Karandhara: The Zen school is a liberalization of the old Buddhist doctrines. Previously, hundreds of years ago, to completely follow the Buddhist path one had to renounce all activity. He had to go away from civilization and live in hermitage. Zen...
Prabhupāda: Nirvāṇa. Finish everything.
Karandhara: Yes. Zen allows a man... According to the precepts of Zen, you can act within the world. You can be a businessman, you can be a soldier, you can be anything, and still attain the same state of perfection by acting without desire, by acting unattached to the results.
Prabhupāda: So that is our philosophy. We... Arjuna acted as soldier, and still, he was recognized as devotee. (French)
Bhagavān: What is the use of practice, if you practice or you don't practice you still get the same result?
Prabhupāda: No, practice must be there. You cannot avoid practice. We also practice.
Karandhara: What he says is the form of the practice doesn't really matter, but the inspiration or the motivation to practice, to try and become desireless, that is the dynamic thing. It doesn't matter what form it takes.
Bhagavān: The problem is still death, though.
Prabhupāda: No, practice without any aim...
Karandhara: They say the aim is the practice itself. Just like we say the aim of devotional service...
Prabhupāda: No, no, the aim is there. Aim is there. He says that to become desireless. That is the aim. So why does he say that there is no aim?
Pṛthu Putra: When he is talking about practice, he's talking about special practice, the zazen practice. And his concept in zazen, his concept of Buddha, is this disciplic succession, that to practice under the guidance of the spiritual master of this disciplic succession of zazen from Buddha. That is his practice.
Prabhupāda: No, if he says that "There is no aim; you go on practicing," so aim is there, he says, that to become desireless. (French)
Pṛthu Putra: He says zazen is in himself the satori, is the practice. We don't practice to get the satori, but the satori is going automatically with the practice.
Prabhupāda: No, no, the aim of practice is to become desireless. Is it not? (French)
Pṛthu Putra: He says the goal of the practice is to become without goal.
Prabhupāda: Oh, it is nonsense. (chuckles) What is this nonsense? Goal is without goal. Then what is this? These are vague terms.
Karandhara: It's like saying nothing is true, but then that's a truism.
Prabhupāda: It is darkness.
Puṣṭa-kṛṣṇa: They want to become minus.
Prabhupāda: But he is plus always. (French) No, if you have no goal... There is example: "Man without any aim is ship without any rudder." What is called? So suppose if the ship goes... (others are talking at the same time) Aeroplane is going with a aim to land in some country, but if he goes on simply without any aim, then there will be disaster.
Karandhara: Well, they have an aim. But the aim is... Because they haven't...
Prabhupāda: That you say they have got; he does not say. You say.
Karandhara: No, but I mean philosophically considering, they have an aim, but it's very obscure. The substance and the significance of that aim is without form or conception.
Prabhupāda: So without aim, what is the use of practice? (French)
Pṛthu Putra: He says he likes the practice without goal, and he doesn't give any value to the practice because there is goal.
Prabhupāda: That is foolishness. Without goal, practicing something, it is foolishness. (French)
Karandhara: No, he is also working for a goal. He just differs semantically with what we say.
Prabhupāda: No, he does not know what is that goal. No, he does not know what is that goal.
Karandhara: Well, he says the goal is to become goal-less.
Prabhupāda: We give the goal... We give the goal, yajñārthe. Yajñārthe karma. We give the goal: for satisfying the Lord Viṣṇu, Yajña, yajña-puruṣa. We know the goal. (French)
Pṛthu Putra: He says, "Who is Viṣṇu?"
Prabhupāda: Viṣṇu is God. (French)
Pṛthu Putra: And how we can satisfy God?
Prabhupāda: That you have to learn from me. (French)
Pṛthu Putra: He says yes.
Prabhupāda: "Me" means from the spiritual master. If you don't work for Viṣṇu, Yajña, yajñārthe karmaṇaḥ anyatra loko 'yaṁ karma-bandhanaḥ (BG 3.9), then you will be entangled in this birth and death. Just like if I do not know what is healthy life, then, if I live whimsically then I will infect so many contaminous disease, and I will have to suffer one after another, one after another, one after another. Therefore the aim is Viṣṇu. Na te viduḥ svārtha-gatiṁ hi viṣṇum (SB 7.5.31). These people, they do not know that what is the aim of life, the aim is Viṣṇu. Durāśayā ye bahir-artha-māninaḥ. They are implicated with the external energy, therefore very much anxious to mitigate this suffering, mitigate that suffering, mitigate that suffering, that suffering, that suf... The suffering will never end. Simply they will be bewildered, one after another, one after another, sometimes man's life, sometimes a dog's life, sometimes cat's life. That's life. So this kind of philosophy is propounded by blind men. Andhā yathāndhair upanīyamānāḥ. One blind man is guiding another blind man without knowing the strict, stringent laws of nature. (aside:) There is one bead lying for three hundred years there. Whose? He has taken initiation. He does not know where is the bead? On the... There is a bead. Just see.
Karandhara: On the heater there's someone's beads.
Prabhupāda: So I see it was lying on the bathroom. Then I brought it here, and it's still lying unused. Whose it is?
Bhagavān: It is mine.
Prabhupāda: You are so forgetful?
Bhagavān: No, I was looking for them.
Prabhupāda: Why? Why did you...?
Bhagavān: I left them on your bathroom door, I think.
Prabhupāda: Yes. (pause) Hmm. So this kind of leadership will not make any solution, if you do not know what is the real goal. (French)
Pṛthu Putra: He doesn't agree if a man create or imagine a goal, he says, the real goal, the real things...
Prabhupāda: No, it is not imagination. That is another foolishness, to imagine a goal. If we imagine some goal, that is another rascaldom. We have to understand what is the goal of life from superior. Just like a child. He does not know what is the goal of life, but his parents know he must be educated. So goal has not to be imagined. Goal has to be understood from superior. So if the superior man is also blind, then he cannot lead other blind forward. If a blind man takes the position of superior, then he will lead these followers to the ditch only. That's all. (French)