Episodes

  • 182: Four Immeasurables part 2 -- Compassion

    182: Four Immeasurables part 2 -- Compassion
    Dec 3 2025
    The second of the Four Immeasurables of Buddhism, compassion is a term that is frequently bruited-about in Zen circles, the ubiquity of which extends to the customary reference to buddha-dharma itself as “the compassionate teaching.” Which begs the question, Compassionate to whom?When we look at the teachings of Buddha, beginning with the Four Noble Truths, they do not look all that compassionate at first blush, at least not in the conventional sense of coddling us poor babies, who,after all, are the ones who are suffering, here.Right out of the blocks, with no warning emoji, comes the shock of the raw, blunt, undeniable existence of suffering — and the charge that we are to fully understand it. This does not seem very forgiving if you ask me, not of the intensely personal nature of our birth, aging, sickness and death, nor of our personal comfort level in confronting it. No rose-colored glasses here. Take it or leave it. The origin of suffering — consisting mainly in our own desires, exacerbated by our own attachments to them,which we are to fully abandon — is not very user-friendly, either. Since they — beginningless greed, angerand delusion, to name a few — are inborn — indeed, according to the Repentance verse, arising naturally from body, mouth and mind — it does not seem fair that we bear all the burden for abandoning them. Whose bright idea was this, anyway? We are not God, after all.The third reality-check — that there can be a cessation of suffering, but wait,there’s more: its realization is entirely dependent upon each individual’s personalefforts — is equally cringe-worthy. Is there no interlocutor, no savior to whom we can turn for succor and salvation? At least a support group we can join?Lastly, that we must follow some righteous, prescribed Noble Eightfold Path, every day — in order to realize this cessation of suffering — seems insufferable. Can’t we just be done with it and move on?This is obviously a set of inconvenient truths, intended to place the onus for acting on them directly on us. So what, exactly, makes them so noble?Well, you could say they are ennobling, in that they remind us of the true meaning of compassion, “suffer with,” implying that we are all in the same boat, ultimately. Our woes are shared with all other sentientbeings, who are also subject to these truths, perhaps with the exception of the Eightfold Path, which is more within the human social realm of practice, though by extension, all sentient beings are on the Path, whether they know it or not. You cannot accuse chickens, cats, dogs and cows of talking the talk but not walking thewalk. Only humans can manage that.Of course, along with his description of unvarnished reality, Buddha offers certain prescriptions for practice, i.e. what to do about it. The Three Treasures may be interpreted as the highest values in Zen, butalso as the three legs of its practice stool: Buddha as right meditation; Dharma as right understanding; and Sangha as right action. Or you may want to substitute the tripartite model of right discipline, wisdom, and conduct, respectively.The implication that we can get this right doesn’t necessarily mean that we can get it wrong. Thenotion of compassion suggests that we have the right to be wrong. Fall down seven times get up eight, thank you Dogen. We have to allow ourselves to fail, in order to succeed. Master Dogen makes the point — no pun — that the arrow hitting the bullseye depends upon the preceding 100 misses. Also, place your oxygen mask on before attempting to help others. Okay, Dogen did not say that.We speak of “practicing compassion,” which doesn’t make sense when expressed as “practicingsuffering with others.” We are already suffering with others, so practicing what already is does not seempossible. What we can practice is ways of helping others. Which implies that what we come up with may notwork. It largely depends upon them. It does not help to suffer fools gladly. But that does not mean that we should not even try.So karuna, compassion, may mean something more like practicing loving kindness, engaging in selfless behaviors of a bodhisattva, without making a big deal of it. In spite of our obvious limitations, doing what we can to help others, but without any attachment to outcomes. Suffering the consequences of failed attempts with equanimity, and practicing the kind of patience that recognizes that this may not end well.Taking up the bodhisattva path of saving all beings begs the question, “From what?” Save them fromtheir own ignorance? Even Buddha could not do that. Also, how many are there? How long is it going totake? And Where do I begin? Living by vow, the bodhisattva vow, means embracing the possibility of eternal rebirth. The possibility, not a belief in inerrancy, nor even the probability. Buddha’s teachings are not arguments.Taking the long view of Buddhism means that issues arising in this lifetime may not be...
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    11 mins
  • 180: Four Immeasurables part 1 -- Loving Kindness

    180: Four Immeasurables part 1 -- Loving Kindness
    Nov 5 2025
    From a downloaded document from one of my online dharma dialogs — dated June 8, 2016, but otherwise unidentified — we find the following definitions of the Four Immeasurables of Buddhism: Metta (loving kindness) Karuna (compassion)Mudita (sympathetic joy or empathy) Upekkha (equanimity) I have always felt that the immeasurables of Zen practice are more important than those aspects subject to measurement. For example, it is more important in doing meditation, zazen, to never give up, as MatsuokaRoshi would often encourage us, than how long we sit when we do, how often, how frequently, how regularly, etc. More important than the quantitative dimension is the qualitative.Folks bring this up in dokusan frequently, saying they know they need to “sit more.” I ask them when do they think they can do that. You cannot sit more in the past — it’s too late. You cannot sit more in the future, because it is not yet here, though you can plan to do so — and possibly set yourself up fordiscouragement by failing to live up to your own expectations — been there, done that. The only time you can do more zazen is when you are doing it. You can do zazen more by refraining from doing anything else while you are on the cushion. Such as daydreaming, worrying, planning, ruminating, regretting, and so on. Turn up the intensity knob. The list is followed by an extension of the definitions: The ease of equanimity, the full-heartedness of love, the tenderness of compassion, the radiance of joy. There follows a brief “prayer,” a term we do not often see in Buddhist teachings, a “short version” attributed to H.H. the Dali Lama:The Four immeasurables are found in one brief and beautiful prayer: May all sentient beings have happiness and its causes,May all sentient beings be free of suffering and its causes, May all sentient beings notbe separated from sorrowless bliss, May all sentient beings abide in equanimity, free of bias,attachment and anger.This sounds very similar to the familiar Metta Sutta, or Loving Kindness Sutra, from the Soto Zen liturgychanted often in Zen temples, though finding our “bliss” is not a term I would use as a goal or objective of Zen practice. While human beings are included in the panoply of sentient beings that we pray may be happy, it is also acknowledged that human beings can be a significant part of the problem, the cause of unhappiness and sorrow in their fellow sentient beings. Needless to say, we “pray” in the sense of earnestness — not to a god, to Buddha, nor to a specific bodhisattva. Our basic prayer is that we wake up, as soon as possible.It should be equally needless to point out that the prayer, or wish, for all beings to be happy does not imply a rose-colored, magical-thinking belief that somehow just because we pray for it, it shall come to pass that all beings will suddenly become happy, via some “spooky action at a distance” — thank you, Zen Master Einstein.We “transfer merit” at the end of our service because we don’t want to suggest that we actually believe we personally accumulate any real merit owing to our devotional activities. Whatever merit there maybe, it must already finitely exist, and can be neither increased or decreased by what we do.Likewise, the practical worldview of Buddhism and Zen dictates that if and when all beings actually do become happy, it will be happy with the causes and conditions of existence just as they are, or in spite ofthem: the unsatisfactory nature of life, being subject to aging, sickness and death, etc ad infinitum. Zen isnothing if not realistic.“Things as it is” is an expression David Chadwick attributes to Shunryu Suzuki Roshi in his charming book, “Crooked Cucumber,” as his condensed expression of one of the central truths of Zen. It does notmean “things as they are.” If it did, there would be no reason to engage in all the necessary discipline andwork of Zen, if it were only to result in things staying the way they are. That is, if our own perception and conception of our own reality did not undergo some kind of meaningful change as a result of our efforts, what would be the point of practicing? Which begs another central question, What kind of change is that?The kind of change that can come about through the practice and study of Zen, particularly itsmeditation, is pointed to in the Heart Sutra, chanted ubiquitously in Zen centers all over the world. The linethat declares, “Given Emptiness, there is no suffering, no end of suffering.” This Emptiness is capitalized tostress the unique meaning of the Sanskrit shunyatta. It is not voidness of existence, or devoid of meaning, but the dynamic nature of change that underlies all existence, the operative meaning of dukkha, usually translated as “suffering.” The suffering that can change through our coming to this insight that Buddha experienced and coached others to find, is of the unnecessary sort — that needless suffering that ...
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    11 mins
  • 179: Connecting the Dots Part 6

    179: Connecting the Dots Part 6
    Oct 1 2025
    APPROACHING THE SINGULARITYSiddhartha Gotama, the founder of Buddhism, known as the Buddha — as well as the Ancestors of Zen — struggled mightily to express the essence of the practice, meaning, and implications of Zen's meditation in the language and idiom of their time, throughout the countries and cultures of origin: India of 2500 years ago; China from around 500 CE; Korea and Japan a half-century later. As Master Dogen reminds us in the closing section of Fukanzazengi—Principles of Seated Meditation:The Buddhas and Ancestors all preserved the buddha-mind and enhanced Zen trainingAnd then goes on to give us our marching orders: So you should devote yourself exclusively to and be completely absorbed in the practice of zazenTheir instructions were and are quite clear when it comes to the personal dimension of practice — just sit. But when we enter into the social arena, we face the same kind of dilemma that they did in attempting to express a direct experience of fundamental reality that is beyond the scope of conceptualization, let alone the reach of language. Buddha and Dogen used parables and analogies to illustrate their point, and along with other masters conjured various models and inventive paradigms to help their followers picture the reality they had intuited, which often contradicted the received wisdom of the period.In our modern context, the closest analogy that I have come across to the process and effects of sitting still enough, upright enough, for long enough, is that of the black hole, or rather the description of what occurs to matter in thrall to the gravitational field of one.Firstly and perhaps most obviously, we align ourselves with the planet by sitting upright. Our backbone comes to approximate a one-to-one correlation with the force field of gravity, visualized as a vector running from the crown of our head through the spine and spinal cord, straight to the center of the Earth. Like a mountain settling into place after the collision of two tectonic plates, our body enters into equilibrium, equipoise. With all forces equally balanced, maintaining the natural posture of zazen becomes relatively effortless. We experience a sense of floating in space, which is what we are doing. Once we have become physically comfortable in the posture, the body goes through its natural process of sensory adaptation, resulting in a blurring of the boundaries of our senses usually taken for granted. Beginning with the tactile sensations of the body, the adaptation extends to seeing, hearing, smelling and tasting. Eventually even thinking, the activity of the brain, adapts and settles into a profound stillness as well. Again, vintage Dogen:In stillness, mind and object merge in realization and go beyond enlightenmentDogen's choice of the verb "merge," it seems to me, captures the essential dynamic of the process of realization. Merging of mind and object, of self and other, of subjective and objective interpretation, of inner and outer — the resolution of all seeming dichotomies — and the non-separation, or nonduality, of the four fundamental spheres of activity and influence from my model of the real-world context in which we live: the merging of our personal sphere with that of the social, natural, and universal spheres. "Realization," in this context, points to a transformative event that is not the same as conceptualization, or even within the realm of recognition, as Dogen points out elsewhere. It is literally the "becoming real" of subjective and objective reality within the personal realm of intimate experience, known as the "hard problem" of philosophy. From our friendly online AI:The "hard problem of consciousness," a term coined by philosopher David Chalmers, is the challenge of explaining how physical processes in the brain, such as neural activity, give rise to subjective, qualitative experiences—like the feeling of redness, the taste of sugar, or the experience of pain—which he calls qualia. Unlike the "easy problems" of consciousness, which involve explaining cognitive functions, the hard problem focuses on the subjective, internal feel of "what it's like" to be a conscious being, something that cannot be fully captured by objective scientific explanations alonehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5DfnIjZPGw&t=7s So we can take it from this that the process of merging that will ensue — when and if we sit still enough, straight enough, for long enough — is not something subject to our control. Which is why we do not try to control what happens in Zen meditation, other than exerting a modicum of discipline on the physical level, relinquishing our usual, restive proclivities for lounging around and fidgeting. In particular, Master Dogen does not suggest any mental regimens or disciplines for controlling the monkey mind, in his manuals of meditation (a key point made by Carl ...
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    15 mins
  • 178: Connecting the Dots Part 5

    178: Connecting the Dots Part 5
    Sep 3 2025
    This segment is excerpted from the introduction to a yet-to-be-published manuscript of selected podcasts from 2020 forward. The working title is "Speaking with One (Zen) Voice," the "Zen" in parentheses, subtitled "25 Centuries of Buddha-Dharma; 3Countries of Origin; 9 Dharma Masters; 2 Dozen Teachings; with Commentary by an American Zen Elder." Selections from the text are posted monthly as our new Substack column, along with my paraphrases of traditional teachings, beginning with Buddha's "First Sermon," otherwise known as "Setting in Motion the Wheel of the Law," or, more simply, "The Four Noble Truths." Check it out. This volume represents an attempt to present Buddhist teachings selected from the vast canon of sutras (indicating direct testimony) and shastras (connoting indirect commentary) spanning some 2500 years, a quarter of a millennium, from three of Buddhism’s countries and cultures of origin — India, China, and Japan. According to scholars, the early talks delivered by Buddha himself to his followers were not written down until several centuries after his death, but were preserved through the oral tradition of chanting and memorizing his spoken teachings. But the accuracy of that transmission is not considered inferior to the later written records, for one reason that it is more difficult to change the content of an oral tradition than it is to modify written documents, either intentionally, by accident, or the ravages of time. Another reason is that the truths of Buddhism and Zen are to be discovered in one’s own experience, primarily via the practice of the same meditation process that led to Buddha’s insight. Buddhism is, perhaps, unique amongst the Major Religions of the world, in this, its tradition of “face-to-face transmission.” Each of Buddha’s Dharma heirs — from those who were exposed to his live dialogs in India, to those who propagated Zen practice and teachings in foreign lands, and the ancestors of those countries — were themselves beneficiaries of direct insight. Of course, the further we go back in time, the provenance or historicity of the canon is less certain, the record from China is more documented than that of India, and that of Japan even more so, as we approach modern times. Most of the selected pieces from these later periods of the evolution of the canon are derived from the liturgy of Soto Zen, verses that are recited in monasteries and temples of today. Speaking with one voiceThe point in surveying this collection, which is merely the tip of a massive iceberg — the Pali canon, Tripitaka, or “three baskets” alone is said to comprise some 84,000 teachings — is that these great Zen forefathers were all speaking with one voice. The written texts selected by Zen’s ancestors in China and Japan to be recited on a daily basis as liturgy were obviously not casual or arbitrary choices. They come at the central truth of Buddha’s message from differing cultural and linguistic contexts, of course, but if we read between the lines, we might get a glimmer of the existential and experiential reality to which they refer, as so many fingers to the same moon. Let us first consider some of the underlying premises of the teachings of the historical Buddha, Shakyamuni (“sage of the Shakya clan”), which differentiate his from other teachings of a philosophical or religious nature. Let it be understood from the beginning, however, that the worldview of Buddhism — and Zen in particular — places emphasis on overarching sameness, rather than petty differences, between people, and sentient beings in general. This inclusive attitude also applies to the other worldviews, belief systems, philosophies, and religions propounded by humankind. We who follow Buddha’s Way are not interested in proselytizing or converting, debating, or winning anyone over to our point of view by argument, nor in discrediting another’s viewpoint. As to any perceived difference between Zen and Buddhism, you are free to substitute one term for the other where mentioned in the following. Three key distinctions where the Buddha’s teaching, usually referred to as “buddha-dharma,” or more simply, “Dharma,” differs substantively: One: It is human-centered. Unlike other spiritual founders, the Buddha claimed no mandate from a god, a deity, or power outside himself; no “Wizard of Oz” behind the curtain preaching his message, other than his teachers in past lives, the so-called “prehistoric” Buddhas. Zen is all about humanity, and our place in the universe. And, for that matter, the place of all sentient beings, on the path to awakening. According to mythical tradition, the newborn baby Buddha declared: “Above the heavens and below the heavens, I alone am the most honored one!” as he sprung forth, fully formed, from his mother’s womb. This expression, while clearly legendary, capsulizes Buddha’s view of humanity’s unique position ...
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    18 mins
  • 177: Connecting the Dots Part 4

    177: Connecting the Dots Part 4
    Aug 6 2025
    From time to time over the nearly 50 years since the establishment of the Atlanta Soto Zen Center, a significant number of its members and its affiliates in the Silent Thunder Order have complained of burning out in terms of their participation in the Zen community. Some have faded into obscurity and were never heard from again. Others have come back after years. The record for the longest hiatus is about three decades. This cohort would amount to a small percentage of the total attendance, or course, but it has been noted that more people come and go than stay. Matsuoka-roshi used to say, of some disciple that was no longer showing up, "Come-and-go type" or, "Wishy-washy type." I assume that these lost souls continue to practice in some form or other, hopefully maintaining their practice of meditation at least. And they probably retain an interest in reading about Zen and Buddhism. And I think it fair to say that if they had stayed, instead of moving on, we would have no place for most of them to sit. This is why I refer to the Zen sangha — and it is probably true of all communities — that it is like a cloud, constantly evaporating and recondensing, with new molecules of water, over time. People have real lives, other demands on their time and energy, and they always have. Master Dogen pointed out that the famous places in China were not typically comprised of large groups, but a small core of a half-dozen monks or so, with others coming and going from time to time. A cursory reading of the history of the formal transmission in Soto Zen makes this clear. Many of these encounters were short-term. So I don't worry too much about the many former members who are no longer in attendance. I do reach out from time to time if someone has suddenly disappeared who was diligently engaging on a frequent basis for some time, out of curiosity if nothing else. But I have enough to worry about, dealing with those who are presently practicing, as well as the constant flow of newcomers knocking at our doors. Most newcomers report that their first exposure to Zen is through reading — or, nowadays, listening — to a well-known teacher online, such as Thich Nhat Hahn, or Ram Dass. I had the pleasure of meeting Ram Dass in person in the 1960s, when I was teaching at the School of the Art Institute and the University of Illinois at Chicago Circle campus. Some friends of mine who knew him told me he was travelling through the area, so I asked them to connect us, and invited him to speak to one of my classes at the U of I. I still have the 1/4-inch reel-to-reel audiotape somewhere of his talk, which was his classic trip to India, giving LSD to the guru tale. I plan to have it digitized so that those who are interested can listen to it. Not to be too much of a name-dropper — near to greatness, and all that — but he came to our apartment for dinner that evening and cooked chipatis and beans for us. My friends told me later that he had told them he thought I was one of the most spiritual people he had ever met. That may have been because my apartment was full of student work, models of geometric structure studies they had done in one of my design classes.Another factoid of interest, and one of those coincidences that we say are not in Zen — he was driving a Chrysler Airstream at that time, and several years earlier, before I had graduated from the Institute of Design, my best friend at that time and I attended a talk by Claes Oldenburg, the famous Swedish-American sculptor, at the University of Chicago, at which presentation, amongst other things, we saw his life-size soft sculpture of — you guessed it — a Chrysler Airstream. But I digress. I have never heard of anyone burning out from too much study of the dharma, or too much sitting in meditation, although some naturally grow tired of too much group discussion, especially when it slides down the slippery slope of intellectualism and erudition, as has been seen many times in the history of Zen. Ch'an Master Huineng famously made a public show of burning scrolls of sutras to make this point. Dogen held that both things can be true at the same time — that the written record also contains the dharma, even though subject to the limitations of language. No, usually, problems with burnout arise in the context of serving the Zen community. Community, or sangha, is the third leg of the stool of Buddhism, joining that of dharma, the study of the teachings of Buddhism and Zen; and most centrally, buddha, the practice of zazen, or the meditation of Buddha. This is what Zen claims to transmit. Where the rubber hits the road in terms of burnout is usually in an individual's efforts to serve the sangha in ways that demand what seems to them to be a lot of time, effort, and energy, with all the opportunity costs associated with any form of contributions of one's precious time to any cause. The third rail for most or all not-for-profit enterprises such as ASZC ...
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    18 mins
  • 176: Connecting the Dots Part 3

    176: Connecting the Dots Part 3
    Jul 2 2025
    In this third installment of my "DharmaByte" column and "UnMind" podcast, exploring the general subject of Zen in our Times, we turn to the last of three suggested topics from Hokai Jeff Harper, Halifax-based publisher of the STO newsletter: • To everything there is a season• The wax and wane of householder zazen practice• What we are feeling right now IS impermanence manifesting itself Hokai somehow managed, perhaps unintentionally, to progressively home in on the central experience of Zen on three levels. Starting with the most universal sphere of our experience on Earth, the seasonality that is an effect of orbiting the sun for approximately 365 rotations of the planet; then down to the social sphere of our practice as householders; and finally into the realm of the intimate, up-close-and-personal sphere of consciousness itself. What I call the "singularity of Zen." As I mentioned in the last segment, we often seem to labor under a misconception that because we follow the lifestyle of householders, we cannot hope to penetrate to the fundamental meaning of the teachings of Buddhism. But Hokai's assertion puts the lie to this assumption. If the Dharma is simply pointing at the present reality that we are experiencing, lifestyle choices cannot possibly have a determinative or dispositive, causal relationship in terms of coming to realization of our buddha mind. What we are feeling now is impermanence manifesting itself, to quote the above quote. Not only what we are feeling now, but what we are seeing and hearing, smelling and tasting, as well as what we are thinking. Or reading, if you are reading this rather than listening to the podcast version. You might quibble with Hokai's construction - "impermanence manifesting itself" - as it suggests that "impermanence" is some sort of independent force capable of manifesting itself, rather than an attribute of the changing nature of the universe. But let's not let mere semantics distract from the message. We are witnessing the "endless, unremitting, unnamable, unthinkable buddha-dharma," as Master Dogen expressed it; and we bear witness to IT mainly through the dynamic of change, or impermanence. Otherwise, we would not register seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, touching, or even thinking, at all. If nothing were changing, there could be no awareness of it. As I mentioned in the segment on householder practice, renunciation in Zen is a matter of seeing through the delusional aspect of living, not a matter of lifestyle. Discernment in Zen is like Sri Ramakrishna's analogy that, like a swan, we need to be able to drink milk mixed with water, and drink only the milk. Or as Master Tozan analogized: A silver bowl filled with snow A heron hidden in the moonTaken as similar, they are not the sameNot distinguished, their places are known So this refined awareness of the nondual nature of reality, termed "emptiness," as opposed to "form" or appearance, is so close to ordinary reality, or perceptual duality, that it is nearly indistinguishable — like white snow in a silver bowl, or a white heron and the full moon — white on white. Buddha taught that the discriminating mind imposes a "false stillness" on reality, tamping down the uninhibited flow of sensory data to a dull roar. This enables us to maintain our balance and negotiate a dynamic, 4-dimensional spacetime environment.This is part of the natural process of "individuation" that sets in once we are born, and culminates in the conception of the independent self, which is a fundamental category error, according to Buddhism. The original alienation that is our fall from grace. It is not that Buddhism claims there is no self whatever. There is a constructed self, and there is a true self, according to this model. The prevalent perception of separation as an incarnated being is not entirely delusional. But it is incomplete — reification of a separate self ignores the rest of the story, the fact that all beings are interconnected, co-arisen and co-dependent. The Twelvefold Chain of Interdependent Arising, attributed to Shakyamuni, parses this coming-of-age story, slicing and dicing stages of development finely, like an Italian chef shaving garlic with a razorblade. This is similar to Master Dogen's fine discernment of reality — from a perspective uniting space, or existence, and time — as articulated in Uji—Being-Time, explored in some detail in a prior podcast. What he referred to as the "fine mind of Nirvana," or the "subtle mind of Nirvana." Master Sengcan, third Chinese patriarch after Bodhidharma and his successor Huike, points to something similar in Hsinhsinming—Trust in Mind: In this world of Suchness there is neither self nor other-than-selfTo come into harmony with this realityJust simply say when doubt arises: "not two"In this "not two" nothing is separate nothing is excludedNo matter when or where Enlightenment means entering this truthAnd this truth is beyond extension ...
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    19 mins
  • 175: Connecting the Dots

    175: Connecting the Dots
    Jun 4 2025
    As I mentioned in the last installment, when thinking about content for the next Dharma Byte or UnMind podcast, I turn to my collaborators for inspiration: Hokai Jeff Harper, publisher of the newsletter, and Shinjin Larry Little, producer of the podcast. Jeff responded to a recent call for suggested topics with: • To everything there is a season• The wax and wane of householder zazen practice• What we are feeling right now IS impermanence manifesting itself In the last episode I delved into the first of these three, the seeming seasonality of everything as a universal principle. We might take a moment to remind ourselves that seasonality is also considered natural, as the waxing and waning of the four seasons. And, while somewhat arbitrary as a concept, is considered causal in terms of the natural sciences of biology, botany, and even psychology — as in "seasonal affective disorder." Arbitrary in the sense that, as Master Dogen says, "You do not call winter the beginning of spring, nor summer the end of spring." Now that we have gotten off the planet, any middle-schooler knows that the root causes of the seasons is a universal phenomenon. Unless they are being home-schooled by a flat-earther, that is. In this segment we will take up the second, the waxing and waning of householder practice, moving the discussion to the social level. Which, of course, is part and parcel of our personal sphere of activity and influence. Whether Hokai meant to point out the usual periodic waxing and waning of our personal commitment to meditation in the context of the many distractions assailing your average householder; or a more societal angle on how householder engagement has grown and diminished over time through the various Eastern countries of origin, compared to its prevalence and intensity in the West modern times, I am not sure. I think it may be more instructive to consider the alternative — monastic practice — and how it colors our perspective on our own, personal options for pursuing the dharma in the midst of life. Zen householders often harbor a misconception that because we are householders — and not monastics — that we cannot hope to penetrate to the fundamental meaning of the teachings of Buddhism. This seems to be a widely shared meme in the Western culture, perhaps particularly in America. And it is based on a fundamental misconception — namely that the social sphere of Zen trumps the personal sphere —that you can tell a book by its cover, when it comes to Zen practice. But you can't. Because we interpret the history of Zen Buddhism as primarily monastic, from its inception in India and its transmission through China, Korea, Japan and the Far East, we presume that the approach of material renunciation — leaving the householder life for that of the mendicant monk, nun, or hermit, or wandering on pilgrimage — is the most effective way, the only way, of recovering our Original Nature, or Buddha Mind. While traditional prescriptions for practice definitely include divesting ourselves of our dependency upon, and predilection for, the pleasures and problems of our times, the renunciation recommended in Zen is not limited to merely rejecting and replacing one lifestyle for another. It is more a matter of seeing through the delusional aspect of any way of living. Including monasticism. This is true spiritual poverty. Master Dogen articulated four levels of renunciation that members of his monastic community were either able or unable to embrace, which I have discussed in more detail elsewhere. They range from the ability or inability to relinquish attachment to family, home, inheritance, et cetera, to the inability or ability to relinquish our own opinions and biases regarding our own reality, regardless of outer appearances. The latter — Dogen's highest level of renunciation — would apply equally to monastic or householder. So apparently the main difference between the two lifestyle choices is that the former is relatively simpler compared to the complexities of the latter. In terms of the ability to realize the truth of Buddhism, lifestyle is just another form of pomp and circumstance. If you find your practice — by which we usually mean meditation — is waxing and waning beyond your intentions and control, you might want to take a radical departure. Stop. Quit, with all the negative connotations that may have in our goal-oriented culture and society. Admit that you have failed, once again. Or rationalize that Zen may work for others, but it does not work for you. In doing so — in "not doing Zen" — you will confirm your bias, and prove to yourself that, like everything else you have tried in life, it just didn't get the job done. Zen did not live up to your expectations. Now that you have resolved that untidy business you can get on with your life. Good luck with that. It turns out that this kind of discernment, that Zen is something we started doing, so it ...
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    15 mins
  • 174: Zen in Our Time

    174: Zen in Our Time
    May 7 2025
    "Zen in Our Time" and "Connecting the Dots" are themes that I have hit upon for 2025, forming the thread running through (one meaning of "sutra") all of my DharmaByte newsletter columns and online UnMind podcasts this year. Contextualizing the teachings and legacy of Zen in modern times — without throwing the baby out with the bathwater — is key to transmitting Zen's legacy. Connecting the dots in the vast matrix of Dharma — while bridging the gap between 500 BC to 2025 CE in terms of the cultures, causes and conditions — is necessary to foster the evolution of Shakyamuni's Great Vow, from the closing verse of the Lotus Sutra's Lifespan Chapter: I am always thinking: by what means can I cause sentient beings to be able to enter the highest path and quickly attain the Dharma? As in so many aspects of our overloaded society, when contemplating the next column or podcast, the question always arises, "Where do I begin?" I turn to my collaborators — Hokai Jeff Harper, publisher of the newsletter, and Shinjin Larry Little, producer of the podcast — for clarity and inspiration. Jeff responded to my call for suggested topics with an intriguing trio: • To everything there is a season• The wax and wane of householder zazen practice• What we are feeling right now IS impermanence manifesting itself Instead of choosing one over the others, it occurred to me that all three are important. And they are interrelated, in a kind of fish-trap narrowing of focus, from the universal span of spacetime as a causal nexus for humankind; then homing in on the social level, considering the modern householder's vacillation in attempting to pursue what began long ago as a monastic lifestyle; and finally zeroing in on the personal: the intimacy of realization within the immediate flow of reality. I will attempt to treat them in succession over the next three installments, in the context of transmission of Zen's Original Mind. TO EVERYTHING THERE IS A SEASONIf you find the 1960s Pete Seeger song popularized by the Byrds running through your brain, you are not alone. If you recollect the poem from Ecclesiastes — which I studied in a unique, small-town high school literature course — you may be hearing echoes of: To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven: A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted; A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance; A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; A time to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away; A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak; A time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace. Or from Tozan Ryokai: Within causes and conditions, time and season, IT is serene and illuminating And finally, from Dogen Zenji: Firewood becomes ash and it does not become firewood again.Yet do not suppose that the ash is future and the firewood past. You should understand that firewood abides in the phenomenal expression of firewood, which fully includes past and future, and is independent of past and future. Ash abides in the phenomenal expression of ash, which fully includes future and past.
 Just as firewood does not become firewood again after it is ash, you do not return to birth after death... Birth is an expression complete this moment; death is an expression complete this moment. They are like winter and spring; you do not call winter the "beginning" of spring, nor summer the "end" of spring. There are many more such incisive and insightful references to time in the literature of Zen, as well as Western thinking, of course, most notably Master Dogen's fascicle titled "Uji," which translates as something like "Being-time," "Existence-time," or "Living time," as Uchiyama-roshi renders it. This 13th Century writing is said to have anticipated the theory of Relativity, Einsteins' prodigious accomplishment, perhaps the most important scientific breakthrough of the 20th Century. But these few recollections from the rich legacy of Zen's written record will suffice for our purposes of connecting some of the dots in Indra's Net, or the modern components of the "Matrix of the Thus-Come One" as described in the Surangama Sutra. Scanning the Biblical poem, it is striking to see so many various activities and reactions to the obligations and behaviors of daily human life listed in equally dispassionate terms, not implying false equivalencies, but for example to blithely assert that there is "a time to kill" and "a time to heal"; "a time of war" and "a time of peace" — in the same breath — is in itself breathtaking, considering the admonition against killing, or murder, found in the Ten Commandments as well ...
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