This podcast is offered by the San Francisco Zen Center on the web at www.sfcc.org. Our public programs are made possible by donations from people like you. Good evening, everybody, and welcome to Zen Center City Center. Welcome particularly to those who are here for the first time. Are there any people who are here for the first time? Welcome, very much. My name is Anna Thorne. I am currently in the practice position of director here at City Center. And for the last three months, October, November, December, I was very lucky to be participating in the practice period in a three-month sitting at Tassahara Zen Mountain Monastery, which meant to leave the busy life of the director behind and just sit and go into silence.

[01:28]

I wanted to thank all of you who made this possible for me to do this. And tonight, at this point, I wanted to also thank Darlene Cohen whose picture is on the altar and who died in the early hours of the day for being such a wonderful teacher and such an enormous role model. Deline often took the seat here in the Buddha Hall and What I admired about Darlene, especially, was her encouragement, her enthusiasm for life and practice, and her light and witty humor.

[02:44]

And she was very clear in her advice around taking care of everyday particularities and cutting through delusion. Her sangha is sitting with her at this time and I wanted to invite us to join their sitting for a short time. And I also would like to include Lu in our sitting here. I miss Lu a lot Lou is a resident here and has now moved to Zen Hospice across the street. Lou is not doing so well. And I assume that Blanche is with him right now. And I just wanted to say a few words about how Lou has been teaching me.

[03:57]

I came to city center in 98, and first was Fukuten in the kitchen. And Lou was actually the one who helped me understand the concept of a bodhisattva. He just picked up everything that needed to be done. When there was a guest coming to the door, not knowing their way, he would show them around, or show them how to make a tea, when a compost bucket fell over he would just clean up the mess and particularly when I was Eno from 2001 to 2003 every afternoon Lou came to the door and he stood there and said what do you need so he would just take on whatever was needed like either a door watch for afternoon zazen or being the doshi or taking on any of the Zendo jobs.

[05:05]

And it was not anything special or he would just do it kind of as a background to everything that was happening. And it really helped me understand what it is to continually practice and just respond. So maybe right now we could just take a moment and remember Darlene and include Lou in our sitting. this talk tonight, I wanted to consider intimacy with the Heart Sutra.

[07:15]

We chant the Heart Sutra every day in our morning service. And in doing so, we actually join all Mahayana Sanghas all over the planet. Sanghas all over the world chant the Heart Sutra in many different ways, expressing interconnectedness. And about a year ago, Tova Green and I went to Vietnam to the International Buddhist Women Conference, and in the opening ceremony of the conference, we chanted the Heart Sutra in many, many different versions. It was a great delight to hear the different voices and the cultural coloring of the different versions of the Heart Sutra.

[08:17]

There were Tibetan nuns who chanted the overtone version or Vietnamese nuns who had a very melodious expression of the Heart Sutra And Tova and I chanted the Heart Sutra in Japanese. So there's actually always the Heart Sutra chanted at any moment, I think. And I think our ritual of chanting the Heart Sutra is expressing our devotion to the teaching of emptiness. That is the focus of the Heart Sutra. I think the ritual of the Heart Sutra, staying with it and memorizing it, and having glimpses and understanding of the teaching, is a way to open up to emptiness.

[09:27]

It's a teaching that we cannot grasp intellectually. So what is it to become intimate with this teaching? At this point, I asked the, you know, whether we could chant the Heart Sutra before I say something about the words. And so maybe we could pass out? Okay. So we chant together. Heart of Great Perfect Wisdom Sutra Avalokiteshvara Modi Sattva Vendi Practicing Kvajra Paravita

[10:29]

So that all fight back with its certainty and thus relieved all suffering. Story put forth form does not differ from emptiness. Emptiness does not differ from form. Form itself is emptiness. Itself forms sensations, perceptions, formations, and consciousness are also like this story. All of us are marked by emptiness. They neither arise nor cease. Neither defied nor pure, neither increase nor decrease. Forgiven emptiness, there is no form, no sensation, no perception, no formation.

[11:41]

Consciousness, no eyes, no ears, no nose, no tongue, no body, no mind. Sight, no sound, no smell, no taste, no touch. Object of mind, no realm of sight, no realm of mind. Consciousness Neither ignorance nor extinction. Ignorance neither old age and death nor extinction. Old age and death no suffering no cause no cessation. No path no knowledge and no attainment. Nothing to attain of Bodhisattva relies on your paramita, and thus the mind is without hindrance.

[12:50]

There is no fear far beyond all inverted views. Realizers, nirvana, all Buddhas of past, present and future rely on Prajnaparamita in thereby attain and surpass completely perfect enlightenment for know the Prajnaparamita Great, miraculous mantra, the great, bright mantra, the supreme mantra, the incomparable mantra, which removes all suffering and is true. Therefore we proclaim the prize of our peace upon us,

[13:54]

Thank you. So the Heart Sutra, the Heart of Perfect Wisdom Sutra, is part of the Perfection of Wisdom Sutras. And the Zen Center version that we just chanted together is called like a short version, which was developed or derived from an extended version which has 100,000 lines and was probably composed between 100 before common and 300 in common era. In the version that has come down to us, it's supposed to, it's not sure, that it was compiled around 300 to 500.

[15:05]

So in one understanding, the Heart Sutra is understood at the second turning of the wheel of the Dharma, meaning Teaching like the Four Noble Truths would be considered the first turning of the wheel. The first turning of the wheel, understanding human suffering, understanding the origin of suffering, that there is relief from suffering, and that there is a path how to be relieved from suffering. That would be the first part of the teaching and then the Heart Sutra is getting in another layer of what liberation is in particular in explaining emptiness and calling actually the Noble Truth the Four Noble Truths empty so the teaching is just a concept that's

[16:19]

one of the maybe scary messages of the Heart Sutra, if you would have the idea that the teaching of the Four Noble Truths is something you could hold on to. the Hatsutra is the core teaching of the Mahayana tradition, and it is addressed to bodhisattvas. It's addressed to bodhisattvas who have made the bodhisattva vow of liberating all beings. It can also be read as a description of progressive stages of spiritual attainment.

[17:22]

For example, the expression in the exclamation, which could be translated as, go, go, go beyond, go completely beyond, or go to the other shore, cross over to complete enlightenment. The Heart Sutra begins with the words, Avalokitesvara bodhisattva, when deeply practicing Prajnaparamita clearly saw that all five skandhas are empty and thus relieved all suffering. Avalokitesvara is the bodhisattva of compassion, who is listening, hearing, and seeing the cries and the suffering of the world. and completely immersed in studying the perfection of wisdom, he sees that all five skandhas are empty.

[18:26]

So seeing the emptiness of the five skandhas means that is another concept of understanding human being. The concept of the five skandhas is form, feeling, perception, mental formation, and consciousness. Form is referring to the body, including the senses and the nervous system. Feeling is referring to the very first reaction to any event that meets our nervous system, which could either be negative or positive or neutral. And the third aggregate

[19:47]

Perception is the next layer of having a concept about this first sensation, having a name. That's the layer of noticing, naming, conceptualizing. The fourth aggregate is mental formation. It's like For example, fear or joy or judgment. They are mental patterns that are activated by certain input or signal. And there are wholesome and unwholesome mental formations. Consciousness would be the fifth of the aggregates. So Avalokiteshvara sees this whole concept of the five aggregates, the idea of the human being as empty.

[20:59]

And exactly that seeing of this concept of being a human being as empty is the release of suffering. In our version of the Heart Sutra, Avalokiteshvara speaks about to Shariputra, who is the foremost in wisdom among the Buddha's disciples and announced to become a Buddha in the Lotus Sutra. Avalokitesvara comments on the connotations and perspectives of emptiness as the heart of wisdom teaching and says... Form does not differ from emptiness, emptiness does not differ from form. Form itself is emptiness, emptiness itself form. In the phrase form is emptiness, emptiness is introduced as the ultimate nature of things.

[22:04]

There is no emptiness without form and no form without emptiness. In his comment, the Dalai Lama in his book Essence of the Heart Sutra says, form lacks intrinsic or independent existence. Thus its nature is emptiness. This nature, emptiness, is not independent of form, but rather a characteristic of form. Emptiness is form's mode of being. One must understand form and its emptiness in unity. They are not two independent realities. When we identify something as form, when we see, for example, a maple leaf, we see something that comes together as a leaf at this moment, depending on incountable conditions and events.

[23:12]

And it's not possible by itself independently existing. So this being interwoven and this coming to be with everything is its emptiness of inherent existence. It's not being separated. So emptiness is not some ultimate thing out there. Emptiness comes with form and not without. It can only be conceived in relating to form in becoming intimate with form. To see that something comes to be through everything else is to see the unity of form and emptiness. When we see the codependent arising of forms, we see their openness and valuability.

[24:15]

we can see how emptiness creates forms. We might understand form as a manifestation of emptiness, something that comes out of emptiness. So to experience emptiness, it is helpful to hear and reflect on the teaching. And in hearing and reflecting the teaching of emptiness, we might open up to meeting it. Meeting or realizing emptiness might be scary, for it is not just unfamiliar but rather unknown to us. We are used to eliminate the possibility of meeting emptiness by identifying and grasping what we see and to make it into something. we have a kind of apparatus of perception that turns things into things immediately.

[25:25]

So in the ritual of chanting the Heart Sutra, we practice. Emptiness cannot be explained or grasped. It can be pointed out It can be pointed at. Chanting the Heart Sutra takes care of that. Chanting the Heart Sutra is asking, what is this? Keeping asking, what is this? Receiving what we cannot know. So again, when we look... At the beginning of the Heart Sutra, what is it? What is the attunement to emptiness? It is Avalokitesvara sitting at the opening gate.

[26:32]

The way to meet and to attune to emptiness is through compassion. And compassion is fostered to the parameters. To become intimate with emptiness, we first need to cultivate openness, flexibility, and stillness. And stillness to be with whatever arises. Our attunement to emptiness is an everyday affair of how we get out of bed, of how we take a shower, how we put our clothes on, how we cook breakfast for the Sangha, how we clean the building. And it is only in meticulous care of each thing that we are doing that we settle, that we come closer.

[27:45]

to understanding reality. When the mind perceives emptiness directly, it perceives nothing else. Within such a perspective, there is no longer subject and object. It's again the Dalai Lama commenting on the Heart Sutra. The Heart Sutra says, Therefore, given emptiness, there is no form, no separation, There is no form, no sensation, no perception, no formation, no consciousness. Which is to say, there is no subject. The five aggregates are experienced as empty and it continues. No eyes, no ears, no nose, no tongue, no body. Which when I first heard that was quite scary. As I was quite happy. to identify with certain smells or certain tunes of music.

[28:51]

So this passage of the Heart Sutra points to state of mind where we do not perceive objects. It would be dangerous to drive a car at this point. But on the other hand, it's through driving mindfully. that we come closer to realizing emptiness. So, tonight I feel I will not follow the long pages of my talk. And I would rather come back to our everyday temple life experience.

[30:04]

And I would rather ask the senior staff at this point How do we practice with this teaching in everyday temple life? What is practicing in community? So maybe those of you who are here from the senior staff could complete my talk tonight. We talk of openness, flexibility, and stillness. When we get up in the morning, we follow the morning schedule that parents had this morning.

[31:07]

When they wake up well, we took practice. We give that with openness, flexibility, and stillness. We don't do what we want to do. We do what the schedule asks us to do. We don't do that low. We started there. We did kinky. We came up to the service and we did soji. It's not the time for doing what you want to do. So I put up in the morning between the end of soji and the mail chart. I find people who are reading the paper in a small picture, you know, making a top of coffee. And then, oh. After the mail chart, we can make a top of the paper. But for that time, we're giving ourselves over to the session. In this community life, we're feeding ourselves over again and again. We're not here just because we want to do the outside. Anyone can come to do the outside.

[32:08]

They'll open every day. We did it. I'm feeding myself a little bit for breakfast, all day, all week, all the time. I just asked someone to be shook at him because the person I thought would be shook at him all the day. Then let's be shook at him. That was wonderful. Maybe they had a thing that they've been doing for a lecture. Can they get themselves to the request? That's all the others. So in our life together, there are many opportunities to do it, many opportunities to give yourself hope to a request. Request to the schedule, request to someone who likes me to chop carrots and kitchen. Request to being able to ask me to do the fact that I also want people to do a lot of savings on this project. So... Let yourself be open to them. The more you're open to them, the less you get stuck with yourself.

[33:10]

Let us get stuck with yourself, the more you can be able to accept with other people. And that's what we can share. I think what's asked of us, particularly in Asia, it's an object. It's really the best to connect with each other. each other's suffering, each other's joy. We might see other cures to have to get here so hard, but really the way it does is it's the idea that we all have to work into and that we all share.

[34:18]

And trying to remember that, even when we're having a very hard time of following the right to be outside and inside. It's the truth that you have, the stuff that you have, how do you overcome that? And I just want to say that even when I have the mirror in my heart, In my area, I experience, actually, a lot of generosity.

[35:23]

from others, and I kind of intentionally hand myself over so that I'm able to pass things to me. This also run with my crew. They kind of have to use those tools as well to kind of just be there. And in being there, beyond You're able beyond all of that, but just being there and really making an effort to meet people, that's why things happen. We all kind of create these things together. When we come from a spirit of generosity, we're really allowing ourselves to welcome people to the same. So my name is De Arendt.

[36:48]

I am currently serving here as guest studio manager, work leader. One aspect of my work is actually to welcome, and meet people who come here, come here and practice with us. We call them their students. I think I want to say, as Anna so wonderfully pointed out, the Heart Sutra is a text that I feel can give us a taste of what it means to be a human being can give us a taste of what it means to be true. So the question I have in this place at Zen Center, in the Zen tradition, how do we actually embody and hopefully realize teaching of the hearts

[37:58]

I would say, the spirit of emptiness, there are certainly many ways to talk about it. One way to talk about it is we take up the practice of following the schedule. We go as far as saying, practice of following the schedule is a direct advent of the teachings of the heart So a place like Tashkara, or traditional monastic settings, it's very easy to understand what the schedule is. Here, it's very complex, because we try to meet the needs of different people, and the needs of what complexities of life in the 21st century. But at work, I would like to say schedule.

[39:01]

is, I pointed this out this morning, is the complete morning program. Soji, which is temple cleaning, which is dusting this hall, scrubbing the toilets, is not only something we need to do, but it's part of the deep practice of following the schedule. Real worship. doing dishes, having dough on the arms, being dough-watched, being night-watched, et cetera, et cetera. Please see them as part of the practice of following the spirit. Now comes a tricky thing in my mind. When we take out this practice, I think what happens to most of us is resistance comes up.

[40:07]

Personally, for many years, I've thought I'm that student because I can't follow the schedule. But I want courage. I think this is really natural. I want to go as far as saying one of us is able to follow the schedule That is, without resistance, I bow to you as Buddha. So resistance coming up is very natural in this practice following the schedule. Great thing here is, in this way, we become aware that We usually want to follow our influences. But to study our resistance here, and work here, and yet continue to follow the schedule, and go all the way and say, just by faith, if we continue this practice, our resistance

[41:26]

So, you just heard the closing of the talk, which was also continuing our discussion in senior staff this morning. And I thank you all for coming tonight and practicing together here. Thank you. Thank you for listening to this podcast offered by the San Francisco Zen Center. Our Dharma talks are offered at no cost, and this is made possible by the donations we receive. Your financial support helps us to continue to offer the Dharma.

[42:29]

For more information, visit sfcc.org and click giving. May we fully enjoy the Dharma.

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