Part One · Pāli Foundations · The Recollection the Buddha Taught with His Own Hands

This book is going to walk a long road—from the recollection the Buddha taught in person while He was in the world, all the way to that dharma-realm buddha-recollection in the Avataṃsaka Sūtra which gathers in all things. Along the way we will pass through the three Pure Land sūtras, through the pratyutpanna vision of the Buddha face to face, through the meeting of Chan and Tiantai. But the starting point is in none of those places. The starting point is somewhere earlier, and plainer.

When most people today hear "buddha-recollection," what comes to mind is reciting the name, seeking rebirth in the West, visualizing the Buddha's marks and radiance. All of these are branches that grew later. Before any of these branches grew, the Buddha taught His lay disciples something simpler—recollection (anussati).

What Part One does is return to this root. It returns to the Nigrodha Park, south of the city of Kapilavatthu—the park where the Buddha often stayed when He came home. There, a Sakyan layman busy with the affairs of a great household brought his disordered days to the Buddha, again and again; and the answer the Buddha gave him is where this book begins.

Four chapters, laid out in order. Chapter one: see clearly what recollection is—not a variation on "concentration," but another track altogether. Chapter two: the buddha-recollection format the Buddha left with His own hands—nine epithets, the itipi so. Chapter three: the six objects that run on this track—recollection of the Buddha, the Dharma, the Saṅgha, virtue, generosity, and the deities; one engine, six directions. Chapter four: how deep this track can carry the mind—right up to the door of concentration.

Read these four chapters through, and beneath all the seemingly ever-more-elaborate practices of the thirty chapters that follow, the grain of this one same track will show.

The foundation must be driven firm first. We begin with chapter one.