PZI Events Calendar
W E L C O M E to the PZI Events Calendar! Here you will find all upcoming events and registration links for PZI Zen Online retreats, sesshins, and weekly meditations & talks. Search by individual event, day, or month. Save to your Google Calendar or iCal Calendar. No experience required to participate. All event times are Pacific Time. Questions? Contact Lucas at PZI Support.
F E A T U R E D
April 26: What Is This Light That Everybody Has? – Deep Sit Sunday Zen with John Tarrant & Tess Beasley
May 7–10: Say A True Word & I Will Stay The Night – Open Mind Retreat with John Tarrant, Tess Beasley, & Allison Atwill
June 8–14: Dragons & Tigers, Oh My! – Our Great Summer Sesshin with John Tarrant & PZI Teachers
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MONDAY ZEN with Jon Joseph: Dahui Breaks Through
REGISTER
Being and non-being are like vines clinging to a tree.
If suddenly the tree falls and the vines wither, where do being and non-being go?
—Book of Serenity Case 87
Every day Dahui went to Yuanwu Keqin for instruction, but all Yuanwu would say is “Being and non-being are like vines clinging to a tree.” Whenever Dahui opened his mouth to respond, Yuanwu would cut him off, saying “That’s no good!”
One day Dahui went to the master and said, ”I heard that you once asked your teacher Wuzu about being and non-being. Do you remember the master’s reply?” In answer, Yuanwu only laughed. Dahui said, “Since you asked in front of the assembly, surely there’s no reason not to tell me Wuzu’s reply.”
Yuanwu then said, “When I asked about the statement ’being and non-being are like vines clinging to a tree,’ Wuzu replied, ‘Try to describe it and it cannot be described; try to portray it and it cannot be portrayed.’ When I asked, ‘What if the tree suddenly falls and the vines whither?’ Wuzu said,’They come down together.’”
Dahui suddenly understood.
Dahui Zonggao (1089-1163) is considered one of the greatest Chan masters from the Song Dynasty, a period when Chan had a profound influence on religious and political life in China, the world’s largest nation at time. He is best known for promoting meditation using huatou (word head) koan fragments as a way to help students break through to kensho.
Dahui was also one of the most controversial teachers of the time. When he found that monks were over-intellectualizing his teacher Yuanwu’s koan collection, The Blue Cliff Record, he ordered all copies gathered up and destroyed. When the political faction his students were aligned with fell out of favor, Dahui was defrocked and banished by the imperial court for fourteen years, though he continued to teach and write.
Dahui’s Letters are perhaps best known for their harsh criticism of “silent illumination,” a purportedly “quietistic” form of meditation practiced in the Caodong (Soto) School. Ironically, it was a leading Caodong teacher, Hongzhi Zhenjue
(compiler of the koan collection The Book of Serenity), who helped Dahui return from exile and regain an abbot position at a leading monastery.
As he was dying, Dahui wrote this poem:
Birth is just so.
Death is just so.
So, as for composing a verse,
Why does it matter?
—Jon Joseph
COME JOIN US on Mondays for koan meditation, dharma talk and conversation. Register to participate. All are welcome.
Jon Joseph Roshi, Director of San Mateo Zen Community
