Tuesday Morning, April 23, 1968, Lecture A
Tassajara
Because I was not well, I am sorry I couldn't join your practice so much. But
you did very well, I think, and even if as a personal experience you cannot
accept your practice, maybe that is not so big a problem. If you can accept
yourself completely [laughs], then you will not be in this world any more
[laughs, laughter]. So, that you have problems means you are still alive. That
is our way. And, even if you make a trip to another world, [laughs] you will
have the same problem, as long as you have your body and mind. Things exist in
that way. That is how things exist in this world.
The cold I experienced this time was a pretty unusual one for the colds I have
had in America. The colds I have had in Japan were as bad as I had this time.
High temperature and feeling, you know, sleeping [or slipping] on some slope
upside down [laughs]. Head is down and feet are up. That was the feeling I had
when I had colds in Japan.
And, as I was very careful recently, and trying to find ways to help you, I carefully
experienced my bad feelings [laughs, laughter]. And, I want to tell you some of
them.
First of all, I want to tell you about breathing. This time, instead of finding
my breathing difficult through my nose or throat, this time my nose and mouth were
open—too open. Like a bottle without a cork [laughs]. So when I took medicine
it came in, all at once. And when I exhaled, it came out forcefully, so I could
not take normal breaths [laughs].
So, I tried to make my throat narrower, with my tongue and the bottom of my
nose so that I could snore [makes snoring sound] [laughs]. In this way, I felt
good. I thought at that time that life without a problem is like breathing
without any nose or mouth—without a head [laughs]. Breathing may be very easy,
but with unhappy feelings [laughs, laughter]. No feeling of breathing at all.
And, my back ached pretty bad. I could have been patient with it, but I tried
many things. I put a stone on my back and tried to make some substituted
problem [laughs]—for the pain. Instead of an unhappy feeling of pain, maybe
some usual pain would be better. So I put a stone here, and having some pain on
my back, I couldn't forget my pain in my back, but it helped the unhappy
feeling of my spine. When I did it, I had no idea of zazen or anything. But,
later I thought, zazen pain in your legs or body in your practice may be like a
stone was on my back. That is a healthy, normal problem. So, whatever
experience it is, if it is a normal experience based on right understanding of
life, you can accept the problem quite easily.
At San Francisco, many times I told them that even though you feel you do not
make any progress in your practice, and even though you have many problems in
your practice, it may be better not to quit sitting because if you quit sitting,
you will not have the pain in your legs, but instead of that pain you will have
another pain [laughs]. So this pain in your practice will be much better than
the pain or problems you will have in city life or in some other way.
“Everyday Mind Is Zen”: This was a very important koan.1 “Everyday
Mind Is Dao.” And, this is pretty difficult. Many people have a misunderstanding
about it. “Everyday Mind Is Dao.” First of all, we should know what is dao or true mind, and this is again the problem of true mind and everyday mind. Dao is the back something from which everyday mind arises. So, “Everyday mind is dao”
means to find dao in everyday mind, everyday life. It looks like it's putting
emphasis on everyday mind or dualistic mind. You may say: “If everyday mind is
true mind, whatever we do doesn't matter; that is dao. To sneak into
some other's field and get a sweet potato, or sweet melon, and eat it in hot
summer weather is dao [laughs]. Whatever you do, that is dao.” You
may understand it this way.
But actually, what it means is to feel big mind through our everyday practice.
This morning, when we were sitting, perhaps you could hear many birds singing on
the sunny side of the mountain. In your practice, to hear it, what you feel or
what you hear is not just birds. It is quite different from when you hear birds
in usual time. Instead of being disturbed by the birds, you will feel a deeper
feeling of your practice—deeper. If you do not hear anything, it is like
breathing without a mouth or nose [laughs]. No problem, but no feeling.
Something which will come into your practice will deepen your feeling of
practice.
But, when you are involved in dualistic ideas—“What time do we sit?” or “What
bird do we see?” [laughs] —it's more and more useless to sit in such a dark
room instead of enjoying this beautiful sunshine at the foot of the mountain
with birds [laughs]. The moment you hear the bird, usually, we will be involved
in this kind of life. But, when you hear the bird in your sitting, without
trying to hear it, then your practice will be encouraged by the bird.
Every morning we hit our bell when we practice zazen. That will encourage our
practice. Sometimes it may be a disturbance, but when your practice is filled
with true spirit, it will encourage your deep feeling. That feeling is dao or everyday mind in its true sense.
There are many stones in Tassajara Creek. Each stone has a very mysterious
strange shape which will tell us various things. Kumazawa Zenji2 wrote something about stones, in Japanese. If you went to Sokoji, you must have
seen it already: five virtues of stones. If you see a stone, there is our
practice. That is everyday mind. So, everyday mind is not just a kind of mind
which is always involved in a dualistic sense.
In Japan, in springtime especially, or in late autumn, a heavy storm or big
flood will wash out everything in a creek so that anyone can see new stones. After
rain, we go stone hunting. So, suppose five people, with their lunch like a picnic,
started stone hunting, someone may go ahead of the people so that he can find the
best stone before the rest [laughs] of the people find something good. But, those
people usually do not find the best stone [laughs]. Maybe the last one, who is
not so enthusiastic to find anything [laughs, laughter], and listening to the
birds, enjoying the stream, by chance he will find the best stone [laughs]. The
eyes of the first one are [laughs] called “chicken's eyes.” Do you know chicken?
[Probably mimics chicken.] [Laughs, laughter.] Trying to find something good,
you know. [Laughs, laughter.] Their mind is too little. So, even though they
try hard, they cannot find anything good. Or if it is mind—we say “monkey
mind.” A monkey is so busy looking around [laughs, laughter]. With that busy
mind, they cannot find anything. Usual mind or everyday mind [laughs] will find
something good.
Archbishop Kumazawa Zenji said, “Stones with many strange mysterious shapes
speak out fluently the full meaning of the mystery of the truth.” That is one
[virtue of stone]. We say strange, mysterious. But if you seek something
mysterious and strange, you cannot find something mysterious and strange in its
true sense. People may say this is a quite common, usual stone, but if it is stone
through and through, it will speak out many mysteries.
And second, “It is stones which support the whole earth from the deepest bottom
of the earth, as a bone of mountains, with immeasurable spirit and bottomless
composure.” These are very beautiful words. I cannot translate it so well. But
I tried.
The third one is: “It is a stone which never changes its position in spite of
the hardship of rain and wind, overcoming the hot and cold.”
And next: “It is stone, with its hard nature”— hard nature? not “nature,” but—
Student: Durable?
SR: Stone is hard, nature of— not nature—instead of “nature” you have some
word.
Students: Quality?
SR: Quality. Ah. “—with its hard quality supporting. It is stone which supports
high buildings and beautiful pagodas fulfilling the duty [function] of a foundation.
Silently adding beauty to mountains and carvings, and harmonizing our mind—is stone.”
He wrote this last year, and last year he was 93. And here he says: “Eihei
Taizen, 94.”3 [Laughs.] People wonder why he wrote he is 94 when he
was 93 [laughs, laughter]. Kumazawa Roshi, the bishop, Bishop Yamada,4 whom you know, said here, “He likes to boast about his age.” [Laughs,
laughter.] So when he was actually 93, he said, “I am 94.” Someone said it is
quite common to add two or three more years after 100 [laughs, laughter]. There
are many famous Zen masters who lived to more than 100. But, we cannot exactly
know how old they were [laughs, laughter]. Maybe more than 100, but how many
more we don't know. He said to write, “Eihei Taizen, 94.” And all of us
thought he was 94. “Oh! He was very old.” He was very happy to hear people
admired him because of his old age.
Mount Fuji is our pride. And it lies just between Yamanashi Prefecture and
Shizuoka Prefecture. Once they had a big dispute whether a shrine which is
located on the top of Mt. Fuji belongs to Shizuoka Prefecture or Yamanashi
Prefecture. They had a very big dispute [laughs].5 At that time, Archbishop
Taizen visited the shrine, and he said to the people who were there, “Yamanashi
Prefecture is the landlord of Mt. Fuji. I support you as the abbot of Eiheiji.”
People worried about that statement very much because they were in the terrible
dispute, and said to him, “If you go to Shizuoka Prefecture, what will you say
to them?” [Laughing, laughter ongoing.] “That is quite easy,” he said. “I will
say Shizuoka Prefecture is the landlord of Mt. Fuji. I am completely for your
dispute, as the abbot of Eiheiji.” This is all right [1-2 words], he said to
the people, and people couldn't say anything. They were astonished. He wouldn't
change his attitude [1-2 words]. “Oh, it's all right. I am saying so.” He is a very
humorous person.
With that kind of time [?] we should find out story. With this kind of story he
helped people to adjust themselves in some entanglement. That is not so easy,
you know. He must have thought that it is silly to be involved in the problem
of which side the shrine belongs to. It is very silly. So, he was laughing at
them. That is so-called “tongueless speech.” What he was saying literally
doesn't mean anything. But he just pointed out their wrong attitude—their small
mind.
This is the Buddhist [1-3 words],6 which is pretty good. Maybe too
special, but I wish that you can keep it [?]. Not only Zen but also for
children [?] of all schools of Buddhism.
[Aside:] Do you have the time?
Student: Right about now. I think we have 4 o'clock rehearsal.
SR: Mm-hmm. Okay.
Thank you very much.
_________________
1 Gateless Gate 19.
2 Kumazawa Sogaku Taizen (1873–1968), 73rd chief abbot of Eihei-ji
and 16th chief abbot of Sōji-ji.
3 Taizen-zenji (1873–1968) died at the age of 95. According to these
dates (from the Zengaku Daijiten dictionary), he was 94 in 1967, so Taizen
apparently had the final say. The name Eihei ("eternal peace") is
taken from the monastery Eihei-ji, where he was chief abbot.
4 Yamada Reirin: Head of the Sōtō Zen School in America from his
arrival in Los Angeles in the summer of 1960, where he was head of Zenshu-ji
from 1960 to1964. In 1965 he was succeeded by Bishop Sumi Togen, then an
instructor of monks at Sōji-ji. Yamaha returned to Japan to become president of
Komazawa University, Tōkyō, and later the 75th chief abbot of Eihei-ji.
5 The border of the two provinces runs right through the summit of
Mt. Fuji.
6 Probably referring to Taizen's calligraphy. Sounds like a Japanese
word—phonetically, "maka-ju-e."
Source: City Center original tape. Verbatim transcript by Bill Redican
(10/22/01). Lightly edited for readability by Wendy Pirsig and Peter Ford
(11/2020).
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