Cooper Union forum; 6; Spring 1970

National Educational radio presents the Cooper Union forum a program taken from a meeting at the great hall of the Cooper Union in New York City by station WNYC. This presentation was recorded on March 5th 1969 to introduce tonight's discussion on San Buddhism. Here is Dr. Johnson ether a child. Or speaker tonight on the topic of Zen. Buddhism. Is Professor Joseph Campbell Professor Campbell comes to us. Is a professor of literature and English at Sarah Lawrence College. He has had a very distinguished background and I don't believe that. He needs any introduction because he is giving a series of three lectures here which I think are a tour de force. The title of the night as I mentioned is an good as of the one last week was yoga. And the

one the following is the search for the frog. I could say a lot of wonderful things about. Professor Campbell and take up a lot of your time but I won't do it. He's just a wonderful man and a great scholar. Professor Campbell. Will. Ever work. The Indians imply a rather amusing image to describe the two principal types of religious attitude. One. They call. The way of the captain and the other the way of the monkey. When the kitten. Is in trouble. The Kitten says meow. And its mother comes and

takes it by the deck and carries it to safety. Anyone who has travelled through India. And seen a little band of monkeys come dashing down from a tree and run across the road. Well I've noticed that the baby monkey. Rides on its mother's back and hangs on by itself. Now these are taken to be the two religious attitudes. The one who calls for lard or lard come help me and the Lord comes. I'm the one who. Goes to work himself without. Calling for. Help from without. Now these same two attitudes are described in Japan in two very vivid terms one in Japanese is GDP J.I. r i k i

which means self energy. One's own energy. And the other word is Tommy key. TNA are Ikea. Which means outside energy or help from without. Now in Buddhism these two ways are represented in Japan respectively by what is known as the Amidah Buddhism. Where the Lord Buddha. Whose name is Amitabh par or the Buddha of illimitable radiance also known as a me tireless the Buddha of. Unending life. Is called upon and. Gives release gives redemption as Christ in the Christian religion yields the grace. Of

redemption. This is the way that we call properly the religious way the way of worship where a deity is invoked and the deity helps. The Devotee to redemption. The other way tare or self-help self managing self doing which isn't asking for God. But is working on its own to achieve what is to be achieved. This is represented primarily in Japan by Zen Zen Buddhism. There's an amusing story told in India of the God the Lord Vishnu. A messenger came and said one of your devotees is in great distress. Go help him and Vishnu sconce sought to. Seize her lord put on all his flying regalia and get on his flying steed namely the Sun Bird cower duck.

And he dashes off to help His devotee but before. Anyone could say Jack Robinson he was back again. And he's asked well why do you come so soon. He said the devotee began fighting for himself. Both ways are perfectly good. I want him to talk about today. It's a way of Tarik in Japan namely Zen Buddhism. Last week I spoke about yoga and I brought out. The fact that. One passes through these inward domains of divine power and so forth. And I showed also how the different images are related to these domains. All that is bypassed in Zen Zen is a is a myth ology without any mythology. It is a discipline or technique for achieving immediate

illumination. It could happen to anyone here tonight if I'm fortunate in my communication and you in your readiness. You might achieve that. The word Zen is a Japanese mispronunciation of a Chinese word namely John C H apostrophe. And this is a Chinese mispronunciation of a sense good word namely DNA. D h y a and a n Tianna means meditation or contemplation. And so we ask meditation on our contemplation of. Walk. Last week I spoke of the idea. In yoga. Of. The mind as a rippled water surface. And when you regard a rippled water surface you have a lot of quickly passing flashing images

and these are broken reflections of the clouds. The trees on the shore. And the aim of yoga is to make that mind to that rippling mind standstill so that they image it will become fixed and firm and solid. And then you will know that that is the form that is broken in all these forms. The aim of yoga I said was to pass from the world of broken forms to the form of forms. Now let us look about this room. Here are lights. These are separate lights on in different parts of the room separate from each other and we may think of them as separate from each other. Looking at them this way we are thinking in the plane of empirical facts.

Separate things. This is the Japanese Kong G Hawkeye. The world or insect or Tomahawk to the world the universe of separate things. But now let's see. Each of these is rendering light. And the light is one so that one light is being rendered through all these bulbs. And one may think either this pretty simple thing one may think either of the many bulbs. Or one may think of the one light. And if that bulb goes out it can be replaced with another and will have the same light light as one and it comes through many bugs. I look out here and I see all these people. Each is just as a bulb is a vehicle for life. Each of you is a vehicle for consciousness. And you may

think of consciousness as one presence which comes through all these lights. These are the two ways that it's optional which way you want to think. One isn't truer than the other they're just two ways of thinking one and thinking in terms of the multiple manifestation and the other in terms of the one thing that is manifest through this multiple. And this is known in the in the Japanese as a rich guy. The one domain the domain of unity and the domain of multiplicity. What we're trying to move to is not simply a discussion of the multiple of the one. But. An experience of our own separate self. And that basic form. As identical with that one. There's a fundamental. Formula.

That comes very early in the Indian tradition. In the Chuang don't you punish odd. Tot mom. I see you've heard it before. You are. It. But not the you that you think you are. When you think about yourself. You think of your separateness from other people. That's why you defend yourself when attacked. That's why you like certain people and don't like others it's always discriminative that you which is separate that way which is name a boat for which we have categories of definition dark eyes blue eyes blond hair dark hair. This race that race and what we're talking about these days. One's identity. That's not it. That's what separates you that's what makes us separate Bob. And so that

aspect of you is not it. That's the broken record reflection. Now is it possible for you to sink into yourself that you in experience not simply in thought but in experience go. Past this sense of. That which is to be protected that which is to be defended so that you come through to the unnameable aspect of yourself. The whole round of Oriental thought I'm a legend in this domain is based on a feeling and realization that the ultimate mystery is beyond naming beyond definition beyond imaging beyond all categories. It is transcendent of speech speech and thought. I can only suggest it but you have to jump past it

when you have an experience and you then define the experience. Even when people fall in love they begin to define it they think. Is this the marrying kind. How far can this go. They try to socialize it identify it. Classify it and as soon as your mind grabs the thing in the net of a definition you've lost the experience. They problem is let it come and not name it. And it may push you right back to where you live where you are and not where you are named. Now the whole problem of this is then contemplation. Is to break the net. Of concepts. That's why the word is used. The philosophy of no mind. Because it's your assumes your mind and name in comes in. You've classified the thing.

There's a whole school of psychopathology psychoanalysis based on the notion that what we're seeking for is a meaning for our lives now. That may be a help. But all that does is help the intellect. Has a meaning. The ultimate. Meaning of Zen is that life is before me a name. There it is. There's a very famous story about the put up preaching. He held up a single lotus flower. That was the sermon and only one person got it. His name was Kashyap. And he is regarded as the founder of Zen Buddhism. Nobody else got the message and so the Buddha

noticing that nobody got the message gave a sermon for those who like beaning. This gave comfort to people who had not found. That life is an experience not a meaning. Now the Buddha himself. Left the world of concepts left the world of meanings. He came in his quest after years of search and austerity and this that and the other trial and error to. What is called the immovable spot the midpoint of the world. Which is the tree the tree called the Tree of illumination. And that came to him when he was sitting facing east the foot of that tree. A lot of life. That is to say the Lord in control of those emotions by which most of us all of us

live and this lord's name was. Desire. And death. And then his character as a lot of desire for idea and Eros. He tempts the one sitting at the tree by parading before him his three beautiful daughters whose names were. Desire. Fullfillment regrets. And if the one sitting by the tree had had the thought of I am a separate entity they are separate entities. He would have. Felt and experienced a relation to them a desire. He had no sense of himself as a separate entity nor of them as separate entities and so there was no response. He had reached the immovable spot. Then the Lord of desire turns himself into the Lord of Death and hurled his army at the border. This is a

very popular favorite motif in Buddhist art and legend. But again there was nobody there. And so these weapons flung at him were turned into lotus petals and they became honorific rather than dangerous. And then the Lord who governs life. A lot of desire. And death turned himself into the lord of duty. The social scientist. And he says to the young prince sitting there wherefore this apathy. Why are you not. Governing the world. Why are you not on today's picket line or sit in or push them around. Societies demand nature in spite of what our sociologists tell us. And human nature you know is anti seeping to society. So that in order to transcend this

temptation simply dropped his right hand and touched the earth. This is called the Earth touching posture. Nature. And nature is rooted in mystery. Society is not. Nature is rooted in that mystery dimension of the transcendent. And the goddess of. Earth herself. Mother Nature spoke. And said This is my beloved son who through many many lifetimes has given of himself. He has no sense of self and there is nobody here. Then the elephant which the Lord of duty was riding bowed in reverence. The Army dispersed and the Buddha that night achieved the illumination of which I was speaking. The realisation of himself as identical with that which is beyond all concepts and please. Bear this in mind.

It neither is nor is not being and nonbeing are concepts. So when you ask do you believe in. God. Or illumination. I can answer either yes or no or both or neither. Because the whole thing goes beyond all concept and so you have to break past concepts and this is not easy at all. Now when the Buddha had broken past concepts this was an explosion and he sat for seven days where he was seated in a pack riveted. Dissolution you might say. Then he stood for seven days seven paces away from where he had been sitting and he looked again at where he had been sitting that for seven days he walked back and forth between where he had been sitting and where he had been looking he is integrating

this experience and then he went and sat against another tree and he said. And here's the first fact to put ism. This cannot be taught. But the illumination cannot be taught. Because there are no words for it. No sooner had he had that thought than the gods came down from heaven and said Teach. For the good of mankind. And so for forty nine years the board had taught. But he did not teach Buddhism. He taught the way to Buddha illumination and so Buddhism is called The way it is called a Yana. A ferry boat. Which will take us to that young Bashaw. Take us from this shore of multiple experiences the many Bobs the many people. To the on the shore of that one which is beyond being one.

The source of the light. The source of all the people that is the on the show beyond duality beyond multiplicity. Well how did the Buddha teach. Well he came forth in the character of a doctor and he used the formulae of Indian medicine. The world is diseased. Why this is the sign of its disease. It is sour. So the first noble truth. All life is sorrowful. Please listen. Life is so powerful that where it all that doesn't mean that life in a capitalistic society is our fault. Or that life in a communistic society is solvable or their life in a fascist society is solvable if and if we could change the society we could make things happy. That's not what it means. It means that all life is sorrowful and the whole.

Import of Buddhism is that it's going to help you to find release from sorrow no matter what the social physical or geographical situation. The next point is can life be cured of this. Is it possible to achieve release from this sorrow and the docter sense of the Buddha's answer is yes. What is the name of the release what is the name of health. The name of healthy says is nirvana and Nirvana means. Blown out. With desire blown out. With fear blown out with ego consciousness blown out. That much does not mean you're dead. That means that your consciousness of yourself as an ego separate like a separate life Bob has been blown out.

And when that has happened you experience release from sorrow and you can still be walking around as the Buddha was for forty nine years. How does one achieve this. One achieves it by what he called the eightfold way. Therefore way is right views right aspirations right speech right. Conduct. Right Livelihood right effort right meditation right rapture. And if you know want to know what right is there Allah libraries. Of discussion. The first followers of the Buddha followed him and left the world as monks. To make the passage to leave the world behind and sit down and wipe it

out. Their way was the way of. Tariq the self-help self-help. Not calling on God and the Buddha himself said achieve your own release. Achieve it my way. Sitting like this in meditation and that is the way of early Buddhism. Now. Some 500 years after the Buddha's time the Buddha states a 563 to 43 B.C. just about the time of the beginning of the Christian era. A totally new movement appears in Buddhism. According to this. One does not have to leave the world to achieve illumination. One can rest in the world performing one's tasks. And. Comes in a new kind of figure not the monk with shaven

head and monks robe going into the forest. But. A kingly figure wearing a beautiful proud on addressing the world. Holding in his hand the word Lotus. This figure. Addressing the world is known as a body sucked by. One who is being sucked by is illumination Bodine. But what the word would have means is the one who won't. But I mean simply awake. Bodhi means wait for. The one whose being is wakefulness. The Great. Wakeful being is named in Sanskrit of alaap Attash for out and the word means he who looks at the world in mercy. This is the figure who in China and Japan is Kuan Yin our quinine who's been called by art historians the goddess of mercy. The legend of Avalon the tester is briefly that when he was about to achieve absolute

release from all reincarnation from all rebirth he heard the rocks and trees and clouds set up a cry of. Sorrow. And he asked why this. And he heard your very presence among us has given us the realisation of the imminence of nirvanic bliss with your departure we shall lose that. So he determined to stay in the world as a teacher as a helper as an aid and he is the opera type of the helper. The one who helps one to illumination and he isn't con it in us all when we talk with each other when we illuminated each other when we help each other even when we think we're hurting each other we're actually helping each other because by letting the other one know something about the way people are. It is a lot to test for who's working through us all this time it was a lovely little Chinese story about. Kuantan. Or I have a

lot to test for in her female form. Since the figure represents mercy and since the female is a more adequate symbol of mercy than the male in the Far East. I would love to test her peers in female form. This is a rather charming story of a young. It's of a town in China on the Isle of act which I had never heard of religion or if it had had no interest in it. And one day a beautiful. Girl. With. Came into the village to sell fish with wicker basket of fresh. Leaves and sticks and in a beautiful fish. She was a glorious thing. All the young men with their eyes. When she had sold a fish she went away. Next day there she was again. Next day there she was again. Finally the boys began to say they wanted to marry her. I said I can't marry the whole village.

Anyone who will study the Koran to try the sacred text of the Goddess Kwan Yin and explain it to me next week when I arrive I will consider to be eligible. So they all went to work to study the sutra. This introduced into Buddhism and. Ten young men thought they had solved it and when she came day addressed themselves to her and she said yes you have read the sutra. You have understood the sutra. Now I cannot marry ten of you. The one who will have realized the import of the Sutra is the one whom I will marry so I'll be back next week and you can present yourselves the next week. Only one young man felt that he was eligible. And the beautiful girl said fine. Now I live by the river and such and such a place you come to my house this evening.

That evening the young man. Went to the Shard the river. It was a lovely little bamboo house there and two old people. At the gate and they said oh we have been waiting for you a long time. Come in. I don't want his room is there. And he went into the daughter's room and the door was open in the back. Out to the river where the reeds where the grasses and the trees and he saw our footsteps go down to the river. And then at the bit he saw her two beautiful shoes and that was all. But he had studied the search and he had realized the sutra and he looked around. He heard the reeds and heard the real leaves. You heard the boy of the birds. And he knew where she was. This was the goddess of self

and she was present in the light and I saw in the reeds he had found her and she was one with his own being. This is the way of being helped of being saved through help and this little story points out how the gods may come and save a person. But that's not the Way of Zen. And I've told of the Buddha. Lifting a Lotus and only one person understood. Now suppose I were to lift a Lotus and I have to say to you. What is the meaning of the Lotus. Or suppose it were into lotus because a Lotus has a lot of mythological implications. Suppose I lifted a butter cup and I said What is the meaning of a butter. Or suppose I lifted the dead stick and I said What is the meaning of a dead stick.

And suppose you ask me what is the Buddha. And I then lifted that stick. Perhaps you begin to get. The book that is called the Tathagata. The one thus come. He has no meaning any more than a flower any more than a tree any more than DAY YOU'LL NEVER SEE. Any more than you. And when you can experience something in and for and ask it self without referring it to anything else. Just that. This experience pushes you back. Into that. Part of your own existence which is without meaning which is just BEING.

But beyond the concept of being both being and nonbeing so that life and death are second. When Buddhism was brought in the first century ID to China. Translations began now there's nothing much more difficult than translating Sanskrit into Chinese because they Hindus love vast numbers. They even have a number that means just vast numbers. And you can read four thousand three hundred sixty five vast numbers two hundred ninety one thousand. Whereas the Chinese they like things quite specific their word for the universe is ten thousand things. So how are you going to get Sanskrit into Chinese. These are vast concepts had to be translated not in terms of word count. Relationships but in terms of meanings and experiences. So a lot of work was going on and translating for 500 years these wonderful translations. And then

different rituals. And then one day they came to China. A sage. Named Bodhi Dharma from India. The date post be five twenty eighty and he went to the Emperor of China Emperor of China said I have been building temples monasteries nunneries and dolling convent. How much marriage have I gained. And the monk said None whatsoever. The Emperor was shocked and he said Who is this impudent man who talks to me this way. The monk said I don't know. Then the monk finding that the emperor of us not open to discussion went across the river. To a convent and sat facing a wall for eight years. To point out the fact that Buddhism had nothing to do with translating texts with sending up prayers. With performing

ceremonies. But only with. Penetrating inwardly as the Buddha had penetrated. He left behind all this religious life. And turned to the direct pointing inward. Then a Confucian scholar came to talk to this modest man who'd been there to get instruction and the Confucian scholar said. Oh master. Master continued to look at the trees at the wall. Snow came down. Two gods. The visitor is standing in the snow still the body shop hasn't turned around. So in order to attract attention and show that he's really serious about this the visitor cut off his own nom and presents it. To the Buddha. And body Dharma turned and said Well what do you want. And he says

as people say who go to psychiatry. I want you to set my soul at rest. Set my mind at rest. And body Thomas said. Produce your mind and I'll set it at rest. And the Chinese said said well that's just the trouble I can't locate it. And body Thomas said leave it alone it's at rest. And that man became his first disciple in China. The next great. Master. In the Way of Zen comes 250 years later. Hui Neng states are six thirty. Eight to seven thirteen.

He was an illiterate would deliver. He used to chop wood and delivered his mother was a widow and he was supporting her mother by delivering one. And one day this ignorant boy standing outside of a house waiting for them to open the door with his would load. He hissed the recitation. Of one of the great Buddhist sutras. The bunch of Chad got a diamond cutter subject and here's this the world of form is identical with the world of emptiness. The world of emptiness is identical with the world of form. And he was suddenly illuminated. He got a. Sudden illumination not sitting down meditating but standing up in his life's work. Suddenly it hit him. So he went to a monastery to learn more about this. But the abbot could say that the boy already knew and he gave him a job in the kitchen.

Then the abbot was going to retire. And a contest was initiated among the monks. The young illiterate that literate and learned monks. The one who could write in a few verses. The essence of Buddhism would become the next Abbot. So there was one fair haired boy there and he wrote on the wall a little poem that said the body is the bone tree is the tree of illumination. The mind America bright keep it always dusted clean less dust on it a light. The essence of Buddhism being to purify to calm to quiet the mind. And the kitchen boy that night asked a friend of history in that poem and when the poem was read he said Now you write this aside. You write The body is not the bone tree. The mind no mirror

bright since nothing is that has any being on OUAT could watch a light. Well when they when. Abba came down next morning all that was a great gossip among the students they were all in the refectory just excited about who wrote this other thing. He knew who'd read that and pretending to be very angry he took a slipper and erased that second poem. Then that night. He called the kitchen boy to him. And he said here are the insignia of office. Here is the bowl. Here is my robe. Go away. And so the monastery life was transcended by Hui Neng. And yet when you go to Japan today and visit a buddhist zen monastery you see them sitting in the most

austere way practicing meditation. Now this is a puzzle to people who are trying to find out what the end is about what Zen is really about is coming to the realization and this is said time and time again coming to the realization of your own true would have nature your oneness with that one coming to its realization. It is not. Reciting the sutras it is not meditation. But. Meditation is the preferred way. Now here's how it works. There's a tradition throughout the Zen. World. Of questions and answers puzzling questions questions that suggest. No meaning and the student is asked. Find the meaning of this. Now go away and meditate and find the meaning.

So he's given this puzzle which has no solution. He's concentrating the master's been very stern about this you come tell me what the meaning is. For instance one of the things what is the sound of one hand kids to go and meditate on this. It's just. They comes back and says what he thinks the answer is because it's not there. That's because there is no real answer and. No go back. Finally it will come to him. What is the meaning of a flower. What is the sound of one. And another question. Show me the face you had before your father and mother were born before. You became this you.

With a name and work and a career. Who what where you then. Now I just want to give a little. Image which I heard first from my great friend. I missed him and to point out the nature of Buddha illumination and from that I think I will be able to give you a pointer to. Buddhism is called the vehicle of the ferry boat the ferry that carries us to the island to show off. So said my friend let's imagine we're in a ferry boat. Here we are in Manhattan. We're tired of it. Fun City. We want to go to the island to show off. Maybe Jersey. There are no bridges yet. We've heard of Jersey. We can

stand. On the docks and look across and see it. We've been told about it and we've been thinking about it all our meditation Jersey. And what do you tell. One beautiful day. We see a boat put out from the Jersey Shore. And come across. It puts. Into dock at our feet. There's a man on the boat and he says anyone for a jersey. Now this boat. Is the vehicle. This is political. And the bogeyman is the Buddha. And you say I'm from Jersey. And he says now there's something interesting and peculiar about this trip. When you get in this boat you've given up fun city forever. You've given up your friends you've given up your career you've given up your name

prestige everything. I ready. You say I'm fed up. I am. All right Sis got a boy. This is early kind of Buddhism. Only those who are willing to give up the world as monks as nuns. Can join. This is what is known as the little ferry boat that carries only those who are ready to give up the world. Sounds good is he now yon odd little fairy. Bob. What is a. This is that early bird ism and this is the Buddhism you'll find in Ceylon in Burma in Thailand. All right. You step ashore. The pope begins to move. You feel a qualm you think oh mother something like that. And. The boat has begun to move out and it's too late. Now you're on the river. Ship ahoy. When these waves rowing sails smell of tar. You can't say left and right you

have to say port and starboard everything is changed. You're a sailor. You're among. You're a nun. You're between worlds you're neither here nor there. This is the stage of the discipline the work to get as in terms of last week's talk from the fourth to the sixth chapter you're at the head. Of the chopper of effort and spiritual work where you thought I was going to be on a short trip might take several lifetimes. My friend and you may get so quite used to it you'll think I am a monk I am a nun and this is the life for me. I love to be a sailor. Now there are people who. Just love that so much that the last thing they'd want would be to achieve nirvana. This you find in teaching very often that people who just love to be students and friends particularly in schools who find this type. They do they just love it when the teacher comes in and said Now a little more that dolling and a

little less here and oh you're doing fine I'll keep right on continue. And oh you've had all that experience now of the master telling you something and you go on. It's the born disciple. But suppose the master came in some day and he said oh you've got it. You're through this to be a terrible shock. Well so it would be for many and many a monk or nun if illumination came. Now there's a certain problem here that must be brought up. Since the aim of illumination is to get rid of ego consciousness. The more you strive for it the more you're building ego. I don't want to live the nation have I got a little mini nation. Am I getting it. Well you're you're you're really stop and you're going to be there a long long time. Well one fine day it might happen. You've scraped a showoff. Jersey Nirvana. Blown out.

You step ashore now you realize where you are. You've come to the really hope high the place of absolute unity no separateness and you turn now to see what Manhattan looks like from Jersey. I guess you've guessed it. There's no river between there's no ferry boat there's no ferry man. This is it. This is the Mahayana realization. The big ferryboat realisation where their. This world of life of time is exactly Nirvana. Life the only thing that's necessary is to change your way of experiencing it. That's what the Buddha said. Blow out your desire. Blow out your fear.

Blow out your definition of yourself. You've got it it's as easy as that and it hits people like that and so now what we have found is between the world of many things and the experience of one thing there is no separation. The Japanese call this remove all tie. Things unity no division. There's one more realization. So you are now moving in the world. Realizing this is it. This is simply to note that there is a dimension of unity that unites us all and not only us all as human beings but us but the energy of the lights and of the. Building around us this is one fantastic. Miracle. So I would think where we all came from. I

think what's coming out of it all. Think of that. Oh that's crazy. It's a wonder. And to walk around with that feeling it's one of these hyped up feelings. And then you come to the next realization what is called g g move K. between this thing and that thing. Now separation. All beings are one being. This is called. The net of gems. The image is given of a net. A great net. And that every joint is a jam and each jam reflects all the other jams and also what is reflected in all the other jams or another image that is employed is that of. The flower reef. When you have a flower wreaths This flower is not the cause of that and all together constitute the race.

We usually think in terms of cause and effect I push this watch and it moves move because I pushed it. But. Think of that what is the course of the growth of an. ACORN. The oak that is to come. What is to be in the future is the cause of what's happening now. Also the past is the cause of what's happening now. And all the things round about causes of what's happening now. Everything is causing everything else all the time and so you have the doctrine of what is known as mutual arising. And here you get the notion that nobody is to blame for anything because. We are all mutually arising and this is one reason why I was in Japan. Shortly after the war with no sense of resentment in the people I knew. The enemies are mutually arising. They are both part of the same thing. Leader and. Following.

All part of the same thing. You and your enemy all part of the same thing thing and thing. No separation. This is a wonderful sublime thought. This is what lies behind Japanese and Chinese art. When you see the picture of a crane it's not just a crane. That's the universe. That's the Buddha consciousness. Anything can be if you looked at every god in that way. Now this is the Buddhism of the Bodhisattva the one who lives in the world and is of the world. And. Your discipline is your career your discipline is your family your discipline it's your job. Zen became in the 12th century in Japan the Buddhism of the Samurai the

knightly monks the warrior monks and so it has become the vehicle. The spiritual background you might say of the arts of fencing swordsmanship Judo. When one studies any of the Japanese. Art of defense it's like a religious exercise or a philosophical exercise and there will be little mottos on the wall. And one pays respect to the mat. Kowtows to the mat. It's there you are thanking the mat. So this is quite different from the monk way the way of leaving the world the way of the Marianna is with that and who's there. Nobody. There is a wonderful type of Buddhist text known as the prophet a prominent text the text of the wisdom of the on the shore and what they show are a lot

of. Realized Buddhism Boddhisattva sitting around. Proposing riddles to each other. The end being to make one or the other. By some fault of language implied that there is such a thing as a human being or an existence. And the question is put. What is the power of the bodhisattva. The answer. The Vow of the body satisfy is. I will not accept. Release for myself until all beings shall have been released. And now we have to continue. But when all beings will have been released then no beings will have been released because to imagine that there are beings to have to be released. I would disqualify you for body Siput for and you have been listening to Dr Joseph Campbell

speaking on Zen Buddhism. The chairman was Dr Johnson E. Fairchild of the Cooper Union. The program was recorded on March 5th 1969 at the great hall of the Cooper Union in New York City by station WNYC. This is the national educational radio network.