Sounds of Valley Streams (Suny Series in Buddhist Studies) [Paperback]

Francis H. Cook (Translator), Francis Dojun Cook (Translator)

Product Details

• Paperback: 184 pages
• Publisher: State University of New York Press; Slight Moisture Damage edition (November 30, 1988)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 088706924X
• ISBN-13: 978-0887069246
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 6 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #865,932 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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17 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Tremendous ideas, beautifully expressed!, May 30, 2001

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tepi "tepi" - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Sounds of Valley Streams (Suny Series in Buddhist Studies) (Paperback)

SOUNDS OF VALLEY STREAMS : Enlightenment in Dogen's Zen - Translation of Nine Essays from Shobogenzo by Francis H. Cook. 164 pp Albany: State University of New York Press, 1989 and Reprinted.

It would be difficult to overestimate the importance of Dogen (1200-1253). As one of the most powerful and brilliant minds Asia has produced - and it has produced many - his many-levelled and multi-faceted works should be viewed, not so much as a purely local and Japanese phenomenon, but as a supreme contribution to world literature. For all of us, he is, as Taizan Maezumi Roshi says, an inexhaustible spring of wisdom.

Dogen's works are profound. They express the point-of-view of an enlightened Master. Such works, especially when written in a sinograph-based language such as Japanese or Chinese, present almost insuperable problems of interpretation, and there are very few scholars who are equal to the task of translating them.

Dr Francis Cook comes to this task well-prepared. His work is highly respected in scholarly circles, he has held faculty posts at Dartmouth College and the University of California at Riverside, where he was an associate professor in the Religious Studies program, and he has a number of impressive publications to his credit.

In addition, he has a masterful command of the Japanese language, a command enhanced by two years spent as a Fulbright Fellow at Kyoto University. He has also devotedly practiced Zen meditation for many years. This last is extremely important as enabling Dr Cook to rise above the intellectualizing and speculation which limits so much contemporary Zen scholarship.

As he himself explained in his 'How to Raise an Ox,' the translator must be able to "approach the text in the light of his own Zen practice.... because unless the translator has some insight, however small, into what Dogen Zenji is saying, he will miss much in the text and the translation will suffer" (page 89). This is a simple point, but it is often overlooked, not only by translators, but also by a certain type of reader.

Whereas Dr Cook's earlier 'How To Raise an Ox' gave us ten of Dogen's essays on Zen practice, the present book, logically enough, now goes on to give us nine essays on Enlightenment. As in his previous book, the translations are preceded by four of his own well-written and informative introductory essays on Dogen: 'Being Awakened;' 'The Buddha Right Before Us;' 'The Enlightened Life;' 'A Few Words on Genjo Koan.'

Students might want to supplement these by also reading Dr Cook's 'Dogen's View of Authentic Selfhood and its Socio-ethical Implications' (in DOGEN STUDIES, edited by William R. LaFleur, pp. 131-149).

Besides having a very clear mind, Dr Cook has such an enviably clear and simple prose style that anyone who is at all serious about trying to understand Dogen should find all of these essays interesting. Here is an example of his style, picked at random from 'A Few Words on Genjo Koan' :

"The emptiness of things does not mean that they are nonexistent or nothing, but rather that they are 'boundless' in containing infinite meanings, qualities, and values.... To say that a certain person is "bad" is to impose the selfhood of badness on the vastly open and fluid configuration we confront and consequently to misconstrue its reality. The emptiness of things does not deny or negate, diminish or limit, and certainly does not impoverish; it opens and expands things infinitely" (page 58).

Yes indeed. For, as the Heart Sutra says: Form is Openness! Openness is Form!

The nine translated Dogen essays, some of which are among his most famous, are as follows :

GENJO KOAN Manifesting Absolute Reality; IKKA MYOJU One Bright Pearl; GABYO A Painting of a Rice Cake; GANZEI Eye-Pupil; KANNON; RYUGIN Dragon Song; DOTOKU Expression; BUKKOJO-JI Beyond Buddha; DAIGO Great Awakening. The book is rounded out with a 27-page section of Notes, a Bibliography of both Japanese and Western sources, and an 8-page Index.

Here are a few lines from Dr Cook's translation of GENJO KOAN :

"Conveying the self to the myriad things to authenticate them is delusion; the myriad things advancing to authenticate the self is enlightenment" (page 66).

A tremendously important idea, beautifully expressed!

Though it will probably be a long time before the West has humility enough to acknowledge that Zen Master Dogen belongs right up there along with such Western luminaries as Plato and Hegel, it's heartening to see that many Dogen translations have now begun to appear. These translations range all the way from the sincere and highly competent, through to the probably equally sincere but somewhat less competent.

Since very few, even among Japanese, understand Medieval Japanese, I'm not in a position to say whether Dr Cook's translation is 'excellent,' though it reads very well and I strongly suspect that it is. He's certainly put in the leg work to qualify as a highly competent translator, and anyone who may be looking for a good edition of Dogen could do worse than select his.

8 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Doorway to discovery, February 19, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: Sounds of Valley Streams (Suny Series in Buddhist Studies) (Paperback)

This book sat on my shelf for quite a long time before I finally made the attempt to see what it was all about. The reason I gave it five stars is that simply put, my life has never been the same. This slim volume opened the world, the mind and the writings of Zen Master Dogen to me, and I've never looked back. Even after many years of study and practice in the Tibetan tradition, I still say Dogen is a gigantic force that once encountered, you're not ever going to be able to sidestep. Some of the most profound words I've ever read are in this book, and it is one of the 10 most influencial books I've ever read. Dogen is a spiritual genius of the highest degree; open this book and encounter his mind. If you like what you find here, try another excellent book on Dogen, Hee-Jin Kim's Dogen Kigen; Mystical Realist.