2/13 Branching Streams: 1st Talk - Things-As-It-Is

[Fuken]

Re: 2/13 Branching Streams: 1st Talk - Things-As-It-Is

Reminds me of when (true story) I first came to Japan and met my first Japanese "Zen Master" (my first teacher, Azuma Roshi of Sojiji). I promptly proceeded to ask him the big questions, one of which was "What is Time?"

His answer: "Now 5:30"

Wow, I thought. HOW PROFOUND. He must mean "time is just what it is!" and it is "Now!"

Instead, I later found out that his English was not so good, and he just thought I was asking what time it was. ops:

Lots of stuff like that in Beginners Mind I think.

Gassho, Jundo

Or maybe it really was profound.
Beginners mind in general is profound and wonderful.
I find it preferable to my aversive mind, and I get along with others better when I am open to my beginners mind.

Gassho, "Fuken" Jordan

[JeffLegg]

Re: 2/13 Branching Streams: 1st Talk - Things-As-It-Is

I have enjoyed the first chapter, especially since it touches on what Jundo has been teaching us about shikantaza. And, Suzuki Roshi's discussion of self respect is very good and probably will get photocopied as handouts for my son and other students. What I found very interesting about the audio cast by Fisher Roshi is how we can divide up the word Sandokai into so many multiple meanings. At first I thought it was just a translation issue (love the 5:30 story Jundo). But, I think it is even deeper in the sense that what we 'assume' or think we believe is 'not always so' (borrowing from Suzuki Roshi's other interesting book.

I am going to reread the chapter again since there is time. But, my appetite is definately whetted!

As for the discusion about Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind... it isn't an easy book. You have to give credit for those folks who can describe the mind's eye so well.

My first introduction to Zen was during my undergrad days. I read Introduction to Zen Buddhism by D.T. Suzuki. As a 20 year old I didn't have a clue but intuitively felt there was something there. I read it again about 2 years ago and found more meaning and relevance. To make a long story short, that reading led to my interest to where I am now--this current post.

Jeff

[chicanobudista]

Re: 2/13 Branching Streams: 1st Talk - Things-As-It-Is

I had mentioned this in a previous post, but I love this part:

"We just sit. It is like something happening in the great sky. Whatever kind of bird flies through it, the sky doesn't care. That is the mind transmitted from Buddha to us." --pg. 30 - S. Suzuki.

To me it feels like a good visualized explanation of the meditation practice.

[Dosho]

Re: 2/13 Branching Streams: 1st Talk - Things-As-It-Is

On top of that, Suzuki's students RECREATED the talks in the books from handwritten notes taken during the talks and really poor quality tape recordings. The transcribers mostly did not speak Japanese, so were hindered in that too.

Jundo,

Do you think one's understanding of Zen, at least what can be learned of it through texts like these, can be enhanced by knowing how to read Japanese? "Enhanced" is a bit of a loaded term there, but are there aspects of Zen that would be better understood if one did not have to rely on translations?

Gassho,
Scott (Dosho)

[Monsho]

Re: 2/13 Branching Streams: 1st Talk - Things-As-It-Is

When we chant Sandokai at my local zendo in Toledo it's translated as "The Identity of Relative and Absolute" and we studied the translation in The Roaring Stream Anthology as "The Coincidence of Opposites." So, it's interesting for me to think about it as "The Harmony of Difference and Equality" - and to consider that all of these translations of Sandokai are both different and alike at the same time . . . and that this difference is good and important even as it points to the same thing.
I have been thinking about Suzuki Roshi's statement that "[o]ur effort in Zen is to observe everything as-it-is" (28), which is a real challenge, especially when I think about taking it into everyday life, and working with seeing "things-as-it-is." I was also struck by Fischer Roshi's comment in his talk that ran something like "we need to bring 'ordinary life' to our religious practice, just as we need to bring our religious practice to our everyday life" (I'm sure I've mangled this - I should go back and listen to it again), which I understood as the "coincidence" or "harmony" of the opposites in the title translations above. All good practice!
Simon.

[BrianW]

Re: 2/13 Branching Streams: 1st Talk - Things-As-It-Is

Do you think one's understanding of Zen, at least what can be learned of it through texts like these, can be enhanced by knowing how to read Japanese? "Enhanced" is a bit of a loaded term there, but are there aspects of Zen that would be better understood if one did not have to rely on translations?

I sure wish I knew more about Japanese / Chinese characters. Fisher Roshi’s explanation of the some of the Chinese characters really peaked my interest in having a bit more understanding on this topic. Unfortunately an audio podcast and thus no visuals. It appears that the component parts (if that is the right terminology) of Chinese characters can really enhance the meaning of material written in that format….especially poetry.

Gassho,
BrianW

[Jundo]

Re: 2/13 Branching Streams: 1st Talk - Things-As-It-Is

Or maybe it really was profound.
Beginners mind in general is profound and wonderful.
I find it preferable to my aversive mind, and I get along with others better when I am open to my beginners mind.

Gassho, "Fuken" Jordan

Oh, 9 bows to you Jordan. I did not mean to say otherwise.

Jundo,

Do you think one's understanding of Zen, at least what can be learned of it through texts like these, can be enhanced by knowing how to read Japanese? "Enhanced" is a bit of a loaded term there, but are there aspects of Zen that would be better understood if one did not have to rely on translations?

Gassho,
Scott (Dosho)

Not really, unless you are engaged in translation. In the case of Sukuki or Nishijima Roshi, it is helpful because they are often speaking Japanese in their minds by just sticking the matching (or what they think are the matching) English words into their Japanese grammar and very fuzzy sentence structure. Because I am familiar with the Japanese way of speaking and writing, I can often (not always!) pierce through what Nishijima Roshi is trying to get at in his "Gudo-lish". :-)

I also want to say to folks that, here in the 21st Century, you (as lay folks at home) have access (right over this internet thingy and in books) to higher quality and better understood Buddhist texts, teachers and teachings than, for example, monks ever had back in some 16th century monastery studying by oil lamp. Click click click, and Robert Thurman or somebody is explaining the texts and the latest scholarship right in your living room. I often say that the average lay person today can have a wider and (more importantly) deeper Buddhist education than any monks of ages past who spent their whole life (which usually was pretty short) on top of a mountain. Plus, monks (even today) can be pretty narrow, otherwise uneducated folks who are not prepared to approach these texts with the mind of modern, university educated folks, for example, they were very prone to superstition and all kinds of crazy beliefs (not to say too that 21st century "educated" minds don't have their own ignorance and prejudices based on "modern thinking").

Now, however, whether we meditate as much as monks on a mountain ... that's a separate question! That part is still important. :wink:

Gassho, Jundo

[Shohei]

Re: 2/13 Branching Streams: 1st Talk - Things-As-It-Is

Howdy all
OT a bit but funny (lol well to me so ... you must now suffer!)
My wife glanced at this book when it arrived and repeated what she read it to be "Raging streams glowing in the darkness" and said that was one helluva title for zen book! :lol: Once i cleared up the title she said MEH and stated her title would have been cooler.

Okay, so as always, so many good posts before my COMPOST ops:

Things that stood out to me as I read were the bits on many/one - the whole. This part was clear to me as Iread it and seemed like I knew this all along. However I think I was looking too hard at it before, Trying with all my being to see, when all I was to do was to see it.

Seeing things as they are including your desires and how they account for your view, Including them instead of overlooking them because they are not desirable in our practice, makes perfect sense.

This

When you are just you, with out thinking or trying to say something special, just saying what is on your mind and how you feel, then there is naturally self-respect

and this

While were talking about self respect a bird was singing outside. Peep-peep-peep. That's self respect. It doesn't mean anything. Maybe he was just singing. Maybe without trying to think he was just singing, peep-peep-peep. When we heard it we couldn't stop smiling. We cannot say that it is just a bird. It controls the whole mountain, the whole world. That is self respect.

really stood out to me too.

The first discussion bit with the student and the spider made me smile. I have had a silly fear of spiders for ever and a day. I escort them outside most now, but not that long ago i really had to have them um.. taken care of :C. I decided to face that fear a few years ago and try to work to get along with them. There is one in my bathroom *(was Our bathroom but its tiny, no tub, and well there is now a permanent spider resident :lol: ), Ive not bothered it since it moved in in the fall. I haven't moved it outside as we have an understanding and its freezing out! So when i read this bit i thought immediately OMG he squished it :S! Funny I would have interrupted the flow of things for the spider... even though my first reactionary thought in fear is OMG SQUISH IT! Funny how that changes.

Gassho, Shohei

[prg5001]

Re: 2/13 Branching Streams: 1st Talk - Things-As-It-Is

Hi,

My first thought was that there is a place in Tokyo called Omotesando and the character for 'san' looks the same as in Sandokai. Omototesando is a place where plots of people meet up and just walk around the shops.

My second thought was that this is amazing to have a text written by an early patriarch.

My third thought was "The four elements return to their natures", even though they are not parted. How does that happen?

Cheers,

Paul

[CharlesC]

Re: 2/13 Branching Streams: 1st Talk - Things-As-It-Is

These are my notes on the first talk.

The central importance in Zen history and ritual of the Sandokai is interesting. For me a religion or spirituality is not some collection of absolute truths about the world that is documented in religious texts and celebrated in ritual. Instead the texts and the ritual to a large extent create the truths and experience of the religion. So learning about the Sandokai is part of my exploration into whether I should follow the path of Zen Buddhism (though even if I decide not to I would most likely continue to do zazen every day).

"Things-as-it-is" puzzles me a little. I don't see how we can perceive "things-as-it-is" without adding our own interpretation. Even when we drop away the sense of the "I" there is a huge amount of processing going on in our brains, transforming the raw data of our senses into something meaningful in ways which have developed over the course of our lifetime as our brain has reacted to experiences. Does it just mean what we experience when we take away the sense of the "I"?

When we talk about the mountain and the moon we confuse thoughts about something with its "reality", though the reality is not something "out there". It is part of "big mind" though I don't know what "big mind" is. It seems to me a rather nebulous concept in the same way as "God" is. Does it mean a state of mind, for example more spacious and non-judgemental than how we normally think, or does it mean something more metaphysical in which everything is merged together into some sort of mystical oneness?

I got some more about the meaning of "Sandokai" from the Fischer talk. From what he says it refers to one of the key aspects of Zen, the interplay between the one and the many, everything being one yet also differentiated at the same time.

When we eat we just eat, the food is part of the awareness we have of the world which includes ourself, not something we are thinking of just from a nutritional or utilitarian point of view. Suzuki talks about dropping discrimination between good and bad, but how difficult is that! I often react with sadness or anger because the world is not how I think it should be.

Does Suzuki mean "things-as-it-is" contains our desires, that when we sit in zazen there is no fundamental difference between the place we are sitting in and our desires, emotions, thoughts, bodily feelings, etc?

I liked the description of what happens when you sit. Thoughts come and go, things happen, you can enjoy them, but you don't cling onto them and turn them into something different inside your mind so that the mountain is not the mountain, etc.

I can''t make any sense out of the paragrah containing "liable to".

He describes self-respect as when we act without a sense of our self, without a sense of separation from everything else. I'm not sure what he meant about personal tendencies. We have to be strict with ourselves about them but at the same time we cannot deliberately get rid of them?

"More and more, you will have this rhythm or strength as the power of practice". That resonated with me, though it is a slow process for me, a very slow process. There was a bird singing outside my window when I was doing zazen at daybreak this morning - Spring is on the way - which reminded me of the "peep-peep-peep".

[Martin]

Re: 2/13 Branching Streams: 1st Talk - Things-As-It-Is

Like many others I found page 28 on the translation of "Sandokai" fascinating, and it was interesting to hear from Monsho about how the same characters have been given other translations. Words are not that which they are describing, and seem to slide across the meanings we think they have as if on ice.

I have always struggled, though, with the idea of the Buddha mind / mind of the great sage of India being "transmitted", intimately or otherwise, from west to east, or from person to person. To me the phrase implies something that was previously in the west (or wherever) and not in the east (or wherever) being passed across whereas I suspect that the Buddha mind was / is in the east (and the west and north and south) long before the first person calling themselves "Buddhist" showed up there. Is something being lost in translation here, or am I muddled again?

Gassho

Martin

[CinnamonGal]

Re: 2/13 Branching Streams: 1st Talk - Things-As-It-Is

Hope to get my copy this week.

The text is no longer available through the link but I did have a glance the day before when I thought, "Great, I will print out the first talk tomorrow". :evil:

Gassho,

Irina

[prg5001]

Re: 2/13 Branching Streams: 1st Talk - Things-As-It-Is

Hope to get my copy this week.

The text is no longer available through the link but I did have a glance the day before when I thought, "Great, I will print out the first talk tomorrow". :evil:

Gassho,

Irina

I just tried and got a cached version. If you still need it I can send you the html page.

Cheers, Paul

[prg5001]

Re: 2/13 Branching Streams: 1st Talk - Things-As-It-Is

Hi Charles, I would like to have a go at giving some answers to your questions. Not that they are the right answer they are just my answers.

"Things-as-it-is" puzzles me a little. I don't see how we can perceive "things-as-it-is" without adding our own interpretation. Even when we drop away the sense of the "I" there is a huge amount of processing going on in our brains, transforming the raw data of our senses into something meaningful in ways which have developed over the course of our lifetime as our brain has reacted to experiences. Does it just mean what we experience when we take away the sense of the "I"?

I think it is more a case of taking in the whole lot and leaving it all as it is. My experience is that my brain seems to have 2 modes of operating. One is where I take things and run with them e.g. I see a nice looking lady walking down the street and I think "she looks nice, I wonder where she is going?" etc and that leads to a memory of a previous girlfriend and that leads on to a thought about a particular night etc etc. The other mode is that the same lady walks passed, I still see the lady but I let her pass and stay in the whole moment so when she is gone from my view she is also gone from my mind. Things are seen in the moment as they are and left as they are. Reactions are just left as reactions and not developed into a thought streams.

When we talk about the mountain and the moon we confuse thoughts about something with its "reality", though the reality is not something "out there". It is part of "big mind" though I don't know what "big mind" is. It seems to me a rather nebulous concept in the same way as "God" is. Does it mean a state of mind, for example more spacious and non-judgemental than how we normally think, or does it mean something more metaphysical in which everything is merged together into some sort of mystical oneness?

I think the "big mind" is more spacious and non-judgemental, what I was trying to say above. However, as "big mind" extends to infinity (and beyond!) I can't see how it could be different from an infinite god.

When we eat we just eat, the food is part of the awareness we have of the world which includes ourself, not something we are thinking of just from a nutritional or utilitarian point of view. Suzuki talks about dropping discrimination between good and bad, but how difficult is that! I often react with sadness or anger because the world is not how I think it should be.

I don't think dropping good and bad means not reacting with sadness and anger it is more to do with not avoiding bad and being attached to good, despite our reactions.

Does Suzuki mean "things-as-it-is" contains our desires, that when we sit in zazen there is no fundamental difference between the place we are sitting in and our desires, emotions, thoughts, bodily feelings, etc?

It's the whole lot, inside, outside and anywhere else. The five aggregates, four elements etc.. etc.. Nothing is left out.

I can''t make any sense out of the paragrah containing "liable to".

I think he means that we should try and see our tendencies (What we are liable to do, likely to do) and that this is the main Buddhist practice aka Dogen's "To study the Way is to study the self. To study the self is to forget the self. To forget the self is...."

He describes self-respect as when we act without a sense of our self, without a sense of separation from everything else. I'm not sure what he meant about personal tendencies. We have to be strict with ourselves about them but at the same time we cannot deliberately get rid of them?

Getting rid of our tendencies would just become another tendency, there is no escape from samsara by doing more samsara but also blindly playing along is not going to help either. AARRGH I don't know, just do zazen....

Cheers, Paul

[CinnamonGal]

Re: 2/13 Branching Streams: 1st Talk - Things-As-It-Is

I just tried and got a cached version. If you still need it I can send you the html page.

Cheers, Paul

Thanks, Paul!

I got the document by e-mail from another kind TreeLeafer.

Gassho,
I.