Matsuoka Day

With palms together


Good Morning Everyone,



What to keep, what to let go of? What to revere, what to dismiss? When traveling to another country to offer the dharma, what would you bring? What would you leave behind? I recall a film or TV show from my childhood where the last scene involved such a question, if it was the end of the world and you were escaping to establish humanity on another planet, what single book would you bring?



Rev. Dr. Zengaku Soyu Matsuoka-roshi was one of the first Japanese Zen Masters who were dispatched by Soto Shu headquarters in Japan to face this choice as he entered the United States. In 1949, Matsuoka-roshi established the Chicago Zen Buddhist Temple, the first Soto Zen Temple to be established in the United States.



Zengaku Matsuoka-roshi was a powerhouse Zen Master, a black belt, he often travelled across America introducing Zen Buddhism wherever he could. He established Zen Centers across the US. Although all of this is true, his pioneer work was eclipsed by the later stellar growth of the Zen Centers in San Francisco and Las Angeles.



Matsuoka-roshi tried to remain true to his mission as he understood it: to introduce and create an American form of Zen. He modified the forms and ceremonies, making them far less ostentatious and monastic. He recognized the lay nature of Zen in America. He thought the temple forms in Japan were correct for Japan but too “fussy” for America (quote from Kozen Sampson).



I fear though that the temptation of successors who feel the need to look to Japan to legitimate their Zen has, and will, result in an abandonment of their founder’s mission here in the US. From my point of view, this is an abandonment of true Zen, as well. We are not Japanese monastics. We are American lay Zen Centers. Lay practice in America must find itself. Its forms and ceremonies must have meaning to American hearts and minds and not be dress-up versions of Temples continents away.



So, on this Founder’s Day, the day we honor our founding teacher, Zengaku Soyu Matsuoka-roshi, I would invite us to look deeply into what we are actually all about. I invite you to study Matsuoka’s teachings before you make judgments of him. Recently, the Atlanta Soto Zen Temple under the direction of Taiun Elliston published two collections of Matsuoka’s Dharma talks. They are a special gift to us today. Please consider ordering one or both of them. Go here: http://www.lulu.com/aszcpublications



Be well.

Stress

With palms together


Good Morning Everyone,



Stress is a powerful experience of thoughts colliding. We concern ourselves with what might happen, imagining all sorts of things, and come, sometimes, to a place of utter paralysis. Under such conditions we are rather like the proverbial deer in the headlights: stopped dead in our tracks, staring right at the danger, and completely unable to move. At such times, it is important to open our so-called third eye.



Our third eye is the eye of wisdom. It is the eye that sees the entire universe. It is the eye that places all things in the larger context. When seeing with this eye we can ask ourselves critical questions because the pressure is off. Third eye is the eye of Big Mind, expansive and infinite; it can help us see what is really important and what is not.



Maybe it’s not so much the third eye that allows this view, but perhaps instead, it is the backward step we take in order to open it. Taking the backward step is the Zen way of stopping, opening, and contextualizing. In this step we become Teflon mind. We experience everything, but nothing sticks.



We deliberately settle ourselves, open ourselves to our breath, and experience just being in our seat. Thoughts and feelings come; thoughts and feelings go. The third eye opens and we are immediately at ease: No hindrance of the mind, therefore no fear. Our heart may now open and experience with great compassion this moment as it is.



What is most important in this moment is this moment itself. I am grateful for it.



Be well.





Today: 9:00 Zazen in Veteran's Park, 4:00 Zen Discussion Group, 5:30 Zazen

A Day

With palms together


Good Morning Everyone,



Tuesday night we had our first Zen 101 group meeting. I was not happy with myself. I spoke far too much. We love to talk about Zen, don’t we? Good grief. The good news is that after all the talking we sat for two periods.



Wednesday morning the Zendo is empty. I sat in the quiet and joined its emptiness. There is only this space, you know, and my breath kept me close to home. With it, I centered myself in the here and now.



Just as yesterday is but a memory and tomorrow a dream, this moment is a fiction as well. Anything I might say about it is not it. Yet words come from deep inside. It can be lonely inside our heads. Words invite thinking and thoughts become company.



We try to escape our present-moment-self with words and ideas. Rather like making things up as we go, our universe unfolds in our mind’s eye. Yet, our way is not to escape, but rather, to live each moment as it comes and as it presents itself as it is. So, we notice our thoughts, notice our feelings, and let them go.



So, during the day yesterday I dealt with banks. I dealt with social security, and I dealt with my feelings. They are now gone and I remain.



Today: 7:00 AM Zazen, 12:00 Clergy Luncheon, 5:00 PM Dokusan with Student Shoji, 7:00 PM Zazen.



All the while, through the day, we will finish building small tans (raised platforms) for oryoki (eating meditation).



Be well.

Jailer

With palms together


Good Morning Everyone,



This morning I woke vowing not only to free beings from suffering, but also to write a morning message to you. This business of vowing to free all beings even though they are numberless has been a thread of conversation between me and disciple Dai Shugyo of late. What does this vow mean? How can this be done?



I say, “Show me a piece of paper with only one side!” Nothing comes out of his mouth. A good start.



When we focus our attention on the words, we are going in the wrong direction. Yet words and their meaning are our way of communicating. Yes, I agree. They are one way, but not the only way and often the words are less a communication of something than an invitation to something. In this case, an invitation to move our mind.



Where is your mind? If it is on freeing, it is in jail. If it is on doing, it is in jail. If it is on numberless beings, it is also in jail. If I ask you to show me a piece of paper with only one side and you place your mind on sides, it’s in jail. If it is on paper, it’s in jail. So, what is jail?



The Buddha looked directly at his jailor and named him, but it wasn’t the naming itself that freed him, it was his actualization of the jailor himself that released both he and his jailor. When we actualize freedom, when we actualize non-duality, we release ourselves: there is paper with no sides, indeed, there is no paper. There is the place where numberless beings are free, as indeed, no beings exist there to be freed.



Beings are numberless, I vow to free them.

Function?

With palms together


Good Morning Everyone,





Interesting. Yesterday afternoon’s Zen Discussion group seemed to be caught on the question, “what is our function?” Most leaned toward survival and safety as first priorities and that is an understandable point of view. Many warriors, including Buddhist warriors, and myself, have made this claim. Yet, today I am not so sure. It depends on how we understand survival and safety.



More often than not, when we talk about personal survival and safety, we create an imaginary scenario wherein someone might attack us and threaten our lives and well-being. We often simplify the picture by using early man scenarios. Oddly enough, these scenarios almost always use hunter models where weapons are involved and present in the scenario, rather than an agrarian model where the gathering and growing food demands cooperation for survival. Cooperation becomes the definition of protection itself and survival depends on mutual aid.



Someone always raises the, “if someone punches me” scenario (as if that is a likely or imminent threat). In truth, I have only been punched once in my entire life and I am 63 years old. Do I really need to think about how to protect myself from an assault such as that? Should this be my baseline understanding of our nature? I wonder what would happen if no one locked their doors and no one had guns. Those of us who say there would be reckless abandon, total chaos, and the like, might check their views of human nature here. What if you knew your neighbor routinely did not lock her doors? Would you sneak in and steal? Would you sneak in and assault her? You say, “well, what about street thugs and the like?” I say, what about them? A lock will really help? And people are far more likely to use a gun against a person they know than a stranger.



The thing is, today we are neither hunters nor are we gatherers. We are not individuals nor are we tribes. We are, arguably, not even nation-states. Rather, we are an immense network of interdependent and interconnected beings. We are an organic system and such a system requires open channels of energy flow. Organic systems are dependent on environmental conditions. Organic systems are dependent on cooperation. Organic systems are dependent on each sub-system recognizing its relationship to every other subsystem, Changes in one part of the system affect all other parts of the system. Survival and safety take on very different meanings in such a context.



Oddly for me, in graduate school where we were taught systems theory as a model for understanding social systems, I argued against it. It was not existential enough for me. But existentialism is dualism dependent. It requires a self to be defining itself in contradistinction to others.



Through my practice, I have come to realize there is no self to define and that any such attempt is an artifice of mind. A Buddhist understanding of reality is a systems understanding with the added dimension of complete impermanence, which includes the system itself.



So, when we talk about our function, and thoughts of survival and safety arise, what do we really asking?



Be well.

A few questions

With palms together


Good Morning Everyone,



Zen Master Seung Sahn asks, “What is our function?”



Let’s look around. A table I am writing on is made from the wood of a tree killed in the forest. The food in my refrigerator was grown and killed for me to purchase. The clothes I am wearing, the fibers, the dye, the weave, all done on a massive scale, shipped to my store in boats, trucks, and trains. The air I am breathing is filtered. The water I drink is processed and then filtered. The coffee comes from large plantations grown on what was rain forest. Yes, when I look around, it would seem my function is to use and not just use, but also to use in excess and at any cost. Who am I that this is should be the case? Am I alone in this abuse? No. At last count (a few seconds ago, according to the World Population Clock) there were 6,855,134,658 persons on this planet. Who are we that this should be the case?



Is using the planet and its resources truly our function or are we simply out of control? Do we just not know how to live simply and without excess? Would we want to?



How much do we really need to live well? Do we need two or three cars? Do we need two or three or four pairs of shoes? Do we need to eat in excess to the point that our girth expands at the rate of the population of our species? No. We want this. Is this our function, to want? To want so badly and so mindlessly that we are willing to end life as we know it on planet Earth?



I consider this question often. I am often speechless.

Compass

With palms together


Good Morning Everyone,





Sitting down to write about Zen is a strange this to do. There is nothing to be said. Every word is a lie as it is the true nature of words to deceive us. They are always mere representations. Not the thing themselves. When we are asleep we fail to see this. When awake, we say nothing: Awake is the realm of doing.



Our Temple will be taking up the study of the text, “The Compass of Zen” in our weekly discussion group this Friday at 4:00 PM. The text is a book developed over the years by Zen Master Seung Sahn. I have enjoyed this text myself over the years. It is a clear, direct dharma gate in itself.



Who are we? What are we here for? What are we to do? These are his questions and he takes us through the many layers of Buddha’s way to get to center. He assists us in our effort to see what our next step actually is, not what we think it ought to be.



Please consider joining us as we enter the Compass.



Be well.