Originally Posted by
martyrob
I truly get this idea of creating a sacred space beyond the petty concerns of the day to day world. Truly, I get that. We close the temple doors behind us and leave behind the clamour outside to find that inner space to start that essential internal conversation. For us Zen practitioners this is vital. This is the lifeblood of our practice, if we don’t have this space, this opportunity, this sanctuary then where do we find the nourishment that feeds our practice? We understand that those moments of deliberate quietude where we stop, momentarily, the incessant din, the moronic inferno. How do we attain the enlightened way, perceive reality, transform all delusions and thus save all sentient beings if we can’t hear ourselves non thinking?
I understand why Jundo wants to close the gates and I truly appreciate his intentions. I also get Onka’s point of view.
Raising kids, doing a job, shopping for food, looking after my old mum; for me this is the Buddha way, my dharma gate. The demarcation between the temple walls and the outside world are no longer clear. The outside clamour intrudes and maybe this intrusion is part of our way too. The old certainties are gone, dharma-wise, maybe we’re in new territory.
Nobody sees themselves as an arsehole. Everybody is trying their best. Hitler saw himself as a decent guy grappling with the Jewish problem that nobody before had the guts to deal with. He just wanted the best for the German people. So, I’m not sure this ‘on the one hand, on the other’, ‘lets agree to disagree’ works anymore today as it didn’t in the 1930’s. The post-war consensus has evaporated. The old certainties by which we negotiated ourselves and the world we lived in no longer exist, we now live in a world of fact and alternate facts. Our political leaders are venal or incompetent failures, usually both. Their supporters conspire in this venality and empower them. Buddhists, like the rest of us, have to make a choice between the world of facts or the world of lies. There’s no space where you can stand between these two notions. These are more than pirates on our ship, they are digging through the bows of our vessel to sink western democracies. Conservatives and Liberals are on one side and on the other are climate change deniers, anti-vaxers, Qanon conspiracy theorists and white suprematists. Credulous people deliberately manipulated by those with an agenda. Decent people just enfeebled with idiocy. Jundo’s battered ship that we all sail on for these people doesn’t actually exist. The gates have broken down, the temple is overrun. Climate catastrophe is at our door, a conflagration will ensue, the sacred space is invaded, we can no longer avoid the choice. Where do we stand?
Historically, as Jundo might say, this is just another blip. The dharma might take some time out until it’s taken up by the cockroaches again in a few aeons.
I am grateful for this place and I am grateful for the protection Jundo affords to this little window of silence and practice, but I’m not sure we can or should keep out the outside world. Moreover, I’m not sure we can any longer get by with cozy nostrums that we’re all good folks, yes, we are, but all the bad stuff is always done by good folks. We have a tendency to not listen to our hearts but to our thoughts and worse still to other people’s thoughts and we know, as good Buddhists, what a whole heap of trouble that can bring.
I get that Jundo doesn’t want this place to become a political debating forum nor for it to be riven with the factionalism that we find everywhere else and I don’t think anyone else here, whatever their politics, wants that either but I think that the tide of events that are flooding the world are coming here too and we might be better confronting that head on rather than hoping we can keep it out and maybe find a way through it that remains congruent with our Zen ethics.
I’m sorry for banging on so long, well over three sentences, but I’ve tried to be as brief as I can.
Wishing you all well,
Martyn
Sat today.
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