I’ve been thinking a lot about Traditionalism in religion. Traditionalism is a word with many definitions. It usually speaks to some form of conservativism. It sometimes is associated with right wing political perspectives, and probably always is marked with a privileging of revelation over reason. There is also a spiritual Traditionalist school which is a subset of Perennialism. My first brush with Traditionalism arose when I read Huston Smith’s magnum opus, the Religions of Man, still in print... Read more

      The Three Pillars of Zen is one of those books that mark the establishment of Zen in the West. It was first published in 1965 and has never gone out of print. Three Pillars has now been translated into a dozen languages. And it remains an important part of the canon of Zen taking Western root. It was edited by Philip Kapleau, later Roshi Kapleau, with major assists from Koun Yamada, and Jiun Kubota (both eventually succeeding... Read more

    My father was born on the 21st of September in 1919. His was a rough life. Orphaned, passed around, institutionalized, run away, lived on the streets, petty crime, maybe larger crimes, prison, released into the Army toward the end of the the 2nd world war, medic, badly, badly wounded, lost his right arm, shrapnel coming up through his skin for the rest of his life, alcoholic, in and out of jail and hospital, dreamer, wisher, wanter of better... Read more

    In Holmes Welch’s Parting of the Way: Lao Tzu and the Taoist Movement (pages 5-6) he offers some parallel sayings from the Tao Te Ching & the Christian Gospels.  The translations are from Lin Yutang and Arthur Waley. For the Bible he preferred the King James version. It is easy to note there are some stretches here. Still. There is something compelling in his project, even if it is simply reveals the longing heart; that reach for a commonality of... Read more

          SURPRISED BY JOY     A Meditation on Kensho in Zen, Buddhism, and Literature Delivered at the First Unitarian Church of Los Angeles September 19, 2021 James Ishmael Ford   “Each branch of coral holds up the moon.” Blue Cliff Record, Case 100 Let’s reflect on the spiritual path, just a little. Let’s consider the moment our heart’s turn. That grace when we are gifted with noticing the world with new eyes, where we discover the world... Read more

      While Edward Bouverie Pusey died on the 16th of September in 1882, and that day is observed as a feast throughout much of the Anglican communion, the feast itself in observed here in America on this day, the 18th of September. I noted this about six years ago. And what follows was largely written then. Although, while I continue to be charmed by the title and retain it, I have washed through the meditation lightly, to reflect... Read more

          I’m deeply moved by the Serenity Prayer which most of us know through the work of Alcoholics Anonymous. Its deep origins are probably the collective insight of the human condition. The sentiment appears first in English, best we can tell, as a seventeenth century Mother Goose Nursery rhyme. For every ailment under the sun There is a remedy, or there is none; If there be one, try to find it; If there be none, never... Read more

      Once upon a time the world honored one was at Vulture Peak. Before a vast crowd of lay practitioners, nuns, and monks, angelic creatures, and even gods, he held up a single flower and twirled it. Of the assembled crowd only the disciple Mahakashyapa, responded, breaking into a wide grin. The Buddha, lord of wisdom, physician of the heart, announced “I have the eye treasury of the true Dharma, the marvelous mind of nirvana, the true form of no-form, the subtle... Read more

The Ten Ox Herding Pictures (Chinese: shíniú 十牛 , Japanese: jūgyū 十牛図 , korean: sipwoo 십우) are a map of the spiritual journey within the Zen schools. The earliest use of a bull or cow or ox as the self in practice seems to date to the Nikayas, the earliest strata of Buddhist teachings, and may have been used by the Buddha of history. The earliest use of a series of images seems to date from the Zen schools in... Read more

      Love bade me welcome, yet my soul drew back, Guilty of dust and sin. But quick-ey’d Love, observing me grow slack From my first entrance in, Drew nearer to me, sweetly questioning If I lack’d anything. “A guest,” I answer’d, “worthy to be here”; Love said, “You shall be he.” “I, the unkind, the ungrateful? ah my dear, I cannot look on thee.” Love took my hand and smiling did reply, “Who made the eyes but I?”... Read more