Good evening everyone. Gives me a good deal of pleasure to be back at Green Gulch where I have visited often enough over the years to feel as though I were coming home. I have been speaking at Zen Center on the precepts beginning with an introduction called The Nature of the Precepts, and continuing night by night through the first four.

[01:16]

So tonight I am scheduled to speak on the fifth grade precept. not taking drink or drugs, not dealing with drink or drugs. Translation not completely set. But since I think many of you have not been able to attend all of these talks at the city center, and maybe many of you none of them, it seemed to me that it would be best if I spoke extemporaneously. about the nature of the precepts and then summarized my thoughts on the fifth grave precept and then opened the meeting for questions and answers.

[02:21]

So please bear with me. I will probably skip around somewhat as I speak, reading from time to time from my manuscript. Also, please understand that I am coming to you from somewhere, somewhat outside your lineage. So occasionally you will need to listen with your ecumenical ear. because I will not be speaking from a strictly soto or conventional soto point of view. My particular lineage is the Harada-yasutani line of Soto Zen Buddhism, the Sambo-kyodan sect, which is influenced somewhat by Rinzai Zen.

[03:43]

In the Haradayasatani line, the 16 bodhisattva precepts are taken up at the end of koan study and dealt with as koans. And like all koans, These are expressions of the way of the bodhisattva in his or her work in the world, freed from personal suffering. The origin of the precepts, of all precepts, is the Vinaya, one of the three main sections of classical Buddhist literature.

[04:53]

The bodhisattva precepts emerged with Mahayana Buddhism and were articulated in the form we can recognize now, first in the Brahmanet Sutra, which was attributed to Indian times, but actually was probably composed in China somewhat sometime after Kumara Jiva, who flourished in the early 5th century. And The Brahmanet Sutra takes its name from the net of Indra, the magnificent model of the universe

[06:18]

a multidimensional net with each knot or each point of the net a jewel that perfectly reflects all other jewels. We are, all of us, reflecting each other interpenetrating each other, containing each other. And this is true not only for our Buddha Sangha, not only true for all human beings, but for all beings, including the so-called inanimate. This is one basis for the sixteen bodhisattva precepts.

[07:26]

The other basis is found in the Prajnaparamita literature. And you will recall at the beginning of the Heart Sutra Avalokitesvara is doing deep Prajnaparamita and clearly sees the emptiness of all five skandhas and thus transforming suffering and distress. A different approach to the precepts. The five skandhas, as you know, are the form or the forms of the world and our perception of them, including our own forms. And Avalokiteshvara is the bodhisattva of mercy and compassion.

[08:36]

And his or her name is translated in two ways in Chinese and in Sino-Japanese. In the latter, Kanjizai is one translation. A rather difficult name to translate into English. something like the one who sees the essential self at rest. When you are completely aware that the forms of the world and your own perceptions of them are transparent, then you are at ease with yourself. And the other name used for Avalokitesvara is Kanzeon.

[09:50]

Kanzeon, the one who hears the sounds of the world. When you are completely at ease and at rest, then you are open to others. To bring this all home, I want to read you a poem that is probably familiar to many of you, Blake's London. I wander through each chartered street, near where the chartered Thames does blow, and mark in every face I meet marks of weakness, marks of woe. In every cry of every man, in every infant's cry of fear, in every voice, in every band,

[11:02]

The mind-forged manacles I hear, How the chimney-sweepers cry, Every blackening church appalls, And the hapless soldier's sigh Runs in blood down palace walls. But most through midnight streets I hear How the youthful harlot's curse blasts the newborn infant's tear and blights with plagues the marriage hearse. My comment on this poem is with each sigh of each hapless soldier, a new flow of blood runs down the walls of the White House. and the equally hapless whore poisons the bride and blinds her infant.

[12:04]

Not only is no man an island, each man, woman, animal, stone, cloud, tree is the universe itself. This is the basis of the 16 Bodhisattva precepts. Now to explain why sixteen rather than ten. The first three are the three refuges, taking refuge in the Buddha, Dharma and Sangha. The second three are the three pure precepts to avoid all evil, to practice all good, to save all beings. And then come the ten, which you are familiar with. Each is the basis for the next.

[13:09]

In taking refuge in the Buddha, Dharma and Sangha, I take Buddhism as my role in the world. I acknowledge the Buddha as my teacher. Someone once asked me, in connection with Hakuin Zenji's statement that all beings by nature are Buddha, No, they asked me something else. What was it now? At any rate, I have forgotten the question, but my response was that all beings by nature are Buddha.

[14:17]

Hakuin Zenji did not say all beings by nature are Mara. what we are doing in accepting the Buddha, the Dharma, and the Sangha as our home, essentially is accepting the good. If we can agree that by good we mean clear, not confused, not ignorant. Mara I view as one who is sort of ultimately ignorant. We must be careful not to confuse our old Judeo-Christian understanding

[15:24]

or Zoroastrian understanding of black and white, good and evil as being separate, absolute things. Okay, now Dogen Zenji took the commentaries of the Brahmanet Sutra and the sutra itself and wrote, or at least gave the talks which were then later collected as the Kyoju Kaimon, which is the, transmitting the precepts of our school. Something like that would be the translation. So, in the course of Koan's study of the precepts, Bodhidharma's comment on each of the precepts is taken up as in the doksan room.

[16:31]

And also, a book called the Isshin Kaimon which is attributed to Bodhidharma, probably was not written by Bodhidharma, probably comes out of the earliest ancestors of the Tendai school, This also is studied. However, the Isshin Kaimon does not offer comments on the three refuges or the three pure precepts, only on the ten grave precepts. And in the Rinzai school, only the Isshin Kaimon is studied for koan purposes, not the Kyoju Kaimon. Okay, that's enough technical information and maybe enough introduction to the precepts. Now I want to go on briefly to the fifth grave precept.

[17:32]

Let me read you what my title is. I forgot the title. Not giving or taking drugs. I moved through several options and I couldn't remember which one was the last one I used. I used the word drugs there as a very general term to include alcohol and various other ways that we have of following a delusive way. You know, when Shakyamuni Buddha looked up and saw the morning star, he cried out, wonderful, wonderful, now I see that all beings are the tathagata. Only their delusions and attachments keep them from testifying to that fact.

[18:35]

Well, we may say, using that model, All beings of the universe are unclouded from the beginning, but the haze created by their use of drink and drugs keep them from acknowledging it. And of course, there are many, many kinds of drugs. Silly conversation is a drug. TV is very much a drug. And probably you can think of others. The person who comes intoxicated habitually is poisoning the body. And the body is the dojo, the dojo of the Buddha. So you are setting up karma that needs to be undone at some time if you are to become clear.

[19:42]

Not selling drink or drugs is likewise a matter of personal practice, but we cannot be holier than thou. Let me read what I have to say about that. Our society is structured on the three poisons of greed, hatred, and ignorance. Probably selling drink or drugs is no worse than selling cars. which destroy many lives, make highways necessary, create the oil mania, and may even justify nuclear war. Pushing heroin spiked with rat poison on a street corner is hardly right livelihood, but it is paradigmatic of corporations dumping carcinogenic insecticides on Latin American peasants. So we're all enmeshed in this acquisitive system.

[20:52]

We cannot afford to be holier than thou. And as a matter of fact, you know, looking at our own Western heritage, In Psalm 104, David gives thanks to the Lord for his gift of wine that maketh glad the heart of man. And the place of wine as the blood of the Redeemer in Christian ceremony gives it a central role in the Christian faith. One must also weigh the medicinal qualities of alcohol and marijuana and their social value. If liquor and marijuana impair the judgment, they also tend to break down inhibitions, and this helps people to overcome their isolation from each other.

[21:56]

So there's a certain amount of ambiguity in connection with this precept as there is with all of them. Bodhidharma said, Self-nature is subtle and mysterious. In the realm of the intrinsically pure Dharma, not giving rise to delusions is called the precept of not giving or taking drugs. Hewing, as always, to the unconditioned absolute, a Bodhidharma shines light on our path. It isn't only drink or drugs or tobacco or coffee or TV or whatever that clouds our minds and makes us unable to testify to the Buddha's own experience.

[23:00]

What is happening in your mind? Do you provide your own barbiturates? We all of us do. And thus we all of us violate this precept. Bodhidoga Dogen Zenji said, drugs are not brought in yet. There you are on your cushions. Drugs are not brought in yet. Don't let them invade. That is the great light. Which reminds me of an old story about Joshu. Joshu was sweeping the courtyard and a monk asked, how can a speck of dust come into this holy ground?

[24:06]

Joshu said, here comes another. Yes. But don't misunderstand. Don't suppose that a deep, quiet mind is necessarily an enlightened mind. It might be quite dark. Unman said to his assembly, each of you has your own light. If you want to see it, you cannot. The darkness is dark, dark. Now, what is your light? Answering for his listeners, he said, the storeroom, the gate. See, light is the 10,000 things advancing and confirming the self, in Dogen Zenji's words.

[25:16]

The thrush, we have a Chinese thrush in Hawaii. I'm very fond of that bird. But the robin is also a thrush. The robin, the gate, a sip of wine. How else may we take our pleasure here? Things of the world are not drugs in themselves. By our use of them, we make them that way. Well, lots more to say on this subject and on the subject of precepts in general, but I think I've spoken enough, and so let us have our four bows and then a brief moment of stretching. People who need to go home may go home, and then we can have question and answer. Okay? Thank you.

[26:21]

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. God bless you. Who would like to lead off?

[28:19]

Yes. It seems to me that maybe at some point, the living life of God has become like a TV modem, and therefore maybe like drugs. I've seen that in my own self come up, and I've seen that in years past with some of the people. Yes, if you let it. Practice is a matter of returning from the TV mind to breath counting, shikantaza, mu, or whatever your specific practice is.

[29:33]

And the practice actually of most people consists of bringing themselves back from that destruction, whatever it is. just sitting with thoughts or just sitting with a particular mental project, like solving your financial problems or rearranging the furniture in your apartment or trying to do personal therapy while you're sitting there, something like that, this can be extraordinarily distracting. Or just letting thoughts come and go, you know, is a way of kind of cultivating a distraction. To focus on your practice and when a thought comes, you see, you can acknowledge it.

[30:37]

You know, that's you yourself appearing. Give it a wave and return to your practice. This is really what zazen is about. Coming back to your practice, settling into your breath counting, settling into shikantaza, settling into mu, or whatever it is that you're working on. Okay? All right. Thank you. Yes, Renee. Would you agree that a child like Marilana and some of the stronger ones like Alasdair have to take an important role in bringing many people and doctrines and years to Buddhism? Indeed, I do agree. Definitely true for me, and I look back to some of these experiences with great gratitude.

[31:43]

Yes. Feeling that they initially made me understand what some of these senators were talking about. Yes. So couldn't there be a more tolerant and grateful view of these stories? Yes, indeed. And so I think probably that point should be made about drugs opening the door to religious possibilities for many, many people. Make a note of that. But generally, I think perhaps tonight, in skipping through the Taisho, I gave a rather intolerant view. But generally, I think in this chapter, I tried to show how...

[32:44]

Greeting an old friend and serving wine is a very, very pleasant way to communicate and to revive an old friendship, for example. Certainly, we should have a tolerant view with regard to all of these precepts. However, you know, at some point we must draw the line, and each person draws his or her own line. Now, in Japan, they have no word for alcoholic. They're very tolerant on the subject of alcoholism. And the man or woman that we would call alcoholic is spoken of in this way, Oh, he likes sake very much.

[34:01]

For us, that is probably too tolerant. We would want to help such a person, I think. And it's very helpful to be able to diagnose what's wrong. I've got a whole corner full of notes here I've made on the basis of questions. When we have a farewell party or something like that, we will commonly toast the person that we're saying goodbye to with a bottle of wine.

[35:33]

And everybody takes a little. We had a poetry reading at Kokoan a while back and served sake with the poetry reading. But it's rather an occasional thing. When we have parties away from the dojo, in someone's house, and it's mostly Sangha members that are attending, then certainly beer is available. Not everybody drinks it, but there is a certain amount of beer drinking. Not that much. there used to be a certain amount of smoking it at those parties, but I don't hear about that so much anymore.

[36:35]

I think it sort of died down of itself. And in Japan, you know, it depends on the monastery. At Ryutaku-ji, where I trained, and Dan can check me on this, there was a party, quite a party, once a year at the end of the year, toward the end of the year. And occasionally when we went out on Takuhatsu, you know, to accept money and food from the townspeople and we would be served lunch, there might be a bottle of beer in front of the place, each place. And I remember how wonderful a teacher Genpo Roshi was for me when I first met him. It was in the dead of winter. He was very old at this time, about middle 80s. And he was sitting there all bundled up, eating toasted mochi and sipping sake.

[37:44]

warming his old bonds. And he was a very good teacher for a young, rather ascetic, Zen student. I want to say something more about... about the nature of the precepts, which I didn't touch on, and that is that they are examined from three points of view, which are really one point of view. The first is the literal, don't drink. The second is the compassionate or Mahayana view of you know, let us give life. Let us encourage life. And if this involves toasting a friend who has just come or is about to go, that somehow enlivens the Sangha.

[39:01]

And the third is that there is no cloud at all from the beginning. This is the Buddha nature view. These three views are best synthesized or synthesized in what we might call the true bodhisattva behavior. Second point I want to make is about the misuse of the Buddha-nature view. Let me read a prime example from that, taken from D.T. Suzuki's Zen and Japanese Culture, where Thakuran Zenji advises a samurai See, that there's no such thing as killing. The uplifted sword has no will of its own.

[40:09]

It is all of emptiness. It is like a flash of lightning. The man who is about to be struck down is also of emptiness, as is the one who wields the sword. Do not get your mind stopped with the sword you raise. Forget about what you are doing and strike the enemy. Do not keep your mind on the persons before you. They are all of emptiness. But beware of your mind being caught in emptiness. And my comment is, the devil can quote scripture and Mara can quote the Abhidhamma. The fallacy of the way of the samurai is similar to the fallacy of the code of the crusader. Both distort a universal view to partisan warfare, and universal views can be distorted in many ways.

[41:14]

The Catholic charity of the Holy See did not include people it called pagans. The vow of Takuan Zenji to save all beings did not encompass the one who he called the enemy. Certain teachings of Zen and certain elements of its practice can be abstracted and used for secular purposes, some of them benign, such as achievement in sports, some nefarious, such as murder for hire. The Buddha Dharma, with its integration of wisdom and compassion, must be taught in its fullness. Otherwise, its parts can be poisoned when they are misused. Uh-huh, for sure. Well, the problem with that is that

[42:28]

No matter how pure my attitude is, I can't do zazen if I've drunk a bottle of beer. I'm fuzzy. So it's not just my attitude, it's what happens to my body. It's the fact that I am being used by this beer. You see, rather than using it at an appropriate time. I'm wondering about how to, when you are in the public sphere, what way can our practice meet in the public sphere? Well, of course, if your practice at that time is to cool off after you've worked all day long in the hot sun at the farm,

[43:56]

then that is a very good practice, I suppose, if you are more or less used to doing that. But it seems to me that if you are going on from there to the dojo, that your action has not been so appropriate. that you will not be able to do the kind of zazen that you could do without having drunk it, no matter how hot and how tired you are. Does that respond to your question? I understand what you're saying. I think I'm thinking more of, I believe, if not hot, I'm going to think of the first, if you've got that, or any of them. Yes. And I know I read a long time ago, actually a long time ago, and it's really amazing to also see that there's usefulness in doing that kind of activity, maybe it's more than just in practice.

[45:22]

Yeah. Yeah. I can go along with that. I can go along with that. I feel comfortable accepting although for physical reasons at my age I've been told I shouldn't be shouldn't be drinking alcohol quite apart from that I can imagine myself younger and enjoying my friends and taking a beer with them at a party sure and If you want to call that practice, it's okay.

[46:31]

It's the practice of communication and love with one's friends. Yes. I'm interested in this issue that you mentioned about drawing a line. Yeah. I sense an area of difficulty in all of this, in what might seem to anyone in religion, particularly astronomy, that whatever I do is good news, and that it has no real consequences on life. A person may justify or may feel completely comfortable in that realm of putting it to me, my body in that realm, of my activity, to feel clear about what I'm doing.

[47:36]

But there's another side of it that I feel that there may be repercussions for others that may have created, create confidence. Yes, yes. And I think there is a tendency for some people, and even some Buddhist teachers, to fall into the same trap that Thakuran Zenji did here with regard to killing. that I am aware of what I'm doing and there is nothing which is not the Buddhadharma, really, and so I can, for example, drink freely. I've heard it said about a Buddhist teacher, not a Zen Buddhist teacher, but a certain Buddhist teacher,

[48:40]

that he is so enlightened that he lives a life of non-attachment even to the precepts. I've heard this seriously said. And I think this is bourgeois, you know. This is rather dangerous because it can justify the most criminal kind of behavior, really. That sort of spirit can be used that way. The world of the netavindra is the world of karma, of affinity. And we are, all of us, teachers. And so inevitably our actions will basically be the actions of others, fundamentally, not separate. So we are very responsible, really.

[49:43]

And this is what right action and right livelihood and all those other points on the Eightfold Path are about. I guess my question has to do with Yes. Yes. And it is for this reason that, or at least partly for this reason, that Zen teachers generally avoid talking about the precepts. and leave it entirely to the end of formal practice. In Soto and Rinzai both. Discussion of the precepts comes at the end of formal practice.

[50:47]

Because there is a concern that people will oversimplify the lessons of Bodhidharma and Dogen Zenji. and presume that since it's all one, anything goes. This is antinomianism. Antinomianism is the doctrine that grew up with the Anabaptists in Germany in the 16th century. The belief that once you are saved, then all that you do will be holy. Anything you do will be holy. Corruption entered in very soon. And the Anabaptists and the ranters and all of those other early millenarian sects had to tone down, you know,

[52:02]

And so their modern successors, like the Quakers and Mennonites and so on, are pretty rigorously moral. So the Buddha-nature view must be integrated with the bodhisattva view. The bodhisattva view must be integrated with the literal view. Yes? In one of your lectures last week, you said that people in the fold I go to prison, I suppose. But I'm glad you raised that question because I didn't go into it very much. What we're doing is assigning what would be our tax to the World Peace Tax Fund.

[53:13]

which holds the money in escrow until such time as Congress passes the law, which Ron Dellums has introduced in each session since 1972, that would provide the taxpayer the option of earmarking taxes for non-military purposes. So that money stays in escrow, and just as soon as Congress passes that law, then the money will be paid over to the United States Treasury. So, so far, after two years of this, we haven't heard a peep from IRS. Because a letter explaining all this has gone with our tax returns. And the tax returns show exactly the amount that is due. So we're not trying to cheat in any way. we were sort of inspired by Bishop Hundhausen, you know, in Seattle, who took this stand.

[54:18]

So, if I have some, or if we have some belief, you see, that things are going so badly in a kind of inhuman and destructive way that we don't want any part of it. That's a pretty extreme position to take because you consider all the good things, you know, that are done with that tax money. So here we've been, you know, on the line for peace for 30 years or more, taking part in demonstrations and writing letters to congresspeople and all of the rest of it. And now we just feel it's time that we take a firm position and say, I'm not going to support this preparation for nuclear holocaust.

[55:34]

I'm only, by demonstrating on the one hand and writing letters to congresspeople, And on the other hand, feeding them with my dollars so that they can continue to do what I don't want them to do, I'm in a very ambiguous position. So I want to be clear-cut and say, I'm not going to support war anymore. And if we take such a position, then okay, that's our position all the way, all the way. personally I doubt if they throw us in jail but if they do okay I'm not going to equivocate it's like draft resistance some draft resistors are resistors up to the point where they are threatened with trial and then they sort of move off that position and others go all the way through like that

[56:48]

It's quite a different point, but I'm glad you raised it. Yes. [...] Of course, was it said that the Christian way is to vow to take the path of the contemplative life?

[58:02]

What seemed to be the point that worked out through both traditions was that once you got on this path, whether... Yes. Yes. It seems to me that this is possible as a lay person or as an ordained person. to take such a vow and try to work it through. There are many Christian lay people who are living a life of prayer. The difference, you mean, between lay and ordained? Well, that's really the question, isn't it?

[59:02]

And I feel that there are some people who are naturally monks, whether or not they are ordained. This is a kind of vocation for them. And so they are the ones who lead the ceremonies and maintain the centers of worship or meditation. Doing a strictly lay Buddhist trip, as we are doing, is very difficult, because there's no core group.

[60:15]

We have two head residents, one at each of our Hawaii centers, and two quarter-time publications people, and that's all the staff that we have. And so there's a problem of continuity, there's a problem of upkeep, there's a problem of leadership. At a recent session in Honolulu, we had three tantos, and part of the time the seat was empty. Because, like Zen Center, our old-timers now are in their middle thirties or late thirties or older. And so they have careers and family and so on to look after. And in mid-life like that,

[61:18]

one is busiest. In early life one is not so busy. In later life one is not so busy. But in middle life there, where many of our old-timers are now, they are getting themselves established in their careers and they are working very hard and they are looking after small children. So they can't get away so easily. And so we make do with what we have and who we are. And it's hard. So I can see the point in encouraging at least the people who naturally are of that vocation to be ordained, or at least to take up that vocation, whether or not they are ordained.

[62:24]

Now that is from a strictly lay point of view. I think that the roshi who comes from the more conventional lines of ordained priests will have a somewhat deeper point of view, probably, and could expound it here. That's the best I can do. Now what I said the other night was that you can see a trend toward layicization or becoming lay in the history of Buddhism, beginning with the Sangha, which was strictly the Buddha's disciples in the beginning, to an enlargement in Theravada Buddhism where there were monks and nuns, laywomen and laymen in the Sangha.

[63:32]

Sort of generally in the Sangha, but really it was considered that the Sangha was the priesthood still. to Mahayana Buddhism, which exploded the idea of Sangha to include not only all people, not only all Buddhists and all people, but all things, all creatures. And the introduction of the bodhisattva precepts and the setting to one side of the old Hinayana precepts, the 250 precepts for the monks and the 348 for the nuns. Although that old way of looking at Sangha still exists in the Sino-American Buddhist Association, for example. I read an article in their publication, True Dharma Seal, entitled, The Laity is Not the Sangha.

[64:36]

Well, that's a pretty elite group, you see. If you support the Sangha, the true Sangha, you know, or not the laity, but this elite group, then maybe in your next life you'll get to be a member of the Sangha. That's the old idea. But we're gradually getting away from that idea. And so the distinction now between monk and lay person, as you implied, is rather vague. Not so clear. Yes? Uh-huh. That's the way they have developed, yes. And Buddhism developed in Far Eastern countries in enclaves like that, in monasteries, partly because they were there on sufferance.

[65:53]

They were not the, Buddhists were not the indigenous, it was not the indigenous religion. They were, it was a guest religion, really, in China, Korea, and Japan. And when they got too big for their britches, they were put down by the authorities. Buddhism was banned for a while in Tang China and given a hard time at periods in history of Japan and Korea. So, sort of this self-protection, they kept themselves within the monastery. Even though their vows to save all beings, you know, extended throughout the whole universe, for practical reasons, kind of stopped there at the edge of the monastery. So there are all kinds of things that are happening now in Buddhism.

[67:00]

The development of the Buddhist Peace Fellowship and all of the other movements of concern in social justice and world peace grow right out of our practice, and there's nothing stopping us. So we can do it. All kinds of things are happening. Yes? I'm assuming at Ringo's we'll have a session. Yes. And I think this session will be different than the past in a couple of ways. We're thinking of opening up the schedule a bit so people have options. one, to choose themselves what they might do with a certain period. And also we're probably going to have lecture. So could you say something about sesshin attitude? I attended a sesshin once where the roshi was ill.

[68:04]

And they couldn't give any teishos until the fifth day of the seven-day session. And of course couldn't give any duksan. It was very difficult for me. And partly because I was a very new student at that time. Certainly, sesshin without teisho and without doksan places the onus upon the sangha and upon the individual student more than is usual. There are three elements of a session in my view. One is zazen, one is tesho, one is doksan. And one of my teachers said the session is like a symphony.

[69:19]

The Hrosi, in his words, the night before session begins, when everyone is gathered, sets the theme for the session. And then his teshos, in one way or another, enlarge and give variety, harmony to that counterpoint, really, to that theme. And the words of the tanto and other senior people in the dojo periodically during zazen. Otso, that's a clarinet here and a bassoon there, you know, following the theme in slightly varied ways. And of course this comes forth in Doksan, and of course it gives the whole session a certain quality, a certain spirit.

[70:34]

So each session is completely unique and different, even though essentially Sesshin means to touch the mind, you know, to receive the mind, to convey the mind. That Setsu in Sesshin is a delightfully ambiguous word. It means all three of those things, to touch, to receive, and to convey the mind. Shin is the mind. In that dimension, you see, there is no flavor, no quality at all. It's entirely pure. But we are all of us individuals sitting together in a certain place at a certain time, so naturally there is a context for this experience of touching the mind.

[71:40]

And everything that goes into session provides that context. And when some of that context is missing, say your zendo burned down, see, you had to sit in the field, you see, something would be missing. And it would put more burden on you to make it a good session. So it puts much more responsibility on the individual participant in the sangha and the sangha together to make it a truly meaningful session when there is no tesho and no doksan. Meaningful, I say. Don't mistake that for anything with meaning. How long do you want to go?

[72:45]

It's 9.20 now. Two more questions? All right. Some questions? Yes. I was going to ask this. There is a Tibetan teacher who is well-known for his character. Yes. And there's a video from him. Uh-huh. On a particular occasion, he came up to give lecture. Obviously, they're going to be to the park health, they'd see. And he gave quite a lot of lecture. He's very professional. And he talked about... Your old kid would absolutely teach the children. And afterwards, I shared a few questions. And I asked him, were the precepts a relative to children? Did the kid get discarded as a student of the Jewish? And he said, absolutely not. The precepts were to help people in every situation, and for all people.

[73:48]

Right on. And not do it. OK. Well, what he said is absolutely correct, you see. Absolutely correct. So, you are put in a rather awkward position there of... of hearing him preach true Dharma without really showing it himself. Or at least showing that he himself was very vulnerable and couldn't even set the bottle aside while he was giving his tesho. In other words, you are put in a position where you are told to do as I say, not as I do.

[74:55]

And I don't think that's fair. You know, in Japan it's said that the tea teacher teaches tea even when going to the toilet. I think that the teacher of Buddhism teaches Buddhism at all times. And so it is important to live up to that responsibility. And I hope I'm not being too stiff and strict about this. I was saying last night, you know, that one must always see the the dark side of one's motives. Why did I write a book about the precepts? I think Renee knows. Maybe I'm a little bit too strict and moralistic.

[76:02]

I've forgotten exactly my train of thought. But, oh yes, be that as it may, I can't help feeling, as maybe one too strict in tomorrow, that it is very important to live up to one's own words. Yeah. What would you say is the essential relationship between morality and meditation? Ah, that's an interesting question. What is the relationship between morality and meditation? It comes down to honesty. It comes down to integrity. What is happening there, you know, in connection with the first question that was asked this evening, you see? What is happening there on your cushions? Dogen Zenji said, drugs have not yet entered in.

[77:12]

Don't let them invade. This is the position of integrity. You know that those thoughts are waiting in the wings. Give them just a fraction of a moment's opportunity and zoom, they're right off center stage. So it is important to exert all one's integrity and to be completely honest at the source of your thoughts. And with this kind of practice of honesty on your cushions, integrity on your cushions, you lead a life of honesty and integrity. This is my belief. we're always bringing ourselves back to move, back to shikantaza. So in the same way, in our daily life, we are bringing ourselves back to a position of honesty and integrity in human relations, where you can say, I shouldn't have said that.

[78:21]

I'm sorry. Yes. One piece that you've spoken about, and that I've worked with a lot, but maybe more specifically, is to hear you speaking ill of others. Yes. And I wonder if you could say a little bit about particularly being honest in meditation and... Yes, it's kind of an ultimate challenge, isn't it? I think that we can use the tools which are provided to us by these modern developments in communication and sharing, which help us to avoid generalizations.

[79:41]

what happens when your child spills her milk, you see? What do you say? Do you say, you are always spilling your milk? That is really condemning others, you see? But if you say, uh-oh, you know, let's get the sponge, the child might say, I didn't mean to do it, you know. In other words, you might not have gotten your point across there that it was an accident, you're still a child, you're in process of growing up, you tipped it over again, but that's okay, I'm sure you're not going to, you're going to try to do better next time. It's all implied in let's get the sponge. You're recognizing that something went wrong there. You're not overlooking it, you're not denying it in any way, but you're somehow working with the child there to help.

[80:59]

to find the right compassionate way to respond that will still be an expression of true dharma. That is the challenge we're always faced with. And those two precepts, not to speak ill of others and not to praise yourself while condemning others, number six and number seven, are very, very difficult ones. But you can find a way. Ben Franklin has an interesting piece in his... in his autobiography. My list of virtues contained at first but twelve, but a quicker friend, having kindly informed me that I was generally thought proud, that my pride showed itself frequently in conversation, that I was not content with being in the right when discussing any point,

[82:21]

but was overbearing and rather insolent, of which he convinced me by mentioning several instances, I determined endeavoring to cure myself if I could of this vice or folly among the rest, and I added humility to my list. Very interesting, you see. So it is possible to correct others when there is an atmosphere of trust. It is possible to plant a seed of correction in a most compassionate way even when there isn't an atmosphere of trust. And it is certainly the responsibility of us all to endeavor to do this. Not to the point of making ourselves obnoxious, you know, but just when it is clear that teaching is necessary here.

[83:32]

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