giant you know a kind of changes
are not applicable to earth but on to that i have here that arms with our worked a great deal with our haku and century song of songs and and tata century bodhisattva vow
and ah i've could at the beginning with haku in on we have three versions of that and the one of the beginning as the earliest version and then you'll see a metal version and anna most recent version and tradition we now have
people with them there are a lot of people not have this
as much as you can if you could share share around

also can everybody here can never going to hear me people in the back hear me okay

you'll see that in the first version and the second stanza we have like a man in the midst of water crying out in thirst like a child of a wealthy home wandering among the poor and then down the fitch says the man who tries that only once will find his guilt swept clean this evil ways completely gone the pure land
and itself not far the man who here's the truth but one submissions with a grateful heart accepting it praising it gains blessings without end but the man who turns within himself and troops his own self nature shelf nature that is no nature go far as fuck goes far beyond mere cleverness he knows
effect and cause or one not two not three the path runs straight this form of formlessness as form going and coming he never moves were part of thoughtlessness as thought he hears the law and song and dance so
you can see
le mans and he isn't that and then we have a kind of intermediate version i think this is really interesting because we have like a man in the midst of water crying out in first run down at the pitch were admitted to the person can translate them but once sweeps all his ancient vice away so you still have a
problems still the person who hears this truth and then still more the one who turns within and troops his own self nature he knows effect and cause or one not too and so on the song and dance or the voice of the law
and so i'm working with this and on often it's been a can rush working in conjunction with our women are who are concerned about this we have a a pretty nice version now of this particular sutra on
feeling still on but ah wrote poetry of the original is very difficult to capture and i don't think get that that's been accomplished but we have how sad that people ignore the near and search for truth afar like someone in the midst of water crying out in thirst like a child of a wealthy home wandering among
the poor
and down again to the fifty censor those who charged us and even once wipe away beginning this crimes where are all the dark past then the pure land itself is near those who hear this toothy than once and listen with a grateful heart and so on so which visually improved
a of that
we aren't speaking of of only man
and like us on in today's engine you keep folks do this to such as at all are not familiar with them
yeah
are we have introduced and the original version we did was some one in which patriarch since and masters appear this is a kind of
phrases that we found problematic for a long time and ah
i've worked out fairly well now i think we have our in the old version this realization made our patriarchs and virtuous and masters extent tender care with the heart of thing and then further down we have the same problem with men and key and him who can be ungrateful or not respectful
even to senseless things not to speak of men even though someone may be a fool be warm and compassionate to him if by any chance you should turn against us become a sworn enemy and abuse and persecute us we should sincerely bow down with humble language in reverent police that he is the merciful avatar of buddha
so in our our new version with bunk we now use instead of patriarchs and zen masters we use either founding teachers are great ancestors are funding teachers during the one that we've used for the last few years and recently we've we've been turning to ancestors are great ancestors
this realization made our founding teachers and virtuous and leaders extent under care and so forth and then who can be ungrateful or not respectful even to senseless things not to speak of people and if by any chance such a person should turn against us become a sworn enemy and abuse
and persecute us we should sincerely bow down with humble language and reverent belief that he or shoes the merciful avatar of buddha so visit to such as in which we've done a lot of on which we've got a lot of work on and on
our search your services or one that i don't think will defend feminists any longer
kit with the succession if you turn to the next stage are we have an iv oblivion do ourselves a dedication in which we recite the lineage of our teachers and on this is problematic for
some feminists because of course there are no women in the lineage
and ah i myself have not come up with any true solution to this year on

that i've been thinking about it a great deal and in on
in the research and just the material that we've been collecting on i've begun to find on are some women that we could appropriately plug into our lineage on the ocean is one on i've been working for the last two years on a translation of the total gotta which is saw the sa
songs of the sisters the original manjula bit sanga and some of those women could very easily or service a founding matriarchs ah another issue that a consider is whether that's even something that we wanted to look in shape
a kind of comfortable lineage of of aquaman teachers
you know ah
and then a
there are many in a bodhidharma is a semilegendary person or than invented the idea of lineage shadow is not a are there in a caravan in buddhism anna
i don't know it's just it's just something to look at so this is this is one one thing that i haven't gotten any solutions to at the moment
the such working with such changes and besides just the sutures we've done a lot more with language and current study and in a or brush is unprecedented
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i was bruised us out the hood and relates to suit them
and another thing would just i just realized she transfers in popular music in some way
he's even say most of the people speaking for women's issues
but for ten minutes interesting out
the conversation she be pretty more and more impressions higher ranking position our status
what am i realized it
i personally don't find a our instance
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for quite some time
as people and o issues
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and i didn't say the fish i mean it just strategies around result every everything that i want to thrive from the structure
after if i ever i will be special
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and i think most of that hierarchy
because we have it
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any kind of this
and requires a certain momentum
or it seems from highest
and try to keep up tired
and
man can easily give themselves to that
finding themselves and
then there's a certain anxiety and remote has been censored
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really getting those being wasted so i like him pain a container rather difficult issues how and read the use of the case happened to him and to take a with i love you to clarify much me either any machine
the definition of coincidence i understand what i'm kathy
when people like to hear about that right now i'm sure interested industry finish this elastic america new and do
i am have recently attended a conference which included out
mostly it was a very highly christian group but very interestingly as the more logistical side and everybody knows at medieval fantasy science literature and such and one of the things that was involved in the group was a said feminism and vaguely struck it
and do run and berkeley at this time a the idea of presenting in a more christian form av it's or pagan for actually
i think i observed it but a more a christian ideas that brutus separated and but buddhism is ah
a mass for the a mother
how does this very feminist idea but when they created in out looking from a media
the monastic you are more religious view what they did actually with masculine eight everything they thought they were bringing out as being feminine the mother
turned in to
some provision of a very masculine abstractions in this particular connection and their imagination they thought that they were discussing something feminine grit in fact the had created a monster right after that there was
some the masculine quite a few of which are
the lady who had a desk worker husband put on this next card and it's on
a catholic mass
excuse me a good christian saint
st
the robin
and they have pulled out a text from this and they did a beautiful feminine mess and had all the traditional ideas of course cases done in costume you don't get all the things put together quite
correctly all the time you know but they did their best to put together what would have been ah the mass of the st that was supposedly done so many ages ago it is not them now and their idea of a mass these mench wasn't buried religiously
feminine example ah
ah
what they were imagining at that time they had delicate white clouds draping the table instead of right colored to and such and you see the difference there
that's distinction they reversed their roles terribly without metal gatlin
and i don't know exactly does this has too much bearing exactly
on things that have been said inserted in a very convenient sense here that it sort of cancelled
but it just came to my mind quite vividly than people were talking about them
said well i worked in the outside world for a long time and what's done in the inside world you know our hierarchy and sexual
there's get them taking everything in the name him
but ons hundred
it seems to me that a lot of the men who came presents and only rios they've been here for a and to plug right in
to the scene that was happening that was more when they were trained for us to thank you for usually playing in it seems like a lot of them are now coming back in question i mean sort of same side of the reverse was happening was the limit is a fair coin back to me my god you know your end this thing
for six or eight thirteen years and become a priest in this is for everyone i wanted to know
that even
yeah right as he should try it i was noticing it's happening with to invite in the rise in europe there wanting to explore their family life new many were married or having children are wanted to figure that island they don't want to be so plugged in
to the to sort of track and i think we also need to work to give them the space so that they can take the time voice of those that have some idea of them all was being you know the good third basement in never taken know would do a job half term remember a taste for them to work out pets
two
have time when
you can be worried
typical with the monastic lineage in which the whole structures based on somebody saying
i'm putting everything side to do this practice i am not going have a personal life
and then now here we are bunch of lay people together and say well
want to try and have a personal life and we still want to try and somehow use that forms of a monastic like it
you know at what point are we fascinating both course of a being good at what point are we really integrating the minute i just in on sort of like taking marlborough out of the countries that
it's really a sorting problems to with what's where's the buddhism in your personal life
ah
are people interested in so many questions or not people wanna hear that really nice to play soccer with we could spend online on this set would've been
i like them here better
two people here use request is kiss up
i understand this is my demonstration model
on on those kids' soccer voluntary here or as a given on come on
finding your it's volunteer
we we used in our song or if it only onge not voluntary oh and so that it was up to the discussion of the tonto to give the cure soccer on and this is not on entirely on the influence of the women in the sanga i think it was
primarily russia's decision but i think it it came in part from the interests of some women particularly feeling that they didn't like the key soccer in the danger at all on there are there's at least one woman who
will not though she is capable of being tonto does not wish to be taunted the considers like the idea of the search homes only that onto the contrary the person who can i dodger who who watched the circus than a junior
everybody everybody wants some stuttering almost am not know a lot of seniors little voucher you to see the receiving a medal ah said the tonto is the person who wants to stick in our and our dojo so here many people walk at anybody wants to know any manner
that uses an mfa a sandwich understood this men and women at once in our dojo it is kind of the position of authority and ah and and so and also the tonto is has often been on an immense and so this is one of the positions that we felt it was really important to see a woman in
position but as i say it's also been questioned by some women and one woman of or though she could be a tighter has not chosen to be turned her on so one of the the changes that we know how this that for us of the kiyosaki was only voluntary and so i suppose you do the same thing you ask
port as accurate so sometimes it's given right and in our dojo know it's never given were that they requested
on what do you do with the motor sleeping with the concerns
this louis happened
on
i don't know how appropriate is that i
i don't know
your the ritual that we do on of walking into soccer
in the morning to open the dojo and then rocket confidential
we have a as i said murphy ritual and are from the the are the major one is still in the morning walk with your soccer seven kilometers or and and product version has always been an interesting visual for me because it seems very phallic
i'll demonstrate this is the the author so the chris bowers the bhutto's
and then on
can just a little when the second master normal
and then
for now to the song
and in the mornings stickers down and you walk the stick around them
cannot that are
that this ritual then run the stickers up on the return and that means that the dojo was then open to practice
subordinate
a man of the day the only official that we do is the same ritual only in reverse the
the
and then
cause
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the original
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