This is the Wednesday Dharma Talk with San Francisco Zen Center. Our speaker for the evening is Anshi Zachary Smith. Zach was Shuso in 2007, that is head monk, ordained as a priest in 2014 and received Dharma transmission in 2019, all with senior Dharma teacher Ryushin Paul Haller. Zach currently directs North Mountain Zendo, a sitting group in North Beach and is a regular fixture at City Center. Zach, when you are ready, we will begin with the Sutra opening verse. The assembly can find this in the chat. Please follow along with microphones muted. An unsurpassed, penetrating and perfect Dharma is rarely met with. Even in a hundred thousand million kalpas, having it to see and listen to, to remember and accept, I vow to taste the truth of the Tathagata's word.

[09:47]

Thanks so much, Kodo. And thank you, Nancy and Paul, for allowing me to give this talk somewhere in the middle of Paul's intensive on the Satipatthana sutta. Yeah. My overwhelming and endless gratitude goes out to my teacher, Paul. Pretty much everything. And so I'm embarrassed to say that up until about 25 minutes ago, I had a...

[11:06]

I had a plan for a talk and it was, and I thought it was kind of a good plan and I had a bunch of notes and everything was going great. And then I, maybe it was more like 45 minutes ago, I sat down to dinner and we had a delicious caprese salad and a little bread. And I went back and I looked at my notes and I was like, no, this is not the right talk. And now I can't give that talk. So in the moment where I thought this is not the right talk, another thought occurred to me about what the right talk would be. And so we'll just see how that goes. So I've read on a

[12:08]

Layo's book on the Satipatthana a number of times, and I've used it as a teaching tool, and it also, I guess, on a number of occasions. And it's never ceased to kind of amaze me, mainly with its, like, complete thoroughness and comprehensive address of just about everything you need to practice right and in fact it's arguable if you just read the you know the kind of top line of the um of the sutta that um what the buddha is saying is like okay all this stuff we've been talking about you know nirvana and all that um this is how you do it He says, among other things, if you do this for seven years, you're guaranteed to be enlightened to the point where when you die, you'll be utterly free from the round of rebirth.

[13:36]

And maybe even if you don't totally get it and there's a little bit of residue of suffering and attachment to one of the fetters or something like that, it'll be so minor that you'll solve it. after one more incarnation. So that's pretty high praise. And then he says, actually, even if you do it for a week, if you really do it for a week, the results will be the same. Amazing, right? So that's pretty strong. That's a strong statement. And so... He says it's the direct path.

[14:37]

And Anilayo has a number of kind of etymological analogies and maybe analyses of what the word is that's used in the sutra for direct. And it's kind of like this. He says, Let's say you're walking on a forest path and you really can't see much, but somebody's dug a big hole in the path, right? And the path goes straight into a pit. Well, then there's a pretty good chance you're going to fall into the pit. That's kind of like, that's the meaning of direct path that he's talking about when he addresses the Satipatthana, right? So that's a big deal. And furthermore, even more interesting, this isn't so much spelled out in the Sutta, but if you look at the commentaries around it, and I actually haven't done this, I'm going to attempt taking the author's word for it, but it's pretty clear that the supporting literature says, oh, and you know, if you just practice one of these things wholly,

[16:06]

The results are still pretty good. So, yeah. So that's strong stuff. And so what could it be, this practice, that it's literally like waking up is like falling down a hole, right? If you read through it and kind of sum it up for yourself, it's like this, right? You abide in contemplation of your experience viewed in terms of, and this is a key part, of the whole

[17:12]

of conceptual framework on which the buddhism of the time and you know buddhism you know ever since is fundamentally based right so the way he spells it out is really pretty great right he says okay so the the four foundations are um you know the body sensation the mind and and the uh dhammas by which he specifically means the teachings that add depth, meaning, analytical accuracy, and so on, on top of the basic experience of body sensation and mind. So that includes the... the Four Noble Truths, but it also includes the Seven Factors of Awakening.

[18:15]

It includes the Three Poisons and so on. It's the whole Buddhist banana, as it were. And the idea is to... All of these are... explicitly meditative techniques. And in the contemplation suggested by the technique, the idea is to either do them all or pick one and go through as many of the aspects as are obviously available in the conceptual framework of the experience of body, of the experience of sensation, of the experience of mental states, of the experience of the suffering, the rising of suffering, the cessation of suffering, and so on.

[19:30]

To do this in this comprehensive way and And in particular, to do it in a kind of exacting frame of mind. And the activities and kind of earmarks of that frame of mind are something like this. And this stuff shows up in the kind of in the refrain and the repeated bits throughout, right? So it's like, well, obviously mindfulness, right? Because that's the... That's what it's the foundations of. Or in some ways, it's the other way around. Foundation is the foundation of this whole path of study. But then something about inquiry and recognition. So the text always says things like when a worldly unpleasant sensation

[20:35]

arises, he knows I have a worldly unpleasant sensation, right? So there's this inquiry into the particulars, right? And a recognition in terms of the dhamma, the wisdom, the teachings, right? what's happening right now. So inquiry and recognition, and then something about allowing and letting go, right? So it says things like, he contemplates the arising and the passing away of sensation. And the implication is that, and the last two sort of earmarks are sort of, they constantly say the translation that Analeo uses says something like independence and not clinging, right?

[21:57]

So the idea is that when the Sensation arises and you recognize it. You feel a kind of independence from or it's not exactly detachment. It's kind of the sensation is fully manifest, right? Not attenuated. But at the same time, there's this there's neither positive or negative attachment to the sensation. There's no independence. It's almost like there's no ownership of the sensation. So to contemplate the whole of

[23:01]

present experience and the obviously the arising and passing away over time of experience in terms of that framework, bringing that particular mind to bear on that activity, on that arising and passing away of experience, on those factors of the experience, those features of the experience. That's the Satipatata. And it also includes a clues but doesn't really explain, which is kind of interesting. this kind of emphasis on skillful means. So not only does the meditator inquire after, recognize, allow, affirm,

[24:27]

not cling and let go of the passing experience. But also, there's a hint of agency in it. So when he starts talking about, for example, negative mental states, the text says, the practitioner knows recognizes the arising, knows about the possibility of the arising of negative mental states, recognizes the arising of mental states, and knows both how to deprecate or remove negative mental states and also prevent or at least

[25:29]

inhibit the arising of mental states in the future. So there's this open, unloaded, non-clinging, curious, and cognizant experience and there's this sense of subtle effort and agency in the kind of direction of that experience to kind of sum it all up. And then if you, you know, so here, you know, I think Probably a lot of you have read the Satipatthana Sutta, but it's not something that we chant every day at San Francisco Zen Center.

[26:38]

And it's not a part of the kind of default Mahayana, either Chinese Zen or Japanese Zen literature that we... we use more or less every day, right? But it has powerful resonances with it, with that literature. And I wanna just mention two, because that's fundamentally all I have time for. The first one is the Heart Sutra, which, as we all know, is the most popular Mahayana Sutra, and really kind of also one of the shortest, in the whole liturgy. So lucky for us. But if you read the Heart Sutra and the Satipatthana Sutta together, you realize that what's actually happening is this.

[27:46]

You could sum it up like this. Avalokiteshvara is was practicing wisdom beyond wisdom. And he had this clear insight, which he then explains to Shariputra, the arhat, basically. And what he says is, hey, you know all that stuff in the Satipatthana Sutta? It's all empty, okay? The thing that's amazing about the Heart Sutra is that it goes through the whole, again, the whole framework of Buddhism, the Noble Truths. And I don't think it mentions everything, but it mentions a lot of it.

[28:48]

The body, sensation, mind. And so on. And also in more detail, in terms of sensation, the sense realms and all the rest of that sort of stuff. So it really breaks it down in a way that's very similar to the Satipatthana. And it says, all that stuff is empty. And it even goes further and says, from the point of view of emptiness, none of that stuff even exists. the supposed breaks or breakages between Theravadan Buddhism and Mahayana Buddhism that happened in this particular case, I guess probably with the writings of Nagarjuna, right?

[29:49]

There's one residence. You have this ancient Satipatthana Sutta and you have the substantially later, nobody really knows when the Heart Sutra is written, but substantially later, Mahayana document that intends to sum up what was considered a new approach to practice and to awakening. But they have this powerful resonance in the sense that they address fundamentally the same material. And it's easy to think of the Heart Sutra as kind of a refutation of the Satipatthana. But I don't actually see it that way at all. My sense is that all it's doing is it's adding on a different way to think about the freedom that arises from practicing with the material that they both raise up, right?

[31:14]

With the... moment-to-moment experience of being a human being seen through the lens of the conceptual framework of Buddhism. The funny thing is that the Satipatthana never really says how it is that just bringing this particular mind to the experience, the ongoing experience of the moment, and analyzing that experience in terms of, say, the various aspects of the body, will somehow settle everything. But it gives a little bit of a hint of it. It says,

[32:18]

you know, be curious, be cognizant, be, you know, allow and affirm and don't cling, right? That's the sort of prescription, right? And that prescription is medicine for the the suffering that arises from, well, ignoring, not recognizing, resisting and not allowing, denying, and clinging.

[33:22]

And so the basic idea is you experience life in a way that doesn't promote suffering. And amazingly enough... the suffering shifts around or doesn't occur or the Satipatthana itself makes it quite clear that it's not the case that negative mental states, unpleasant sensations and all that sort of thing don't occur when you do this. It says when they occur, you bring a mind to them that promotes equanimity, peace of mind, and probably flexible, skillful decision-making as opposed to suffering despite and ruination.

[34:52]

I think that the thing that the Mahayana and the Heart Sutra is adding to that, and in some ways it's just a little tweak, right? It's like it's the recognition that these things are constructs and actually there is no strict definition of, quote, negative mental state or unpleasant sensation, right? And that one aspect of that is that it's all deeply personal, right? It has to do with the intimate details of one's own conditioning, how these things arise. Everyone's version of the human condition is completely personal, right? The kind of basic axiom of Buddhism is that, yes, there are universals in the human experience that are accessible through practice.

[35:58]

But nonetheless, like Dogen says, there are as many minds as there are people. So even just given that kind of... definition of emptiness. You say, here's a category. And so the response that Nagarjuna makes in the documents in which he describes the emptiness document is he's basically saying, okay, point to the object that completely belongs in that category. Can't do it, can you? Well. And he goes on like that for page after page after page. But in any case, even looking at it that way, it's helpful, right? But in addition, I think it's the perceived assumed reality of and solidity and...

[37:12]

self-consistency, the illusions of reality, solidity, self-consistency, and so on of our mental constructs that make them so dangerous and slippery, right? And the Heart Sutra is saying, just stay close to the proposition that it's not like that, right? Do all this other stuff. Also be curious, cognizant, et cetera, et cetera. But do it in the recognition of the fact that none of it is the way we think of it. The constructs that we make up will always fail to capture reality and even will always fail to capture perceived reality, which is to say a reality that's already conditioned by the world of form and our sensations and et cetera, all of that, right?

[38:31]

And then the other document that we chant pretty regularly, Dogen's Genjo Koan, which interestingly enough is like one of Dogen's here's how you do it documents, right? It's like he wrote a lot of stuff, but early on in his career, he wrote a... a few documents, the Fukanzo Zengi, the Bendo Wah, the Gencho Khan, that were explicitly manifestos in the sense that they were saying, everybody should be doing this and here's how you do it. And also in the case of the Bendo Wah, here's why it's good and why what everybody else has been doing is bad, right? But never mind that. So the... He says a number of things, but the most famous and most kind of resonant thing that he says is his famous statement that to study the way is to study the self, and to study the self is to forget the self, and a few other things after that.

[39:57]

If you look at the Satipatthana and... In the light of the Satipatthana, you look at the Heart Sutra, right? What is that content that you're abiding in contemplation of, right? What is the content that you're deeply practicing with in the case of Avalokiteshvara? But the... the experiential components that we usually identify as the self, myself, that we claim to own, that we claim to be entitled to. It's the self. It's the self in direct contradiction to the basic doctrine of Buddhism that there is no self.

[41:04]

And the way out of that particular bind is the idea put forward in the Heart Sutra where Avalokiteshvara makes it clear that she's talking about this self from the point of view of emptiness, from the point of view of the absolute, right? From the point of view of the conditioned and the provisional, you could argue that you have a self and that you're studying it right now, right? But the material that you bring to that study is exactly this, the body the sensation, the contents of your sensorium, the mind, the various states that play out and the thoughts and stored patterns that arise and float across the screen of your subjective experience.

[42:25]

And furthermore, the recognizable processes, syndromes, whatever you want to call them, that people over the years have identified and said, wow, a lot of people have a problem with this. Jealousy and hate, like ignorance, like greed, like et cetera, these things, right? The poisons, and so on, the fetters, right? So Dogen says, again, sit in contemplation of that. that interplay, that process, or those processes, right?

[43:40]

And study them as intimate and... profound detail as you can possibly manage. Really become intimate with the operation of the self and the way it gives rise to suffering, the way it deaffirms and clings and so on and so forth. And he says that that process in itself, and by study, let's be clear, we're not talking about taking notes or memorizing things or something like that. It's more about, again, inquiry, recognition, allowing affirmation, and letting go.

[44:52]

That's the process. That's the study, right? And Dogen's claim is that, as is the claim of the Satipatthana and fundamentally the hard sutra, is that that process in and of itself... Well, the Zen Center liturgy seems to me... translates it as forget. But you could also say it just allows the laying aside of the cell. So I guess I need to sum up because I'm running overtime now with my talk that I just cooked up 40 minutes ago or something like that. But I would say the resonances that are so powerful that there must be something going on and that all three from their perspective are valuable, helpful, and worth pursuing in as much detail as we could possibly imagine.

[46:12]

So anyway, that's about all I had to say. And Mojo was going to sleep, so thank you a lot. May our intention equally extend to every being and place with the true merit of Buddha's way. Beings are numberless, I vow to save them. Illusions are inexhaustible, I vow to end them. Dharma gates are boundless. I vow to enter them. Buddha's way is unsurpassable. I vow to be coming. Thank you very much to the assembly. Thank you very much, Zach. Now a transition to some questions, comments.

[47:14]

If you'd like to participate in that way, feel free to raise your Zoom hand. And I can see all of you, actually. So if the Zoom hand isn't working for you, then feel free to raise your regular hand. And a reminder of our practice of move up and move back to encourage full participation by everyone. If you tend to move up and speak, then you can make some room by moving back and vice versa. Good evening. Thank you very much for your talk, Zach.

[48:15]

You're welcome. I always enjoy getting through the talk. What is a practice offered in the Satipatthana Sutra that I could actually take up and implement in my life, in my own practice? What is something that is brought forward in the Satipatthana Sutra that a practitioner like myself could actually work with and might bear some fruit in practice? Does that make sense? Well, yeah, totally. It's a great question. I mean, I would say, first of all, there's one that you do all the time, which is... watching the breath. There's a whole section on watching the breath. It says when you breathe a long breath, be aware that you're breathing a long breath.

[49:21]

When you breathe a short breath, be aware that you're breathing a short breath. That in itself is a practice that kind of goes a lot of places, right? But beyond that, like, well, I remember once hearing a talk from Reb where he said, you know what you can do? You can just pick a sense door, right? And focus for a whole period of zazen or five periods of zazen or 10 periods of zazen. on the content of that sense door and the way in which the attention goes to particular sensations, raises them up into perceptions and this kind of flower of mental formation attaches

[50:32]

to them and then pretty soon you're thinking something right um you know uh that's a very satipatana practice right that it he you know he doesn't spell exactly that out in in the in the sutta but it's clear that that's what we're talking about here right um will you when you when you you know experience a a particular sensation that has a particular resonance, you notice it, you notice the resonance, right? And you notice the way in which because of that resonance, that sensation was allowed to rise into your perception rather than just, you know, like 99.99999% of the sensations that we experience. It's just lost, basically, right? Like, you know, in time, like tears and rain or something like that, right? So So any of those is great. I would say, you know, like pick a, pick a paragraph that, you know, I mean, you don't have to, if you don't want to, you know, spend a period of zazen imagining your body rotting away or something like that, you know, don't do it.

[51:45]

But, but pick a, pick a paragraph from the, you know, the, the section on the, on the Dhammas and really see if in the context of your present experience, you can see your version of the three poisons manifest, right? I mean, that stuff is really, really great, right? And has a lot to say about how we construct ourselves and animate ourselves in the world. moment to moment. And the Satipatthana explicitly says also, you think about these things from the internal perspective and the external perspective, right? So it's both how it's manifesting inside and how it's manifesting out in the world. So you can even do this when you're, you know, walking around, bumping into things, things like that, right? So does that help at all?

[52:47]

That helps tremendously. Thank you. Yeah, that really helps tie your talk together and help it anchor it to my own experience a little bit more. So thank you very much. Aw, thanks. Anyone else? Zach, I see that brings us to the end of our time. I cut off a question if there's a burning question for a very concise exchange, but maybe it's time for a closing word if that is not forthcoming. Well, I was going to say, does anyone have a yes or no question? No, I just want to thank everyone for listening. I really enjoyed doing this, and it was great to, as a result of being asked to give this talk, to dig into and and feel the kind of weight and intelligence and comprehensive effort involved in the construction of the Satipatthana Sutra.

[54:03]

It's wonderful. So thank everyone very much. Have a great night. Thank you so much, Zach. Thank you, everyone. You should be able to unmute now if you would like to. Thank you very much, Zach. Thank you. Thank you, Zach. Thank you very much. Thank you, Zach. Thanks so much. Have a great night. Take care. Thanks. See you soon. Yes, definitely. Thank you, Zach.

[54:41]

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