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I somehow really over-prepared for this talk so the notes below will be given in different pieces over the first two talks most likely. If I have time I’ll edit this down to closer to what I said but listening to the talk is probably the most interesting thing to do. –Tim
Welcome everyone. Our topic for this practice period seminar is a big one, and I hope a central one for all of us. What is the heart of the matter? What is the most important thing? What is truly central to our lives?
As the center of this exploration we’ll take up a study of the Heart Sutra – a short Buddhist text chanted daily in thousands of centers all around the world. We chant it here a few times a week. But I hope this seminar can be more for us than an academic inquiry into this odd little text from the Buddhist tradition. We are practicing in a tradition and I do think knowing something about that tradition is helpful but there is a bigger dimension to this question of the sutra at the heart of our lives than just learning more about this aspect of the Zen and Mahayana Buddhist tradition.
Let’s recite the Heart Sutra now a bit slower than usual and in usual speaking voice:
Great Wisdom Beyond Wisdom Heart Sutra Avalokiteshvara Bodhisattva, when deeply practicing prajña paramita, clearly saw that all five aggregates are empty and thus relieved all suffering. Shariputra, form does not differ from emptiness, emptiness does not differ from form. Form itself is emptiness, emptiness itself form. Sensations, perceptions, formations, and consciousness are also like this. Shariputra, all dharmas are marked by emptiness; they neither arise nor cease, are neither defiled nor pure, neither increase nor decrease. Therefore, given emptiness, there is no form, no sensation, no perception, no formation, no consciousness; no eyes, no ears, no nose, no tongue, no body, no mind; no sight, no sound, no smell, no taste, no touch, no object of mind; no realm of sight … no realm of mind consciousness. There is neither ignorance nor extinction of ignorance… neither old age and death, nor extinction of old age and death; no suffering, no cause, no cessation, no path; no knowledge and no attainment. With nothing to attain, a bodhisattva relies on prajña paramita, and thus the mind is without hindrance. Without hindrance, there is no fear. Far beyond all inverted views, one realizes nirvana. All buddhas of past, present, and future rely on prajña paramita and thereby attain unsurpassed, complete, perfect enlightenment. Therefore, know the prajña paramita as the great miraculous mantra, the great bright mantra, the supreme mantra, the incomparable mantra, which removes all suffering and is true, not false. Therefore we proclaim the prajña paramita mantra, the mantra that says: “Gate Gate Paragate Parasamgate Bodhi Svaha.”
The human mind and culture is so complex and yet in a way so definite and constrained. We think we know who we are, we know who the others are, we know our history, we know our limitations, we know what we like and what we don’t like, we know what’s wrong with the world. We know what’s right and what’s not so great about this or that branch of Buddhism and maybe we know something about other faiths too.
And even more basic knowledge is worth considering. We know that this is wood, and the walls are a kind of creamy off-white.
We know so much. We say “knowledge is power” and “knowledge will set us free” and yet is that the whole story? Is that really how it is? All of this stuff that we know is it really so? Or is it also in some ways a kind of limitation on our living in this world. Is our knowledge a simplification in a way also? Can our knowledge also be limiting to us? Is our knowing and sureness and right-ness in some ways like ropes that bind us into a particular position.
The root questions in Buddhism are always: what’s really happening and what helps?
What is our actual lived experience as apposed to our idea of what’s happening? And as we investigate that we see some trouble. Some difficulty. Some pain. Some confusion. Maybe a little more than we bargained for or quite wanted to see. Here is the first ennobling truth Buddha taught at the very beginning. Suffering or dis-ease is to be fully understood.
Sometimes we say “The first noble truth is life is suffering” but that’s a bit of a shorthand that’s a little off the mark. The Buddha didn’t say that. Actually what he said is that a life based on clinging is suffering and that there’s clinging baked into the way we understand our life. I don’t want to spend too much time on the first noble truth today but we’ll come back to it. The point for today is that this suffering arises from a deeply held view. From the way we know who and what we are. But we can understand our life in a different way, that’s the good news.
The confusion can be understood. It can be seen. We have that capacity as human beings. We have that courage. To see clearly what is our experience. To notice the various social and psychological filters and blocks and little by little to let them go. The ways we don’t want to see what’s really happening. We ways we might base our lives on a fantasy of some kind.
And once we see more clearly it’s possible to do something skillful. Something accurate and helpful. Meditation practice makes it more possible for us to get accurate feedback from our life. To have the inner space to see more clearly. And then we can see it can get better. What reduces suffering and increases contented joy? There are many famous examples of people asking the Buddha questions about why and he wouldn’t answer those questions. He was interested in how. How do we practice? How do we wake up from the dream of being separate, being alone, believing too strongly in our idea of this small confused person?
This poem by the Caribbean poet Derek Walcott somehow speaks to this question of the heart of the matter:
Love After Love the time will come when, with elation you will greet yourself arriving at your own door, in your own mirror and each will smile at the other's welcome, and say, sit here. Eat. You will love again the stranger who was your self. Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart to itself, to the stranger who has loved you all your life, whom you ignored for another, who knows you by heart. Take down the love letters from the bookshelf, the photographs, the desperate notes, peel your own image from the mirror. Sit. Feast on your life. Derek Walcott
That one’s often quoted in Dharma talks, here’s another that speaks to this in another way:
Dark August So much rain, so much life like the swollen sky of this black August. My sister, the sun, broods in her yellow room and won't come out. Everything goes to hell; the mountains fume like a kettle, rivers overrun; still, she will not rise and turn off the rain. She is in her room, fondling old things, my poems, turning her album. Even if thunder falls like a crash of plates from the sky, she does not come out. Don't you know I love you but am hopeless at fixing the rain ? But I am learning slowly to love the dark days, the steaming hills, the air with gossiping mosquitoes, and to sip the medicine of bitterness, so that when you emerge, my sister, parting the beads of the rain, with your forehead of flowers and eyes of forgiveness, all with not be as it was, but it will be true (you see they will not let me love as I want), because, my sister, then I would have learnt to love black days like bright ones, The black rain, the white hills, when once I loved only my happiness and you. Derek Walcott
Our central text in considering the Heart of the Matter is the Heart Sutra. Like all of our Buddhist texts these words have travelled long and far over time and through languages and cultures. We think the Heart Sutra was originally composed in Sanskrit in Northern India sometime around 300 AD when Buddhism was one of the dominant practices of the area – a time when there were large Buddhist Universities, many monks and nuns, and in the culture at large had a deeply imbued sense of Buddhist practice and the merit and value of both practicing for yourself and support others, especially the monastic sangha, in their practice. Indian Buddhist teachers brought these teachings to Tibetan maybe around 500 AD and Chinese pilgrims brought them to China by about 600 AD. And the Heart Sutra teachings were brought to Japan soon after that. And then the Heart Sutra was brought to America in the 1950′s by Japanese Zen monks – chanting it at first in the Sino-Japanese style that’s also in our chant books, starting sometime in the 1960s and 1970s translations into English started being made and also used liturgically for chanting.
So over all of these centuries these teachings moved around and as they crossed each cultural barrier they were translated. But translation is not a neutral act. Subtle teachings about wisdom can’t just be translated word for word from one language to another. Even manuals for electronic gadgets and coffee makers are hard to translate as we’ve seen, all the more so a text on how to wake up to the wisdom that runs through all things.
So the Heart Sutra’s journey is full of stories. Maybe all wisdom is bound up in stories. We want wisdom to be pure and free of the bother of messy human stories I think, but that doesn’t seem to be how it is. Maybe all is story. We swim in a sea of stories, as Salman Rushdie got in a little hot water pointing out. So we might as well learn how to swim and enjoy the warm and the cold water as we float along through the currents. As we think about our lives and inquire into what the heart of the matter is maybe that’s also chiefly stories, do you think so?
Let’s pause and reflect a minute about our own story. Is there wisdom there? Foolishness? What is our story?
Most of the stories of thousands of years of practicing with the heart sutra are lost, but a few we still know. I’ll try to highlight a few of them as go along in our journey. Because these are real people trying to understand something about their lives. They are just like us. Just like us.
Today I’ll mention a bit about Xuanzang, the Chinese pilgrim who’s translation of the Heart Sutra is the translation lineage that came down to us. Kaz Tanahashi does a wonderful job telling this story so I’ll read from an unpublished manuscript of his that I somehow ended up with on my computer:
The principal Chinese version … is by Xuanzang of the seventh-century, CE. (His name is also spelled Hsüan-tsang, Hiuen-tsiang, Hiuen-tsiang, Yüan-tsang, or Xuanzhuang.)
Consisting of two hundred sixty ideographs, the Xuanzang version is the shortest of all extant Chinese translations of the sutra. It is regarded as supreme in its clarity, economy, and poetic beauty. It is commonly chanted in China, Korea, Japan, and Vietnam. Consequently, Buddhist groups in the Western world founded by East Asian teachers rely on the Xuanzang version.
The Heart Sutra’s story weaves through the life and work of this ancient Chinese monk, Xuanzang. Our source is a biography by Xuanzang’s disciple Huili, who also edited many of his translations. After Huili’s death, Yancong, another student, completed the biography. Titled Biography of the Tripitaka Dharma Master of the Da Ci’en Monastery of Great Tang, it is regarded as the most detailed and accurate biography of Xuanzang.
Here, in brief, is his story:
In 629 CE, the twenty-seven-year-old Xuanzang broke the Chinese imperial prohibition on traveling abroad and set off on a journey westward for India in search of authentic dharma. As fellow monks wanting to travel with him had given up on traveling with him, he was alone on the road.
While crossing the Gobi Desert, facing tremendous hardships, Xuanzang was said to have been surrounded by grotesque evil spirits. Again and again, he invoked the name of his guardian deity, Avalokiteshvara Bodhisattva, but the spirits kept moving around him. Finally, as he fervently chanted the Heart Sutra, the spirits were driven away.
The version he chanted had a special meaning to him: There was a poor monk in Shu, or Sichuan (the western part of China), who had festering sores all over his body. Pitying his sickness and stained clothes, the young Xuanzang took him to a local temple, and found money there for food and clothes. The sick monk taught Xuanzang the Heart Sutra as a token of his gratitude. Xuanzang continued to chant and study it for years.
Xuanzang impressed kings of the Central Asian countries—Turfan, Kuci, Samalkand, and Kapisi—with his profound knowledge of scriptures. He gave dharma discourses and gained patronage to further his travels. After a three- year journey, miraculously escaping various dangers—enduring a heavy snowstorm on a steep mountain, getting lost in the wilderness, and attacks by bandits—he arrived at the Nalanda Monastery in the kingdom of Magadha, northeastern India.
Buddhism was flourishing, and Nalanda was the center of Buddhist studies with over ten thousand students. Xuanzang met the renowned master Shilabhadra, then said to have been one hundred-six years old. Three years before, Shilabhadra had had unbearable pains in his limbs, and wanted to end his life by fasting. But Manjushri Bodhisattva, deity of wisdom, appeared to him, and said that a Chinese monk was on his way to study with him. From that moment, Shilabhadra’s pains went away. Seeing Xuanzang, he recognized him as the monk he had awaited.
Xuanzang listened to the master’s lectures, in the company of thousands of other students. Studying various Buddhist texts and the Sanskrit language at Nalanda for five years, Xuanzang came to be recognized as an outstanding student and dharma teacher.
After visiting Buddhist sites and giving discourses in the eastern, southern, and western kingdoms of India, he returned to Chang’an, China’s capital, in 645, bringing back Buddhist images and scriptures. It had been an eighteen-year journey.
Instead of punishing Xuanzang for disobeying his edict, Emperor Tai, the second emperor of the Tang Dynasty, praised him for his courage and achievement. That same year, the emperor assisted Xuanzang in launching a national project to translate Sanskrit scriptures into Chinese. Tai gave Xuanzang a temple called the Hongfu Monastery in Chang’an and many assistants, including twelve monk-scholars checking translations for accuracy, and others to help with editing. Xuanzang dictated his translations from the original texts.
In 646, he completed a report to the emperor about the topography, history, customs, and politics of the places in Central Asia and India he had visited. His twelve-scroll work, Regions West to Great Tang, was the most extensive and detailed book of geographical descriptions that had ever been written.
The popular epic Journey to the West by Wu Chengen of the sixteenth century—stories of a monk guarded by a super-powered monkey, boar warriors, and a river monster—is based on Xuanzang’s writing. In 648 Emperor Tai asked Xuanzang to take an official position. Xuanzang declined, saying that his life’s mission was to clarify the Buddha’s dharma. Tai was impressed with Xuanzang’s determination. In the same year, the emperor wrote an introduction to Xuanzang’s translation of the sutras under the title: “Great Tang’s Three-Basket Sacred Teaching.”
(The Buddhist canon is called the Tripitaka or Three Baskets. The “baskets” or “collections” consist of sutras, precepts, and later scholars’ treatises. One who has mastered the entire scripture is called a Tripitaka dharma teacher, or simply Tripitaka. That was our translator Xuanzang’s title.)
An admirer of the fourth-century calligrapher Wang Xizhi, Emperor Tai made an extensive effort to collect and study Xizhi’s masterpieces. Monk Huairen spent over twenty years assembling samples of Xizhi’s handwritten ideographs to fit into the texts of the emperor’s introduction to the canon, as well as the Xuanzang translation of the Heart Sutra. Huairen patched together brushwork of the Calligraphy Sage, and had the texts carved onto a stone monument.
This artwork is still regarded as one of the best samples of classical Chinese calligraphy.
In 648, the Crown Prince became a senior monk at the Da Ci’en Monastery in Chang’an, which then became the center for Xuanzang’s translation work.
Soon after that, according to Huili’s biography of Xuanzang, Emperor Tai became gravely ill and asked Xuanzang to be near him at the Cuiwei Palace on Zhongnan Mountains, in the south of the capital city. Although Huili did not mention it, a later record says that Xuanzang translated the Heart Sutra at the palace on the twenty-fourth day of the fifth month of 649; Monk Zhiren transcribed it.
Tai passed away three days later. The Crown Prince ascended the throne as Emperor Gao. Xuanzang spent two years translating the most comprehensive collection of the Prajna Paramita literature, from 200,000 Sanskrit lines into six hundred scrolls—the largest Buddhist scripture ever. (A “line” is thirty-two Sanskrit syllables.)
On completing the translation of the Maha Prajna Prajna Paramita Sutra in 663, he exclaimed: “This sutra pacifies the nation. It is a great treasure of the world. This completion is to be celebrated by everyone in the sangha!” He was sixty-two years old.
He asked one of his students to count the texts he had translated; the result was seventy-four texts in 1,338 scrolls. This surpassed his great predecessor Kumarajiva’s seventy-three texts in 383 scrolls. (A scroll, or fascicle, is a chapter-length text bound in a separate volume.)
Xuanzang passed away in 664. It is said that over one million people bowed at his coffin, and over thirty thousand people stayed overnight at his tomb. Emperor Gao said in grief, “We have lost our national treasure.”
There are several recent books about Xuanzang actually and many more stories about him and his travels. We certainly should know about him just as we know about Marco Polo as one of the great travelers of the ancient world. And actually I guess now they think substantial portions of Marco Polo’s journals were made up by him later when he was in prison back in Italy – I think so far Xuanzang’s account has held us pretty well.
As Kaz’s telling mentions the Heart Sutra is part of a much larger literature. A very short summary of sorts of this literature called the Prajna Paramita literature. You probably recognize that term from chanting the sutra. Prajna Paramita. Maha prajna paramita. Maha means “great” – so we end every ritual pretty much with those closing words, that prajna paramita is a great thing.
Prajñaparamita has been translated to English as ‘Perfect Wisdom’ – but perfect is a little misleading for us with our tendency towards perfectionism. We have such a sense of holding something in a particular position of improving things and seeking the perfect version of something. Sometimes Prajnaparamita is translated as “wisdom beyond wisdom” as we do when we chant the title of the sutra in our services.
Jña is a verb meaning to know or understand. Pra is an intensifier. Hence, Prajña means – something like knowledge but deeper than knowledge, so: wisdom, but active, “deeply knowing” might be better than “wisdom” which we think of as a noun. We can have wisdom, but we do “deep knowing”.
There are two etymologies for the word paramita. The first comes from the word parama meaning “highest”, “most distant”, “most excellent”. Thus “that of which there is nothing superior in this world is said to be excellent (parama); the excellence of wisdom is the perfection of wisdom”.
In the second etymology, paramita is divided into para and mita. Para means “beyond” or “the other shore”, and mita means “that which has arrived”, or “that which goes”. So in this reading prajñaparamita means the unsurpassed wisdom which delivers beings to the other shore. Thus it is the highest wisdom in Buddhism because of its ability to deliver one to the other shore; i.e. realization, by means of the contemplating and meditating on it. So this is wisdom as a verb, that’s really important.
And perhaps because paramita has a feminine ending in Sanskrit we end up with an embodiment of this wisdom as a kind of deity or a bodhisattva, it’s not clear how this came about but the religious impulse to create archetypes and embodiments is strong and really kind of beautiful. So we have in our chant books this hymn also – let’s chant this slowly and kind of sing it a bit with a feeling of warmth:
Homage to the Perfection of Wisdom, the lovely, the holy. The Perfection of Wisdom gives light. Unstained, the entire world cannot stain her. She is a source of light and from everyone in the triple world she removes darkness. Most excellent are her works. She brings light so that all fear and distress may be forsaken, and disperses the gloom and darkness of delusion. She herself is an organ of vision. She has a clear knowledge of the own-being of all dharmas, for she does not stray away from it. The Perfection of Wisdom of the buddhas sets in motion the wheel of dharma.
We’ll talk in another class a bit about where that hymn comes from. There’s a bit longer version in one of the prajna paramita sutras which I think you’ll really appreciate.
And there is a whole list of practices of the bodhisattvas which are modified with this word paramita. We also have dana paramita – the perfection of generosity. The shorter list of 6 paramitas also includes patience, precepts practice, energy and forebearance, concentration, and meditation itself.
So we have two totally non-western words that get rendered usually as “perfection of wisdom” but both “perfection” and “wisdom” may lead to some trouble for us. So coming into something like this it’s probably smart to spend a little time exploring the biases and frameworks we’re bringing with us on the journey.
[break into pairs: short discussion - what is "wisdom" and what would "perfect wisdom" be?]
Thich Naht Hahn in his lovely little book about the Heart Sutra (which turns out to have been edited by Peter Levitt! So maybe part of it’s charm is through his work) has a nice section on how he thinks about prajna paramita:
Perfect Understanding is prajnaparamita. The word “wisdom” is usually used to translate prajna, but I think that wisdom is somehow not able to convey the meaning. Understanding is like water flowing in a stream. Wisdom and knowledge are solid and can block our understanding. In Buddhism knowledge is regarded as an obstacle for understanding. If we take something to be truth, we may cling to it so much that even if the truth comes and knocks at our door, we won’t want to let it in. We have to be able to transcend our previous knowledge the way we climb up a ladder. If we are on the fifth rung and think that we are very high, there is no hope for us to step up to the sixth. We must learn to transcend our own views. Understanding, like water, can flow, can penetrate. Views, knowledge, and even wisdom are solid, and can block our understanding.
Thich Nhat Hahn, The Heart of Understanding, p. 8
Wisdom in English has this meaning according to the dictionary:
wisdom. noun.
1. the quality or state of being wise; knowledge of what is true or right coupled with just judgment as to action; sagacity, discernment, or insight.
2. scholarly knowledge or learning: the wisdom of the schools.
3. wise sayings or teachings; precepts.
4. a wise act or saying.
Which references of course the English word “wise” – here’s the dictionary on wise which is an adjective
wise. adjective
1. having the power of discerning and judging properly as to what is true or right; possessing discernment, judgment, or discretion.
2. characterized by or showing such power; judicious or prudent: a wise decision.
3. possessed of or characterized by scholarly knowledge or learning; learned; erudite: wise in the law.
4. having knowledge or information as to facts, circumstances, etc.: We are wiser for their explanations.
A very significant thing here is that wisdom in English is a noun, and yet Buddhist wisdom, prajnaparamita is definitely a verb. And yet it’s not exactly something to do. An investigation. The process of understanding.
And wisdom refers in English to one who is wise. So wise is an adjective and refers to a state or quality of a person. So again sometime a bit more fixed than Thich Naht Hahn’s flowing water. In English wisdom is something you possess. And we hear people looking at wisdom and a kind of spiritual attainment in that way – usually that it’s something someone else has and you don’t, right?
And so this sutra, this teaching, that’s in the middle of the question “what is the heart of the matter?” right away is encouraging a certain attitude. A certain fluidity. Bringing up some doubts about how we view ourself and others. That wisdom isn’t a thing you can possess and get more of. Something more here like entering more fully into the flow – letting go of knowledge maybe, or maybe using knowledge more skillfully as a tool to be held so lightly. To lightly.
I was quoting Thanissaro Bhikkhu a bit on Saturday about wisdom. He’s a reliable source for study about the earlier form of Buddhism that’s usually called Theravada now. Sometimes you see the term “hinayana” which is a prejorative meaning “lesser vehicle” that is better not to use. You can read Thanissaro’s writings quite extensively on a website called accesstoinsight.org – he’s a smart American scholar and a deep and committed monk who trained in Thailand and now has a community outside San Diego. He is also friendly with our Insight roommates here in the Dharma Hall and does weekend study retreats here in this very room every couple of years that are well worth going to.
Thanissaro says Buddha’s wisdom is practical and completely based on causes and results, to watch out that we don’t get too heady and philosophical about it. Thanissaro is a bit critical actually of the Mahayana idea of emptiness which as we’ll see is the real basis for prajnaparamita. And I appreciate and learn from his criticism actually. It’s really helpful to have a wise critic in a neighboring tradition.
I’ll put a link to his essay on wisdom and emptiness called “The Integrity of Emptiness” onto the website, it’s long and worth reading and the gist is this: If an attitude or action leads to less suffering and more joy, it’s wise. Period. And here an attitude is actually a mental action. So it’s all about action and the results from actions. Wisdom is a lived experience. He uses the example of being addicted to alcohol in his essay:
What’s striking about this standard for wisdom is how direct and down to earth it is. This might come as a surprise, for most of us don’t think of Buddhist wisdom as so commonsensical and straightforward. Instead, the phrase “Buddhist wisdom” conjures up teachings more abstract and paradoxical, flying in the face of common sense — emptiness being a prime example. Emptiness, we’re told, means that nothing has any inherent existence. In other words, on an ultimate level, things aren’t what we conventionally think of as “things.” They’re processes that are in no way separate from all the other processes on which they depend. This is a philosophically sophisticated idea that’s fascinating to ponder, but it doesn’t provide much obvious help in getting you up early on a cold morning to meditate nor in convincing you to give up a destructive addiction.
For example, if you’re addicted to alcohol, it’s not because you feel that the alcohol has any inherent existence. It’s because, in your calculation, the immediate pleasure derived from the alcohol outweighs the long-term damage it’s doing to your life. This is a general principle: attachment and addiction are not metaphysical problems. They’re tactical ones. We’re attached to things and actions, not because of what we think they are, but because of what we think they can do for our happiness. If we keep overestimating the pleasure and underestimating the pain they bring, we stay attached to them regardless of what, in an ultimate sense, we understand them to be.
[from http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/thanissaro/integrityofemptiness.html ]
And so wisdom has a basis in clear seeing of our actual experience in this view. That if we really feel the damage a choice like drinking too much alcohol, if we really experience that deeply without distortion, then when the desire to drink arises this counterweight of experience is the actualization of wisdom. We can see the desire arising, we can feel the effects drinking will bring, and we make a choice. To there’s a real process here, a practice, and a basis in experience not in ideas and philosophies.
Psychologists who study addiction and addicted people themselves might see more nuances and twists and turns to addiction but the basic point is pretty well valid. Don’t make this into something complicated. You make choices, there are effects. You may feel the effect or block or deny that experience in some way. And it’s wise to use the actual effects of actions as a guide to which actions to take. Or put another way it’s pretty stupid to make our choices just based on our opinions of what’s supposed to happen. You can’t argue with that, and we shouldn’t just take this as another nice idea but really explore directly in our lives. What happens? What choices do we make? What are the results? How did it really feel.
So that’s really good I think. And yet there are some deeper, maybe you could say philosophical, dimensions to the way wisdom is explored in prajnaparamita that are maybe a little harder to put into words. That maybe can only be thought about symbolically or poetically, or are beyond thought and concept all together.
Some of these dimensions are accessed less with rationality than with silence, perhaps with devotion, with exploring our lives through the aegis of different practices that might make a little less obvious sense than the side Thanissaro is bringing up here.
So I have a few suggestions for ways you might start to explore prajnaparamita this next week, try one of more of these:
1) chant the heart sutra every day with a ritual framework of some kind – offer incense at an altar and bow maybe. You might also add a devotional dedication which you could write yourself of use the Hymn to the Perfection of Wisdom that’s in our chant books. This might look like this: at a quiet time of the day go to an altar, offer incense, to three bows, chant the heart sutra and then the hymn or just a simple dedication like “With gratitude to Buddha’s and ancestors I have offered incense and chanted the Wisdom Beyond Wisdom Heart Sutra. May all beings awaken to the Buddha Way.”
2) write a few free poem about the flow of experience every day, or at least once or twice before our next seminar. Just sit down and start writing, try your best not to feel bound by some idea of what poetry is or doing a good job. I did this and I’ll close with it so you can see it doesn’t have to be lovely wise poetry with carefully constructed images and symbolism and all that, just an expression of this flow of life.
3) you might see about getting ahold of one of the 3 books on the heart sutra I recommend or another one you run across. Call up Village Books or order online. It’s really surprising how quickly you can get ahold of just about any book these days. I am not sure if they are in the library. And take up the practice of study, I’ll say more about the practice of study next week maybe. But just reading a section or two and letting the words sink in. Not reading too much in one sitting or trying to hard to make sense of it all, something like that. And paying attention not just to what the thinking mind thinks it’s learning but also to the overall feeling of your being before, during, and after you study. Study has many effects – not just intellectual learning. It’s quite fascinating really.
4) and it almost goes without saying that regular meditation practice is the root cause of the wisdom of prajnaparamita. So see if you can sit at home and with a sangha this next week. Just sit and let everything go. Don’t try to do anything. Just be present. Practice the gentle return to the feeling of the breathing in the body or do whatever the simplest most direct practice you know is. Wisdom is not elaborate. It’s just this. Sometimes elaborate can help us, but my suggestion is to be simple in your practice these weeks. Return to the essence of just being alive.
Okay, here’s my odd little flow of consciousness poem. Which now I re-read it got a little preachy and discursive and philosophical but the mind does that doesn’t it? Maybe the next run at this I can stay closer to something less heady, or not. Who knows how the mind works. So to release yourself from perfectionism on that level too, just write something if you want to take up this means of exploration. I’ll close with that and open the floor for any comments or thoughts.
Emptiness Poem 1 Reaching out for the heart of the matter. Looking under stones, and beside parked cars. The arm extended, the hand open, the mouth slightly parted. Wishing we were in the mountains, or at least on vacation. Holding on, letting go. This and that. The world divided. A woman walking home after dropping the kids at school - love and steadiness in her step. The ordinariness of that right-ness goes unremarked by the commuters passing by. The dams removed from the river. Even before the biologists are ready the fish start returning - "it's game on!" Home to the quiet of the house, so many different kinds of silence. The mind insisting it's time to get busy. Okay then, get busy, be busy, move fast. But a stillness right there, none the less, or just less, or not having a quantity or a verb or even a way of saying anything at all? This day, is this the day? This hour? This minute? How fine does it go? Can we be satisfied? No, can I be satisfied? No, can there just be satisfaction? Meanwhile the world goes, the rain moves across landscapes. The soft pebbles of the rain. The warm body that loves what it loves. A poem or a teaching or some sense of connection to that bigger something flits through the mind. Into the gaps between emails, between worries, between thoughts. Avalokita can face the dharmas, she never turns away, she hears the cries and wields her thousand arms helps without thinking of helping. Saves without thinking of saving. Just there for us. How we can love one who loves us without making us into something, into someone. And yet, how we long for a love that tells us we are someone...special - even though we know that's not...quite...right. And the Buddha, is he our father? Our teacher? Is he the wind? Or the rain? We would prefer him to be the sun. Why say that he is a "he" though - doesn't that limit the proposition? Language is all we have it seems. Rusty tools in an old wooden toolbox made by hand by someone's grandfather long before there was a Home Depot selling toolboxes made by plastic mold machines - or is that just romanticizing - is older better? Is newer better? Is better better? And so easily the mind wanders off. Distracted by the toolbox and the tools and unable to lift a finger when suffering reels us in, caught on a straight hook, wriggling to our death by distraction in the wealthiest country in the world. All of us in the top 1% really it turns out but we don't appreciate this - wishing for more or that it was more fair at least or that we could live on less, but anyway wishing for a different life. And we have these teachings. Or these teachings have us now. This dharma staff is in our hands and we can't let it go. Our responsibility to carry on and to own all of the twisted karma and to be the caretakers of this wisdom medicine in case it can help. Not distracted by our own limitation - or idea of limitation, who knows if there is any such thing. What is there here that could be limited anyway? So we just do our best. To return, To the heart. Of the matter.
