Can Zen practice, even if you’re really good at it, lead us to freedom from suffering within the wild fluxes and flows of this life (aka, cause and effect or karma)? Remember that when the Buddha realized enlightenment, he thought that what he’d seen was too subtle for most. His post-enlightenment Plan A was to just sit under the bodhi tree and bliss out until his physical body’s karma was exhausted. But when he actually looked around at real people,... Read more
Wúmén Huikai (1183-1260, literally, “No-Gate Bright-Opening”), the compiler and author of the Gateless Barrier (無門關 Wúménguān), is one of the most important ancestors of our Zen tradition. Aitken Roshi notes: “An unconventional Zen master in many respects,Wúmén let his hair and beard grow and wore old soiled robes. He worked in the fields and carried his own slops. Called ‘Hui-k’ai the Lay Monk,’ he is a wonderful archetype for us monkish lay people in the West.” Wúmén was a contemporary... Read more
What is zazen? Everybody knows that Zen practice is largely about zazen, literally, “sitting zen” – but what is zazen? Through the ages, there has been a lot written about the subject, especially for a bunch that has spent so much time sitting down and shutting up. I got the bug for this inquiry (what is zazen?) from Katagiri Roshi. It involves investigating the ancient sayings, drilling in, and seeing how the ancients regarded this practice of sitting, and other... Read more
Jiryu Mark Rutschman-Byler at No Zen in the West recently raised the issue of "Private Religion, Private Engagement; Communal Religion, Communal Engagement." Read more
As is well known, the Chinese written language, and especially the ancient Ch'an texts, use words differently than does the English language. Read more
I’m going to roll back into the “mu koan” here. One thing I’m not going to do is try to convince any nonkoan Soto practitioners that koan training is in line with Soto Zen or that contemporary Soto Zen and Dogen’s Zen are only indirectly related. I renounce these topics! They are among my favorite topics, to be sure, but let’s look at the data. It seems that I wrote about a thousand posts about these two themes in the... Read more
Recently, a new-ish Zen teacher who is thinking of accepting a position at an established center, contacted me and asked what I’ve learned about transition. That got me thinking and here are a few ideas. Read more
One night earlier this month at Lhodrak Karchu Monastery in Jakar, in the Bumthang district of Bhutan (the photo on the left is of monks there practicing debate), I set out for dinner at the cafeteria where the 80 or so mostly Western conference participants received meals. The cafeteria was four blocks from my dorm, down a winding road where I knew I was likely to pass a dozen or so friendly (or, at least, neutral) stray dogs who roamed... Read more
There is more that I’d like to share here about Zen practice now, our experiment to revitalize the way of awakening in the global culture in the 21st Century. And I hope to get back to that when I return from Bhutan. Read more
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