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Peggy Teresa Nancy Kennett was born at St Leonards-on-Sea, Sussex, England, on this day, the 1st of January, in 1924.<\/p>\n
Houn Jiyu Kennett was the first women Soto Zen master to teach in the West. Her teaching career also opens questions of orthodoxy and authority that begin to define the outer limits of what might be described as traditional Zen. She is the lineage source for Shasta Abbey<\/a>, Throssel Hole Abbey<\/a>, and the Order of Buddhist<\/a> Contemplatives<\/a>. Breaks from her organization are the source for the priestly lineages at the Dharma Rain Zen Center<\/a>, Bright Way Zen<\/a>,\u00a0Boundless Way Zen<\/a>, the Buddhist Temple of Toledo,<\/a> and Empty Moon Zen<\/a>.<\/p>\n Peggy Theresa Nancy Kennett was born in 1924 in England. Her father, a tailor, was involved in the Theosophical Buddhism<\/a> organized by Christmas Humphries at the London Buddhist Lodge. In the 1950s, as it moved in a more traditional Buddhist direction and out of this was renamed the London Buddhist Society, Peggy joined and eventually took on various leadership responsibilities.<\/p>\n During the war Peggy enlisted in the Royal Navy and worked for naval intelligence, assigned to coding and decoding. After the war she won a scholarship to Durham University and continued her training at Trinity College of Music in London studying medieval music. She supported herself primarily as a church organist. In addition to her connections to the London Buddhist Society, she studied at the London Buddhist Vihara, a Theravada Mission, and undertook a correspondence course of instruction through the Young Men\u2019s Buddhist Association in Ceylon.<\/p>\n In 1960 when Chisan Koho Zenji, abbot of Sojiji, traveled to the West and visited the London Buddhist Society, she coordinated his visit. He invited her to come to Japan. And, as soon as she could put her affairs in order, she did so.<\/p>\n For reasons that remain unclear, while on her way to Japan she received novice ordination\u2014in January, 1962, while in Malaysia\u2014from Seck Kim Seng, Linchi abbot of the Cheng Hoon Teng Temple in Malacca. However as soon as she arrived in Japan, she was formally received as a student by Chisan Koho, with whom she would go on to study extensively. However, since he was also concerned with the administration of a major temple and denominational affairs, in practice her primary teacher was often Suigan Yogo Roshi, one of Chisan Koho\u2019s senior associates who would also later become abbot of Sojiji.<\/p>\n Jiyu Kennett Roshi received Dharma transmission twice, from both Suigan Yogo Roshi and Chisan Koho Roshi. She was then installed as abbess of Unpukuji, in Mie Perfecture. I originally wrote for my biographical sketch of her life and teaching career in Zen Master Who<\/a>, that in 1969 she was authorized to start a Zen center in London. This does not appear to be the case. She seems to have left Japan without informing the Soto denominational offices, or, it seems, her teachers. She came to California and the San Francisco Zen Center,<\/a>\u00a0deeply curious about their enormous success as a Western mission. She decided to stay in California rather than return to England. Speaking with a couple of her early Western students, I believe she thought she\u2019d always be \u201cPeggy\u201d in the relatively small convert Buddhist community there. While her opportunities to expand her work as \u201cRoshi Kennett\u201d in California were wide open. Whatever her reasons, she started a small temple, and formed the Zen Mission Society, in an apartment in Mission Hill.<\/p>\n This was where I first studied with her. My memories of that time continue vividly\u2014particularly of the intimacy of the tiny, new community. I recall, for instance, sitting with the roshi and several other young monastics on chairs and her bed, drinking lobsang suchong<\/em> tea and watching \u201cDark Shadows,\u201d a campy vampire soap opera.<\/p>\n To be brutally honest, my memories of Jiyu Kennett Roshi as a teacher are mixed. She followed in the authoritarian style of her Japanese inheritance. And, I believe, the inclinations of her own personality. Interpersonally, she was remarkably invasive. In my twenties, she pushed me into a marriage with another student that would cause great unhappiness for both of us. On the other hand, she had genuine insight into the boundless realm and also pushed me toward my own deepest experience of the great matter.<\/p>\n As with most matters in the actual world, she combined a brilliant mind, some authentic practice, and the complex needs of a human being formed out of hurt and hope.\u00a0She was a complicated person, of course. With great wit, keen intellect, and a substantial dark side. Illustrating all three points, Kyogen Carlson recalls a time at the monastery when it seemed the typical monastic was<\/p>\n \u201c(T)hin, pale, and wears glasses.\u201d One day one of the women (Roshi called us \u201cshe-monks\u201d and \u201che-monks\u201d) returned after a stint at a branch temple. This was a woman of rather generous proportions, and when she entered Roshi\u2019s room, Roshi exclaimed \u201cAt last! Finally another woman around here with a decent set of jugs. We\u2019ve had nothing but skin and bones around here lately.\u201d<\/p>\n While often capricious and occasionally even cruel, her real intent did usually seem to be opening the heartmind. As Carlson Roshi observes, \u201cMany times I saw her skillfully push and channel the frustration in a disciple until he or she gave up the struggle itself and broke through to the universal view.\u201d<\/p>\n The Zen Mission Society first moved its temple from San Francisco to Oakland. Finally it established the monastic complex at Mount Shasta in far Northern California. It was at Mount Shasta that I was ordained osho and received Dharma transmission from her in 1971. I left the monastery not long after that. Today her organization, now called Shasta Abbey and the Order of Buddhist Contemplatives, has several branches around North America and Europe, with the majority in England.<\/p>\n Gradually her organization took a decidedly more monastic approach. This was well after she\u2019d established a temple complex along traditional Japanese lines, where priests and monastics could be and often are married. Thus the shift to mandatory celibacy was very controversial and a number of priests either left or were expelled. The Oregon Priory, led by two of her married successors, Kyogen Carlson Roshi and Gyokuko Carlson Sensei, separated from Shasta Abbey at that time to form an independent succession. Their Dharma Rain Zen Center is now one of the larger Zen centers in North America.<\/p>\n Kennett Roshi was always controversial, for reasons small and large. She introduced a broadly \u201cAnglican\u201d style, which included substituting a form of Medieval Christian \u201cplain chant\u201d in liturgy; and, for several years, having clerics wear Western style priest\u2019s collars. Eventually the organ was included in standard liturgies.<\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a>\u00a0More significant controversies arose following a series of \u201cvisions\u201d she experienced in the wake of a severe illness. From this she began offering teachings in significant ways at variance from mainstream Zen. This particularly included a complex scheme of stages of awakening and a pronounced theistic cast to some of her writings.<\/p>\n