Customer Reviews

Essential Zen

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Tanahashi & Schneider's anthology creates a sense of the thread running through Zen because ancient stories from the T'ang Dynasty (619-906) are juxtaposed with stories about Zen aspirants in modern America. They do a wonderful job of illuminating several traits unique to Zen, not by explaining them discursively, but rather by providing one illuminating story after another. For example, type of guidance a novice receives in Zen is virtually unparalleled in the world's spiritual systems. An explanation of everything unique to it would most likely be arcane and dry, hardly helpful to the outsider. Instead, this book tells stories, profound touchstones from the tradition. My favorite entry from the chapter "Skillful Guidance is a story about the interaction of the Zen Master Nanquan (Japanese: Nansen, 748-835) and a hopeful pupil looking for him.--- Nanquan was working on the mountain. A monk came by and asked him, "What is the way that leads to Nanquan?" The master raised his sickle and said, "I bought this sickle for thirty cents." The monk said, "I'm not asking about the sickle you bought for thirty cents. What is the way that leads to Nanquan?" The master said, "It feels good when I use it." (p. 10) --- One of the many virtues of that story is that, until our intuition opens to it, we are very much like the monk in the story, and Nanquan is teaching us as well. As I read the book, I felt that I was being taught by both ancient and modern Masters, and the miracle is, across thirteen centuries, they speak with one voice. Admittedly, not every selection will make sense to the beginner on a first reading, but that is one of the book's strengths - many passages become deeper with repeated readings. This is not a once-through quick read; this is a text from which new insights might emerge for years and years. It is a book that challenges you to grow, and it will remain relevant as you grow. For this reason, I recommend it not only to beginners, but to seasoned Zen practitioners as well.

As sad as it makes me to say it, I can't agree that this book is good for anyone who is JUST starting to learn about Zen. Call me an ignorant illiterate (I will admit that!) but I read lots of books on various religions and here is how I would rate this book. IF YOU KNOW SOMETHING ALREADY ABOU ZEN OR ARE WELL INTO IT: Four and a half to five stars. Lots of great excerpts from various authors, many of them Westerners. They're diverse in content and vary in length. So it's a great for collection anyone who already has some knowledge of Zen. IF YOU DON'T KNOW MUCH ABOUT ZEN: You'll have to skip a lot of the sections as you start reading them, and not because that is the subject's inherent nature. Someone who picked up this book to learn about Zen would definitely have to go and buy a few more books to figure out the meaning of a lot of the sections. BOTTOM LINE: If there had been a bit more explanation about each section before the excerpts this book would be the "essential" Zen. But anyone just learning will have to get other books first to truly grasp the essentials in this book.

A good collection of various Zen writings that concentrates more on writings from Americans and the Western world in general. I enjoyed this book because it gave a more Western view of Zen. Although a lot of the writing is American, plenty of non-American writers are included. Most of the items included seem to be based on more contemporary thought then on 'classic' Zen. A great addition to any Zen library.

This book gives a valid and "mostly" understandable text that describes the aims of Zen. It is a must have for those new to Zen because it expounds upon what Zen is not. It gives the reader a basic vocabulary for future cultivation of Zen philosophy.

Essential Zen comes thirty-seven years after the publication of Paul Rep's Zen Flesh, Zen Bones: A Collection of Zen and Pre-Zen Writings (1957). The books are similar in that they both are collections of Zen writings highlighting the paradoxical and irreverent that is at the heart of Zen Buddhism.

I would put this on the same shelf as Zen Flesh, but I would not take it down as often. (Then again I may. Who is to say?) The striking brilliance of Zen Flesh comes partly from its being the first meaty collection of Zen writings in English, but also because it included writings from the precursors of Zen in the Taoist and Vedic traditions. Essential Zen takes a slightly different, perhaps more sophisticated path. The writings are heavy with the paradox of Zen and with the contradictory nature of life. Thus we have Master So-and-so contradicting himself. Thus we have enlightenment coming upon the contradiction. Essential Zen also seems more esoteric. There is little in the book like the denotative guiding stories from Zen Bones. Tanahashi mentions the famous tea pouring into an overflowing cup story that appeared in Zen Bones, but one senses that such stories have become a bit too heavy-handed. Or maybe there is a kind of precious intellectualization creeping in here, a kind of anti-intellectual intellectualism! such as has happened with the short story since the days of O. Henry and Poe. Everything has become so, so precious and so, so subtle that perhaps only those with lots of experience can appreciate the nuances. In reaction I have came up with my own Zen poem this morning:

I am putting on clean underwear today
so that in case I drop dead
nobody will find skid marks in my shorts.

Schneider titles his introduction "Graffiti on Perfectly Good Paper," more or less defining the paradoxical nature of a book that collects Zen sayings: on the one hand the sayings are worth reading; on the other they are of so little value in terms of enlightenment that they waste perfectly good paper. Tanahashi entitles his introduction, "On Positive Emptiness" and refers to the "collective consciousness of the tradition." A graphic theme in the book is the circle drawn with black-inked calligraphy brush. The final sentence in the book (from Dogen) sums up what is meant: "Your continuous practice creates the circle of the way."

Consequently this is not an introduction to Zen sort of book. It is for sophisticates. Some of the writings are amazingly beautiful, such as the poem "Song of the Bright Mirror Samadhi" by Dongshan Liangjie on pages 63-66. It is he who asks, "When arrowheads meet head-on, is it only a matter of skill?"

I also liked this Zen haiku from Lou Hartman (p. 103):

Scalding coffee from a freezing cup.
At the rim no telling
Which is which.

This is also nice: "Issan Dorsey was asked, 'What is the essence of Zen art?' He replied, 'Nothing extra.'"

There is a wonderful piece called "Roshi" by Leonard Cohen in which he and the Roshi are drinking a bit too much Courvoisier. (pp. 133-134)

Finally here is a beautiful poem by Daigu Ryokan (p. 76):

This sick pale face doesn't brighten the mirror.
My white hair keeps getting all tangled.
With dry lips, I frequently think of water.
Body so grimy, in vain I wish to be clean.
Cold and heat immediately become noticeable.
Pulse is oddly confused and disordered.
I faintly hear woodcutters talking.
The second month is already half gone.

I am attracted to these poetic writings because Zen is essentially an art, the art of living. I am also attracted because there is in the very nature of life at its core a sense of paradox. We see this in the contradictory nature of the quantum that is both a particle and a wave, something our minds cannot comprehend.

In this text on Zen, Kazuaki Tanahashi and Tensho David Schneider explore many of the classic writings considered 'essential' to Zen as an East Asian tradition, as well as an incorporation of modern American writings that are representative of the fascination with and growth of Zen in the West. These writings reflect both serious and humourous sides; some are elegantly simple (without being simplistic) and others are enigmatic and complicated.

Tanahashi explains the incorporation of modern Western ideas and writing on Zen:

`If the present moment is when truth is actually experienced, then Western Zen, however young and immature, ought to be treated on a par with traditional Zen in China, Korea, and Japan.'

Zen is a difficult concept to grasp, not least of all because of its very simple underpinnings. Zen comes not from Buddhism alone but rather incorporates many strands -- always striving for completeness and looking for the interconnectedness of all, Zen has as a fundamental symbol or expression of enlightenment a circle: Shunryu Suzuki on his deathbed traced a circle in the air, symbolising transcendence, connexion, momentary enlightenment, everlasting completeness.

Schneider also discusses the very idea of a book on Zen:

`Zen prides itself on being a teaching 'outside words and letters'; thus any book of mere writing -- no matter how elevated or enlightened -- could not rightly be called essential. The essential Zen, in book form, would more likely consist of blank pages; a reader fills them in. Or not.'

The idea of the circle permeates this book. Throughout there are ink drawings of different kinds of circles, and the poetical verses and stories loop back upon themselves in many ways.

Now that things have been made perfectly clear, Tanahashi and Schneider proceed to develop the ideas of Zen in a very personal way, which is, after all, the only way in which Zen can be experienced and understood.

Which way
did you come from,
following dream paths at night,
while snow is still deep
in this mountain recess?
- Ryokan

Zen is a place, but it isn't. Zen is a journey, but not really. Zen is, and it isn't. Through poetry, tales of journeys, tales of myths, tales of being still, tales of understanding and confusion, the reader begins to see just a little piece of Zen, and yet, Zen is not something that comes in pieces, and is not something to be seen. Understand this, and you begin to understand Zen. Or not.

Through faith and doubt, through grand designs and commonplace daily life, Zen is there with enigmatic meanings, always designed toward the greater enlightenment, the greater completeness, the greater oneness. This essential text includes discussion of Zen practises designed toward the attainment of greater enlightenment. Coming full circle back to a discussion of The Circle, the ideas of Zen are still incomplete, and still fully presented.

He was offered the whole world
He declined and turned away.
He did not write poetry,
He lived poetry before it existed.
He did not speak of philosophy,
He cleaned up the dung philosophy left behind.
He had no address:
He lived in a ball of dust playing with the universe.
- Jung Kwung