..续本文上一页mise of education was that suffering builds character, and therefore all senior boys were at liberty to bang about the junior ones with a perfectly clear conscience, because they were doing them a favor. It was good for them, it was building their character, and as a result of this attitude, the word "discipline" has begun to stink. It”s been stinking for a long time. But we need a kind of entirely new attitude towards this, because without that quiet, and that non- striving, a life becomes messy. When you let go, finally, because there”s nothing to hold onto, you have to be awfully careful not to turn into loose yogurt. Let me give two opposite illustrations. When you ask most people to lie flat on the floor and relax, you find that they are at full attention, because they don”t really believe that the floor will hold them up, and therefore they”re holding themselves together; they”re uptight. They”re afraid that if they don”t do this, even though the floor is supporting them, they”ll suddenly turn into a gelatinous mass and trickle away in all directions. Then there are other people who when you tell them to relax, they go like a limp rag. But you see, the human organism is a subtle combination of hardness and softness. Of flesh and bones. And the side of Zen which has to do with neither doing nor not doing, but knowing that you are It anyway, and you don”t have to seek it, that”s Zen-flesh. But the side in which you can come back into the world, with this attitude of not seeking, and knowing you”re It, and not fall apart--that requires bones. And one of the most difficult things--this belongs to of course a generation we all know about that was running about some time ago--where they caught on to Zen, and they started anything-goes painting, they started anything-goes sculpture, they started anything-goes way of life. Now I think we”re recovering from that today. At any rate, our painters are beginning once again to return to glory, to marvelous articulateness and vivid color. Nothing like it has been seen since the stained glass of 

　　Ù. That”s a good sign. But it requires that there be in our daily use of freedom, and I”m not just talking about political freedom. I”m talking about the freedom which comes when you know that you”re It, forever and ever and ever. And it”ll be so nice when you die, because that”ll be a change, but it”ll come back some other way. When you know that, and you”ve seen through the whole mirage, then watch out, because there may still be in you some seeds of hostility, some seeds of pride, some seeds of wanting to put down other people, or wanting to just defy the normal arrangements of life.

　　So that is why, in the order of a Zen monastary, various duties are assigned. The novices have the light duties, and the more senior you get, the heavy duties. For example, the Roshi very often is the one who cleans out the _benjo_, the toilet. And everything is kept in order. There is a kind of beautiful, almost princely aestheticism, because by reason of that order being kept all of the time, the vast free energy which is contained in the system doesn”t run amok. The understanding of Zen, the understanding of awakening, the understanding of-- Well, we”ll call it mystical experiences, one of the most dangerous things in the world. And for a person who cannot contain it, it”s like putting a million volts through your electric shaver. You blow your mind and it stays blown. Now, if you go off in that way, that is what would be called in Buddhism a pratyeka- buddha--"private buddha". He is one who goes off into the transcendental world and is never seen again. And he”s made a mistake from the standpoint of Buddhism, because from the standpoint of Buddhism, there is no fundamental difference between the tr…

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