A Zen Talk
Young & Old, Truth & Death

In the Heart Sutra, it says there is no old age and the Teachings of Shakyamuni Buddha are precisely that of truth. Each one of us has this nature. If we come to awaken to this, we see the words of the Buddha were very true. This sense of time about ancient times or modern times disappears. Even though many awakened people have come and gone in this world, it will feel as though those ancient teachers are alive today. It will feel as though you are living with them within that truth. As a result, your faith continually grows.

A Lecture by Venerable Hyunoong Sunim
Sixth Patriarch Zen Center, Berkeley

When people are young they have strong energy and they feel as though they can accomplish anything. Its a fine attitude but its simply an expression of a certain part of life. Its not truth and its not something permanent but we hold to youth or strength and we believe in that instead of truth. This is how we become attached.

When we're young it takes little to make us feel happy and hopeful but as we get older, its like the sun going down; that energy becomes diminished, it starts to fade. When that hope we believed in starts to fade, this is when we start to have that feeling of wandering about our life. People who aren't even that old start to have thoughts about wanting to die. So there's a constant direction towards decline.

This is typical of most people, but if we can awaken to the truth within us, it won't matter if we are young or old. In our true mind there is no attachment to youth or old age and this is why we won't have expectations; we just express ourselves when we are young according to that youth and as we get older, we can see things more at a distance. As we grow older we can become wiser. So getting old isn't something bad. But, if we misunderstand our life or approach it in the wrong way, when we get older and our energy declines if we still don't have an understanding, then we will begin to feel unsettled, uncomfortable and we will start to fear death.

From the point of view of truth, because it functions without any of those things, as we get older we simply accept what old age means, when we're young we accept our youth.

In the Heart Sutra, it says there is no old age and the Teachings of Shakyamuni Buddha are precisely that of truth. Its not a matter of just looking at what was within the Buddha himself. Individually, within each one of us we have this nature. If we come to awaken to this, we see the words of the Buddha were very true. This sense of time about ancient times or modern times disappears. Even though many awakened people have come and gone in this world, it will feel as though those ancient teachers are alive today. It will feel as though you are living with them within that truth. As a result your faith continually grows. The way you see the present time becomes broader. This is real religion.

The teachings can be correct teachings but people believe them in their own way; people hear the teachings and believe them through their own delusion. So when we try to awaken we try to do so through those same habits. Reading books is not bad but we need to understand that our mind can be deluded and if we observe our mind as we read, then that's okay. If we're not observing our self as we read the books then as we read the teachings we just try to understand them as mental concepts or in our own way and we nod our heads saying "yes I understand this". At the time we're reading it our head can understand but this has absolutely no effect over our own delusion. If our knowledge just keeps growing through those kind of habits, then our mind of faith will not appear.

All that has increased is our knowledge and as our knowledge increases, without even realizing it, it starts to produce arrogance and our mind of faith decreases.

If our arrogance grows and our faith declines, we come to make a lot of judgments, unnecessary, useless judgments. This is how we start to make another world of illusion. This is how karma arises. Through this karma, our emotions, energy and consciousness come together and start to harden. They function out of harmony with each other. We can become physically ill, for example, a "wind illness" in Oriental medicine can come to cause someone to lose control over their arm or hand. Even though its their body, they can't do what they want with it. In the same way, when we become deluded our consciousness and our mind become separated.

If we want the candlelight to be bright, there has to be wax, but in this case the wax and wick have become separated so there is no brightness in our consciousness. We can have a lot of thinking but because there is no light there, we cannot see and it becomes useless thinking. Its with this that we live in the world and make judgments of the world and we don't understand how to see correctly. In many different ways our paths in the world become blocked.

So even though we live in this great natural universe, we've made it into a very small world. We feel very uncomfortable because we don't know what will happen next. In this condition we cannot help but experience suffering and there is not anyone who enjoys suffering.

People want to be happy but they've taken all the necessary conditions for happiness and shattered them and then they live in confusion. Even though we all have this wisdom which is the same wisdom of the Buddha, we still live in confusion.

Its very fortunate that we have this nature of awakening. We don't make distinctions between different kinds of karma that we have but because this Buddha nature is the light of wisdom, when you've seen it once, even extremely heavy karma will be shattered and everything will become very bright. We need to see it as very fortunate that we are able to know the teachings of the Buddha and to study and practice the Buddha Dharma.

From moment to moment you have the opportunity to awaken but you just have to ask yourself whether your approach is incorrect. You don't need to think about this, just observe these things and moment to moment it is there. Our thinking, developed from habits over time, frequently arises and snatches it away from you and you forget it again. Its not that you've lost it, its just that your thinking habits have enticed you back into those thinking habits. So don't take it hook, line and sinker when those thoughts come up, because even then, this nature I'm talking about is there. You can remind yourself: "this is just because I wasn't realizing my attachment, its not that truth isn't here".

This is something which has great possibility. If it was something we didn't actually have our self and had to try to borrow from someplace else, then it would be difficult.

Sometimes we just take a wrong step and all we have to do is realize that. As we continually realize these mistakes, one by one, our karma becomes lighter and our practice becomes easier.

Then we will find real freedom. It won't matter what comes along from outside us to obscure it. We will see that past, present and future are all connected with each other and I and others are one.

The method for this practice is not thinking.

What we can obtain from the world is very temporary and not secure. Because we have to live in the world, we need a certain amount of money, food and clothing. But those kind of things cannot give us eternal comfort and they cannot prevent you from having fear of old age and death. You can never know what kind of illness or death you may have. At death, there is no medicine.

Death is something we can do absolutely nothing about. If you awaken to the truth that is within you, then you no longer believe that this body is who you are and you will realize that your real self is that truth. That is why Christ said I am the way and I am the truth. This body is a kind of house, it's a house of truth, this body is something we use for awhile and then it disappears.

So, its not that we make efforts to try not to be attached to our body. Rather, when we experience this truth, then that kind of attachment just automatically disappears and we realize that old age is just a very natural thing and that death is just a very natural thing. In the same way as autumn, when the leaves fall from the tree, can produce poetry in our heart, old age and death, can also produce poetry in our heart. This is not true for most people, they can't even THINK of writing poetry at those times.

Some take a path where they constantly worry. Usually we are worried or startled by the slightest little thing. When we get older, out teeth start to get loose or we get arthritis, our head is not clear anymore, our body feels heavy we have a lot of useless thinking in our head. As a result, our body and mind head in a dark direction. Its like the earth opens up and we fall into a big crack and the earth closes up again. This is called hell. Its not a place we go after we die, its right here with us while we're alive. So according to how we live and the purity of our life, we can be in a good place; but if live incorrectly in our life, then, of course, even after we die, we will not be going in a good direction. Most people have all kinds of worries: worried about coming down with dementia, worried about not having money… we keep doing this, when we add on top of it all these worries and negative thoughts; its not helpful.

If we can have the kind of mind where we can write some poetry at old age or death, how much better that would be. This is the path of someone who practices Zen. We are all the same kind of people who are traveling through life. Since we're all traveling anyway, lets all get on the Zen train. I hope whenever you can, you will come here and sit and lets continue to work on going in this direction. I invite any of you to get on this train; I will drive!

Understanding the teachings and sitting has been very good for my life. The more time goes on, the more experiences I have. I realize the teachings of the ancient masters and the Buddha are, without a doubt, complete and correct. It becomes proof when we've experienced it, we continually change and there is always a feeling of gratitude coming from within. A lot of happiness arises, so the light keeps getting brighter. So there's a path we can take like this. In Buddhism we call this the path of extreme joy.