The layman. The monk. No one.

[Geika]

I see no reason why not to live in monastery or retreat-like fashion, walking in shashu around the house, bowing, wearing the rakusu, chanting, etc. I also don't do that sometimes. It's usually when I am alone or doing housework, but I try to wear the robe even if not wearing it.

Gassho, sat today

[Jishin]

His hair looks like a bunch of little turds.

Gasho, Jishin, _/st\_

[Jundo]

Lovely. A lot of wisdom on this bathroom wall.

**

Gassho, J

** Although images like that can get you in trouble in some places. Buddhism comes in many beautiful varieties, suited to varied practitioners. Chan/Zen folks always tended to be respectful and irreverent at once, finding the Sacred which shines through both sacred and irreverent.

Buddha Toilet In France Causes International Fracas

http://gadling.com/2013/03/07/buddha-toilet-in-france-causes-international-fracas/

[Byokan]

...I have been contemplating putting every fiber of my being Into the practice, but have been hesitant because I don't know if its necessary or not. Even today I bowed to a toilet I was about to clean at work, but almost felt as though I shouldn't have to because "I'm just a layman".

I have met some Buddhists in my lifetime who live as though their home is a monestary, and I have met those who treat the practice casually (but not without seriousness).

What is the way way? I'd sure like to....

Hi Kyle,

I got all ecstatic about the potty and forgot what I originally wanted to say in response to your question. Just this: practice your own practice. Sit your own sit. Live your own life. No two people ever walked through the same dharma gate.

You're asking what is necessary? Necessary for what? To get to... enlightenment, or Buddhahood, or nirvana, or some other spiritual destination or state? In fact, you cannot go to IT, no matter how hard you try. IT is already here, and expressing ITself through/as you. All Buddhism does is help us remove obstacles and impediments to let IT flow freely, naturally. If monastic life helps you to remove obstacles, then live monastically. If practicing in the “normal” world helps you to remove obstacles, then practice in the “normal” world. Neither is better, and each is right in its own time. Living gently, cultivating awareness and compassion, walking the Eightfold Path, practicing the Precepts, wherever and however you live, are all ways to remove obstacles. Doing these things, your life and your actions will come to express the Buddha/Dharma/Truth more authentically, more appropriately. Your actions, and “every fiber of your being,” will align with your true Buddha nature.

Ok, um, actually, there aren’t really any obstacles. But we have to realize this, once, again, and 10,000 times.

Or not. I don’t know anything, this is just my current understanding; hopefully you will find something useful in it.

Gassho
Lisa
sat today

p.s. Ryan, yes I agree, the toilet, the zafu, and the sofa are all the same, and yet, should never be confused. Crap happy!

[Ryan379]

Perhaps a toilet is just a toilet, crapping is just crapping and bowing is just bowing, with no significance other than what we project onto them?

As Jishin says; we all need somewhere to crap. Rather the toilet than the sofa!

Gassho

Ryan

Sat Today

[Jishin]

Gasho, Jishin, _/st\_

[Byokan]

Hey crazy talk,

Form is emptiness and emptiness is form. Sure. But I still need to shit somewhere.

Gasho, Jishin, _/st\_

Do it with a smile, my friend.

54c75067b01c0.jpg

Gassho
Lisa
sat today

[Jishin]

Hey crazy talk,

Form is emptiness and emptiness is form. Sure. But I still need to shit somewhere.

Gasho, Jishin, _/st\_

[Byokan]

Why bow to the toilette when it does not bow to me? And if it did bow to me would I not think "how bizarre, this is not a toilette at all!"

If a toilette could talk it would say "are you delusional? I am a toilette. Quit being ridiculous and crap on me. That is my proper function. That is my form. The sky is blue. The grass green. I am a toilette and made for holding shit and not bowing."

Hi All,

Toilets. Do you think that your toilet is not bowing to you? Your toilet rolls at your feet in ecstasy. Toilets not only talk, they sing. All the toilets, stars, rocks, trees, animals, buildings, machines, doughnuts, hammers, shoes, the very sky and the planets swinging in their orbits and every atom in the universe, are all singing a song, singing their hearts out, singing about you. It's not out of line to say, hey thanks for the song, that's very nice. Toilet form and function? Sure. Also toilet formless and functionless. Also toilet dancing and singing for, with, and as, you. Look again.

Crazy talk from a raindrop.
Gassho
Lisa
sat today
on the toilet and everywhere

[Kairu]

"Take everything with a spoon of neutrality" is what I'm gathering from this. Yet revere even the things we see as the lowest of low, because even the Buddha can be found in it. And even the highest of the high, even though we despise it. Cut perceptions with the flaming sword of wisdom, so to say?

Kyle
Sattoday.

Sent from my LG-D851 using Tapatalk

[Jishin]

The layman. The monk. No one.

"The Great Way is not difficult for those who have no preferences." - Hsin Hsin Ming

With this disclaimer in mind...

Why bow to the toilette when it does not bow to me? And if it did bow to me would I not think "how bizarre, this is not a toilette at all!"

If a toilette could talk it would say "are you delusional? I am a toilette. Quit being ridiculous and crap on me. That is my proper function. That is my form. The sky is blue. The grass green. I am a toilette and made for holding shit and not bowing."

Just my crappy thoughts.

Gasho, Jishin, _/st\_

[Jishin]

https://www.facebook.com/BuddhistHumor/posts/367300726687046

Buddhist Humor
November 7, 2012

A monk once asked Ummon, "What is the Buddha?"
Ummon answered thus: "A dried shit-stick!"
(Note: A 'dry shit stick' was the medieval equivalent of toilet paper. Hence Yunmen's reply is sometimes translated as "Something to wipe your arse on!")
------------
In his Enlightenment Day jodo, a dharma talk on Buddha's awakening, master Dogen said:

Whether Buddha is present or not present, I trust he is right under our feet. Face after face is Buddha's face; fulfillment after fulfillment is Buddha's fulfillment.

Last night, this mountain monk [Dogen] unintentionally stepped on a dried turd and it jumped up and covered heaven and earth. This mountain monk unintentionally stepped on it again, and it introduced itself, saying, "My name is Shakyamuni." Then, this mountain monk unintentionally stepped on his chest, and immediately he went and sat on the vajra seat, saw the morning star, bit through the traps and snares of conditioned birth, and cast away his old nest from the past. Without waiting for anyone to peck at his shell from outside, he received the thirty-two characteristics common to all buddhas, and together with this mountain monk, composed the following four line verse:

Stumbling I stepped on his chest and his backbone snapped,
Mountains and rivers swirling around, the dawn wind blew.
Penetrating seven and accomplishing eight,
bones piercing the heavens,
His face attained a sheet of golden skin.
----
Explanation: Buddha is everywhere. The Buddha-field is not just for animate observers, for we are contiguous with experience beyond us. There is no separation. If we experience a piece of crap, it is part of the Buddha-field experience.

"...To understand Dogen's bizarre story we must first understand the koan, a story in which the master Ummon says that Buddha is the same as a dry shit on a stick. Master Ummon simply says that Buddha is the same as reality before our eyes. If there is a dry shit on a stick right in front of our eyes, then reality is just a dry shit on a stick. Thus Buddha is a dry shit on a stick. If it still seems disrespectful, imagine how the historical Buddha taught somewhere: "I'm mountains, rivers, forests, skies, clouds, grass, all living and non-living beings, earthworms, sand, wind, rocks, but certainly I'm not a shit. And certainly not a shit on a stick, something you wipe your ass with."

When Buddha attained enlightenment, he said that together with him all things and all beings attained it. Enlightenment means to wake up to reality and reality does not exclude anything, so even a dry turd on a stick is necessarily a part of the enlightened reality."

Gasho, Jishin, _/st\_

[Jundo]

This reminds me of case 21 of the Mumonkan (Katsuki Sekida translation):



Gassho

Ryan

Sat Today

Yes. I will also point out Dogen's extensive writings on the sacredness of the toilet, only some of which I posted in preparations for our upcoming Rohatsu Retreat ...

http://www.treeleaf.org/forums/showthread.php?13963-ATTENTION%21-Our-AT-HOME-2-DAY-ROHATSU-RETREAT-December-5th-to-6th%21-BE-READY%21&p=166940&viewfull=1#post166940

I left out some of his other writing on the sacredness of the toilet (this story references the habit of Rahula, the Buddha's biological son ... from when he was married before he started Buddhaing ... who became a monk, to sleep in the toilet room ... ) ...

In the fourteenth section of the Ten Procedures to Be Recited it says:
When Rahula, the Buddha’s son, was a novice, he took to
spending his nights in the Buddha’s lavatory. The Buddha, fully aware
of what His son was doing, patted Rahula on the head with His right
hand and recited this verse:

My son, it was not to be poor or in want,
Nor to rid yourself of fortune or position,
But simply to seek the Way that you left home,
Which will surely bring hardships enough to bear.

So, you see, the Buddha’s temple had its lavatory too. The form for dignified
behavior in the Buddha’s lavatory was to wash oneself clean, and the Ancestors, in
turn, passed this on to us. The conduct of the Buddhas has still been preserved: to
follow the ancient ways is a great joy and something indeed hard to come by.
Further, thankfully, the Tathagata gave voice to the Dharma for Rahula whilst in
the lavatory. The lavatory was a place fit for the Buddha to turn the Wheel of the
Dharma. How to conduct oneself in that training place of the Way is what the
Buddhas and Ancestors truly Transmitted.

Why did Rahula sleep there? Long story ...

A.i.24; the Vinaya (iii.16) gives a story illustrating Rāhula's extreme conscientiousness in the observance of rules. He arrived one evening at Kosambī, when the Buddha was staying there in the Badarikārāma. Rāhula was told there of a new rule which had been laid down to the effect that no novice should sleep under the same roof as a fully ordained monk. Unable to find any resting place which did not violate this rule, Rāhula spent the night in the Buddha's jakes [water closet]. When the Buddha discovered him there the next morning, he modified the rule. This incident and Rāhula's keenness in observing rules are described again in greater detail at J.i.161f.

http://www.palikanon.com/english/pal.../r/raahula.htm

Gassho, J

SatToday

[Ryan379]

Hi,

I don't bow to the toilette because I crap in it.

Gassho, Jishin, ST

This reminds me of case 21 of the Mumonkan (Katsuki Sekida translation):

A monk asked Unmon, "What is Buddha?"

Unmon replied, "Kanshiketsu!" (A dry shit-stick.)

Mumon's Comment:
Unmon was too poor to prepare plain food, too busy to speak from notes.

He hurriedly took up*shiketsu*to support the Way.

The decline of Buddhism was thus foreshadowed.

Mumon's Verse:

Lightning flashing,
Sparks shooting;
A moment's blinking,
Missed forever.

Gassho

Ryan

Sat Today

[Kairu]

Thank you all for your insightful replies. I just felt like there was this huge gap between monk and layman, but at the same time I wasn't sure if the gap was just an illusion I made up. I never thought of practicing at home as harder, but now that it's been explained... Yeah, it is hard, isn't it? Heh.

About bowing to that toilet: I've been trying to do a little of that samu mentioned in the Rohatsu thread, and man is it hard. I find it to be even harder than sitting zazen. I find myself thinking about getting the job done, or I'll keep looking at the clock.

I decided that the best way to get back on track is to sing the word samu to the tune of jingle bells. Hahaha.

Also thank you all for giving me a lot of terms, names, and articles to look up.

Kyle,
-Samu all day erry day.

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