to the dojo, and stayed on his kind of agnostic path, and he was an artist, so he found his way through a lifetime of art. So, there's an example of a deep dream that shows you that you're not on the right way. Is that the kind of thing you meant? Yes, I wonder if you could expand on that, yes, it's self-cautioning, there should be self-caution. Yes, I think I did go into this a little, but I probably should do more, yes.

[01:00]

Yes, I can quote from the Surangama, there's really some horror stories in that chapter, some of those fifty kinds of mokyo. So, incidentally, that Surangama Sutra is published by Ryder back in 68 or so, translated by Charles Luke, and it's long out of print. It probably should be brought back, hint, hint. Why would you propose that the man painting and rubbing out the same vision was not showing signs of perfect enlightenment? It seems to me that he was stuck in that place.

[02:10]

Yes, I think that the mark of someone more mature would be a willingness to go on from experience and to be content with the notion that there might not be another great experience like that, but that my life is fueled or my life is steered straight by the experience that I had then, and I am now working not necessarily beyond that, but certainly I am

[03:10]

letting it alone and dealing with the world of people and animals and plants now, and I'm not looking back. Is this making sense? It makes sense, I'm not sure I agree. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. In a tradition where the Lord said, pray without ceasing, watch for the night will come. Oh, sure. Oh, sure. But, you know, when he comes and you have that experience, then you go on and maybe he'll come again. Each time he paid it, she came again. Hmm. I suppose he must have felt that way.

[04:12]

If he did, okay, he might have felt that way. My sense from that story, and the way John Woo told it, was that he was like a poet who was continually reworking his juvenilia. Uh-huh. This sounded almost to me like he was trying to get it again. To get it back. I'm always telling students that they should value their mākiau. It's a milestone on the path for you, but no experience is be-all and end-all, and you

[05:22]

must go on from there. I can hear what you're saying, Jack, but . . . Towards the end of the essay, do you quote Wolfgang saying, erase, erase? No, that's my words. And I'm saying that, paraphrasing Yangshan, saying the truth of the Mahāyāna is beyond that. Bam! Listen! That's a very interesting question, though. Yes? It seems that mākiau is referred to as a vision of some type. What about just a feeling, a feeling of connectedness, without any words to describe it, or any actual . . . Yeah. Yes.

[06:23]

Yes. In earlier work, I translated mākiau as mysterious vision. But it's certainly more than vision and refers to the circumstances rather than the perception that things are uncanny, not ordinary at all, and weird in some ways. Our ordinary feeling is that I am here and you are out there. Hmm? This is the ordinary immature attitude. And it is also absolutely true, you know, I am here and you are out there.

[07:25]

But it's only immature in that that is not the only experience. The sudden realization of interconnectedness is certainly a very precious experience. Yes. And also one that can be just a step away from realization. Okay? Yes? In the case, I wasn't very clear on the way in which the entire assembly was perceived. Oh, they thought that the truth of the Mahāyāna is beyond the four propositions and transcends the hundred negations. And that's it. They thought that was the message. Well, I think, I think that's what Mumon meant.

[08:33]

If I had a kotsu here, I would... Yeah. Basu Yosenji said, Who is hearing that sound? One of the most important questions that is asked in all of Zen literature. Yes? And also, who is dreaming the dream? Yeah, and that can go around and around, the two, can it? Who is dreaming the dream? Yeah, well, I asked that in here, who is dreaming?

[09:37]

Right. Yes, right. Yes. But, you see, who is dreaming the dream centers the inquiring spirit upon the self. This. But who is hearing that sound connects you up? Yes. Somebody else had a hand up here. In the book of Thich Nhat Hanh, I read something like this, that the dishes, washing the dishes. That's a very important experience too. One of my old friends at Cocoan came to me in Doksan, with his face alight, and said to me,

[10:46]

when I stood up for Thich Nhat Hanh, there was only that standing up in the whole universe. Very important experience. The dishes washing the dishes. So I tell students, Mu breathes Mu. Yes. Yes, the dream is dreaming the dream. Yeah. Some Native American languages don't have nouns. It's all verbs. Okay, some more.

[11:58]

Yes. Maybe you have questions about other matters. What is the importance of a koan? The importance of a koan. Koan is an arcanum, you know. Arcanum is a word from Western mysticism,

[13:13]

that is especially found in Tarot, where such images as the hanging man have a great evocative power. When you think that in the Tang period there were a few hundred Zen masters, maybe, I don't know how many, but anyway, a whole lot of them, maybe a hundred, at any one time. And all of these teachers held evening meetings like this, in which monks or nuns would come forward and make their vows,

[14:24]

and there would be a dialogue. And there might be maybe twenty such dialogues in an evening. And so, imagine how many dialogues there were. And all of them recorded, you know, all of them written down. Imagine how many dialogues there were. Hundreds of thousands of dialogues or more, millions of dialogues probably. Of these, only 550 are used in Sambo Kyodan curriculum, at most 1,500 in some Rinzai dojos. And of these, the Koan Mu has arisen to the surface

[15:25]

as the most efficacious of all these arcanums, arcana. Like the images in Tibetan temples, which are felt to be empowered by the devotions of so many thousands of worshippers. I don't want to make too much of this rather occult side of it. And we can just look at the ordinary experiential side, that it has been found to be the practical way to realization experience, to focus upon these points, which are inevitably complementarities.

[16:41]

And, you know, the scientists at the turn of the century found that the wave theory and the particle theory of light were both true. So how can such apparently conflicting theories both be true? Well, they invented a word, complementarity, to show how form could be emptiness and emptiness can be form, so to speak. That's the basic complementarity of Zen and of life, of reality. How can the particular and the universal be the same? Well, you know, this comes out in Bell's theorem

[17:46]

that anything that happens to any particular particle happens to all other particles in the universe equally and at the same time. You know, science is groping for all this kind of realization intellectually but from the beginning it has been presented in Zen poetically. This apparently solid body, you know, is made up of particles that are as far apart from each other as the earth is from the nearest star in relation to their size. And even those particles cannot be said to have substance, they cannot be said not to have substance. So what is it then? You know, Gauguin's question,

[18:55]

what are we, where do we come from, where are we going? is the one that really troubles us in our heart of hearts, troubles all of us. And it's in the direction of resolving these deep questions that we examine these points which come out of the heart of the most mellow and profound experience of great teachers. How old was Zhao Zhou or Zhou Shu when he said Mu? Boy, I don't know, but he didn't start teaching until he was 80. You know, really, he was probably about a hundred years old. And he probably didn't have the energy to do anything more than whisper it.

[20:01]

But that whisper really came straight from the mystery. And it behooves us to understand, to stand under, to make our own that same mystery. So that is the function of Koan. I remember years ago I was talking to an assembly here on the mainland, not in this room, when someone challenged me about my preoccupation with history. And I said, what are you talking about, my preoccupation with history? And he said, well, you're always talking about Koans. And there are dialogues that took place back there a thousand years ago in a different country, in a different culture. Well, the interesting thing about Koans is that,

[21:12]

except for a very few that sort of relate to folk stories that need to be explained, it's perennial stuff. You know? I mean, if you say essential nature to a Catholic priest, he knows exactly what you're talking about. If he is at all learned, or a Catholic nun, she knows her stuff. The words, even, are the same. The word dog is the same. You can just transpose Buddha nature to essential nature. Does the dog have essential nature or not? No. No. How am I doing? I didn't mean to...

[22:15]

I didn't intend to hold forth on the subject of Koans to an audience that's practicing Shikhandaza. Excuse me. It's the dog that taught you. Yeah, you know, that's an interesting question. And watching your dog kicking away while she's asleep, you wonder. Yipping away. Hmm. Yes. Oh, yeah.

[23:28]

Oh, yeah. Yes. For what it is. Yes. Someone remarked to me that the whole world is metaphor, and everything in the world is metaphor. This is a very interesting point,

[24:30]

and it enriches the notion that all life is a dream, because without any previous introduction to the idea that all life is a dream, to say it is, someone might get the impression that it's meaningless, you know, and that it has no substance. Of course it has no substance, but, you know, substance of no substance. Yeah. Yeah. I was flabbergasted when my mother told me a few years ago that my crazy Hungarian grandmother

[25:33]

who was very mystical and wild in her beliefs and practices, came from a sort of gypsy-Jewish mix way back in the backwoods of Eastern Europe, would all the time say, and my mother repeated to me in Yiddish, which I can't do right now, her most common phrase was the Yiddish phrase, all life is a dream. And this she got from her growing up and from some of her practices. Right, right, right. This sort of wild mystical culture. Right. Yes, yes. Yes, I think more can be said about that in here. Yes. In a sense, Yangshan's dream was rather tame,

[26:38]

but in a sense it was wild, you know, that he should actually go there, you know, and take his seat comfortably in that place. Yes. How's our time? It's quarter to. No, not quite quarter to. Okay. Yes. What was the distinction you were trying to make between dreams we would have on our Christian dreams at night? Why were you denigrating the one and not the other? Yeah, I don't mean to denigrate so much. I'm just trying to make the distinction between dreams and reflections. Yeah, in fact, some makyo occur while asleep. Yeah.

[27:39]

And particularly in that time between deep sleep and waking. Hypnagogic. Yes. Hypnagogic? Hypnagogic? Hypno... Huh? Hypnagogic. However, commonly, statistically, maybe, the makyo that are reported to me occur on the cushions. Yes. There's a Zen story I heard, actually, it's pretty gorgeous. I was talking to you in bed rounds last year, and it relates to a Zen master who,

[28:43]

when he was young, he was a young monk, he used to be fond of, I think, lying in a canoe in a lake and watching the scenery and sort of dreaming of God. And he had some experience there which profoundly affected him. I forget what happened. Maybe Norman Moore remembers. But it was, he was really awakened by this and he went to his teacher. And his teacher said, yes, that's important, but that's not the enlightenment of the Buddhas and ancestors. I don't care. That's good enough for me. It's good enough for me. And his teacher said, that's the mind of the Buddhas and ancestors. Well, of course, well, yes. Hard to say.

[29:43]

But for sure, with some experience comes some confidence. This is a story of a teacher and student who knew each other well, you know. It is uncommon for a student to reply, to me anyway, when I say, that's an important experience, a milestone experience, but there's another step, to say, no, that's complete.

[30:49]

It's rather unusual and each interview, of course, is different and the dynamics of teaching, the dialogue are different and everything, but it is quite possible that in this case the student was right and then the teacher was right in agreeing, but I can't tell. Well, it's more listening to the message,

[31:59]

so to speak. When the Buddha looked up and saw the morning star, this was not merely a trigger for something to turn over in him. Although it was, of course. He was getting instructions, so to speak. And this is the virtue of the Mahayana, you see, that we are all of us, human beings, animals, plants, inanimate objects, turning the wheel of the Dharma as avatars of this, of essential nature,

[33:02]

so to speak. We get the message from other avatars. We hear so much about looking within and finding the truth there, but every single story in Zen literature is a story of experiencing something from outside. Outside, quote-end-quote, you see, quote-end-quote. It's really not outside, but in ordinary terms, out there. The star, the stone striking bamboo, the distant peach blossoms, and so on and so on and so on, all through this literature. This is what is taught. So, it's not merely that we look within and find essential nature there. Not merely that. So, samadhi

[34:05]

is vitally important, but the whole world is in samadhi. You know, I remember, in fact, I tell this story in taking the path walking in the garden of Ryutaku-ji with Soenroshi, and he pointed to a frog floating on the surface of the water. You know, arms and legs spread out the way frogs do sometimes. And he said, what is that frog doing? And I knew better than try to say something, so I kept quiet. And he said, frog zazen. Even people in mental institutions are in samadhi to some degree. They are absorbed to some degree. So, samadhi is really

[35:07]

a very relative term. And the whole world is absorbed to some place. Wordsworth had the lines, the stones on the highway are deep in admiration. Remember that line? So, I want to encourage samadhi, but samadhi is not a be-all and end-all as a practice or as an experience. That is, once on samadhi, personal samadhi. Well,

[36:16]

this has been a very precious experience for me this evening and these weeks that Anne and I have been spending with you. And I'm very grateful to you. I only hope that I will have a chance to read every one of these aloud like this, at least to some audience, because it's useful. Maybe ten years from now I'll have a good book. There's room here in front and there's room in the little aisle here. So please come forward so you won't have to stand up. Come right forward here. That's it.

[37:17]

Sit in there. It'll be the flower arrangement right here. All right. Please come forward. There's room in here. Lots of room here. Come forward. That's it. There we are. Please sit comfortably. Tomorrow

[38:18]

Anne and I will leave for two weeks. I, to Japan, for some meetings that are made necessary by the death of my teacher, our teacher. And Anne to visit her brother and his family on the East Coast. And we will be back for the remainder of October and almost all of November with Yvonne Rand. So we are not saying goodbye to Green Gulch for this year. But we won't be in residence here so I want to take this opportunity to thank all of you for your generous hospitality It's been very helpful for us to have this

[39:20]

sabbatical. Giving me a chance to to do some writing and the bonus has been getting acquainted with you, learning much from you and your program and gaining respect for your practice. I'm putting together my talks on the Wumeng Guan, the Mumong Khan, a book of 48 classic Zen cases that was composed edited first in the 13th century in Converting talks to essays

[40:21]

is quite a daunting task and I have read many of them to Sangha members at the Kokulan Zen Do during classes And people there were very helpful, making suggestions and offering criticisms. And I read Case 23 to you earlier during our stay, and you also were very helpful with that case. And tonight I will read Case 25, Kyozan's Dream, Yangshan's Dream. And I invite your comments during our discussion period. So bear with me while I read this.

[41:23]

Yangshan dreamed he went to Maitreya's place and was led to the third seat. A senior monk struck the stand with a gavel and announced, Today the one in the third seat will preach. Yangshan arose, struck the stand with the gavel, and said, The truth of the Mahayana is beyond the four propositions and transcends the one hundred negations. Listen, listen. Wumen's comment. Tell me, did he preach or not? If you open your mouth, you are lost. If you cannot speak, you are stumped. If you neither open your mouth nor keep it closed, you are one hundred and eight thousand miles off.

[42:37]

Wumen's verse. In broad daylight under the blue sky, he preached a dream within a dream. Absurd, absurd, he deceived the entire assembly. Yangshan was an early Tang master, a cousin of Linji or Rinzai in the Dharma. His teacher was Guishan. And together they are credited with founding the Guiyang or Igyo school of Tang Zen, one of the five Zen schools of that time. This is a school remembered for harmony rather than for confrontation in its dialogues. Yangshan went with Guishan to the fields to help him with plowing.

[43:47]

He said, How is it that this side is so low and the other side is so high? Guishan said, Water can level all things. Let the water be the leveler. Yangshan said, Water is not reliable. It is just that the high places are high and the low places are low. Guishan said, Oh, that's true. Water is the leveler. Be like water and find the essential equality. Guishan is saying, Water is not the only symbol of reality. Yangshan replies, If you just view everything as equal, you miss the wealth of unique phenomena in our world. Guishan agrees, and student and teacher are in perfect accord.

[44:53]

Equality and variety are in perfect accord. Yangshan was known to his contemporaries as Little Shakya, a name we might render as Shakya Muni Jr., a true son of the Buddha himself. He acquired this name through a fabulous story. A magician flew in from India one day. Yangshan asked him, When did you leave India? The magician said, This morning. Yangshan said, What took you so long? The magician said, Oh, I went sightseeing here and there on the way. Yangshan said, You obviously have occult power,

[45:55]

but you haven't yet dreamed of the great occult power of the Buddha Dharma. The magician returned to India and told his followers, I went to China to find Manjusri. Instead, I found Little Shakya Muni. Manjusri, you know, is the incarnation of wisdom. It is interesting that a teacher who scorned ordinary occult accomplishments, such as flying through the air, would also be remembered for his dream of going to Maitreya's mythological realm. Maitreya is the Buddha still to be born, due to appear a very long time from now. He is waiting in the Tusita heaven in deep samadhi, gradually evolving with all beings toward his ultimate role as world teacher.

[47:01]

Yangshan dreamed he went to the Tusita heaven. What kind of dream is this? All life is a dream, as the Diamond Sutra says and other sutras say. When he was ninety-four, Yamamoto Genpo Roshi inscribed the ideographed dream, which an artist then incised in a wooden plaque that hangs in our temple in Honolulu. I get the sense that dream is the way the Roshi summed up his long life. But as Wumen remarks in his verse, Yangshan's dream was within that dream. It was, as we would say in western terms, a deep dream.

[48:05]

The deep dream in Zen Buddhism is generally placed under the rubric of makyo, uncanny condition, visions or other sense distortions that are experienced during zazen. It is a term that is related to the name Mara, the evil one. The Chinese Surangama Sutra sets forth fifty kinds of makyo, some of which are clearly encouraging milestones on the path, but it warns that preoccupation with these positive symptoms can lead one astray. I am reminded of a story that John Woo told in his class on Christian mysticism

[49:11]

at the University of Hawaii many years ago, of a priest who at the age of eighteen had a vision of the Virgin Mary and then spent the rest of his life painting, rubbing out, and repainting his vision on the wall of his cell. He treated a sign of promise as its fulfillment and remained there. A cautionary tale. Zen teachers tend to be over-scrupulous in their concern that makyo can be delusive. Yet they will acknowledge that commonly a makyo will precede deep realization and can even occur as a confirmation of that realization. When Yangshan told his teacher Guishan about his dream, Guishan remarked,

[50:13]

you have reached the level of sage. What do you suppose he meant by that? Yamada Roshi once remarked to me, it is possible to be enlightened without being a sage, using enlightened in its rather technical sense of having a glimpse of essential nature. And, of course, it is possible to be a sage without being enlightened in that narrow sense. Guishan is saying, however, you are an enlightened sage. High praise indeed. What is a sage? A mature human being, I would say. Yangshan could dream that he went to the Tusita heaven and was led in to sit at the third seat,

[51:14]

because that was his seat, just below Maitreya and Shakyamuni. That was where he belonged. He really was little Shakya. As a Zen student, your deep dream shows you where you are in your practice and in your life. You find yourself to be the central figure in a ritual that confirms you on the path, much as Yangshan was confirmed as a teacher and sage. No bluff is possible here. Some of my students have found themselves to be Buddhist figures, covered with gold leaf or with gold light. It is an experience that transcends sexual identity. Women might find themselves to be Shakyamuni, men to be Guanyin.

[52:20]

There is a sense of the very old, or of the timeless, and a strong feeling of encouragement will follow. Although it is not identified as such, case 35 of the Blue Cliff Record is surely a makyo. Wuju, or Muchu, visits Mount Wutai, believed to be the abode of Manjushri. In very wild and rough terrain, Manjushri conjured up a temple where Wuju could spend the night. They had quite a remarkable dialogue, and the next day, when it was time for Wuju to go, Manjushri ordered his servant boy to see him to the gate. Wuju asked the boy,

[53:22]

What temple is this? And when the boy pointed, he turned his head. The temple and the boy, too, vanished completely. A dream, and the dialogue of that dream is one of the toughest koans in our curriculum. Wuju asked Manjushri, How is the Buddha Dharma being maintained here? Manjushri said, Sages and ordinary people are living together. Dragons and snakes are mixed. Wuju asked, How many are there? Manjushri said, Front three, three. Back three, three. That's the kind of strange nonsense one encounters in a deep dream. You must enter that uncanny condition yourself once again,

[54:28]

and with your critical faculties alert, with your critical faculties alert, in order to understand it, to stand under it, and to make it intimate. I have not read a commentary or heard a taisho on the story of Yangshan's dream, in which the teacher says that it was a makyo. I think they must recognize it as such, however, a makyo that goes beyond promise and presents the essential world itself. There, in the presence of the Buddhas, Yangshan confidently arose, struck the stand with a gavel and said, The truth of the Mahayana is beyond the four propositions and transcends the one hundred negations. Listen, listen.

[55:29]

The four propositions are the one, the many, being and non-being. The one hundred negations are made up with four negatives for each of the propositions. Not, not not, neither not nor not not, and both not and not not, making sixteen. Then each of these sixteen is found in the past, present and future. That makes forty-eight. These have appeared or have not yet appeared, so that makes ninety-six. Negate the original four and you get one hundred negations. Out, out, cries Guishan. Erase, erase. The truth of the Mahayana has nothing whatsoever to do with such intellection. It is found, as the Buddha pointed out in the beginning,

[56:35]

beyond the realm of words. Yet even with the word beyond, perhaps some kind of image appears. The Emperor Wu of Liang invited the Mahasattva Fu to speak on the Diamond Sutra. Fu ascended to the high seat, shook the lectern once, oh, once, like that, and descended. The emperor was astonished. The Duke of Chur, his spiritual advisor, asked, Your Majesty, do you understand? The emperor said, I don't understand. The Duke of Chur said, The Mahasattva Fu has expounded the Sutra. The Mahasattva Fu was a contemporary of Bodhidharma,

[57:39]

though perhaps they never met. He is not a part of our lineage, formally speaking, but is one of the great personages who appeared from the potent matrix of Chinese Buddhist culture in those early pre-Tang times. Yangshan swung the gavel, and this was just like Fu shaking the lectern. Then he added words of explication, ending with a cautionary, Listen, listen. Pay attention. Who is hearing that sound? Don't neglect this point. Women comments tell me, did he preach or not? If you open your mouth, you are lost. If you cannot speak, you are stumped.

[58:39]

If you neither open your mouth or if you cannot speak, you are 108,000 miles off. You will have to wait around for Maitreya, as women remarks in his comment to case five, and ask him about it. Women is simply echoing Yangshan, it can't be said, it can't not be said. Cut through, not, and not, not, and listen. Who is preaching here? The Zen Buddhist Taisho is literally a presentation of the call. That call is the cats, see?

[59:42]

Literally, the word call there refers to that shout of the Zen teacher. It's like the call of the peacock, or a coyote, or the mallet striking the wooden drum. It has a trace of meaning, and like the others, is meaningful. Listen, listen. Women's verse reads, in broad daylight under the blue sky, he preached a dream within a dream. That's how it is, like Shakespeare's play within the play of Hamlet, which is all play. The dream within the dream of broad daylight and blue sky,

[60:43]

where the Buddha Dharma and the Dharma of trees and birds are completely clear, is all a dream. Who is dreaming here? Absurd, absurd, woman's verse continues, he deceived the entire assembly. Shibayama Roshi points out that another version of this story ends with the words, the monks dispersed. Presumably, that is the monks in the dream, the monks dispersed, presumably with joy at Yangshan's teaching. But maybe they were fooled into their delight. Maybe they thought the truth of the Mahayana is simply a matter of transcending the four propositions and the one hundred negations, and they didn't really listen.

[61:45]

Okay, thank you. So, who would like to comment or ask a question? Yes. I was just wondering, when you refer to Maitreya, why is it lay off? Can you give me more details? Of course. In fact, the figures of Maitreya are quite feminine. You've probably seen them, typically leaning on fingers like this. Yeah, you've seen that image. But, just as Guan Yin can be considered male,

[62:52]

so Maitreya can be considered female. But it's just a kind of usage, I think. That's right, they don't have the pronoun. You know, Japanese people love test questions, and so I tried a few on them. And I once went through a phase of asking my Zen friends there, is Guan Yin male or female? And the answer I got was usually, sa. You know, oh, I wonder. It's not something that occurs to them, because as you say, the pronouns don't appear in the language.

[63:57]

So, it's not something that occurs to them. Start dumb! Yes? It strikes me that there are different dimensions to the dream. There's the dream which in a sense keeps us out of touch, the dream as wish or hope of something that will come. Yeah, I think probably I should mention something like this, Joe, because even in discussing makyo, people will come to me and say, I saw these great lights, you know, and there's little balls running around. It's nonsense, you know.

[65:15]

It's probably something you had for dinner, you know. And so, we need to distinguish pretty carefully between the deep dream that I'm speaking of here, which is almost always, not always, but almost always some kind of religious drama in which the dreamer has a central role. Although it may be just finding oneself to be the Buddha or one of the bodhisattvas. But usually there's some action, some action that confirms the self. So, this is very different from the dreams of ego aggrandizement or the dreams that involve fear and so on.

[66:18]

Very different. An important point. Who's got a pencil? I forgot to bring my pencil. Thank you. I think I'll hang on to this until the end of the meeting. Yes, yes. I would appreciate hearing more about makyo expressing a central point. Well, I think that's a good question. Well, sometimes someone will bring to me a very interesting makyo.

[67:22]

And I will say to that person, if that person is working on the koan Mu, for example, how does this relate to Mu? And sometimes it's very easy. The student will say exactly how this relates to Mu and what Mu is. So, it's the threshold, so to speak, of kensho, right there. The dream was, the makyo was. And sometimes it isn't. And sometimes the experience may be next week or next session or next year. But usually it's a precursor of deep experience. I'm reminded that Flora Courtois was just here last night having supper with us. In her little book called An Experience of Enlightenment,

[68:29]

she describes her own makyo before her realization experience took place. And she was in a cave, living as a cavewoman with her family. And they came out into the light of day, and there was this beautiful vista before them all. And all the other members of her family went back to the cave, and only she went on. You know, there's nothing overtly Buddhist about this. In fact, she had no contact with Buddhism at this time. The extraordinary thing about that book is that it's an account of a woman's realization experience without a teacher. I recommend that book to you. It's published by Theosophical Press, and it's just recently reissued. My own makyo, which I described in Taking the Path of Zen,

[69:38]

was at the same session when I later had my first important experience. I found myself seated in a vast temple that had stone floors and enormous stone pillars that went up to an infinitely high ceiling. And a line of monks in black, very tall monks, walked around me reciting sutras. But such was the general attitude about makyo that I had picked up already that I didn't even mention this to my teacher. I think that's regrettable. The Zen teacher has kind of gone overboard, I think, in warning against makyo.

[70:47]

So it's not given its due. But it's not a be-all and end-all experience at the same time, and so this is what I want to caution people about. Don't be like that poor fellow that kept rubbing out and repainting his vision. He was stuck back there, you see, at age 18, for all his life. Does this answer your question enough? All right. Now somebody right near here had a question. I was struck by the differentiation between the enlightened being and the sage. Yes. It reminded me of something that Yamada Roshi once said about Father LaSalle and how much he admired him as a human being. Yes. And the difficulty of the integration of those two. Uh-huh. Yeah. David, did you want to question?

[71:49]

Do you have a question? I wanted to talk more about the difficulty of that integration and how it's possible to be enlightened and not a sage. Well, Yamada Roshi was using, as I said, that term enlightened in its narrow sense. And in that narrow sense, it refers to a peep into essential nature, you know, which Yastani Roshi described as rubbing a clear place in a piece of frosted glass, you know. And you look through there, and that's essential nature, all right. But you have to clean up all the rest of that impurity and maybe push the glass out. It's important to regard the realization experience in a very real sense as the beginning of one's practice. And from then on, you have a lot of work to do.

[72:54]

I remember Anne and I attending a hasan-sai ceremony for Dr. Okada at Yastani Roshi's dojo acknowledging Dr. Okada as having finished his Koan study and preparing to be a teacher. And Yastani Roshi said, now his practice begins. Always beginning. And even Kyozan or Yongshan probably heard his teacher's words with a little bit of doubt, you know, thinking, Not yet. I don't think I'm really a sage yet.

[73:57]

Even though he, from his heart, was confirmed as a Buddha. Yes. This case reminds me of a phrase that says something like this, that without error, no satori. Without error, no? No satori. Oh, satori. Without error, no satori. Yes. And without satori, no error. And I... Without satori, no error. Let me see. I think that, for instance, this makyo, that confirms in a certain way satori.

[75:03]

The makyo really confirms I am on the path. That's what it does. And what is clear, what becomes clear by understanding the place of makyo is that we're talking about a practice, about a process here. That zazen is not a static condition. And that there are little milestones and big milestones on the way. The way is endless, as Dogen Zenji says. And this practice is continued endlessly, in this five-part statement there. To study the Buddha way is to study the self, and so on. You know that five-part statement.

[76:08]

It ends. And this realization, this enlightenment, is continued endlessly. Very interesting to play with the fact that he uses the passive voice here. It's very subtle. Yes. You used to be more cautionary about makyo. Isn't it also possible it can confirm you being off the trail? If it is, it's not the kind of deep dream that I'm speaking about here. You can have a deep dream that shows you that you're off the path. For example, I began zazen with a very close friend.

[77:13]

And we went to visit Senzaki together. And we began sitting with him together. And then, very early on, he had a dream. Oh, this was a dream while he was asleep, not while he was doing zazen. And his dream was a vision of Torii. Did you know the Shinto gate? Which he saw as the gate to the Dharma, or the gate to the practice. And it was a shimmering golden, or a wooden gate, but with shimmering golden light. And a very attractive gate, with a very attractive vista on the other side. But he realized that wasn't his gate. Same.

[78:17]

And...

[78:19]

@Text_v004
@Score_JJ