The topic for this special month is the transmission of the Dharma torch, the simple transmission of the true Dharma. I don’t know if Dogen Zenji really said this, but, in one record of his conversations, the Kenzeiki, it says that in Japan, after about four hundred years of transmitting literal and formal Buddhism, Japanese society had matured enough for him and his lineage to transmit the true Dharma. Similarly, in China, after four hundred years of transmitting literal and formal Buddhism, the Chinese people were ready for the great teacher Bodhidharma to transmit the essence of the authentic Dharma.
   It seems to me that in America we have a different kind of situation. After a fairly short period of exposure to Buddhism, Zen teachers and other Buddhist teachers too, came to America and almost immediately transmitted the authentic and essential Buddhadharma to us in the form of a very simple practice. We did not have four hundred years of working with the literal and formal aspects of Buddhism to prepare the ground for an insightful reception of the true Dharma.
   I don’t know how we’re doing, or whether we can so quickly really open up to the “pure and simple color of true practice.” But we can’t change history; we have to accept that this has happened. In a sense, the subtext of this month of study is how the Bodhisattva precepts provide a way for us to truly receive this marvelous Zen transmission. What was transmitted to us was a practice of one precept. Originally, many of us came for that pure and simple one precept practice, which has always been and still is characterized overall simply by total devotion to upright sitting, total engagement in immobile sitting. It was that way in China, in India, in Japan, Korea, and it’s that way now.
   As a number of our teachers have said, it may be rather difficult to understand what it means to just sit. Still, this “just sitting” is the overall characteristic of this school. All of us share in that. A truly simple experience of the sacred. No matter where you go in the realm of the disciples of Dogen Zenji, immediacy is always the quality of the unvarying transmission of the one true Dharma. And of course, right now, immediacy is the one thing we have.
   In our final moment, the focus will be on the effort which accords with our fundamental, our radical endowment. In the end, that’s what we must focus on, and that’s what we must focus on for eternity – our root endowment. Can we accord with this, by not moving? This is the practice and teaching of thusness which you chanted this morning, which we call zazen.
   Dogen emphatically says that if you do not engage in one thing you will never reach the one wisdom: one precept called “just to be yourself.” No side roads, no alternatives, no choosing. When we are just ourselves – we are assured by our ancestors – the entire world is saved. When we can sit kindly enough with ourselves until we know who we are, the whole world is liberated. As Dogen Zenji says, even if you sit in this self-fulfilling awareness for a short time, the entire universe resonates with this mudra and the entire sky turns into enlightenment.
   As Sawaki Roshi said, the entire universe echoes every action and when we are ourselves the entire universe is itself. When we are ourselves, we can respond appropriately. But of course it’s very difficult for us just to be ourselves. We would like an alternative, we would like to choose. But in order to do this simple practice we must renounce all alternatives, we must renounce choosing, and simply become the chosen one. As long as we’re looking for alternatives we will complain and grumble. When we give up alternatives we cannot help but move straight forward on the path.
   Still, it’s difficult to understand what this means. In kind of reverse order, many of us realize that, as Dogen Zenji says, the one great cause of entering the Zen gate is the Sixteen Great Bodhisattva Precepts. These precepts show us the body, the shape and the function of Buddha’s mind. They show us the magnificence and profundity of a simple practice. These sixteen precepts are the way to enter into one precept. These sixteen precepts are extremely comprehensive and broad. They show us the meaning of one practice, the body, shape and function of one practice.
   They have a moral aspect. They seem to engage the issue of moral conduct, of doing and not doing things, of right livelihood. They also show the way of transmission of the Dharma and the real meaning of our sitting practice. They provide a way for us to expose the vows which are in our silent sitting so that others may understand what it is we hope to accomplish for all beings in this simple practice. They articulate for ourselves and others the attitude with which we practice sitting.
   To say that in the end we will be focused on our fundamental endowment is the same as saying that in the end we will receive these precepts. In our final moment we will go for refuge in Buddha, Dharma and Sangha. To say that for eternity we will focus on our root endowment is the same as saying that for eternity we will incessantly, wholeheartedly take refuge in the Triple Treasure.
   Receiving the precepts ourselves and assisting others to do so, also provides a way for those who have the opportunity to practice this simple way to unite with those who do not. Receiving these precepts is something that both monks and lay people can do. We have the same Bodhisattva precepts. Through these precepts we unite the entire cosmos. Even though not everyone seems to be able to practice sitting still, we unite and inform, mutually, each other.
   We receive the precepts, and after receiving them we vow to maintain them, to maintain taking refuge in the Triple Treasure, maintain avoiding all evil, doing all good and benefiting all beings. We vow to continue to observe the precepts. The reason they need to be maintained is that everything changes. Our understanding of the precepts is constantly changing. The meaning of the precepts is different in every situation. How will we maintain these precepts after we receive them? The touchstone of understanding how to maintain the precepts is this engagement in stillness and silence. In the stillness and silence we have a chance to understand how the world has just changed and what the precepts are calling for now.
   The Book of Serenity, Case fifty-three is called “Huangbo’s Dreg-slurpers.” Dregs are sediment that appears in a liquid. If you take wine and decant it from one bottle to another there’s some sediment. If we take the precepts, the river of the precepts, the blood vein of the precepts, there can still be some sediment in that flowing liquid. How do we stay up in the flow, in the living, pulsing flow of these precepts and not sink down into the sediment, becoming literal about it?
   Huangbo came into the hall one day and said to his monks, “What do you all want to look for?” He took his staff and swung it around and chased them out of the hall, but they didn’t leave. He said, “If you go on like this, how will you have today? Don’t you know that in all of China there are no teachers of Zen?” At that time a monk came forward and said, “Well, what about these places all over China where people are guiding followers and leading assemblies?” Huangbo said, “I didn’t say there is no Chan, no Zen, in China. I just said that there are no teachers of Chan.”
   In the commentary on this case there is a story about a wheelwright. Maybe all of you know, a wheelwright is somebody who makes wheels right. Maybe you know that the etymology of the Sanskrit word dukkha, suffering, or frustration, has to do with a wheel that’s out of round, that’s not quite round. In a sense, maybe, all of us who are disciples of Buddha are wheelwrights. We endeavor to do the work of making the Dharma wheel and turning it.
   This is story about a wheelwright named Lun Pian. One day Lun Pian was working with his chisel and adz on his wheels. He worked for a great Chinese lord named Ji Heng. Ji Heng was inside the great hall, in one of the rooms, reading a book by a window. Lun Pian saw him. He put down his chisel and mallet, went over and said, “Sir, what are you doing?” Lord Ji Heng said, “I’m reading a book of the ancients.” The wheelwright said, “Are those ancients alive or dead?” The lord said, “They’re dead.” Wheelwright Lun Pian said, “Then, you’re slurping the dregs of the ancestors.”
   Maybe you know about China in those days. I’m not sure this took place in the T’ang dynasty but the story became popular then. The Lord could have had this servant executed on such provocation. He said, “You need to make an explanation. Otherwise, you die.” The wheelwright said, “I look at it in terms of my own work. If I go slowly it’s easygoing but not firm. If I go quickly, it’s hard but it doesn’t fit in. Without going fast or slow, I find it in my hand and accord with it in my mind. I can’t express it in words. There’s an art to it but I can’t teach it to my daughter, and my son can’t learn it from me. Therefore, I have just been making wheels for seventy years. This is why, your majesty, this is how you are slurping the dregs of the ancestors.”
   The introduction to this case says that in facing the situation you don’t see Buddha. Great enlightenment doesn’t hold a teacher. The sword that settles heaven and earth obliterates human sentiments, and the ability to capture tigers and rhinoceros depends on forgetting holy understanding. Not killing, not stealing, not taking what’s not offered, not lying, not misusing sexuality, not speaking of others’ faults, not praising yourself at the expense of others, not being possessive of the Dharma teaching, not being angry, and not disparaging the Triple Treasure. This is the gate to being still and quiet. What is the flowing not fast, not slow, of these precepts? What is the living, changing, ungraspable life of the Triple Treasure? What is the today of avoiding evil, practicing good and saving beings?
   We receive these precepts, and they live, and because they live, we realize there are no precepts. “There are no precepts” means there’s only one precept. “One precept” means, everything’s the precepts. As Reverend Tenryu said, the sound of the bell is the precepts. The sound of the airplane is the precepts. The precepts show us the boundless magnificence of our practice. When I heard him say, the other day, that the sound of the bell was the precepts, in my mind there was a flash, and I saw myself putting garbage in a garbage can. In the kitchen there’s a dishwashing area, and under the table there’s a compost bucket. I bring compost and put it in the compost bucket. I have to reach under the table to put the garbage in the compost.
   When he said the sound of the bell is the precepts, I saw a flash and it was of me and I was putting garbage in the garbage can. But you know, I wasn’t really being respectful when I put the garbage in there. I realized I wasn’t there at that moment. I just dumped the garbage. I was not there. I violated the one precept, and I violated all the precepts. But I felt good catching myself. I felt good that this rude character had been apprehended.
   When I realize, if I can understand and remember that everything, every one of your faces, every one of your bodies is the precepts, I feel I’m sitting still. I’m quiet and I have no greed, hate or delusion. They are struck aside immediately. When I forget that, I’m off. When I remember that I’m off, and examine it, all beings are protected. I’m not saying I never again will disrespectfully use the garbage can, but that is my vow. I vow to wholeheartedly practice all good, with no breaks. I vow that putting garbage in the can will be an act of goodness, not an act of mediocrity or okay-ness, but a sincere expression of my wish for all beings to be happy and free. It’s one practice – twenty four hours a day.
   As Dogen Zenji says, in the end, you will be able to inherit and transmit the wisdom life of the Buddha ancestors by these Sixteen Great Bodhisattva Precepts, these sixteen petals of the one flower of simply being yourself.
   I have an image of us being wheelwrights. We have one precept with sixteen spokes and we have to find our way to take care of this wheel of the great precepts. How not to go too fast or too slow, but always working with these sixteen precepts, always taking care of these sixteen precepts. Maybe the way to care for it will come into our hands. Not be too hard and self-righteous about our understanding of what they mean; not be too soft and nihilistic and say it doesn’t matter. What’s the true kindness with which we take hold of the great wheel of Buddha’s precepts? How do you care for these precepts? How do you receive them and take care of them moment after moment as they change in the flow of events? That’s my question to myself; I’ll check myself out. You check me out. And that’s my question to you.
   This meeting, this group of people from all over this great North American continent, from Minnesota, from Wisconsin, from New York City downtown, from Yonkers, from the countryside of New York, from Maine, from Massachusetts, from Oregon, from Utah, from New Mexico, from Texas, from Washington, from Canada, from the great ancestral lands of Germany and France and England, from our ancestral source in Japan, Tokyo, the countryside, the mountains, the monasteries, all these people coming together and practicing in peace and harmony under the auspices of one practice that is entered by sixteen precepts.
   I’m very grateful to have been here for this truly international month of peace and harmony, of respect and gratitude among all of us, and I hope it actually leads to all of our practices being refreshed and inspired. It certainly has for me. It’s great to see old-time practitioners able to try different roles, to get up out of the dregs and be something unusual. Do you enjoy seeing it?
   Any comments or protests?
[Maezumi Roshi’s comments cannot be heard clearly on the tape.]
   So, I’ll try to remember that in all of America, at least around here, there are no teachers of Zen.
[question about the use of the word endowment.]
   You were surprised by the word endowment? Interested? What was surprising and interesting about it?
[responses are inaudible]
   And it surprised you to think of somebody giving you something? How about if your endowment came to you from the causes and conditions foundation?
   If you felt that there isn’t anybody who’s giving you the endowment, I think that would be more in accord with Buddha’s teachings. That’s part of the meaning of “there’s no teacher in all of China.” There is, however, teaching. There isn’t a fixed thing out there that gives you the teaching. There is teaching, but there isn’t a thing called a teacher. Everything could be a teacher. But in Zen, there are people who are guiding groups of men and women and leading communities. That’s part of the Zen scene – these things going on – but there’s no fixed thing. In the world of dependent co-arising there’s not any teacher being held there. There’s not any endower and thing out there which gives everything. There’s no one thing like that. So if the word endowment perks that sense, then I think you’re right to be suspicious of that sense. That’s not what is intended by your basic nature.
[unintelligible question]
   What did Buddha say? True human nature, true human nature as no human nature, the Tathagata teaches. So the true human nature that’s endowing us, there’s no such thing. And that’s the real helpful aspect, that’s the river that’s flowing through our life. But of course we like to reach down and get some dregs. But if we do that, we should just admit we’re doing it and carry on with the real work of facing the situation as it is. Dregs can be used. So what’s necessary is to value what’s happening, over and above what you can grasp and use.
[question]
   Exactly. How do you plan the meal without falling into either of the extremes. How do you get the ingredients out without falling into either of those extremes. Hopefully, if we just keep meal-planning and ingredient collecting for seventy years it will come into our hands. Won’t that be swell?
   Thank you very much.