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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TUESDAY ZEN with David Weinstein: Yunmen’s Cleverer Thief – Book of Serenity Case 40
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Yunmen asked Jianfeng, “May I have your answer?”
Jianfeng said, “Have you even arrived here yet?
Yunmen said, “In that case I’m late.”
“Is that so. Is that so?” said Jianfeng.
Yunmen said, “You are a cleverer thief than I am.”
Several people have told me that their first reaction to this koan was, “Huh?” Though koans often don’t make sense, this one seems to make even less sense than the usual not making sense.
The conversation between Yunmen and Jianfeng appears to be modeled after a conversation that took place between the Greek King Milinda and the Buddhist teacher Nagasena around 150 BC almost 300 years after the Buddha died, and a thousand years before Yunmen was born – an encounter between Hellenistic and Buddhist thinking. Reminds me of touring the Buddhist collection in a museum in Lahore, Pakistan. There were many life-size statues of bodhisattvas wearing Greek robes.
The conversation between Milinda and Nagasena is one of many included in the text The Questions of King Milinda, and it goes like this:
The king said, “I’m going to pose a question. Can you answer?”
Nagasena said, “Please ask your question.”
The king said, “I’ve already asked.”
Nagasena responded, “I’ve already answered.”
Then the king said, “What did you answer?”
Nagasena countered, “What did you ask?”
The king said, “I’ve asked nothing.”
Nagasena replied, “I’ve answered nothing.”
As you can see this ‘not making sense’ has been going on for a long time, though the conversation between Yunmen and Jianfeng seems to make less sense than the conversation between Nagasena and King Milinda. Progress?
Have you arrived here yet?
—David Weinstein
COME JOIN US on Tuesdays for koan meditation, dharma talk and conversation.
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David Weinstein Roshi, Director of Rockridge Meditation Community
