Recently I opined that the first clear Western Zen Buddhist spiritual classic is Shunryu Suzuki’s Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind. There probably are others. Actually I think there are others. Which, however, folk are going to argue about. With the exception of this one. Okay, okay, of course there’s someone who will argue against it. But, I think at the consensus level this particular ship has sailed. This is the book that seems pretty obviously destined to be... Read more
There’s an interesting conversation on Facebook right now that follows the Zen teacher Dosho Port’s publication of a list of essential writings by Eihei Dogen and Hakuin Ekaku that every Zen student should read. One reader asked if there were a comparable list of writings by Zen teachers in the West? The Roshi responded that by definition, no. We need more time to see what if any currently popular books on Zen written in the West... Read more
Hugo Enomiya-Lassalle was born into a Huguenot family on the 11th of November, 1898 in Gut Externbrock, in Westphalia. He experienced the horrors of trench warfare during the Great War. By the time he was twenty-one he had become a Catholic and entered the Jesuit Order. Ten years later he was assigned as a professor of German at the Jesuit Sophia University in Tokyo. Enomiya-Lassalle looked beyond his academic position and began working with the desperately poor and... Read more
It was on this day in 1957 that the Skiffle band the Quarrymen played at St Peter’s Garden Fete in the Liverpool suburb of Woolton. The band’s leader was sixteen year old John Winston Lennon. While setting up for a set the bassist Ivan Vaughn introduced John to his classmate, fifteen year old James Paul McCartney. Apparently Paul, as he preferred to be called, helped John tune his guitar. Both were impressed with the other. And with... Read more
A friend asked me if I had any particular thoughts about Buddhism and cosmology. He seemed particularly interested in the classical Buddhist understanding that dukkha is said to mark the entire universe. In the moment I said, no, I don’t. But, that isn’t precisely so… As a Buddhist of a modernist turn I do not hold the traditional cosmologies firmly in favor of a light embrace of our contemporary scientific world-view. Or, rather, I look for complementarities,... Read more
There is no doubt in my mind the American Declaration of Independence is one of the signal documents of human history. Frankly, if the 4th of July served no other purpose than to draw our attention to that Declaration, it would justify all the money and time and effort that goes into those parades and fireworks. The Declaration speaks to a deep longing of the human heart and particularly the possibilities of autonomy and self-direction. And,... Read more
The following is a list of pointers on the way attributed to Zengetsu, described by Paul Reps & Nyogen Senzaki in their small early classic of Western Zen writings, 101 Zen Stories, (later compiled with other similarly slender volumes as Zen Flesh, Zen Bones), as a Chinese Zen master of the Tang Dynasty. I don’t know anything at all about Zengetsu beyond this list and a poem collected in Zen Poems of China & Japan, translated by Lucien... Read more
We’ve just completed our second Blue Cliff Zen sesshin (to touch the Heart-Mind), an intensive Zen meditation retreat. They are three, five, and seven days. This one was three. Our sangha was hosted by Pine Mountain Buddhist Temple at their lovely location in the Ventura Mountains between Ojai & Santa Barbara. Here are some photographs from the retreat… Read more
While Soto Zen Buddhism in North America is following its own currents, there remains a profound connection between these various contemporary experiments and establishments in North America and our mother organization in Japan. Here is a small gift from the Sotoshu, a collection of Key Terms and brief essays exploring them. Key Terms of Soto Zen Teaching A great many people are now practicing zazen in the Japanese Soto Zen Buddhist tradition outside Japan. But, because the tradition... Read more
Dear Dharma Friends, We seem have come into an age of “zero tolerance” for immigrants, refugees, and for people in our midst perceived as “different” by those who stake out positions of dominance here in the U.S. and in many other parts of the world. As Buddhist practitioners who see the oneness of all beings and our responsibilities to them, we are called to act and write and practice generosity on behalf of those in need. While our... Read more
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