tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18863009004630897862024-03-14T02:18:25.456-07:00Koan ConversationsKenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00470542916911283360noreply@blogger.comBlogger56125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1886300900463089786.post-22152324936454955802023-05-13T01:22:00.007-07:002023-05-15T00:25:46.621-07:00 Buddhist HeavenThree Cheers for Grandmother Zen!<br /><br /><i>“It is much more difficult to control one's mind than to control the weather.”</i> --Yeshe Dorje<br /><br />A lonely sheet of paper lies on the top of my desk with some scribbled notes. I picked them to see if I could get back to the moment when it felt important to jot them down. Now they just look random but I tell myself that there is some rhyme and reason. There has to be, or does there?<br /><br />There seems to be some notion floating around that if it ain’t hard nosed, tough no nonsense practice, it ain’t Zen. It certainly can’t be compassionate--or something. <br /><br />To any macho Zen priest out there having a hard time adjusting to becoming a hospice monk, too bad, or as they say, suck it up. If you saw Issan in the kitchen trying to get his recipe for chocolate chip cookies right, with a temperature over a hundred and sweat on his shaved head, you might change your mind. You might even call it courageous Grandmother Zen.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">______________</div><br />One of my dearest friends, Michael, was suffering a long, painful and slow death from AIDS. His partner was an older, very proper, even stuffy, English queen. When I suggested that they might come and visit Maitri to see if it might be a good place for Michael’s final days, the partner was emphatic. He said “never.” He called it “The House of Death.” I was shocked.<br /><br />Great pain and denial go hand in hand.<br /><br />I vacillated between those two views many times every day. Before I moved into Hartford Street I imagined that I would be doing some modern version of the ancient Tibetan practice of living in the cremation grounds. The reality was somewhere between cooking mashed potatoes to suit a resident’s particular taste and making sure the cable bill was paid.<br /><br />The Tibetan Yogi, Lama Yeshe jporje Rinpoche, the Dalai Lama’s rainmaker, visited Maitri. Issan welcomed him with a big hug and a kiss, to which the startled Tibetan sage responded with a huge grin. I’m told there was immediate chemistry. Issan took him from room to room, probably pointing with his light but careful attention to their detail, the convenience of the bathrooms, light filling the bedrooms in the early morning hours, things that made Hartford Street feel like home, really more like your grandmother’s house. Yeshe-la was so impressed that he blurted out that Issan had created Buddhist heaven. <br /><br />Stories of the rainmakers' visit were repeated so often they assumed the status legend. I asked Issan if Yeshe Dorje had even talked about Buddhist heaven. Issan said, “Yes,” he remembered their conversation very well. “He was a lovely guy,” but added “he didn’t pay the electricity bill.”<br /><br />Whether or not Yeshe Dorje was capable of confounding the clouds, he certainly had experience trying to push out the bounds of the order of things. Beyond incantations and spells, a rainmaker needs to be able to read tell-tale signs in the sky that escape ordinary sky-gazing, not so much to control as to see which way the wind is blowing. When a storm is brewing, seek safe shelter. <br /><br />In the various cultures that have invited Buddhist teachings to stay a while, even as a guest, we find at least several, if not many versions of heaven. Currently the most prevalent myths about this transition between life and death in the West is a kind of instantaneous shift, an escape, shaking off the bonds of our earthly body. New Age Spirituality has us as spirits temporarily inhabiting a corporeal form. At this stage of my life, I find this very odd notion, and very much at odds with the Buddhist notion that the gift of the human body is the result of eons of conscious efforts to wake to the path of liberation.<br /><br />This popping out of the bottle story line is, I think, a hangover from our 19th century bout with American and European Spiritualism. More ancient Western myths are deeper and more nuanced. The narratives and anecdotes of the gospel of Jesus have defied easy classification; Ovid persisted into the Medieval world, and of course Dante was no shape-shifter. We can trace these stories of the transition back to Homer and the wealth of half-remembered lore that animated the ancient world. Most of them are more in line with a fairly consistent tread throughout Buddhist teaching--that the path from this life to the next is determined by our choices, limited and difficult they may be, and the depth of our practice.<br /><br />The New Age holds accounts of near death experiences in awe, and, perhaps I am being harsh, imagines death as a kind of “This is Your Life” TV rerun. There may be some truth in the analogy, but it also is colored, fatally in my view, with easy admonitions about loving beyond petty grudges, good over evil, heroic virtue idealized. I admit that “This is Your Life” captivated my childhood imagination, but I think that was more due to the genius of its writers, and their sentimentality, rather than a glimpse into Perennial Philosophy.<br /><br />Still there are stories that connect us with who we are, ordinary places where we can recognize who we really are.<br /><div><div style="text-align: center;">______________</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div>I remember a rather handsome younger man who often visited his friend in Maitri, a sweet man who had the small room at the top of the stairs on the second floor, facing the street. Like so many of us in the early 1990’s, this young man spent an enormous amount of time visiting friends in several of the places where they were dying, Coming Home Hospice, the Missionaries of Charity’s Arc of Love, Garden Sullivan, Wards 86 and 5B of San Francisco General Hospital. When the time came, he attended their memorial services as most of us did--we all struggled to honor the deep connections that linked us with so many friends who were dying way too young. He was so grateful for the care his friend had received that he wanted to give something back. He came to me and asked how he could help.</div><div><br />The room needed a quick paint job if we could get it done before the bed was filled again. I said if he could help me paint it we could do it in a few hours. As we worked together, he told me that he sensed something different at Maitri. He said he always felt like he was visiting his grandmother. I knew he wasn't talking about the “This is Your Life” version of grandmother.<br /><br />Yeshe Dorje was right. Issan created Buddhist Heaven. </div><div><br /></div><div>Three Cheers for Grandmother Zen.<br /><br /><i>Come home to the empty house<br />Longing for the warmth of a fire<br />Or chocolate chip cookies<br /><br />You notice your picture hanging on her wall<br />Right where she left it<br />Her uncompromising love that seeks only your happiness<br /><br />It is a blessing<br />To touch this heart of grief and create a miracle<br />Fill that house once again<br /><br />This is the great way</i></div>Kenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00470542916911283360noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1886300900463089786.post-75774199363017890222023-04-08T21:57:00.010-07:002023-04-09T06:40:32.172-07:00 Out of Bounds, Off Limits<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="May be an image of 5 people" height="565" src="https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/Xx2qnEB7Ykn9W0iwbjDLWhdChIK3sFuJva2mfzTHfdjMutPQEvOlsLhV6JOEi4GYB-ewxKZd_qBsiWNZxsMVB_ZZNE_LJaC8K9yrL8vQjv7nEUjJasSwEnRCYbQlkx_aUck3_voWfLD5KctvVxRar40" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 0px;" width="564" /></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">This is where Issan "Tommy"Dorsey Roshi began his career as a drag artist.</td></tr></tbody></table><br />In a friend’s kind of online bio she said that “Zen is essential to my practice, but I'm not a Zen teacher. It turns out I'm too heretical for institutions and that's a good thing. There's much seeping in that doesn't fit the forms. The ecology of erotic emergence overflows.” I thought of her and Issan when I saw this picture of military police preventing entrance to a legendary San Francisco gay bar. If I am perhaps distorting her remarks to dig down deeper into something she intimates about the groupthink that seems to go hand and hand with the kind of rigorous practice that is normally delivered and fostered in western zen centers, forgive me.<br /><br />“The Black Cat” was one of San Francisco's first gay bars to offer regular drag shows. It was the San Francisco jumping off point for one of the great first generation American Zen teachers, Issan ”Tommy” Dorsey Roshi. <br /><br />These days Issan wouldn't have a chance in certain parts of America, the country he put his life on the line for. But he seized on the chance of practice as soon as he encountered it and that gave him another life.<br /><br />Rei, it’s always out of bounds and off limits or it ain’t Zen.<span id="docs-internal-guid-97f99787-7fff-f023-7d0c-68e1f1e23abc"><div><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-alternates: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div></span>Kenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00470542916911283360noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1886300900463089786.post-75558583355601745332022-07-14T01:34:00.019-07:002023-09-27T00:06:20.714-07:00"Too Many Words"<h3 dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">What I learned from Phil Whalen about writing.</h3><h3 dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span id="docs-internal-guid-0b0f5386-7fff-5ae6-042d-8f513dfa0879" style="font-weight: normal;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">It's a matter of some reassurance</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">That we are physically indistinguishable from other men.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">When introspection shows us</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">That we have different degrees of intelligence</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Varying capacities for knowing morality</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">We lose something of our complacency</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">--Scenes of Life at the Capital</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap; white-space: pre;">One morning in July of 2022, Google’s algorithm decided that I needed to hear James Dalessandro, bestselling novelist, journalist and filmmaker, tell me about ”The Beat Poets and the Summer of Love.” Or to do justice to the algorithm’s intrinsic value, I was to pay 25 dollars to listen to Mr. Dalessandro’s wise words. When I read the blurb, he told me that Lawrence and Allen and Jack would spill light on the short lived revolution. </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><b id="docs-internal-guid-6198ba2e-7fff-dfa1-b945-9ed34b9fd9d9" style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap; white-space: pre;">In 1967 more than 100,000 young people descended into the Haight-Ashbury, donned tye-dyed tee shirts or just stripped off their clothes, took lots of drugs, had lots of sex and proclaimed a new age. The Summer of Love was also the end of Phil's sojourn in Kyoto, so it is possible that he had returned to San Francisco. But Jack had already departed the scene, renounced a lot of the Beat philosophy which he thought just gave people permission to be spiteful. I think it highly unlikely that Phil would have shared his friend Allen’s enthusiasm for a revolution. Phil’s hedonism was more restrained. Very much more actually but that didn’t stop him from loving Allen. </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap; white-space: pre;">Still I find it abhorrent that the Road Scholar Scholar didn’t include Phil; perhaps the platform insists that their experts focus on hot money makers. 25 bucks is 25 bucks.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap; white-space: pre;">I lived with Phil for about 4 years after he’d received dharma transmission from his teacher. I sat with him in sparse zendo, recorded his talks, got yelled at, went to sesshin, sewed a rakusu, listened to his gab, went with him to Walgreens and took lay precepts under him. I was as close to Phil as most of zen friends, except for the very few he really allowed into his life, Allen for one, and I know that he was in love with Lew Welsh, but aside from that, Phil was a lone wolf. We could be friends, but when I got to a place where real intimacy might have been possible, he ended it abruptly. I know others who had the same experience. He wrote “When introspection shows us/ That we have different degrees of intelligence,” and he thought of himself on the high end of that scale.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap; white-space: pre;">And despite his remarkable intelligence and way with words, Buddhist Phil could be incredibly dull. He once taught a class on the Heart Sutra and my head didn’t burst with the astounding insight into the interplay of form and no-form, full and empty, thinking and the end of thinking. I had to fight off sleep. Phil preferred his Buddhism boring. He could be as doctrinaire as any squawking human being, and then some. Today however, as the clouds drift down from the mountains, and internally I begin to count between the thunder and the faint flash to locate where it has struck, I am reading his verse with joy and gratitude. He was a genius. </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap; white-space: pre;">Morning is fading and the clouds have covered Moon Peak. I can only see as far as my closest neighbor, a small Indian hotel called “Heaven’s View,” 25 meters to the East. Monsoon is closing in. When I knew Phil and was his student, his eyesight had failed to the point where, if I can weigh his words and match it with what I can recall of his gait and gaze, he could only see vague cloud-like formations, and that had to be enough. Misdiagnosed glaucoma would take away the joy of seeing words dance on the page. He was not resentful, or if he was, he didn’t show it. The more immediate concern was how words, which had been the center of his life, the real source of his joy, would continue to nourish a voracious appetite for clarity. It was also an inventive appetite, so we experimented. I was enlisted into a small army of amanuenses. </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap; white-space: pre;">We would read to him. I could see him concentration latch onto a passage and hang there. Sometimes there would be a request to return to the beginning of a passage. We could not stop until instructed or we heard the han for zazen. </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><br /></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap; white-space: pre;">Once in while there would be a request from some recondite journal which Phil could never turn down. It usually meant reworking an older prose piece. There would be no more poems. He would find a short piece that came from years back--one that I remember was about dancing around a bonfire on the beach near Bolinas. I read it once. Phil had me shift the order a few clauses, then I read it again. We put some back into their original order. I read the passage again. And then again. Finally in what sounded almost like a sigh, “Too many words. Too many words.” That was the point where work began in earnest. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: transparent; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0t0bsPVDfPkN-Emn1aFHYsle8pZKE2oMe-qY5Cufofb3g1IDGbluKF8BCgpU8MwotF-2iF8Y_yxPRBpjx2HvVhzGXzSZKf0Wie-4zSDyzx5pF1-xvZu7WkW7VPUBBiOCpU8P2nId9aGNJ-Dnf7pA9zUT299Zpxu1nPQQI9TMOogytg0L9RhBaqk3M/s460/whalen.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="345" data-original-width="460" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0t0bsPVDfPkN-Emn1aFHYsle8pZKE2oMe-qY5Cufofb3g1IDGbluKF8BCgpU8MwotF-2iF8Y_yxPRBpjx2HvVhzGXzSZKf0Wie-4zSDyzx5pF1-xvZu7WkW7VPUBBiOCpU8P2nId9aGNJ-Dnf7pA9zUT299Zpxu1nPQQI9TMOogytg0L9RhBaqk3M/s320/whalen.png" width="320" /></a></span></div></span></h3><h3 dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></p><br /></span></h3>Kenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00470542916911283360noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1886300900463089786.post-5754957811820966202022-06-07T04:28:00.039-07:002022-06-10T19:11:42.251-07:00 An Unauthorized DeathWhen Maylie Scott’s mother died at home in Berkeley, she called me. Apparently after my stint at Maitri Hospice, I had the reputation as the go-to person for dealing with Buddhist death rites. Personally I found the designation of hospice priest slightly uncomfortable. I had done my best to distance myself from any sacred ritual after spending several of my Jesuit years fussing over post Vatican 2 updating. But as we say, that was my personal issue.<br /><br />Actually I made it up as I went along. I had to. I’d fallen into my role taking care of men dying from HIV without any formal hospice training. The crisis trained us all, often brutally. The same for taking care of the Last Things. If there was a handbook, it was untranslated or came with tons of cultural baggage. This is a story about some of what we did, why we did it, and where our hands were tied.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjso4OFKdENvzJM81JyGNt39RakcuSOTq_RQe39_bu_enAp0Ykbeh1Y1foqB1E34cUiirAepIahRSqhSM_LkwrZM_uWiL5TqI0Bh20aGCoKwK8QlDTNvaG73iw9ip0TY0oBPf8K45xK_IrdKP5tC1GAV8Z1qSBWwqxZEnp5-SJEQlWIlPhmdt4bVECS/s1404/Issan%20copy.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1404" data-original-width="1114" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjso4OFKdENvzJM81JyGNt39RakcuSOTq_RQe39_bu_enAp0Ykbeh1Y1foqB1E34cUiirAepIahRSqhSM_LkwrZM_uWiL5TqI0Bh20aGCoKwK8QlDTNvaG73iw9ip0TY0oBPf8K45xK_IrdKP5tC1GAV8Z1qSBWwqxZEnp5-SJEQlWIlPhmdt4bVECS/s320/Issan%20copy.jpg" width="254" /></a></div>When Issan died, Steve Allen asked Kobun Chino Roshi to perform the exacting Soto ritual done at Eiheiji for their most revered priests. Kobun had served in an official capacity there, teaching ritual and chant. He himself had been well trained; his seemingly endless chanting was mesmerizing but certainly beyond our language ability not to mention voice control. He could not train us. I drifted off and realized that it probably wouldn’t make any sense to translate it anyway. It was perfect for that moment, and that was enough. It had to be. Later there were a few odd ceremonial gestures, like pouring salt on either side of the doorposts, that I understood even less. The salt heaps seemed to be Japanese superstition, perhaps to ward off marauding Yōkai. I didn’t want to believe that they had crossed the great waters with the Dharma, but I might be wrong. <br /><br />Issan had arranged for his own cremation with the Neptune Society. We followed their car to the crematorium. It was a bare, ugly industrial space; the workers were dressed for work around the hot furnace. Though not disrespectful, it was utilitarian which came into sharp contrast when Kobun, Philip, Steve, Shunko Jamvold, Angelique Farrow, David Schneider and David Bulloch put on their formal Okesa. The usual work of burning bodies was interrupted by our chanting. I could see that this was outside the usual practice, and it cost extra. <div><br /></div><div>Steve and Shunko returned several hours before Issan’s body was reduced to ashes. Usually the crematorium would grind any remaining bone fragments into a powder in what looked like a giant food processor before returning them to the next of kin. Steven had requested that Issan be spared this process so that he and Shunko could sift through his ashes with ceremonial chopsticks, looking for small gem-like fragments to keep as relics.<br /><br />Several weeks later there was an elaborate funeral at Zen Center. Hundreds of people gathered; Richard Baker Roshi, Issan’s teacher, was the head priest, but Kobun, as well as Mel Weitzman, Blanche Hartman, Norman Fisher and Reb Anderson were also present. Towards the end Richard Schober, the chair of Maitri and not a Buddhist, turned to me and said it felt like high mass for a bishop. <br /><br />Between 1989 and 94 I was part of so many services for men who died in the hospice as well as others for Issan’s friends that I lost count. Almost 90 men and one woman died during Maitri’s first years. I tried to school myself, attempting to discover an appropriate level of formal ritual. Issan, Steve and Phil performed the Soto memorial service that included food offerings, and chanting, particularly the <i>Daihi Shin Darani</i>, an invocation for the compassionate intervention of Avalokitesvara. There was also a period of spontaneous sharing about the person’s life and loves, something that Richard Baker may have added at San Francisco Zen Center. Several times I helped gather a minyan so that we could recite Kaddish, and there was one Roman Catholic Mass in the zendo. On at least 4 occasions Issan, Steve or Phil performed Tokudo for men who wanted to join the sangha and shave their heads before they died.<br /><br /><h3 style="text-align: left;">The Book of the Dead</h3>In 1989 at Lone Mountain College, I went to a teaching regarding the <i>Tibetan Book of the Dead</i> by Jamgön Kongtrül Lodrö, coupled with the bardo initiation. There were only six to eight of us who attended all the teachings. The lama sat on a high throne in the neo-gothic chapel for three hour sessions twice a day for three days. Despite all this formality he was very approachable, answering questions in an informal, personal way. I remember a long argument he had with an animated, forceful Jewish woman who said she could not forgive Hitler but felt she had to. Jamgön Kongtrül’s resolution, as I recall, was if the Talmudic leaning woman could stop harming herself no matter what she wanted to hold onto, opinions and positions would inevitably fall away.</div><div><br />When on the evening of the last day, time came for the empowerment of passing through the bardos, the audience swelled to overflowing, mostly gaunt men with HIV. I knew in my heart that many of these men were engaged in some kind of magical thinking. The fear of death was palpable. Jamgön Kongtrül Lodrö performed the ritual in the manner of someone steeped in tradition. Perhaps death’s sting had not dissipated by the last chant, but if the pain of the men who lined up for his blessing was even slightly mitigated, it was a success. In my own life, the sting would linger for years, a kind of survivor guilt. Along the way ritual became less important, though it did not entirely vanish.<div><br />Normally an initiation ends with some practice instruction. On that last evening Jamgön Kongtrül concluded with a plea for everyone to live their lives as fully as possible for however many minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, years remained. He said that would be the best practice; that bardo practice was noticing what happened in the “in-between” gaps in our experience. Many of these men would be dead in a few months. His instruction was a kind gesture of compassion. <br /><br /><h3 style="text-align: left;">Joshi, Kennett Roshi, and bending the law to death’s favor</h3>Paul Joshi Higley was the first Zen priest in the community to die after Issan. He was one of two men and one woman Issan ordained. Paul had been a student of Chogyam Thrumpa, and held some level of Shambhala Training. He came to the hospice with a six month life expectancy and lived for nearly two years. He became part of our community, and my friend. In his late 30’s, dying of AIDS, he had a strong will to live fully. Determined to take full advantage of anything that medicine could provide during that first terrible decade of the epidemic, he didn’t die in the hospice but at Garden Sullivan Hospital out on Geary Ave after an experimental treatment.<br /><br />The hospital called early in the morning, perhaps 1 AM. I’d promised Paul that his body would not be embalmed and that it would remain undisturbed for at least three days before cremation, but I was not at all prepared to find a way to transport a dead body from a hospital back to what looked like an ordinary San Francisco house in the dead of night. In those days the hospital afforded you 4-6 hours to have a funeral service to pick up “the remains.” I called Paul's father who met me at the hospital and provided the signature required for the release of his son’s body. Then I had to convince a tiny African-American mortuary to transport his body to “a Temple.” This was not entirely a fiction as Maitri was still part of Hartford Street Zen Center, but it was pushing the limits. It was against the law for a body, certainly an unembalmed body, to remain in an ordinary house, not a licensed funeral home, for three days.<br /><br /></div><div>We returned Paul’s body to his room at Maitri between 4 and 5 AM. I began to wash it carefully with sweet tea and a few drops of alcohol added, the astringent to help seal the pores; then I inserted some cotton balls into his anus. He’d been my friend so this was both a labor of love and extremely difficult. Issan once told me that in the time of AIDS, we were at war, and the ravages of Paul's last struggle with the virus were visible on his body. I imagined that I was washing them away. It was sunrise when finally Paul’s body, properly dressed, lay undisturbed in his room, dominated by a huge Tibetan style shrine. I turned and saw the last calligraphy that he’d done on large pieces of fine paper hanging on the wall. They read “Yes, Yes, Yes.”<br /><br />Over the course of the next three days, friends, family and admirers came and went. It was a kind of Buddhist wake.<br /><br />Phil sent me to Jiyu Kennett Roshi’s <i>Selling water by the river: A manual of Zen training</i>, to review what she wrote about a priest’s funeral. Together he and I sketched out the full ceremony, where everyone would stand, the placement of the altar table, the food offerings, the order of the chanting. Phil was a Soto priest performing the cremation ceremony of a Soto priest. He wanted to make sure that we omitted no part of the ritual performed in the crematorium in Emeryville. <br /><br />Paul had kept $25 dollars in his pocket to pay for his cremation. After the ceremony, we used it to buy lunch in a Japanese restaurant. It didn’t quite cover the entire bill.<br /><br /><h3 style="text-align: left;">What did we keep?</h3>A few appropriate words!<br /><br />After all my experience and hard won lessons, I might expect that I could say something definitive about The Last Things. I cannot. As far as ritual, the first thing that comes to mind is Aitken Roshi’s counsel to Joel Katz, Ken MacDonald and me when we carried Dan Dunning’s ashes to a long boat at Queen’s Surf to be spread out beyond the reef. The Old Man said, “a few words would be appropriate.” Dan had been a dear friend for years. As I took the lid off the urn, I mumbled, “I loved you immensely, and I’ll miss you immensely.” Joel and Ken saved the day. They chanted the <i>Enmei Jukku Kannon Gyo</i>, banging rhythm on the gunwale as we rode the waves back to shore. I’m sure Dan loved that professional musicians did the honors, especially since he’d seen Phantom half a dozen times.</div><div><h3 style="text-align: left;"><br />Washing the body</h3>Frank Ostaseski taught me the practice of washing a body for the final time. It is an intimate gesture of love and respect. It is also a difficult practice. When not left to morticians or hospital nurses, it can be an act of friendship. It is also a physical act, reminding us that death is real. Thank you Frank.<br /><br /></div><div><h3 style="text-align: left;">Don’t touch anything for a while</h3>I had a Japanese friend whose partner died of AIDS. Yoshi wanted to keep the man’s body undisturbed for three days. He bought all the dry ice available in his small Marin town. Early on we decided that Maitri also ought to allow a resident’s body to remain untouched for three days. Cultural conventions certainly did not influence me nor do I have any particular beliefs about the soul traversing to a nether world, but I did sense that trying not to interfere with a natural process was probably a good thing, akin to not interfering with the natural process of thought in meditation. </div><div><br /></div><div>I certainly wanted to be respectful. Working in the hospice, I'd become keenly aware of a delicate balance between pushing to get something done and leaving things alone. Although it may feel like a good idea for personal relationships to be as loving, complete and even as robust as possible as death approaches, there may have been damage which requires more healing time than what’s available. On the other hand, having a formal will in place as well as written instructions about funerals etc., is something that has a definite time frame. Sometimes I had to push through denial and procrastination to get papers signed. Thankfully I had the assistance of very well trained social workers from Visiting Nurses and Hospice to help.<br /><br />But more of a problem was the legality of not removing a body immediately. The law required that we not keep a body more than 24 to 48 hours without refrigeration or embalming. Luckily I found a funeral director who helped with the legal forms, the death notice, so that we could keep a body in the hospice for as long as possible. After some experience we realized that though we didn’t need dry ice, we did need a lot of ventilation. We always seemed to be pushing the limits. <br /><br />One of the social workers called it “lying in state” when she would ask patients how they wanted their bodies treated after they died. Many, if not most, chose our Buddhist wake. Their friends did come by. It always took its own form. Sometimes there was chanting or some spiritual practice, but it didn’t have the religious formality of visiting hours with the obligatory rosary of my upbringing. Most of the men in the hospice would have rejected that anyway. In almost every case I can remember, it just seemed to fit.<br /><br />As I sat with many bodies, I began to notice that dying is not instantaneous. Like any process of saying goodbye, life doesn’t just end when the breath stops. It’s not like walking out and closing a door. The legal definition of death may be that the heart no longer beats, but hair and fingernails continue to grow. The skin seems to continue to breathe. Bodies actually change. Over the course of several days I could actually see life taper out. I was not imagining something. It is a reality that I can no longer escape.<br /><br /><h3 style="text-align: left;">Full Circle</h3>After Maylie Scott’s mother Mary died, I'm sure Maylie washed her body with love. Then she called several of us who’d been close to her mother during the last years of her life. We came and sat up with Maylie through the night. Three days later she called the Neptune Society. Within the hour they arrived accompanied by two cops because there had been an “unauthorized death.” Maylie thought that her mother would have been very amused by the ruckus she caused. <br /><br />Mary’s ashes are kept in the ancient Malling Benedictine Abbey south of London where her other daughter, Sister Mary John, was the abbess. From Eiheiji, through Kaddish and The Book of the Dead, to a small Buddhist Hospice in San Francisco during the time of AIDS, and onto a small abbey of cloistered Anglican nuns. Perhaps a bit wobbly, but full circle. Life and death continue to circle on and on.</div></div>Kenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00470542916911283360noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1886300900463089786.post-87460167202509078322022-05-24T21:20:00.005-07:002022-05-24T22:11:42.371-07:00Khyongla Rato Rinpoche died this morning.Khyongla Rato Rinpoche died this morning in McLeod Ganj. He was probably 101 years old. The registry of births in Tibet was not very precise when he was born but who’s counting? My landlord Hari Singh who has been his driver at least since the onset of Covid just texted me.<br /><br />Hari called Rato “The Holy One” out of his deep respect and love. I called him “Chuck Rinpoche.” <br /><br />Perhaps 8 months ago Hari asked if his wife could use my kitchen to cook a meal for the Rinpoche. He’d made a special request to eat some of Reshma’s home style cooking. The flat was also easier for Rato to negotiate and the seating more comfortable. I said of course. We all had greeting scarfs and Hari lit a smudge pot smoke offering on the steps. About 1 PM, we welcomed Geshe Nicky Vreeland followed by Rato, helped along by his attendant Norbu. <br /><br />The food was wonderful. Lamb curry North Indian style. I was amazed to watch Rato, Nicky and Norbu eat with such gusto. Reshma prepared the Rinpoche’s dish carefully, with rice, smaller pieces of mutton and lots of gravy.<div><br />My friend Alex Kype was also there. He’d warned me to be on my best behavior. The Rinpoche was high up the ladder of Buddhist royalty. I sat next to Rato and Nicky was to his left. Rato's voice was barely audible, but Nicky repeated his words. In the course of the conversion, Rato told a story about when he moved to New York City in 1968 to found The Tibet Center. He rented a small apartment midtown but he had no money. So he went to work as a stock boy* in B. Altman. No one could pronounce his name so he told everyone to just call him Chuck. He started laughing. I jumped in and asked if I could call him Chuck Rinpoche. He laughed more. <br /><br />Rato’s scholarship and dedication to the Way were remarkable and revered over several incarnations, but he’ll always be just Chuck Rinpoche to me. <br /><br />Thank you for your visit. We were honored.<br /></div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiK7oEriB7yqA7LhWRytuG8PVXaePuQrUDMnaFj14J_4KKlLFczZBjpYdGwfXa6JpQ_RZhEultQleoVJEUktvCDV9Sxa0sX0RC833ypc5jb5bGOVIUgpdEfFGzDAxn-IuGAAinDSsuLWDUr75RyI-iDgkROvcEensEK2aShnsyUW2zv13JkbjQlebpk/s2022/Rato%20copy.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1530" data-original-width="2022" height="303" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiK7oEriB7yqA7LhWRytuG8PVXaePuQrUDMnaFj14J_4KKlLFczZBjpYdGwfXa6JpQ_RZhEultQleoVJEUktvCDV9Sxa0sX0RC833ypc5jb5bGOVIUgpdEfFGzDAxn-IuGAAinDSsuLWDUr75RyI-iDgkROvcEensEK2aShnsyUW2zv13JkbjQlebpk/w400-h303/Rato%20copy.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><span id="docs-internal-guid-f61854f4-7fff-5d78-552c-9c49e896463b"><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #202122; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">*This is an interesting factoid. “Chuck” probably earned minimum wage in '68, </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">which was $1.60 per hour (equivalent to $12.47 in 2021).</span></span></span><br /><div><br /></div>Kenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00470542916911283360noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1886300900463089786.post-85545419551681162192022-03-26T00:06:00.007-07:002022-03-26T22:05:45.475-07:00CONTENTS, All and NothingIntroduction<br /><br />What is “The Record of Issan?”<br /><br /><a href="https://www.koansconversations.com/2022/03/an-invitation.html">An Invitation</a><br />Several ways to read and listen to a conversation about things that matter.<br /><br /><div><a href="https://www.koansconversations.com/2021/08/the-end-of-rainbow.html">"The End of the Rainbow"</a><br />Steve Allen questions Issan when he became Abbot of the Hartford Street Zen Center.<br /><br /><a href="https://www.koansconversations.com/2019/09/the-hands-and-eyes-of-great-compassion.html">The Hands and Eyes of Great Compassion</a><br />What about compassion is difficult to understand? A koan commentary<br /><br />Memories in a shoe box, <a href="https://www.koansconversations.com/2021/05/issans-jesus-koan.html">Issan’s Jesus Koan</a> </div><div>Bruce Boone’s memory of Issan.<br /><br /><a href="https://www.koansconversations.com/2021/03/issan-listens-to-parable-of-good.html">Hearing the parable of the Good Samaritan—for the first time!</a><br />My friend, Fr. Joe Devlin, S.J., celebrated a Catholic mass in the zendo.<br /><br /></div><div><a href="https://www.koansconversations.com/2021/08/dont-worry-be-happy-just-do-your-best.html">Don't Worry. Be Happy. Just do your best!</a><br />Issan humms Bobby McFerrin. Actually he told me he couldn’t get it out of head; it was one of those loopy tunes that we can’t stop. But then he amends Meher Baba.<br /><br /></div><div><a href="https://www.koansconversations.com/2021/08/dokusan-goes-kung-an.html">Dokusan goes Kung-an</a>, Talking publicly about sex<br />The Master teaches how to brush sexual fantasy from meditation.<br /><br /><a href="https://www.koansconversations.com/2021/09/they-never-get-pleats-right.html">“They Never Get the Pleats Right” A Mondo</a><br />Never Blend In. Not even a fever of 102 could keep Issan from the obligation of officiating at the wedding of some old friends.<br /><br /></div><div><a href="https://www.koansconversations.com/2021/12/one-day-not-work-one-day-not-eat.html">"One day not work, one day not eat," 一日不做一日不食</a><br />There are always dishes to clean and cookies to bake, if you’re lucky.<br /><br /><a href="https://www.koansconversations.com/2021/10/sex-death-and-food.html">Sex, death, and food</a><br />Dainin Katagiri Roshi admonishes Issan! “Yes, we work hard long hours. Then we die.”<br /><br />“Are you going somewhere?” <br /><br />Buddhist Heaven. Three Cheers for Grandmother Zen!<br /><br />Lord Krishna comes to tea<br /><br />Issan and Sweet Baby James<br /><br /><a href="https://www.koansconversations.com/2021/09/is-life-over-when-its-over.html">Is life over when it's over?</a><br />A friend asks Issan, Why don’t we just kill ourselves?<br /><br />Really Choosing Death. <br />There were men who took their own lives in the Hospice. We do get some choice in the matter.<br /><br /><a href="https://www.koansconversations.com/2021/12/q-and-zen.html">Q and A Zen</a><br />A cautionary tale plus a koan—or two. My memory of Issan’s last breaths.<br /><br /><a href="https://www.koansconversations.com/2021/05/when-breath-ends.html">When the Breath Ends</a>, "Sun-faced Buddha, Moon-faced Buddha."<br />Issan practices till his last breath.<br /><br /><a href="https://www.koansconversations.com/2019/09/issan-said-i-have-things-to-do.html">Issan said, "I have things to do!" </a><br />This story about Issan’s last week of life came back to me when another Buddhist friend received news of a grave diagnosis from his doctor. <br /><br /></div><div><a href="https://www.koansconversations.com/2021/12/phil-dreaming-of-gummy-bears-sees.html">Phil, dreaming of gummy bears, sees angels descending.</a><br />A mind is a terrible thing to waste.<br /><br /></div><div><a href="https://www.koansconversations.com/2021/03/ryutans-candle-and-richard-baker-roshi.html">Road to Rohatsu</a><br />After a powerful meditation retreat, Issan asks me to come back to Hartford Street. <br /><br /><a href="https://www.koansconversations.com/2022/02/i-didnt-shout-but-im-still-big-phoney.html">I didn’t shout but I’m still a big phoney.</a><br />Blue Cliff Record, Case 10.<br /><br /></div><div><a href="https://www.koansconversations.com/2021/07/how-does-past-become-past-therapy-jesus.html">How does the past become the past? Therapy, Jesus and Zen</a><br />Perhaps this does not belong in the story of Maitri, or maybe it does.<br /><br /><br />Other Stuff<br /><br />Mindfulness is not a Part Time Job<br />Bowing, Boring and Bliss<br />Saint Francis, Goa and Me</div>Kenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00470542916911283360noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1886300900463089786.post-35459830679236893312022-03-25T23:58:00.004-07:002022-03-26T22:13:00.788-07:00 Issan asked Shunko, “Are you going somewhere?” <p><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">This story has already made the rounds, as well it should. It is so short and concise that it doesn’t yield to a lot of confusion or elaboration. Good koan material.</span></p><span id="docs-internal-guid-86b1c94f-7fff-4708-e3c5-e757931dacc4"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Issan knew how to deliver a one liner. He was in fact a true master, but this was delivered with no drama, and when he was in such pain and personal distress, we had to stop laughing and realize that he was not just making a joke but effortlessly pointing towards freedom.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I also know for certain that he was smiling and filled with gratitude. I can almost hear his laugh.</span></p><div><span><br /></span></div><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Michael Shunko Jamvold was a Zen monk who practiced for many years. He was known for traveling between monasteries and practice centers. Sadly he died alone in Japan from an untreated or misdiagnosed respiratory disease. He was also one of Issan’s close friends whom Issan called on to take care of him at the end of his life. Shunko responded with devotion and grace.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">During the last few months of Issan’s life, as the disease took its physical toll, either Steve or Shunko, but sometimes someone else they asked to help, would sit with Issan and help him with basic needs, food, drink, turning over in bed, going to the bathroom. But basically the day-to-day attendant duties fell to either Steve or Shunko. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The bathroom was just across the hall from Issan’s room, but he needed support just to navigate the 15 or 20 steps when he needed to use the toilet. Shunko held his arm firmly but gently. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">On one of the return trips back to Issan’s bed, Shunko was overcome with emotion, and blurted out: “Oh Issan, I am going to miss you!”</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Issan smiled and asked Shunko, “”Oh, are you going somewhere?”</span></p><br /><br /></span>Kenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00470542916911283360noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1886300900463089786.post-65014042352607534642022-03-18T04:26:00.004-07:002022-03-19T08:26:51.766-07:00 The Ripple Effect: An Engaged Buddhist Conversation<p><span style="color: #222222; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">This is a short piece I wrote about my experience living and practicing at Maitri Hospice for a German Buddhist magazine,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> Ursache & Wirkung, in an edition about "Buddhismus unter dem Regenbogen."</span></p><span id="docs-internal-guid-ffa2eaf7-7fff-77b4-ae0c-71e2a07bdf33"><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; padding: 0pt 0pt 11pt 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #222222; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Tobias Trapp asked me to write a few words about volunteering during the AIDS epidemic. I jumped at the chance because it gave me an opportunity to acknowledge Frank Ostaseski and Issan Dorsey Roshi as well as to encourage others to accept the invitation to be with another human being at the end of their lives.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #222222; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">In 1989 I lost a very dear friend, a woman who’d been like a mother to me. Her daughter asked me to donate the hospital bed that she had in her room at the retirement home where she’d spent the last years of her life in San Francisco. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #222222; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Through a series of phone calls, a gay friend who was doing design work for the Zen Center Hospice Project, gave me Frank’s number. Could the Hospice use the bed? Frank said he’d love to have the bed. How could we move it across town to the Hospice? I had a truck. Frank said let’s meet and be delivery men. We set a time. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #222222; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I liked Frank immediately, bright, up beat, not my picture of a deathbed priest. He was also very persuasive--between the time we’d loaded the bed in my truck and unloaded it at the Zen Center, I was signed up for the upcoming Zen Hospice Volunteer Training Program. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #222222; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">That afternoon also set the tone for volunteering, listening and responding to simple requests, taking care of what was at hand, and working with others. No special knowledge was required. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #222222; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Within 6 months, I met Issan Dorsey Roshi, and became a volunteer at Maitri Hospice. Guided by Issan’s compassion, taking care of almost 100 men changed me. I cooked spaghetti and painted walls, I helped men sort through a lifetime of personal letters and called their mothers. Not every task was easy, but the rewards were immense. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #222222; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I could not have known that this simple trip would lead to the first Buddhist Hospice for people with HIV/AIDS. I was just helping a man carry a bed across San Francisco. Thank you Frank, Issan, J.D., Bernie and the other men who came into my life. Your gifts were amazing.</span></p><br /></span>Kenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00470542916911283360noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1886300900463089786.post-18186153962556028992022-03-06T19:36:00.008-08:002022-07-15T14:51:02.343-07:00 Lord Kirshna comes to tea.<p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">I knew that Allen was in town when there was a knock at the front door at 3:30 exactly. A young man, 21 but not a month more, clean shaven, holding a book, asked, “Is this the Philip Whalen Zendo?” I invited him into the living room where he sat down and quietly continued his reading. I knew that Allen would be at the door shortly; I could hear Phil beginning to make his way up the stairs. He and Allen shared years of friendship. They were punctual. I began to prepare tea.</span></span></span></p><span><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I loved when Phil’s friends came to visit. Phil was on his best behavior. Not that he was normally badly behaved though in private moments he could be angry, even insulting. Despite being one of the foremost leaders of a movement that questioned the very roots of believing and behaving that my parents taught me, when he was proper, he was extremely proper. But there was another quality to the conversations with his poet friends. Their language was careful and measured. It was literate. I was always looking for any innuendos, and I loved their laughter. It was poking fun without the slightest hint of slighting someone.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Phil of course knew Allen’s long time companion, Peter </span><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Orlovsky, and talked openly about Peter’s drug addiction. </span><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="color: #333333; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Phil joked to me about Allen being a follower of “the Cult of Boys,” and this was the first time that Allen had brought a young lover with him. Phil was not very interested in sex himself, reinforced or dictated by his isolated personal habits, but I knew I would be looking for Phil’s reaction. How would he treat a young lover?</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="color: #333333; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The young man and I sat a short distance from Phil and Allen. There were barely pauses in their conversation. It doesn’t matter what it was about. It could have been Buddhism, Trungpa, Diane de Prima or other poets who passed through the Disembodied School at RMDC, or even where to get the best Chinese food in San Francisco. They were friends, and though we weren’t excluded, we were not included. What was clear is that his young companion admired Allen. He hung on every word, carefully listening to each line, laughing when it was appropriate. Allen for his part was attentive to the young man. Not condescending or at all lecherous, he was careful that his friend was treated like an invited guest, not a hired boy. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="color: #333333; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Yes I admit that I entertained the possibility that there was some kind of coercion behind the young man’s presence. The age gap was enormous, and there have always been rumors about Allen’s sexual exploits. I also had a distasteful experience of being manipulated by an older man. But at least that afternoon, I was not sitting with a boy-toy but a bright young man who genuinely liked older men. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="color: #333333; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I’d been reading Christopher Isherwood’s tribute to his guru, </span><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Swami Prabhavananda,</span><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> My Guru and His Disciple</span><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. </span><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="color: #333333; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I</span><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">sherwood asked the Swami a hesitant question about a new relationship with a young man. Isherwood confessed that, given his experience in the stiff Victorian world of English Catholicism, he was expecting a censorious pronouncement. Prabhavananda told him to treat his lover like Lord Krishna.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Then it hit me. I’d been to tea with Lord Krishna.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A year later I was sitting with Phil when Allen called to tell him that he was dying. Phil cried. </span></p><br /><br /></span>Kenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00470542916911283360noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1886300900463089786.post-47941021583698623502022-03-03T03:53:00.002-08:002022-03-03T09:24:22.479-08:00All of You Are Gobblers of Dregs!<span style="font-family: Jomolhari;">Blue Cliff Record, Case 11 (the long version)</span><i><div><i><br /></i></div>One day Huangbo went up in the hall and said, "What do you people want to look for?" </i><div><i>And he chased them with his staff. </i></div><div><i>The assembly didn't disperse, so he said, "The Great Master Nintou Farong [594-657, 5th gen] of Ox Head Mountain spoke horizontally and spoke vertically, but he still didn't know the key of transcendence. These days the followers after Shitou [700-790, 8th gen] and Mazu [709-88, 8th gen] speak of Zen and speak of the Way most voluminously. </i></div><div><i><br /></i></div><div><i>All of you are gobblers of dregs. </i></div><div><i>If you travel around like this, you'll get laughed at by people. As soon as you hear of a place with eight hundred or a thousand people, you immediately go there. It won't do just to seek out the hubbub. </i></div><div><i>When I was traveling, if I found there was someone at the roots of the grasses, I would stick him in the head and watch to see if he knew the feeling of pain. If he did, I could give him a cloth bag full of rice as an offering. </i></div><div><i>If you always take things this easy here, then where else would there be this matter of Today? Since you're called pilgrims, you should concentrate a bit. </i></div><div><i>Do you know there are no teachers of Zen in all of China?"</i><br /><br /><p><span style="font-family: verdana;">There is a lively on-going debate in an online Buddhist group about the nature of practice and enlightenment. Dosho Port published a piece on August 18th called<a href="https://www.blogger.com/#"> “The Showa Dispute About True Faith.”</a> He describes the efforts beginning in 1928 to make Soto Zen more compatible with “modernism,” including Christianity, by reframing its belief system. A dispute ensued. One side organized their material under the slogan, ‘Original Enlightenment, mysterious practice.’ The other side, the monk establishment, wanted actual practice verification.<br /><br />I am vaguely familiar with this dispute about modernization in Japanese Soto Zen before the Second War, and the attempts to "translate" the doctrine, if I can use the word, to make it more understandable. There was an attempt to take a portion of Buddhist literature in Japanese, but also Chinese, and free it from its Medieval encapsulation. I went to Masao Abe's amazing classes when he was teaching in San Francisco at CIIS. He definitely comes from this school. I’m a former Jesuit so I also delved into Kitarō Nishida and the Kyoto School’s adoption of Western philosophical discourse. 40 years ago, we all immersed ourselves in the extensive writings of D. T. Suzuki, who, I have to say, comes across more like an apologist or evangelist.<br /><br />This may be a bare minimum to butt into this conversation, but I will. These efforts to strip the vehicle down to its essential parts leave just enough to work with. To begin, let me take the debate one step further, and remove the parochial underpinnings.<br /><br />My pared down augment runs like this: an experience of liberation is possible for humans. We don’t quite know what it is because of the current condition of our minds: our mental acuity, the quality of our perceptive apparatus, a balanced or afflicted emotional state, plus I think we have to throw a good dose of fancy, magical thinking, cultural mythology, plus translation difficulties and the vagaries of language into the mix. My list is not complete--there’s a lot to sort out, but I think we can establish, or posit, three hypotheses:<br /></span></p><ul><li><span style="font-family: verdana;">Such a state or quality of freedom exists and can transform our experience as humans.</span></li><li><span style="font-family: verdana;">It is possible, even desirable, to achieve it.</span></li><li><span style="font-family: verdana;">We recognize that it will take effort, education, what we commonly call meditation, and possibly recalibration to achieve this experience.</span></li></ul><p><span style="font-family: verdana;">We believe that certain people have had this experience, most notably the Buddha, but others too, for example Eihei Dōgen, Linji Yixuan, Hakuin Ekaku, Je Tsongkhapa, Shinran, but perhaps we could stretch our imaginations to include the current Dalai Lama, and maybe that auntie whom Red Pine encountered sitting in a cave in China who never heard of Mao Tse Tung but, forget about her, she never wrote anything down. We’re stuck with the guys, they’re all guys, who wrote, had secretaries, or disciples who took extensive lecture notes.<br /><br />What did they write: of course we have the Sutras, plus other stories of the Buddha and his disciples; the enlightened guys also wrote descriptions of their experiences, some of which seem to be in coded language; thankfully there’s lots of poetry, balanced with carefully reasoned philosophy of mind and analysis of perception and experience; we have to include the myths, and what we call practice manuals, “how to” lists; there are some riddles that purport to point to the experience; then extensive records of the mental and yogic disciplines that practitioners used to achieve this state of liberation plus prescriptive injunctions and admonitions that have even been codified. There is also a large body of instruction material that has not been written down that is generally reserved for advanced levels of practice.<br /><br />But there are huge problems with all this literature. First is the language and translation. We're blessed to have an army of very well trained and literate translators, but cultural and archaic understandings of the texts remain. Then there is the sheer volume and diversity of the materials. Even if we could determine their authenticity, be sure we have an accurate translation, and be able to determine their precise meaning, we‘d still be stuck with the question of how to use it, actually lots of questions.<br /><br />Our Western Zen practice stems to some degree from these efforts to modernize. Harada Sogaku Roshi, and after him, Hakuun Yasutani, Kuon Yamada and the Jesuit Roshis, Bob Aitken and the rest of my crowd come from another strain of that same impulse to modernize so that's what I was handed.<br /><br />Schools of thought are schools of thought. What do we do with them? Again, for better or worse, they inform our practice.<br /><br />First I think that there's a logical fallacy in the way we understand these efforts at modernization. Following (any) time-honored system of training that we’ve been handed, we believe that if we accurately recreate the logic of the thinking, the order of the steps, the lineage of the teachers, then we can access the authentic experience of liberation. If we fail, then we did something wrong. Perhaps it is a road map, but we want it to be Google Maps, with the blue dot moving across the dashboard screen. Good luck with that. I will set up a dharma combat: can algorithms become enlightened?<br /><br />Another knot appears when we identify the criteria for validating the credentials of a teacher from within this arcane body of knowledge, whether it’s <i>inka</i> or <i>transmission</i> or <i>tulku</i>. The checklist resides in experience outside ourselves and muddies the teaching as well as opens the door to abuse and exploitation. Call the dharma police to testify before the High Court.<br /><br />Is this even good practice? I remember working on the koan “Mu” for years with Bob Aitken. I kept complaining in my very Jesuit way that it was all just a self-referential exercise in a closed system. He'd say, yes, it appears that way, and then he’d encourage me to continue. I did. In 1996 I was living with Maylie Scott on Ashby in Berkeley and still doing sesshin with Aitken and John Tarrant. One Sunday morning I had to drive a rented truck back to Santa Rosa. As I was returning to where I’d parked it the night before, POW. All that self-referential mind swirling stopped and I got it. It didn't matter if it came via some well-intentioned modernization efforts in a Soto Shu University in the 20's. It hit me. There was no turning back.<br /><br />Of course that experience faded soon enough which presented its own dilemma, but it was enough to set me on my own path. I remember saying to Phil Whalen once what a shame it was that the library at Nalanda was destroyed--all that knowledge lost. He smiled and said, “Don’t worry, kid. Enough remains. Just enough.” I feel the same about any attempts to update our practice and make it modern or palatable or whatever. Enough remains, Just enough. And, as thanks to Phil I’ll add: “With any luck if we’re lucky.”<br /><br />I don't want to take a path based on pious dreams and hopes, magical thinking, myth or wild speculation. When coupled with a few token morsels of experience that we might be able to recognize in ourselves if we’ve spent any time on the cushion, we enter dangerous territory. I was lucky to be able to see something authentic in several teachers, among them Issan Dorsey, Phil Whalen, Maylie Scott, Bob Aitken, John Tarrant. I trusted them, and was able to just stick with it until I began to catch a glimpse for myself that something else is possible.<br /></span></p></div>Kenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00470542916911283360noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1886300900463089786.post-83889803610536840802022-03-02T03:20:00.006-08:002022-03-02T05:21:33.659-08:00 An Invitation<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; white-space: pre-wrap;"><i><span style="font-family: helvetica;">[This is a part of the Introduction to *The Record of Issan]</span></i></span></p><span id="docs-internal-guid-04d0667c-7fff-cf80-20bc-73da21a64310"><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Please come and sit with me. I invite us both to sit quietly as we can. Issan will also join us. Oh how he loved a good conversation, especially the jokes. Together we can explore what holds us together. The story of his life and Zen teaching are the glue.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I started to say “binds us together'' but that is not the correct word. It makes me think of prison or captivity. The purpose of this exploration is to be more free and spontaneous. Issan would prefer something far more gentle and affectionate, more like the caress of love or the hug of friendship. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Perhaps this conversation will help both of us see more clearly what we are about. This is not the ordinary course of a conversation. Sometimes we just want to go over old times and have a good laugh. That’s probably just fine for certain times and places, but most times it’s a waste of time. Issan loved to quote Suzuki Roshi, “Don’t invite your thoughts to tea.” Disappointment and regret are sure to follow. Regret has its place, but not in this conversation. There are thousands of things that all of us should not have done, but tears or dreams of what might have been cloud our eyes and obscure what is right in front of us.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">And Issan would probably suggest that we be on our best behavior, at least try to pay attention to what is being said. </span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">This requires an alertness of body and mind. We can listen to glean information, to satisfy our curiosity, or actually to try to find some answers to the questions that matter. How we listen determines what kind of answer we find.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Issan died on September 6</span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: 0.6em; vertical-align: super;">th</span></span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> 1990. He continues to speak to us when we hear the words as if he were speaking to us. I have heard many students tell stories about him, some of them are recorded in this book, and they all have the very clear signs of words that were said to an individual person in a particular time at a definite place. If they have one consistent thread, it is Issan’s encouragement: Do the best you can. Listen and respond with every bone in your body. Don’t think too much of yourself, but certainly be yourself. No apologies are necessary. </span></p><div><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div></span>Kenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00470542916911283360noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1886300900463089786.post-19471788976635373792022-02-27T10:49:00.018-08:002022-02-27T13:51:39.733-08:00I didn’t shout but I’m still a big phoney.<span style="font-family: Raleway;">Blue Cliff Record Case 10<br /><br />Let me begin with a snippet from the few introductory lines that Hsueh Tou calls the pointer: “If on the other hand, you neither face upwards or downwards, how will you deal with it? If there is a principle, go by the principle. If there is no principle, go by the example.”<br /><br />The koan<br /><i><br />After Mu Chou’s formula introductory question, “Where are you from,” in a reversal of roles, the shouting teacher gets shouted at.<br />Then Mu Chou said, "After three or four shouts, then what?"<br />The student had nothing to say.<br />Mu Chou hit him and said: You thieving phon[e]y.</i><br /><br />It was sometime in the Fall of 1993. If Mu Chou asked me where I’d come from, I would have said “Hartford Street Zen Center,” but he would not have recognized our lives there. A small temple in the heart San Francisco’s gay ghetto, it had never been your typical Zen Center even before AIDS. After I moved in 1989, more than 80 men and one woman died in its 13 bedrooms. Our everyday life was centered around doctor’s appointments, dispensing medications, talking with friends and family about wills and funerals, performing funerals, cooking food as well as two periods of zazen every day plus a pretty standard Soto ritual. We tried to organize some of the more formal Buddhist study typical in Western Zen centers, but the grief support groups had more attendees. I have to add that my daily ritual usually ended with a bout of heavy drinking in a local bar a block away. It was more than a full time job.<br /><br />The concern of our zendo was the pain and fragility of life. It was inescapable. You could try to run away, and we all did from time to time in our own way. But now Issan was dead; Steve Allen had resigned as abbot, and left for Crestone. And it was the end of Maitri Hospice being part of the Temple. Phil told me to get rid of it. It was Issan’s project, and he had other ideas about Zen masters’ dying. In retrospect I think that he hated trying to live his life with everyone dropping dead around him. He might have accepted Issan’s invitation to move in because they were old friends; they had been in Santa Fe together, and they were Dick’s first real dharma heirs. But actually I really think that one of his main motivations was that he was homeless and had nowhere else to go. He had set himself to master Zen, and though he had done his work deeply and thoroughly, he was still a human, and a frail old man.<br /><br />We had been sitting all day, and I went into Phil’s room just before the closing bell. I remember quite clearly what transpired. It could be fairly labeled passive-aggressive. From time to time, I have been less than proud of my behavior although I let myself off the hook with the recognition that I am also human.<br /><br />I forget the exact reason I was so pissed off, but I was. Of course I was burned out and disappointed, perhaps something about the changes at Hartford Street, perhaps Phil’s brushing me off, but we all were a bit “reactive,” Phil included. That is the way with anger’s confusion--whatever remains, the angry mind latches onto like a life raft in a raging sea. With all that experience of dying, anger turned out to have been a clever student and strategized its survival with the cunning of a fox.<br /><br />I remember that I’d determined beforehand that in this dokusan I would not say anything. Just sit like a fat lump and keep my mouth shut. If I felt even the slightest inkling of the beginnings of a word, much less the formulation of a question, I would shut it down. I would kill an errant thought before it even showed its face. I would not recommend this strategy for inching towards happiness, but on occasion it is interesting to test if it is even possible. Perhaps yelling the nonsensical “Katz” has some salvific result as it involves more of the spontaneous, emotive parts of the psyche, but my Mother had taught me that shouting was always bad manners. Despite the fact that we learn that great Zen teachers favored this theatrical gesture as a pedagogy, I still believe my mother. Western teachers have tried to polish this skill, but when I hear them affecting a Katz shout, it feels contrived. Or embarrassing. It is still better than cutting off fingers and other outlandish external “shoves” designed to facilitate the dropping off of body and mind. Shouting is not a principle in Zen, nor is it really an example of anything but the coordination of breath and vocal cords.<br /><br />So for whatever reasons I could never be a shouting student, and I sat. It would be an exaggeration to say that I was shouting inside, though I did feel a few interior bumps. And once in a while Phil began to look up and begin to say something, but then he stopped too. And so on for a very uncomfortable span of time.<br /><br />Then Phil faintly smiled and said, “Let’s go back down to the zendo and join the others.” I remember or imagined a feeling of disappointment in his voice. That was it. He didn’t call me a phony. Do you spell it with an “e”? Did he see through to my anger? It makes no difference. All things considered, he was very generous. <br /><br />I said in the beginning that Mu Chou would not have recognized our lives at Hartford Street Zen Center. Perhaps I’m selling him short.</span>Kenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00470542916911283360noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1886300900463089786.post-33917855715144167072022-01-27T06:43:00.018-08:002022-02-16T23:55:25.898-08:00 Buddhism doesn’t need saints<div class="separator"><span style="font-size: 12pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">And by the way, don’t cry too much over Thích Nhất Hạnh.</span></div><div class="separator"><span style="font-size: 12pt; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div><span id="docs-internal-guid-a2f67738-7fff-7d0f-a65a-f36d3c517a64"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Dorothy Day said: "Don't call me a saint, I don't want to be dismissed that easily." Of course Timothy Dolan, the Archbishop of New York, proposed her for canonization as soon as he could. The old left wing Catholic in me finds it ironic that a man who is the complete antithesis of the kind of life Day proposes for a modern Christian calls her Blessed Dorothy. She might accuse him of da</span><span style="font-size: 12pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">mpening her radical voice, even silencing the anarchist grandmother who confounded comfortable notions, but I wouldn't hesitate, not even for a nano second.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Pushing for sainthood lets purveyors of religious doublespeak, cults, snake oil and associated pyramid schemes off the hook for their flagrant sins. I will also argue that the whole rigmarole of canonization is just lip service to what Jesus calls Christians to do. We don’t really have to go and take care of lepers. Saint Damien did it. Pray to him that we be spared. Or in the case of the Founder of the Catholic Worker, someone can take care of the castoffs our materialistic culture dumps on the Bowery as long as it’s not me or my kids.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">One of the reasons that the leaders of the Protestant Reformation dismissed saints was to end the superstitious practice of encasing some bones in the local cathedral to entice lucrative pilgrim spending as well as defund the Papal ponzi scheme of selling indulgences to cover the extravagant cost of building Saint Peter’s in Rome. Every organized religion needs a building maintenance fund so this might be just have been marketing but it has always felt a bit underhanded to me.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">There are some people who want to make Issan Dorsey into a Buddhist saint--gotta have a saint in high heels. Of course we could do worse. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Before I started work at Maitri Hospice, the Dalai Lama’s rain-maker, the Yogin Yeshe Dorje visited. He and Issan got on very well, one of those connections. The rainmaker grabbed Issan and said, “You’ve created Buddhist Heaven.” Issan laughed. Later when I asked Issan about the visit, he smiled and said, “He was a very nice man, but he didn’t pay the water bill.”</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">All that is just a preface to something that has been creeping to the surface as the tributes pour in for Thầy, “The Saint of Mindfulness, Beloved Thích Nhất Hanh,” and I need to say it. Whether he really was a very nice Buddhist dude, or even if he was just an ordinary flawed human like the rest of us, don't for a minute think that the work of being mindful, practicing, looking after our interconnected world can be done by anyone else but us</span><span style="font-size: 16px; white-space: pre-wrap;">, and that includes all the difficult bits. Don’t waste a lot of tears or weave nostalgic odes about all the really good teachers dying. The Lord Buddha died too, quite a few years back.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEitiKSD0EwOAgK4DEmgUdKlDQSjVw4OZLBooVVExWymUXXOU6p-qUBl-JbtllzqZMd-5gF6NQG5DfAa_J0CA48SfNXB6FyHyeAirgObsjmvm9jY5nfNp7AdrxGhyuEUfzkKzyce58wXgbOnlNxLyjYGmGh7IUfqODel1VW0nWBFj2D9VwPBq19rwysU=s1924" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1280" data-original-width="1924" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEitiKSD0EwOAgK4DEmgUdKlDQSjVw4OZLBooVVExWymUXXOU6p-qUBl-JbtllzqZMd-5gF6NQG5DfAa_J0CA48SfNXB6FyHyeAirgObsjmvm9jY5nfNp7AdrxGhyuEUfzkKzyce58wXgbOnlNxLyjYGmGh7IUfqODel1VW0nWBFj2D9VwPBq19rwysU=s320" width="320" /></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">We can't allow ourselves to get distracted by any cult of personality. We can't get off the hook no matter how hard, by whatever devious means we try. We have to do the work ourselves.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I began with the caution from Blessed Dorothy Day undermining the whole sanctification scheme, and I will close with a hopeful note from the same complicated woman who lived an exemplary life, "The world will be saved by beauty." Amen.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span><p></p><br /></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br />Kenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00470542916911283360noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1886300900463089786.post-84212181949395405842022-01-18T07:36:00.004-08:002022-01-18T10:28:13.048-08:00Nobodaddy<p> <span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">January 18th, 2022</span></p><span id="docs-internal-guid-e3989b1e-7fff-fad3-a101-82b6b2b0a1c7"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Nobodaddy</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">At this particular moment in the current debate about the Jesus prayer, strained as it is, I come down firmly on the side of “dangerous.” For the meditator it’s a step down from that lyric on the car radio that stays in your head and you can’t turn off. Instead of prison and mother, it weaves a lovely spell of angels and divine nectar. Perhaps this is not the danger that the fathers of the Eastern Church warn about, but nonetheless a danger.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The repetition starts out as a simple concentration exercise, riding the breath like 123. The terrain is familiar but the vehicle is clumsy and unpredictable like an imaginary Model A Ford. Boredom sets in as stories & associated phantasms begin to loop, and on that radio a lyric purporting to be from the son of David pops up, or, my favorite, the thespian voice of the god of Abraham faking Aristotle. Rattling around the head’s Netherspace, it’s a wily enemy, play acting to hold onto power. It wants to be accepted as "the Truth." </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">If we don’t play close scrutiny, it maintains secret sway over our choices and our futures. But we might get lucky enough to understand deeply that we alone, no one else, sustain the imagined conversations and images that flow through the mind. This moment of enlightenment can strike instantaneously! </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Avoid the loud applause.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">To Nobodaddy </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">by </span><a href="https://everything2.com/title/William+Blake" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="color: #1155cc; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-skip-ink: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">William Blake</span></a><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Why art thou silent & invisible </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><a href="https://everything2.com/title/Father+of+Jealousy" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="color: #1155cc; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-skip-ink: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Father of Jealousy</span></a><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Why dost thou hide thyself in clouds </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">From every searching Eye </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Why darkness & obscurity </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">In all thy words & laws </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">That none dare eat the fruit but from </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The wily serpents jaws </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Or is it because Secresy </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">gains females loud applause </span></p><div><br /></div><br /></span><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEieTZe29I-evk3F7TGQIqDzDwC_2-_uPWbeW9R9hiDxgTvdP1cxJrShojhvh_kkSqq3O8SJlGSlU-5nnOJBP1_OlkRT94JEFcUQLHzUet8d1X9EMPOZm6evn1ZPvOWDwjNfleim7LiWRnHt3x3p_JrZ94Z_VDE7ng_H3tOxkM7-siT-8Z_-VCJKp-rY=s2358" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2358" data-original-width="1800" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEieTZe29I-evk3F7TGQIqDzDwC_2-_uPWbeW9R9hiDxgTvdP1cxJrShojhvh_kkSqq3O8SJlGSlU-5nnOJBP1_OlkRT94JEFcUQLHzUet8d1X9EMPOZm6evn1ZPvOWDwjNfleim7LiWRnHt3x3p_JrZ94Z_VDE7ng_H3tOxkM7-siT-8Z_-VCJKp-rY=w305-h400" width="305" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">UriZen, William Blake</td></tr></tbody></table><br />Kenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00470542916911283360noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1886300900463089786.post-73949041923304245142021-12-15T09:18:00.013-08:002021-12-16T21:51:25.485-08:00 Phil, dreaming of gummy bears, sees angels descending.<p><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; white-space: pre-wrap;">The mind is a terrible thing to waste.</span></p><span id="docs-internal-guid-f02ffbc7-7fff-88dc-fecc-285b1264c74d"><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Now Phil was dying. Perhaps as long as a year before, he’d reached back for his chair which wasn’t there and fell breaking his assbone. Thus began a slow decline. I was alarmed. It’s hard to say that a Zen Master, especially one that I loved, had given up on life, so I won't. But progressive blindness had stolen the delight of seeing words on a page, physical pain made the formal posture of zazen impossible and now immobility obliterated the comforting routine of meditation, gabbing, study, jokes, and food. Not physical therapy with Baker Roshi’s student Joe Muscles, not Chinese food with taro root, not even gummy bears, could turn the tide. The ever present good cheer, except when it suddenly disappeared, felt concocted. The veneer was wearing thin. I didn’t feel the bitter resignation of a person fed up with life. It was more a sense that he’d just had enough. He invited the dying to begin, and the invitation had been accepted. It would be long and slow.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Some sages claim that this was a good way for a meditator to die, as if waving a long slow goodbye to everything that had been assembled to make you--a precious death. In a way I feel that this is a bit like sticking a smiley face on a Hallmark condolence card. It masks the uncertainty of each piece tumbling into oblivion. Phil was always so kind to those who were helping him, but on the other hand he couldn’t hide the day to day frustrations. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">He would rail at the dying steps prescribed by Elizabeth Kubler-Ross, saying "I have to decide if I’m at the bargaining stage or the resignation stage.” But he seemed to be following them exactly, or at least that was the framework that I carried into my conversations with him. I actually felt that he’d only taken baby steps away from the anger stage, but all that is extremely subjective. Perhaps I was still angry with him for ending the Maitri experiment, or screaming at me in the hallway, or harping on that old time religion. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Zenshin’s mind had always been clear as a bell, much clearer than his vision. His memory for words, phrases, even pages in a book, had been almost photographic. I wonder how much of this was compensatory.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Once when I was entertaining some weird questions about presumed Kundalini energy in meditation, what Phil called the “squigglies,” he said, “Ol’ Luk Luk has something to say about that. ”Middle case, third shelf, second from the left. (I think it was Charles Luk’s “Secrets of Chinese Meditation, but it might have been “Empty Cloud.”) Page 63, middle paragraph, beginning at the forth sentence. That’s the interesting part. Read back to me. Then he gently told me that focusing on the heart might be good practice rather than chasing swirling whirling wisps of energy all over the place.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Another time when we were reading “Scenes from the Capital,” we got to a part where he talks about Gerald Manley Hopkins. He started to recite “The Windhover” not with his flat voice, not with his whimsical voice, but reverently, almost like plainchant. When he stumbled, he pointed to the first case, second shelf, 12th book from the right, page 43, “Just start reading.” </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><i> No wonder of it: shéer plód makes plough down sillion</i></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><i>Shine, and blue-bleak embers, ah my dear,</i></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><i> Fall, gall themselves, and gash gold-vermilion.</i></span></p><br /><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">When I was sitting with him in a bright room of the Zen Center Hospice on Page Street, he asked me, “Do you see them?”</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“Who?”</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“The angels.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“No actually, I don’t. Where are they?”</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“Right there, floating around,” pointing towards the upper corner to the left of his bed.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“No, I still don’t see them.”</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“Look, goddamn it.” His voice sounded plaintive, perhaps wistful.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“What do they look like?”</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“Just like the ones on the Macy’s gift bags.”</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“</span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I can’t see them Phil, what would you like me to do?”</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“Call the police, they’re reliable.”</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEj6L22d2kF0qoXBmrKt5ze1UiaECgRTSSOAS0l-DR-QcXhdnO5ff3DDDYLiWCmNNbv6OEHUh6AHmOjfy7y9_5s_Yjaro1u74CmWrn0Q45MJprW6lTHWwBtaQpXvDLjjxcBy9NCZmjXPH5LrcRCiPPeMA3D8KZs28xSzgxEXfg2kGxHLQnDOKGSW6FwZ=s1655" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1655" data-original-width="1248" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEj6L22d2kF0qoXBmrKt5ze1UiaECgRTSSOAS0l-DR-QcXhdnO5ff3DDDYLiWCmNNbv6OEHUh6AHmOjfy7y9_5s_Yjaro1u74CmWrn0Q45MJprW6lTHWwBtaQpXvDLjjxcBy9NCZmjXPH5LrcRCiPPeMA3D8KZs28xSzgxEXfg2kGxHLQnDOKGSW6FwZ=s320" width="241" /></a></span></div><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Together we looked. </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">I could see nothing while at the same time I wondered where his mind had gone. The Mind is a terrible thing to waste, he used to joke. What mind? Here we were using what was left to search for angels.</span></span><div><span><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The angels on the Macy’s bag too “Fall, gall themselves, and gash gold-vermilion.”</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">When he died I arrived late to the crematorium in South City. Baker Roshi read from one of his poems a line about eating delicious raspberries. Then we filed past, bowed and placed a raspberry in the plain box that held his body. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Contrary to Zen custom, I visualized dumping buckets of crimson raspberries gashing gold-vermillion. I couldn’t stop myself.</span></p><div><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div></span></div>Kenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00470542916911283360noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1886300900463089786.post-28861299797774013122021-12-13T04:37:00.005-08:002021-12-13T04:37:58.937-08:00 Begin with a joke!<p><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; white-space: pre-wrap;">My friend and mentor, Jon Logan gave me some wise and generous advice, advice that Issan would have seconded, “Always start with a joke.”</span></p><span id="docs-internal-guid-92bbd2a3-7fff-521c-0611-4933b2293fe1"><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Roboto, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">So here goes.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Roboto, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">One bright afternoon, Isaan was walking down Hartford St. towards 18</span><span style="font-family: Roboto, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: 0.6em; vertical-align: super;">th</span></span><span style="font-family: Roboto, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> with Steve Allen and Jerry Berg. They were headed to the hamburger place that used to be close to the corner right next to Moby Dick’s. That information might not be important unless you want to know if Issan loved hamburgers—he did—but you have to know that Steve is a Zen priest, one of Issan’s closest friends, his dharma heir, and the first Executive Director of Maitri Home and Hospice. Jerry Berg was a successful lawyer and prominent leader in the gay community, and an early supporter of the hospice.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Roboto, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">As they walked, Steve and Jerry were talking about possible legal structures for the hospice while Issan lagged a few steps behind. He noticed a bottle lying on the sidewalk and bent to pick it up. Yes, any rumors that he was an incarnation of Mr. (or Miss.) Clean are well founded. But when he noticed that the bottle was rather beautiful and might be worth keeping, he took out the rag that he kept neatly folded in his monk’s handbag, and began to polish it. Suddenly, a Genie appeared! A Buddhist Genie, a Bodhidharma look-a-like, with a shaved head, droopy ears and a bright robe. The Genie looked at Issan and Issan looked back, a staring match of wonderment. Steve and Jerry turned around to see what Issan was holding Issan up, and stopped dead in their tracks.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Roboto, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Genie spoke the time honored script of genies: “Because you have freed me after many lifetimes of being cramped-up in that god damned bottle, you, yeah, I guess all three of you, get one wish. It’s just one so you’d better make it good.”</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Roboto, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Steve didn’t hesitate: he knew his Buddhism and asked to be released from his karma and enter Buddhahood, or nirvana, or the Pure Land, right there and then. Just as he was about to raise his palms in gassho, the traditional gesture of respect—poof, he was gone.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Roboto, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Jerry thought to himself, that’s powerful magic. I’m going for it. I’m not getting any younger so how about a great life in a heaven modeled after Palm Springs—but without the humidity—endless pool parties, rafts of handsome men, an eternal nosh that never made you fat? As he smiled and waved good-bye—poof, he disappeared too.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Roboto, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Genie turned to Issan who was left standing alone—it might have been wonderment on his face, maybe just a bit puzzled. The Genie said, "OK, honey, it's your turn, what does your little heart desire?</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Roboto, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Issan didn’t hesitate, “Get those two numb-nut girls back here. We have a hospice to run.”</span></p><div><span style="font-family: Roboto, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div></span>Kenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00470542916911283360noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1886300900463089786.post-54932270009550059222021-12-12T00:26:00.024-08:002021-12-17T18:00:54.853-08:00"One day not work, one day not eat," 一日不做一日不食<div><span id="docs-internal-guid-a5528249-7fff-bf55-f255-0b789b1a60cb"><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.68; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #336699; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The renowned revolutionary Chinese Master Baizhang Huaihai ( 百丈懷海; Hyakujō Ekai) is perhaps most well known for introducing manual labor to Zen Monasticism. From his rule book comes the oft-quoted phrase, “One day not work, one day not eat.” Modern western students can thank him for </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #336699; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">samu</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #336699; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">, chopping vegetables and cleaning toilets during our retreats.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.68; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"> </p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.68; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #336699; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Legendary teachers create legends. Some of Suzuki’s students came upon him cleaning the public toilets at Zen Center. Not exactly what they expected. Perhaps their surprise was at least partially the result of some lingering guilt for leaving a dirty job undone.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.68; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"> </p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.68; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #336699; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">One asked, “Roshi, what are you doing? Why are you cleaning the toilets?”</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.68; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"> </p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.68; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #336699; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“Because they needed to be cleaned.” And there was still time before meditation and dinner.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.68; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"> </p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.68; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #336699; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">It is said that Suzuki gave Issan his name during </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #336699; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">samu</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #336699; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. Someone tells the story of Richard Baker climbing the stairs at the Page Street Center with Suzuki Roshi and coming upon Issan balancing a large industrial floor polisher, keeping it close to the floor to do its work. Machines have a mind of their own. Suzuki Roshi admired his tenacity, and said “Issan, One Mountain,” I think pointing to some determination to quell the bumpy forces at work in our nature, or that is my story.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.68; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"> </p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.68; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #336699; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">There are several versions of both these stories floating around to amuse, edify or even prod us. Zen students love a pious yarn. They circulate like the wind, picking up little particles from each teller, sometimes veering so far from the facts that they become jokes or even lies. That is the nature of stories. I will add a few more.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.68; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"> </p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.68; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #336699; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Issan loved to cook and clean. We have to learn to sit zazen correctly but Issan knew </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #336699; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">samu</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #336699; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> in his bones.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.68; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"> </p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.68; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #336699; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">At Christmas the first year I lived at Hartford Street, I wandered into the kitchen to find him carefully inserting cloves of garlic into a pork loin. There must have been 50 shiny white slivers obeying Issan’s careful, meticulous thumb. Raw pork, raw garlic—meat was only allowed in the kitchen on special occasions; I thought I caught a fierce look of concentration as if to wrap it more quickly in aluminum foil.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.68; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"> </p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.68; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #336699; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“What are you doing?” along with the unasked question, what is it? “Oh” he said, “I’m trying a roast Cuban pork with mojo sauce for JD (the first resident of the hospice). He told me that he loved it, and it is Christmas.” He could never say No to JD. Many people complained that he was just continuing to spoil a spoiled child. But in my heart I feel that Issan knew there'd be no miracles in the last few months of the young man's life. It was just cooking a tricky Cuban dish with a lot of garlic. </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.68; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"> </p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.68; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #336699; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">For most of us in the Castro, “Come out the the closet” meant to be honest about our sexuality, to banish all secrets about being gay. It had connotations of a difficult process for most white middle class gay men of that era, difficult conversations with backward, prejudiced families, about why we weren’t going to marry. Coming out of the closet opened the possibility of losing not only family but long time friends, jobs, inheritance. I certainly had to deal with all those scenarios. It took years. So when Issan told me that if he was depressed, he cleaned out the closet and almost immediately felt better, my mind immediately latched onto every Gay Liberation catch phrase.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.68; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"> </p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.68; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #336699; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">At the bottom of the stairs that led up to my attic room, there was a shallow closet with shelves next to the door to Issan’s room. One morning I came rushing down the stairs, probably late for a meeting. The door of the closet stood open; Issan stood behind his ironing board, neatly pressing his worn underwear. He smiled and said, “Oh, I feel so much better.” He really meant cleaning out the closet. Just that. No time for my middle class preoccupations, well maybe the nanosecond between jokes.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.68; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"> </p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.68; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #336699; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Issan often said that Maitri was difficult work, taxing, and demanding. Once he even compared it to war, telling me that he’s been to war, on a ship during the Korean conflict, and it was not fun. But he also said that what made it bearable was to laugh a little and have some parties, tell a few jokes between the deadly serious bits. One of the most delightful</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #336699; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> samu</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #336699; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> tasks was baking chocolate chip cookies for the parties, wigs and skirts optional.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.68; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"> </p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.68; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #336699; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I came into the living room looking for Issan, needing to ask about some mundane detail. I asked Phil where he was.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.68; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"> </p><span style="color: #336699; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“Probably cleaning the toilet with a toothbrush.” Yes, </span><span style="color: #336699; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-skip-ink: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">just</span><span style="color: #336699; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> cleaning a toilet bowl can be that difficult. I saved the joke for last. And I'm not lying.</span></span></div><div><br /></div><div><i>Below is Ken MacDonald, Issan's heart student, joking, I hope. But he has an important environmental message which might help inform our samu.</i></div><div><br /></div><div><span style="border: none; clear: left; display: inline-block; float: left; height: 320px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; overflow: hidden; width: 273px;"><img height="400" src="https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/d_wj8jcxrWKuLVh9ND1aOJjp3jvszYziBVAcH9ocmv0Vi0SRxjz5xmIUzpQGmYErGgBq3SaCqxzJ220JgR1I78kcBnQNC2sewF4zeIz40uwD-LlL0BDekktswOAb_kAF2JSufl0F=w342-h400" style="margin-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px;" width="342" /><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: italic; white-space: pre-wrap;">Nearly 40% of the developing world’s population lacks clean drinking water and about 2 million die each year because of it. By 2025 nearly ⅔ will live in water-stressed countries.</span></span><span style="font-family: times;"><i>Nearly 40% of the developing world’s population lacks clean drinking water and about 2 million die each year because of it. By 2025 nearly ⅔ will live in water-stressed countries.<br /><br />In the developed world we take our supply for granted, flushing it away mindlessly. But BRITA’s latest ads seem to imply that since the water we use for all our purposes “comes from the same source,” it’s as if we are drinking sewer water. Do you think that’s tasteless?<br /><br />But if you do buy a BRITA filter, don’t expect it to protect you from anything…it doesn’t filter bacteria,</i></span><span id="docs-internal-guid-87403e33-7fff-307e-3f4d-2a7bcfbbe18b"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"></span></span></div>Kenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00470542916911283360noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1886300900463089786.post-79223829481257782602021-12-10T02:52:00.049-08:002021-12-11T18:55:37.900-08:00 Q and A Zen<p><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="color: #5f6368; font-size: 12pt; white-space: pre-wrap;"><i>A cautionary tale plus a koan</i><span style="background-color: #fcfdff; color: #336699; font-family: Jomolhari; font-size: 14.85px; white-space: normal;">—</span><i>or two.</i></span></p>A friend recently told me about some advice from a Taoist master. I admit that I automatically distrust some Western dude with an ancient Chinese title. It feels like a label to make him credible. I don’t fully understand what Daoism is, and certainly haven’t the faintest idea of what it might have meant in 6th century BCE China. The friend didn’t actually repeat his Taoist teacher’s advice. I think I might be required to fork over some cash before I had the pleasure. We are a gullible lot. <br /><br />I investigated my initial response and discovered two basic questions: What are the prejudices that spark my immediate response? And what would be the criteria for me to trust a teacher and what he or she teaches? These are separate questions. It is important for me not to discover one answer and think that it provides a solution to both investigations. It is easy to conflate and confuse the answers: because I have discovered that I am distrustful for X reason, the teacher and his or her teaching must be trustworthy.<br /><br />Sometimes in Zen circles we western practitioners get lost in a lot of talk about our way, the Rinzai Way, the Soto way, the right way. This kind of jabber is barely distinguishable from cultish blabber. <br /><br />The questions this raises are really the same: How can we recognize what we call “authentic” practice; and what makes a teacher trustworthy? <br /><br />These questions bite their own tails. Some people, even trusted teachers, counsel us to trust our feelings. But when we honestly examine them, we find a twisted mess. We are told to just sit and they will sort themselves out. We sit. Perhaps a few of the knots disentangle, but there is no guarantee that a clear direction will emerge. Judge by the solutions that appear in real time, there are no easy answers. <br /><br />In 1990 when nearly 100 men were dying from AIDS in San Francisco every week, I remember talking with a bright, engaging woman who came to sit zazen at Hartford Street. She asked questions about the Hospice and Issan. I invited her to come back, perhaps become a hospice volunteer. She begged off, explaining that she was very involved in her practice at “the big Zen Center.” I remember her words exactly. “We do the real Japanese Buddhism: we bow at everything every time we turn around.” That is one choice.<br /><br />I never saw the woman again. What stopped her? Did I get in the way? Perhaps there was something about the dying, knowing that you’re dying, and the emotions that stirs up. I cannot say. Several of Issan’s close students didn’t visit. When he started to get sick, they actually disappeared, later explaining that they couldn’t bear to see him suffer or they preferred to remember him as the Pastor of Castro Street. Many were also gay and themselves HIV positive. There was such pain and suffering in the community, facing death head on was hard for all of us. I met Issan when HIV started to ravage his body and mind so that is really the only Issan I knew. It was his gift and my luck. But when I listened to stories of Issan at Tassajara or at Zen Center, Green Gulch or Santa Fe, I knew that dying Issan was the same man dedicating himself diligently and completely to the practice.<br /><br />I feel that the bowing woman missed an opportunity to experience a man who lived out the teaching until his last breath, but I also know that Issan would never have faulted her for avoiding him and bowing every time she turned around. He was so non-judgement and tolerant not to mention how much he loved to bow. I admit to applying a little pressure on the woman—I needed help at the hospice—and I also admit to feeling slightly superior in my role running the hospice which was of course real practice. I can’t set my experience center stage for applause, but on the other hand, I need to avoid rote answers, or getting caught up in some cultural forms that I don’t understand as if they unlock some esoteric secret. <br /><br /><b>Quick change of scene</b><br /><br />Listening in on a recent discussion bemoaning the death of Zen in Japan—so many first-son priests escaping the lifeless tedium of administering the family's temple business, my mind went back to a morning I spent looking over the library at Hartford Street, searching for a book that might unlock the mystery of the universe. Trained as a Jesuit, I hoped to find an answer, even a coded one, recorded by someone at some time in some place that might point me in the right direction.<br /><br />I picked up a volume and read about the third and final destruction of Nalanda, including its vast library, and tried to start a conversation with Phil Whalen. I was more horrified at the loss of the the sutras, the Mahayana texts and commentaries, including all the works, the notes and who knows what else, of the pivotal scholar Nāgārjuna than I was by the wanton murder of thousands of monks and teachers. I blurted out something about the horror of burning books to Phil who was sitting in his chair across from me. He just looked up, smiled and said, “Don’t worry, kid. They left us enough, just enough.”<br /><br />Muhammad bin Bakhtiyar Khalji is not alone in trying to destroy the dharma by burning books and killing monks and nuns. Beginning in 1950 Mao and the People’s Liberation Army systematically destroyed monasteries and burned as many sacred texts as they could lay their hands on in Tibet. In 1868, the Meiji Restoration began the campaign of Haibutsu kishaku (廃仏毀釈), literally "abolish Buddhism and destroy Shākyamuni," which led to the wholesale destruction of Buddhist temples and monasteries as well as sacred texts. The Taliban destroyed huge ancient Buddha statues in Bamiyan Afghanistan early 2001 which shocked the world and was soon followed by the regime’s defeat, but it did not prevent them from reasserting their hardline earlier this year.<br /><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;"><span style="border: none; display: inline-block; height: 380px; overflow: hidden; width: 556px;"><img alt="haibutsu-kishaku01.jpg" height="380" src="https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/OWHnvI_L3iZQAKbnncha7x0s_JqOd-BuQVmbuXLbvO-fqsWMtCb7iB6aRaz8_6rNTdH7AbQSLMfkZsQUn6baADBuTw1MZYLrdtDI2BfX6xxUDYzhqLKNyjIXXIDQ1gmWWO88wK05" style="margin-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px;" title="haibutsu-kishaku01.jpg" width="556" /></span></span></p><span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span id="docs-internal-guid-7e909dcd-7fff-7428-d303-7c2a302897cf"></span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto,sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-size: 9pt; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">The burning of sūtras during the Haibutsu kishaku (unknown source).</span></p></span><br />So while I deplore book-burning or destruction of religious art, their preservation is not a necessary condition for our practice. The loss of cultural Japanese Buddhism, centuries old beauty and tradition, including bowing to everything all the time, is a real loss, but it might have already disappeared.<div><br />How much remains? Just enough.<br /><br /><b>Issan is dying.</b><br /><br />In the early morning of September 6th, 1990, Issan’s breaths had become very labored. Someone woke me. My room was directly above his. I went downstairs and joined the others. There were perhaps ten people in the room, most of whom had shared the last difficult months of his journey, his doctor Rick Levine, Steve Allen, Shunko Jamvold, Angel Farrow, David Bulloch, David Sunseri, Kai Harper Lee, Jakushu Gregory Wood, myself—I can’t really remember who else was present. Most of us were sitting as best we could in the posture of meditation. Phil Whalen sat in a chair.<br /><br />The time had come. We waited for the end. I actually don’t know if it felt so dramatic to others, but to me it did. We were told that certain endorphins naturally kicked in to numb the pain, and of course there was palliative medication, but it was almost painful to hear the sound of his struggling for breath. His body jerked and trembled. Steve got up, lay down beside him, and held him gently. At first I was shocked. I was sure that Steve had never held Issan in that way before, but then it seemed like a perfect, spontaneous response—Issan loved the reassuring caress of another man. Gradually his breath became calm but more shallow. I tried to follow my own breath, to remain present and focused. It was difficult. There was a cascade of thoughts and emotions realizing how much I’d come to love Issan and how deeply I would miss him. <br /><br />The room became very quiet. Then Phil got up from his chair and bowed one last time to his old friend. Was he leaving? I was startled. It felt important to me to stay to the end. In a soft voice Phil said, “I’m sorry but I have to excuse myself. I will open the Zendo in the morning, and I need to sleep.” Then he left while life remained.<div> <span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="color: #5f6368; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Love rides on the breath,</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="color: #5f6368; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Labored, easy, </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="color: #5f6368; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">When the breath ends </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="color: #5f6368; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">It stands up, walks out,</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="color: #5f6368; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">And saves itself.</span></p><br /></span></div></div>Kenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00470542916911283360noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1886300900463089786.post-89943541516508621292021-10-01T06:19:00.023-07:002021-12-10T05:39:30.242-08:00 Sex, death, and food.<p><span style="font-family: Raleway;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #5f6062; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Dainin</span><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="color: #5f6062; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> Katagiri Roshi admonishes Issan!</span></span></p><span id="docs-internal-guid-fb52a5ea-7fff-b33a-2e9e-d48dc82fd8c6" style="font-family: Raleway;"><br /></span><span><p style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: times;"><span style="color: #5f6062; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">This life we live is a life of rejoicing, this body a body of joy which can be used to present offerings to the Three Jewels. It arises through the merits of eons and using it thus its merit extends endlessly. I hope that you will work and cook in this way, using this body which is the fruition of thousands of lifetimes and births to create limitless benefit for numberless beings. To understand this opportunity is a joyous heart because even if you had been born a ruler of the world the merit of your actions would merely disperse like foam, like sparks. </span><span style="background-color: #fcfdff; color: #336699; font-family: Jomolhari; font-size: 14.85px;">—</span><span style="color: #5f6062; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">from </span><a href="https://www.themathesontrust.org/papers/buddhism/Dogen-Tenzo-WhiteWind.pdf" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><span style="color: #1155cc; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-skip-ink: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Tenzo kyokun: Instructions for the Tenzo</span></a><span style="color: #5f6062; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> by Eihei Dogen zenji </span></span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Raleway; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Let’s talk about death while we’re still breathing. Talking about it after we’re dead might be challenging.</span></p><span style="font-family: Raleway;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Raleway; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A dying Isaan told me something Katagiri Roshi said to him when they were both very much alive. I find myself revisiting this conversation about impermanence and death. And while I’m at it, can I also include a conversation about sex? They’re both dead and can’t have that conversation, or we’re not privy to it, but I will try to do it for them. </span></p><span style="font-family: Raleway;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Raleway; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">And I’ll even stick my tongue out at you, Katagiri, even though you may only be a ghost.</span></p><span style="font-family: Raleway;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Raleway; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">And now, in reverse order, sex, death, and food</span></p><span style="font-family: Raleway;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Raleway;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">During one practice period at Tassajara, Issan ran the kitchen<span style="background-color: #fcfdff; color: #336699; font-family: Jomolhari; font-size: 14.85px; white-space: normal;">—</span>the position of tenzo is highly respected in Zen monasteries thanks to Dogen weaving a spell about the cook’s practice of making food. Issan told me he’d been working night and day in the kitchen. According to the Founder of Soto Zen, this is really good practice: </span><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“Day and night, the work for preparing the meals must be done without wasting a moment. If you do this and everything that you do whole-heartedly, this nourishes the seeds of Awakening and brings ease and joy to the practice of the community.”</span></span></p><span style="font-family: Raleway;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Raleway; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">But Katagiri Roshi called him in. </span></p><span style="font-family: Raleway;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Raleway; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Of course he went. The Roshi asked him why he was missing so many periods of zazen. Issan said he felt he had to explain himself<span style="background-color: #fcfdff; color: #336699; font-family: Jomolhari; font-size: 14.85px; white-space: normal;">—</span>he was terribly busy; there were a huge number of students to cook for; directing the preparations required an enormous effort; and, cut to the chase, Issan admitted that he was challenged working with some of the students as well as not complaining about foodstuff he didn’t think was terribly wonderful to begin with. </span></p><span style="font-family: Raleway;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Raleway; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Katagiri sat stone-faced. Then he said, “Yes, we work hard long hours. Then we die.” That was it. And as they say in the koans, Issan bowed and left. A true koan exit.</span></p><span style="font-family: Raleway;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Raleway; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Issan told me this story just months before he died. In both his smile and the bright tone of his voice, I could sense his gratitude for the decades old warning. The certainty of death added urgency to his story. HIV was ravaging his body. He knew he was dying. His body felt it. Denial was no longer possible, but I didn’t hear even the faintest note of resignation in his voice, rather a note of surprise that seemed as fresh as the day of that meeting. Past and present seemed to merge.</span></p><span style="font-family: Raleway;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Raleway; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">He never forgot those few words. They changed his life. They were a blessing. They shook something loose. They turned every excuse and explanation upside down, and released unexpected wonders.</span></p><span style="font-family: Raleway;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Raleway; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A conversation about food ended in death. Issan spoke honestly. He was dying as the direct result of a sexual encounter with his longtime boyfriend. What did he have to hide, and how could he hide it anyway? Despite the fact that many people loved Issan, they also found his relationship with James troublesome, not particularly because it was gay love, but the love of his life was a man addicted to methamphetamines. </span></p><span style="font-family: Raleway;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Raleway; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I began to look for other things Katagiri might have said about death, and found several. The old horse always found his way back to the barn. The words of a beloved and respected master have a way of creating their own currency. In Zen the phrase “turning word” points to a phrase that helps a student refocus his or her attention, perhaps even prompt a realization. In turn students circulate a good turn of phrase. </span></p><span style="font-family: Raleway;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Raleway; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Steve Allen told me that when Katagiri visited Suzuki Roshi just before Suzuki died, Katagiri cried out, “Please don’t die!” Another version of his plea is more personal and direct, “I don’t want you to die.” I had also heard that Katagiri’s last words were, “I don’t want to die,” but that may just have some sincere student either misquoting, conflating or confusing time and place. I can find no solid confirmation, but none of these statements are what you might expect from a Zen master. They certainly don't fit any sentimental notions of a master’s death poem.</span></p><span style="font-family: Raleway;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Raleway; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">But each version of the story rings of something real, gut emotion crying out. I accept the invitation to get real. </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Raleway; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Raleway; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Onto Questions about Sex!</span></p><span style="font-family: Raleway;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Raleway; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Dosho Port quotes you, Katagiri, as saying: "After my death I will come back and haunt over you, checking on your practice."* Yes, for me, Roshi, even though I was not your student, you have come back to haunt my practice, but not checking it as you did Issan’s work as the tenzo. I find myself weighing the value of your words. They have some punch, but is it a strawman? If I deflect the impact of your admonition about dying with the volatile ammunition of sexual scandal, am I ducking the question?</span></p><span style="font-family: Raleway;"><br /></span><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-left: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Raleway;"><img height="320" src="https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/ZS0fTOD7m3G5eYkJMna_rTWG-44v1CIL5nJLjbdRKc22j2fIDS-lAMtasxP8_Add0KYHdyTWPPqu_jKHlLckXrJbbAK21NHtTkMR6tpr7-xzI-iF836rGZiqHg17mGpfQYBQNegP=w206-h320" style="font-size: 11pt; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 0px;" width="206" /></span></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Raleway; font-size: xx-small;">"But I kept my mouth shut"</span></td></tr></tbody></table><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Raleway;">Can I take you seriously? Revelations about your sexual misconduct have come to light after your death. I am unsure if you actually lied about your relationships with women in your community, and there was no accusation that you were abusive. But keeping your mouth shut is not entirely honest either. I get that your reputation did depend, to some degree, on the perception of your being a steady family man. Perhaps you felt that if you were not directly confronted, your silence would serve the dharma. You are often quoted as saying that a good Zen student kept his or her mouth shut, followed directions, and sat upright. Roshi, I am told you were a good sitting monk, that you followed directions, well mostly; your form was good; and you certainly kept your mouth shut.</span></p></span><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Raleway;">I have also tried to keep my mouth shut. I have not commented on your sexual dalliances, Roshi. As a matter of fact, I wouldn't even judge them<span style="background-color: #fcfdff; color: #336699; font-family: Jomolhari; font-size: 14.85px;">—</span>if it were left to me, I would allow you any sexual expression you felt drawn to as long as it didn’t hurt others. But you were not fully transparent about your affairs. Did you really think that they would not come to light? Your naivete has come back to haunt us.</span></p><span style="font-family: Raleway;">I am obliged to add your name, Katagiri, to the list of teachers who have abused their position. Of the more than 450 Zen teachers in the United States, the amount of oxygen taken up by the small proportion who have been involved in sexual scandals is enormous. The distraction alone gravely harms the teaching.<br /><br />I will name names: Issan’s own teacher, Richard Baker,* Joshu Sasaki, Taizan Maezumi, Eido Shimano, Dennis Merzel. High profile Tibetan teachers whose names have been dragged into the same mud include Sakyong Mipham and Sogyal Rinpoche. These men, and they are all men, truly hurt us in real ways. </span><span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Raleway;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Raleway;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Po-chang and Huang-po: "The Buddha-Dharma is not a small affair”</span><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">*</span></span></p><span style="font-family: Raleway;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Raleway; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">When the hurt goes away, does it mean that we have understood? I’ll stick out my tongue!</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Raleway; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p></span><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Jomolhari;"><span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">One day the Master [Po-chang] addressed the group : "The Buddha-Dharma is not a small affair. I twice met with the Greater Master Ma's 'K'AAA! ' It deafened and blinded me [for] three days."</span></p></span><span><span><br /></span></span><span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Huang-po hearing this, unconsciously stuck out his tongue saying "Today, because of your exposition, I have been able to see Ma-tsu's power in action. But I never knew him. If I were to be Ma-tsu's heir, afterwards I'd have no descendants." </span></p></span><span><span><br /></span></span><span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Master Po-chang said, "That's so, that's so. If your understanding is equal to your teacher's, you diminish his power by half. Only if you surpass your teacher, will you be competent to transmit. You are very well equipped to surpass your teacher."</span></p></span></span></blockquote><span><span style="font-family: Raleway;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Raleway; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Roshi, you were saved by the queer guy! Issan fished some sound practice advice out of a muddy pond and passed it on. He wasn’t blinded or deafened by a few words. but he wasn’t blindsided either. He carried them in his heart for more than three days. In fact he used them till the day he died.</span></p><span style="font-family: Raleway;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Raleway; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Your dharma heir, Teijo Munnich, quotes you, Katagiri, “Please don’t call me ‘Zen Master.’ No one can master Zen.” And you also said, “Do not make me into a god after I die.” </span></p><span style="font-family: Raleway;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Raleway; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Don’t worry, Roshi. I won’t. Thank you.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: center;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span id="docs-internal-guid-13e499d0-7fff-5ef8-015c-b5e963300f9d"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: none; display: inline-block; height: 524px; overflow: hidden; width: 624px;"><img alt="Maori Haka" height="524" src="https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/zGeS6gK9vCrvd_6ZXGSuYzfZIhIejy7aog-ut2F7bgWMSX5Ud_kHk7Br1C6-XwE4hgCRT1h6-nhFAm6YIYH-is6zDc65N3L-98iOS5dzL5HkKU4fP8HPOY0g7nyLjgbGNZphnKVK=s0" style="margin-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px;" width="624" /></span></span></span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #4a4a4a; font-size: x-small; text-align: left; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Maori people of New Zealand have created a ritualistic dance, the Kapa Haka, </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #4a4a4a; font-size: x-small; text-align: left; white-space: pre-wrap;">in celebration of light triumphing over darkness.</span></div><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span id="docs-internal-guid-7b0c13c5-7fff-1b05-27e2-76d4a03775c1"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: center;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">_______________________</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">* </span><a href="https://www.themathesontrust.org/library/instructions-cook-tenzo-kyokun" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><span style="color: #1155cc; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-skip-ink: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Tenzo kyokun: Instructions for the Tenzo</span></a><span style="color: #5f6062; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> by Eihei Dogen zenji </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">*Dosho Port, </span><a href="https://www.amazon.in/Keep-Me-Your-Heart-While-ebook/dp/B003XF1LHU" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><span style="color: #1155cc; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-skip-ink: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> Me in Your Heart a While: The Haunting Zen of Dainin Katagiri</span></a></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">* Bivins, Jason C. </span><a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1525/rac.2007.17.1.57" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><span style="color: #1155cc; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-skip-ink: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“‘Beautiful Women Dig Graves’: Richard Baker-Roshi, Imported Buddhism, and the Transmission of Ethics at the San Francisco Zen Center.”</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Religion and American Culture: A Journal of Interpretation</span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">, vol. 17, no. 1, [University of California Press, Center for the Study of Religion and American Culture], 2007, pp. 57–93, https://doi.org/10.1525/rac.2007.17.1.57.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">*following the Ming version as translated by Cleary. Also quoted in </span><a href="https://www.google.co.in/books/edition/Zen_s_Chinese_Heritage/woWQAgAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=zen+student+surpass+the+master&pg=PT102&printsec=frontcover" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><span style="color: #1155cc; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-skip-ink: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Zen's Chinese Heritage</span></a></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><a href="https://www.google.co.in/books/edition/Zen_s_Chinese_Heritage/woWQAgAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=zen+student+surpass+the+master&pg=PT102&printsec=frontcover" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><span style="color: #1155cc; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-skip-ink: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Masters and Their Teachings</span></a><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> by </span><a href="https://www.google.co.in/search?hl=en&sxsrf=AOaemvLsv2ciP9xtohdNVQVvjvhwx_1Mkg:1633056903596&q=inauthor:%22Andy+Ferguson%22&tbm=bks" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><span style="color: #1155cc; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-skip-ink: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Andy Ferguson</span></a><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></p><br /><br /><br /><div><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #4a4a4a; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div></span>Kenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00470542916911283360noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1886300900463089786.post-66727222490197171432021-09-16T08:20:00.026-07:002021-09-18T07:51:47.700-07:00 Is life over when it’s over?<p><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span id="docs-internal-guid-eade2d22-7fff-1c6d-4d99-4e54cc3e7210" style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: none; display: inline-block; height: 440px; overflow: hidden; width: 351px;"><img alt="Photos courtesy of alanwatts.org" height="400" src="https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/U8xnCw-yG_lYsqxND26o4uihrShNXr0Xlox5S2PQPpVVuTYyrLs_l_IIhhuULRZX5-ja6ChB54dfVW0yEtW7UdUMKoIu0nGe0rUNO2TohJemX7dgyx8qmCArW04e6iJ24GpOF6Lw=w319-h400" style="margin-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px;" width="319" /></span></span></span></span></p><p><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-weight: 700; white-space: pre-wrap;">Ala</span><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">n Wilson Watts</span><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> (6 January 1915 – 16 November 1973)</span></p><span id="docs-internal-guid-9403eb1c-7fff-e33d-200e-c133b90b7c16"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><i><span style="font-family: Jomolhari;">"Each one of us, not only human beings, but every leaf, every weed, exists in the way it does, only because everything else around it does. The individual and the universe are inseparable". ~Alan Watts Sensei</span></i></span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Are there reasons for living and reasons for dying?</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Why should we think that Zen is in trouble simply because there are flawed people who practice and flawed people who teach? Certainly punches and counter punches are distracting, especially in a scandal, but they are not off limits. In my view, idolizing revered teachers also limits the possibilities in practice for anyone who sets foot on the path. This presents its own set of problems which I might explore at another time. Zen is devised for humans, not gods.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Many years ago I went to a meeting with several of Claudio Naranjo’s old Seekers After Truth students on the “Vallejo,” the Sausalito houseboat where Alan Watts talked and drank, womanized and created legends. </span><span style="font-size: 16px; white-space: pre-wrap;">It is common knowledge that he was an alcoholic, but I have no knowledge of sexual excess. </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; white-space: pre-wrap;"> From both my reading and first hand reports, however, I can say with certainty that he did go on and on. He wrote and published 25 books before his death; 40 more have appeared since. That is the stuff of legend, and an enormous contribution.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I also visited a couple who lived in the rustic cabin in Druid Heights near Muir Woods where Watts died. One report is that he slumped over his desk drunk and died though some say he made it to bed that night. The story is vague as are a lot of stories about alcoholics. We will never know the truth because we don’t really need to know. But his desk was kept in the same condition as it had been when he died as a kind of shrine to assist his passage to the Pureland, or Byzantine Heaven, or some New Age version of Limbo. I asked hesitantly if I could sit in the chair where he sat when he wrote. My host said, “Of course. This way is open to anyone.” I imagined that I heard a faint echo from the Master.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Phil Whalen told me that he loved to listen to Watts on the old Berkeley KPFA. Many of the people who first gathered around Suzuki Roshi did. For some it was their initiation into Zen. Watts read widely and wisely even if at times he speculated wildly. </span><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Chadwick_(writer)" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">David Chadwick</span></a><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> recounted in his biography of Suzuki, </span><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Crooked Cucumber: the Life and Zen Teaching of Shunryu Suzuki</span><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">, [that] when a student of Suzuki's disparaged Watts by saying "we used to think he was profound until we found the real thing", Suzuki fumed with a sudden intensity, saying, "You completely miss the point about Alan Watts! You should notice what he has done. He is a great </span><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bodhisattva" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">bodhisattva</span></a><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">.” Suzuki did not disparage the ox who tilled the soil even if all the rows were not perfectly lined up. That would come later, and in some cases the insistence on plowing perfectly straight lines got a bit out of hand. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">At dinner in Mandala House I remember a lively conversation with my host's wife who was very close to a dear friend who was also present. The woman's son by another marriage, a bright, handsome guy had driven across the Santa Cruz mountains to be with his mother. Not long after he died in a car wreck on a treacherous part of that same highway. His mother chose to join him. She took a huge number of sleeping pills and never woke up again in the same house, perhaps the same room where Watts died.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I never met Alan Watts, but I met his ghost. I also carry with me the memories of many other men and women who left life with a troubled past. Though I might think I understand some of their reasons for living, I cannot claim to know the reasons for their dying.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: center;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">____________________</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Michael Papas was a guest student at Tassajara during the Summer of 1980. He recalled a talk by Issan that he says was a real downer. “I can’t repeat any of it, and the memories of the specific content are vague, but I didn’t find any good news in it at all!”</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Afterwards, he asked Issan, “If things are so bad, why don’t we just kill ourselves ?”</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"> </p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Issan's answer came quickly, “Because it wouldn’t help.”</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"> </p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">My friend is a long-time Zen student. He says, “It was a great answer obviously. It has stayed with me for more than 40 years. I thought of it many times in 2016 when my wife left me and suicide seemed like the only way to stop the pain. But truthfully back then, having children was my main reason for sticking.”</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Issan died on </span><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">September 6, 1990. He was 57 years old. If he were still alive, he would be 88 years old today. Watts was only 58 when he died and his legend spans decades. I might complain that they both died too young with so much left to contribute. I might sing that tired old tune “only the good die young,” but I’d add that sometimes the good die young because they were bad, or at least not as good as we would like to believe.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Michael, thank you for sharing Issan’s kind answer. It still has life.</span></p><div><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202122; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div></span>Kenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00470542916911283360noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1886300900463089786.post-70480530077386032332021-09-02T08:56:00.021-07:002021-09-14T01:14:43.962-07:00“They Never Get the Pleats Right”<p><b><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="color: #333333; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A </span><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="color: #333333; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Mondo</span></b></p><span id="docs-internal-guid-30898b18-7fff-644e-9c93-d7604517a3bb"><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.39725; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: transparent; color: #333333; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Master Nansen* was washing clothes.</span></p></span><span><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.39725; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: transparent; color: #333333; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A monk asked: "Is the master still doing such things?"</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.39725; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: transparent; color: #333333; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Master Nansen, holding up his clothes, asked: "What is to be done with them?"</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"> </p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">*Nansen was the accomplished teacher of the famous Mu-dog guy, Joshu, who when Nansen died went into a deep state of grief that, we’re told, lasted decades. I’m not Joshu, but I will tell a Nansen style tale to focus my own grief that reappears from time to time decades after Issan died. </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"> </p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"> </p></span><span style="font-family: Jomolhari;">A more formal sounding Buddhist name to this story might be “there’s nothing too small that you can let escape your attention, even if no one’s going to notice,” but “They Never Get the Pleats Right” tells the story.<br /><br />When we began Maitri at Hartford St, we carried on a full meditation schedule on top of running the Hospice. <br /><br />One Saturday we were sitting meditation from early morning till dusk. Issan was not sitting. It was during the last six months of his life, and actually he was in bed. His fever had spiked to almost 103 the previous day; his doctor, Rick Levine, was sitting with us and monitoring his patient. <br /><br />That evening Issan had a longstanding commitment to officiate at the wedding of two men, old friends, at the Hall of Flowers in Golden Gate Park. Issan married same sex couples in the religious tradition of Soto Zen long before the issue of gay marriage exploded, Prop 8 passed, was then voided, the Supreme Court—well, that’s a whole other story.<br /><br />After lunch I came upstairs from the zendo, and noticed that Issan’s formal white kimono had appeared on the coat rack in the hallway, wrapped in plastic fresh from the dry cleaner. The simple garment had several deep pleats around the waistline, but with the Okesa, the Buddha’s robe, worn over the left shoulder, not much of it is actually visible. It’s almost like ceremonial underwear.<br /><br />I went back to my cushion in the zendo. When I came upstairs again about 3:30 to fix tea before the last block of sitting, Issan was standing behind his ironing board in the living room, in his bathrobe, wearing a little head band. Sweat was dripping from his forehead. He was ironing the kimono fresh from the dry cleaners. I stopped on the stairs, and had to stop myself from telling him sternly to get back to bed--the hot iron didn’t mix with an elevated body temperature. He saw my shock. He turned towards me, smiled and said, “They never get the pleats right.” I knew he wanted me to laugh. But he was serious about his task, and didn’t want me to stop him. How could I argue with a man obviously in a deep state of concentration if I was laughing? I didn’t. I didn’t dare.<br /><br />I went back to the zendo, and Issan returned to his bed. Just after the closing ceremony, we met again. Steve and Shunko, part of the ceremonial team, had packed the car, and everything was in place. Issan came down the stairs perfectly dressed. He might have been brushing off his fears when he said, “It’s such a long complicated ceremony. I hope I get it right, but it's a Zen ceremony—When I forget what I’m supposed to do, I just bow. That's always right.” This time we both laughed.<br /><br />Everyone came home relieved. The wedding had been fabulous. When Shunko complained that the husband’s gift list of toasters and table service included nothing for the Hospice, Issan was quick to remind him that it was the couples’ special day. They were setting up house together for the first time.<br /><br />Oh that man loved to iron. He also ironed his non-priestly underwear. I saw it with my own eyes. I don’t know if the newly married couple were given a shiny new steam iron, but I do know that Issan gave them the gift of his practice. <br /><br />Issan taught me ironing practice though I am not as devoted to it as he was, but there’s another lesson here about gifts and toasters and table service. It took me a long time to digest and I still struggle with it: There is always enough money to do what you need to do. And most likely it will be just enough, not a penny more or a penny less. When you are tight, (or especially if you’re tight) it’s probably time to reorder your priorities, and mindfully count your pennies.</span><div><span><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 10pt; margin-right: 10pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 10pt; margin-right: 10pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b>The Verse</b> is from the poem, “</span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Ironing,” by Vicki Feaver</span></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="320" src="https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/rWhM_s2GzGHMRblim-UoE_OCUlJshj7VZ7NDr_LFmvIhabprC_9MEUW8HarOhH5zZ-4sUt1URcgjT8skTUjU4T9oP6401lUOEP5f7B3EeJFMpdFupB7NO6UW0U7vX3uFechSO4FB=w320-h320" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 0px;" width="320" /></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td></tr></tbody></table><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16px; font-style: italic; white-space: pre-wrap;">And now I iron again: shaking</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">dark spots of water onto wrinkled</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">silk, nosing into sleeves, round</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">buttons, breathing the sweet heated smell</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">hot metal draws from newly-washed</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">cloth, until my blouse dries</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">to a shining, creaseless blue,</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">an airy shape with room to push</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">my arms, breasts, lungs, heart into.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 10pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 10pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 10pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 10pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 10pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 10pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 10pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 10pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">In memory of Issan Tommy Dorsey Roshi (March 7, 1933 — September 6, 1990)</span></p><br /></span></div>Kenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00470542916911283360noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1886300900463089786.post-46021573969073730822021-08-30T00:38:00.014-07:002021-09-02T22:03:42.080-07:00Don't Worry. Be Happy. Just do your best!<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Jomolhari;"><img alt="File:Don't worry, be happy.jpg" height="320" src="https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/y0LV73VYSUx9tOc6xJ8bC2VPRbt8pisDpIXbDs5D-4nWFiFxQCsJrgsSOzfr0S_SmllL9gDybLH1rKHk_R9Y-NSAs_dxQ42tEUAGNS98Wkw_MZCnr4sCcbhfNf2cDmfwYzbNB4QN=w194-h320" style="font-size: 12pt; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 0px;" width="194" /></span></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td></tr></tbody></table><span style="font-family: Jomolhari;">Issan loved the Bobby McFerrin song “<a href="https://www.blogger.com/#">Don’t worry. Be happy</a>.” I am not sure whether or not he knew that it came from Meher Baba, or that <a href="https://www.blogger.com/#">Meher Baba</a> took a vow of silence. It doesn’t matter. He'd humm it like a mantra.<br /><br />But he also said that Meher Baba didn’t get it entirely right. It was incomplete. He was insistent. “I always tell people: life is uncertain. Just do the best that you can. We aren’t asked to do more. It’s more than enough.”<br /><br />I almost forgot. If you told him about some unhappiness, he would have happily given you his phone number. "People call me all the time. They need to talk about things."<br /><br /><br /></span><div><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><br /></p><span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Who better to supply the verse?</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><a href="https://www.google.com/search?rlz=1C1CHZN_enIN940IN940&sxsrf=AOaemvJ7QUM9bN-boT_F_e4xOoqLd9eLtA:1630641001259&q=Bobby+McFerrin&stick=H4sIAAAAAAAAAONgVuLUz9U3MCxOSjNaxMrnlJ-UVKngm-yWWlSUmQcAXb-_cx4AAAA&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiqgIuN8-HyAhVROisKHdlsA6EQMXoECAgQAw" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="color: #1155cc; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-skip-ink: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Bobby McFerrin</span></a></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Here's a little song I wrote</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">You might want to sing it note for note</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Don't worry, be happy</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">In every life we have some trouble</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">But when you worry you make it double</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Don't worry, be happy</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Don't worry, be happy now</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">don't worry</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Ain't got no place to lay your head</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Somebody came and took your bed</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Don't worry, be happy</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The landlord say your rent is late</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">He may have to litigate</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Don't worry, be happy</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Oh, ooh ooh ooh oo-ooh ooh oo-ooh don't worry, be happy</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Here I give you my phone number, when you worry, call me, I make you happy, don't worry, be happy</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Don't worry, be happy</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Ain't got no cash, ain't got no style</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Ain't got no gal to make you smile</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Don't worry, be happy</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">'Cause when you worry your face will frown</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">And that will bring everybody down</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">So don't worry, be happy</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Don't worry, be happy now</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Now there, is this song I wrote</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I hope you learned note for note</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Like good little children, don't worry, be happy</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Now listen to what I said, in your life expect some trouble</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">When you worry you make it double</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">But don't worry, be happy, be happy now</span></p><br /><br /></span></div>Kenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00470542916911283360noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1886300900463089786.post-60877128239590914552021-08-29T22:08:00.007-07:002021-08-29T23:10:07.741-07:00Honolulu Haircut<img height="262" src="https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/Jjjg3zkfmHluf5jhpeyWrB2nbWTQyF55L4yJw2Mp_sGY4csgAE1I_7k5ennzoZERS42F13fCZdHpE4r85oa_CxOo0YLWHlCB4Ul_dX4TyBF7ni0rkuZQjiMz-9OSZebNxeYpuMzH=w400-h262" width="400" /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: Raleway;">After the sesshin with Bob Aitken where I met Ken McDonald, one afternoon Ken and I found ourselves cruising around Honolulu doing a drop-in-the-local-Temple kind of tour.<br /><br />At the Soto Shu main temple in Nuuanu Ave, the head priest was cheerfully spending the afternoon with his wife trimming the hedges that abutted the parking lot. He looked up and smiled, acknowledging us. Then he said: “Giving haircut.” <br /><br />We asked if we could sit zazen in the hall, and, after what I took to be a strange look of puzzlement, he took a key out of his pocket and opened a door to what appeared to be a closet filled with racks of folding chairs where there were three or four zafu’s placed facing a concrete wall. <br /><br />If we had dreamed of an Eiheiji styled zendo, it was not to be found. But we had just completed 7 days of intensive zazen so the bare room was welcoming. All there was was sitting. There was no need for liturgical trappings,</span>Kenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00470542916911283360noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1886300900463089786.post-6585012131970570892021-08-29T19:59:00.013-07:002021-09-12T04:44:40.019-07:00"The End of the Rainbow"<p><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-size: 12pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Over thirty years ago at the height of the AIDS epidemic, Steve Allen asked Issan, “The world is ending. Where is the great peace when we need it?” </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Steve tells us that the setting for his question was the formal ritual in which Issan took the high seat of a recognized Zen teacher, his mountain seat. Steve imagined that he was simply cementing his relationship with his root teacher.</span></p><p><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-size: 12pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Issan remained silent.</span></p><p><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-size: 12pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">After a while Issan turned the question around and asked Steve what he thought. Steve answered, “We find it with each other.” Not just a good answer--but one that held real answers to questions that we didn’t even know we had.</span></p><p><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-size: 12pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">A disciple’s question might bring forth the deep understanding of his or her teacher, but Steve also found a way to liberate himself. Our connections with each other are not limited. The ancient ritual might have required that Issan portray the immutable stone face of one mountain, but his follow-up question revealed a heart of gold. </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">When the end of the world gets in your way, follow the way that brings us together. When the storm clears, it may lead to the end of the rainbow.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><div align="left" dir="ltr" style="margin-left: 0pt;"><table style="border-collapse: collapse; border: none;"><colgroup><col width="503"></col></colgroup><tbody><tr style="height: 334.75pt;"><td style="overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="407" src="https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/n9jLAAUP-f9RaGUwhXoouLFAg9f16VpDTUeyd-I45dZPms7si6Idme17v5TUxGDZ193J1ucyLxe8YKgTzSV8cVzzs5jzAMNzy9wYPB79hYUVZwuO4fCyXif-FPoQD4fvUvK2UhZO=s0" style="cursor: move; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 0px;" width="624" /></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial; text-align: start; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">David Bullock, Del Carlson, Angelique Farrow, Steve Allen, Issan Dorsey</span></span></td></tr></tbody></table><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="border: none; display: inline-block; height: 407px; overflow: hidden; width: 624px;"></span></span></span></p></td></tr></tbody></table></div>Kenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00470542916911283360noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1886300900463089786.post-27068138681851164502021-08-18T02:48:00.018-07:002022-03-23T02:46:28.779-07:00The Hands and Eyes of Great Compassion<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span id="docs-internal-guid-673a2892-7fff-3866-77f6-a1c2e11bd81e"><h3 dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Cambria,serif; font-size: 12pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">The Hands and Eyes of Great Compassion</span></h3></span><span><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.656; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Cambria,serif; font-size: 12pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">Maha Shobogenzo Case 105</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.656; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Cambria,serif; font-size: 12pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">Book of Serenity Case 54</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"> </p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"> </p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Cambria,serif; font-size: 12pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;"><span style="border: none; display: inline-block; height: 464px; overflow: hidden; width: 624px;"><img height="464" src="https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/3t15bxf7mh-WoHd68l2_ZSiJ9jTvaixm4a2P8xN8pUUicfUIuWpQawxKDoEyn-E0Z3kq0TbC204W83bQ5YKlhN1VS1CmQwBWtbN_KSM8vfZXq5foyBV1LCq7UtQ8ynq-C75bsHgI" style="margin-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px;" width="624" /></span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"> </p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.728; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Cambria,serif; font-size: 12pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">The Case</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Cambria,serif; font-size: 12pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;"> </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; padding: 0pt 0pt 1pt;"><span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: times; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">Yunyan asked Daowu, </span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; padding: 0pt 0pt 1pt;"><span style="font-family: times;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">“How does the Bodhisattva of Great Compassion (Avalokiteshvara) use so many hands and eyes?”</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;"><span style="vertical-align: super;">1</span></span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; padding: 0pt 0pt 1pt;"><span style="font-family: times;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">Daowu said, “It’s just like a person in the middle of the night reaching back in search of a pillow.”</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;"><span style="vertical-align: super;">2</span></span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; padding: 0pt 0pt 1pt;"><span style="font-family: times;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">Yunyan said, “I understand.”</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;"><span style="vertical-align: super;">3</span></span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; padding: 0pt 0pt 1pt;"><span style="font-family: times;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">Daowu said, “How do you understand it?”</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;"><span style="vertical-align: super;">4</span></span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; padding: 0pt 0pt 1pt;"><span style="font-family: times;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">Yunyan said, “All over the body are hands and eyes.”</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;"><span style="vertical-align: super;">5</span></span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; padding: 0pt 0pt 1pt;"><span style="font-family: times;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">Daowu said, “What you said is roughly all right. But it’s only eighty percent of it. “</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;"><span style="vertical-align: super;">6</span></span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; padding: 0pt 0pt 1pt;"><span style="font-family: times;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">Yunyan said, “Senior brother, how do you understand it?”</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;"><span style="vertical-align: super;">7</span></span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; padding: 0pt 0pt 1pt;"><span style="font-family: times;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">Daowu said, “Throughout the body are hands and eyes.”</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;"><span style="vertical-align: super;">8</span></span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: times;"> </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><br /></p></span><b>The Commentary</b><br /><br />If your whole body were an eye, you still wouldn’t be able to see it. If your whole body were an ear, you still wouldn’t be able to hear it. If your whole body were a mouth, you still wouldn’t be able to speak of it. If your whole body were mind, you still wouldn’t be able to perceive it. Because the activity of Bodhisattva of Great Compassion is her whole body and mind itself, it is not limited to any notions or ideas of self or other. Bringing it up in the first place is a thousand miles from the truth. Answering the question only serves to compound the error. Don’t you see? Avalokiteshvara Bodhisattva has never understood what compassion is.<br /><br /><br /><b>The Capping Verse</b><br /><br />All over the body, throughout the body.<br />It just can’t be rationalized.<br />Deaf, dumb and blind — virtuous arms, penetrating eyes<br />Have always been right here.<br /><br /><b>My Comments:</b><br /><br />Here's Wansong’s comment, "When reaching for a pillow at night, there's an eye in the hand; when eating there's an eye on the tongue, when recognizing people on hearing them speak, there's an eye in the ears."<br /><br />Why is this so difficult to understand? I really want to ask Wansong why he’s making such a fuss. Has he never slept with a pillow? I think the poor old guy was just deluded. The hand doesn't need an extra eye to reach out to grab the pillow. If he’s waiting for an eye to appear on his tongue before he speaks, that’s our good luck, we won’t have to listen to his double talk. An eye in the ear won’t help him either. He’s already muddied Quan Yin’s Great Compassion song with too many notes. And about that painter guy who did the famous portrait--he had too much time on his hands and the paint in his pots must have been overflowing.<br /><br />There are innumerable qualities in Great Compassion, but that doesn't mean that it’s complicated or something mere human beings shouldn't strive for, or that it’s impossible to attain. Tonight you can practice: when you’re deep in sleep, reach behind you and hold onto your pillow. Better yet, follow Issan’s example. Fluff the pillow of a friend who’s in pain and can't reach behind to do it for themselves, wipe their brow, help them hold a glass to their lips, cook them chocolate chip cookies. That will clear out some of the webs in your notions of the Great Compassion.<br /><br />Keep it simple.<br /><br /> <p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-right: 11pt; margin-top: 0pt; padding: 0pt 0pt 11pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Cambria,serif; font-size: 12pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;"><span style="border: none; display: inline-block; height: 400px; overflow: hidden; width: 329px;"><img height="400" src="https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/AyXANh9zYVmYvJpYFjh222foqlMARluyiuTEg_fL8xTIDbyZ7Nu3AgqEvbp_boWTjp7g4X8U8OF0dBl91OOj5YGfFVBytvF4uvXLqZg0i56Cy0VLQlAiQaGukDLgl_uY5QdVua5x" style="margin-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px;" width="329" /></span></span></p><span><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: #fcfdff; line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-right: 11pt; margin-top: 0pt; padding: 0pt 0pt 11pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Cambria,serif; font-size: 12pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">The Footnotes</span></p></span>1. Why does he ask? Is it out of curiosity or an imperative?</div><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">2. Miraculous activity; it’s not to be taken lightly.</div><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">3. That’s exactly the problem that you started with in the first place. Stop understanding.</div><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">4. It won’t do to let him get away with it.<br />5. Many Zen practitioners fall into this pit.</div><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">6. It’s because he understands it that he only got eighty percent of it.</div><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">7. Make it your own; don’t rely on another’s provisions to support your life.</div><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">8. No gaps! But say, did he really say it all? If you say he did — wrong! If you say he didn’t you have missed it. What do you say?</div></div>
Kenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00470542916911283360noreply@blogger.com0