This word “emptiness” has a very profound feeling. If you visualize a deep ocean or calm lake which is very, very deep, you begin to feel it’s something more than scary.
In the words of the
I feel a little sorry I cannot speak very well, today. I called Japan and found out my sister-in-law, elder brother’s wife, finally passed away. My elder brother said she went peacefully. She didn’t suffer. I have a good feeling about her, even though she is very young, one year younger than me, thirty-five years old. She was the best friend of my younger sister, from elementary school to university, so I was always with her, playing. She left two children. It’s kind of karma, I feel, clear karma is going on. It’s very strange. She didn’t feel any sadness. For the children it is a very big thing. But maybe it is a big gift to them, too, to die so early. Not existing for them as a mother leaves a huge empty space. For me, the very early death of my father was a huge gift. I still cannot measure how big it is. When I was
sutra, “Shariputra, all existences are marked with emptiness, all dharmas are marked with emptiness,” you have a very interesting thing when you hear this. Dharmas are existences and also teachings. In this sutra, “dharma” can be understood in both ways: Teaching and phenom-
enal existence. Writing the word, “Dharma” is referring to the whole
eight years old my father passed away, leaving a very cold sensation on my hand. That was the last sensation. Most of the time I felt a very smooth and warm feeling, but in the end he was colder than ice. I was massaging his toe when he passed away. Now, in wintertime I live with my father very closely. When I have a big difficulty, a dark, painful time, always he appears and carries me on. I cannot see him, but feel his force. My whole body is carried by his existence… Very strong feeling, we knew she would go soon, it’s not shocking. It’s like seeing a candle burning completely, without leaving anything left over. That kind of feeling, I feel…very peaceful feeling. I don’t feel any emotion left over.
Karma is the law of life, you cannot miss it, so you follow your karma. This karmic force becomes the force of wisdom, too, complete expression of wisdom…let me keep silence for a while…Very interesting feeling is the two children, a little older than my two. Same as mine, a boy and a girl…A while before she passed away, I had a strong feeling that I had to call Japan. She hadn’t passed away at that time. My mother and her sister were helping her and my elder brother was at home. He told me, “Don’t worry” but I didn’t feel okay. Then “something” came and took my place, and I felt okay again… When she died, unfortunately, they called many times but we weren’t home…finally the day before yesterday night…
It seems the physical appearance of life, this body, I touch…but the formless life which fills the space between people is more real. Like the appearance of this body is part of a big thing, and this inside which I also feel, consists of this big existence. At the same time, my external feeling is also my body. Like seeing a mountain
teaching in past Buddhist history. When I put the word “no” on each element of it, I am going to make Bud-
dha’s teaching appear again in the very original state. At the same time each of us understands all “dharmas” as phenomenal existences. I say “I”, you also say “I”. “I”, “I”, “I”. These individual existences in the phenomenal world are marked with emptiness, too.
If we experience something, we say it exists. Whether it is truly so or not, we are not sure. When we are dreaming in very deep sleep, we have no sense of, “I am dreaming this.” Everything is so real we do not doubt it until someone makes a sound and we wake up. Then we wonder, “Where am I?” waking up from the dream to so-called “reality.” Yet it’s sad, if this “real-
- it cannot be a separate body from myself. Moon and stars, sun, wind, rain, everything is your external body, so it is a natural thing to have complete communication between your existence and some part of the outer body of you.
Actually, she lived thirty-five years as a woman. That is one life she had, and I lived thirty-five years of her in me. That is also her life, too. I am thirty-six, a little older, and left by her death. I have some responsibility to fill this empty feeling, which will continue as the children’s huge empty space. They will also have to fill it by themselves. So what will happen will be for them to live with the people who are left: My natural mother, her natural mother and father, all her relatives, and the continuous life of her in me. It is karma, of course. The same as our meeting together almost every week. It is not a different thing.
One night, the last time I visited in Japan, in the middle of the night I heard a strange cry, like a coyote, and low groaning. I thought, “What is that little animal-like sound?” It became familiar and I thought, “I have the same sound in me.” I woke up in the middle of the night. The whole temple was very dark, and, half-asleep, I followed the sound. Soon I saw my sister-in-law holding the table in the bedroom. My elder brother was holding her shoulder. It is a very sorry feeling, strong feeling, of how people live with this pain growing. You feel shot by truth. No leftover emotion. No judgement. Just accept it. I asked my elder brother, “Can I do something?” and he said, “She is doing okay.” I went back to my bedroom. My mother was still awake at that time, writing a letter. It’s a strange feeling when someone in the family is very sick and many people hold it, living with the problem. Her doctor asked, “Why did she live so long?” He thought she would pass away last year
ity” feels fine to you, to realize it is a dream, and there is nothing to attach and nothing to be attached to. That’s
too sad. You think that if you could possess things forever, or be possessed forever, you could sleep peacefully without worrying or thinking. But it doesn’t happen. Instead, because of many, many things going on, constant tension is needed to carry this dream on, to keep it from being misty or uncertain, or like a nightmare. And yet, in reality, we have many opportunities to wake up from this dream.
“…marked by emptiness” you do not stop existing. The word, “no” and the word, “emptiness” have a big power to free yourself from a stuck state. You cut the delusion from your existing. Like we don’t doubt this is our
about this time, but she continued to live one more year. Sometimes she was very, very bright, like her whole body was light. Sometimes she was just a shadow, a moving shadow.
Length of life is very interesting. Some people live a very short time, some live a long time, and there is no way to say long life is good or short life is good. Some people sleep most of their life and do some amount of work for the world, and some live a very short time and do the same job for people. When I sit with you like this, each of you has a very different impression and vibration, a particular sensation. Often, when I’m alone, I have an image of you, I see you, and what happens is that I have a feeling before the image appears. I think, “Oh, she’s appearing.” Our mind is so fine, we can’t understand it, but it can be very aware, very focused. Everything takes it’s own place and clearly shows what it is. In the “eko,“ after chanting, we say “…fulfillment of all relations.” To actually fulfill all relations is your practice. It means you are fulfilled by all existence.
Moment after moment, you just live with hand very open, aware, appreciating…this is practice. Otherwise, you are living a complete life with no appreciation of it. People do very good things for you, you owe your whole life to them, but you don’t feel it because it’s so perfect. If wrong things happen, you feel them, but if everything is perfect, you think, “This is it,” and do not say “Thank you.” You do not appreciate it. So to be enlightened by all existences is nothing but to enlighten yourself, and enlighten them all at once. (Kobun is talking about his sisterin-law, who had metastasized breast cancer and participated in the trial of an experimental cancer drug, October 28, 1974.)
nose, these are our eyes, and all at once we begin to see the nose is a bump on our face. It is very true. We have
nose, eyes, mouth, and skin, too. Everything we experience and how we transcend it in words is very true. At the same time it is not true at all from the very beginning to the very end. We don’t need to say it this way. Maybe something sticking out like this nose is actually a “cave” if you say so! To say, “I can see” is completely a word of ignorance. Your eyes are not seeing anything, actually. By starting to see you begin to not see. That is how you discriminate. Perfect existence doesn’t need to be seen, so to try to see is the beginning of separation. To say, “the eye’s work is seeing,” also shows awareness of the reason for separation. To deny it is to bring you back to perfection, actually, constant perfection, without losing your eyes there or here. Perfection, and picking and choosing, work at the same time. This is how we, in our innocence, exist. You do zazen and you come back. You don’t lose your body. Your nose is still a nose.
In Mahayana Buddhism, to study this Indian idea of emptiness is the main subject. It translates as “conditioned origination.” Looking at this bag (holding up a purse), I don’t know what’s in there, but by holding it like this, to feel emptiness means my concern penetrates into all helpers which brought this to me. You can imagine one hundred million hands which made this bag possible. Not only that, but this material is part of a cow. That portion of the cow, when it was alive, from which this part was made, somehow it is almost impossible to imagine. So it is not just the word “empty.” Maybe we should use “nonsubstantiality,” because of the innumerable conditions which made this possible. “No substantiality” doesn’t mean just “no self” or “no existence.”
This “emptiness” is not just in this sutra. It is in a basic text of Nagarjuna. There is one famous gatha, number 18 gatha of 24th chapter. The English translation is:
What is originated by conditions That, I say, is identical with
Emptiness. It is also identical with derived name. It is
again the purport of the Middle Way.
One who perceives truly the pratityasamutpada (Sanskrit for
“dependence on conditions, variously originated.”) realizes
the (four sacred) truths… suffering, it’s origin, cessation of
suffering, and the path.
Whosoever sees the pratityasamutpada sees the Dharma
Whosoever sees the Dharma sees the pratityasamutpada.
Whosoever sees the pratityasamutpada sees the Dharma
Whosoever sees the Buddha sees the Dharma. Sakyamuni Buddha discovered this and tried to let people discover it by themselves, but for a long, long time people just played with his teachings without experiencing what they were.