Jules Shuzen Harris teaches Zazen, the meditation practice at the heart of Zen Buddhism. There are many forms of meditation that offer you the opportunity to cultivate stillness and open up space in your life. One such form, zazen, has both outward and inward instructions in how to engage your awareness in the immediate, uninterpreted experience of the present moment. [...]
In Northern California, a Soto Zen Monastery takes shape
On June 13, on a hundred-acre plot of land not far from wine country in Northern California, priests and supporters from all over the world came together for the framework-raising ceremony of Tenpyozan, which is intended to be the first monastery in the West to offer Zen training of the same style and curriculum as that of traditional monasteries in Japan. About thirty Soto [...]
Becoming the Mountains and Rivers
When we know something intimately, taught Dogen, it ceases to exist and so do we. John Daido Loori Roshi examines this quintessential teaching in Dogen’s Mountains and Rivers Sutra. Thirteenth-century Zen master Dogen is known to us as an outstanding poet, metaphysician, and one of Japan’s leading spiritual figures. He was also a lover of nature. Dogen built his primary [...]
Not by Ourselves
Shikantaza demands our full self-expression, says Tenshin Reb Anderson, and this can only be realized when we meet intimately with others. But can we stop living by our own willpower, and have faith in the way of the Buddha, which we can’t practice by ourselves? For the past two hundred years in Japanese Soto Zen, the understanding of most teachers has been [...]
Forum: Understanding Dogen
When student approach the work of Dogen Zenji, the founder of Soto Zen, they find enigma and obscurity, plus great clarity. A roundtable discussion on his teachings with Bonnie Myotai Treace, Taigen Dan Leighton, Norman Fischer and Steven Heine. Dogen has come a long way. When Zen first got hot in the U.S. during the 1960’s, Dogen was just another obscure Japanese master in [...]
Buddha Is Right Here
Buddhadharma presents two of Suzuki Roshi's talks that address the fundamental koan – the life we lead at this moment. Ignorance and Enlightenment “There is no difference between buddhas and people, but buddhas understand their ignorance and we are ignorant of enlightenment.” A lecture on the “Genjo Koan,” given at Sokoji Temple, San Francisco, March, 1966. In observing [...]
Koan and Shikantaza: Escaping the Trap of Delusion
Jan Chozen Bays on shikantaza and koan study, Zen’s two primary practices. “What is the difference between Rinzai and Soto Zen,” an earnest student asks me, “and which is better?” My simple answer is that Rinzai practice is characterized by the study of koans, while Soto practice is founded upon the practice of shikantaza. Because my teacher, Taizan Maezumi Roshi, was taught [...]
Living a Life of Vow
"Being at home right here in this body," says Blanche Hartman, "this is living a life of vow." In our Soto Zen tradition we have a ceremony called tokudo in Japanese—"entering the Way," or "attaining the Way." The opening line of the invocation is, "In faith that we are Buddha, we enter Buddha's Way." The main elements of the ceremony are confession and repentance to purify [...]
Earthquakes and Blossoms Appear
Zen teachings of Kobun Chino Otogawa Roshi, who died tragically while trying to save his young daughter from drowning. Who Is Your Teacher? The real purpose of practice is to discover the wisdom which you have always been keeping with you. To discover yourself is to discover wisdom; without discovering yourself you can never communicate with anybody. In everyday life, we can [...]
Kobun Chino’s Trailer
Reginald Ray writes a remembrance of Zen master and famed calligrapher Kobun Chino Roshi, who died tragically with his young daughter in July, 2002. On July 26, 2002, Kobun Chino Roshi drowned trying to save his five-year-old daughter Maya, who had fallen into a pond. The deaths of father and daughter were a terrible blow—first to his wife and two small surviving children, [...]