[This document can be acquired from a sub-directory coombspapers via
anonymous FTP or COOMBSQUEST gopher on the node COOMBS.ANU.EDU.AU or
ANU Soc.Sci.WWW Server at http://coombs.anu.edu.au/CoombsHome.html]

The document's ftp filename and the full directory path are given in
the coombspapers top level INDEX files]

[Last updated: 28 March 1994]
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
"JUKAI - A REFUGE AND A HOME"
a teisho by John Tarrant, Roshi

Originally published in: Mind Moon Circle, Autumn 1994, pp.9-10.

This text addresses some of the most fundamental and delicate religious issues.
Therefore, it should be read, quoted and analysed in a mindful way.

All copyrights to this document belong to John Tarrant, California
Diamond Sangha, Santa Rosa, Cal., USA

Enquiries: The Editor, "Mind Moon Circle", Sydney Zen Centre, 251
Young St., Annandale, Sydney, NSW 2038, Australia. Tel: + 61 2 660
2993
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
JUKAI - A REFUGE AND A HOME
John Tarrant, Roshi


The ceremony of refuge is a sort of koan that I return to every year
when we perform it. Refuge is a Zen initiation. It starts with vows
and involves taking on a robe and a Zen name. This is the closing of a
circle, the completion of a thing begun before. Disasters and joys
first drew us to attend inwards and so to value our lives, then a
chain of many causes led us to our companions in zazen.

Refuge comes when a certain kind of wandering is finished because now
we can make out a path through the Pacific fog. Perhaps the true
wandering begins then, in trust. We have become curious, we listen to
the inner life and act on what we hear and follow it. Like a wedding,
the ceremony closes one time and opens another that we are already
becoming immersed in. And Jukai is a public ceremony - we acknowledge
that we are in a greater whole, composed of uncountable beings, of
stars and plants and rivers and particular people who know us well.
Our vows are taken before this big audience.

From our small point of view, refuge is intended to be helpful and
practical. If we are confused we can check our experience against the
vows and the spirit of the ceremony. What is this? How does it fit? Is
it right? Do I love it? So we can begin to refine our question and our
capacity to ask and explore. And we choose. We understand by this that
we won't always make the best choice because we choose what we don't
know. We choose to walk a path without a precise knowledge of the
destination. It takes courage to choose and this is a good thing,
close to love. And we are willing to bear the shame and guilt of
choosing and erring and changing. When we decide, other possibilities
go dark. There is risk. By choosing, we show that we have learned this
- that sometimes the choosing itself is as important as what is
chosen, that we are on a journey not at a place of ending and it's
best if we love the travelling for its own sake.

In their profound sense, the vows lead us down into the timeless
centre of the world which is the core of the self. There, we walk
alone in the moonlight, not remembering our names. We are not stirring
things up and the lake naturally settles, the water grows translucent.
This is what the vows allow and encourage. They do this by focussing
on the particular and small. They draw a boundary around our acts the
way ancient cities and temples were built within circular walls. They
don't usually relate to heroic shifts but to the accumulative power of
many small choices. If we are in doubt we need to do our one good
thing - one thing true or genuinely of service - and the next good
thing will appear. The way is like this. Despair tells us that the
good is not worth doing because it is so small. Yet it is precisely
the small that is vast. It develops our integrity and with it our
relation to the Tao and the source of everything sacred.

Finally through the vows, we take on the blood line of the teachings
and meet the ancient men and women standing behind us. Our
participation in the way has deepened and turned more towards joy
because we have become conscious of it, we have said to our inmost
selves, "I am walking the way."
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
end of file
