Dōgen’s Dharma Hall Discourse for the Winter Solstice 1240

[Kokuu]

“Attaining oneness, heaven is clear; attaining oneness, earth is at rest.” (Lao Tzu, Tao te Ching)

Attaining oneness, a person is at peace; attaining oneness, the time becomes bright. As this oneness grows, within the days growing longer, the buddha ancestors attain longevity. Everybody, within this growth you arouse awakening mind, practice, engage the way with effort, and attain realisation of a single phrase [clear understanding of the dharma]. You have already attained the power and vitality that is within this growth.

Therefore, making a rosary with the bodies of buddha ancestors, you reach three hundred sixty days. Every time this day of winter solstice arrives, the length of days proceeds like this. This is exactly the body and mind of buddha ancestors, so this growth proceeds like this.

The body and mind of each Buddha now can grow. The face and eyes of jade rings and round jewels are shaped in a heavenly palace. Having counted each of them, how long and how far do they reach? On this auspicious occasion, knowing the count is the single brightness.

Happy Solstice to all!

Gassho
Kokuu
-sattoday/lah-

[Hosui]

Where nirvana is not reified nor samsara rejected,
what samsara is there, what nirvana is falsely imagined?

(Nagarjuna's Middle Way - Mulamadhyamakarika, 16.10 p.170, Siderits & Katsura translation)

Gassho
Toby
Sat/lah today

[Hosai]

Happy Solstice to all!

"Turn your face to the sun and the shadows fall behind you." — Maori Proverb

Peace!

_/\_
sat/ah
matt

[Kokuu]

Where nirvana is not reified nor samsara rejected,
what samsara is there, what nirvana is falsely imagined?

Indeed! Reality is just this, right here, right now, beyond the labels of our conceptual mind.

Yet that is not to say that awakening does not happen and that delusion is not real.

"Turn your face to the sun and the shadows fall behind you." — Maori Proverb

[Jundo]

Lovely.

Gassho, J
stlah

[Hokai]

親切な言葉一つで三か月にわたる冬の期間
Shinsetsuna kotoba hitotsu de san-kagetsu ni wataru fuyu no kikan
One kind word can warm for three winter months

Gassho
J
satlah

[Hosui]

Indeed! Reality is just this, right here, right now, beyond the labels of our conceptual mind.

Yet that is not to say that awakening does not happen and that delusion is not real.

However, as Nagarjuna says:

What arise in dependence [dependent origination] on the good, the bad, the false [greed, hatred, delusion] conception,
those things do not exist intrinsically, therefore the defilements [greed, hatred, delusion] are not ultimately real

(Nagarjuna's 'Middle Way' - Mulamadhyamakarika, 23.2 p.255, Siderits & Katsura translation)

Gassho
Toby
sat/lah today

[Kokuu]

What arise in dependence [dependent origination] on the good, the bad, the false [greed, hatred, delusion] conception,
those things do not exist intrinsically, therefore the defilements [greed, hatred, delusion] are not ultimately real

I do not disagree with our honoured ancestor Nagarjuna. However, while these things are ultimately not real, that does not mean we should ignore relative existence.

As it says in the Sandokai:

To encounter the absolute is not yet enlightenment.


Or, as Dogen himself puts it in Genjokoan:

When all things and phenomena exist as Buddhist teachings, then there are delusion and realization, practice and experience, life and death, buddhas and ordinary people. When millions of things and phenomena are all separate from ourselves, there are no delusion and no enlightenment, no buddhas and no ordinary people, no life and no death. Buddhism is originally transcendent over abundance and scarcity, and so [in reality] there is life and death, there is delusion and realization, there are people and buddhas.


It is good to recognise that the mirror stand (human body and mind) and specks of dust (defilements) are empty, while also seeing that emptiness itself is no other than this phenomenal world right in front of us. Things may be "not ultimately real" but that doesn't mean they do not exist at all.

Gassho
Kokuu
-sattoday/lah-

[Furyu]

Thank you for all these. Beautiful.

I love this saying, thank you John.

親切な言葉一つで三か月にわたる冬の期間
Shinsetsuna kotoba hitotsu de san-kagetsu ni wataru fuyu no kikan
One kind word can warm for three winter months

Happy solstice!

Ramine
SatLah