Roshi Bernie Glassman: Bearing Witness to the Oneness of Life 2013 (Part 1 of 5)

Rejoice! In this Saturday morning session, Roshi Bernie opens by answering a couple of questions posed by the audience. “What is the most important element in bringing about change?” “What should you do if you don’t know what to do?” Rejoice! Bernie then moves on to the main topic of the session, the Auschwitz retreats that he founded, lead and participated in for the past twenty years. He describes the history of Auschwitz and how the original retreat came to be. His vision for the retreat has been to include people from many different “clubs,” and to build a container around the three tenants of the Zen Peacemakers: not knowing, bearing witness and loving action. He wanted the first day to be overwhelming. To be a plunge to get people into that state of not knowing. The teacher of the retreat is the place, Auschwitz, and that they must bear witness to the place. Bernie spends the remainder of the session describing a number of deeply moving, touching and thought provoking stories of loving action that arose out of not knowing and bearing witness.