In modern times giving the shiho is not so difficult. But to get it from me, you must first receive the monk's ordination. Then, three years after the ordination, you can get the shiho.
This year I have been thinking of whom to give it to. The shiho is not at all difficult; but I must send the documents to the Central headquarters in Japan (Eiheiji). This is formalism. If I give the shiho, and if it is not truly official, it is still the true shiho. With it you can become a true, great master. An international master.
QUESTION (in German): Creativity is art. So, is Zen art too?
Master: Art? You must not make categories. German people are always making categories. Zen and art are not the same. Zen is infinite, and so it can of course include art. Zen is art, fine. Zen includes art. Sometimes art, sometimes religion. It includes everything.
Understand? No. He does not understand because he has a narrow mind. You wish to create your own personal logic, so it is very difficult for you. Zen is also logical. Dogen's Zen is very logical. Understand? No.
Kwat!
Fifteen thousand Soto masters
QUESTION: How many Soto Zen masters exist in the world?
Master: Mainly in Japan now. There are none left in China, or very few-and one in Hong-Kong. And very few too in America.
In Japan there are more than fifteen thousand Soto temples, and there should be a master in each one of them. The rule is that to become chief of a temple you must receive the shiho.21 In France there is the temple at Avalon and the Paris temple. So if I give the shiho, each one of you will nominally become the chief of these temples for one or three months. I make it very easy.
Anyway, I think there are about fifteen thousand Soto masters.
True ego: Your original self
QUESTION: You once said that we must be ego and we must be beyond ego. What does this mean?
Master: Contradiction. But you must have both. To have a strong ego and to have an egoistic ego are not the same. You must have confidence in yourself. You must find your true ego-and at the same time abandon it. Yet, you must not forget yourself.
Continue zazen and your true ego will become strong, and you will find your original self.
You are not interchangeable with someone else. You are only you. A man is not just hair and organs. You have a speciality, an originality of your own. But if you wish to find it, you must abandon ego. Abandon all, and only true ego remains. Everyone has karma, everything has it-dust, mud. But clean your karma and you can find your true originality. To abandon your ego, you abandon your karma. Abandon egoistic ego and you become true ego. This ego here is very important. Socrates said, "Know yourself." You are not another. You must find your true self.
QUESTION: These mondos seem to consist of special answers, and people on the outside, in the social world, cannot understand them. People on the outside cannot understand your answers.
Master: I answer for you.
There are people here who understand. My answers are clear. Only foolish people cannot understand.
True criticism is necessary
Master: Yes, Madame, you have a question?
Madame: Yes, my question concerns the woman who caused the disturbance in the dojo yesterday (the crazy woman). Until now I had thought Buddhism to be a very tolerant and compassionate religion. I simply do not understand this criticism of her.
Master: Discussion is necessary in order to progress. Personal criticism is not so good, and for religious people this sort of criticism is even forbidden. But discussion on different schools, on doctrine, on philosophy, discussion on what is true, is necessary, True criticism is important. I want to receive true criticism. Dogen's criticism of Rinzai Zen is true criticism. If you want to seek true Zen, then criticism is necessary.
An historical comparison: Rinzai and Soto
QUESTION: If Dogen criticizes Rinzai, then he is also criticizing Obaku, who gave the shiho to Rinzai. Yet, Obaku, you say, was a greater master...?
Master: Some say Rinzai is greater than Obaku, but Dogen doesn't agree with this. For Dogen Obaku is greater.
Rinzai Zen spread widely during Dogen's time (in the 1200s), and many many Rinzai monks from the mainland visited Japan. So Dogen felt that he too must spread Soto Zen, and he studied more and more deeply Rinzai.
Before, I too, like Dogen, admired Rinzai Zen.22 But now as I must certify Soto Zen, it is necessary to compare the two. I must make a profound comparison, and not just light criticism. Rinzai Zen is sometimes very accurate. Certain points in Rinzai Roku impressed me very much. But now I understand that Dogen's Zen is much deeper. So this is why I compare them now. Nobody until today has compared them like this. I am making a true, deep comparison.
Certainly I want to find out where Rinzai Zen is deeper than Dogen Zen, but....
Surely I will be able to find some point, somewhere. I want to find this. It is necessary.
J U LY 28 / 8.30 P.M.
NO DIFFERENT THAN THE PATRIARCHS
This sesshin of ten days is almost over.
During these ten days I have been very happy. Everyone has continued zazen. Your postures are very good. The new people are very sincere, and my Paris disciples have completely developed. Now it is they who must educate the new disciples.
I have said that there is no object in zazen: mushotoku. Some question this.
During zazen we must not hold to an object; not to becoming strong or healthy, not to (obtaining) kensho, not to satori. We must not have a goal. But we must have hope, an ideal.
I think that the reason why you have all assembled here to do zazen is because you are seeking the true way. If you were here just for your own health, then you could have gone to the beach, to Cannes or Nice.... Why have you come here? For the mountains and the fresh air? I do not think so. I see this in your back when you are in the posture.
In the end we are completely alone. Our life is a solitary trip. We go alone, we walk alone. But for those who seek the Way, for those who have found it, then it is possible to play, and to play together. Zazen is play.
Zazen is the true gate of the Dharma, the gate to true peace, to true freedom, for eternity. Zazen is the highest play, and I am very pleased to have played here together with you.
I have said that to do zazen alone is good-I have experienced it alone for many years-but to do zazen with others is more impressive, more powerful.
You, united here, form a spiritual family which extends into eternity. Your intimacy here is greater than any other; greater than the intimacy of family, of parent, of brother or sister. The family is only for one lifetime, but for those who enter the dojo, and sit beside one another, and practice together this ten-day sesshin, an eternal family has been formed.
Only half-an-hour left. Please be concentrated and calm.
Only during zazen can you become truly deep. Here you can find your true ego, and your karma can vanish-even if you are in pain, even if bonnos arise.
"Without muddiness in the water of the mind," says Dogen in Sansho Doei, "clear is the moon. Even the waves break upon it and are changed into light."23
Our lives are all complicated and difficult, even when in the best situations, in a happy family life, in a good husband and wife relationship. Life is not always smooth. Sometimes there is serious trouble: in the family, in the social world, in business. Big waves, huge storms arise. But do zazen and all the waves, little ones and big ones, and the storms too-everything-will break, on the moonlight of zazen.
A woman in the mondo today asked me when my faith first developed. It was a deep question for me. Sometimes I forget this, and madame's question woke it up in me again. My faith became fresh once more.
My faith in zazen has continued until today: ever since I met my master Kodo Sawaki in my youth.
I hope you too have faith in zazen.
I certify exactly that zazen will help you throughout all your life.
When we die we enter alone into the coffin. In the end our voyage is completely
alone.
But through zazen, we are already alone: we become intimate with ourselves, with our ego, and so when we die we have no need of fear and we die naturally.
I have long experienced solitude and now my mind and face are fixed.... Along the way, in my youth and for fifty years, many waves came, many troubles and difficulties, and it was not always easy. Zazen alone helped to support my mind, and so I could still become strong. My disciple, Stephane, said that whenever he has troubles (and even headaches), he does zazen and they go away. I told him that he was foolish, but this is not true. At such times zazen supports our lives.
Kodo Sawaki became, right from the first, my object of faith. He was always saying to me that you must not have faith in me, but in zazen. And sometimes he would become angry with me and he would criticize me. But his anger and his criticism were full of compassion. He would say to everyone: "Baka! Baka! Complete fools!" But this "baka" was completely compassionate. "Silence! Baka!.... "
My master educated diplomatically. But not always. If he had been always diplomatic he would not have been able to make great men. When someone makes a big mistake, true anger is necessary for a true education.
For some people, to cut their bad karma, criticism is necessary. A great teacher cuts the karma of his disciples (for you cannot cut karma by yourself).... So Dogen criticized Rinzai Zen.... Dogen's ketsumyaku24 includes both the Rinzai and Soto lines. Nonetheless, it is necessary to decide, to realize, which is best, which is the most accurate.25 This is the role of a true educator. There is no need to be diplomatic.
Dogen was at first completely impressed with Rinzai Zen. But when he changed temples, when he moved from Uji temple to Eiheiji ten years later, Dogen's religious spirit developed and deepened, and so his mind changed.
At that time in Japan many Chinese Rinzai monks were arriving from China. They had been invited by the governor of Kamakura, and also by the emperor himself. But the emperor made mistakes concerning Rinzai Zen.
If mistakes are being made on Zen, if the direction is wrong, then it is the work of the truly religious person to criticize. And so Dogen began to criticize Rinzai.
Almost all Rinzai monks admire Dogen's Shobogenzo, then and today. And Rinzai masters, even today, use Shobogenzo as a text.
Yes, what I am doing now is comparing Shobogenzo and Rinzai Roku.
Shobogenzo is complete. It includes many contradictions, but these contradictions are hishiryo. Read it carefully and you will see that these contradictions are not contradictions. Dogen wrote in many directions and this is why it is so deep.
Eighty percent of Rinzai Roku is like Soto. Rinzai was a close brother to Soto. He had experienced zazen...yet he never wrote about it and so people make mistakes on this account.
Rinzai said: "Doru" (followers of the way; Rinzai is here addressing everyone in the mondo, messieurs, mesdames, followers of the way), "Doru, do not let yourself be deluded by anyone-this is all I teach. If you want to make use of it" (of a genuine interior spirit) "then use it now, without delay or doubt. But disciples of today do not succeed because they suffer from lack of self-confidence. Because of this lack, they run here and there and are driven around by circumstances, and kept whirling by the ten thousand things. You cannot find deliverance this way, but if you can stop your heart from running after whisps of the will, you will not be different from the Buddha and the patriarchs. Do you wish to know the Buddha? No one else than the-who-here-in-your-presence is now listening to the Dharma. Just because you lack confidence in yourself you turn to the outside and run after seeking. Even if you find something there, it is only words and letters and nothing of the spirit of Buddha or the patriarchs." (Rinzai did not like books and sutras.) "Venerable Zen students, if you do not meet him at this very moment, you will be reborn in the wombs of asses and cows. Followers of the way, you are not different than Shaka."26 (If you follow the six senses then you are no different than Shakyamuni Buddha.)
I said today that you and Shakyamuni are the same. I have sat for thirty years in the posture of Shakyamuni Buddha. It is the same as the boddhisattva posture. It is the same as Dogen's. If the posture is the same, the mind is the same. The flow of the six senses never ceases.
What master Rinzai says here is completely true. Dogen, though, who was more humble and more respectful, says that we must "approach" Shakyamuni Buddha. He says that he wants to "become like" Shakyamuni Buddha. Rinzai, whose words are stronger, says that you are the same as the Buddha, and "no different" than the patriarchs. But then this statement of Rinzai's becomes a koan.
Chukai!
JULY29/7A.M.
THE ANCIENT FEUD:
The practice was forgotten
In China during the time of Soto master Wanshi and Rinzai master Daie, in the twelveth century, a strong opposition developed between the two. Followers of the Rinzai school called followers of the Soto school mokusho-zen. (Moku means silence and sho means to shine.) Silence, only silence, but at the same time shining-shining on others, on other existences; the posture of zazen, its mind, shining but not only oneself shining, not only one's ego shining, but shining for others too.
At the same time Soto people called the Rinzai followers kanna-zen. Kanna-Zen, which was established by master Daie, means to observe the spoken word. This was a talking Zen, discussion and debate Zen. It always ended with a katsu.
The opposition started when Rinzai Zen began spreading rapidly with the koan system as its spearhead.
"Does a dog have Buddha nature?"
"MU! //
What is Mu?"
Many interesting discussions developed around the koan, and the practice of zazen was almost forgotten. And it was only the Soto monks who continued the practice: no discussions, nothing, only zazen facing a wall.
In discussion and debate Soto monks were not clever.
So Rinzai Zen spread in China while Soto did not. Because Soto was only mokusho, silence. Shining on others in silence. Shining by oneself.
Discussion has nothing to do with Zen. Not all Rinzai disciples are like this.
In Soto too they are not always so good.
Monks who sleep during zazen, who only eat and sleep and never think, these monks are the worst.
Nyojo and Dogen completely respected master Wanshi (10911157). And Fuyo Dokai (1043-1118) too. Fuyo Dokai was another great master of the Soto line. But he ran into problems with the emperor.
The emperor presented Fuyo Dokai with the highest violet kolomo28 and also invited him to teach in the capital. But Fuyo Dokai refused (both the gift and the invitation) and so the Emperor became angry and put him in prison. When he got out, he went off to the mountains where he built a dojo. Very soon his dojo became full of people. Many from the capital and from the imperial palace joined him there. They came and received ordinations, and even some princesses became nuns. Fuyo Dokai began to worry: the emperor might get angry again. So Fuyo Dokai created severe rules in his dojo. He wanted to discourage them, he wanted them to return to the capital. So he finally decided to decrease the food.
Asceticism and mortification are good methods for testing people. Another method is to forbid sex for the young. Difficult, but possible-in a prison. But to reduce the food, this is even more difficult to bear.
In a Zen dojo one eats only twice a day, breakfast and lunch. There is no dinner. So, depending upon the number of people arriving regularly at his dojo, Fuyo Dokai would decrease the rice by increasing the water in the morning genmai soup. More people more water.
Sometimes, at the Paris dojo, I imitate this method.
So, Fuyo Dokai watered down the morning genmai. And sometimes he cut out lunch. Even so, no one left.
It was at this time that Soto began to flourish.
Then came Soto master Wanshi and Rinzai master Daie. And in the dispute between the two schools, the two methods developed (mokusho and kanna).
Anyway, in the end Daie respected Wanshi and they ended up good friends. When Wanshi died, Daie organized
a big ceremony for the dead Soto master.
JULY 29/10 A. M.
ZAZEN, SUMMIT OF THE MOUTAIN
This is the last zazen of the first sesshin. The permanent disciples, however, will continue to do zazen throughout the month of August.
Soto Zen: silence. Iwazu, Iwazu. Beyond all discussions. Mokusho Zen: silence is shining. But with wisdom.
Master Dogen wrote in Fukanzazengi that there is no selection in zazen. Do not select the clever, do not select the fool. Zazen is for everyone. Anyone can get satori.
In Buddhism wisdom is the perfect and highest dimension. It is not cleverness, it is not simply intelligence.
Dogen concentrated on the education of his disciples. And especially after establishing himself at Eiheiji. He concentrated on his disciples in order to make true educators out of them. To make masters.
If you do zazen you can understand yourself profoundly, and you can become a great educator, a great master. For all people. For all people in the social world. In this modern civilization there are few true educators. There are many professors, many doctors-there are enough of them for this civilization. But as for true educators, there are not enough. And so we have the crisis of modern times.
The first spoonful, it is said in the sutra Bussho Kapila, is to cut the bad. The second is to practice the good, and the third is to help, to educate, all mankind. This does not mean to educate with knowledge, or to educate through science.
You must give to everyone: Hannya Haramitsu. Paramita in Sanskrit. A fuse (gift) does not consist only in giving money, not only in material things. But to give good words, good knowledge, good wisdom, good education-to give this to others is also a gift. Giving the kyosaku too can be a gift. So too with anger, if it is to educate.
The kai, or the sila in Sanskrit, are the precepts, the morals, the rules. In Mahayana Buddhism the kai are of a very high dimension.
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