Chán, Zen & Yi Jin Jing | (3/30/21 - Ask Us Anything LIVE)

Denny and I reprise the history of Zen; dig into Chán Buddhism; center much of the episode on a key question about Bodhidharma; and primarily present Yi Jin Jing in light of its importance for linking body and mind.

Transcript

Good morning everyone,

Good morning,

Good afternoon,

Good evening wherever you are.

Welcome to another episode of A.

U.

A.

Ask Us Anything.

My special co-conspirator here is Josh and he and I are the Yin and Yang of Budhidharma.

Good morning Josh,

How are you?

Hey Danny,

What's going on?

It's a lovely day here in St.

Louis,

Missouri.

How's it in California?

It's great here too.

The weather's been amazing.

So you have a lot of notes that I wasn't able to incorporate all of which into the presentation.

I incorporate many of them.

So there will be plenty of opportunities that you can kind of interject as we go through the presentation.

So should we just get started?

Sure,

I'll just give a quick intro here.

We're calling this one Chan,

Xin,

And Yi-Jin Jing.

And we've gone over,

I'll include lots of links in the show notes.

We've done Xin a little bit,

So we haven't done too much Chan,

But we're going to probably go into those a little bit as more of a background and focus more on Yi-Jin Jing and kind of an enigmatic figure surrounding Yi-Jin Jing.

I just thought today,

I mentioned real briefly,

Since we're doing the show,

I thought probably I ought to practice Yi-Jin Jing.

So I went to the park today and I'm not going to give an interpretation of this.

And we talked about experience and experimentation well.

And don't let this color your perceptions of Yi-Jin Jing.

It's just a one-off thing.

So it's not going to be representative of anything other than maybe kind of the mystery surrounding some of the mystery surrounding Yi-Jin Jing.

So I set the intention,

Which is with an experimentation of loving kindness when I was doing this,

Which is interesting,

Right?

So when I look up and getting ready to do the big push,

There is this dog,

Two dogs,

The fluffy dogs sitting there right in front of me.

And I almost fall over when I do this.

I managed to stand up.

So then I did it again and I focused more on my body,

So I wasn't paying attention to the external world.

So then I was able to more stable.

So and then the guy was like,

He's having trouble controlling his dogs and they're whatever.

Some people let them run.

So it just almost done here.

Well,

On the way home though,

I see this Cooper Hawk.

It's a really big Hawk and it comes in the local park every once in a while.

And it was perched next to a bird's nest.

And then there were some,

I don't know what it was doing in there.

But then it flew off and there were other birds chasing it,

Right?

They usually do sometimes they'll pack the bigger predator bird as it goes.

And there's a bunch of starlings,

Which is a kind of a not native bird,

A lot of them making noise.

And then that was,

Yeah,

So that's all I wanted to share.

Take that for what it is or what it isn't.

You know,

I'm not going to interpret anything like that.

But yeah,

So Denny,

So let's take it away here.

Okay.

Okay.

Thank you,

Josh.

Yep.

You never know,

Josh.

It might be a incarnation of something.

I mean,

If you open the book that Buddha once upon a time were all of those.

Yeah,

All the Jhana details.

Yeah.

So we actually,

Usually it takes us a couple of weeks to decide what the topic ought to be.

This one actually decided almost immediately after we finished.

We talk a great deal about Chi.

And I thought it's now time to really come back to the core of our practice,

Which is meditation and then also the practices of that,

Which is I Ching Ching.

So ultimately what I want to answer is the important question of why I Ching Ching as opposed to what is in Ching Ching because we can do that in a later talk.

But the question is why I Ching Ching?

So let me just kind of explain the title.

I was going to put up a slide,

But then I figured we kind of talk about this enough.

So Chan,

Chan,

Chan actually is the abbreviation for Chan-na.

That's a Chinese pronunciation of either a Sanskrit or Pali word called Jhana.

Jhana,

Some people interpret that as different stages of meditation.

Some people interpret that as sentimentation,

That is let your negative energy settle.

So that's Jhana,

Which became Chana.

And then later on it's abbreviated into Chan.

And then when it went to Korea,

It was Sun.

And then when it went to Japan,

It's Zen.

And there's another pronunciation in Vietnamese.

But all those words come from Chan,

Which come from Chana,

Which come from Jhana.

So we got that out of the way.

Now Yi Jing Jing,

This is the word that if you've never heard of it,

It's a,

I'll call that a,

I call it a yogi.

I'll just call it a yogi practice because it came from a yoga,

A yogi.

But Yi means exchanging.

Jing is somewhat controversial.

Most people would say that's tendon.

Some people would go as far as saying this,

How do you say that Josh?

Ainyew,

Which is the part that connects the tendon connecting to the bone.

Is it a A-I-N-E-W?

Oh,

You know,

I don't know.

That's a good question.

So it's another part.

There's another part of the anatomy.

I'm tending to think that Jing is either connected tissue or the spiral core.

You would find that in the Chinese literature that uses the same word.

But again,

The point here is that don't ever interpret a single Chinese character because then you have infinite meaning depending who you talk to.

And then the last one Jing,

It just means a treatise,

A classic,

Just a book or just a record.

All right.

So we're going to talk about Chan.

We're going to talk about Zen and then we're going to talk about Yi Jing Jing.

Now this is a very,

Very busy chart,

But I think it's good.

So first of all,

Let's just go down.

Let's just go down on the left hand side,

The legend.

So the very dark kind of orange color is essentially the origin of Buddhism.

We all know that Buddha was a prince of a small kingdom,

Which is in what today is Nepal.

So even though we consider him a North Indian,

He was actually born in Nepal.

And so this dark orange color is where the Buddhism was originated.

Now what's interesting is that when you go to,

Let's skip to the very light,

Almost yellow color.

This is actually when,

This is the area when Buddhism first migrated.

So you can see it goes as far as Kashmir,

Which is the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan.

And some of you might know that when the Taliban took over this part of the world,

They blew up some Buddha statue,

The world's biggest Buddha statue,

Which tells you that at one point Buddhism was very active in this region.

In fact,

It's the first region that Buddhism was very active.

Now what's interesting is that the entire India is,

There's no longer Buddhists.

There are more Catholics in India than there are Buddhists.

That religion actually kind of extinct.

Now you may say,

Well,

But don't we go to India and see all these relics?

Those are for tourists.

Those are entirely for tourists.

Now what's even interesting is that originally Buddhism was quite active in Indonesia,

Very active in Indonesia,

And it was very active in Philippine too.

Now of course all that has gone because of Islam.

So when Islam came to this part of the world,

They took over.

And so the only place where Buddhism is active is basically in greater China,

China,

Mongolia and Tibet.

Some people argue that Tibet is part of China,

Which is okay with me.

And then it's also very active in the Southeast China,

Starting with Sri Lanka,

Right here,

To Burma or what is now called Myanmar,

To Thailand.

Now what most people don't understand is that it's actually very,

Buddhism in Thailand is actually very recent.

It's less than a thousand years old compared to other part.

So for some reason,

Buddhism went to Myanmar,

Went to Cambodia and Laos,

But kind of skipped Thailand.

And it's only after the Mongolians invaded China,

Then a lot of the monks kind of came down north from,

And then also they came up from the Sri Lanka.

And so now,

So the other thing that is interesting is the timeline.

So we talk about the early Buddhism and then we talk about Mahayana and then the Theravada.

So we did that a little bit.

So I would just kind of summarize,

Okay.

So just kind of put things in perspective,

Temporally.

Sikatakottama is the name of the historical Buddha.

This is the name before he was enlightened.

And so he was born essentially 550 years,

563 years before Christ,

Before common era.

So he lived for 80 years.

So that we know.

So this is kind of,

So Buddhism is 2,

600 years old.

That's what you need to remember.

Now last time we,

Last few times,

We talk about the councils.

So the first council was after Buddha passed away.

The second council was a couple of hundred years later when they had some issues with the rules and regulations.

And then the third council,

Which is the most important one is with King Azuka,

Who kind of consolidated all of the teachings into these three buckets.

The Sutra,

The rules and regulations,

And then all that.

And so what we know about Buddhism as it migrates out of the heartland,

Really starts with King Azuka.

So the first one is what we call the Theravada.

And this is starting around that time,

Third century.

So Theravada is the green line.

It went down to first the Sri Lanka.

And then from Sri Lanka,

It went to Burma.

And then eventually it went to Thailand.

And then from there,

It went to Cambodia and Laos.

So that's the extent of the Theravada teaching.

And if you want to know more,

Just we had a talk on that.

And then the red arrow is what is called the Mahayana.

The Mahayana started in the fourth to fifth century.

And so last time we talked about it's inaccurate to call everything else Hanayana because the Theravada,

It's just look at the timeline.

The Theravada basically predates the Mahayana by seventh century.

Now what's interesting is that what we call Mahayana,

Which is really Chinese,

That should give the more accurate description is that it is Chinese Buddhism because the Chinese Buddhism is very unique in that it's not pure Buddhism.

It's actually a combination of Buddhism,

Taoism,

And Confucianism.

So people might say that they are Mahayana.

What they really saying is that they're Chinese.

They're Chinese Buddhism,

Which has a very unique characteristics.

Not all of the teachings are from Buddha.

I dare to say that.

Now what's interesting is that when the Buddhism first went to China,

It wasn't Mahayana.

So let me explain that.

So the very first milestone,

The very first time that it's been documented that Buddhism went to China was this temple called the White Horse Temple in Luyang in Huanai.

And the reason we know that is because it's historically documented that there was an emperor and the emperor had a dream,

Had a vision,

And there was a bright light on the west.

So he went to his staff and said,

What's going on?

And they said,

Well,

There was a great sage that was born.

And so he sent his ministers to go look for that.

And so the ministers got halfway and they met up with two monks that came from essentially Kazasastan.

And so they came with a bunch of books and they were monks.

And so they were very happy.

And so they built this temple for them so that they can start the teaching.

And the first book that they,

The first sutra they interpret was this thing called the Sutra of 42 Chapters,

Which actually is a lot closer to the Theravada teaching than it is to the Mahayana teaching.

In fact,

There is no resemblance to the Mahayana teaching.

It's all Theravada teaching.

So I guess the point by point is that when we talk about Mahayana,

When we talk about Chinese Buddhism,

That's a very recent event.

The original wasn't like that.

The original were much closer to the Theravada teaching.

Now we all know about a Tang dynasty monk that went to India through the mountains and so forth.

And there was the journey of the West,

If you know,

If you know that,

That is very famous with the monkey and the pig and all that.

Well,

That's obviously a fiction,

But he wasn't even the first monk.

There was another monk prior to that who went from China to India.

And he was in search of,

Remember we talked about the three buckets,

The first bucket was the Sutra,

The second bucket is called the Vinanya,

Which is the rules and regulations,

The precepts.

So he was looking for that because he felt that the monks weren't practicing correctly.

So he wanted to find the original document to really,

So he can bring back the discipline.

So he went there for that.

What's interesting is that he went through the land,

But he came back through the sea.

And so he actually went through what we call Selang,

Which is Sri Lanka.

And there he actually found the original teaching of Buddha,

What we can now call Agama teaching.

And Agama,

Whenever you see an A,

That means that's negation,

Not.

Gama means that they're leaving.

So Agama means that when Buddha was enlightened under the buddhi tree,

He went searching for his,

Essentially his bodyguards.

So when he left the palace,

His father sent five bodyguards,

Five or six,

I don't remember.

And so they also become monastics.

And so they were practicing together.

And then when the historical Buddha gave up the teaching to search for his own path,

His bodyguards or his followers basically abandoned him.

So he went back and he basically said,

Don't go away.

And so Agama means don't go away,

Come back.

And so this monk actually in the fifth century actually went to India and on the way back into Sri Lanka brought back what is called the Agama Sichuan into China.

So finally you get to the more famous monk,

The one that went to India on his own.

And that's now in the seventh century.

What's interesting is that most people don't really know what he did other than that he was a good interpreter,

That he brought back all these scripts and then he had a big effort to translate it.

What people don't know was that he also founded a particular sect,

A particular sect.

Now I couldn't find the English interpretation of the sect is called Fa Shang.

Fa means Dharma.

Shang means,

It's hard to explain that,

But it's like the characteristic of Dharma.

And so this Dharma has different interpretation.

This particular Dharma has to do with when we talk about the sound,

The sight,

The smell,

The touch,

And then we say Dharma because that's the physics and then the physiology that associated with that are the eyes and the ears and the nose and the tongue and the body and the mind.

So in this case,

The mind is actually the brain.

And in this case,

Dharma means all the perturbations inside your mind.

So in this case,

Dharma means consciousness,

The eight consciousness.

So there's a big emphasis on the sixth sense basis,

The sixth sense doors,

The sixth sense fears and all that goes around that,

Surrounds that.

Now what's interesting is that another name for that means that this word and this word means only consciousness.

But it actually came from the work called Yogacara.

Yogacara is the practice of yoga.

Now they're not talking about the practice of the Asana or the Hatha yoga.

That's not what they're talking about.

They're not talking about practice of yoga as you do in the gym.

That's a fast food version of yoga.

So what they talk about yoga is the historical,

Is the authentic study of the mind.

That's what yoga means.

Okay.

Now this sometimes gets interpreted as mind only,

Right?

Or consciousness only?

Is that right?

Consciousness only.

Yes,

Yes.

Very good.

Very good.

Yeah.

Consciousness only.

Now,

Of course,

He started that,

But it never took off.

It never took off.

Okay.

So finally we have Bodhidharma.

That's what we want to talk about.

Bodhidharma is the first Patriot of Chan,

Or Chana,

Or Zen.

Now people argue when he actually appeared,

But there was a historical fact that he had a meeting.

It was documented with the Emperor Wu of the learned dynasty,

Which is a very short-lived dynasty and he lives in the sixth century.

So we know that.

So he more or less came in that part.

And then finally I want to talk about,

So this is the first Patriot.

Then I want to talk about the sixth Patriot because the sixth Patriot is really when the Chan meditation,

The Chan school really,

And Josh had a very nice set of notes on the five schools.

And so the kind of folklore is that that was predicted by Bodhidharma.

He actually said that,

So there was a lot of folklore.

For example,

Bodhidharma had a bowl and a gaza and it was supposed to transmit from one generation to another generation.

And he said that by the time we get to the sixth,

You don't need to do that anymore because by the time you get to the sixth,

It will be one stamp,

Five flowers,

Something like that.

So he kind of predicted that,

But who knows?

I wasn't there.

So I want to just kind of focus on that.

So this is when Chan first became popular,

He was the founder in the sixth century,

But it really became very popular,

Started to be very popular in the seventh and eighth century.

It started from the first to the sixth.

Very quickly,

I was just talking about the sixth Patriot is,

Because I want to talk about Zen because Zen came later.

Danny,

Before we get into that,

Let me go back to the last slide.

I just wanted to make a quick comment here that probably can't be answered.

But the very first thing,

The White Horse Temple,

That story,

It's just a very kind of mystical story almost.

And I was always wondering who the sage was that they were going to go see,

But they never made it.

And how did the monks coming from the sage,

Did they have foreknowledge?

And of course,

Why did they bring those teachings instead of other teachings?

And it's just really interesting,

The dream imagery and whatnot.

So yeah,

There's things we won't really know.

Well,

The answer to that,

One part answer is that they couldn't have brought the Mahayana teaching because Mahayana teaching was not invented yet.

It wasn't invented until the second century.

So that's all they have.

So now this is going to piss people off because I actually take the position that Mahayana was invented.

Well,

I actually hear that too.

It would take a lot more study for me to comment either way on that as well.

It's interesting where they got the Sutra 42 chapters at as well.

But it doesn't mean anything because the Bible was invented.

Well,

That's the thing.

So that is not as important as the usefulness of the teachings,

Right?

And how they can be applied to everyday life and wisdom.

That's more important.

The other stuff is just kind of scholarly stuff,

Which is fascinating too,

But we don't want to lose sight of the actual importance of everyday life.

I think this is okay.

You always have people who are enlightened.

I think the idea that everything has originated from a single point of reference,

That is wrong.

Because now you're trying to turn the teaching into an intellectual exercise as opposed to what we have always been saying,

An experiential exercise.

Exactly.

And it gets you actually look,

Who cares where Mahayana teaching comes from if you actually can experience enlightenment through it.

And it filters through everybody's own experience as well.

And then it just changes a little bit like that perhaps as well.

But yeah,

I totally agree.

Yep.

Yeah.

Okay.

So can we go on?

Very quickly,

Very quickly.

It's a very famous story,

Very famous story that the sixth Patriot,

Number one,

Is that he was illiterate.

He was illiterate.

Look,

Muhammad was not a scholar.

So if you're enlightened,

You're enlightened.

So now I don't want to go through that very quickly,

But this is the part of the story where he wasn't even the decimate sixth Patriot.

There was somebody else who everybody thought that he was going to be the sixth Patriot.

And so one day the fifth Patriot wanted to have a contest and he asked all his students to wrote a poem.

And of course,

All the other students wouldn't dare to write anything knowing that the senior student was going to be the decinate sixth Patriot.

And so only he would write the poem.

And so the first poem was written by him.

I actually liked this poem much better than the one that was written by the sixth Patriot.

The sixth Patriot wrote the second one.

I love this poem because it really talks about how you're supposed to practice.

So it's hard to explain.

The English translation doesn't do it justice.

So let me going to try.

So first of all,

It says that the body is like the booty tree.

So what you have to understand is the significance of the word body in the Chinese culture.

So in the Chinese culture,

We always start with the body.

So there's a whole Confucius teaching that if you want to be the ruler of the world,

You start with the body.

You have to live a righteous life first.

Then you have to take care of your family.

Then you have to take care of your community before you even attempt to take care of the society and the universe.

So the idea is that you start with the word body.

It kind of brings that in your practice,

You start with yourself.

And yourself is like the tree that you want to grow.

So this brings back to like the standing posture that we stand like the pine tree.

That the idea is that you have to be firmly on the ground and you have to be flexible.

This is actually all the good characteristic of a sage.

So this poem,

The English doesn't do it justice because it says that it basically talks about someone who's an advanced student,

Someone who's a monk and how he should be practiced.

He focused on his body,

He focused on himself,

And then he envisioned this as the booty tree.

Booty just means awakened,

Wisdom.

Now then he says your mind is like the mirror.

And again it doesn't do it justice because it's not just a mirror but the bright mirror.

What do you mean by bright mirror as opposed to bright light?

A bright light shines,

A bright mirror reflects.

So this is really the practice is that when we talk about vipassana,

When we talk about contemplation it's really like looking deep into your mind as reflection.

So here he's not just talking about the mirror but a mirror that reflects brightly.

Then he says the platform.

So he says the mind is like a platform where the mirror sits.

And this is important.

Now you have to understand that before buddhidharma,

The most popular Buddhism is something called Ten Tai.

Which if I explain,

I think the next slide is really the study of the Lotus Sutra.

So Ten Tai is actually the name of one of the patriarchs for that particular sect.

And so he's borrowing that word to say that Tai means platform.

So now he's talking about the mind is like the mirror that shines that is on top of this platform.

So he's stepping on the shoulder of some great stage.

Then he says,

Then you must constantly,

So this is constantly,

Very diligently.

And then he's talking about the dusting where you have the stick and then the horse hair,

Like all the Taoist priests,

They carry this.

You see this in movie.

So he says,

Therefore you must constantly white clean the mirror because you don't want it to collect dust.

Now the word that he uses is not collect,

Even though he translates the leg.

The word that he uses is contaminate.

Or when you dye clothing,

You start with a white piece of cloth and then it becomes color.

That process is this one here.

It's a beautiful poem.

It really describes what a person should be doing in his practice.

Now of course the sixth pre-track came and he is so advanced.

He is so advanced that he is so above us that he says,

The booty is not a tree.

The mirror is not a platform.

We ain't got a thing.

So how we collect dust?

This is coming from emptiness.

This is like,

You just saw that and you say,

Wow,

Man,

This is cool.

But to me,

It doesn't really help me.

See,

That's the thing.

It's like the first poem is more like the standard practice and then the second one kind of goes beyond that.

So you kind of got to fully realize and embody the first understanding of the first thing and be able to speak about that and then go on to the other.

There's several different English translations of this.

Let me just read real briefly another one here on this translation.

So the first part is,

The body is the Bodhi tree,

The heart-mind is like a mirror.

Moment by moment,

Wipe and polish it,

Not allowing dust to collect.

And then of course the second part from the future six patriarch here,

Bodhi originally has no tree.

The mirror has no stand.

Buddha nature is always clean and pure.

Where might dust collect?

I've heard of some other ones that are better than that.

I'm forgetting his name in Canada now.

I like his version,

But maybe I'll include that in the show notes.

Okay.

Thanks,

John.

But the reason I wanted to do this is even though we talk about Bodhidharma as the first patriarch of Chan that eventually became Zen,

Bodhidharma left no teaching.

So the teaching really came from the six patriarchs.

So we all know about the platform Sutra,

Which was essentially a collection of saying because it is illiterate.

So when we talk about Zen Buddhism,

It really start with this poem.

It starts with this poem that we ain't got a thing.

We have not a thing.

That's the emptiness part.

So this is important.

Okay.

So what I go on?

Okay.

All right.

Okay.

So now we're going to talk about history of the Japanese Buddhism because we want to talk about how Chan became Zen.

So Buddhism first went to Korea and then from Korea it went to Japan.

And so it was basically in the fifth or sixth century.

So this is predate the Tong Dynasty.

This is actually quite early.

So obviously the first,

The Buddhism that was brought to Japan initially was not Zen.

Okay.

So this is people don't understand that and they think that everything start with Zen.

That's not true.

It actually,

If you go to Japan,

One of the very popular,

This thing called Shingon.

Shingon means,

Shingon came from the Kanji here means real speech or real.

So this is actually mantra.

Okay.

Now,

So in Japan,

Japan is made of four islands.

You have the Hokkaido,

You have the main island and then you have the Gaoshu.

If you know Ramen,

Then you know Gaoshu Ramen.

But there's a part,

The tiny one that most people don't know.

There are 88 temples in there and people once in a lifetime,

This is sort of what they want,

Once in a lifetime,

They will want to walk all 88 temples.

I actually have a book where people would stamp as you go.

I got four stamps so far.

So I got 84 to go.

Okay.

This is the lifetime thing.

And all of those are Shingon.

Now what is Shingon?

What is mantra?

So the map that we showed earlier has the three main sect,

Has the Theravada,

The Mahayana,

And then sort of the esoteric part that people associate that with Tibet.

So most people just think that that's all there is.

But actually this esoteric part actually was very,

Very popular in China during the Tang dynasty,

But it died out just out of one event.

There was one emperor that didn't like Buddhism.

He wanted to promote Taoism.

And so he just basically cut off all the support to Buddhism.

And at that moment that this esoteric sect died off in China.

But the legend was that right before that,

This monk actually went and visit.

And the monk who transmit the Dharma to him said that,

Where have you been?

I've been waiting for you for three years now and transmit all the teaching to him.

He brought it back to Japan.

So today,

The Shingon or Mantra school only exists in Japan and Taiwan because Japan had occupied Taiwan for a while.

And then that's one part.

And then the other version of that is in Tibet.

So this is very popular.

Then another one that is very popular is the one I mentioned,

The Ten-tai.

The Ten-tai is basically they focus on the Lotus Sutra.

So all these predated Zen.

The very first monk that he was actually a Ten-tai monk.

And then he went to China and he brought back a sect.

So I mentioned that there are five schools,

Five sects.

And so only really two.

So to be honest,

Chan Buddhism doesn't exist in China anymore,

Not as a pure form.

It's kind of mixed in with something else.

So only a pure form of Chan Buddhism exists only in Korea and in Japan.

In Japan,

There are two sects.

There is this one called the Renzen and then the one called Soto.

Now the Renzen is actually very popular in Korea.

And so this actually originally was brought from Korea.

And then this monk actually went back to China and reabsorbed it and brought it back to.

Now the difference between Renzen and then I'll talk about the other one Soto.

Is the Renzen has,

I always say it wrong,

Kon.

I've heard it pronounced Renzai as well.

Renzai,

Renzai,

No you're right Renzai.

And then it's koan.

Like I think it's a last name of a Jewish person too.

I mean there's a Jewish family line called koan.

It's similar,

It's actually the same koan actually.

Yeah koan.

It's a saying that the master customized for the disciple.

What's the sound of one hand clapping?

Yeah,

The one is very popular.

The one I like is the one in Korea.

I mentioned that last time.

It's called Yimugo,

Which is who am I.

Like that.

Okay,

So then later on another monk,

Daojun,

Which is the most famous one.

He went back to China.

He brought back Soto.

And I hear it pronounced Dogen by the way.

Dogen Zenji.

Dogen Zenji,

Yeah.

Actually the Chinese is Dao Yuan,

But Dogen,

Dogen Zenji.

Zenji means the teacher of Zen.

Yeah.

Okay,

Now what's interesting,

A little bit of background.

So before Renzai was imported into Japan,

The country was ruled by the nobility,

Ruled by the emperor as most countries are.

When Zen Buddhism was brought into Japan,

The idea that,

I'll talk about this later on where it's a no thinking concept.

That you do the perception,

But not the,

What's the word that I'm looking for?

I'll give you an example.

So when you see these samurai movies and the two samurai were facing each other and they could be like,

They're not even staring at each other.

They just listen to each other for hours.

They could be like in the rain,

It's very famous scene.

And then all of a sudden one guy move and another guy move and he moves so much faster that he would cut off his waist or cut his head without even a drop of blood on his blade.

And what they're doing is they're focusing on the perception without contaminated with their own hindrances,

Only emotion.

That came from Zen Buddhism.

It was only that then the samurai class got elevated and so the country was essentially from that point on was ruled by the shoguns.

And it wasn't until towards the end of the 19th century when,

Admiral Perry went to Japan with a bunch of battleship that they went to the Minji restoration.

That's when they decided to elevate the emperor once again and essentially abandoned or did eliminate the shogun system.

It's very interesting.

So there's a very famous saying that the Renzai is for the shogun and the Zoto is for the peasant.

The Zoto is a much more simplified version.

They don't have this Kong thing that they have because the idea is that all you have to do is sit.

So there's a very famous saying called Shinkatasa.

And if you interpret it as only sitting or sitting only,

Just sit,

Just sit and awakening will come.

Which is to simplify,

Which is way to simplify.

This is one of the problem I have with my experience with the Zen practitioners in the United States is that they take that too literally.

They just sit and they know many many things including the body.

Because Shinkatasa actually came from something else which is interpreted as silent illumination.

And I think I talked about this.

I don't want to go through that here.

Okay a few comments.

That's one great pro about the different schools of Buddhism is that some of them are a better fit for certain folks than others.

So people can benefit a lot more from a certain school than others.

Some people actually need to be in a school where they're not comfortable.

So they get that as well.

So the other thing about the samurai,

We talked about this before,

It's more like they're just going on sense impressions and instinct and decisiveness and just making decisions.

No thoughts,

No language,

No time for anything.

It's just whatever they're perceiving through sense data and action.

It's just from the training.

And then the other thing I wanted to say is,

We don't have time to go into this,

But the Korean Buddhism,

Like you did too,

It was just briefly mentioned,

Although you mentioned somewhat throughout,

This is something I don't hear much about at all.

So maybe that's another point of study for me in the future.

Yeah we could do that.

So there are a couple of good points that Josh mentioned,

I wanted to kind of repeat them.

One is that there's no right or wrong.

There's only right for you or not right for you.

And that's the key.

So kusula,

Skillfulness,

Right?

Yes,

Yes,

Yes.

So you notice that I bring a lot of historical context.

And the reason is that I want you to,

The audience,

To be better consumers,

To be better informed consumers.

That when you look at a practice,

It's not about right or wrong.

There is no such thing as right or wrong,

But some of the practice are better for you,

More suited for you because of your kama-sit.

Because you actually have probably done this before in a previous life,

Okay?

And that's why they are more familiar to you.

That's the truth.

And so then you do that.

Whereas when you do something else,

You realize that it doesn't make sense to you.

Well,

Just don't do it then.

That's one.

The other one is,

I'll talk about this more,

It's really about using your brain versus using a spiral core.

Okay?

Now just,

I'll let that hang for a little while.

Okay?

I'll come back to that.

All right.

I'll wrap up there by saying,

You know,

That it's just tough.

Well,

First off,

I want to say thanks for the history because for me,

I'm not as good in the history because I won't go into that,

Why it's not so good.

Because I hear,

You know,

The generally accepted history is sometimes very accurate,

But then a lot of times it gets really politically colored and there's a political motivation for a lot of the history.

And then when some other things come along that it's been trying to suppress,

I find that's really interesting,

But it's trying to get to the truth of history,

But it goes through so many filters as well.

But anyway,

That's needed for.

.

.

Yeah,

Well,

History is,

Yeah,

Exactly Josh.

History is his story.

So first of all,

It's a story.

Then there's a gender bias.

Or it can be,

Right?

Yeah.

Anyway.

The other real quick thing,

Now right or wrong,

You know,

Ultimately,

Yes,

There is no right or wrong.

There's only,

You know,

It doesn't apply ultimately.

And then again,

If you're working on ethics,

There are things that are,

You know,

Traditionally right or wrong.

However,

Buddhism,

Instead of looking at good and evil,

There's more emphasis placed on is this skillful,

Useful,

Wholesome and wise.

So that way you don't get people arguing about good and bad,

What's good and bad.

So yeah,

Thank you for that,

Josh.

So let me correct myself by saying that when I say right or wrong,

I said it with the context of all roads lead to Rome.

Okay.

So which means that you have to kind of,

We kind of all have to agree on a destination.

And then we have to have to agree on a set of metrics that tells you that you're heading in the right direction.

But once we agree on that,

Then there's a lot to choose from,

Because all roads lead to Rome.

I think that's probably what Josh had in.

Yeah.

Kind of like laying the groundwork and knowing a destination,

Right?

So great point.

Yes.

Yes.

So this is a chart that I put together some time ago,

And this just summarize what I talk about in terms of how Chan became Zen.

Okay.

So I'll skip this part in a minute.

I'll talk about this.

And so Buddha's teaching went through down to Buddhidharma.

Buddhidharma teaching went from the first,

Second,

Third,

And fourth.

And then eventually went to the sixth patriarch.

The sixth patriarch was the one that split it into all his students were the one that split it into five different sects.

One of the sects was picked up by Doujin and then eventually brought it to Japan.

And then later on was brought to the United States.

Actually it was brought to United States before Suzuki Roshi,

Because he came as a Soto Zen.

He actually started in a temple in the Japanese town in San Francisco.

Then he strike out on his own.

And then he started the San Francisco Zen center.

I did that because at that time I was talking to my friends from the San Francisco Zen center.

Okay.

So this is a chart that shows that.

All right.

Now the question is,

So we talk about Buddhidharma.

We talk about how he was the first patriot and then eventually his teaching was passed on to the sixth patriarch.

Then it became these five families.

So what was,

What was Buddhidharma's teaching?

And Denny,

This is a central question that I,

Once you get to it,

I want to come back with my kind of side notes answering this question.

Cause I have a lot of potential answers to this question.

Let's just put it that way.

And I'll talk to that after you get.

So now you have to understand that,

That,

That Buddhidharma came from India.

He came by sea.

He actually landed in Canton province.

There's actually a place you can go to that,

That says that he had landed there.

He made his way up into the North.

He met up with the emperor and the emperor asked him a question and he gave the wrong answer.

And so he wasn't,

He wasn't being supported,

Being supportive of him.

So he,

He kind of went away in disgrace or more or less.

And then he then went to what is now called the Shaolin temple,

Which wasn't much at all at the time.

He found himself a cave and then he screwed himself for nine years and then he emerged.

And when he emerged,

He didn't really have any kind of teaching except this thing called the Yijing Jing,

Which is just a bunch of exercise.

What's you know,

What's going on?

What's going on?

Why did he do that?

Why was,

Why did he find that to be important?

So,

So this,

This,

This story,

I want to mention this story because if you watch the movie,

There's a very good movie that talks about the life of Buddhidharma in Chinese.

They talk about this story and this story kind of everybody associated with,

With the Buddhidharma now,

Where in fact it really wasn't him who told the story.

It was actually one of the disciples of the six patriarchs who told the story.

And the story was this.

So this was,

This was a Wei Yang.

Wei Yang is the Zen teacher.

He had a disciple younger than him,

You know,

Quite a bit younger than him.

He himself was,

Was the,

Was the disciple of the six patriarchs.

And his young,

Young student was,

Was very diligent.

He likes to sit all the time,

You know,

He likes to do meditation all the time.

So one day the master said to the student,

Says,

Do you know why you're doing this?

And he says,

Well,

I want to be enlightened.

I want to be a Buddha.

So the teacher went away and he brought back a break and he started polishing the break.

And then the student got curious.

He went to the master and says,

Master,

Master,

What are you doing?

He says,

I'm polishing a mirror.

And he actually laughed.

He says,

How can you polish a mirror out of a break?

And he says,

Well,

If you could just sit there and become Buddha,

Why couldn't I polish a mirror out of a break?

So this is a good story.

It is associated with Buddhadharma,

Even though it's,

Historically it's not accurate.

So what was the message there?

What is the message there?

Why can't someone become enlightened just by sitting?

Because I see all my friends in the Zen center.

That's all they do.

I see all my friends in all the other temples.

That's what they do.

Every time you know someone who learns meditation,

That's what they do.

You go to take the 10 day vipassana class,

They do that for 10 days.

Just sit thinking that someday they will become a Buddha.

And so this story says that,

Well,

If you could do that,

Then I can definitely make a mirror out of a break,

Polishing a break.

So what's the problem?

So before I talk about this,

I want to talk about what do we try to achieve in a practice?

This is the spiritual part.

This is the spiritual part of a practice.

So I remember last week,

Josh,

I don't know if you were there,

I think Kandel,

The person who is very,

Very bright,

And he asked the question,

What's the difference between Dao Yan and Qi Gong?

And I gave an answer and said,

Well,

You know,

The Qi Gong,

The word means something,

And it was something that the communists put together in 1962.

It was meant to be just a physical practice.

So essentially they take Dao Yan,

Which is very spiritual.

And I didn't say the word then,

But I said the word in one of my writing,

And I said,

It castrated it into Qi Gong,

So that it's no longer spiritual.

So I thought about that some more,

And I said,

Well,

I remember one time in the beginning of the Chinese New Year,

A friend came to me and says,

Well,

I want to translate this Chinese verse into English,

And it talks about the oxen.

And I said,

Yeah,

It just says golden oxen,

That's all.

He says,

Yeah,

But an oxen is a castrated bull.

So an oxen is a castrated bull,

Like Qi Gong is a castrated Dao Yan.

So it depends who you ask.

If you ask the oxen,

What is the difference between oxen and bull?

I bet the answer is pretty much the same.

If you ask the bull,

The bull is going to say there's one missing part.

I like this analogy,

Didn't you?

So you can't talk about practice without really talking about the spiritual part.

So what is the spiritual part?

So the spiritual part that says that our existence is in three realms.

So there is this realm called the karma realm,

The sense desire realm.

This is where we are.

So we are humans.

And then there is divas above us.

And then below us,

There is the azura,

Which is like the demigods.

There is the hell.

There is the hungry ghost.

There is the hell,

Hungry ghost,

And also the animal.

So all the animals have its own place.

So humans is one of the animals,

But we consider ourselves separate from that.

And so this is where we are.

So when you die,

You can come back as a human or you can come back as a cockroach.

That's what I mean.

Now you say,

Well,

I don't want to die.

This is too much for me.

Then just go back to the oxen.

We're talking about the bull here.

Okay.

All right.

So now what people do,

Whether you are a Taoist or a yogi or a Buddhist,

Your goal is to escape this sense,

This desire realm.

So the next realm is called the rupa realm,

The form realm.

And the one after that is called the formless realm.

If you're stuck in these three realms,

You still have to go through what is called samsara.

Okay.

You're not awakened yet.

You're not enlightened yet.

So Buddha,

You know,

To be a Buddha,

You actually have to escape all three.

Okay.

Now this is,

This is good background.

So what is our first goal?

Our first goal is to escape the desire realm so that we can go to the form realm.

Okay.

So the first,

So the,

The form,

The form and,

And,

And the formless combined,

There's seven stages,

Eight stages.

So the first state,

The first four of these stages are called jana samadhi.

Okay.

So the eight of them,

The first four is in the,

In the form realm.

So in order to reach that form realm,

You have to escape what is called the five hindrances,

The five hindrances.

So attachment,

Aversion,

Sloth,

Resonances,

And doubt.

Okay.

Now the first one you can escape from is the doubt.

So I think of this as a path and,

And because I grew up in China and when I visited my grandfather,

My uncles would drive,

I would give me a ride on this,

On this bicycle and they will be running,

They will be riding bicycle in the dark,

Total darkness on this one very skinny road,

Which have like the feel on the,

On both sides.

So I always think about this,

This road.

I always think about this road.

And if you can reach to the end,

Then you have reached the first stage of the form realm.

But there are,

There are,

There are possibility of falling off.

So either you fall off this side or you fall off that side.

So I don't want to talk about this,

But if you fall off that side,

We call this lazy Zen,

You fell asleep.

Now the Chinese word for that is you lost fire means that you don't have qi.

Okay.

You lost shi qi,

Which is like you lost circulations.

You lost your,

Your,

Your life energy and you fall asleep.

The other possibility is that you,

You then you,

You don't fall asleep,

But then your mind is uncontrollable.

So that's what we call the monkey Zen.

The Chinese word for that is that you're now engaging or entering Mara.

Okay.

So your mind is speeding.

So going back to this chart,

The reason why you can't just become Buddha by sitting,

Because if you could,

Then I must,

I'll just take a break and make a mirror out of that is because of this pitfall that you either practice lazy Zen or you practice monkey Zen.

I'm going to have to come in here and say,

Yes,

This is totally as well.

But then some people take this too far and say,

Well,

I never need to sit,

You know,

I don't need to even do formal practice.

You know,

I just,

I'll just make this,

You know,

My I'm just,

Um,

I just can penetrate this with my mind and being,

You know what I mean?

So what is,

What am I,

Who am I to argue?

Well,

That's,

That's,

That's a great point.

You know,

Some people actually might not need it,

But I think general practitioners that you're right.

So,

You know,

That's right.

It's,

That's a good point too,

Denny.

Um,

But the,

The point is even if you do set a formal or formal meditation,

These can be for somebody that's not as advanced,

These hindrances can become more noticeable.

So then they can be mastered and addressed because if we didn't have the,

You know,

Um,

One opportunity of the hindrances is that they can actually be mastered.

You know what I mean?

So if we don't really experience them right away,

Well,

That would be great too.

But then again,

We just,

Our practice can be even deeper if we know how to master them.

And,

Uh,

I'd like to hear about the one mind on doubt because doubt is the really dangerous one because it comes masquerading as wisdom.

A lot of times,

You know,

It presents itself as wisdom,

But it actually it's doubt,

Right?

Hmm.

Well,

I don't want to spend too much time on that.

We should do that.

We can skip that because I want to come back to that central question about Bodhidharma.

Why did he do that?

Cause I've got,

Okay,

So let me know when it would be a good time to share that.

Okay.

So,

So I'm,

I'm,

I'm,

I'm,

I'm making an argument,

Right?

I'm like the lawyer,

You know,

Like,

Like just like,

You know,

Peeling the onion.

Okay.

So,

So Buddha was a yogi.

I'm just going to throw it out there because first of all,

He's,

He's,

He's North Indian,

Right?

And you know,

That's,

That's what it is.

So,

So people forget that people forget that he was a yogi that he renounced at the age of 29 and he was enlightened when he was 35.

So he spent six years as a wandering yogi and he had two teachers.

The first teacher taught him.

Yogi the yogi practice.

And he actually reached the seventh stage.

Remember we talked about the eighth stage.

He reached the seventh stage.

Then he says,

No,

I need to find a better teacher.

So he found a better teacher.

You want to mention the little bit of background on this?

No,

I don't know a lot about this,

But I do know the,

The end of part of this is that,

You know,

He,

He eventually saw that this was not the way,

What he wanted because when he came out of these jhana states,

These high refined states of consciousness,

Which some people interpret jhana as being a unified gathered.

Oh,

That's more samadhi,

But jhana as absorption.

That's how some people,

But even then,

Because it wasn't ultimate liberation,

Right?

And yeah,

Yeah,

Because he was,

He was still inside the three realms.

That's right.

And he was still,

You know,

The samsara,

He still had to suffer from samsara.

He was offered to teach this too.

And he turned it down because he,

He felt this wasn't the ultimate,

The way out,

Even though at the time this was considered,

This was it,

You know,

Yeah.

I mean,

He was granted a franchise,

You know,

He was granted a franchise.

You know,

So he said,

No,

No,

I want to have my own brand.

I don't need a franchise.

But I also find it really important how he respected those teachers very highly.

And the fact of,

You know,

The eighth,

Eightfold known path,

The eighth one is right samadhi,

Right?

So this played a really central role in,

In,

Yeah.

In fact,

He,

The very first thing after he was enlightened was,

Was,

Was to go back to find these teachers and unfortunately they all have passed away.

Yeah.

Now,

So,

So anyway,

So,

So I think,

I think it's a historical fact that the,

The Buddha was a yogi.

He practiced yoga or at least the original yoga.

Right.

Well,

This is,

Denny,

That's another thing since we're on that real quick,

You know,

I'm not going to,

Uh,

I would say maybe,

Maybe not.

There's but the one,

I think the Theravada,

If I'm getting this right,

A lot of times it's,

It's interpreted as ascetic,

You know,

There were practices recorded where he was,

You know,

Kind of starving himself one grain of rice a day where the stomach,

Uh,

He could feel his backbone with his stomach,

His hair was falling out,

He's holding his breath,

So he's passing out.

Now there's a,

There's a thing called a fakir,

Which they do things like that lay on nails of bed,

Uh,

Anesthetic.

But then again,

You know,

The,

Um,

The,

The absorption,

That's kind of a yoga practice.

So it was something like that and things have might've changed.

So it was somewhere between some kind of a lot of yoga practices and these aesthetic practices.

I wouldn't call them either one,

I would say.

Yeah.

So,

So,

So that's a very good point.

I want to,

I want to pick up on that.

So,

So,

So I'll talk about how he had reached the eighth stage and that's when he was like Josh said there,

He was the aesthetic where he was just like one grain a day is what all he had.

And so I mentioned this before that if you go to the Asian museum in San Francisco,

You go to the,

Um,

Upper floor,

The top floor,

That's when they have all the,

Uh,

Buddhist,

Uh,

Artifact.

And there was,

It was one statue and it was Buddha with essentially his bone and his skin.

Okay.

Now,

If you remember that,

Or if you go to Google it,

Now I teach,

When we teach meditation,

I talk about the seven support point,

The seven support point,

The seven support point is actually coming from the Taoists.

Okay.

So the seven support point,

You know,

How you succeed,

How you put the hand in your hand,

What did you do with the spine?

What'd you do with the shoulder,

Especially the shoulder where you open up like this.

And then,

And then also how you position your head so that the thousand meeting energy points and this forms a triangle and everything is,

Is straight so that you have this thing called the one pillar supporting the sky.

You know,

All that is from the Taoist,

But who sits like that?

Who sits like that?

Right.

So,

So this,

I want to just kind of bring to,

So it's too easy for us to say,

Well,

This is Yogi and this is yoga and this is Taoist.

It's all taught.

In fact,

In fact,

This is,

This is,

This is important.

So what did Buddha do?

Buddha didn't invent anything.

He,

You know,

In fact,

I mean,

It's literature.

That's how he said that he,

All he did was he rediscovered a technique that he called the,

I'll explain that in a minute that this technique was something that he rediscovered.

So what is that that he discovered?

Now I want to go back to the central thesis,

Central theme of the Yogi practice.

So the,

So the Yogi practice came from Shiva.

Okay.

The law Shiva,

Which is,

Which is a deity,

It's a,

It's a,

It's a God,

He is the God of yoga.

Now in the past,

I talk about Sati.

Sati is,

Is,

Means mindfulness.

And I talk about the story of how the word Sati is actually the name of a,

Of a princess who was actually a goddess that,

That became a princess.

And then when,

When he felt that he was,

She was,

When she felt that she was insulted by her parents she jumped into the fire and then went back into the heaven and then reincarnated as the second wife of Shiva.

And so he,

Not only was his second wife,

He was his first student.

So the conversation,

This is,

You know,

Take it for what it is,

But there was a conversation that was documented in the Indian literature of the conversation between law Shiva and the diva Parvati or something like that.

I don't remember.

And law Shiva says that there are these called chakras.

So that,

You know,

This is like the energy points,

The triangles where the energy lines meet.

The energy lines are called the Nadi and there's 72,

000 energy lines.

And then they meet and law Shiva was the one that says that,

That it's a,

It's a,

It's a seven is the magic seven.

So you start with the seven chakras.

That's as easiest.

Then you go and you become,

There's 21 of them.

And if you can master all 21,

That's the best you can do with this human body.

And then from the 21,

It then has the 109,

108 and 108 is a magic number.

And 108 is the number that has a lot of mystery.

Like the,

The diameter of the earth and the distance from the earth to the sun.

The ratio is 108,

The diameter of the moon and the distance between the earth and the moon,

The ratio is also 108.

And then from 108,

It become 112 and then 112,

It became 114.

And so the,

So,

So these are the different ways that you can achieve some kind of liberation and Buddha discovered one.

And so the argument is that,

You know,

Buddha only need 1% of what law Shiva had to offer.

Now,

Denny,

Was this the,

Are these teaching,

Where do these teachings come from?

The chakras?

Cause I,

I know the Theravada teaching,

As far as I understand,

They don't mention chakras at all.

They do not mention chakras,

But the Tibetan do.

Yes.

Yep.

So when we talk about esoteric,

That when we talk about esoteric,

They do.

Yes.

They actually,

In fact,

In fact,

You remember the history,

Right?

So the Tibetan Buddhism was first brought into from the princess.

Remember the princess,

I talked about the tongue princess.

And so it became very popular,

But then it was completely destroyed.

And then eventually the,

One of the sage went back to India and brought back a different version of that.

And so the chakras is really,

I'm not,

I'm not in a position to really talk anything about this.

I just wanted to draw the historical linkage between Buddha and yogi.

It's fascinating.

I'm glad you did.

Cause I haven't heard this before.

I,

I,

This is,

This is amazing area to explore.

The chakra thing is really,

Um,

Yeah,

It can be controversial as well.

Um,

I there's a post on my site that if anyone wants to look into that too,

About other things that aren't heard,

But I was just curious,

This text,

Is it a Chinese text that was written from,

I'll give you some of the links,

You know,

Where we can probably do that.

Sure.

Okay.

So let me go on.

All right.

So,

So essentially what,

What,

What,

Uh,

Sakata Gathama did was that he rediscovered this technique that allows the ninth stage of Samadhi.

Okay.

Now this is,

This is the word.

So this word,

This first word means,

Um,

The disappearance,

The disappearance of sensation and perception and Samadhi.

Okay.

So this is the one that says that you can achieve this ninth stage of Samadhi by using only the sensation,

But not perception.

Sensation is when you start using the brain and that's where the hindrance comes from.

So if you learn how to use the perception,

Okay.

So this,

This actually perception and sensation come from the five skanders.

So the five skanders,

The first one is called Rupa form.

Then the next one's called sensation.

The next one is perception.

So people have different words for it,

But,

But here's what it means.

The form is everything that is physical,

Physical means everything that is both physics and physiology.

So the physics are the light,

The sound,

The touch and so forth,

Right?

And the physiology is the eye,

The nose,

The tongue,

And the,

So combining that is everything that is physical about our existence.

So once we,

Once our physiology engage with the physics,

It generate,

Um,

It activate the nuance.

So now it's about physiology.

So sensation is physiology is really how we generate the electrical signal.

And then all these electrical signals are then collected into our brain,

Our cerebral.

And once we activate the brain,

That's called perception.

Okay.

So we go on.

So I'll come back to that.

This is very important.

And the analogy the Buddha gave for a form,

It's a lump of foam and the,

The one for feeling was above bubbles in the water.

And then I want to say perception,

Um,

Uh,

Perception is like a,

A mirage in the desert.

I'm getting that right.

Yes.

Very good.

Now,

So not only was Buddha a yogi,

All of his initial followers were yogi,

Right?

Remember we talked,

They were all doing practices together.

Remember you,

I don't know when you talk about here or we talked about in the past where you,

If you open any sutra where there is a Tarabata teaching or Mahayana teaching,

They always talk about 2,

500 students.

Where did the 2,

500 students came from?

It's actually 25 and five because he had the five followers,

Right?

Then he,

Then he got another,

I forgot it was 50 or 500 students.

Every time,

Every time he meets someone,

That someone is someone who's,

Who,

Who,

Who is a guru who had a follower,

Right?

And then,

And then,

And then they would bring the students.

So he,

That's how he,

You know,

Buddha's wholesale.

He was,

He was a wholesaler.

He wasn't a retailer.

Okay.

So he just like,

He go and he,

He,

He,

He convinced the guru and then the guru brought all his followers.

So he just like chunks and chunks.

So,

So all of his students were yogis.

What does yogi mean?

Yogi means YUJ,

Y-U-J or YUT.

Okay.

So that word is,

Is another English word for that is yuk,

Which is that,

That beam that you put in front of two oxen so that when the two oxen pull the car,

They can synchronize.

That's what YUJA mean is it means union,

Union of what?

Union of your body.

Since you're living in the desire realm,

You only have your body and the brahmins,

The brahmins are the ones that's living in your mind,

Living in the form and the,

In the formless.

So yoga,

That's what yoga means is the union of your body and your mind,

Right?

So you start with the body.

Then the next one is that,

So Buddha,

He never rejected you got teaching.

That's that's a,

That's a wrong perception because he just naturally assumed that all his students are yogi.

He himself or yogi,

He never thought about that.

This teaching being outside of India.

So he never made a point of mentioning the yogi practice in his own practice because it's the prerequisite.

Not only was,

Was,

Was Buddha a yogi,

Buddhahma was a yogi,

Right?

So buddhahma was supposed to be the 28th Patriot of the Indian school,

Chan meditation school,

Janya school.

The first Patriot was someone by the name of Maha Kasyapa,

Who was,

Who was,

If you ever seen like the Buddha statue with the two men next to him,

The older guy,

That's him,

Right?

And so the story was that,

Was that one day Buddha was getting ready to give a lecture and his students were gathering in front of him and then it,

But it took forever.

He never,

He just sat there and,

And then people noticed that he helped onto a flower and all the students were bewildered except Maha Kasyapa was sitting across the way and he was smiling.

And then,

And then Buddha says,

Well,

You got it.

That's that's,

That's Zen.

Okay.

That's Zen.

I love this story.

Go ahead.

You know,

It's,

It's great because it's not everything needs to be talked about.

I would say though that this story,

I was looking into this and some people claim that that was a Chan invention that it was first recorded.

It actually is a Chan invention.

In the gateway.

But still the importance of the teaching.

I didn't want to confuse,

I don't want to confuse the presentation anymore by,

By using facts.

It was a Chan,

You can,

There was,

It actually came from a book and that was the only time they ever show up.

And then,

But people kind of,

Even the fact that even,

Even,

Even the argument that he was a 28th patriot,

It was also an invention,

But it doesn't matter.

Now when you go to Japan and you go to the Zen temples,

You see this a lot,

This lot,

And it translates into this,

This is don't establish words,

Use mind to transmit mind.

Now there are all kinds of interpretation for that.

You know,

There's all kinds of interpretation.

It's the same thing as,

You know,

Sit only shikatasa.

It's all kinds of interpretation for that.

But what it really means,

This is what I think that the Zen practice is not about intellect or it's not about intellectualization.

It's about direct experience.

That's what it means.

But experience,

A true experience is experienced without hindrances.

Yes,

Because those hindrances can be clouded the actual experience,

Right?

Yes.

Yes.

So why do you practice Yijing jing?

Why do you practice Yijing jing?

Because you have to have a way of maintaining a healthy and robust body.

That is your foundation upon which you can build,

You can then build your practice.

Well,

I don't want to say that,

But you don't want to me.

But there's something else that I didn't talk about here.

Now,

If you practice Yijing jing,

You will get a much better appreciation for what the word jing means.

The two interpretations that are kind of outside the norm.

One is that jing also means connective tissue.

So if you interpret it that way,

Then it's a way to enhance your shi qi,

Your qi,

Okay,

Because it's an exercise that works on the connective tissue.

Because when you when you have health problem,

It's either because your blood circulation got got stuck,

Or that your bio energy got stuck.

Either way,

You need to work on that connected tissue.

So that's one interpretation of the word jing.

There's another interpretation of the word that I think is even more important here is that if you go all the way back to the very first book,

When they when they start to formalize the Chinese name,

The word jing means spiral core.

Why is spiral core so important?

The spiral core is where you have perception without all of our nerve systems,

They don't go to the brain,

They first go to the spiral core,

And then it's delivered to the brain.

So if you want to have a practice in such a way that then go back,

It's going to take me some time to go back.

And why you're doing that,

Danny,

It's interesting that all the different interpretations too.

But my interpretation is based on my experience.

That's exactly what I was getting at.

It's based on my experience that however we understand it is great.

You almost have to experience it.

You have to experience it.

Now you might have a different experience.

You might have a different experience,

But talk to me when it's an experience.

Yes,

Exactly.

Okay,

So so this is the difference between sensation and perception.

Perception is when you use the mind root,

Which is the brain.

Okay.

So sensation is when your physiology is interacting with the physics and activating a neurology and all your nerve is connected back to your spine.

And so Yi Jing Jing is the way to basically exercise is a way to prepare your spine,

Prepare your body so that you can actually practice towards the nine stages of the body.

And sensation is more of a direct experience than perception,

Because perception why it's very helpful is oftentimes we'll start when we're a young child,

Right?

We'll see something and then somebody will tell us,

Oh,

That's this,

Right?

So it's an idea in the mind.

It helps us navigate the world so we can know what a couch is and what a table is.

But it's ultimately kind of an idea that solidifies to identify to make things easier.

Because if we had to,

If we saw a couch every time we didn't know it was a couch,

We had to figure that out every time we saw it,

It would be it would just take too much time and be too confusing,

Right?

But the actual sensations of what we're experiencing,

That's like a direct experience.

And then we can we just layer language and ways to explain what those sensations are over the top.

So we the one the one there's a phrase,

There's a there's a word that we use called equanimity.

So if you talk about the five hindrances,

The ultimately the way to escape the five hindrances is equanimity.

But in Chinese,

It's very easy to explain that because we know exactly what the opposite is for for the lack of equanimity.

Whereas in English,

There's no such word.

There's nothing that really like pinpoint it says,

Oh,

Yeah,

Because you're doing this.

So the closest thing to that is discrimination,

Discerning,

Prejudice,

That kind of word.

Okay.

So the idea is that is so another way of talking about the perception versus sensation,

And talking about the back to the samurai,

The two samurai fighting,

You know,

Fighting in the rain,

And they just standing there with a sword looking at each other.

That's attention without intention.

They've totally focused,

They totally focus on the sensory.

So the minute that you move,

They know.

Sometimes before.

Sometimes before but without intention,

Because they're not going to assign value to it.

So it's not it's never about wants what they want,

What they don't want.

And that's the ones and what they don't want comes from the brain.

Right.

So,

So I always explained that to my,

So my,

So my,

So my,

My dad who suffers from dementia,

I need I need to,

I need to help him both physically and mentally.

So one of the things I do is I introduce him to Guanyin Pusa,

The goddess of mercy.

And one of the things I told him,

I asked him,

I said,

Look,

He has a nice,

Very nice statue in his room in his house.

And I said,

Look at the statue.

I said,

Notice the eyes.

And so he looked at his what's wrong with the eyes.

He said,

Why?

You notice that the eyes is always looking down.

They don't,

The Guanyin Pusa doesn't look at you,

Because they don't care who you are.

They don't make they don't say,

Oh,

Yeah,

Because you deserve it.

Or you don't deserve it.

It's mercy.

It's loving kindness.

Bodhisattva of compassion,

Right?

Yeah,

Compassion.

It doesn't discriminate between the compassion that's given.

It's like this metaphor,

The sun,

You know,

The sun doesn't think,

Okay,

Well,

This person deserves my warmth.

And this person doesn't.

It just shines.

Yeah.

So a lot of a lot of Master Jiru students practice Tai Chi,

Right?

What was the name of that practice?

I forgot now.

Well,

No,

It is Tai Chi,

Right?

It is a form of Tai Chi,

But they have a different name.

They have a different name.

I forgot what it is.

But but I have many conversations with them.

So Grand Master Sam,

Who taught them the Tai Chi.

Oh,

Yeah,

Ili Chang?

Ili Jing.

Yeah,

Ili Jing.

So actually Grand Master Sam and Master Jiru,

They were Dharma brothers,

Right?

And so Master Jiru actually know everything except that he doesn't show it.

So the one thing that Grand Master Sam teaches is no thinking.

Don't slow down your reaction by trying to be intellectualized.

No thinking bypass your brain.

Yes,

Even if they can react faster.

Yeah,

You don't even think,

Well,

That's an arm or,

You know,

None of that.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Now I still managed to break lots of china in my kitchen.

But I do notice that sometimes when something dropped,

I would catch it.

Whereas before I couldn't do it.

I would never thought that I would have that.

Yeah,

It's a good reaction now.

You just,

You learn to.

So I want to go back to that main question.

I thought we were going to talk more about Bodhi Dharma,

That's okay.

Because Bodhi Dharma is this fascinating figure.

You know,

There's so many stories surrounding him.

I'm going to include some of those in the show notes.

We don't really have time to get into those today.

But you know,

That central question that Denny put up,

You know,

Why did he meditate in the cave for nine years?

I just want to go into some of these that I had.

These are kind of side notes,

Kind of more of a flowering or flavoring,

I should say.

And hopefully not a,

You know,

To show off study and knowledge and,

You know,

Get lost in the weeds here.

So Josh,

If I may,

I'll let you finish the show by continuing with your thought here.

But I just want to kind of summarize something here and then let you go.

So I just want to,

Because I asked the question,

I said,

Why did he,

You know,

Why didn't he give us any teaching other than Yijing Jing?

Because Yijing Jing is a yogi practice.

And both the historical Buddha and the Buddha Dharma were yogis.

And the yogi practice is to allow the union of your body and your mind.

And you can't do that unless you have a robust body.

Because even though like I said that,

You know,

Like even with chi,

You know,

Your energy line,

You're building a bridge between the body and mind,

You know.

So if you stop your body,

But you don't have the mind,

You're building a bridge to nowhere.

But if you didn't even have a body,

Then there's nothing to build.

Right.

Okay,

Go ahead,

Josh.

Sorry about that.

No,

That's totally right.

And there's actually one famous story that I just came across looking this up where he is,

If you don't have a body,

Well,

There's a story where I if I'm getting this right,

His arms and legs kind of disappear.

It's kind of more of a mythological thing,

Right.

But I mean,

It makes sense that he's conclusion here,

Because think about if you're literally meditating in a cave for nine years,

And you're most of that's kind of sitting,

Well,

You're going to need something to maintain the body because the body's just not going to maintain perfect,

Perfect health,

Right.

So you're going to be so the this Yi Jin Jing physical practice,

It's kind of like a one of the most efficient ways with the smallest amount of time to kind of have energy and strength in the body.

Yeah,

That's a very good point.

It doesn't distract from the way you kind of unify.

That's a very,

Very good point.

It goes together,

Right.

That's a very good point.

So let me show the last slide.

So the Yi Jin Jing that we practice,

As far as I can tell,

There's three different versions.

And the one that the versions that we practice,

I'll just give a little bit of history to that,

Was taught to us by Master Jiru.

Master Jiru came to United States and he became the abbot for two temples.

And then the abbot emeritus,

If you will,

Of those two temples is a monk by the name of Meng Qi,

Who came to,

Who actually escaped communists in 1949,

Went to Hong Kong and then eventually make his way to North America.

Before he came to Hong Kong,

When he was still in China,

He was the 48th abbot of a temple called Tinding Temple.

Now if you trace the history of that temple,

Then you will find that the monk who started it is a sort of quote unquote crazy monk called Fa Yuan.

He himself was a disciple.

He wasn't exactly an official disciple.

This is when the fourth patriot had already gave the gaza and the bowl to the fifth patriot.

And so he actually had retired and he wandered through the countryside and then he saw this crazy monk and he took him in and taught him.

And then after that,

Then Fa Yuan decided that he needs to be out there active again and start building lots of temple.

And of course the fourth patriot learned it from the first patriot.

So the story was that when Master Zhiwu learned it from Master Meng Qi,

Meng Qi explained to Master Zhiwu that this is a technique that all the abbot use while they're in seclusion.

The Chinese word for abbot is square meter.

This is the room that they seclude themselves in and the Chinese meter is more like 10 feet.

So the room is no bigger than more like eight feet by eight feet.

It's a tiny little room.

And so Master Meng Qi says that when all the abbots go into seclusion,

This is what they practice.

So this is back to what Josh said is that you need something to energize your body when you seclude it.

Now what you notice is that if you ever see documentary of these chambers where the abbot seclude,

The floor is always stone,

But in the middle of the floor,

There's a dip.

There's always like a dip.

So I never understood why there would be a dip until you practice Yijing Jing,

This version.

Then you notice that every time they jump.

Who knows how much they've done that.

So yeah,

How many generations,

Right?

Anyway,

Go ahead,

Josh.

Sorry to interrupt again.

Hey,

That's what I've done so much to other people.

So it's okay.

Please,

Please continue.

Please continue.

Oh yeah,

My batteries run in that I've got to go on to the next thing.

But yeah,

It's just so fascinating all these stories and I loved Denny's teachings on the imagery as well and such a nice linear,

Easy way to follow and learn.

Life is more spiral.

So the thing is with Bodhidharma,

How did he actually,

This is kind of unanswerable,

But how did he come up with those teachings in the cave?

It's fascinating.

I guess he had plenty of time to come up with that.

I'm not sure he came up with it.

Yeah,

It's kind of rhetorical.

I think it's more like he edited it.

But how did he come?

But where did it come from,

The origins?

Because he was a yogi.

Well,

See,

This is a circular argument.

I understand.

But let me ask you a question.

I mean,

Let me ask you a question.

I think that when Bodhidharma came to China,

He noticed that nobody is practicing the body.

Everybody was doing either mental diarrhea or mental constipation.

So he got upset.

Well what do you think Master Jiru faced when he came to North America?

He noticed that everyone who quote unquote was practicing Buddhism was again doing the same thing.

So what did he do?

He went into the cave.

Well,

It wasn't a cave,

It was a trailer.

He went into the trailer for three years.

And what did he do when he came out?

He came out with this five breathing exercise.

So how did he learn that?

He didn't learn it.

In his cave too?

No,

It didn't even come to him.

He took everything that he had learned.

Condensing,

Yes.

He took everything that he was learning.

He grew up with his grandfather,

Who was a Shaolin martial artist.

He himself had learned Tai Chi two separate times,

Two separate lineage.

And then he took everything.

He just said,

Look,

I got to put it in a package so that I could.

.

.

It's like asking Isaac Newton to teach calculus.

Right,

Yes.

He has to come up with.

.

.

He says,

Well,

I can't,

That's too much.

I got to come up with something.

And so this ties into the thing with Bodhidharma too.

He probably saw that stuff,

Right?

Like you're saying and said,

This is probably what needs to be taught now.

So this is what needs to be taught now to what's going on here.

So some of the other things I was interested about here,

The.

.

.

Well,

Don't answer that.

We can come back to maybe at the end,

But just put the question out here.

This was kept secret and only done by Abbotts and Private,

Right?

And then how was it passed down?

And then why did they keep it secret?

And how did.

.

.

And why did this version of Yi Jin Jing finally open up to the wider public and the significance of that?

So.

.

.

Well,

It wasn't kept secret.

Hang on,

Let me pause that.

It wasn't kept secret.

That was the.

.

.

Come back.

I need to run down the rest of these here.

So going back to Bodhidharma,

And I have to go a little bit faster here since we're running out of time.

So you talked about the polishing rock,

But a lot of times that's attributed to Bodhidharma.

But so I was thinking maybe he would.

.

.

So one story is he did that whole story and then he went and meditated in the cave.

So maybe that was to.

.

.

This is speculation,

Obviously.

All this is speculation.

But just to prove that even though he criticized it,

He was still going to go do it anyway,

Just to prove,

Just to maybe carry out that even though he criticized something,

He was going to go do it.

The very thing he criticized and said it wasn't necessary.

So and then.

.

.

No,

No,

No.

He went in the cave.

He was sitting all the time.

Well,

That's true too,

Right?

Yeah.

But still,

I mean,

You almost might as well be if you're secluded that way.

So that's a good point.

So what if he could see into the future too?

And he knew the outcome of what was going to be of that sitting or well,

Meditating for nine years wasn't going to make that much a difference,

But he went and did it anyway.

It's kind of a weird point.

But now that there was a show,

I'll include the notes.

There's a Tibetan translation of this where instead of facing a cave wall for nine years,

They say it's actually facing a reality for nine years.

So that's an interesting point too.

Now there's newer stuff that Prajnottara,

His teacher,

Some people are giving some kind of evidence and historical records and whatnot that was actually a female.

So if that was the case,

We don't have time to go into that.

How much of the symbology of a cave is actually kind of symbolic of the feminine womb?

You know,

You have male and female.

I need to get out.

No,

No,

No,

No,

No,

No,

No,

No.

When you enter form realm and formless realm,

There's no more gender.

Right,

Right,

Exactly.

But we're talking about a conventional regular desire realm level here.

You know what I mean?

So that would be a teaching to the mass populace,

I would think as well.

So there are works attributed to Bodhidharma that you said he doesn't come out with anything but Yijing,

Basically.

The mind to mind transmission method,

You know,

That kind of,

I think maybe it was reinforced.

It could be possibly reinforcing that too,

Because you don't need kind of a written down or spoken teaching if there's this mind to mind experiential thing.

Like the flower sermon,

Nothing really needs to be said,

Right?

So it could possibly reinforce that kind of teaching method.

The other,

Let's see,

You know,

This is a really kind of strange thought.

And please,

I want people to jump in here and correct me.

And I'm kind of showing my ignorance here,

Perhaps.

But you know,

The Buddha was in a warrior caste,

Right?

So I was wondering how much,

And some people talk about an ancestral karma.

So I was wondering how Bodhidharma,

You know,

He was influenced a lot of the Kung Fu and stuff.

So I'm wondering,

You know,

The Buddha's ancestors,

If they were,

You know,

His,

He seemed to come from the royal caste,

But the royal caste and the warrior caste are kind of lumped in together,

If I'm not mistaken.

So I'm wondering if his whole lineage had warriors in it.

And if there was some kind of ancestral karma link,

Karmic link behind Buddha's lineage and his family that he was came into,

And if there was warrior things,

And now the Shaolin warriors,

With that and how that might interrelate.

But remember that contemplating karma is one of the imponderables that can lead to craziness,

Right?

So,

So there's so many different parallels here,

Potential parallels,

Like you said,

With with Shifu,

Master Jiru.

But I'm really not,

Although I could say things,

I'm gonna I think it's too early for me to comment on that.

So so that's just a bunch of stuff there.

Yeah,

There are documents,

People do talk about how the historical Buddha was both a scholar and a warrior.

He was trained very well in both sides of the arts before he left the palace.

Yeah,

That's right.

Yep.

Yeah.

I think even there was a story about how,

Anyway,

It doesn't matter.

Yeah.

It's good.

Right now anyway,

Right?

Okay,

Yeah.

So I'd like to say the,

Well,

I probably forgot some of the comments you had on that.

But well,

We can we could possibly put other things in the show notes,

But we've run probably over an hour and a half here,

Right?

So yeah,

Hour and 34 minutes.

Okay.

Okay.

Well,

We got it out there,

Huh?

Yes,

Exactly.

And there'll be even more for your study.

And we still don't have an empty mind.

I don't get it.

Right?

Well,

No wonder.

Okay,

Josh,

I'm gonna I'm gonna end the stream.

Thanks,

Everyone.

And see you in a month.

I always the last Tuesday of the month at 10 o'clock Pacific time.

Thank you.

Thanks,

Everyone.

Bye bye.

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