Grass Hut - 18 - "Who Is the Original Master"

[Jundo]

Hello Buddha(s),

Now to Chapter 14, "Who Is the Original Master?"

Is this Buddha present? Are you present? Are you here? Is there something else you can be?

How best to find this Buddha?

Gassho, J

SatToday

[Myosha]

Is this Buddha present? Are you present? Are you here? Is there something else you can be?

Eternal.

"How best to find this Buddha?"

The mirror.


Gassho
Myosha sat today

[Jishin]

Who Is the Original Master? A monkey's ass.

Is this Buddha present? No.

Are you present? Hard to say.

Are you here? You who?

Is there something else you can be? Bee.

How best to find this Buddha? Under a rock.

Gasho, Jishin, _/st\_

[Rich]

The original master never leaves the building.

SAT today

[Jundo]

The original master never leaves the building.

SAT today

Elvis has left the building.

Gassho, J

SatToday

[Jika]

Hm, what's the definition of this building/hut at the moment?
If it's the Mirror, how can the dust of Elvis have left?
If it's a perishable hut, Elvis has perished with the hut and gone into Mastering, which was present before.
All music biz bizzing.
Sorry.

Gassho,
Danny
#sattoday

[Kaishin]

I think the only real answer to these questions lies in only-just-sitting. I don't think I'll ever fully grasp emptiness on a mental level. Just when I think I understand, a new analogy or explanation has me second guessing. But on the cushion all that falls away regardless.

-satToday

[Rich]

Elvis has left the building.

Gassho, J

SatToday

and is in the building

then-and-now-elvis_3155863k.jpg



Sat today

[Jundo]

Some of our non-native English speakers may wonder what this "Elvis" thing is all about.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elvis_...t_the_building

It is not some mysterious mystical code.

In fact, so many of the mysterious sayings in old Koans that seem so hard to understand are just the same: Old Chinese slang and puns that we no longer get. Maybe, 1000 years from now, Zen students will struggle with this mysterious Elvis Koan ...

Bodhidharma came to China, and Elvis left the building!

We're caught in a trap and can't get out!

Gassho, J

SatToday

[Myosha]

*slurring* "Thank-you-very-musch."


Gassho
Myosha sat today

[Jishin]

e 1.jpge 2.jpge 3.jpg



Gassho, Jishin, #Sat2day

[Jeremy]

I think the only real answer to these questions lies in only-just-sitting. I don't think I'll ever fully grasp emptiness on a mental level. Just when I think I understand, a new analogy or explanation has me second guessing. But on the cushion all that falls away regardless.

-satToday

I agree. Sometimes it's like a game of join-the-dots where the dots you'd previously joined up become unjoined and dance a jig while you're not looking!

Just this morning I read this nice 'feature' of 'emptiness' in a footnote in Francis Cook's "Hua-yen Buddhism. The Jewel Net of Indra", p134 (this summarises one of the main themes of the book):

Buddhists use several terms to denote the same thing -- emptiness, Buddha, Buddha-nature, nonbeing, tathagatagarbha, and dharma-dhatu, to name a few..."

And sometimes 'the same thing' doesn't mean 'the same thing'. All good fun!

Gassho
Jeremy
SatToday (Phew!)

[Jika]

Some of our non-native English speakers may wonder what this "Elvis" thing is all about.

majestix.jpeg
("I'm feeling so tired... just tired..."")

Gassho,
Danny
#fellforit

[Byrne]

Everyday I wake up in a different place.

Gassho

Sat Today

[AlanLa]

Is this Buddha present? Yes, always

Are you present? Once in a while

Are you here? Everywhere I go, there I am (dammit)

Is there something else you can be? I will let Sammy answer for me

[Risho]

Al gassho

Risho
-sattoday

[Myosha]

Is there something else you can be? I will let Sammy answer for me

Holy shnikes!

That key change alone is worth every minute behind the board.

Thanks.


Gassho
Myosha sat today

[tom1957]

My understanding of the benefits of considering : who is the original master ? is that we can see that the original master is non-discriminating primordial awareness. The non - judgemental source of wisdom. Is this our original face before we were born ?

Dennis Genpo Merzel in his book Big Mind Big Heart enters in to a dialogue with pupils, as a facilitator, to help people contact their Protector and the Controller that has been created by the false self. From this exercise our engagement with what we perceive to be a dualistic and relative reality and external circumstances can be seen to be merely projections of our mind based on the mental construct of a false self.

Through coming to the realisation that we create our reality based on the mental projections of a false self that has allowed a Protector and
Controller to unconsciously dictate our responses to seemly external circumstances we can work towards allowing our responses to, as an alternative, be generated form the base of pure awareness (the Master) and select responses form a menu of options from this back drop based on compassion.

Do you think this this correct ?

Gassho

[Jundo]

My understanding of the benefits of considering : who is the original master ? is that we can see that the original master is non-discriminating primordial awareness. The non - judgemental source of wisdom. Is this our original face before we were born ?

Dennis Genpo Merzel in his book Big Mind Big Heart enters in to a dialogue with pupils, as a facilitator, to help people contact their Protector and the Controller that has been created by the false self. From this exercise our engagement with what we perceive to be a dualistic and relative reality and external circumstances can be seen to be merely projections of our mind based on the mental construct of a false self.

Through coming to the realisation that we create our reality based on the mental projections of a false self that has allowed a Protector and
Controller to unconsciously dictate our responses to seemly external circumstances we can work towards allowing our responses to, as an alternative, be generated form the base of pure awareness (the Master) and select responses form a menu of options from this back drop based on compassion.

Hmmm, Is the master a "non-discriminating primordial awareness"? Can a name so easily be placed upon such, can it be objectified and nailed down? Genpo's system (the pricing issue aside) is nice in producing some brief experience of oneness and wholeness (I have sat thru his class). But is this merely getting back to a blank canvas without the painting, the empty page without the poem?

As we move into life to paint our painting, tell our stories, knowing of the paper and canvas is very informative and helpful. But it is not so easy, as canvas flows into painting, and the painting brings canvas to life ... a painting of both beauty and ugliness by our hand's own choosing. The paper is just the media for the story, a trillion stories of the world that we all write. Knowing of the underlying presence is only part of the work to be done. Canvas is lifeless without the colors and imagination of the painter, paper is just dead wood until the comedy and drama are added. The canvas does not determine what the painting of life will be, the paper does not guide us in how to write a good story.

I do not believe that knowing that there is a canvas underneath, or sensing that stories are written on blank paper truly provides so much guidance regarding what we should create (at best, it tells us that so much of the ugliness we create in our lives now does not have to be and is our own choosing, and it tells us that our stories are just that ... largely self created fictions. Before realizing so, we are ignorant painters and writers who are fooled by our own creations, and do not realize the degree to which brush and pen are in hand. We are like characters in a tale who do not realize they are in a tale, and simultaneously, we are like artists who do not realize they are artists with the future course of the story significantly in their own power ... though not wholly in our power, because the whole world ... every ant and raindrop and all the other sentient beings are our fellow artists joining in creating the big picture). We do not know of the possibilities, how much is fiction, and how much is within our control. However, that still does little to tell us what art to create from this point forward).

So, I don't think it so simple. That is one reason that old Koan stories threw monkey wrenches in easy attempts at formuli, and why Zen Masters of old said "not enough" to students who had brief flashes of "primordial oneness" or the like and thought that the job of painting and writing was now done. It is why Master Dogen spoke of "practice-enlightenment", the need to paint the painting with each brush stroke after another, the writing of the endless story line by line and phrase by phrase. That's where things really come alive! It is dependent on the choices we make one by one.

Maybe Genpo makes things too cut and dried in order to sell books and seminars?

(Sorry, I am not such an artist with words myself, so not sure that my imagery above gets the point across).

Gassho, J

SatToday

[tom1957]

Thank you.

I haven't sat through the Genpo's class. I think I understand the point you are making however and that simply recognising the blank canvas isn't enough and that this is just getting back to the blank canvas without the painting.

Also thinking that objectifying is perhaps a by-product of an attempt to understand the 'system'.

Your observation that knowing the canvas is underneath doesn't provide much guidance is very helpful and indeed I see the formulaic approach.

Practice-enlightenment.......no short cuts !

Gassho.

td1957

Hmmm, Is the master a "non-discriminating primordial awareness"? Can a name so easily be placed upon such, can it be objectified and nailed down? Genpo's system (the pricing issue aside) is nice in producing some brief experience of oneness and wholeness (I have sat thru his class). But is this merely getting back to a blank canvas without the painting, the empty page without the poem?

As we move into life to paint our painting, tell our stories, knowing of the paper and canvas is very informative and helpful. But it is not so easy, as canvas flows into painting, and the painting brings canvas to life ... a painting of both beauty and ugliness by our hand's own choosing. The paper is just the media for the story, a trillion stories of the world that we all write. Knowing of the underlying presence is only part of the work to be done. Canvas is lifeless without the colors and imagination of the painter, paper is just dead wood until the comedy and drama are added. The canvas does not determine what the painting of life will be, the paper does not guide us in how to write a good story.

I do not believe that knowing that there is a canvas underneath, or sensing that stories are written on blank paper truly provides so much guidance regarding what we should create (at best, it tells us that so much of the ugliness we create in our lives now does not have to be and is our own choosing, and it tells us that our stories are just that ... largely self created fictions. Before realizing so, we are ignorant painters and writers who are fooled by our own creations, and do not realize the degree to which brush and pen are in hand. We are like characters in a tale who do not realize they are in a tale, and simultaneously, we are like artists who do not realize they are artists with the future course of the story significantly in their own power ... though not wholly in our power, because the whole world ... every ant and raindrop and all the other sentient beings are our fellow artists joining in creating the big picture). We do not know of the possibilities, how much is fiction, and how much is within our control. However, that still does little to tell us what art to create from this point forward).

So, I don't think it so simple. That is one reason that old Koan stories threw monkey wrenches in easy attempts at formuli, and why Zen Masters of old said "not enough" to students who had brief flashes of "primordial oneness" or the like and thought that the job of painting and writing was now done. It is why Master Dogen spoke of "practice-enlightenment", the need to paint the painting with each brush stroke after another, the writing of the endless story line by line and phrase by phrase. That's where things really come alive! It is dependent on the choices we make one by one.

Maybe Genpo makes things too cut and dried in order to sell books and seminars?

(Sorry, I am not such an artist with words myself, so not sure that my imagery above gets the point across).

Gassho, J

SatToday