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Product Details
Paperback: 388 pages
Publisher: Grove Press; Edition Unstated edition (January 18, 1994)
More than any other known source, this series of essays (including the other two companion volumes) have probably done the most to put Zen 'on the map' - in the Western world. In some quarters - at least, it has become fashionable to regard D.T. Suzuki as 'passe' - a bridge builder, whose work has now reached its 'sell-by' date. While I can see why some people might feel that way - if training with a Roshi, or tired of 'reading too much' - Suzuki's 'essays' continue to have relevance for people making their first dip into the world of Zen.
In one sense, you could say that Suzuki wants to say too much, and the 'purists' may fault him for it. But he was good at his job - and knew exactly how to write about such things for a Western audience, saying enough to entice them and whet their appetite, then drop them in at the deep end! His way of doing this was lively and engaging. Suzuki was a good communicator (he had an American wife, which certainly helped. Beatrice Lane Suzuki was an accomplished student of Buddhism in her own right) - and, in some respects, Suzuki was more successful than some of the roshis teaching in the West. He wasn't trying to sell you an institution, but pointing to the 'treasure house' we must all find, for ourselves.
One thing is worth noting about Suzuki's 'essays.' For the most part, the anecdotes he has presented were taken from the T'ang masters in the Dentoroku (Chuan Teng Lu). You get a pretty fair spread of teaching-examples, and they are not all from masters in the Rinzai (Lin-chi) lineage. In the T'ang, there was no such sharp division between the Zen schools and in that sense, Suzuki's account has a freshness about it.
Suzuki will not bog you down with laboured academic digressions.Read more ›
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Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki (1870-1966) was a Japanese author of books and essays on Buddhism, Zen and Shin that were instrumental in spreading interest in both Zen and Shin to the West. Suzuki spent several lengthy stretches teaching or lecturing at Western universities, and devoted many years to a professorship at Otani University, a Japanese Buddhist school.
He wrote in the 1926 Preface to this book, "Some of such scholars sometimes try to explain the truth and development of Zen, but they sadly fail to do justice to the subject. On the other hand, Zen masters so called are unable to present their understanding in the light of modern thought... unfortunately from the scholarly point of view, they ... do not show any lively intellectual interest in the psychology and philosophy of Zen... it is thus incapacitated to walk out of the seclusion of the cloisters... great mistake it would be if one should ever take ... that Zen could be mastered from its philosophical presentation or its psychological description; but this ought not to mean that Zen is not to be intelligently approached or to be made somewhat accessible by our ordinary means of reasoning... This book is a collection of the Essays originally published in 'The Eastern Buddhist'... The book will be followed by (Essays in Zen Buddhism, Second Series) before long..."
Here are some quotations from the book:
"So we see that Enlightenment is not the outcome of an intellectual process in which one idea follows another in sequence finally to terminate in conclusion or judgment.Read more ›
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17 of 21 people found the following review helpful
Suzuki's works offer a clear insight look at the often misunderstood world of zen. Suzuki gives the reader the ability to understand zen, rather than dictating what zen is. This work would be of benefit to any one wishing to see if zen is 'right' for them
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This was a tough read for me. Obviously a classic, but unless you are an advanced student of Zen, I would go for a more basic book on Zen Buddhism. This would be a good addition to an extensive Zen library for someone who has been studying for years.
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I studied Buddhist philosophy in some detail as an undergraduate, but that was many years ago. I am revisiting it now, so I turned to the writings of D.T Suzuki, perhaps the most widely respected author in this field, both for his erudition (knowledge of all the primary texts in their original languages from origins in India, through China and Japan) and his accessibility to the layperson. This is something of an amazing feat, given the subtleties involved in explaining Zen, a formidable exercise in itself, given that the entire philosophy is based on enigmatic sayings/practices employed by masters approaching their students.
Suzuki was the first to truly explain Zen Buddhism to the Western world and it is a must read for anyone who seeks the root understanding of the subject.
I give it the highest recommendation.
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I just looked up what year these were published and nearly fell out of my seat when I saw 1927, this version I think came out in 1948. I first became interested in it in the 1960s when I was a philosophy major looking for enlightenment!! Now I have then on my Kindle so I can't lose them as I did my original paper back. You can never lose a Kindle book thank to Amazon!!
D T Suzuki is a scholar and this is a scholarly work not a self help book. Reading it now in my post enlightenment phase, I am amazed at it depth and the amount of information included between these covers. Back when I first read it there was not the vast material on Buddhism as there is now, so often these early works get put on the back burner. I invite those who read it long ago like me to revisit it on their Kindle. For those who are serious about Zen, but who have not read it, I am sure you will be surprise like I am the amount of material that is here. Just remember this is not a Pema Chrodron book, this is a scholarly work but one of the greatest scholars on this subject.
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