Online class: Exploring the Buddha’s First Teaching


Event Details

This event finished on 06 November 2020


Eight-week class led by Kosen Gregory Snyder

Class dates: Fridays 9/11, 9/18, 9/25, 10/2, 10/9, 10/23, 10/30, 11/6
Please note that there will be no class on 10/16 due to the three-day sit

Class time:  7:00 to 8:30pm. Students are encouraged to sit zazen before the class starts, if possible.

This class will be offered online via live stream. Participants will receive log in details after registering.


Exploring the Buddha’s First Teaching

This class will be a line-by-line study of the Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta, which is considered the Buddha’s first teaching given to five ascetics with whom he had practiced prior to his awakening. Noting its importance, it is no far reach to say that all subsequent Buddhist texts are a commentary on this one. While the teaching is most known for the Buddha’s explication of the four noble truths, there are many other jewels woven into its fabric that have bearing on how we understand our practice today. I invite each of you to join me as we together engage the Buddha’s dharma for the benefit of all beings.
No books will be required for this course. So that you are familiar with the text, you are encouraged to review the four translations of the Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta at Access to Insight prior to the class. I look forward to studying together.

Class fee:  $200 Sustaining / $150 Base / $110 for BZC members (more than 3 months)

To register, please click here. Please note that registration for this class closes September 18.

Please note our cancellation policy for this offering: To request a refund for this class, you must notify BZC in writing by the start of the first class. Refunds will be issued in the total paid less a $15 processing fee. Please note that there are no refunds for events with registration fees under $50. Please see our complete cancellation policy here.


About Kosen Gregory Snyder

Kosen Gregory Snyder is a dharma teacher and senior priest at Brooklyn Zen Center, as well as its co-founder and current President. He is also the Senior Director of Buddhist Studies at Union Theological Seminary, where he directs and teaches in a Masters of Divinity program focused on Buddhism and Inter-religious Engagement. Kosen received priest ordination and dharma transmission from Teah Strozer and is a lineage holder in the Suzuki Roshi lineage of Soto Zen. Kosen is active with multiple interfaith and community networks organizing around peace-building, anti-violence and social justice initiatives, and currently sits on the Brooklyn Borough President’s Advisory Council on Faith-based and Community Partnerships. Kosen’s practice of Zen and the dharma includes an understanding that personal and social liberation are a deeply integrated process of mutual unfolding. In addition to teaching in a formal Zen context, he facilitates Undoing Whiteness and Undoing Patriarchy workshops and ongoing groups that focus on investigating self-identities that may unconsciously perpetuate societal suffering. His efforts include ensuring the dharma is truly available to everyone, supporting young people in practice, developing a community-responsive Zen center, and advocating for bringing the illumination of conditioning around patriarchy, racism and economic exploitation to the center of our Buddhist exploration of self. He is devoted to co-creating an American dharma movement that fully embraces a deep social engagement focused on transforming inequity, bias and violence in ourselves, our communities and the world.