Organ Mountain Zen



Wednesday, October 10, 2012

My Zen

With palms together


Good Morning Everyone,



I became a novitiate priest in the Matsuoka-roshi lineage in 1999. At that time my teacher, Ken Hogaku McGuire-roshi did not use clear guidelines for progression through the “ranks” as it were. Instead, as many Masters before him (including the Buddha himself) he used his own intuition. Matsuoka-roshi, it is said, ordained people before they were “ready” and by this his critics mean before they knew the appropriate blocking in the grand theatre of Zen. Matsuoka’s perspective was, as I understand it, students would ‘grow’ into the priesthood. Of course, as has been the case with me, when your Sangha is small you must use the people you have to fill the positions necessary in order to make the Zendo function. This requires appointing people before they are ready and working with them as they grow into the role or not.



Matsuoka-roshi was a true pioneer of Zen in America. He knew Americans were excellent candidates for the practice of Zen. He also knew that the dead Zen of Japan, that “cathedral Zen” Senzaki-roshi often referred to, would not fly here. True Zen, the Zen of everyday life, had to be alive. It had to be dynamic. It was not the Zen of ornate robes, perfect gassho, and the correct number and order of liturgical elements. Matsuoka-roshi’s Zen is, as was Senzaki’s, “living room” Zen.



Hogaku-roshi offered me the authority to form my own Order in 2005 when he granted me the “rank” of “Roshi.” Inside my head I believe conferring of “rank” is silly. The ordination process was high theatre. I was most uncomfortable being an actor in it. Yet, there is a long tradition of teacher to student transmission, so long it goes back to the Buddha himself. Who am I to break with it? What I will break with is the meaningless parroting of old practices. Our Zen here in America must be authentic, which is not to say church Zen, but rather the living Zen of everyday, ordinary, experience experienced directly.



How we pick up a cup is equally important as how we place a rakusu on our head (and in some ways far more important, as a cup is an everyday part of the universe, whereas in American lay practice, a rakusu is an ornament for weekly service). My Zen is the Zen of the everyday, not the Cathedral Zen of actors wrapped in brocade and bowing without true respect at the appropriate bell.



Treat your cup as yourself and yourself as the universe and you are a true practitioner in my book. Treat your enemy as you would yourself and you are a master. These are the true practices of Zen. None of this should be taken as an escape from proper liturgy and the forms associated with it. It is to say that the way and manner with which we and the forms become one is of utmost importance. Zen Liturgical Forms, teacups, turning on a lamp, eating a meal are all the same. It is our unification with these that leads to an awakened and compassionate life.



Be well

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