The Most Lost They're the ones who know.

The Most Lost

They're the ones who know.

rustyring.blogspot.com/2026/02/the-...

#hermitpractice, #nonhypocrisy, #poem, #skilfulness, #Zen

The Most Lost I practice the religion that suits me. The one that says I'm right and you're wrong. That I'm the ideal, and you the mistake. We all do that. Except the most lost, Who commit the sin their sanghas condone In full knowledge. _(Photo courtesy of MC1 Chad J. McNeeley, the United States Navy, and Wikimedia Commons.)_

The Most Lost

They're the ones who know.

rustyring.blogspot.com/2026/02/the-most-lost.ht...

#hermitpractice, #nonhypocrisy, #poem, #skilfulness, #Zen

The Most Lost I practice the religion that suits me. The one that says I'm right and you're wrong. That I'm the ideal, and you the mistake. We all do that. Except the most lost, Who commit the sin their sanghas condone In full knowledge. _(Photo courtesy of MC1 Chad J. McNeeley, the United States Navy, and Wikimedia Commons.)_

The Most Lost

They're the ones who know.

rustyring.blogspot.com/2026/02/the-most-lost.ht...

#hermitpractice, #nonhypocrisy, #poem, #skilfulness, #Zen

The Most Lost They're the ones who know.

The Most Lost

They're the ones who know.

rustyring.blogspot.com/2026/02/the-...

#hermitpractice, #nonhypocrisy, #poem, #skilfulness, #Zen

The Most Lost I practice the religion that suits me. The one that says I'm right and you're wrong. That I'm the ideal, and you the mistake. We all do that. Except the most lost, Who commit the sin their sanghas condone In full knowledge. _(Photo courtesy of MC1 Chad J. McNeeley, the United States Navy, and Wikimedia Commons.)_

The Most Lost

They're the ones who know.

rustyring.blogspot.com/2026/02/the-most-lost.ht...

#hermitpractice, #nonhypocrisy, #poem, #skilfulness, #Zen

The Most Lost I practice the religion that suits me. The one that says I'm right and you're wrong. That I'm the ideal, and you the mistake. We all do that. Except the most lost, Who commit the sin their sanghas condone In full knowledge. _(Photo courtesy of MC1 Chad J. McNeeley, the United States Navy, and Wikimedia Commons.)_

The Most Lost

They're the ones who know.

rustyring.blogspot.com/2026/02/the-most-lost.ht...

#hermitpractice, #nonhypocrisy, #poem, #skilfulness, #Zen

Keeping Up Boots on the ground.

Keeping Up

More relevant this week than it was when I wrote it five years ago, almost to the day.

rustyring.blogspot.com/2020/06/keep...

#hermitpractice, #karma, #LilyTomlin, #meditation, #mindfulness, #nonhypocrisy, #XuQinxian, #Zen

Keeping Up We're catching a lot of reality these days. First a plague swept the planet, laying waste to technocratic pretentions of invulnerability. And now, the global stampede to busted old right-wing pipe dreams has metastacised in the States into an actual overthrow of constitutional governance, complete with federal troops moving on citizens. It's not just the National Guard (which would be dystopian enough). We're talking the straight-up foreign-country-occupying US Army. Which has already put boots on the ground to occupy its own. To me, the most telling point in all of this is the fact that the Joint Chiefs of Staff signed off on it. Some of those men might have had reservations. One hopes that at least one heart under that oppressive weight of medals was deeply conflicted. But not enough. Even Communist China has produced one general who wouldn't march, under identical circumstances, against the civilians he'd sworn to protect. “I’d rather be beheaded," he said, "than be a criminal in the eyes of history." And yet the Americans, who love a uniformed sound-bite as much as anybody, have yet to present such an officer. At times like this, I'm always taken aback by my own disappointment. I like to think I'm over the human race. I've witnessed so much empty posturing, so much crass and conspicuous hypocrisy, that I cannot, in good faith, pretend to have any in my species. And yet. The fact is, these things go deep. The beliefs you were taught as a small child, the history your elders spun into your bones, are pernicious. You can outlearn them, but you can't unlearn them. Not at the endocrinal level. In such moments, I meditate on the words of Lily Tomlin: "No matter how cynical I get, I can't keep up." The call to activism is one I don't feel qualified to discuss; I'm torn between two valid positions on that. However, on another point I rest solid. When we sin, human beings tell each other "such is the way of the world". That's a lie. The world is faultless. Such is the way of _people_ , who remain in full possession of their moral autonomy and the necessity of applying it. We're not like other animals. We're not mindless slaves to nature or instinct, and therefore each of us is empowered to "be another way" at any time. Which is the flywheel of karma. As we enter this era of radical – if ironic – unmasking, I would ask the Sangha to consider the following suggestions: > Live in the light of things as they are, as they really are, now and for the rest of your life, and refuse all stories. > > Look deeply – and courageously – with every breath. > > Remember what you see, permanently, after everyone else has moved on. This is what you owe yourself. _(Photo courtesy of Vasil Šelechaŭ and Wikimedia Commons.)_

Keeping Up

More relevant this week than it was when I wrote it five years ago, almost to the day.

https://rustyring.blogspot.com/2020/06/keeping-up.html

#hermitpractice, #karma, #LilyTomlin, #meditation, #mindfulness, #nonhypocrisy, #XuQinxian, #Zen

Maximum Illumination It's what you do with it.

Maximum Illumination

It's what you do with it.

rustyring.blogspot.com/2025/03/maxi...

#ahimsa, #antinomianism, #arhat, #Buddha, #Buddhism, #Chàn, #China, #Christianity, #enlightenment, #guru, #hermitpractice, #monk, #nonhypocrisy, #sangha, #Zen

Maximum Illumination Enlightenment is the stated goal of Buddhism, possibly the only doctrine we all share, though variously defined. As far as I know, all Zen lineages, diverse though we are, uphold the conviction that enlightenment is possible in this life; that it comes irrespective of social and material distinctions; and that meditation is the fundamental discipline of enlightenment practice. In theory, we also hold our leaders to a "maximum illumination" standard; that is, the teacher must be the most enlightened person in the zendo. The old Chàn chronicles preserve accounts of itinerant peasants summarily unseating exalted abbots in dharma combat. And if that martial art has now mellowed to ritual sparing between genial sanghamates, in those old Chinese records it's presented as deadly earnest. All of this goes to the strength with which the Ancestors cleaved to a central principle. To wit: if we're going to dropkick the Buddha's explicit insistence on an egalitarian sangha, then the brother or sister monk we perch precariously on that perilous peak must at minimum embody awakening. And it's at this point that we slam smack into the Christian concept of antinomianism. For among the many commonalities our two religions share is an insistence on the possibility – nay, obligation – of attaining a superior spiritual state in this life. We call it enlightenment, they call it salvation, but though our understandings of those states differ in important ways, our certainty that they exist prompts coreligionists to announce themselves special and demand extra-scriptural privilege. Specifically, they declare themselves leaders. And this is where the antinomianism comes in. Because upon their ascension to secular power, two unproductive phenomena abruptly co-arise: > 1. Their conduct becomes demonstrably unenlightened. > > 2. They insist this unenlightened conduct is in fact the height of enlightenment, it's just that the sangha are too pedestrian to grasp their higher wisdom. And that second one is antinomianism. You see, it's really very simple: treating others like doormats is the soul of bodhisattva practice. It's simply what arhats do, and if only you were one, you'd get that And there-in lies a crisis. Because it's not. Not that defining enlightenment isn't hard. How can you tell if a person has attained a state that can't be comprehended, or even defined? As the ancient Zen joke would have it: how do you eff the ineffable? I've thought about this a lot. I've scrutinised my own experience; what's happened on the cushion, what changes in me during and after kensho, what's changed in my personality in two decades of mindful practice. I haven't become enlightened, but I've changed measurably, and the Buddha said that's evidence of nascent awakening. So becoming a better person than you were pre-zazen is the test. Are you less judgemental now, more empathetic? Less uptight, more patient? Calmer? More loving, less ambitious? Has your ego diminished, or inflated? Are you supple or brittle? Do you fret more in social contention, or less? How do you measure up on the 8 Worldly Dharmas Illumination Indicator? If these lights aren’t green, why waste your life becoming an even bigger ass than you already are? In the end, I've gained one practical insight into the quandary of human limitation: –––> It's what you do with it. _(NB: Not a newconcept on this pages, but a new application of it.)_ Annoyance, impatience, disappointment, despair, frustration; what do you do when they happen? Do you use or manipulate others? Do you make cutting remarks or determine to get even? Do you apologise when you've behaved in an ignorant, superior, or abusive fashion? These are universal human challenges, but a moral authority must own and publicly grapple with them. And by this standard, you can see the risk you run to your own practice when you set yourself up as a guru. Which is why my brotherly counsel is not to. Of one thing I'm sure: selfish, inconsiderate, preëmptory behaviour is not a sign of enlightenment. It's not that I don't yet know enough about enlightenment. It's that I know too much. _(Photo courtesy of Unsplash.com and agenerous photographer.)_

Maximum Illumination

It's what you do with it.

rustyring.blogspot.com/2025/03/maximum-illumina...

#ahimsa, #antinomianism, #arhat, #Buddha, #Buddhism, #Chàn, #China, #Christianity, #enlightenment, #guru, #hermitpractice, #monk, #nonhypocrisy, #sangha, #Zen

Maximum Illumination It's what you do with it.

Maximum Illumination

It's what you do with it.

rustyring.blogspot.com/2025/03/maxi...

#ahimsa, #antinomianism, #arhat, #Buddha, #Buddhism, #Chàn, #China, #Christianity, #enlightenment, #guru, #hermitpractice, #monk, #nonhypocrisy, #sangha, #Zen

Maximum Illumination Enlightenment is the stated goal of Buddhism, possibly the only doctrine we all share, though variously defined. As far as I know, all Zen lineages, diverse though we are, uphold the conviction that enlightenment is possible in this life; that it comes irrespective of social and material distinctions; and that meditation is the fundamental discipline of enlightenment practice. In theory, we also hold our leaders to a "maximum illumination" standard; that is, the teacher must be the most enlightened person in the zendo. The old Chàn chronicles preserve accounts of itinerant peasants summarily unseating exalted abbots in dharma combat. And if that martial art has now mellowed to ritual sparing between genial sanghamates, in those old Chinese records it's presented as deadly earnest. All of this goes to the strength with which the Ancestors cleaved to a central principle. To wit: if we're going to dropkick the Buddha's explicit insistence on an egalitarian sangha, then the brother or sister monk we perch precariously on that perilous peak must at minimum embody awakening. And it's at this point that we slam smack into the Christian concept of antinomianism. For among the many commonalities our two religions share is an insistence on the possibility – nay, obligation – of attaining a superior spiritual state in this life. We call it enlightenment, they call it salvation, but though our understandings of those states differ in important ways, our certainty that they exist prompts coreligionists to announce themselves special and demand extra-scriptural privilege. Specifically, they declare themselves leaders. And this is where the antinomianism comes in. Because upon their ascension to secular power, two unproductive phenomena abruptly co-arise: > 1. Their conduct becomes demonstrably unenlightened. > > 2. They insist this unenlightened conduct is in fact the height of enlightenment, it's just that the sangha are too pedestrian to grasp their higher wisdom. And that second one is antinomianism. You see, it's really very simple: treating others like doormats is the soul of bodhisattva practice. It's simply what arhats do, and if only you were one, you'd get that And there-in lies a crisis. Because it's not. Not that defining enlightenment isn't hard. How can you tell if a person has attained a state that can't be comprehended, or even defined? As the ancient Zen joke would have it: how do you eff the ineffable? I've thought about this a lot. I've scrutinised my own experience; what's happened on the cushion, what changes in me during and after kensho, what's changed in my personality in two decades of mindful practice. I haven't become enlightened, but I've changed measurably, and the Buddha said that's evidence of nascent awakening. So becoming a better person than you were pre-zazen is the test. Are you less judgemental now, more empathetic? Less uptight, more patient? Calmer? More loving, less ambitious? Has your ego diminished, or inflated? Are you supple or brittle? Do you fret more in social contention, or less? How do you measure up on the 8 Worldly Dharmas Illumination Indicator? If these lights aren’t green, why waste your life becoming an even bigger ass than you already are? In the end, I've gained one practical insight into the quandary of human limitation: –––> It's what you do with it. _(NB: Not a newconcept on this pages, but a new application of it.)_ Annoyance, impatience, disappointment, despair, frustration; what do you do when they happen? Do you use or manipulate others? Do you make cutting remarks or determine to get even? Do you apologise when you've behaved in an ignorant, superior, or abusive fashion? These are universal human challenges, but a moral authority must own and publicly grapple with them. And by this standard, you can see the risk you run to your own practice when you set yourself up as a guru. Which is why my brotherly counsel is not to. Of one thing I'm sure: selfish, inconsiderate, preëmptory behaviour is not a sign of enlightenment. It's not that I don't yet know enough about enlightenment. It's that I know too much. _(Photo courtesy of Unsplash.com and agenerous photographer.)_

Maximum Illumination

It's what you do with it.

rustyring.blogspot.com/2025/03/maximum-illumina...

#ahimsa, #antinomianism, #arhat, #Buddha, #Buddhism, #Chàn, #China, #Christianity, #enlightenment, #guru, #hermitpractice, #monk, #nonhypocrisy, #sangha, #Zen