Shinzen Young explains 'A' in a Whole New Way

So I want you to see my favorite T shirt.

I don't know if you really see it all that good, I have a whole blog about this.

It's hard to miss really.

Essentially, it's this concept.

A big a inside a circle.

So.

You know where I got this T shirt.

So this is crew swag.

From The Avengers movie this gave me a lot of geek cred at the Buddhist geeks couple years ago. You may remember their first meeting. I was the keynote speaker and I wore this during the during the conference because the movie hadn't come out yet, so that's what did me.

The credit card I had like like stuff from the movie before it was available to the public so I was over at their place? And he had all this crew swag so you could take whatever you want and this immediately jumped out so.

You may or may not have an idea of why.

But take a look it's a.

1st letter of the alphabet inside a circle.

So just out set off any possible associations Buddhist Wise.

And each.

Good gas are not completely unrelated.

Well, the circle called Ensle ENS, so you can look it up on the Wikipedia. The Circle is used a lot in set for the obvious symbolism of the list.

That is also empty.

For example, in Soto Zen.

And actually some rings. I also when you sit use it with this moon drop this circular Modra. This is called the Dharma. Talk to Sumathi Muthaura. I love the name Dhamma. Talk to means the realm of the Dharma. The realm of the absolute somebody is somebody in this case concentration and moon throws a hand gesture so this is sort of like the cosmic Samadi hand gesture so.

There's you know, I saw the circle immediately. It's associations and it's meanings. But what really jumped out was the letter, A in the middle of it.

Um.

It reminded me of something from the school of my original ordination.

Which is Japanese shingle she got his Japanese factory on practice and as you no doubt no visualizations are fairly central part both in the Tibetan versions of Ledger, Anna and in the Japanese version and there is a.

Practice that is done, not only by the monks, but by householders. The average lay people in Japan that are associated with the shingle in school, they're taught this very simple of vision visualization called Ajikan.

So con means a visualization. It's the same con is in like cons along so it means contemplate actually comes a lawn means see the world's sounds, but I buy extension contemplate and so forth so that's this con character. G is the same as in kanji, it means a character So what does army in Walla?

Is not just the 1st letter in the English alphabet 1 version or another of it is the 1st letter of the Greek alphabet Alpha.

Uhm it's also the 1st letter in the Hebrew alphabet olive, which pretty much sounds like Alpha and that's no coincidence.

And it's also the 1st letter in all of the alphabets of India. Specifically Devanagari, which is the set. Sanskrit alphabet used in North India. Ah is the first letter.

So.

This is not a coincidence.

The alphabet is one of the most extraordinary cases of cultural diffusion known to anthropology. It was invented. Once there, actually is just one alphabet was invented once about 1000 BC. In what's now Lebanon Essentia Lee.

Which.

Was the center of Phoenician culture and the phoenicians were sort of the northern cuzens of the Israelites essentially the same language, Biblical Hebrew.

Finish is very similar to that, so they invented this alphabet, Aleph Bet Gimel. Dalvin Havea outside in the Hebrew order and that diffused.

The Greeks picked it up from the.

From the phoenicians the Etruscans picked it up from the Greeks. the Romans picked it up from the interest skins. And we English speakers picked it up from the Romans.

So web W, but it also went E.

Um.

As the Aramaic script, which is what's used to write Hebrew now. That's actually our meat. That's actually in the Aramaic version of the alphabet?

Derived from the Phoenician and then it spread and became the Arabic alphabet used all over the Islamic world spread further E Aramaic script was introduced into the eastern part of the empire of Alexander the Great during the Hellenistic period and was modified and became Dave and operate the alphabet used for Sanskrit that spread down into self.

India and the cultures influenced by India through Buddhism to bet fact if you sort of Squint Your Eyes and look at Tibetan.

And you squint your eyes and look at HEB is sort of look similar that's not a coincidence as I totally amazing. That is not a coincidence to band script is derived from a form of Devanagari. Devanagari is derived from the sensually the same alphabet used to write Hebrew once you go back to the phoenician, but it gets more interesting it spreads even further.

Um.

So.

Because mantras are important in Vajrayana, practicing you visualize the letters. You champ the letters. So when the Japanese picked up Bud Rihanna.

Um with it came.

Um.

A knowledge of how to write Sanskrit in.

And in **** alphabet. Now they write with a brush, but they write the letters of a modified form of Devanagari called Sedom alphabet.

So to this day.

Monks in my school.

Learn how to write the mantras in the actual Indic script, not relying on kanji or Chinese characters are comma.

Um.

So that means that.

All the way from Japan.

In the E.

To England and Wales in the West.

That single alphabet spread diffused.

So.

The 1st letter of the alphabet is Ah or olive or a?

And in the Sanskrit language as in the Greek language.

Ah.

Or on the same thing is negation.

It's the negation symmetry symmetric asymmetric.

Um think of any Greek word, and the opposite of it. The negative negation of it will have them and a butter some other examples.

Up.

Typical atypical great what are some other examples?

Simply out, we use that one huh?

Atheistic without feels without God so.

The letter, A is the Great Negator.

OK.

So the content RG com.

The contemplation of the letter, A?

Is used?

Not at first to develop of course, concentration power through visualization, but then to lead you to the insight of the Great Negation? What is the great negation? Well, the button. Born state and what is the unborn state? Well, Yuval meditated on it? Many many times with my system?

Gone OK, so I'll stands for gone as the source of all things it's The Great.

The rich nothingness, the Nada The Nihill Nihill Parexel NTA.

The nothing par excellence whence our sensory experience arises and whether it returns moment by moment whether we notice that or not, and as we notice it more and more were called more and more enlightened so it immediately jumped out to be that wow. This is a really cool T shirt because.

It's got both the end, so which is sort of like the Zen symbol for.

The rich nothingness and it's got the Ah, the Alpha privative. It's called the eh that negates symbolizing the primordial state of the unborn nahs. RG home to show they say in Japanese that the character are points to the original face. They don't use that phrase, but the before your parents were born you know there's an expression.

Before your parents were born.

Before your parents were born right.

Before expansion and contraction separated.

You have face.

What was it?

Well, it will be the face of 0, now wouldn't the primordial unborn.

So I thought there's a lot of Buddhist meaning in The Avengers movie.

So that was a piece of Kruse way that that I grabbed.