Subtitles
at least a partial view of what this 00:00:00
at least a partial view of what this fantastic metaphysical construct is and 00:00:04
if you want to incidentally explore it 00:00:13
further the alas the literature is not 00:00:18
too well available but there is an 00:00:21
excellent account of it in the second 00:00:23
volume of Fung ulong's history of 00:00:24
Chinese philosophy and I think that's 00:00:28
the best place to go there is a book 00:00:33
that there are little book that Suzuki 00:00:35
wrote called the essence of Buddhism 00:00:37
published in London by the Buddhist 00:00:40
society and that also is an account of 00:00:45
it but it's harder to find so now how do 00:00:52
we get from where we were to Zen well it 00:01:00
goes like this in the Sutra of the sixth 00:01:09
patriarch the Tanjung which was the 00:01:16
collected teachings of the sixth 00:01:19
patriarch of the Zen school who as I 00:01:22
said was a contemporary a flat son and 00:01:26
fat son died in 712 ad and a nun died in 00:01:31
713 in his discourse he gives a lesson 00:01:39
on the art of teaching the art of being 00:01:44
a guru and this lesson is based on 00:01:53
getting people to be capable of polar 00:01:58
thinking polar thinking is simply well 00:02:05
it's not just thinking it's a kind of 00:02:07
feeling and a kind of sensing wherein 00:02:10
you see the going together nurse 00:02:13
of things that I have thought to be 00:02:14
mutual are thought to be mutually 00:02:16
exclusive opposites in other words you 00:02:23
wouldn't know you were right unless 00:02:25
somebody else was wrong 00:02:25
normally we think then the right and the wrong are mutually exclusive but when 00:02:31
you are capable of polar thinking you 00:02:36
see that they go together 00:02:38
appllo a person who feels in a polar way 00:02:41
sees figure and background going 00:02:43
together he doesn't see them as mutually 00:02:45
exclusive now then you see when I was 00:02:50
explaining the GG muguet the fourth 00:02:53
Dharma world or the fourth way of 00:02:56
looking at the universe which is the 00:02:58
culmination of the Kagan school I was 00:03:03
trying to show this point that all 00:03:09
events have a go witness with each other 00:03:12
in the same way as a figure in a 00:03:14
background so in order to get this point 00:03:18
across way none explained that when a 00:03:20
person asks you a question about 00:03:22
something sacred you give him an answer 00:03:26
in terms of something secular when he 00:03:31
asks you about something eternal you 00:03:34
give him an answer in terms of the 00:03:37
temporal when he asks you about 00:03:39
something abstract you give him an 00:03:41
answer in terms of the concrete and so 00:03:45
the whole way down the line so when you 00:03:48
read your Zen storage which are always 00:03:51
this apparently delightful nonsense 00:03:53
somebody says what is the fundamental 00:03:55
meaning of Buddhism and the answer is a 00:04:00
dried dung scraper in Far East they 00:04:10
don't use they use not to use toilet 00:04:12
paper 00:04:12
they had a stick they used instead and 00:04:15
this is the answer you see he has 00:04:22
switched completely from the domain of 00:04:25
life that is considered 00:04:27
philosophical and sacred the one that is 00:04:29
considered completely unproven and 00:04:31
unmentionable then on other occasions 00:04:37
it's good girls the other way a monk 00:04:41
says to the master they're engaged in 00:04:46
cooking they're peeling potatoes humming 00:04:49
this has passed me the knife the master 00:04:53
hands it to him blade first and the monk 00:04:57
says please give me the other end the 00:05:00
Masters what would you do with the other 00:05:01
end and this he immediately has a kind 00:05:08
of metaphysical flavor to it 00:05:10
so that he jumps you see from the 00:05:12
practical question to the metaphysical 00:05:14
but if you ask him the metaphysical he 00:05:16
will always answer in terms the everyday 00:05:16
and the whole genius of Zen is really this that it has got a way of religious 00:05:26
life and the form of iconography and the 00:05:35
form of which is secular and it has 00:05:40
created a whole school of poetry where 00:05:44
the deep philosophical matters are never 00:05:48
never mentioned except sometimes by way 00:05:52
of making a joke because what Zen tries 00:05:58
to do ideally is to be completely cool 00:05:58
to create the religion of no religion so that you don't notice it's around unless 00:06:15
you're in the know now this is not 00:06:25
actually true in practice many people 00:06:29
are disturbed when they go to Japan and 00:06:32
they walk into zen temples and find that 00:06:35
they have rituals and services such as 00:06:37
I've just been playing to you that they 00:06:39
have elaborate Buddha 00:06:41
images and people are making boughs to 00:06:42
them as a matter of fact when Professor 00:06:45
Houston Smith went to Japan and was 00:06:52
being shown round of Zen monastery he 00:06:55
noticed that his guide that the 00:06:57
particular master of the monastery 00:06:59
whenever he passed an image of the 00:07:01
Buddha would stop and bow and he said to 00:07:06
him I don't understand this he said 00:07:08
because I thought you was my wrists 00:07:10
would run up these images and as you one 00:07:14
of your masters did in one of the 00:07:15
stories said I don't see why you bow he 00:07:18
didn't like just as well split up and 00:07:21
the master said you spits eyebrows but 00:07:36
you see the the the thing about all this 00:07:38
is the about iconoclasm there are very 00:07:44
different spirits of iconoclasm the 00:07:51
puritan iconoclasts who broke down all 00:07:54
the images in the english churches hated 00:07:57
the images they thought they were evil 00:08:00
and wrong and so they smashed them 00:08:03
ruthlessly but when a chicken comes out 00:08:08
of the egg shell the egg shell is not 00:08:12
something to be deplored it's certainly 00:08:15
something to be broken but had the shell 00:08:18
not existed the chicken wouldn't have 00:08:20
been protected so in precisely the same 00:08:23
way images religious ideas religious 00:08:29
symbols exist in order to be 00:08:31
constructively and lovingly broken 00:08:35
because they are like opening a package 00:08:38
if there's no package you know you can 00:08:41
hardly get the contents cause they'd 00:08:43
fall through your fingers so if 00:08:46
something comes to you in a package for 00:08:48
packaging is so important I'm so 00:08:50
interesting something comes to you in a 00:08:53
package 00:08:54
well it's like on Christmas Day here all 00:08:57
these gorgeous packages with colors and 00:08:59
gold and everything and very often the 00:09:01
package is a much better than what's in 00:09:03
them but you then or everybody proceeds 00:09:08
to tear them apart and get what's inside 00:09:11
so from this point of view the Zen 00:09:14
Buddhists regard all ideas about 00:09:18
Buddhism about philosophy about religion 00:09:21
and so on has so much packaging and in 00:09:26
order to get at it you have to get rid 00:09:27
of the packaging so what happens then 00:09:27
when we get to the state I was talking about this morning 00:09:37
where you abandon completely all belief 00:09:40
you abandon every sort of way 00:09:48
of hanging onto life you accept your complete impermanence the prospect of 00:10:07
your death of vanishing into nothing 00:10:13
whatsoever you see and of not being able 00:10:18
to control anything of being at the 00:10:23
mercy of what is completely other than 00:10:27
you and you let go to that you see in it 00:10:34
this means that you even get rid of any 00:10:36
any God whatsoever to do this fully you 00:10:40
don't have a thing left to cling to so 00:10:47
this complete let go 00:10:47
flips and you discover having made it a new way of experiencing all together in 00:11:05
which 00:11:08
you don't need any God because you're it but also you don't think of the idea 00:11:25
that you're it in other words this is 00:11:31
why Krishnamurti makes a certain kind of 00:11:36
attack on people who are Vedanta stand 00:11:39
who believe that the human self is 00:11:42
ultimately the divine self he says why 00:11:44
do you believe in that see because if 00:11:47
you believe in it you are making it a 00:11:50
thing to hang on to and so in a way then 00:11:55
you see all belief in God is lack of 00:11:57
faith that ever struck you you're still 00:12:03
clinging and so long as you're still 00:12:05
clinging you don't have faith because 00:12:07
faith is the state of total let go 00:12:07
so when through some marvelous desperation we get to the state of total 00:12:16
let go and then you see it fantastically 00:12:25
religion anything like religion simply 00:12:28
disappears there's no need for it any 00:12:29
longer 00:12:30
it's like you've crossed the shore 00:12:32
crossed to the other Shore you don't 00:12:34
need the raft get off leave the raft 00:12:39
behind now the other Shore is actually 00:12:43
the same as this one you know when you 00:12:46
cross the river when the mountain is in 00:12:50
the distance see there's the other Shore 00:12:52
over there it's kind of different from 00:12:54
here you can sit here and say hmm be 00:13:00
nice to live there I wouldn't it see a 00:13:03
place up there I just love to live 00:13:05
because it looks so good from here but 00:13:08
then you go and you buy that house and 00:13:11
you sit there and it feels the same as 00:13:13
this place feels because you're there 00:13:16
and how things feel how you are and you 00:13:20
look back across here and say gee isn't 00:13:22
that lovely 00:13:22
there are mysterious trails going up Mount Tamalpais the look as if they led 00:13:33
to that place that we were talking about 00:13:41
this morning the secret garden which 00:13:44
every child remembers and they disappear 00:13:49
through trees and there's a kind of a 00:13:51
mysterious little Canyon when you can 00:13:55
hear the sound of a waterfall and you 00:13:56
know somewhere in there is that garden I 00:13:59
know as a matter of fact where it is 00:14:00
there is one but always when you follow 00:14:06
the road right through it leads back to 00:14:09
San Rafael and its suburbs on the other 00:14:14
side you see I have been year seeking 00:14:26
the ideal place and I've come to the 00:14:31
conclusion that it the only way I can 00:14:33
possibly find it is to be it if you can 00:14:41
find it in you then anywhere you go is 00:14:43
the ideal place to live but it's so 00:14:47
fascinating projecting it outside and 00:14:49
going on a look for it I mean this is 00:14:54
the hole of fun fun means so when 00:15:03
therefore religion is abandoned you are 00:15:12
in a dangerous fix because you can very 00:15:20
easily slip into madness we were talking 00:15:25
this morning about a vision Lloyd 00:15:30
brought up this question about the 00:15:33
vision of a fourth dimension or another 00:15:35
dimension and anybody who looked at it 00:15:37
went crazy 00:15:37
and this is a real danger that people who have the mystical vision whether 00:15:46
through practicing yoga or Zen Buddhism 00:15:53
or has a caste Christian prayers or by 00:15:57
taking LSD become a serious menace to 00:16:03
society and society gets really worried 00:16:09
about them because they have they 00:16:14
they're not taking the world and its 00:16:16
concerns seriously any longer they know 00:16:20
it's an illusion and if you really know 00:16:25
it's an illusion if you really know I'm 00:16:28
an illusion I don't know what you're 00:16:31
going to do with me I don't know whether 00:16:33
I trust you I don't know whether you're 00:16:35
going to keep the rules i I just don't 00:16:39
know about you you've seen through it 00:16:40
and goodness only knows you may do 00:16:42
anything and if you're not sure of 00:16:45
yourself 00:16:46
and you suddenly see that all this is an 00:16:49
illusion there's nothing you can cling 00:16:50
to it's all relative 00:16:52
now you may get bugged and you may go 00:16:56
nuts that's the great danger in all of 00:17:02
this and that is why as a Zen monastery 00:17:10
is at one in the same moment a place of 00:17:14
total iconoclasm of seeing through the 00:17:21
whole thing and yet at the same time it 00:17:25
maintains a discipline as clean and 00:17:30
strict as anywhere you can find the 00:17:37
combination of the two is simply 00:17:39
marvelous unfortunately modern Japan 00:17:44
doesn't dig it 00:17:44
but you what they've done is to their they well recognized that you cannot go 00:17:55
into outer space and come back to this 00:18:07
world without strict controls it's 00:18:12
exactly the same way when you're skin 00:18:14
diving you go below a certain number of 00:18:18
fathoms and you experience 00:18:20
weightlessness now a person who's not 00:18:24
properly trained at that level will get 00:18:27
happy now there's no reason why you 00:18:29
shouldn't get happy provided you keep 00:18:32
your wits about you nothing matters at 00:18:36
all when your weight vanishes because 00:18:40
after all you don't matter anymore 00:18:42
you have no weight nothing is waiting 00:18:45
nothing is important and a person may at 00:18:49
this point take off his oxygen mask and 00:18:51
offer it to a fish in which case he'll 00:18:57
drown he'll never come back and if he 00:19:01
stays down too long he enjoys this too 00:19:04
much his oxygen supply will run out and 00:19:08
he'll be lost so he has a watch and he 00:19:14
knows according to discipline that at a 00:19:16
certain time on this instrument he's got 00:19:19
to come up it's like when you're had too 00:19:23
much to drink and you're driving you've 00:19:26
got to watch your speedometer drive by 00:19:28
instruments when you're in a difficult 00:19:31
situation in an airplane and you've lost 00:19:33
your sense of gravity what's your 00:19:35
instrument don't trust your senses you 00:19:38
see this is very important in Buddhist 00:19:45
imagery there are guardians of the 00:19:51
directions of the universe and they are 00:19:55
all in the figure of Chinese generals 00:20:00
with 00:20:02
and swords and very fierce expressions 00:20:05
and they are always put at gates you 00:20:09
know gates a north south east and west 00:20:12
and here are the guards they guard the 00:20:15
entrances but what they really got is 00:20:18
the directions because it's absolutely 00:20:22
important that we can agree on our time 00:20:27
scale and on our north south east and 00:20:31
west so that I can meet you if we can't 00:20:36
agree about that we will miss each other 00:20:37
completely we'll never meet and if we 00:20:42
can't meet we can't have dinner together 00:20:45
if we can't have dinner together we 00:20:47
can't love each other so in the middle 00:20:53
of nothingness which is all this space 00:20:56
here see which is nothing whatever 00:20:59
there are nevertheless directions and 00:21:03
think what a beautiful thing that is you 00:21:05
see to set up directions in the middle 00:21:07
of nothing so for this reason in the 00:21:15
religion where anything goes and 00:21:19
anything is allowed and no holes are 00:21:21
barred there is for that reason 00:21:24
precisely a disciplined and an order 00:21:24
which is pretty strict but the spirit of the strictness is different than the 00:21:35
spirit of strictness in theistic 00:21:45
religions see in Buddhism there's no 00:21:48
boss ultimate reality is not conceived 00:21:54
in the form of authority because from 00:22:01
their point of view that's childish 00:22:01
you're your own boss and you're responsible if you want to be belong to 00:22:12
a very society it's up to you if you 00:22:20
want to conform in other words but one 00:22:22
of the interesting things is you can 00:22:23
always cease to be a monk without 00:22:28
dishonor in the Christian Church you 00:22:31
can't because you make life vows to get 00:22:35
in you promise forever to be obedient 00:22:40
chaste and poor and this is this is 00:22:46
irrevocable like Christian marriage but 00:22:52
in the Buddhist order you can leave 00:22:56
anytime you want and they say all right 00:23:00
you know you you've got many other lives 00:23:04
ahead of you 00:23:05
in which you can be a monk all over 00:23:07
again and if you don't want to do it 00:23:08
this round you don't have to and we're 00:23:11
not so we're not mad at you 00:23:13
just please if you don't want to undergo 00:23:16
this discipline but go somewhere else 00:23:20
there's no dishonor about that at all I 00:23:23
have a friend in Los Angeles who runs a 00:23:25
very fancy restaurant he was a Buddhist 00:23:28
monk for 10 days it was quite an 00:23:34
experience but that's all right 00:23:38
okay you try it and if you want to stay 00:23:43
here we're very happy to have you if you 00:23:45
don't want him we just assumed you 00:23:46
weren't around because you're not 00:23:48
deceiving us you know if you stay and 00:23:51
you don't really want to but fili water 00:23:52
you're a nuisance it's like a person who 00:23:55
feels they ought to be unselfish and is 00:23:57
therefore always making promises which 00:23:59
they're never going to fulfill it's much 00:24:02
better to be frank until people what you 00:24:05
honestly feel then pretend so 00:24:05
this reason then where there is no religion at all because everybody's 00:24:14
realized that the sky's the limit 00:24:18
there isn't any boss there's nothing to kowtow to because you're it 00:24:31
it follows 00:24:41
that you become therefore responsible for creating an order instead of there 00:24:52
but you see instead of submitting to the 00:24:59
order you create it next you find that 00:24:59
you can having got rid of religion completely well now everything becomes 00:25:16
religious that is to say instead of 00:25:27
having some kind of hang up on 00:25:37
universals on vast abstract huge area 00:25:43
conceptions you employ instead things 00:25:48
that are very particular very temporal 00:25:54
because of GG Mogae you remember the the 00:25:59
image that i use to illustrate GG muguet 00:26:02
was the net of jewels wherein every 00:26:06
crystal reflects all the other crystals 00:26:09
every dewdrop on the spider's web 00:26:11
reflect all the others okay so then 00:26:11
I just happen to pick up this because some happen to be handy I don't want you 00:26:27
to think about fans and Orient and what 00:26:34
sort of thing but with this all Buddhism 00:26:41
can be taught all the universe all 00:26:47
Sciences all philosophy can be 00:26:49
demonstrated with this because this is 00:26:53
one of the jewels reflecting all the 00:26:56
others when you pick up a link in a 00:26:59
chain all the other links come up with 00:27:01
it see so with it and if you ask me 00:27:13
about what is the mystery of life what 00:27:17
is God and I show you this fan people 00:27:23
look at you in a strange way and say I 00:27:25
wonder what he meant by that well the 00:27:30
truth of the matter is it didn't mean 00:27:32
anything at all because this doesn't 00:27:37
mean anything 00:27:37
words mean something because they refer to events and things that are other than 00:27:47
the sounds of the words but the things 00:27:55
and events that words refer to don't 00:27:58
refer to anything else of course they're 00:28:01
connected with everything else but they 00:28:03
don't refer to everything else in the 00:28:05
same way as the symbol doubts 00:28:05
so that's why Zen always answers in terms of the completely concrete what is 00:28:22
this or fan that must be a noise which 00:28:40
this isn't this is what this is or 00:28:47
alternatively if you don't want to be 00:28:49
hung up on it it's this or this so in 00:29:04
just the same way let's consider the 00:29:13
advance that Zen makes in the world of 00:29:16
art the saw the world of painting I 00:29:19
showed you a Tibetan painting this 00:29:22
morning which was extremely elaborate 00:29:26
where every tiny space was filled and 00:29:29
where all of it was obviously religious 00:29:32
it was quite clear that this painting 00:29:34
was an icon now Zen people don't like 00:29:39
that kind of painting I mean it isn't 00:29:46
that they have a real prejudice against 00:29:49
it but they don't usually have it around 00:29:52
instead they prefer a style of painting 00:29:55
in which there's an enormous amount of 00:29:57
untouched paper and where a brush has 00:30:06
very swiftly and deftly painted some 00:30:10
bamboo sort of in one corner now the way 00:30:15
the bamboo is put on the paper 00:30:17
Alive's all the rest of the paper 00:30:22
because it turns it into a lake 00:30:28
without drawing a single line a master 00:30:32
can put bamboo on a piece of paper and 00:30:35
turn the rest of the paper into a lake 00:30:37
okay everybody can see the lake there 00:30:42
although nothing has happened empty 00:30:45
space or it might be a whole mountain 00:30:48
might be there but covered in mist 00:30:51
because you see he didn't use the paper 00:30:55
as mere paper you often see around 00:30:59
especially motels they have you know the 00:31:05
kind of motel where you have flower 00:31:06
prints over the bed and there's a bunch 00:31:10
of flowers taken out of an old book of 00:31:13
etchings or something put in a frame or 00:31:15
some interior decorator 00:31:17
there was a relief one two three or on a 00:31:21
row and always the bunch of flowers is 00:31:24
put bang in the middle of the piece of 00:31:26
paper now you know what that does that D 00:31:28
vitalizes all the rest of the paper 00:31:31
because it means the background has 00:31:34
become unimportant and this is always 00:31:36
done by people who don't understand 00:31:38
polar thinking who don't feel that 00:31:40
figure and ground go together but all 00:31:43
Zen painting where you get this 00:31:46
extraordinary relationship our figure 00:31:49
two background is done by people who 00:31:52
feel and think you know ants actually 00:31:55
sense in a polar way they see the space 00:31:59
and the solid simultaneously and that's 00:32:04
why the Chinese place things in space 00:32:06
the way they do even you can't all see 00:32:13
it from where you're sitting a piece of 00:32:15
calligraphy our contains in it an 00:32:19
extremely important relationship between 00:32:23
the characters and the space it would 00:32:29
take me quite a while to go into all the 00:32:31
details of that but they have to be just 00:32:37
the right size to accord with that space 00:32:37
there isn't only one way of doing it there are several ways of putting the 00:32:44
characters in a piece of paper that size 00:32:50
but in each way that you use you take a 00:32:56
count of the space you don't use the 00:33:01
paper as mere neutral background so when 00:33:09
for example you will find so often that 00:33:14
the Chinese painter takes his area his 00:33:18
rectangular area in which he is painting 00:33:20
and he will paint one corner and for say 00:33:28
from the bottom-left he will strike up a 00:33:31
bamboo stalk and Flo leaves in the wind 00:33:35
on it 00:33:36
and so leaves the rest this is a trick 00:33:46
you see which uses and as I said it 00:33:54
vitalizes the whole of the rest of the 00:33:56
area and you don't do that simply by 00:34:05
putting the figure plump in the center 00:34:05
so the whole art which has been inspired by Zen is based on polar recognition of 00:34:22
the identity of space and solid solid 00:34:39
and space they see one implies the other 00:34:39
but this is always so unexpected from the point of view of common sense people 00:34:48
in other words think space is nothing 00:34:52
and that it has no power and so for this very reason the architecture inspired by 00:35:03
Zen is practically all of it playing 00:35:11
with space Zen emphasizes the luxurious 00:35:23
richness of poverty of rooms with 00:35:29
practically nothing in them furniture 00:35:34
lessness and it has a luxury that's 00:35:40
unbelievable 00:35:40
the uncluttered life although I must say that somewhere I went to the house of a 00:35:54
very great tea master where everything 00:36:03
was absolutely gorgeously in order oh it 00:36:08
was the highest style Zen taste Japan 00:36:12
they call it 00:36:14
yamato damashii and we went into a 00:36:19
little tea room and jano in a kind of 00:36:22
experimental fiddling way pushed aside a 00:36:25
screen and inside was a western-style 00:36:29
room completely cluttered with papers 00:36:34
and old clothes and everything thrown in 00:36:38
there whoosh you see because everybody 00:36:41
needs an unconscious place you can 00:36:43
somebody everybody everybody's house has 00:36:46
a basement or a closet or something 00:36:48
where they throw everything away that's 00:36:54
just what I call the element of 00:36:56
irreducible rascality is always there 00:36:59
but nevertheless on the outside the 00:37:11
place where you operate you know they 00:37:15
have this sense of complete clearness 00:37:15
which is the coincidence in one art expression our freedom and discipline 00:37:27
anything goes 00:37:33
because you've got complete space in 00:37:35
which you can do anything and yet the 00:37:37
space is disciplined beautifully 00:37:37
then in subject matter of painting then people of course as I said prefer the 00:37:56
secular even when they paint saints 00:38:02
sages Buddhas and so on they give them a 00:38:04
secular form that is to say they looked 00:38:07
like just ordinary people they don't 00:38:11
necessarily have halos or special 00:38:14
markings they prefer that they shouldn't 00:38:19
that they should look kind of rustic and 00:38:24
they prefer to put on the altar as it 00:38:28
were the the tokonoma of a tea room the 00:38:35
alcove in other words is not almost 00:38:38
never adorned with a religious figure 00:38:45
but always with naturalistic painting 00:38:53
rocks water vegetables trees whatever 00:38:53
so in the same way in poetry where the haiku is a kind of masterpiece of this 00:39:14
way of feeling the universe the haiku 00:39:23
always celebrates a particular finite G 00:39:35
type no G is distinct from re instant of 00:39:40
life in the dense mist what is being 00:39:47
shouted between hill and boat and you 00:39:54
trauma such a poem will remember you 00:39:57
know some morning when you were at some 00:39:59
gorgeous River estuary and you couldn't 00:40:03
see anything there's a conversation 00:40:05
going on between someone's calling down 00:40:07
to someone in the boat from the hill and 00:40:09
you can't make out what it's all about 00:40:10
any more than you can make out what's on 00:40:12
the other side of the river and yet you 00:40:14
know it is gorgeous somehow but the very 00:40:17
fact that you can't see makes it all the 00:40:18
better 00:40:18
this is all there is the path comes to an end in the parsley this is called in 00:40:41
Japanese you Ken 00:40:52
why you GE M we have no English word for 00:40:57
you again whatsoever but you old swagger 00:40:57
trail ends nowhere but with a certain implication that is to say as I was just 00:41:14
trying to describe the place up in the 00:41:24
mountain well somehow the trail 00:41:28
disappears and there might be something 00:41:36
beyond but the whole point is that you 00:41:39
don't investigate too closely then 00:41:43
you're the sort of person who when you 00:41:45
get in there would spoil it so I could 00:41:55
say um when you make love to somebody do 00:41:58
it delicately don't be too inquisitive 00:42:01
don't be too probing because that would 00:42:03
injure what you love but the real 00:42:14
constant theme of the haiku 00:42:14
is that it always in comics the specific finite temporal immediate moment and 00:42:31
with this says more than you can say 00:42:45
with any amount of abstract 00:42:48
generalizations only only only only you 00:42:54
always know but behind this the people 00:42:58
who make up the Haiku are not bruger are 00:43:01
Philistines who say well isn't the main 00:43:11
thing simply to be practical and get on 00:43:13
with your work the point about the haiku 00:43:24
is this it's something in human life 00:43:28
which is very difficult to pin down but 00:43:32
it's when somebody comes on at you and 00:43:39
says something but you know that there's 00:43:42
another meaning behind it which doesn't 00:43:44
have to be stated between you and so you 00:43:50
get a joke so you get a tacit 00:43:53
understanding about something this looks 00:43:59
like it's this but it is that Mike who 00:44:06
does this in a very cunning way it's the 00:44:12
simplest possible utterance basho said 00:44:16
to get haiku well-written ask a 3-foot 00:44:19
child to say 00:44:19
the robin's egg is blue you like the fire I'll show you something beautiful a 00:44:34
great big ball of snow and this is a 00:44:41
haiku but something is conveyed by this 00:44:52
sea which we're not going to talk about 00:44:58
it'd be bad form to begin with it's like 00:45:04
gentlemen in England don't talk about 00:45:05
religion or sex boy you don't mention 00:45:17
these things it's not quite like that 00:45:19
but it's nearly like that see there's 00:45:22
something got over to you by this where 00:45:28
the whole fun of the thing is that you 00:45:31
don't mention it but this is possible 00:45:36
only when you know the GG muguet thing 00:45:41
that every bit of experience takes in 00:45:45
everything else so in exactly the same 00:45:47
way we have a Confraternity among us in 00:45:51
our society today of hipsters and they 00:46:00
can with a flick of an eyelash make a 00:46:04
whole crowd of people laugh or in the no 00:46:04
because they have seen that one single motion of an eye is the whole universe 00:46:14
in operation and the joke is that the 00:46:22
people outside don't know this but when 00:46:26
I move an eyelash at you and you're in 00:46:28
the nerve about this you laugh 00:46:28
it's a very funny game 00:46:33
[Music] 00:46:43