Book of Equanimity  Case 48 

VimalakirtiÕs Nonduality

Master Wong SongÕs Preface to the Assembly

Even if oneÕs subtle function is universal, thereÕs a place where 
one canÕt even begin to act. Even if oneÕs eloquence is unhindered, 
thereÕs a time when one canÕt open oneÕs mouth. Longya was like a 
handless man boxing. Jiashan made a tongueless man able to speak. 
Who is it who can extricate oneself midway?
 
The Main Case

Vimalakirti asked Manjushri, ÒWhat is a bodhisattvaÕs method of 
entering nonduality?ÓManjushri said, ÒAccording to my mind, in all 
things, no speech, no explanations, no direction, no representation, 
leaving behind all questions and answers, this is the method of 
entering nonduality. Then Manjushri asked Vimalakirti, ÒWe have each 
spoken, now you should say. Good man, what is a bodhisattvaÕs method 
of entering into nonduality? Vimalakirti was silent.

Master HongzhiÕs Verse

Manjushri inquires after the illness of the old Vaisalian;
The gate of nonduality opens Ñ Behold the adept.
Crude without, pure within Ñ who appreciates it?
Forgetting ÔbeforeÕ and losing Ôafter,Õ donÕt sigh.
Struggling to present the gem Ñ the man with his feet cut off in the 
garden of Chu:
Repaying with a jewel, shining bright Ñ the cut snake of Sui.
Stop checking Ñ
There are absolutely no flaws:

This past week we looked at home practice and I mentioned to the 
group that was assembled there that although in the Mahayana 
tradition there is a strong support of lay practice and that there 
are indeed lay practitioners or white-robed ones in the history of 
Mahayana Buddhism, the fact is that until the present day there 
really has been no lay practice per say. Technically you can say 
that Layman Pang, and laywoman Pang, and the daughter in the Pang 
family, three very enlightened lay practitioners of the Tang Dynasty 
were lay practitioners but in actual fact when you look at the way 
they lived their lives you would have to say that they were really 
following a monastic lifestyle. Layman Pang had made a lot of money 
as a merchant but he reached a point in his practice when he took 
all of his worldly goods and went and sank them in a big lake. And 
he and his wife and daughter became wandering mendicants in a sense. 
They didnÕt beg for their food, they sold straw sandals on the road 
for their food. They lived in the woods, they had basically 
renounced worldly affairs. Vimalakirti who, in this koan is one of 
the most famous of the lay practitioners, is said to have lived at 
the time of the Buddha. He was a merchant, very involved in worldly 
affairs, was as enlightened as the Buddha, equivalent to the Buddha 
and used as an example of lay practice. But we donÕt know anything 
about how he lived his life. We know his wifeÕs name, and his 
daughterÕs name, and his sonÕs name. We know how he made his 
business, but we donÕt know what he did day to day. How he managed 
to run all his businesses and at the same time come to deep 
realization equivalent to that of the Buddha. So as an example, itÕs 
not much of an example. We get his teaching, the teaching of the 
nondual dharma in this sutra, the Vimalakirti sutra, but none of the 
details. 

There doesnÕt seem to be much of a history of lay practice though we 
know that it existed at various times in China and Japan and so on. 
And it seems that probably one of the reasons is that institutions 
such as monasteries are the places that would maintain historical 
records and lineages. But so far as we know, no continuous lay 
lineages have come down though the ages to this time and this place. 
Whatever happened to Layman Pang, did he have any disciples? Did 
Vimalakirti have any disciples? Did Laywoman Pang have any 
disciples? Did Leng Chow, the daughter have any disciples? We donÕt 
know. We do know that they studied at the monasteries of the time 
and that they later became wanderers. We know what their teachings 
were, and they are very fine teachings, no question about it. So in 
a sense weÕre writing in the latter part of the twentieth century in 
the West, a history of lay practice. WeÕre putting the chapters in 
there that have never been put in there, and weÕre writing a few 
other chapters too. 

Mahayana Buddhism has always spoken of the equality of men and women 
and yet the historical records donÕt show much activity of that 
equality. There are isolated cases, but definitely no equivalent to 
the way the Mahayana teachings speak of the equality of men and 
women. Discrimination exists against women in all of the schools in 
one way or another. Individual teachers are the exceptions rather 
than the rule. So again for the first time in the history of 
Buddhism, it finds itself in a country where that discrimination is 
illegal. And so the opportunity for the Mahayana teachings of the 
equality of men and women now has an opportunity to come to 
fruition. And now for the first time in the Mahayana tradition, half 
the practitioners are women, in some places more than half. Women 
teachers are emerging. Again the same is true of social action, 
although Mahayana Buddhism speaks of compassion and the bodhisattva, 
very little opportunity existed in the history of Buddhism for that 
compassionate action. Monasteries were very isolated in China. 
Emperors were very touchy about what you had to say or how you 
interfered in the function of state. If the religion proved to be 
any kind of a threat whatsoever to the nation or the state, 
monasteries were burned and the monks were beheaded, itÕs as simple 
as that. Again for the first time in Mahayana Buddhism, it finds 
itself in nations in the West where religious freedom is an 
essential guarantee of the State. Separation of Church and State is 
one of the primary principles in these societies. So social action 
becomes possible without fear putting an end to the religion. 

ItÕs kind of extraordinary, just this setting, right here today, is 
unprecedented in all of the ancient history of Buddhism, to have a 
hall filled with lay practitioners listening to a discourse in the 
context of monastic practice. There were always public talks, but 
this is different. The lay practitioners are participating fully in 
every aspect of the training. Dokusan, service, work practice, 
everything that the monks do, the lay practitioners have an 
opportunity to do. It makes you wonder why it took so long. 

If you really put yourself into the situation as it existed many 
years ago at the time of the Buddha or in China or in medieval 
Japan. Leisure time wasnÕt available, people were struggling for a 
living. If you were a farmer, you and all of your family were 
constantly tilling the fields, and monasteries and teachers were 
hundreds and thousands of miles away, deep in the recesses of the 
mountains. Hard to get to; not so difficult in the 20th century with 
transportation and communication what it is. Leisure time was 
something that only emperors and members of the courts had, and they 
were the lay practitioners. Almost all the lay practitioners in the 
history of Zen were the high government officials and the emperors, 
they were the only oneÕs that had the leisure time to do it, but 
today leisure time is available to people. We have weekends off, we 
have a couple of weekÕs vacation every year at least. People who are 
lucky enough to be teaching have two months off each year. This is 
unprecedented. So this provides for the first time an opportunity to 
do serious practice and not gain merit just by dana, by giving, but 
rather by oneÕs own practice. And itÕs for this reason that weÕre 
put so much emphasis on lay practice here at Zen Mountain Monastery. 
I am convinced that a strong core, monastery or center, with a 
teacher representing a lineage, authenticated, can provide a 
powerful core for a large group of lay practitioners in the world. 

The next question is, how do you support them? Obviously the main 
means of support is communication. Communication of the dharma, of 
the teachings, of the Buddha, of the Sangha. And so we create 
Mountain Record, we took advantage of the modern media and 
communication revolution and use video and audio. We set up systems 
that provide human contact such as training advisors that coordinate 
the activities inside and outside of the Monastery. We create lay 
practice centers and affiliates wherever thereÕs a large enough 
group of students in one place to support it. And we create a form 
of teaching that can take place on an individual basis, and thatÕs 
the Eight Gates of Training. The only thing in the Eight Gates that 
we havenÕt figured out how to get to you through Dharma 
Communications is dokusan, the intimacy of the teacherÐstudent 
relationship. But maybe in the not to distant future, IÕll be able 
to show up in your living room when you want dokusan. We donÕt have 
the kind of teaching that some of the traditions have, that the guru 
is always present. At any time you just summon the guru and the guru 
is present. We donÕt have gurus, unless itÕs you. Each person is 
their own guru. The teacher can only point. The teacher can only 
create complications. The teacher ultimately has nothing to give and 
ultimately you have nothing to receive. But there is a process, the 
process of going deep into oneself to find the foundations of what 
this incredible dharma is about. And so I say again and again, that 
we should keep in mind as we practice this incredible Way, that what 
weÕre doing is not only clarifying our own life but creating a 
precedent, weÕre writing a chapter in the history of this incredible 
dharma. 

In the Preface to the Assembly, Wong Song says, ÒEven if one subtle 
function is universal, thereÕs a place where one canÕt even begin to 
act.Ó What heÕs referring to when he says ÒÉsubtle function is 
universalÉÓ is the totality of human experience, the totality of 
being, the totality of the universe. In other words heÕs talking 
about the absolute basis of reality. So even if one has realized the 
absolute basis of reality, thereÕs a place where one canÕt even 
begin to act. Having realized that, thereÕs something that is 
ultimately non-functional. The second line says, ÒEven if oneÕs 
eloquence is unhindered, thereÕs a time when one canÕt open oneÕs 
mouth.Ó No matter how eloquent you are, there are things that cannot 
be spoken of, that cannot be expressed. The Tao that can be 
expressed in words is not the true Tao. Then he gives examples from 
other koans and asks the question, ÒWho can extricate oneself 
midway?Ó How do you extricate yourself from this state? Keep in mind 
that the Vimalakirti sutra, the thrust of the Vimalakirti sutra is 
the teaching of the relationship between absolute and relative. The 
teachings of the nonduality of absolute and relative. And when you 
speak of the nondual dharma, itÕs speaking of all of the 
nondualities. So whatever applies to form and emptiness also applies 
to any other duality. Man and woman, heaven and earth, good and bad, 
monastery and the world, monk practice and lay practice, sacred and 
secular. And always teachers have used one to illuminate the other. 
So when you point to the absolute, the teacher will point to the 
relative. When you point to the relative the teacher will point to 
the absolute. Understand that the truth of this incredible dharma is 
found in neither. 

Here in this koan, Vimalakirti asks Manjushri, ÒWhat is a 
bodhisattvaÕs method of entering into nonduality?Ó Manjushri is the 
teacher of the past seven Buddhas, and an extraordinary bodhisattva. 
And thereÕs an assembly of bodhisattvas at VimalakirtiÕs house. 
Those of you that have read the sutra are familiar with it. 
Vimalakirti was ill, and the Buddha called all of his bodhisattvas 
together and all the arhats and the disciples. Many of these 
disciples were monks of the old school, of the Hinayana school. This 
sutra is a Mahayana sutra and itÕs going to show what the 
shortcomings of the Hinayana practice are. You see all sorts of 
things happen, like the goddess showers flowers down on the assembly 
and the flowers all stick to the robes of the Hinayana practitioners 
and theyÕre freaking out because they are not allowed to adorn 
themselves, and they start tearing at the flowers to try and take 
them off. But all the bodhisattvas, the flowers just fall right off, 
they donÕt stick. So thereÕs a big discourse on what thatÕs all 
about. In another situation a goddess appears and in the Hinayana 
teachings, women canÕt become enlightened, they have to be reborn as 
a man to become enlightened. So hereÕs this enlightened goddess who 
engages in dharma combat with one of the Hinayana monks who canÕt 
understand that since sheÕs so enlightened which she proves through 
this wonderful dharma combat, ÒWhy donÕt you leave your womanÕs body 
and become a man?Ó And she does a number on him with regard to that. 
So itÕs a nice teaching this sutra, of those things that I talked 
about, compassion, of the equality of men and women in the dharma, 
of lay practice, in the world in the monastery in the mountain. 
Being codependent realities, mutually interpenetrating, mutually 
arising and thatÕs the way I hope our practice here at Zen Mountain 
Monastery will continue to develop between the lay practitioners and 
the monk practitioners. That there will always be a dynamic and 
supportive relationship on the part of both parts, because it wonÕt 
work with either. Both are essential to the dharma staying strong, 
vital, and touching our lives and everything that we do. 

So Vimalakirti was sick at home. Sick because of the sickness of all 
sentient beings. And heÕs laying in bed and Buddha gets hold of 
Subhuti and says, ÒWhy donÕt you take a bunch of the monks and go 
over and visit Vimalakirti.Ó They donÕt want to go because every 
time they go, Vimalakirti gets them all entangled in dharma combat 
which they always end up losing. It reminds me of the dialogs with 
Plato and Aristotle, kind of like a setup for the master to come out 
on top. And finally the Buddha says, Go, and they go. Tens of 
hundreds and thousands of arhats and bodhisattvas, goddesses, and 
gods fill this little room that heÕs in, and of course thereÕs 
plenty of room for everybody to fit in. ThereÕs a lot of magic in 
this sutra. If youÕve never heard Robert Thurman speak on it, heÕs a 
treat to listen to. He gets all excited about it. He starts naming 
one after another, all these different kinds of beings that are 
present, and all of the magic. And as he says in his book, the 
intent of all of this magic is to stretch oneÕs imagination, not to 
place any limits of the possibilities. From a Zen point of view all 
of these extraordinary magical things that take place need to be 
understood, and many of them are what koans are about. So everybody 
goes there and each chapter deals with a different aspect of the 
teaching of Vimalakirti. This particular one deals with nonduality. 
Vimalakirti asks each of the bodhisattvas to present their 
understanding. So basically what the whole chapter is about is each 
bodhisattva getting up and saying what the bodhisattvaÕs method of 
entering nonduality is. Of course every one of them is going off at 
the mouth. TheyÕre explaining the whole thing, including the great 
master Manjushri, teacher of the Buddha. So Vimalakirti finally gets 
to Manjushri and the end of the chapter and says, ÒWhat is a 
bodhisattvaÕs method of entering nonduality?Ó And Manjushri says, 
ÒAccording to my mind, in all things ÉÓ you could really nail this 
line word after word. ÒAccording to my mind, in all things, no 
speech ÉÓ then shut up, ÒÉno explanationÉÓ stop talking, ÒÉ no 
direction ÉÓ stop pointing, ÒÉ no presentation, leaving behind all 
questions and answers, this is the method of entering nonduality.Ó 
Then Manjushri asked Vimalakirti, ÒWe have each spoken, now you 
should say. Good man, what is a bodhisattvaÕs method of entry into 
nonduality?Ó Vimalakirti was silent. 

ThereÕs many ways to look at that silence. The same koan appears in 
the Blue Cliff Record. In there, Setcho includes the same wording up 
to the question of Manjushri, ÒTell us what is a bodhisattvaÕs 
method of entering into nonduality.Ó He doesnÕt say that Vimalakirti 
was silent. He says, ÒWhat did Vimalakirti say?Ó And then he also 
says, ÒSeen through.Ó Indeed what did Vimalakirti say. YesterdayÕs 
talk, Lu Tzu Faces the Wall, what did Lu Tzu say? The Buddha teaches 
the outsider, the Buddha remained seated, what did the Buddha say?

In the footnotes to this koan, what he says, he quotes, ÒManjushri, 
now you should say, good man, what is a bodhisattvas method of entry 
into nonduality?Ó The footnote to that says, ÒOnce heÕs surrounded 
and divested or everything ÉÓ keep in mind all of this dialog of 
thirty two bodhisattvas, each one presenting entry of the nondual 
dharma. So heÕs surrounded and divested of everything, theyÕve 
mentioned everything. So once heÕs surrounded and divested of 
everything they donÕt count on a violent outburst. Was the violent 
outburst VimalakirtiÕs silence? Thunder filled the whole universe, 
waves washed the heavens. 

The name Vimalakirti means untainted name or pure name. His wifeÕs 
name was Golden Woman. His sonÕs name was Good Thought, his 
daughterÕs name was Moonlike Beauty. 

A monk once asked an old master, ÒVimalakirti was the golden-grained 
Buddha.Ó This was one of the ways that they referred to him. Why did 
he listen to the teachings of the assembly of Shakyamuni Buddha. 
ÒWhy did he even bother with listening to these bodhisattvas present 
their understanding?Ó And the master said, ÒHe didnÕt make a contest 
between others and self.Ó He didnÕt put himself above them, he 
didnÕt separate himself. He made himself part of that group. And 
through the entire dialog he remained seated and he listened. And 
then when they asked him for his presentation, he remained silent, 
he continued to remain silent. Another master said, ÒManjushriÕs 
applauding in this way, still is casting a divining ladle. Listening 
to the empty sound, Vimalakirti remained silent. DonÕt you folks go 
drilling tortoiseshells or striking tiles.Ó In other words, donÕt go 
to sorcery to try and figure this one out. Before the I-Ching they 
used to use a tortoise shell to divine the Book of Changes. They 
would heat it and it would crack, and theyÕd study the cracks and 
lay the yarrow stalks. Now computers are used. Another master said, 
ÒVimalakirti was not silent, did not pause. Argument that he 
remained seated turned out to be wrong.Ó All the things they said 
turned out to be not true. One of the problems about this silence, 
is that it becomes a nest, and Zen students like everybody else like 
to make little nests. So inevitably students will present silence 
and inevitably the teacher will chase them out. Just like the 
goddess wouldnÕt accept silence from Shariputra. When she pressed 
him on the point of the absolute, he remained silent. She said, 
donÕt give me that! So why was ShariputraÕs silence unacceptable and 
VimalakirtiÕs, everyone though it was wonderful? WhatÕs the 
difference? 

Wong Song has a little thing in here. He says, ÒEven now, in various 
places when they see this matter brought up, they still say, 
ÔRemaining silent for a while (so-and-so) said.ÕÓ And then he says, 
ÒA monk once asked a teacher, ÔIn the records it often says liang 
jiu,Ó which is the word for silent. ÒÔliang jiu for a good while,Õ 
who is liang jiu?Ó The teacher said, ÒThe younger brother of Liang 
Ba .Ó This is told as a joke. Wong Song goes on to say. ÒThe last 
two lines are the most outstanding.Ó And then I go to the references 
to find out whatÕs happening. When you label it as a joke, 
somethingÕs wrong. Cleary tries this explanation. Scholars are not 
great joke tellers, particularly when you have to translate it from 
ancient Chinese into modern English. He gets kind of hung up. But 
what itÕs basically about is that Liang jiu, jiu is also the word 
that means nine, it sounds exactly like the word that means nine, 
the number nine. And Ba is the sound for the number eight. So when 
somebody asks the teacher, ÒWhatÕs liang jiu?Ó meaning whatÕs 
silence? The teacher took it as whatÕs liang nine, and he said the 
elder brother of liang eight. And I wondered how I could say this to 
make it understandable to you. And the word silence. What is 
silence? the student asked the teacher. The teacher answers, 
ÒSi-lence is Jo-lenceÕ mute brother.Ó I thought it was great. After 
a week of sesshin, thatÕs a riot. Thank you, thank you.

In the verse on another koan in the Book of Equanimity, the one of 
Mazu, when Mazu said, ÒBrother YakujoÕs head is white, and the other 
brotherÕs head is black.Ó In the verse to that koan, Hongzhi says, 
ÒGrandly sitting, cutting off the road of the tongue, what a laugh 
the old awl of Vaisali.Ó And thatÕs of course Vimalakirti. And the 
verse this time, he says, 

Manjushri inquires after the illness of the old Vaisalian;
The gate of nonduality opens Ñ behold the adept. 
Crude without, pure within Ñ who appreciates it? 
Forgetting ÔbeforeÕ and losing Ôafter,Õ donÕt sigh.
Struggling to present the gem Ñ the man with his feet cut off in the 
garden of Chu:
Repaying with a jewel, shining bright Ñ the cut snake of Sui.
Stop checking Ñ
There are absolutely no flaws.

One of the remarkable things about the dharma to me is that, ancient 
Chinese culture and twentieth century American culture are on two 
opposite sides of the poles. There are ways of expressing things, 
their poetry, their stories, what they thought was funny, what they 
thought was great, what they thought was heroic, the examples using 
warriors and generals and so on, are very different to what the 
American practitioner, or the Western practitioner in the twentieth 
century is in to. Yet the dharma, the teaching thatÕs hidden in 
there, if you can get beyond the surface, get beyond the metaphors, 
get to the heart of it, that dharma is very applicable to everything 
that we do. It will take a hundred years at least before it begins 
to manifest itself in a Western form. So one of the things that IÕve 
also found, is that if youÕre working with the Book of Equanimity, 
the verse, which was written by Hongzhi, and Hongzhi was the one 
that collected the Main Case, and Hongzhi was several generations 
before Wong Song who put these all together and added commentaries 
to it. If you want to get what Hongzhi was talking about, check out 
the verse before, itÕs the only statement he makes about the koan. 
And Hongzhi is the same person that wrote Cultivating the Empty 
Field. He was considered one of the finest of the Sung Dynasty poets 
and a great Zen master. In this verse he says, 

Manjushri inquires after the illness of the old Vaisalian; 
that is Vimalakirti, 
The gate of nonduality opens Ñ Behold the adept.Ó 
And of course again, itÕs extolling the virtues of Vimalakirti.
Crude without, pure within Ñ who appreciates it?

He uses an example of this silence of Vimalakirti as being 
equivalent to in the sutra, he says, ÒShakyamuni closed his room, 
Vimalakirti shut his mouth. Subhuti extolled speechlessness to 
reveal the Way. Indra and Brahma beyond hearing showered flowers. 
These are all because the truth is mastered by spiritual knowledge 
so the mouth is thereby silent. How could you say they had no 
eloquence?Ó It is what eloquence cannot speak of. ThatÕs what I 
spoke a lot of yesterday. That thereÕs direct immediate seeing, 
experiencing. ThatÕs what itÕs about. ThatÕs what heÕs calling 
spiritual knowledge, thatÕs what this practice is about. ThatÕs what 
you get to in your own zazen. And then there is speaking of it. 

Now speaking of it can be useful. The Buddha spoke of it, hundreds 
of masters spoke of it. Today in this hall we speak of it. But those 
are still, nonetheless, words and ideas that describe the reality. 
ItÕs the reality itself that needs to be realized. We use all kinds 
of skilful techniques, everything that we do is skillful means, bar 
none, including zazen. And the whole point of those skillful means 
is oneÕs own direct realization of the truth. It can happen any 
time, any place. Something comes along and opens that door for you. 
ItÕs different for different people. But always zazen is somewhere 
at the root of it. 

He speaks of a gem, a semi-precious stone, and inside that stone, 
thereÕs a story in one of these ancient-Chinese things, that thereÕs 
a semi-precious stone which doesnÕt seem like itÕs very important. 
When you cut it open, inside it is the real gem. And this is being 
made an equivalent of Vimalakirti, who outwardly seems dumb, and his 
speechlessness makes it seem that way, he doesnÕt say anything. But 
that itÕs pure and genuine within. The stone conceals the jewel.

Crude without, pure within Ñ who appreciates it?
Forgetting ÔbeforeÕ and ÔlosingÕ after, donÕt sigh.
This is another thing from the collections on meditation where the 
master says, ÒNow when I speak of knowing, you neednÕt know knowing, 
just know Ñ thatÕs all. Then before you donÕt continue extinction, 
and after you donÕt bring on production. The continuity of before 
and after broken, in between is solitary and alone.Ó 

In the sutra of the third patriarch, he talks about it again and 
again and again, how the truth is to be found outside of the words 
and ideas that describe it. And in the end he talks about, Òthat the 
way of words and speech finally comes to an end,Ó because the way is 
beyond these things. ItÕs not the past, itÕs not future, itÕs not 
the present. 

Struggling to present the gem Ñ the man with his feet cut off in the 
garden of Chu:

This is such an awful example. This is the story about this guy who 
comes to the emperor with a gem, and the emperor looks at the gem 
and says, ÒThatÕs not a gem, thatÕs an ordinary stone.Ó This is the 
stone that has the gem inside it. ÒItÕs an ordinary stone, cut his 
leg off.Ó So they cut one of his feet off. Then that emperor ends 
his term and a new emperor comes and the guy comes running back 
again with the stone. The emperor looks at the stone and says, 
ÒThatÕs a stone not a gem, cut his other foot off.Ó So this is the 
guy with two feet cut off, who finally comes to the third emperor. 
This third emperor summons him and asks him about it, and he said, 
ÒI do not resent the amputation of my feet, I do resent that the 
real jewel is taken to be an ordinary stone. That an act of loyalty 
is taken to be deception.Ó The king had the stone split and found it 
was the real jewel. The king grieved and said, ÒHow lamentable that 
two former sovereigns found it easy to cut off a manÕs feet but 
found it hard to split a stone. Now it actually turns out to be a 
gem and a treasure for a nation.Ó There might be nicer ways of 
presenting the gem that Vimalakirti was, in that outwardly he was 
very ordinary, and inwardly he was the embodiment of nonduality of 
the teachings. 

ItÕs the same with repaying with a jewel shining bright, the cut 
snake of Sui. The cut snake of Sui is not so bad. ItÕs the story 
about this guy whoÕs walking along and he sees this snake, with a 
piece of it cut off. So he goes over to the snake and puts a little 
water on him and tries to heal him and then weeks later heÕs at his 
house and thereÕs a big flash of lightning, and thereÕs the snake 
holding a gem in his mouth. ItÕs a reward. These are all Tung 
Dynasty fairy tales that are worked into these koans and used in the 
verses. Of course if you were living at that time all of this would 
make immediate sense to you and youÕd get it. But for us it seems a 
little out of the way and it needs explanations. 

Stop checking Ñ There are absolutely no flaws:
I donÕt know if that needs any interpretation. There are absolutely 
no flaws. Stop checking, because it is inherently complete of 
itself. You are inherently complete of yourself. There are 
absolutely no flaws. Wong Song says, ÒGo ahead, point one out.Ó No 
flaws means there is a continuum. No gaps, no breaks. In birth 
nothing is added. In death nothing is lost. When the universe is 
destroyed, it is not destroyed. What is that? The absolute basis of 
reality? Emptiness? Well form is emptiness, and emptiness is form. 
Form is exactly emptiness, and emptiness exactly form. ThatÕs what 
the Heart Sutra tells us. ThatÕs what the Identity of Absolute and 
Relative tells us, just the title tells us. ThatÕs what Mahayana 
Buddhism tells us. ThatÕs what Vimalakirti has told us. ThatÕs what 
tens of thousands of koans and masters have told us. So what is it 
that is not destroyed when the universe is destroyed? What is it, 
that is neither born nor extinguished? ThatÕs what Vimalakirti is 
trying to show here. Not just in this one thing but throughout the 
whole sutra. The message of Vimalakirti is the relationship between 
form and emptiness. Nonduality is about the interpenetration of 
dualities. The mutual causalities of dualities, the codependence of 
dualities. ThatÕs what our practice is about, whether youÕre a monk 
or a lay practitioner. Each of us depend on the other. Whether 
youÕre a man or a woman, each of us depend on the other. Whether 
youÕre in the world or on the mountain, each of us depend on the 
other. And where it all comes home is on that pillow. And the 
process that brings it home is zazen.