November 16th-17th Treeleaf Weekly Zazenkai - DAYLIGHT SAVINGS, CHECK START TIMES!

[Jundo]

A Reminder: DAYLIGHT SAVINGS has changed, so please confirm the start times below which are an hour earlier in most places.

Today's Sitting is Dedicated to TETSUGEN BERNIE GLASSMAN, Zen Teacher, Engaged Buddhist, Mensch, Human Being. Please see the post below on BEARING WITNESS

Hello All,

Please 'sit-a-long' with our weekly FRIDAY/SATURDAY 'LIVE FROM TREELEAF' 90 minute ZAZENKAI, netcast from 10am Japan time Saturday morning (that is New York 8pm, Los Angeles 5pm (Friday night), London 1am and Paris 2am (early Saturday morning)

... and to be visible on the following screen during those times and sit-a-long-able any time thereafter ...

LIVE ZAZENKAI NETCAST IS HERE:
CLICK ON THE TAB ON LOWER RIGHT FOR 'FULL SCREEN

FOR THOSE WHO WISH TO JOIN TO SIT LIVE WITH A CAMERA, A LINK TO JOIN WILL BE POSTED BELOW IN THIS THREAD ABOUT 15 MINUTES BEFORE START TIME. JUST CLICK AND JOIN. WE ARE NOW LIMITED TO 10 INDIVIDUALS WITH CAMERAS, BUT ANY NUMBER CAN WATCH LIVE 'ONE WAY' AND SIT-A-LONG VIA THE ABOVE SCREEN. IF JOINING WITH CAMERA, PLEASE MAKE SURE YOUR MICROPHONE IS MUTED::

00:00 – 00:15 CEREMONY (HEART SUTRA in English) and Dedication
00:15 – 00:45 ZAZEN
00:45 – 00:55 KINHIN
00:55 – 01:25 ZAZEN
01:25 – 01:30 VERSE OF ATONEMENT & FOUR VOWS

As you can see, our Zazenkai consists of chanting the 'Heart Sutra' in English (the words are at the link below), some full floor prostrations in sets of three (please follow along with me ... or a simple Gassho can be substituted if you wish), followed by our Dedication, Zazen twice for about 30 minutes each, with 10 minutes of Kinhin in between, and we end the sitting with 'The Verse of Atonement' and 'The Four Vows'.

Please join us in the Chanting of the Heart Sutra (although please keep your microphone muted). You can download and print out the Chants we will recite at the following link (PDF):

Chant Book (PDF)

or

Chant Book (SHORT VERSION HTML)

Not everyone realizes that they can join in the Chanting of the Heart Sutra, Verse of Atonement and Four Vows (although we ask that you keep your microphone down). Please follow along with the Chant Book, and let your voice ring!

So, please join us as soon as you can, and we will keep a Zafu open for you.

Remember, when we drop all thought of 'here' 'there' 'now' 'then' ... we are sitting all together!


Gassho, Jundo

SatTodayLAH

PS - There is no "wrong" or "right" in Zazen ... yet here is a little explanation of the "right" times to Bow (A Koan) ...

https://youtu.be/GR6POpsXh9Q

The other video I mention on Zendo decorum is this one, from our "Always Beginners" video Series:

Sit-a-Long with Jundo: Zazen for Beginners (12) - Basic Zendo Decorum At Home
https://www.treeleaf.org/forums/show...093#post189093

[Jundo]

Bernie Glassman, who passed from this visible world this week, was an advocate of BEARING WITNESS as Zen Practice, human practice. Witnessing openly, in a way caring and concerned, recognizing what cannot be changed, but looking for opportunities to change what we can. Present with peoples' suffering, not ignoring: Open and empathetic, not merely staring from a distance. Bernie led so many hundreds of people to BEAR WITNESS in the concentration camps of Poland, the streets of New York among the homeless, in waste dumps and battlefields. One sat, then got up to do what might be done.

One of Bernie Roshie's fellow teachers in the Zen Peacemaker Order, which Bernie founded, is JULES SHUZEN HARRIS. He writes this description of BEARING WITNESS in a recent edition of Lion's Roar:

-------------------

How to Practice Bearing Witness
BY JULES SHUZEN HARRIS| APRIL 2, 2018

Zen teacher Jules Shuzen Harris teaches us a three-step practice to connect with and serve those who are suffering.

In times of doubt, disbelief, and insecurity, the practice of bearing witness can be an
important aspect of our awareness and presence.

Bearing witness can be defined as acknowledging that something exists or is true. From a
Buddhist perspective, and specifically the Zen Peacemakers Order, to bear witness is to
embrace both the joy and the suffering we encounter. Rather than simply observing the
situation, we become the situation. We become intimate with whatever it is—hunger,
poverty, discrimination, disease, or death.

When we analyze and judge a situation, we normally come to it with all of our ideas and
habitual beliefs. We are only able to see it through the lens of our conditioned thinking. But
when we shift to the practice of bearing witness, we suspend our analytical thinking and
move to a place of open awareness. This allows the witnessing presence to become one with
whatever situation we encounter.

To bear witness, we need to set aside the focus on our own reactions and enter a place of
stillness and receptivity. Bearing witness in the world, we are cultivating the same ground of
open heart and mind that we practice in our meditation.

This brings us to the question, “What is the benefit of bearing witness practice?”

Psychologically, it enables us to connect with a place of real empathy. It also provides a kind
of catharsis, a release from our emotional reactions of pity, shame, or fear.

Spiritually, bearing witness invokes a sense of interconnectedness, of oneness, a direct
realization of the wholeness of life.

Politically and socially, it enables us to see clearly the entire web of causes and conditions
that create suffering, and to take effective action to improve people’s lives.

Here is a three-step practice of bearing witness that you can do:

MORE HERE

https://www.lionsroar.com/how-to-practice-bearing-witness/

Bernie Quote:

“When we bear witness, when we become the situation — homelessness, poverty, illness, violence, death — the right action arises by itself. We don’t have to worry about what to do. We don’t have to figure out solutions ahead of time. Peacemaking is the functioning of bearing witness. Once we listen with our entire body and mind, loving action arises.”

A description from Tricycle:

It began in 1996 when a group of 150 people journeyed to Auschwitz-Birkenau, the Nazi concentration camp where millions of Jews were systematically exterminated, to bear witness to the inconsolable suffering of the past and its present effect upon the world. Glassman feels that where there is great pain, there is also the potential for enormous transformation. A place like Auschwitz-Birkenau is thus a powerful energy center. ... One of the insights offered by bearing witness is the recognition that many social activists fail to truly know what it is like to live in the situations they seek to improve or eliminate. People who feed the hungry often don’t know how it feels to be hungry. Glassman believes the direct experience of suffering is crucial to helping others. It is one reason he began his street retreats, in which a group of people agree to live on the streets for one week as if they were homeless, begging for food or eating in shelters and sleeping wherever they can. When pushed into the unknown, the street retreatants are forced to be more observant of themselves and their surroundings. From this increased awareness, healing takes place. ...

[Mp]

Thank you Jundo ... I may or may not be able to be live, as I have a work commitment, but will try my best to be there. =)

Gassho
Shingen

Sat/LAH

[Jundo]

Thank you Jundo ... I may or may not be able to be live, as I have a work commitment, but will try my best to be there. =)

Gassho
Shingen

Sat/LAH

I will post the link if I don't see you.

Have a good Samu.

Gassho, J

STLah

[Mp]

I will post the link if I don't see you.

Have a good Samu.

Gassho, J

STLah

Thanks Jundo. =)

Gassho
Shingen

Sat/LAH

[Shinzan]

I'll be there, internet willing.
I'll be sitting in remembrance of Tetsugen. I met up with several ZPO folk at the No DAPL Standing Rock prayer camp, in deep winter (10 below). That's bearing witness!

_/\_ stlah

[Onkai]

Thank you, Jundo. I will join two-way, tech permitting.

Gassho,
Onkai
Sat

[Shinshi]

Thank you Jundo. I will be there one way tonight.

Gassho, Shinshi

SaT-LaH

[Sekishi]

See you all soon.

Gassho,
Sekishi
#sat #lah


Sent from my Tricorder using Tapatalk Pro

[Kyonin]

Thank you Jundo.

I'll be there live

Gassho,

Kyonin
Sat/LAH

[Jundo]

link to join ... i think ...

https://hangouts.google.com/hangouts/_/ytl/gewEfCDLQPq3byidAyLGDmipnxB5Jf2waw7W_1GtlUM=?eid=116930448607190706458&hl=en_GB

[Jakuden]

Will be there with you all two way tonight tech permitting!

Gassho,
Jakuden
SatToday/LAH

[Shinshi]

Thank you Jundo for your heartfelt words about Bernie Glassman and the importance of bearing witness in a heart felt manner.

Thank you everyone.

Gassho, Shinshi

SaT-LaH

[Sekishi]

Thank you all for sitting together. Lovely to practice with all of you.

Deep bows,
Sekishi
#sat

[Shokai]

Thank you Jundo, Sekishi and all who sat or will sit. Have a wonderful week.

gassho, Shokai

stlah