Today is the 27th of June 2023. And we're going to take up some koans from the Diamond Sutra - we'll be doing the Diamond Sutra as our study text this year prior to our precepts ceremony, the Matariki, and we had the first session on Sunday, and it struck me we're talking about how influential Diamond Sutra was on the koan curriculum. And it struck me that it would be useful to have a look at the these koans as well as reading the sutra.
And we'll be sourcing them from a book called "The Flowing Bridge: Guidance on Beginning Zen Koans," and it's by Elaine MacInnes. And she kind of conveniently puts all of these koans together in one chapter, though, when you study them, they're not not necessarily ordered in this fashion. But it's, it's a helpful organization. So we're going to draw on that.
Elaine MacInnes was a Catholic nun from the order called Our Ladies Missionaries, and she she only recently died. She was born in 1922, and just died last November 29 of November. So, just a couple of years short of March 1924. And she died in 2022. So she was just short of 100 to a couple of years. And she she trained under Yamada Koun Roshi, who of course was a mentor for Philip Kapleau and was involved in parts of the writing of "The Three Pillars of Zen" - very important figure and teacher mostly known in the West I guess as the teacher to Robert Aiken Roshi.
And Elaine MacInnes train with him was was, I think, formally sanctioned by him and taught at different a couple of different places, Toronto, and also in the Philippines. Some years ago now, probably about 15 or more. I met at a bishops meeting that I've been invited to as a part of a interfaith contingent. I met a nun there who had done some sessions with Elaine McKenna's in Manila. So she's somebody who's had a lot of impact emphasis, influence rather, in and outside of the church, that the church so we'll turn to text
so she's gathered these she's gathered together different koans Muslim preliminary clients into one list. And then we'll look at each each of these. Thus I hear it's the first one. All the Buddhas and the Buddha's Dimas of the supreme way arise from the sutra. What is the sutra? It's the second one. In the Dharma, everything is equal. There is neither high nor low. Why is Mount ro high and mount on low? The third one dwelling nowhere mind cuts fourth. Dwelling nowhere mind comes fourth is a weather way of translating what an hour. Our own koan curriculum has aroused the mind without its abiding anywhere. arouse the mind without its abiding anywhere. Next one is if you try to see me through colors and to seek Me through voices and sounds, you are on a false path, you will not be able to see the target. How can you see the target a target of course is another name for the Buddha means the Thus Come One. And then the last. Peering is I guess it's kind of synthesis of, of these these questions. It's YUI Hall, the dharma of phenomena and mooi Hall, the dharma of emptiness and we'll see more about these hit to them. Hadn't seen these ones before.
She says a little bit about the name of the sutra. She says the full name of the discourse mentioned here is the Diamond Sutra of the perfection of transcendental wisdom. The diamond cuts all other materials that cannot itself be cut by any of them. When clean and polished, it shines resplendent in the tiniest light, even when immersed in water, translating the title with this in mind, it could read the discourse on the penetration of the impenetrable wall tick not Han as, as the title of the diamond that cuts through illusion. The diamond that cuts through delusion, or illusion
can relate this to say Manjushri, who we have on our sesshin alters the bodhisattva of of prajna wisdom who's who has sutra book on one hand and then the other hand he wields a Dharma cutting sword into sort of a delusion cutting sword cuts away what is unnecessary. The Diamond Sutra is part of the Prajnaparamita scriptures the wisdom books, which came out of India. For the northern Mahayana, Buddhists that includes us, the president paramitas scriptures are the most sacred and precious of all their canonical writing. prajna means the highest intuition, which views things in the aspect of qu shunyata emptiness, who is the is the Japanese translation of shunyata, who is not dual annalistic, who is not in the holistic, but speaks of ultimate reality, which cannot be placed in any modern logical system. The Diamond Sutra sets forth the doctrine of shunyata. And pressure, emptiness and wisdom, she says does not, can't be placed in any modern logical system, I think it's fair to say that can be placed within in a system of logic. And that the one in which this is done in a very effective way is to be found in Tibetan Buddhism. Zen of course doesn't really track with logic. That's the other thing. It's, it's anti logical. In the sutra, the Buddha states that he does not have any fixed Dharma to teach. His doctrine consists solely in wiping out all third thoughts that stir the mind. So the mind can be still he says wisdom inherent in every person can manifest itself and perceive the nature then perceive the self nature to become to come to Buddhahood. In the introduction to the main body of the text we read. Now in the midst of the assembly, this is about the second the second chapter of the of the sutra. The first chapter describes the Buddha going on rounds rounds and coming back washing and eating and sitting. Which is in itself a teaching a complete teaching. Now in the midst of the assembly was the venerable Subhuti Subhuti was one of Shakyamuni his 10 Major disciples. He is depicted in the President's sutras as the foremost in understanding in emptiness there's a there's a little legend about some booties birth which which is in a kind of vivid Fable liteway describes his birth to booty the word his name's booty has three meanings empty born, will manifest and good luck. And apparently in some booties household, there were 108 store houses filled with all the precious Jim's gold and silver Lepus luxury crystal mother of pool, so on. Great, great, great wealth. But when some booty was born, all the store houses fun strangely, unexpectedly were found to be completely empty. One after another the vaulted doors were open to reveal absolutely nothing with who has stolen my jewels, cried some booties, distraught Father, we had such wealth and now we are penniless, what is the meaning of the sun. So he went to a fortune teller diviner who calculated that the disappearance of the jaws and the birth of the child I mean simultaneous, and so for this reason his father called him in Dearborn. But analyzing the child's birth chart, for definer declared a very lucky were on the on the child was further named Good luck. Then seven days after the Buddha's birth, or the family wealth reappeared and the 108 stories and so then the father chose to rename his son well manifest. But anyway, he's he's this birth sociate some closely with emptiness.
Forthwith civility arose and covered his right shoulder ninja knelt upon his right knee, and respectfully raising his hands with palms joined, address the border that's just a little bit about these things that he does.
Rose and covered his right shoulder and then knelt upon his right knee and raised his hands with palms joined. These were traditional ways of showing respect and asking for the teaching. And then he asks, world order one. It is most precious, how mindful but to targeter is of the bodhisattvas protecting and instructing them so well. Well dotted one, if good women and good men seek the consummation of incomparable enlightenment, by what criteria should they abide? And how should they control their thoughts? This is the important question the fundamental question that informs this whole sutra? How should we conduct ourselves and how should we train our mind? This is in order to seek the consummation of incomparable incomparable enlightenment. In other words, an ATAR, Assam yuksom Bodhi complete perfect enlightenment. So how how do we practice for this for this aim?
How Should another way of putting it it's another translation, how should they subdue their harsh terrain? All if false views and thoughts what should we do? The Buddha said very good subunits of booty. Just as you say that to targeter is even mindful of the body surfers protecting and instructing them well. Now listen and take my words to heart. I will declare to you that by what you by what criteria good men and good women seeking the consummation of incomparable and live men should abide and how they should control their thoughts. So this sutra then sets out instructions for us on how we should control our thoughts
so Budi said Pray do world and one with joyful anticipation we long to hear now, Eli McInnes adds to that. Now, presuming that you are all good men and women seeking the conservation of income, comparable enlightenment, we present the following expert excerpts from the Diamond Sutra, to insert instruct you as to the criteria of how you should live and how you should control your thoughts. She's what she's doing here as is bringing, bringing this whole discussion, this whole sutra, here in into this room we have the good men and women seeking realization. And this sutra is expounded really for us, for us to take to heart and it's not meant as a philosophical exercise, but really as as an existential process of unfolding. And the first the first lines of the sutra that are that are taken up as a con. Thus I hear and you will, if you've read in the other sutras, you'll have heard this before this is free professors. It's most of the sutras and it's a Nanda speaking here. Little bit about Allah Nanda, who was he was a relative in constant companion to the border for the last 20 years of the Buddha's life.
And he was probably the child of Buddhist father and his aren't very closely related. is recorded in the Buddhist books that Ananda was born during the very night Shakyamuni received his great enlightenment. Eventually, he attached himself to the group of people who accompanied Shakyamuni on his mendicant preaching tours, and was a great favorite not only of the leader, but of the followers of the world as well. He was a brilliant man with the most exceptional mirroring. He was called the best hearing and remembering monk.
You said to have be able to recite all sutras, all the discourses he'd heard word for word, and he would just start each time when he he recited a sutra he would start Thus have I heard
a Nanda during the Buddha's lifetime, didn't come to awakening. And this bothered him. There's a con in the mall on Khan which which dramatizes this, this angst. Amanda's it's called the non Buddhist questions the Buddha and non Buddhist comes to see the Buddha and asks, says, I do not ask for words, I do not ask for no words. The world on one that's the border just sat still. The non Buddhist praised him saying, the world on one with his great compassion has dispelled the clouds of my delusion and enabled me to enter the way making a deep bow of gratitude he divided into bartered and under then ask the border, what is it this non Buddhist realize that he praised you? So? The World One on One replied, first class horse moves that even the shadow of the work? Here was this most faithful of disciples with him moment by moment for over 20 years, and yet he he could not realize the truth until later then, He was seeing a non Buddhist, have a realization, very painful for him. But he didn't, he didn't give up. He kept going. And he, he years later when disciples were gathering for the purpose of compiling all the teachers, what his sermons there was a meeting to be held and those consternation that Ananda wouldn't be able to join because he hadn't yet had some insight. And so, one version of the story has Kashipur the leader of the group Mahakashyapa, put Ananda on a on a one week says Shane, and at the end of this week, he had come to realization and was was therefore qualified to participate in the meeting. And he attended the meeting, when he attended the meeting, he recited from memory, all of the discourses he had had heard, starting each time, thus how I have heard. So, we take up these these words, come, thus I hear how do you how do you hear how can you demonstrate that hearing is central to this whole sutra really. Any sutra that we hear we you could say hearing through the mind of Ananda?
No, no hearing is possible without a mind no experience. This is why this is why our minds are so fundamental how do we here
the next part of the sutra taken up is this statement. All the Buddha's and Buddha's Dharma of the supreme way arise from the sutra. What is the sutra in Ealing Elaine McKenna's comments all through the sutras there is an insistence on the teaching. All those who seek Kant, summation of incomparable enlightenment should discipline their thoughts. And also nobody sattva who was a real bodhisattva cherishes the idea of an ego entity a personality or being or a separated individuality this this these four
our powerful ways in which we slice up our experience and how we how we create awareness
read them again here an ego entity a personality of being or a separated individuality.
I'm not going to go into too much detail with these because we'll be looking at the moment in our session on on Sunday a second session on on the sutra proper
can just look at them more generally. It's also quite confusing because different translations of the sutra use different terms for each of them. But we can say you can say that they are ways of describing our our dualistic and bifurcating Habits of Mind And it's, it's over these that we need to learn to have some control or at least to, to begin to become aware of them as operating and not be misled by them
to to conceptualize a self is to also give rise to another. And we often have different standards for ourselves from those we have others. And so this this this way of thinking is the source of so much suffering in the world
Elon McInnes writes, when we think ego we solidify it against his opposite non ego so we think we this is ourself and everything else, there's other and each of us does this and those worlds don't match up at all sorts of great conflict but if you if you look deeply into into the nature of the self, then has tick not Han ports that you find they were all made up of non self elements actually, of everything that we think of isn't as not self is necessary for us to exist most obviously in most intimately our parents we are the continuation of our parents and our grandparents and our great grandparents and beyond that not just where our genes come from, but all those who who contributed to our welfare survival he educated us cleaned up our wastes for that matter
what if what if that stopped what if no one was collecting our rubbish each week
we don't usually think about wasting our rubbish as a part of ourselves we we otherwise it as quickly as possible
would have if we had to drag around all our waste with us is very fine. Animators done many videos for pop songs, Michel Gondry, and one hilarious one his guy
in a in a kind of suit of turns something we discount is disgusting but it's a part and actually is a part of who we are.
She continues in the same way being proposed as non being the use of AI separates into it and all else. This is the way how bifurcating invalid. Intellect works. Only in the transcendent state beyond opposites is the infinite realized. So what is the sutra? It can't be the opposite to that sutra. How do you transcend this sutra and that sutra? There is another section of the sutra not quoted in this con that says that the Infinite is under clearable. If that is so then how you going to transcend the opposite to declare the infinite which is under clearable. How do we get beyond On our dualistic thinking, just so deeply ingrained in us
as as in our ways of doing things as the Shane's all of these pointers to towards lead us towards non dual states
which is which aren't something we have to create or manufacture they're they're fundamental to who we want we are we just cover them up with our concepts about things
that the next one to also next the next column from the Diamond Sutra also explores the this issue of
by forgetting Interlake. In this Dharma Heir everything is equal there is neither high nor low, why is MT ro high and MT on low we could say here, we could say here, why is Ruapehu high, and rung a total low if everything's equal, as the the sutra says, Then how come there are high mountains and low mountains
she says that the English word equal tends to be bifurcating one thing has to be the same measure quantity amount or number is another. Another case of this and that you and I. But equal also means regarding or affecting all objects in the same way, which concur in the Dharma. So it's very nature, the Dharma by its very nature, the Dharma sees all as equal. Why then is one mountain high and one low? Gain were invited to to live beyond our normal ways of thinking to address this question.
She says I trust there is no serious end student who would present this Khan and dog son as a study in comparative typography. Nor do we sit on a celestial throne and proclaim all mountains are the same. In the Diamond Sutra, Buddha tells us that a bodhisattva does not discover through intellectual process. Why? Because he says, If men allow their minds to grasp and hold on to anything, then they would be cherishing the idea of an ego entity, a personality of being or a separated individuality. Likewise, if they grasped and held on to the notion of things as devoid of intrinsic qualities, they would still be cherishing the idea of an ego entity, a personality, of being or separated individuality. So you should not be attached to things as being possessed of or devoid of intrinsic qualities. Because once we once we see a thing, then we attach to it, an object like, like iron filings to a magnet. At this point in his teaching, the Buddha refers to it as a raft. A question is asked, does a man who safely crossed a flood upon a raft, continue his journey carrying that raft upon his head? So long as the mind is attached, even to the Buddha's teaching as a basis, it will cherish the idea of AI and other got to learn to to, to put that raft down once once it's no longer once it's served its purpose. After the Buddha stated that we should not be attached to things as being possessed or have or devoid of intrinsic qualities, he said, This is the reason why the target always teaches the same. My good my teaching of the good law is to be likened unto a raft. The Buddha teaching must be relinquished, thrown away, how much more Miss teaching is also a famous quote of the Buddha's got to throw away even the Buddha's Dharma how much more we have to throw away false teachings false dawns and then she comes back again with this question. Please sidestep all miss teaching, and show me why Mount Ruapehu is high, and mount Ronny toto is low. Show it pretty prior to words.
Next phrase is taken up as dwelling nowhere, mind comes forth, or as I've said before, arouse the mind without its abiding anywhere. The Diamond Sutra says Subhuti abides nowhere. In another place in the discourse, the Buddha says, If the mind depends upon anything, it has no shore Haven. If a mine depends on anything, it has no shore Haven, no refuge, because all things are subject to change. All things are insubstantial.
skipping around here, but Subhuti dwells nowhere therefore, he is cited Subhuti joyful abide or in peace dweller and seclusion in the forest. And we can we can understand this, this forest in two different ways, just literally as, as living in a in a hermitage and in the jungle or living aloof and, and perturbed by the distractions and temptations of the forest of human complexities and desires. This is this is can say this is more of the televote an emphasis rising above impurities. In the Mahayana we we emphasize more transcending necessarily leaving behind but seeing through entanglements. Dwelling know where your mind was come forth. Our mind is our consciousness. Can we tell where it is? Some people point to their head, but that is the brain are referring to. In reality, we can't locate it. And yet, we can see it function. As Yamuna Roshi used to say, it is the entrance to the essence of the vast limitless universe. It's a helpful way of thinking about our minds, the entrance to the essence of the vast limitless universe. And then she she quote some further we cannot locate our essential nature because it has zero. Yet it has infinite capabilities. It can see with the eyes, walk with the legs, think with a brain and digest food with a stomach. It weeps when it is sad and laughs when it is happy. Though it is zero. No one can deny its existence. It is one with phenomenon, the essential nature and phenomena One from the very beginning. That is why the hanya Shindo Your Heart Sutra, can say, form is nothing but emptiness, emptiness nothing but form as we just chanted a short while ago, form is only emptiness, emptiness only form form is no other than emptiness, emptiness no other than form. If your mind must come short fourth, show it to me, right here right now, let me see
rouse the mind with us out it's abiding anywhere, how can you do that? Actually, we can do it moment by moment, every day.
Next, next lines to be taken out. If you try to see me through colors and seek Me through voices and sounds, you on a false path, you will not be able to see the target, how can you see the target? The Buddha asks What do you think is the targeted to be recognized by some material characteristics. Wherefore, because the Tagada has said that material characteristics are not in fact material Korean characteristics whosoever not in fact, we were so ever not in fact, material characteristics wheresoever material characteristics, there is delusion, but whosoever perceives that all characteristics are in fact no characteristics perceives the target. This is the kind of the dialect suture repeated again and again taking everything out from underneath us pulling the rug away.
Later on, he says all bodhisattvas Alyssa and great should develop a pure lucid mind not depending upon sound, flavor touch, odor or inequality, that bodhisattva should develop a mind which alights upon no thing whatsoever. And so, should he establish it and McInnes comments perhaps this is mindfulness. rousing the mind without surviving anywhere.
Finally, we come to these two sort of summary themes for the sutra that she talks about UA haul and we haul U haul is the the dharma of phenomena you have points to the dharma of form and shape, we are taught in the sutra that all phenomenal things are under the law of change. They are like a dream a phantom, a bubble, a shadow, they are like do or a flash of lightning. You should see things like this and this is this is this. She quotes this famous gutter four lines from near the very end of the sutra that's shaggy think of all this fleeting world, a star adorn a bubble in a stream, a flash of lightning in a summer cloud of flickering lamp a phantom in the dream. So, so this is how to experience our world. Phenomenon existence dreamlike fleeting but at the same time, vivid beautiful particular
one face of things and then the other one is, we, we owe the drug Dharma of emptiness, with no beginning or no end. The word movie hall imply implies effortlessness. All things are freely subject to emptiness. Emptiness is not something imposed, but something inherent and no thing of its inherent which they.
She gives a whole other list of words that he used to describe this this motto Dharma, self nature, self realization, essential nature, Satori, enlightenment, Buddha, nature, heaven, Lotus, land, nirvana. All these verbal words that that can indicate something but no way to capture it. They have no shape or form even though they are in our phenomenal world. In daily life, we are always meeting and seeking seeing to targeter every moment every task we do, life itself is replete with fullness and emptiness. We live each second as a minute, each minute and as our each hour is a day, each day is a week, and each month is a year. Each moment is a lifetime. Let us live each moment replete with fullness and emptiness. She ends with a story which I'd like to end that teisho With that, that beautifully illustrates how it is how we experience things. If we do drop these, these four bifurcating concepts that we hold so tightly to separate self human being, living being lifespan that's one translation of before slightly different than the one she gives here. Which from the a of price translation we're using the grid fine. But let me tell the story because it's it's embodies what the sutras been talking about. comes, I think, from either twang, sir, or lauter. She doesn't. She doesn't say don't think. But he hears the story. Once upon a time, there was a Chinese Carpenter, whose work was so extraordinary that the prince of Oulu called him in and said to him, these things you make a so perfect, that it does not seem possible that any human being could make them. Is it true, or is it not true? That in your work, you have superhuman assistance. And Ching, the carpenter, who was a very humble man answered the prince of Oulu, something like this. First of all, when I am to make some cabinet or box of great quality, I separate myself from the world for two days. At the end of that time, I am no longer aware of title, dignity or estate, so that no matter for whom I was making the box, I am just making it for a person. There is no longer any glamour, no longer any sense that I must make a better box because a great no woman has ordered it. Then for two days more I relax and meditate. And I come to the conclusion that it is of no consequence whether the box is good or bad. I no longer fear that my work will not be sufficient. I no longer hope that it will be outstanding. I have lost all interest in whether I am praised or blamed for the thing I have produced. Then, in two days more, I am no longer aware of myself, I no longer care whether I exist or not. Gradually, that part of my mind that is naturally unusually devoted to personal concerns is relaxed away from these, so that I no longer know that I have a body or that I have hands or feet, everything becomes very quiet. All this time, I have been visualizing what I am going to build. Until finally, there is nothing but visualization and the object. Having attained this degree of internal rapport with value, I then go out into the forest, or wherever the materials for the object to be found. And I wonder about until I find my piece of work by box or cabinet or screen, somewhere within the body of something that already exists. I look at the tree and say there is my box, I look at Bamboo and say, there is my screen. And I am aware that I am going to move the box that is already in the tree out of the tree to where it can be seen. Then I sit down quietly with all my materials, and I allow heaven to put the box together. When heaven puts the good box together, the seams are perfect. When men put a box together the seams are not perfect, because the man will say the seam is better than that seam or I must make a good seam or will the purchaser be pleased with the box. Thus all things come to nothing. But I am concerned only with the fact that heaven makes the box and the box that heaven makes will please heaven. If I am fortunate and all these matters, the box they have made will cause the prince of Mu to say to me, did you receive superhuman help. And he learned witness in his ads in our daily lives we work with objects boundaries and other elements seen as contradictions to target. But discipline and practice bring all things to me discipline and practice bring all things to me. No thought of self or success or failure. What fame or admiration dropping all of these we'll stop here and recite the Four Vows.
All beings without number to liberate and Lastline
Dharma gates beyond measure to penetrate the great way on Buddha to attain all the things with number to liberate endless fine to root against me on metta penetrate great way put a to attain the number to liberate endless fine passion gates beyond measure penetrate the brain way
Just a reminder that we'll have done the study this Sunday second session starting at 11. And that's available on zoom as well as in person. Anything else? Any other announcements okay.
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