Zen Ghosts

I have been a fan of Jon Muth from his earlier comics days with his work on “Meltdown: Wolverine and Havoc” and the epic “Moonshadow” series.  Fantasy writer Micheal Moorcock said of Moonshadow

 “This is an outstanding graphic tale, told at a level of literary and visual sophistication which introduced new standards and aspirations to the genre” 

Recently his storybook fiction has been equally stirring and eminently life-changing for me as both a former after-school librarian and a massive fan of zen tales and watercolors.  Rarely does the poignancy of a koan combine with an emotional exploration as well as it does in Muth’s books.

His newest book, “Zen Ghosts” follows the haiku speaking panda Stillwater and his young friends through an American Halloween.  In a fashion similar to his earlier books “Zen Shorts” and “Zen Ties”, Muth ties together Asian and Buddhist thought in a framework that is easily identifiable by children while engaging to adults with little or no interest in Asian philosophy or culture ( or like me, has a massive interest in both).  A wicker basket to be enjoyed for its utility or for the surprises held inside.

In “Zen Ghosts”, Halloween serves as the backdrop to the Wu-men koan “Senjo and her soul are separated. Which is the true soul?” which was based upon the T’ang period ghost tale where the young girl Senjo appears as sick and lifeless to her parents after they refuse her wedding to the man she loves.  The spirit of Senjo manifests into another form and runs off with her lover while her former self remains sick and listless in the house of her parents.  Eventually, Senjo is reunited with her other self as her familial ties draw her back to her father’s household.

from "Zen Shorts"

Issei Buddhism in the Americas and Racism in Utica

Issei Buddhism in the Americas

Well supported by primary correspondences and sources, Issei Buddhism in the Americas (in part edited by Duncan Ryuken Williams whose is an associate professor of Japanese Buddhism and the chair of the Center for Japanese Studies at the University of California Berkeley also wrote “The Other Side of Zen: A Social History of Soto Zen Buddhism in Tokugawa Japan“) spends much of its 191 pages documenting the Buddhist experience from the point of view of those that brought it over:  Japanese American immigrants.  Especially topical with the recent commentary concerning the place of Buddhism in the West, this book places the emphasis less on the western academic perspective of Buddhism and more on how the structure and understanding of the Dharma and Buddhist practice changed within the Japanese American community during the late 19th and early 20th century.

By examining the eastward transmission of Buddhism (rather than the Western transmission from Europe) alongside the diaspora of the Issei, the authors show how these early settlers negotiated a new multiethnic, multilingual and multireligious landscape by adapting the presentation and understanding of Buddhism.  Far from static and stagnant, many of these early pioneers were progressive, proactive and reformist in their presentation.

While many western practitioners attempt to classify and create boundaries between Western and Asian Buddhism along traditional/progressive lines, “Issei Buddhism in the Americas” shows that those categories were already in major flux before any popular “Western” interest evolved.  Most important (and surprising) to me were the drastic changes in Jodo shinshu when emigrating from Japan as well as the burgeoning agglomeration of Zen and Catholicism spiritual practices in Brazil (being a Zen practitioner as well as raised Catholic, I found particular interest in that essay).  I was also disturbed to learn about extended work camps (basically businesses, that looking for cheap labor, found it in the form of recently released detainees) for many Japanese detainees that existed long after WWII ended and some were in my home-state of New Jersey.

The impetus for the movement of Buddhism to the West was not the occasional western interest in an Eastern philosophy (although I am certain that it played a significant role) by academics but a personal immigration of home-practice, societal bonds and emerging traditions from Asian Buddhists as well as trail-blazing clergy, priests and practitioners that, in a movement to make traditional Buddhism more applicable to a new environment, adapted traditional Buddhism to a new audience ~ Asian and non-Asian Buddhists living in the Americas.

Duncan Ryuken Williams did a wonderful job in presenting a series of academic essays based upon primary sources in a manner that was understandable to a lay-person like myself by organizing the book into four digestible chunks: 1) Nation and Identity 2) Education and Law 3) Race and Print Culture and 4) Patriotism and War.  Each part contains two essays pertaining to the topic with a lengthy introduction written by the editor which provided the necessary backing information and historical foundation to make the essays approachable and understandable within context of the period.

From the Introduction:

…Asian immigrants were distinguished from their European counterparts by unequal treaties, low wages and hostility to “heathen religions,” and ineligibility for citizenship, voting rights and land ownership.  It was in this context that pioneer Issei Buddhists started establishing temples in the Americas…These temples established for and by immigrants were more than just religious sites: like the Christian churches and Jewish synagogues of many European immigrants, they became centers of social and cultural life that addressed the practical needs of a growing and increasingly more settled community.

If for a moment you believe that the hostility to “heathen religions” and Asian immigrants is something in our country’s uninformed past, I ask that you read about the Vietnamese Quan Am Temple in Utica NY and how vehemently the white Christian community and neighbors oppose it.  From stating that the statue is too tall for the neighborhood, stating that the monks are on welfare and lazy to racist comments about the Vietnamese community at large.

If so motivated, read the book and comment on the article. [Update!  The Observer Dispatch has dumped the comments from the article.  For the most part these comments came from members of the Christian Evangelical community and were a rather disturbing display of racism and bigotry in the US against refugee populations and other religious beliefs.  Remember, it is much easier to swipe a problem under the rug rather than address it directly.  From William P. Cannon, Multimedia Team Editor:

We seek to foster healthy community conversations. When a story has multiple violations of our terms of service, we will deactivate the comments. We make no judgement about how comments reflect on the community

So, there you go. ]

Cheers,

John

Shunryu Suzuki Roshi and Reflective Zen Practice

Any “zennie” can list numerous quotes from Shunryu Suzuki Roshi and each one would be as penetrating as the last but the depth of his teaching seems to always allude me.  In my early days of practice I came across a free copy of “Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind” online and attempted a reading.  I mean, this is Shunryu Suzuki, right?  Between he and D.T Suzuki, they defined Zen Buddhist practice for an entire generation of Buddhists in America.  But the book didn’t speak to me.  I didn’t feel it and I didn’t know why.

Now I do realize what wasn’t present when I first read Shunryu Suzuki … practice and experience.  You need to bare your neck to read and digest these teachings.  You need to be humbled before you pick it up and in order to be humbled you need to have practiced and have seen the wall.  Until that point you think the wall is your entire world.  Practice lets you peek over.

I originally thought that “Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind” was an instruction manual to Zen practice but it isn’t; it is a reflective journal of your practice up to this moment.  It isn’t meant to teach you how to practice but how to relate to your practice.  The goal of the book is to put you in the proper context in relation to your practice and your life.  Suzuki Roshi was just slowly and consistently nudging you away from your self in these lectures and pages.  Small, gentle prods that were meant to show you your self and let you laugh at it.

I’m picking it up again, this book.  And I have what was missing before – a practice.  Not failures or successes.  Not wisdom and compassion.  Not ignorance and greed.  Just practice.  Inherit in each of these aspects form the evolving whole of this practice and this life.  This fear and this joy.  These tears.

So if you haven’t read it in a while, try it again.  Below are some lectures from Shunryu Suzuki that are equally stirring.  But maybe you should sit first and then come back to them. I don’t know.  You can listen to Shunryu Suzuki but to hear him you need to relate to the words … then maybe we can empty them of any meaning whatsoever.

Cheers,

John

Road to Heaven: Encounters with Chinese Hermits

The first foray into an unknown field of research is a challenge. Much of the time is spent searching out false leads and running into dead-ends.   Up one hill only to notice several hills that follow in the distance.  Promising lands up close are disappointing and barren.  You are running half blind-folded and grasping at whatever possible trail you pick up.  This was the feeling gathered from Bill Porter’s “Road to Heaven: Encounters with Chinese Hermits”.  Anxious to find his quarry of modern mountain hermits in China; Porter’s book reads like a survey report pitched together with scraps of info from field notes and recorded conversations.

Is this sounding negative? It shouldn’t since this raw, indigestible writing agreed with me for a topic that tends towards idealization in the Western Buddhist community.  “Oh! If only I could find silence and peace I could practice so much easier.” “If only I lived on some mountain, some river-side, some beach, some fucking other place.”  If only I read more sutras, started younger, had the correct type of cushion, the right teacher …

In this book Chinese hermits, enigmatic as they may be, largely existed solely from the donations and support of larger monasteries or families.  What was disappointing in this book was the lack of detail really spent on the lives and interviews but what information was gleamed from the wisdom of the hermits was a stark reminder that practice was practice.  Taoist, Zen and Pure Land were simply labels that, when practice became organic and fluid, began to blur and blend into each other. 

Q: Is Pure Land practice more appropriate for the present age?

Hsu-tung: All practices are appropriate.  There’s no right or wrong dharma.  It’s a matter of aptitude, your connection from past lives.  Once people start practicing, they think other kinds of practice are wrong.  But all practices are right.  It depends on the individual as to which is appropriate.  And all practices are related. They involve each other. They lead to the same end….The goal is the same. Practice is like candy. People like different kinds. But its just candy. The Dharma is empty.

__________________

Q: What sort of practice do you follow? Do you chant the name of the Buddha or meditate?

Chi-ch’eng: I just pass the time.

__________________

Te-ch’eng: I teach all sorts of odds and ends. You name it. Whatever seems to fit. A little of this, a little of that. This is what practice is all about. You can’t practice just one kind of dharma. That’s a mistake. The Dharma isn’t one-sided. You have to practice Zen. If you don’t you’ll never break through delusions. And you’ve got to practice the precepts. If you don’t, your life will be a mess. You’ve got to practice Pure Land. If you don’t, you’ll never get any help from the Buddha. You have to practice all dharmas….Its a system. All practices are related.

The wisdom of hermits isn’t austere.  It is practical and rooted deeply in practice.  A practice that is embedded in the Dharma but expressed in the daily working of a hard, cold and sometimes lonely life.  In that way the practice of the hermits is not so far from our own practice at times.  Maybe we need a tang of loneliness to view ourselves in meditation or the bite of wind to help us gasp the name of the Buddha. 

Or maybe we just pass the time.

Cheers,

John

While unrelated to the book ~ Amoungst White Clouds is a documentary on contemporary Chinese Hermits…

Baisao and the Zen of Tea

The Old Tea Seller: Life and Zen Poetry in 18th Century Kyoto by Norman Waddell, published by Counterpoint Press.

Part of this book is a translation of the short Chinese-styled poems and prose by Baisao as well as a biographical sketch by one of his contemporaries.  The author, in the first half of the book, creates a tapestry of Baisao’s life from various primary sources including letters to friends and students, official documents and the works of Baisao himself.  Interspersed with paintings and calligraphy from Baisao and his contemporaries, a full view of this character from 18th century Kyoto emerges.  In a time when Japanese Zen was becoming more and more dogmatic as well as state-sanctioned – Baisao’s wit and home-spun but learned wisdom must have been a delightful change from the rigid monasteries of the day.

The first part of this book traces Baisao’s transformation from novice to monk and then from master to impoverished old tea seller.  After a long stint as an Zen monk in a temple in southern Japan, Baisao left for Kyoto, a city he visited in his youth, to live the actual practice of Zen.  Zen as it exists for the great Ch’an masters of the past; free from the confines of temple bureaucracy and stale dogma.  Adopting the dress of a Chinese sage (a Crane Cloak), he opened a small tea shop (aptly labeled Tsusen-tei – “the shop that conveys you to Sagehood”) and eventually adopted a lay-lifestyle of making a meager living (largely donations to keep from starving) through the sale of tea and occasional calligraphy.

An enigmatic character of the time, Baisao had strong opinions of Zen practice and its place in 18th century Japanese society.  Rather than conform to the limits set by monastic rules, Baisao lived a life that was largely scorned during the time period – A tea-seller (I liken it to living as a hot-dog vendor in Philly).  But rather than the mindless hawking of hot flavored water, the old tea seller intuitively weaves his Zen koan training into every cup brewed and verse set to paper.  Far beyond the tea-mongers or tea-aficionados of the day – Baisao takes the enjoyment of a cup of tea into a realm of mental fortitude and soulful clarity.  Tea will never provide the enlightenment but an enlightened man can surely pour you a cup, providing a small moment of satori that drifts off as the cup reaches its end.

Baisao lived the life of a nonconformist who embraced a working life of poverty rather than a monk’s life of begging or temple work.  He shrugged off the robes of the priest as just another attachment.  He became a destination himself, just like the scenic temples and groves that he set up his brazier and banner.  He spanned the purgatory that lies between monk and layperson, practitioner and vagrant.  His colorful life straddled the gray area that exists in our practice.

His verse moves simply and crisply without subjecting itself to needless explanation or expression.  It is simple and direct but forces the reader to think and ponder – linked to the koans he trained with – Baisao’s verse requires us to ponder to gain wisdom.

I moved this morning

to the center of town

waist deep in worldly dust

but free of worldly ties.

I wash my robe and bowl

in the Kamo’s pure stream

the moon a perfect disc

rippling its watery mind.

Baisao lived a simple life in a remarkable way.  For a generation of practitioners who struggle with the application of Zen practice into the daily grind of 9-5 workloads and pressing family matters, Baisao provides with a simple remedy that I gleamed from his words.  Don’t press Zen into your life or try to mold it.  Drop a few leaves of it into your daily life and let it simmer.  The movement and turbulence will not cease, nor will it ever, but the flavor will be much more wonderful and the taste subtle.

Cheers, my friends!  We all balance on the fringe of practice.  Baisao provides us with the fuel to move past rigor and dogma and seamlessly blend our life and our living together.  It is one thing to be able to label and describe that tea you are sipping (or beer you are guzzling), it is a completely different thing to savor that drink wordlessly…thoughtlessly.

* In the interest of full disclosure, I was sent a copy of this book, for free, from the publisher to write about it. I probably would have gotten a copy of this book regardless; I would have ordered it from my public library and thus gotten it free anyway.  And I don’t think getting a free copy of the book from the publisher really changed my opinion of it, beyond a tiny feeling of obligation to say something — anything — about it on my blog. Regardless, however, it really is a very good book for the reasons outlined above. if I were to dislike this book, for whatever reason, I would have stated it and given an explanation why.  Now, if the publishers were to have provided me with a pony or llama, they would have gotten a better review (can you review a llama?).  Maybe even a smiley face.

*in the interest of even fuller disclosure, i should admit that I stole most of that above disclosure from the buddha is my dj’s disclosure.  I did not, nor was compensated in any way by either the buddha or his dj.

The monk says “Chop chop chop”

My tree is still gnarled and old.

The Ch’an monk Deh Chun lived out in the boondocks of Tennessee during the roaring 1960s and ’70s.  There he seemed to have attracted a devoted group of university students as well as some very curious neighbors.

When Deh Chun first came to Tennessee, there was a huge dead oak in the yard beside his cabin.  One day one of his neighbors happened by and said, “You’d better cut that thing down, or one of these days it’s going to fall on your roof.”

“Oh, Thank you,” said Deh Chun. The next time he went into town he bought a hatchet at a thrift store. He promptly set to work on the tree’s enormous trunk, chopping away for some time every morning, and showing no signs of discouragement at his minimal progress. Neighbors, seeing him working day after day, showed up with chainsaws and power saws, offering to cut it down for him.

“Thank you, no,” said Deh Chun. “I do it my way.”

This went on for months, wit hsuch regularity that if his neighbors didn’t hear the steady  class=”hiddenGrammarError” pre=””>chop, chop, chop of Deh Chun on his tree on any given morning, they’d come over to make sure he was all right.  It became a phenomenon, a cause for conversation; and before too long, this strange old Chinese fellow who’d moved in from out of nowhere had become a member of the neighborhood.

On the day the tree finally fell. with a crash that shook all the houses on his street, one of Deh Chun’s friends asked him, “So what will you do now?”

“Make firewood,” answered Deh Chun.

He later said that this was the way he’d taught them meditation: you just chop away, alittle bit every day and one day an enormous tree falls.”

[from One Bird One Stone: 108 American Zen Stories by Sean Murphy]

One day the giant does fall but then begs the question  – “What now?”  Once we chop down our delusional mind we are still left with plenty to work with – there is always more work. 

The original process of chopping down the tree only served to remove the danger of delusions and illusions.  The tree was looming over the house ready to fall.  Without action (even slow and deliberate action) the tree would fall eventually and crush Deh Chun’s cabin.  Our delusions will eventually fall on us.

We all started out some place in our practice.  I started in a very similar spot.  I noticed the tree looming and wanted to prevent it from falling and causing damage so I began work on chopping it down.  chop chop chop  This is practical Buddhism – we see a danger and work to prevent it – preventive medicine.

But once the danger passes there is plenty of work still creating something positive from that fallen tree of ego.  chop chop chop We can forget that it sits there or continue to craft something that is helpful to others or ourselves.  Some practitioners stop with the fallen tree in their yard and others make it into something beautiful, useful and beneficial. 

See the tree, chop it down, build a chair and then burn it for warmth.  Sounds like a good idea to me.

No Illusions,

John

Non-Fiction Reading Challenge Part 2

The true challenge is to keep myself only restricted to the books I have already chosen. However, the fall-back of working at a library is that new and interesting books are constantly floating by my office. The following two have been including in my reading challege as well:

• Neptune’s Ark: From Ichthyosaurs to Orcas by David Rains Wallace: I have read a book by Wallace previously called Beasts of Eden: walking whales, dawn horses and other egnigmas of mammal evolution and The Bonehuners’ Revenge: Dinosaurs and fate in the Gilded Age. Beasts was a great books and Wallace does a great job of melding science onto a timeline and at the same time keep the science relevant and current. He also has a knack of really capturing the passion and drive of many of these researchers. This is an easy task for the grand old men of paleontology (Cope, Marsh, Brown and Simpson) and also easy for blatant self-promoters (Baker, Sereno) but not so easy for current and less flamboyant researchers.
  
• Every Living Thing: Man’s Obsessive Quest to Catelogue Life, from Nanobacteria to New Monkeys: Well, I love taxonomy and I hope this books does for taxonomy what Wallaces’ book did for mammalian paleontology.

So far, very little time has been devoted to reading. Work, baby and thesis dominate most of my time (in that order). I have been getting maybe a 1/2 hour a night before I retire, at best. Still working though Gandhi’s Passion but I should be finished before the end of the week. Next one is going to be either God is Dead or Neptune’s Ark.

cheers,

Non Fiction Reading Challenge

So, I have been working in a library for over four months now. Oh, it seems like so much longer. I mean that as a positive. I feel that I have picked up enough information recently to last me a good year, I think.

My point being is that I am constantly walking through the stacks. Going to talk to this person or get that thing or whatever. I inevitably grab some book as I walk through or see something that I need to read and have been stacking books on my desk with the intent to read them but never seeming to get to them.

If this continued, I would have a small library on my desk and no time whatsoever to read them. So, I have decided to enact a challenge on my self to read 7 nonfiction books from my “randomly grabbed off the shelf” pile and, I don’t know, learn something?

I listed my choices below and gave a brief description of what they are about and why I grabbed it in the first place.

1. The Colony by John Tayman: I grabbed this one a while back from the nonfiction section right by our back-office doors. Grabbed it because it was in the section with all these crazy books about early epidemics in North America (plague, scarlet fever etc.) and the name seemed to stand out. Anyway it is about the leper colony started in Hawaii during the late 1800s that lasted to the mid 1900s. Seemed interesting and who doesn’t want to read about disfiguring diseases?
2. Gandhi’s Passion: The life and legacy of Mahatma Gandhi by Stanley Wolpart: Gandhi is just fucking awesome. I had to read more about him after I rewatched the 1982 movie with Ben Kingley. The whole non-violence thing seems so lame until you realize that it took decades for it to change anything….most of which he spent in jail….willingly. Just awesome. Also he was one of the first pantheists (he cut and pasted what he wanted from each religion to mold his home religion of Hinduism). I call this pragmatism but whatever, still cool.
3. The Way of Kendo and Kenjitsu: Soul of the Samurai by Darrell Max Craig: OK, I ordered this one. I really want to learn and I think my new zen will be pummeling Darrin (or getting pummeled by him).
4. Gonzo: The life of Hunter S. Tompson, an oral biography by Jann S. Werner and Corey Seyman: Basically…an oral biography of HST will be pure golden awesome dipped in caramel.
5. A Modern Buddhist Bible: Essnetial Readings from West to East edited by Donald S. Lopez: First off, I am a buddhist so this is usual reading for me. Secondly, its Jack Karouac, Philip Kapleau both Suzukis and a host of other scholars that I have been wanting to read for a while.
6. God is Dead: Secularization in the West by Steve Bruce: Written by an atheist South Dakotan so I got curious and it seems to be more of a book on statistics rather than atheists ranting and raving about how bad religion is.
7. I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead: The dirty life and times of Warren Zevon by Crystal Zevon: AAAAAAAWWWOOOOOOOO!!!! Zevon is pure liquid cool and is probably the most magnificant bastard to ever grace this hallowed ground. Seriously the guy was a genius and an alcoholic, sexaholic and OCD to boot. His life has got to be interesting. And its an oral history like the HST book.

As I get through these I will cross them out as I read them and probably write abit on them. I think this is a good challenge for anyone to do if you feel that you need to learn or read something new. Try it out, just walk through a library and grab what gets your attention. How else would I have found “How to Dress Like a Pope for all Occassions”?

Cheers,