Good morning!
After a long period with a lot of rain, we have a beautiful Sunday with calm surroundings and clear sky and comfortable sesshin. Sesshin means embracing the heart and mind and touching them. Have you noticed the four monkey picture in our kitchen? Tsugen Roshi drew the picture and put a poem on it, saying, “To no seeing, no hearing, and no speaking, no thinking is superior.” When we sit, we are like the three monkeys, but monkey minds go on.
Dogen’s Universal Recommendation for the Right Zazen says, “If there is even the slightest discrepancy, you become separated as far apart as heaven and earth. If the slightest liking and disliking arises, your mind is lost in confusion.” The monkey mind makes me-ism, making discrepancy and liking and disliking. These are the fundamental Triple Poisons, poisoning the earth losing the heaven. The fourth monkey sits in Zazen without monkey mind.
“Settle into the solid, steadfast, seated Samadhi. Fathom the unfathomed state? How do you fathom the unfathomed state? Fathomless. This is the essential art of Zazen.” In Zen Samadhi, there is no yardstick to fathom, small or large, self or other, etc. This is the direct way to the right target, pure peace or pure land. “The treasure house will open by itself, and you will appreciate and use it at will.” Pure-land or waste-land, treasure house or haunted house, depends on us.
If suddenly an earthquake or fire took place now, what would you do? Before thinking, we get out. When the world is on fire, what do you do? The Zen koan of “A step forward at the top of a hundred feet staff” advises us to step forward. The Brahma besought the Buddha to step forward into the world to avoid the destruction of the world. Forty-five years after his awakening, he never spent a day without the world. This is the Great Way, Bodhisattva Way.
5/29/16
