Help Others

In the Shobogenzo, Dogen Zenji says that whether one is clever or dull doesn't matter. If we practice zazen, we will get the same attainment. This is Buddhist understanding, or a Buddhist idea, of human character. This point should always be remembered, especially by the intelligent ones. When the clever ones do not help others, the Sangha will be destroyed. Only when clever and talented people help others will the Sangha last long. This is our teaching. -------------------------------- Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture - 68-02-00-D as found on shunryusuzuki.com. Edited by DC 

Clever

In a sutra it says, "If a clever heretic studies, he will lose his life, but a clever Buddhist will gain from his cleverness." This kind of story is found all over. [DC note: You don't have to think of the words "heretic" and "Buddhist" here in a limited away. You could say foolish and wise or whatever works for you. ] -------------------------------- Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture - 68-02-00-D as found on shunryusuzuki.com. Edited by DC 

Commenting on the Lotus Sutra

Here appears Dipankara. Usually, as you know, Dipankara Bodhisattva is the oldest of all the Bodhisattvas. But according to this sutra, even before Dipankara there were so many Bodhisattvas, like Srigarba, whose enlightened name is Vimalanetra, or like Varaprabha, or Kandrasuryapradipa. And what does this mean? Actually, there is no first bodhisattva. Actually, everyone is a bodhisattva. This sutra suggests this kind of teaching.  -------------------------------- Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture - 68-02-00-D as found on shunryusuzuki.com. Edited by DC 

Great Sadness

RIP Micah Sawyer Jr.

Kalpa

Did I explain another way of understanding one kalpa? There is a big rock, like Tassajara. And every five hundred years, maybe, or more, an angel comes to the rock, and she makes her sleeve rub off some stone. When that stone has vanished from the angel's sleeve rubbing it, it is one kalpa. So there are many ways of explaining what one kalpa is.  -------------------------------- Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture - 68-02-00-D as found on shunryusuzuki.com. Edited by DC 

Commenting on the Lotus Stura

The last kalpa will be when everything will go, including human life. Juko is the name for the kalpas when everything existed pretty firmly, without losing its form, and eko [samvarta kalpa] means the time at the end of juko when everything will disintegrate. Integrated age and disintegrated age. An integrated age is twenty kalpas long, and one kalpa is our lifespan going up and down, from ten to eighty thousand years. [That means beings evolving from lifespans of ten to eighty thousand years and back so it's just an inconceivable number.

Student 1: Will there still be Buddha after the disintegration?

S.R.: There is a koan which is exactly the same as your question.

Student 1: What is the answer to the koan?

S.R.: That is also a koan, so this is your homework. Interesting question.  -------------------------------- Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture - 68-02-00-D as found on shunryusuzuki.com. Edited by DC 

Suzuki reading and commenting on the Lotus Sutra

"He (some Buddha) spoke during fully sixty intermediate kalpas, always sitting on the same seat with the immovable body and tranquil mind. And the whole assembly continued sitting on the same seats, listening to the preaching of the Lord for sixty intermediate kalpas, there being not a single creature in that assembly who felt fatigue of body or mind."

A great difference from my lecture! What does it mean, by the way? Do you understand what it means?  -------------------------------- Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture - 68-02-00-D as found on shunryusuzuki.com. Edited by DC 

Same name?

This teaching wasn't new. Even before Buddha started to tell the Lotus Sutra, Kandrasuryapradipa appeared and told the same teaching. And one after another, Kandrasuryapradipa Buddhas appeared in the same name and left the same teaching. That is what Manjusri saw, actually, in his previous life. This is your homework. What does it mean? You may wonder if this is just a fairy tale or if it means something. This is, I think, good homework for you. And if you want to ask this on the final day of the training period, during question and answer, you can ask me. Be careful not to get a big slap, okay? What does it mean? One after another, Buddhas appeared in the same name, Kandrasuryapradipa, and told the same Saddharma Pundarika Sutra.  -------------------------------- Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture - 68-02-00-D as found on shunryusuzuki.com. Edited by DC 

Concluding this lecture on the Lotus Sutra

"...and to the Bodhisattvas he preached the law connected with the six Perfections, and terminating in the knowledge of the omniscient, after the attainment of supreme, perfect enlightenment." So far the teaching was for sravakas and pratyekas, and now the teaching is for the bodhisattvas. For the bodhisattva, Buddha gave the teaching of the six paramitas. I think I explained them already. Dana Paramita, bestowing of material and teaching; Sila Paramita, keeping the precepts; Ksanti Paramita, the practice of patience; Virya Paramita, zeal and progress; Dhyana Paramita, the practice of meditation; and Prajna Paramita, wisdom paramita, the power to discern truth or reality. 

Thank you very much.  -------------------------------- Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture - 68-02-00-C as found on shunryusuzuki.com. Edited by DC 

Same

We say the Four Noble Truths and Eightfold Path are teachings for the sravakas, and the Twelve Links of Causality is a teaching for pratyekas, but according to recent results of scholarship, Buddha actually taught both of those teachings without separating them: sometimes the Four Noble Truths and the holy Eight fold Path, sometimes the Twelve Links of Causality. And if you analyze those two teachings, they are two different versions of the same teaching. What he meant was the same. -------------------------------- Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture - 68-02-00-C as found on shunryusuzuki.com. Edited by DC