TREELEAF ZENDO PODCAST – Détails, épisodes et analyse

This month, accompanying our sangha's book study, we take a look at the first five koans from the famous Blue Cliff Record. We do that through the Soto Zen lens, extracting the practical essence from these famous ancient exchanges.

Further reading and discussion for this talk are available on the Treeleaf forum: October 2024 Monthly Zazenkai»

This month, as we begin our sangha's Ango, we dive into a few sections of master Dogen's ¨Shoaku Makusa¨ (Not Doing Wrongs)

Further reading and discussion are available on the Treeleaf forum: September 2024 Monthly Zazenkai»

Today, we find enlightenment in EVERY aspect of this world, even the hard parts we do not welcome. And we find enlightenment in how we live in this world, finding our own role

Further reading and discussion for this talk are available on the Treeleaf forum: OUR MONTHLY 4-hour Treeleaf ZAZENKAI»

For this talk, we will reflect on some of the Verses, Vows and Dedications we are heard to Chant around here for each Zazenkai and at other times.  For further reading on these and other Chants, I highly recommend "Living by Vow: A Practical Introduction to Eight Essential Zen Chants and Texts, by Shohaku Okumura, Wisdom Publications, 2012."

Further reading and discussion for this talk are available on the Treeleaf forum: November 6th-7th, 2015 - OUR MONTHLY 4-hour ZAZENKAI! »

Reading: "Wild Ways of the Precepts in Japan"

It is not known if the precepts in sixteen articles resulted from Dogen’s own innovation or if he borrowed this group from another source. [Dogen, in a writing describing the ordination ceremony for his priests] states that the ordination ceremony described therein is exactly the same as the one conducted by [Dogen's Teacher in China] Ju-ching in 1225 when he administered the precepts to Dogen. The reliability of that assertion, however, seems doubtful. [from "Dogen and the Precepts" by Prof. Steven Heine]

Further reading and discussion for this talk are available on the Treeleaf forum: October 2nd-3rd, 2015 - OUR MONTHLY 4-hour ZAZENKAI! »

When SweepingZen asked for a talk on International Blasphemy Rights Day (September 30th), I joked that I do that with most of my posts!

A nice thing about Buddhists is that we rarely kill, burn at the stake or imprison our critics, dissenters, heretics and the doctrinally different (although we have our scattered extremists too, the same as any religion). We are pretty non-violent, but even we aren’t totally immune from forbidding and punishing blasphemy and unwelcome voices.

Keep room in Zen Buddhism for the misfits, square pegs, tradition breakers and “original non-thinkers” on the edges. Learn to distinguish the con artists, shysters, abusers and predators from those who have simply walked their own path, attended the “monastery of hard knocks”, are doing something good even if not how you would do it. Having “set standards” and “required training paths” is useful and generally necessary for helping to assure substance, experience, dedication and ethics in our teachers. Someone can do a lot of harm when falling down in those things, like an untrained doctor or a drunken lawyer. However, keep room for exceptions and “special cases” too. Look at who the priest has become, not so much only how she or he got there.

Further reading and discussion for this talk are available on the Treeleaf forum: INTERNATIONAL BLASPHEMY DAY: Make Room for the Misfits! »

What is Ango in our day and time, for householders in the modern West? Is it Ango as the Buddha, Dogen and all the Ancestors Practiced?

The meaning of the Japanese word Ango [安居] (Skt : varsha or varshika; Pali: vassa ) is “tranquil dwelling”. The origin is the “rainy-season retreat” , the period when Buddhist monks in India stopped their travels and outdoor activities for the duration of the rainy season and gathered at some sheltered location to devote themselves to Practice, study and discipline. One practical reason was because the heavy rainfall made traveling and outdoor activities impractical. But it was also a time when the individual monks in Buddha’s time, spending most of the year scattered here and there in small groups or individually, could gather and unite as a community and Practice together. During the rainy season in India, monks traditionally dwelt in a cave or a monastery for three months—from the sixteenth day of the fourth month to the fifteenth day of the seventh month. During this period the monks learned the Buddha's teachings, engaged in meditation and other practices, and repented their harmful behavior and weaknesses. The tradition is said to have begun during the time of Shakyamuni, was brought to China, and in Japan the three-month retreat was first observed in 683. Now it comes to us.

Further reading and discussion for this talk are available on the Treeleaf forum:

September 4th-5th, 2015 - OUR MONTHLY 4-hour ZAZENKAI! ANGO SEASON BEGINS! »

We continue with Why Zen Students Fail!

One reason is because they trust the Zen Teachers too much sometimes.

Another reason is because they trust their Teacher not enough sometimes.

Sometimes they are blind to a Teacher's flaws, victims of excess devotion, faith and obedience (yes, it sometimes happens, as described HERE)

Sometimes students expect a Zen Teacher to be flawless, saintly and superhuman, and run away at the first sign of humanity.

Students should realize that the teachers are really just mentors, "friends on the way", folks who have been around the block, guides who have walked the path and can help point out the generally good directions and the dangers and quicksand. Learn from the voice of experience and the wise advice, but in the end, each student must do their own walking.

In all cases, the student should learn to see through the Teacher to the Teaching, seeing this messy world and the Pure Land as One.

Further reading and discussion for this talk are available on the Treeleaf forum:

SIT-A-LONG with Jundo: Why Zen Folks FAIL!! (6) - Trusting the Teacher »

Today's Talk:

Theory of Zazen for Three Personality Types Sankon-Zazen-Setsu by Keizan Zenji (translation by YASUDA & ANZAN, with some adjustments from Masunaga and Kennett)

In traditional Buddhist descriptions, there the three levels of capacity that Buddhist practitioners exhibit (sankon 三根; Sk. trīṇi indriyāṇi): dull (donkon 鈍根), middling (chūkon 中根; Sk. madhya indriya), and sharp (rikon 利根; Sk. tīskṣṇa indriya) capacities. These are three different capacities that Buddhist practitioners exhibit.

Dogenologist & Historian Carl Bielefeldt comments (Dogen’s Manuals of Zen Meditation, footnote 33 on p.152): Here [in the “Theory of Zazen for Three Personality Types”] Keizan distinguishes three levels in the understanding of zazen (corresponding to the traditional Buddhist disciplines): the lowest emphasizes the ethical character of the practice; the middling, the psychological character; the highest, the philosophical. The second, he describes as ―abandoning the myriad affairs and halting the various involvements, ‖ making unflagging effort to concentrate on breathing or consider a koan, until one has gotten clear about the truth. (In the highest zazen, of course, this truth is already quite clear.) In his influential Zazen yojinki as well – though [Keizan] repeats the Fukan zazen gi passage on nonthinking—Keizan recommends the practice of kanna [Koan phrase centered Zazen] as an antidote to mental agitation in zazen (ibid. 497b).

Further reading for this talk is available in the Zazenkai forum thread:

August 2015 Zazenkai Forum Thread »

So many Zen students think that the longer they sit the better. They believe 10 years surpasses 10 months or 10 days, which must be better than 10 hours, which is better than 10 minutes or seconds. They treat Zazen like a taxi meter or points to rack up, the more they sit the closer they are to the goal. They equate more and more sitting with going deeper and deeper, or becoming more and more peaceful, or more and more "Buddha-like", or more and more "enlightened".

However, Zazen only truly hits the mark when all measure of time and score, goals and attainment are dropped away. Only then does a moment of sitting contain all time, only then does one realize the destination ever present. Zazen is thus very unlike many forms of meditation (not to mention very unlike our usual clock watching, tally counting, comparing and measuring, goal oriented attitude toward the rest of our busy lives) in which deeper and deeper attainments, and greater and greater achievements, add up with time. In Zazen, one attains the deepest attainment and the greatest achievement, namely, the timeless which is right in each tick of the clock, the goal ever reached again and again in each passing mile on the road across town. But one only realizes so when one sits as the still and round face of the clock which holds all time as the hands make their circles ...

Further reading and discussion for this talk are available on the Treeleaf forum:

SIT-A-LONG with Jundo: Why Zen Folks FAIL!! (5) - Watching The Clock Rackin Up Points »