Upcoming retreat and Master Hongzhi and Silent Illumination

The correct way of practice is to sit simply in stillness
and silently investigate.

Deep down there is a state one reaches where externally
one is no longer swirled about by causes and conditions.

The mind, being empty, is all-embracing.

Its luminosity being wondrous,
it is precisely appropriate and impartial.

Internally there are no thoughts.

Vast and removed, it stands alone in itself
without falling into stupor.

Bright and potent, it cuts off all dependence
and remains self-at-ease.

Master Hongzhi, the twelfth-century master who put together these practices under the name Silent Illumination.

PLEASE NOTE THE MEETING PLACE AT COURTENAY ELEMENTARY SCHOOL IS CLOSED FOR DEC 27 AND JAN 3

There is an upcoming retreat at the Bethleham Retreat Centre in Nanaimo. We arrive between 3 and 4 o'clock on Friday the 25th at the Bethleham Retreat Centre in Nanaimo. We set up in our rooms, we eat, we do an evening meditation. We have a full day Saturday, Sunday and leave on Monday at 2 o'clock. I'm about to receive the quote for the cost, it's around $306 plus taxes which includes sleeping and food. As one of you is a  student, let me know if you can afford the cost. I can up other people's cost. Please contact me witha non-refundable depostit by December 15.  See http://www.bethlehemretreatcentre.com/

FMI chancommunity.ca

or adrian at 250 898 8201

adrian2@shaw.ca

2013 January Chan retreat in Nanaimo

Upcoming January 2013 Chan Retreat at the Bethleham Retreat Centre in Nanaimo.

There will be a retreat led by William Tsao January 25, 26 and 27, 28.  So, we arrive between 3 and 4 o'clock on Friday the 25th at the Bethleham Retreat Centre in Nanaimo. We set up in our rooms, we eat, we do an evening meditation. We have a full day Saturday, Sunday and leave on Monday at 2 o'clock.  The cost is $306 per person which includes sleeping and food. 

William will be doing more retreats in Europe and the US so we will not have as much access to the teachings presented in person by him. If you are interested in consulting William about your practice, this is the time to do it.

Many of us have already done a retreat at the Centre http://www.bethlehemretreatcentre.com/  It's a great place.

You can put a 50% NON-REFUNDABLE DEPOSIT to be received by the 15th of December to hold a place in the retreat. We are able to book a maximum of 18 rooms, so space is limited. This is a not-for-profit retreat. Full registration cost should be received by January 15th. (Problems?….give me a call.)

All registrations/deposits are to be sent/emailed to:

adrian symonds

1146 Cumberland Rd.

Courtenay, B.C.

V9N 2E6

250 898 8201

Address the cheques to Adrian Symonds, not the retreat centre. Do not register or send your deposit/ full cost to the retreat centre! They do not have the administrative capacity to deal with dozens of personal cheques. 

Please register ASAP. AS of the 21st of november, there are 10 out of 18 rooms available. 

If you want your email address removed from my Chan list, please let me know.

For more info on Chan check out chancommunity.ca

Upcoming Summer Retreat: Aug 3 to 10

Retreats allow you to deepen your practice. A retreat is approaching. I don't have the digital poster for it yet. The registration information is at chancommunity.ca. A 3 day retreat is $130 and a 7 day retreat is $210: a bargain especially considering who is leading the retreat. A suggested donation above and beyond the not-for-profit costs ($130 and $210) would be given to the Hermitage and to the monk, Master Guo Jun, who is leading the retreat. The retreat has registered 35 people already without advertising. It will be the largest retreat the Hermitage has hosted. The food is fantastic. There is camping on site and a few cabins are available for non-campers. There are many b and b's available but if you are thinking b and b, better pre-book it now. Most cabins will be shared unless there are particular individual challenges. 

Do a retreat if you can. If you've never done one before, choose a 3 day retreat. They may not let you do a longer retreat than 3 days if you've never retreated before. If you have meditative experience, go deeper and do a 7 day. Dont' go to the retreat if you don't develop a daily sitting practice before the retreat. It's much too difficult to sit for all that time. The first three days are the hardest. 

Go onto the Hermitage site http://www.dharmafellowship.org/hermitage/ for more info on Master Guo Jun, and register through chancommunity.ca, not the Hermitage.

All this month we are sitting at Courtenay Elementary School, the 2nd floor...the first room you'll see at the top of the stairs, Thursday nights, 7 to 9. For the one person who told me she could not get there before seven because she leads a yoga class, call me 898 8201. Sometimes the janitor closes the front doors after 7:10. I'll talk to him. We will switch to Gordon's studio the first Thursday in July, same times, 7 to 9 only the date will CHANGE TO WEDNESDAY evening. 

Upcoming teaching weekend

William Tsao, principle teacher in Canada of Chan and certified in both Huatou Chan and Silent Illumination Chan by Master Sheng Yen will be leading a  two day workshop:

Cost: by donation only

Time: Saturday June, 2 2012 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. to 

  Sunday June 3, 2012 10 to 4 p.m.  (are these times ok William?)

Place: Gordon Ross Photography Studio

2314 Rosewall Crescent

Courtenay, BC, V9N 8R9

250 338 8030 (do not register at this number)

Registration A.S.A.P.: 

adrian symonds

250 898 8201

adrian2@shaw.ca

The official poster will follow later.

Please take advantage of this very special occasion. 

1923: Zen master Nyogen Senzaki meets Sufi Master Hazrat Inayat Khan

In San Franciso, 1923, Sufi Ahmed Murad Chisti (Murshid Samuel L. Lewis) introduces Zen Master Nyogen Senzaki to Sufi Master Hazrat Inayat Khan. Senzaki writes, "His eyes were full of water---not the tears of the world, but water from the great ocean---calm and transparent. I recited an old Zen poem by Jakushitsu---not with my mouth, not with my mind, but with a blink of my eyes, like a flash.

No living soul comes near the water.
A vast sheet of water as blue as indigo!
The abyss has a depth of ten thousand feet.
When all is quiet and calm, at midnight,
Only the moonlight penetrates the waves
And reaches the bottom easily and freely.

"Murshid," I then said, "I see Zen in you."
"Mr. Senzaki, I see a Sufi in you," he replied.
Both of us then smiled at each other.
...from Nyogen Senzaki in Eloquent Silence, pg. 242.

This is the eightieth blog and perhaps the last.  Susan Murphy writes in Upside-Down Zen, "How is this practice, this immensely sobering Way of meditation, also a matter of pure play?"

After 80 blogs, we know definitively ...that we don't know. The playing begins, anew.

 Classes will remain at the Courtenay Elementary School. Check the headings for cancellations and change of place.

Also check out these Chan sites of interest:

1. chancommunity.ca

2. How to chan meditate:

http://chancenter.org/cmc/chan-practice/how-to-meditate/

3. Master Sheng Yen in Facebook

4. The Western Chan Fellowship at http://www.westernchanfellowship.org/

5. Other Buddhist centres in the Comox Valley:

http://www.dharmafellowship.org/hermitage/ 

http://www.sherabchammaling.com/biography.html

Call Adrian at 250 898 8201,

email adrian2@shaw.ca 

Hui-Neng and the 3rd No, No abiding, and yes there will be a class this Thurs.

Hui-Neng taught three guiding principles to attain No Self.   No thought. No form. No abiding. The third No is perhaps the stickiest of the 7th century Chan patriarch Hui-Neng's three principles. The 20th century modern Chan master Sheng-Yen in his dharma talk  'What is Chan?' given  in 1977 illuminates the concept of No Abiding.

"I must emphasise that the content of Chan does not appear until the third stage. Chan is unimaginable. It is neither a concept nor a feeling. It is impossible to describe it in any terms abstract or concrete. Though meditation is ordinarily the proper path leading to Chan, once you have arrived at the door of Chan, even the method of meditation is rendered useless. It is like using various means of transportation on a long journey. When you reach the final destination, you find a steep cliff standing right in front of you. It is so high you cannot see its top, and so wide that its side cannot be found. At this time a person who has been to the other side of the cliff comes to tell you that on the other side lies the world of Chan. When you scale it you will enter Chan. And yet, he tells you not to depend on any means of transportation to fly over, bypass, or penetrate through it, because it is infinity itself, and there is no way to scale it.

Even an outstanding Chan master able to bring his student to this place will find himself unable to help any more. Although he has been to the other side, he cannot take you there with him, just as a mother's own eating and drinking cannot take the hunger away from the child who refuses to eat or drink. At that time, the only help he can give you is to tell you to discard all your experiences, your knowledge, and all the things and ideas that you think are the most reliable, most magnificent, and most real, even including your hope to get to the world of Chan. It is as if you were entering a sacred building. Before you do so, the guard tells you that you must not carry any weapon, that you must take off all your clothes, and that not only must you be completely naked you also have to leave your body and soul behind. Then you can enter.

Because Chan is a world where there is no self, if there is still any attachment at all in your mind, there is no way you can harmonise with Chan. Therefore, Chan is the territory of the wise, and the territory of the brave. Not being wise, one would not believe that after he has abandoned all attachments another world could appear before him. Not being brave, one would find it very hard to discard everything he has accumulated in this life - ideals and knowledge, spiritual and material things."...from http://www.westernchanfellowship.org/what-is-chan-shengyen.html

Also check out these Chan sites of interest:

1. chancommunity.ca

2. How to chan meditate:

http://chancenter.org/cmc/chan-practice/how-to-meditate/

3. Master Sheng Yen in Facebook

4. The Western Chan Fellowship at http://www.westernchanfellowship.org/

5. Other Buddhist centres in the Comox Valley:

http://www.dharmafellowship.org/hermitage/ 

http://www.sherabchammaling.com/biography.html

Call Adrian at 250 898 8201,

email adrian2@shaw.ca

Please notify me if you wish to be removed from the email list.

Hui-Neng and the 2nd No...No Thought, No Form; (and no class this Thursday)

Hui-Neng, the 6th Patriarch of Chan, is best known for the Three No's: no thought, no form and no abiding. What is no form? It's not that things don't exist; it's that we must not cover over  the object of our perception with our self-centered, our discriminatory volition. 

"Nothing that exists is true

don't think what you see is true

if you think you see the truth

what you see is surely false

if you want to find the true 

the mind free of the false is true

unless your mind forsakes the false

nothing is true where true can't be." 

...1st verse of the Hui-Neng's Gatha of Truth and Falsehood and Movement and Stillness.' The Platform Sutra, translated by Red Pine, pg. 43

The mummified body of Huineng is kept in Nanhua Temple in Shaoguan Prefecture (northern Guangdong).

Also check out these Chan sites of interest:

1. chancommunity.ca

2. How to chan meditate:

http://chancenter.org/cmc/chan-practice/how-to-meditate/

3. Master Sheng Yen in Facebook

4. The Western Chan Fellowship at http://www.westernchanfellowship.org/

5. Other Buddhist centres in the Comox Valley:

http://www.dharmafellowship.org/hermitage/ 

http://www.sherabchammaling.com/biography.html

Call Adrian at 250 898 8201,

email adrian2@shaw.ca

Please notify me if you wish to be removed from the email list.

Marty, William Tsao and Lisa the Timekeeper, and Adrian

and Patricia