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 morning. It's okay? Good. Thank you. I'm sitting in my own front room and I was, before I sat down, I was looking out the window and the house across the street has a gay pride flag. And it made me think of many years ago, more than 20, I was having a Dokusana one-on-one Zen interview with a young man.

[01:00]

And he, I don't know quite what the context was, but I remember clearly what he said to me. He said, I don't want to be tolerated for being gay. I want to be loved. And I thought, well, don't we all? Don't we all just want to be loved for who we are? And right now, I was thinking, you know, now San Francisco is... I don't know if we're the gay capital of the world, but certainly... Gay Pride has turned into Gay Pride Month. This sense of celebration, jubilation, and hopefully love.

[02:07]

And this notion of thinking of how the years of struggling, the years of... rebellion, advocacy, tolerance, acceptance, thinking how it's not that different from the passage of practice of every one of us. Maybe we could even say the passage of practice in our own internal workings. that there's some norm. And Buddhism would say a norm sort of with the structure of attractions, desires and aversions and confusions. That the practice of awareness comes along and challenges it. And then each of us goes

[03:20]

if we persist with the process. Each of us goes through our own resistance, the challenge of changing entrenched habits, ways of thinking, ways of feeling, ways of perceiving the world, ways of judging ourselves and others. And then, if we persist, and I think in moments we thoroughly have, something ordinary, something spacious. Well, don't we all? Don't we all want to be loved? Don't we all want to just be in the moment, trusting, being trusted? enjoying aliveness.

[04:25]

A couple of weeks ago, Pam Weiss gave a wonderful talk describing how trees relate to each other. The two are anthropocentric. perspective maybe comes as a surprise that they would have a benevolence towards each other. And how often it seems that for us as humans, while we yearn for that benevolence, while most of us uphold it as a virtue, that it has its own elusiveness, even within ourselves and within our relationship to so-called others.

[05:36]

So I'd like to offer you the notion that this practice the practice of awakening, the practice of opening, the practicing of enacting our deep sense of virtue, that this is what the Buddha way is offering, requesting, And each of us is engaged in our own particular journey. So right now at City Center, or sort of at City Center, on the internet, I'm teaching a class on Zen perspective on the Satipatthana Sutta.

[06:53]

And the Satipatthana Sutta is one of the seminal early teachings of Buddhism, supposedly the direct teaching of Shakyamuni Buddha. And I'd like to contrast it from the perspective of Dogen Zenji's Fukanza Zenki, universal recommendations for the practice of Zaza. What is it to take that notion of virtuous benevolence and sit down and enact it? And so how I would like to start is, I'd like to read the opening paragraph of Dugan Zenji's Fukansa Zenji, and then read the opening paragraph of Satipatthana.

[07:57]

And for those of you who were at the class on Monday, sorry, but it's a little different. In Dogen Zenji's Fukanzo Zenki, he wrote it in the 13th century. It's a little bit like in English, the equivalent of Middle English. He was combining Japanese and Chinese and had his own wonderful way of wordsmithing phrases. Anyway, I've taken that as an excuse to look through different translations and craft this. My apologies to Dogen, my apologies to you for doing so, but I did. The source of being is originally complete and all-pervading. How could it be contingent upon what's realized? What need is there to make efforts to attain it?

[09:02]

turning awareness inward, illuminating original self. In doing so, body and mind will naturally fall off. I'll read it again. The source of being is originally complete and all-pervading. How could it be contingent upon what's realized? What need is there to make efforts to attain it, turning awareness inward, illuminating original self. Doing so, body and mind will naturally drop off. All those years ago, when that young man sitting two or three feet away from me, facing each other cross-legged.

[10:06]

And he said, I don't want to be tolerated. I want to be loved. The truth, I think in that moment, with a wonderful, singular, unique personal expression, on his behalf. And at the same time, a universal expression. And I offer you the notion, maybe it isn't just humans that want to be loved. Maybe trees want to be loved. Maybe all the animals and insects and fish All the creatures of the world want to be alive, want to thrive, want to be in harmony with all existence.

[11:30]

In some ways, this... represents original self, with the singular and the universal interplay. In some ways, this is the dharma and the realization of the Dharma, this interplay. There is a spiritual image that I think is beyond Zen or even beyond Buddhism, the notion that this universal existence is the great sea of existence, the individual being

[12:33]

is the momentary wave on the sea. And Dogen Zanji is saying, well, if you're going to take up this practice of intentional awareness, please remember. please remember the movement within you, that what it is that moves through your body, and more particularly, what it is that stirs your mind into thinking, in emoting, what it is that makes... remembering an appropriate response.

[13:40]

Mix anticipating an appropriate response. Mix replaying moments, interactions where you felt hurt or limited. Mix replaying moments where you felt open, grateful, connected, loved. Relevant. The character of aliveness and the wish to live. This universal character. And in the original text, the word that's used is Tao. Easily translated into English as the way. Sometimes as the truth. Sometimes as the truth of the way. And here I translated as the source of being.

[14:45]

And then I started off with the truth of the source of being. I thought, that's too complicated. The truth of the source of being is originally complete and all-pervading. which we know. I mean, who would have known that trees took such good care of each other? Probably all the indigenous people of the world figured, or I don't say figured it out, they just felt it. for the last several thousand years. Now we have scientific proof, so it must be true. It's perfect and all-pervading.

[15:52]

Can we start our intentional practice of awareness virtuous appreciation can something in us, that wonderful human quality, that even while engrossed, maybe not completely, but in the throes of separate being, we can hold up a universal aspect of being. What if we said to ourselves, despite all the outrageous, terrible, wonderful, utterly inappropriate, laudable and worthy of our veneration,

[17:14]

acts that happen in this world by humans, onto humans, and onto the planet and elsewhere. Despite all that, the great wish for benevolence, caring. And in this maybe mysterious way, that we both yearn to receive it and we yearn to give it. And yet. Seems to be lots of evidence to the contrary. What need is there to make efforts to attain it? There's a wonderful Zen story where Joshua does that.

[18:27]

And how do you practice? Joshua was famous for his fundamental deliberateness. Said he didn't, after a lifetime of practice, he didn't realize until he was 80. is a master of the fundamental question. How does any one of us sit down and become open, benevolent, deeply accepting what is? what need is there for efforts to attain it?

[19:35]

Turning awareness inward, illuminating original self, illuminating that commonality of being, illuminating the instinct that's so fundamental, the instinct of aliveness, that it not only transcends nationality, culture, you know, all the ways we set up identity, goes beyond that. It unites us with all beings, the impulse to live, that mind, that being. And then the last line, in doing so, body and mind will naturally fall off.

[20:55]

The ways in which we become utterly engrossed in our individual being, the ways we become so engrossed that the interconnected being, the great being, becomes disconnected from us. Even though we never stop being a wave on the ocean, we consider ourselves a separate entity. The image that came to mind to me a couple of weeks ago was, we consider ourselves in a rowboat, rowing furiously across the great ocean. The sea of being. To enchant your sense of spaciousness, I want to read a little bit of Pablo Neruda's The Sea.

[22:10]

He said, I need the sea because it teaches me. I don't know if I learn music or awareness, if it's a single wave or its vast existence. The fact is that until I fall asleep, In some magnetic way, I move in the university of the waves. I need to see because it teaches me. I don't know if I learn music or awareness, if it's a single wave or its vast existence. The fact is that until I fall asleep in some magnetic way, I move in the university of the waves. Maybe Dogen's saying you're always moving in a magnetic way in the movement of the waves.

[23:20]

It's always pouring through and energizing your body, your breath, your mental states, your emotional states. your sense of self, your sense of connection. So now, now I'd like to read the opening paragraph of Satipatthana Sutta, mindfulness, monks, this is a direct path of the purification of beings, for the surmiting of sorrow and lamentation, for the disappearance of dukkha and discontent, for acquiring the true method for the realization of nirvana, namely, the four satipatthanas.

[24:39]

This one, Dogen's written in the 13th century, this, the origin, a little murky, but we think 25 centuries ago, purification of beings, the direct path for the purification. In the... In the original language, purification is when something becomes completely itself. It's like when you smelt gold. It becomes pure gold when the contaminants, when what was ever mixed, falls away or burns off or is strained off, however it is. the direct path to become what you already are.

[25:59]

The direct path to become in a singular way, in a unique personal way, what you already are, and in a collective way, to become part of, in the language of Zen, original being, all being. to be part of the great ocean. Even though, as Neruda says, I don't know if it teaches me music or awareness. For the surmounting of sorrow and lamentation, You know, I was born in Northern Ireland.

[27:06]

I lived there until I was 21. And we were in the midst of civil strife, violent civil strife, that we called the Troubles. And then many years later, after... The troubles lasted around 30 years. Depends upon when you actually think the troubles stopped. In some ways, like maybe many troubles in our life, personally and nationally and globally, they haven't quite stopped. They've diminished. But they had stopped. The peace treaty was signed. And then there was a decision take care of the victims of the troubles.

[28:07]

And then the first thought was, well, obviously there were people who were killed. They were obviously victims. There were people who were physically wounded. They were victims. There were people who were relatives. of those people. They were victims. And then as the commission that was deciding who were victims talked more and more, and they said, well, what about the people whose lives were just turned upside down by not being able to go to work, by not being able to send their kids to school, by their extended family, their neighbors, going through great violence? Weren't they victims?

[29:10]

And in the end, the commission concluded everyone was a victim. That in this world, where now we can hear the atrocities from the other side of the globe in a matter of ours. We can get video of it, we can get the details of it, at least within a day. That the universality of our existence is now being efficiently communicated across the globe. that we're starting to share our collective sorrow and lamentation. Monks, this is for surmounting sorrow and lamentation.

[30:21]

And then each of us, in the inner workings of our own being, challenges. If we take the word trauma and let it have the definition that seems to be developing where something is injured in a way that its capacity to heal, to reintegrate to become re-enlivened with health and virtue is interrupted. This is more common than we first admit.

[31:28]

That we first realize. And sometimes practice is like this, the practice of awareness. As we open up, we start to invite into awareness, intentionally and unintentionally, the wounds, the parts of ourselves that are asking to be healed. This is the path of purification of beings for surmounting sorrow and lamentation and for the disappearance of dukkha and discontent. for the realization of nirvana.

[32:41]

I read somewhere, I can't remember where, probably just Zen mind, beginner's mind, but the Suzuki Roshi said, nirvana is following one thing through to the finish. One thing as in any one thing through to the finish. Yeah. Reconnecting each moment thoroughly into being. Not cutting it off. Letting it be until it has ceased. This is the quality of nirvana. It ceased. The root of the word means to put out the fires of attachment.

[33:50]

So. And then this path of realization, this true method, is the four sci-fi katanas. So I would like to... offer you the notion of maybe the question, are they similar? Are they different? Are they saying the same thing? Are they coming at it in different ways? Or are they coming at it the same way? It seems to me that these are complementary perspectives. The Zen of Dogen Zenji is in the Fukanza Zengi, which I was quoting.

[35:10]

As you sit, as you begin to sit, hold it, hold what's going to happen in the spaciousness of the human condition, the universal human condition. Hold it in that spaciousness. Allow it to have its place in that way. We can't change the universe. We can't change the history of how we got to this moment. But here it is, this moment. And we can be it completely. Because we always are it completely.

[36:18]

Dogen's asking us to contemplate that, to take it in and manifest it as we start to sit. And then he's saying, then turn the light inward. Examine, pay attention to singular being then. See how it's coming into manifestation. What are the thoughts, the feelings? Okay. And then this teaching from Shakyamuni, starting with the singular. To my mind, it's a little bit like saying, when you have a toothache, it's so bad, You can't think about anything else.

[37:24]

Attend to the toothache. As if to say, when we sit down to meditate, when we sit down to be Zazen, that the discomfort, the anxiety, the distress of being alive, It pours forth. It moves the mind into thinking. It impacts the body in ways that our psychosomatic being tighten. It affects the breath. It affects the states of mind. And this... is the consequence of the discomforts of being alive is that a compliment to dogan's statement is it in contrast is it two ways to look at the same thing

[38:50]

Which one is more skillful for you in how you meditate? How you do zazen? And this choice of words from this translator, the disappearance of dukkha. Not unlike Dogen's phrase, body and mind fall away. Neither of them is saying, and then you suppress it. Then you push it away. Then you actively separate from it. They're both saying, you cultivate a way of being, and then something quite... organically quite naturally happens.

[39:54]

When that young man said to me, I want to be loved, I looked at him, he looked at me, And as Kadigiri Roshi once said, in those moments of connection, in those moments of presence, the world, the whole world is forgiven. disappearance of dukkha. So even though I'm out of time, I'm going to, because I don't think the talk would be complete without mentioning the four modes of satipatthana.

[41:25]

They are awareness of the body and the breath, awareness of physicality, the physicality of being. And then the second one is awareness of the feeling response to experience. The Buddhist teaching is that its initial is either pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral. And then that stimulates something within us. So the first is awareness of physicality. The second one is awareness of the response to being alive. And sometimes we're expressing that as an accumulation.

[42:29]

Sometimes it's the accumulation of decades. Some way that we hold our body that has become utterly habituated and invisible. Some ways that we relate to the breath, that we breathe. And the methodology of vipassana, of satipatthana, of awareness, is to bring as clear an attention as we can to the experience of the body and the breath. And in that process, we connect to something similar to what the Zen teaching of original mind is putting forth.

[43:35]

There's a wonderful Zen story where the teacher asks the student, what were you before your parents were born? You know, what were you before all the particulars of your individual being were set in place and assumed as absolutes? There's a way in which we can connect to the body sensations and the sensations of breathing that gives us some sense of that interbeing. And then the second satipatthana, the second mode of awareness of mindfulness is how is that being experienced? What's the human, what's the response of the organism that you are? How is it manifesting right now?

[44:45]

And then the third one is, and... how is it shaping consciousness in this moment? You know, what's the state of mind? And then the fourth one is, and in this state of awareness, what's being seen, what's being acknowledged, and what teaching is it offering? So in a way, they're a progression. And then in another way, in any particular moment, one or the other, some combination of them, might come up for us as the most prominent.

[45:55]

And maybe when we're contrasting the the Zen approach and the Vipassana approach, maybe we could say the Zen approach is thoroughly receptive, especially the Soto Zen approach. Just open up to it and receive it. And be aware of it. And the Vipassana approach is... There's something helpful in acknowledging different aspects of it. No. Something helpful in acknowledging the physical sensation, the sensations of breathing in and breathing out, the

[47:04]

the emotional quality of the state of mind of the moment, the context of mind in that moment. And then there's something that helps our awareness to acknowledge. Even when our mind is not settled, not so concentrated, acknowledging still can offer something. Oh, my mind is not settled right now. I'm still reverberating from that difficult conversation I had this morning. Even acknowledging it. can draw us back, can make a point of connection.

[48:09]

So those are the four satipatthanas. And I'll wrap all that up by reading another poem. Maybe I won't read the whole one, the whole poem. It's by... Poet Laureate here in the United States, Joy Harjo. I hope you'll find it relevant to what I've just been saying. Once the world was perfect. Once the world was perfect and we were happy in that world. And then we took it for granted. Discontent began a small rumble in the earthly mind. Then doubt pushed through with its spiked head. And once doubt ruptured the web, all manner of thoughts jumped in.

[49:15]

We destroyed the world we'd been given for inspiration, for life. Each stone of jealousy, each stone of fear and greed and envy and hatred put out the light. No one was without a stone in his or her hand, bumping against each other in the dark. And now we had no place to live, since we didn't know how to live with each other. Then one of the stumbling ones took pity on another and shored a blanket. A spark of kindness made a light. The light made an opening in the darkness, Everyone worked together to make a ladder. The wind clan mind, the wind clan person climbed out first into the world. Then the other clans, the children of those clans, their children and their children, all the way through time to now into this morning light to you.

[50:30]

Joy Harju. May the light of awareness appear as you live being yourself. And what other choice do you have? Thank you. Thank you for listening to this podcast offered by the San Francisco Zen Center. Our Dharma talks are offered free of charge and this is made possible by the donations we receive. Your financial support helps us to continue to offer the Dharma. For more information, please visit sfzc.org and click giving. May we fully enjoy the Dharma.

[51:31]

@Transcribed_UNK
@Text_v005
@Score_97.24