Spirituality

Good Morning Everyone,


“Spiritual” is a word commonly associated with religous belief and practice. I often say, from my friend Claude Anshin Thomas, Zen is a disciplined spiritual practice. Often people will refer to themselves not as “religious,” but as “spiritual.” In a class I taught for several semesters at the Academy for Jewish Learning, I used a text entitled, Jewish Spirituality, and most students seemed more comfortable with this reference to themselves than as religious people. Because Zen is often not thought of as a religion, it is usually relegated to the “Eastern Philosophy” sections or the “New Age” sections in bookstores, likewise in people’s minds. Clearly, Zen is not something we can easily put in a box, thank goodness.



What does it mean when we use the term, “spiritual”? Especially when posing it as a counter-point to “religious”? Our friend, Brad Warner, goes to lengths in his books, especially, “Sex, Sin, and Zen” to distance Zen from “spirituality” altogether casting spirituality as an idealism. He writes, “It (spirituality)takes the view that the spiritual world, the world of ideas, imagination, and mental formations, is the true reality. Matter is regarded as secondary at best or sometimes non-existent. We are spirits trapped inside bodies…” (p. 13).



In my copy of his book I scribbled in pencil a note, “vocabulary problem” suggesting to myself that we often have a rather narrow view of some words, this one in particular. Let’s talk about this.



Spirituality comes from the root, “spiritus” or breath. Now, let’s say we are standing in front of the Grand Canyon as the sun rises. The visual image, no, the total visceral package, takes or breath away. Then we analyze: 1. “Materialism:” this is a way we have of describing the literal, material, aspects of light striking rocks, impacting our eyes, being interpreted by our brains, and uttering, “Wow!” We try to describe the breath-taking “Wow” and get caught in 2., “idealism.” All of which draws our attention from the actual, direct experience of spiritus. Rudolf Otto, a religious scholar, once wrote a book called, “The Idea of the Holy.” In it he describes this experience and calls it “mysterious tremendum.”



The thing is, we really do not have language for our direct experience of the power of the universe. And the language we do have takes us into the worlds of philosophical discourse and away from the experience of “Wow!”



I think it is a good idea for us to stick with the experience itself, though. It is that total sensation of breath-taking power that is the thing to stay with. In the Bible, it is said God spoke and through his breath the world was created. When we sit outside and the wind moves across our face and through the trees, we could say we experience his breath. The Hebrew word for “spirit” in this context is “ruach” which means breath or wind. The framers of the bible, much like we, did not know what to do with these experiences, sitting as they did, outside under the stars witnessing and experiencing the wonders of the natural world. So, quite naturally, they, as we, thought about their experience, framed it in words, and made wonderful art, literature, philosophies, and even religions, out of their ideas.



Zen, on the other hand, asks us (in my opinion) to go back to the root of the word, spiritus, and it is in the root of the word’s sense, that I argue Zen is a spiritual practice. Our practice is rooted in the breath and our experience of ourselves in the breath without recourse to words.

Zen is not “spiritual” in the sense of soul or disembodied spirits or other ideas about the breath or the so-called vital force or energy supporting life. Zen is rooted in the spirit itself, that which comes before the thought of spirit, the breath. The breath in its actual direct experience. To touch this in a deep and abiding way, we must practice. Hence, a disciplined, spiritual practice. Through this we can begin to see how our breath is connected to everything. It is revealed in how we experience the touch of a cup of coffee, the touch of the keys on our fingertips, the experience of anxiety, joy, sorrow. Our breath is our touchstone and this is why we pay close attention to it.



Be well.

Open Heart

Good Morning Everyone,




The season is upon us. A season of introspection and manifestation of good will. Every year I hope this season’s underlying feeling will spread out like a warm and loving pool supporting each of us with compassion and generosity through the year. My sense is this is exactly what is happening, although sometimes the subtle nature of the pool is difficult to see. Let’s endeavor to bring our heart out into the open not only this year, but the next, and the next after that.

Be well.

Happy Thanksgiving Y'all

Dear Readers,

Thank you very much for visiting my blog and taking the time to read my notes.  I am deeply thankful to you as only readers make a writer a writer.

Happy Thanksgiving.

Is Buddhism a Religion?

Good Morning Everyone,




This morning I would like to address the word “religion.” Religion is a word that is like an intersection with many avenues for discussion. What does it mean to be “religious”? Some say they are “spiritual” rather than “religious.” Are “spiritual” and “religious” synonymous? Are they different? In what ways? Is Buddhism (or the Buddha Way) a religion? Is it a spiritual practice?



The Oxford English Dictionary says religion is derived from Latin roots which meant “bond,” “scruple” and “reverence.” So, the first definition of religion from the OED is, “a state of life bound by religious vows, the condition of belonging to a religious order.” The second definition suggests it means “a particular religious order or rule.” The third definition (and the most challenging): “Belief in or sensing of some superhuman controlling power or powers entitled to obedience, reverence, and worship, or a system defining a code of living as a means to achieve spiritual or material improvement; acceptance of such belief as a standard of spiritual and practical life; the expression of this in worship, etc., also action or conduct indicating such belief.” (Shorter Oxford English Dictionary, 5th edition, emphasis mine.)



So, apparently, according to the OED, the driving definition of “religion” is that a religion is a system of belief or practice that binds us to a way of life through a vow. It also suggests a link between religion and spirituality either through a sense of a higher power or to a systematic way of living aiming at “spiritual or material improvement.”



I am impressed with these definitional terms as I believe they identify many of the avenues for discussion I mentioned above. It is significant to me that the OED has bifurcated the turning point definition. The third definition includes a fork: belief in the superhuman or a systematic code of living. It is this bifurcation that allows Buddhism to be considered a religion, especially when coupled with the first two and the Latin origins of the word.



This definition also suggests a significant point: religion itself should not be entered into lightly and is a serious thing as it involves vows, a code of conduct, and a set of practices which we must hold in high esteem and actually practice. Simple belief in something, even a higher power such as a God, does not itself, apparently, qualify. To be “religion” there must be a vow involved and a practice.



In my next post, “Spirituality.”



Be well.

Enough Already

Good Morning Everyone,




This morning I read a piece by a professor at UC-Davis in response to the savage pepper spraying of peaceful demonstrators on campus. It was heartening to see a voice rise up, as if in the wilderness, to say, “You know what? Enough!” His point was that we are reaping the rewards of a gradual, but escalating militarization of urban police forces. Our language has been one driver of this with phrases like, “War on Drugs,” “War on Terror,” “War on Poverty.” For goodness’ sake, to listen to us, it’s all we know how to do. So when people get fed-up with the 1% getting richer and richer while crying “poor me” at every effort to balance things out a bit, and decide to say “Enough!” using one of the few methods they have, peaceful demonstration, we now see a war on demonstrators.



Here’s the thing, it seems to me that we are on the edge as a civilization, moving ever closer to a collapse. What has made it possible for the 99% to stay satisfied was the existence of stores like Wal-Mart, Sam’s Club, and cheapy gas stations. But a casual look at the prices even in these places reveals a growing inability for everyday people to purchase the basics, to say nothing of their distractions.



For a society being raped by the rich to remain peaceful it needs it’s distractions. The 1% really needs to get this. I am hopeful that it doesn’t appreciate this as, since, as our ability to distract ourselves disappears, the truth rises, and one possible result is a societal refusal to go along anymore.



We have allowed ourselves to be pacified too long. Corporate profits, especially in banking and oil, have gone through the proverbial roof. Meanwhile, we at the middle and lower end of the economic spectrum are barely able to afford to eat, let alone buy a candy bar that once was easily affordable, but now is thought of as a luxury.



Be well, verbalize and actualize your dissatisfaction with your life and find ways to make it better.

On Religion

Good Morning Everyone,




As is sometimes the case, especially on a certain “Buddhist” website, my words create a bit of a irksome response. I posted my note on “Self” sometime ago. It and the follow-up note, “Blog” created a small stir. Some of us coming to Buddhism seem to think that this way will result in a state of peacefulness and serenity undisturbed by discord, words, or thoughts. Not so.

Some Masters have taught that silence is the way, that when we speak we make a big mistake. This is so in some ways, but not in others. The Buddha taught that we are not only wasting our time discussing ideas about something, but that such discussions themselves are an actual hindrance. This is so, but again, I think in a rather narrow context. When Masters say such things I think they are more often than not referring to achieving an aim of realization. When we are in a sociologically homogeneous group this is so. To get to homogeneity, however, we must discuss terms, compare and contrast practices, and work toward coming to an agreement on the foundations of our effort.

When put into structures, our beliefs become a serious challenge for "like-mindedness" to occur. Belief systems and the structures within them are very important to some religions. The Buddha Way, on the other hand, is just that, a way. Ideas about it are often, as we pointed out, a hindrance. Yet, as we can all plainly see, we like to talk about what we know or think we know. To do this, it seems to me, we must hold lots of discussions regarding our definitions of terms. Such discussions can be difficult, but I think necessary for the sake of insuring we are talking about either the same idea or similar experience.



So many ideas branded as "religious" are actually Christian specific, for example, with very specific understanding not shared by other religions which may use the same word. This is my argument with the current batch of atheistic writers who attempt to debunk "religion" but are in fact debunking a rather parochial view of religion instead. If I may be so challenging, I do not think there is a single "religious" word, concept, or idea that is or can be commonly understood amongst those considering themselves to be "religious." Therefore, a dialogue addressing such foundational terms like "self," "heaven," "nirvana," "sin," "salvation" is absolutely essential.



I will begin such a dialogue over the next few weeks as we approach a season considered by many to be “religious” and by some, a pain in the ass.



Be well.

The Self, part two

Good Morning Everyone,




The Self, part two,



Discussions of “the self” lead us too often in the wrong direction, the direction of the individual, as if the individual actually exists. When we practice deeply we can see that individuals are actually not individuals, but are rather aggregates of a deeply interconnected and interdependent whole. Care must be taken here, however, as even this is misleading: when we reside in the “whole” or “Universal,” the “Universal” itself is rendered meaningless.



One aim of practice, then, is to penetrate this. This is the place of “mind and body fall away.” With no mind and no body, there is no individual, but no universal either. Relative and absolute depend on each other, just as black needs white to render meaning to itself.



So, when we address “self” we should look outward from our individualistic view and attempt to see the vast, living web of complete existence. This is the true self, the self without a name, the self that existed before our fathers and mothers were born, the self that never is born and never dies. This is everything that is, was, and will be. This is also everything that is nothing. This is no-self, no thingness manifest.



The self makes itself in relation to all other things. It is interactive, seamless and completely dynamic. Without other, there is no self. Without self, there is no other. This is to say, I am the manifestation of all there is, was, and will be. As are you.



So here we are, arising out of nothingness. We are not complete, however, until we make ourselves manifestations of the whole.



Be well.