Dogen Zen Belfast

  Master Dogen has been exploring the image of prajna, direct intuitive knowledge of our reality, as space: This refers to the practice of zazen as we can experience it ourselves when we sit down and allow all thoughts of 'inside' as opposed 'outside', 'self' as opposed 'other' to drop away. Our thinking clarifies and clears and we are in an open, unhindered state not chopped up and dominated by our usual thinking activities. The chapter continues with this short verse about it from Master Dogen's own teacher, Master Tendo Nyojo, where he likens himself in practicing zazen to a wind chime:   My late Master, the eternal Buddha, says:    Whole body like a mouth, hanging in space; Not asking if the wind is east, west, south, or north, For all others equally, it chatters prajna:  Chin Ten Ton Ryan Chin Ten Ton.      This is the chattering of prajna [transmitted] by Buddhist patriarchs from rightful successor to rightful successor. It is prajna as the ...

  Master Dogen continues his reworking of, and commentary upon, the traditional prajna-paramita literature with another passage from the  Mahāprajñāpāramitā Sūtra ...     The God Indra asks the venerable monk Subhuti, “Virtuous One! When bodhi sattva-mahasattvas want to research the profound prajna-paramita, how should they research it?” Subhuti replies, “Kausika! When bodhisattva-mahasattvas want to research the profound prajna-paramita, they should research it as space.”. So researching prajna is space itself. Space is the research of prajna. The God Indra subsequently addresses the Buddha, “World-Honored One! When good sons and good daughters receive and retain, read and recite, think reasonably about, and expound to others this profound prajna-paramita that you have preached, how should I guard it? My only desire, World-Honored One, is that you will show me compassion and teach me.”  Then the venerable monk Subhuti says to the God Indra, “Kausika! Do you...

  In his bold rewriting of the Heart Sutra, Master Dogen has affirmed the myriad things (every thing we experience or encounter) as instances of prajna, or direct experiential wisdom, rather than just negating them as the concepts or identities or names that we place on them with our thinking... and this is how we experience things in a clear state of sitting zazen - things come and go freely in our experience when our thoughts and likes and dislikes etc concerning them have calmed down. Now Master Dogen draws on the wider literature to pursue this point:    In the order of Sakyamuni Tathagata there is a bhiksu who secretly thinks, “I shall bow in veneration of the profound prajna-paramita. Although in this state there is no appearance and disappearance of real dharmas, there are still understandable explanations of all precepts, all balanced states, all kinds of wisdom, all kinds of liberation, and all views. There are also understandable explanations of the effec...

One idea that comes up around Zen practice is that Zen Buddhists shouldn't have views and opinions about things... we should be completely without values and judgements. This leans to a somewhat extreme view of Zen practice, and can amount to nihilism if taken too far. Zen practice isn't really about not having views on things like the direction that society is going, and racism, war, politics etc etc - it's just that in Zen practice, in our daily practice of 'dropping off body and mind', we see those thoughts and views as what they are. We become unbound by them and no longer make the mistake of accepting them as being exterior reality. They're just thoughts and conceptual models of reality we make ourselves. We drop off all that in sitting zazen of course, but the point in doing that is to see thoughts and views directly as what they are, and not to be duped by that sense of 'self' that may be implied by how we may attach to thoughts and feelings. The ...

  Twelve instances of prajna paramita are the twelve entrances [of sense-perception]. There are also eighteen instances of prajna. They are eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body, and mind; sights, sounds, smells, tastes, sensations, and properties; plus the consciousnesses of eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body, and mind. There are a further four instances of prajna. They are suffering, accumulation, cessation, and the Way. There are a further six in stances of prajna. They are giving, pure [observance of] precepts, patience, diligence, meditation, and prajna [itself]. One further instance of prajna-paramita is realized as the present moment. It is the state of anuttara-samyak-sa bodhi. There are three further instances of prajna-paramita. They are past, present, and future. There are six further instances of prajna. They are earth, water, fire, wind, space, and consciousness. And there are a further four instances of prajna that are constantly practiced in everyday life: th...

Image by Frettie: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en I was very lucky to fall in with a Zen grouping that emphasises lay practice - our teacher Nishijima Roshi and his students were/ are largely lay people living and working in the world and practicing and studying zazen mostly at home and at occasional retreats. There wasn't a big emphasis on all the cultural trappings of Japanese Zen, although it was there for people to go into if they wanted to - the robe and the rakusu were considered important, as tangible expressions of the transmission of the practice-realisation of zazen, but you didn't have to dress like a Japanese monk if it didn't seem right. You can just wear the kesa or rakusu over everyday western clothes. Some people will be more drawn to the rich forms and trappings of monastic or temple Zen of course, and that's fine, but in our lineage at least you don't have to be into that. The practice is essentially about meeting our life direc...