Zen Buddhism El Paso Texas (11/21/2009)

Yes, we will be sitting this Saturday, 330pm, November 21, at 711 Robinson in the Kern Place neighborhood. Hope you can join us.

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THE FLOWER SERMON

Toward the end of his life, the Buddha took his disciples to a quiet pond for instruction. As they had done so many times before, the Buddha’s followers sat in a small circle around him, and waited for the teaching.

But this time the Buddha had no words. He reached into the muck and pulled up a lotus flower. And he held it silently before them, its roots dripping mud and water.

The disciples were greatly confused. Buddha quietly displayed the lotus to each of them. In turn, the disciples did their best to expound upon the meaning of the flower: what it symbollized, and how it fit into the body of Buddha’s teaching.

When at last the Buddha came to his follower Mahakasyapa, the disciple suddenly understood. He smiled and began to laugh. Buddha handed the lotus to Mahakasyapa and began to speak.

“What can be said I have said to you,” smiled the Buddha, “and what cannot be said, I have given to Mahakashyapa.”

Mahakashyapa became Buddha’s successor from that day forward.

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Since the November cold snap it’s been more and more difficult for John to find flowers for the altar in his neighborhood or in the arroyo, so he walked down to Albertson’s and bought a bunch of cut lilies, the three-bunches-for-$12 kind. He picked one for the altar, and the others he put in a tall vase on the dining room table. The lily he chose for the altar was beautiful--fully formed and open, a soft-russet spotted with dark specks and with white showing through, its creative parts fully exposed although of course no bees or hummingbirds are allowed inside the Zendo. While lighting the candle and seeing the lily I remembered the story the Buddha, his flower and his student. After serving tea, I placed the flower on the floor so we could see it easily. I rang the bell, we sipped our tea and enjoyed the flower in silence. Silence can be difficult but not always. Certainly not with the flower. After tea and the bell and the Four Great Vows, I blew out the candle, we thanked each other and we stacked the zabutons and the zafus. That’s been a few days now. The flower is probably dead.

By the way, scholars are not sure whether this story is true or not. The Wikipedia article suggests that it may be an invention of the Chinese Ch'an Buddhists. I don't really care. It's a good story.