My Imperfect Teacher

Over the years, I came to see Bernie’s imperfections as his greatest gift. It was through accepting, coming to terms with, appreciating his imperfections that I was able to make some peace with my own. Where would I have been, where would I be now, if Bernie had been “perfect”? It wasn’t that Bernie was always acknowledging his imperfections, not really. But he wasn’t hiding them. That was gift enough. I could see them – maybe most of his students saw them – and they were part of the package. They were part of what made Bernie Bernie.

What if Bernie had managed to hide his imperfections? What if I couldn’t see them? Where would I be? I did a Dharma talk about this once at one of Roshi Bob Kennedy’s sesshins. I talked about how important Bernie’s imperfections were to me in becoming a teacher, how fortunate I was. Ironically, it seemed that Bob might be a more difficult teacher than Bernie because he was a less difficult person. It was a kind of humorous idea. Bob never seemed to be insensitive to others, always gentle, always thoughtful, always caring. Maybe it was his Jesuit thing, but I didn’t see the flaws.

Where were his imperfections for his students to come to terms with, to appreciate? How would Bob’s students come to embrace their own imperfections? How would they become imperfect teachers? It’s important. If you don’t become the imperfect teacher, you end up a fraud, pretending to be a perfect teacher, if you become a teacher at all. What a challenge. By comparison, Bernie was easy.

By contrast, Maezumi Roshi, Bernie’s teacher, my Dharma grandpa was even easier than Bernie, although I am only now appreciating this aspect of his life. Maezumi’s flaws were blowing in the wind, left onlookers gasping.  How could an alcoholic and a womanizer be an enlightened teacher? How was this possible? Some students chose to ignore them. Some chose to break with him. Some made excuses. Others pronounced him cured. Maezumi had gone in rehab; he’d faced his problems. What did that mean? That he’d fixed his imperfections? That now he was “perfect” again, everyone’s ideal of the Zen teacher?

The challenge, Bernie showed us, is to work with your imperfect teacher. I am grateful to Bernie for sharing so much of his work with his Maezumi koan. He was grateful for his special relationship with Maezumi – Bernie was Maezumi’s first successor – and enjoyed the deepest sharing in Maezumi’s Japanese Soto Zen experience. He worked for years with the burden and obligation: there was so much that drew him that he couldn’t do without disappointing and hurting Maezumi. Bernie appreciated Maezumi with all his flaws.

Bernie was my hardest to pass koan. Maezumi must have been even harder. Working with his imperfections helped to make Bernie the teacher he was.  Working with Bernie’s imperfections was my pathway to making peace with my own.  And that, it seems, is the pathway to becoming a teacher.