210 Nananda

           Eleanor emailed.

The master had been admitted to the hospital for an inflamed gall bladder and pancreas. He had been in pain for four days and when he had then become very ill Eleanor had rushed him to the emergency ward. Doctors discovered that gall stones blocked his duodenum. Laparoscopic surgery to remove his gall bladder had been scheduled for Monday. Since I knew that everyone in the sangha had to work I wondered if anyone could be present; so when my only class was over at noon I drove to the hospital where I found Nananda in the waiting room.

We hugged.

"Thank you for coming," she said.

"Thank you."

The master had just been rolled into surgery.

"Two hours."

"Oh."

Nananda was on her way to the cafeteria for lunch and she invited me to accompany her. Though we had practiced together at several workshops and sessins at Heartmind I hardly knew her.

Nananda asked what I had been doing.

"The usual," I said.

I explained that my days had been full of family, teaching, practice, and writing.

For two hours we talked—

Ten times longer than all of our previous conversation combined.

"Writing?" Nananda inquired.

"Yes."

"What have you been writing?"

"A book."

"About what?"

I explained that I was writing about my personal experience of Buddhism and Buddhist practice and that most of the book was about the master and my five years at Heartmind Temple.

"That sounds interesting," Nananda said.

"Well…."

I did not quite know how to respond to that.

I smiled.

"Will your book make him famous or infamous?" Nananda asked.

Nananda grinned.

"Neither I suspect."

Hope.

Nananda explained that although the master was in her opinion one of the very best Zen teachers in America most books by Zen students about their teachers were unrealistic, too worshipful, and that they presented a false picture of the struggle most Zen students go through.

"Where do students get such unrealistic expectations of their teachers?" Nananda asked.

"From the literature!" I exclaimed.

"I suppose."

"From the legend," I said.

"Yes."

"Absolutely."

"Yes."

Nananda agreed.

"My book isn't like that," I said.

"Oh?"

"It's not an exposé," I said, "but it is mainly about my conflict with my teacher."

Nananda grinned.

"I quarreled with Kudo," she said.

Nananda described how on one occasion they had been yelling at each other.

"Face to face," she said.

To illustrate she leaned forward until her face was just eight inches from my own.

"Like this!" Nananda exclaimed.

I smiled.

I recognized the gesture.

Yes.

I was very familiar with it.

The master.

"I threatened to leave and never come back," Nananda explained.

Nananda paused.

"He told me to go ahead."

I waited.

"I told him that if he said that three times I would."

I laughed.

"It sounds like marriage," I said.

Nananda nodded.

"Yes," she said. "Without the fun."

I smiled.

"He said it twice," Nananda said, "then said he understood."

I nodded.

"But I did leave for a time," Nananda explained, "and I took a six-week retreat."

I thought.

"He and I didn't yell," I said.

"No?"

"We disagreed."

"About what?" Nananda inquired.

"The practice journal mainly," I explained, "his verbal abuse."

Nananda nodded.

"He insisted that I was not as fulfilled and happy as I felt," I said.

I waited.

"If he thought that," Nananda said, "then there's at least a grain of truth in it."

I smiled.

"Our relationship made me unhappy so I quit," I explained.

"Oh."

"But he begged me to come back."

"Really?"

I nodded.

"Yes."

"Really?" Nananda asked again.

I nodded.

"He asked me to come in to talk with him about it and when I did he warned me and he threatened me and he demanded and commanded and then finally he just begged and cried."

"Really?" Nananda asked.

"Yes."

Nananda explained that usually when a student experiences conflict with his teacher the student thinks it is he himself who is wrong because he believes or has been led to believe that his teacher is always right; and because all of his fellow students seem from the outside to be doing fine the student thinks the problem is his own and that he has failed.

I listened.

"But that is a misunderstanding," Nananda said. "That is not really the case."

I thought.

"It's not like that at the temple," I said.

"No?" Nananda asked.

"No."

I explained that at the core of the sangha was a tiny group of students and that it was obvious in practice group meetings and in other ways that everyone at the temple had problems.

Nananda asked how things seemed once I returned to the temple and to practice with the master.

I explained that our differences remained unresolved but that for the most part it seemed okay.

"Then," I said, "the business with his secrets occurred."

I waited.

"I really don't know much about that," Nananda said.

I waited.

"Tell me," Nananda said.

I summarized.

I explained that in a small group meeting the master had mentioned just in passing that there were a couple of things in his life that he could not tell just anybody because public knowledge of them would ruin his reputation and that this had not made sense to me.

"I wanted to know if secrecy to protect reputation is the Way," I said.

Nananda smiled.

"I probed," I said. "I was curious."

"Yes."

I told my story.

I explained that the master had told me of his sexual relationship with Nananda, that he had then also told me that I could do whatever I wanted with the information, that I had told my wife and others of it, and that I had then mentioned in my practice journal that I had done so.

"He popped his cork," I said.

Nananda smiled.

"He expelled me from the temple and excommunicated me."

"I suppose that hurt," Nananda said.

I thought.

"No," I said, "not really."

"No?"

"I trusted his judgment," I said.

It was true.

"I was concerned about his health."

"Yes."

I explained that if our relationship caused him anxiety that endangered his health and the master thought it best to end our relationship I had already decided that I would just accept it.

For a few moments we sat silent.

I waited.

"What do you think he was really upset about?" Nananda asked.

I considered again.

"I don't know," I said. "It still doesn't make sense to me."

Nananda waited.

"I was a student one hundred percent," I said.

It had felt that way.

Yes.

"Did he say why in your meeting?" Nananda asked.

I nodded.

"He said it was gossip and triangulation."

"And—"

"I think it was the first time I had ever heard the word triangulation. He said a student who had a problem with the teacher should speak only to the teacher about it and that if a student asked another student about the problem he should be told only to ask the teacher."

"You understand the harm of talking behind a person's back."

"Of course."

Yes.

I nodded.

"Yes," I said. "It wasn't like that.

"How so?"

I summarized.

Nothing was ever said behind the master's back that we students had not said to his face. Up until the business of his secrets in his relationship with Nananda the master had not emphasized confidentiality. He had encouraged us to talk with one another about our practice, to help one another, and he had praised us for doing so. So far as I knew the issue of confidentiality had really never arisen until the mention of his concern over his reputation. The master had known for over two years that I was writing a book. My last entry in my journal before the master expelled me, I told Nananda, was the question of whether it would mean the end of our relationship if I included the secret about her in my book. I had emailed my journal to him just before Sunday zazen and service and in our practice group meeting the master had begun by saying he had just read a student journal and felt a twist in his intestines.

"I suspected it was mine," I said. "I didn't know."

I thought.

"But I think he would have remained my teacher if Eleanor had not encouraged him to withdraw from a teaching relationship that was causing him stress and endangering his health."

"What did Eleanor know about it?"

I laughed.

"I don't know," I said. "But I did not object."

I paused.

"It was confusing."

"Yes."

"I had to trust his decision."

"Yes."

"I was present during the episode of diverticulitis."

"Yes."

"I did not want another of those," I said. "I thought he might die."

"Yes."

I concluded.

"He called me in to talk the next Friday and withdrew from our relationship, expelled me from the temple, forbade me from attending the board meeting, and excommunicated me."

"Ha!"

Nananda laughed loudly.

"Ha!"

I grinned.

Nananda seemed to find the conclusion to my story hilarious.

This comforted me.

"When we quarreled," Nananda said, "he permitted me to come only to zazen and service."

"Oh."

"Not for any other reason," she explained.

Nananda laughed.

"Mine was total," I said.

Nananda laughed.

"Ha!"

I explained.

"I heard from friends that at the board meeting he read from the precepts and said that I had violated them but that is just hearsay. He did not do anything like that in my presence."

"Which precepts?" Nananda asked.

Hmm.

"I don't really know," I said.

Nananda waited.

"Right speech I think—triangulation and gossip."

Nananda considered.

"Do you think you had done anything wrong?" she asked.

"No."

"Not even a little guilty?"

"No."

"But you don't feel hurt?"

No.

I shook my head.

No.

"It wasn't like that," I said.

No.

I tried again to explain.

Hmm.

"I trusted him and I was concerned about his health and besides—"

I paused.

"Yes?"

"Our other conflicts had become wearying," I said. "It felt right to me, too."

We were silent.

"It felt best to accept it and go forward," I added.

We were silent.

"But it wasn't a secret," Nananda said finally. "Others knew."

I listened.

"So I wonder why it got so out of proportion in his mind?"

"I don't know," I said.

I continued.

"He told me that he had told Eleanor about it, too, and then he told me that he wanted me to talk with Eleanor about his past sexual relationship with you. That sounded really weird to me. It was too confusing. I was supposed to go to Eleanor and say I wanted to talk with her about your intimate relationship with him? I couldn't broach a subject like that. To what end? I hardly knew Eleanor and I didn't even know if you knew that he had told people. I had no idea now what was a secret and what wasn't, what was confidential and what wasn't, what was private and what wasn't, and I had already told others about it yet he seemed now to want to contain it. It was way too confusing for me so I just ignored his request."

Nananda thought.

"I wonder if he was worried about my finding out that he had told people about it."

"I don't know."

"That makes sense," Nananda said.

"Maybe."

"Then it was me he was trying to protect."

"Maybe."

"And himself since now he felt guilty about telling others without telling me."

"I don't know."

"I think that's probably it."

"I don't know."

"Secrecy always has a sickness about it," Nananda said.

"Yes," I said.

"It's not good," she said.

"No."

I thought.

"Kudo told me that, too," I said. "That further confused me."

We sat and we thought.

I waited.

"In my years as a Zen teacher," Nananda said, "no student has ever told me anything really intimate, private, or confidential."

"Really?" I asked.

I was thinking of the many intimate confessions of my writing students at the college.

"Yes."

"I wouldn't know about that," I said.

"It's true."

I explained to Nananda that I had told the master more than once that he was free to repeat to others anything I told or wrote to him, that I had nothing left to hide, and that until this story of her and him the master had never told me anything in dokusan that he had not also told me in my journal or in group discussion.

Nothing special.

Criticism.

"Nothing he ever told me seemed confidential until the end," I said.

Nananda thought.

"I tell my students that I discuss them with other Zen teachers," Nananda said.

Consultation.

Yes.

I did it at my job.

But—

"What about Zen students discussing their Zen teacher?"

I wondered.

Nananda said that the question of privacy and confidentiality in dokusan had been a big issue at national meetings of Zen teachers. Did it apply to the teacher only or also to the student? Was it relative or absolute? Could some things be revealed and not others or what?

"Where should the line be drawn?" Nananda wondered.

"Yes."

I explained that all of those questions had become difficult. Confidentiality had never before been an issue at the temple, I told Nananda, and it arose only after the master had told me about him and her and I had told others and then wondered about putting it in my book.

"But it wasn't a secret," Nananda said again.

"I guess not."

"No."

Nananda explained that what little she knew of my situation she had learned only from the emails and that she knew almost nothing of the larger context of what was going on. No one had told her anything of what had happened leading up to the emails about me and my expulsion.

"And nobody told me anything about what happened to you after," Nananda said.

I filled her in.

The hospital—

My visits—

His invitation—

Our talk—

"He invited me to come back to practice."

"Did you?"

"I've been just three or four times," I said.

"Why?"

"There were conditions on my return," I explained.

"Like what?"

"I'd have to work on my dark side," I said.

"Yes."

"I'd have to acknowledge that I was not as happy and as fulfilled as I felt."

I paused.

"Yes."

I thought.

"We had not resolved our differences," I explained, "and his health was still an issue."

Nananda nodded.

"I knew the same old questions would come up again in my practice with him."

"What questions?"

"Well—"

"Yes?"

"He never answered my question about whether protecting reputation is the Way."

Nananda grinned.

"You know what his answer to that would be now don't you?" Nananda asked.

"What?" I asked.

"No!"

"But that is not what he said."

"Really?"

"No."

Nananda looked puzzled.

"No."

There was too much to report.

Too complicated.

"No."

Nananda waited.

"Given all that has happened the past two years and his health the way it is," I said finally, "I'm afraid that it would seem just plain malicious to ask him that same question again."

Nananda thought.

"It sounds like you'll need to write another chapter to your book," she said.

Nananda smiled.

"I've already written it," I said.

"Really?"

"Yes," I said.

"It sounds like a good book," Nananda said.

Time passed.

Talk.

Her name was called.

I waited.

Nananda returned with a grin.

I smiled.

"It all went just as planned!"

"Good."

Nananda had learned that despite the scar tissue from previous surgeries doctors had been able to remove the master's gall bladder with small laparoscopic incisions instead of a big cut.

His surgeon was pleased.

"Good."

The master might be home soon.

"Good."

Nananda would sit with the master in recovery.

"Thank you," Nananda said.

We hugged.

"Thank you," I said.

We bowed.

I drove home and told Ruth all that had transpired.

"Good!"

Eternal return.