Who are you, What are you doing, What's happening - Are they three questions or one? Barry Magid April 1st 2017

The enlightenment of Shakyamuni was said to be insight into the emptiness and interconnectedness of all things. The original Sangha that grew around the Buddha and his teaching was said to live a life that expressed that truth. They were homeless. They had no fixed abode, no possessions. They would be dependent on begging. They way they lived their life would reflect impermanence and interconnectedness. Dogen also taught a ritualized life that enacted the basic truths of Buddhism. Who they were was inseparable from what they did. The danger is that identity devolves into rule following. It is one of the important functions of April Fool's day and Carnival in the broader sense, that every now and then, ritually, the rules are turned upside down. All the things we usually do to define ourselves get violated or played with. It's a nice guard against becoming precious and rigid about the forms of practice. And a disciplined way of expressing the fact that you don't have to do anything to receive these basic truths about impermanence and interconnectedness.

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