Once DT Susuki went back to Pure Land practice (Split from: Are Zen teachers awakened?)

neander
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Once DT Susuki went back to Pure Land practice (Split from: Are Zen teachers awakened?)

Post by neander »

I find it interesting that DT Suzuki who spent a good part of his life evangelizing Zen in the west confessed at the end of his days he did not find Satori and actually went back to the Pure Land.

https://www.threewheels.org.uk/reflecti ... hist-poet/

He was for sure a big gun if not the biggest in the West as the forefront of the Japanese Zen in the west...

so people should reflect on this...
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KeithA
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Re: Once DT Susuki went back to Pure Land practice

Post by KeithA »

neander wrote: Thu Feb 18, 2021 7:09 pm I find it interesting that DT Suzuki who spent a good part of his life evangelizing Zen in the west confessed at the end of his days he did not find Satori and actually went back to the Pure Land.

https://www.threewheels.org.uk/reflecti ... hist-poet/

He was for sure a big gun if not the biggest in the West as the forefront of the Japanese Zen in the west...

so people should reflect on this...
Why? This is common knowledge. He never claimed to be a teacher of Zen, that I am aware of. :shrug:
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Re: Once DT Susuki went back to Pure Land practice

Post by Matt J »

Where does it say he did not find Satori and went back to Pureland? His actions in this talk sound pretty Zen.

The Pureland/Zen dichotomy is largely a forced one, IMHO. Plenty of Zen masters had a foot in both. And Chan master Xu Yun has a brilliant talk where he demolishes such a dichotomy.
neander wrote: Thu Feb 18, 2021 7:09 pm I find it interesting that DT Suzuki who spent a good part of his life evangelizing Zen in the west confessed at the end of his days he did not find Satori and actually went back to the Pure Land.

https://www.threewheels.org.uk/reflecti ... hist-poet/

He was for sure a big gun if not the biggest in the West as the forefront of the Japanese Zen in the west...

so people should reflect on this...
"The world is made of stories, not atoms."
--- Muriel Rukeyser
neander
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Re: Once DT Susuki went back to Pure Land practice

Post by neander »

KeithA wrote: Thu Feb 18, 2021 7:27 pm
neander wrote: Thu Feb 18, 2021 7:09 pm I find it interesting that DT Suzuki who spent a good part of his life evangelizing Zen in the west confessed at the end of his days he did not find Satori and actually went back to the Pure Land.

https://www.threewheels.org.uk/reflecti ... hist-poet/

He was for sure a big gun if not the biggest in the West as the forefront of the Japanese Zen in the west...

so people should reflect on this...
Why? This is common knowledge. He never claimed to be a teacher of Zen, that I am aware of. :shrug:

this is true, but still, he did not find what he was looking for in all the teachers he met..otherwise, he wouldn't have come back to Pure Land
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Re: Are Zen teachers awakened?

Post by narhwal90 »

Not sure its appropriate to say what is or is not in someone elses head. Maybe he decided it was time to look more closely into Pure Land.
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Re: Are Zen teachers awakened?

Post by neander »

narhwal90 wrote: Thu Feb 18, 2021 8:09 pm Not sure its appropriate to say what is or is not in someone elses head. Maybe he decided it was time to look more closely into Pure Land.
I do not judge people thoughts but I judge their actions.. and what he allegedly did at the end of his life is quite clear...
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Re: Once DT Susuki went back to Pure Land practice

Post by neander »

Matt J wrote: Thu Feb 18, 2021 7:52 pm Where does it say he did not find Satori and went back to Pureland? His actions in this talk sound pretty Zen.

The Pureland/Zen dichotomy is largely a forced one, IMHO. Plenty of Zen masters had a foot in both. And Chan master Xu Yun has a brilliant talk where he demolishes such a dichotomy.
neander wrote: Thu Feb 18, 2021 7:09 pm I find it interesting that DT Suzuki who spent a good part of his life evangelizing Zen in the west confessed at the end of his days he did not find Satori and actually went back to the Pure Land.

https://www.threewheels.org.uk/reflecti ... hist-poet/

He was for sure a big gun if not the biggest in the West as the forefront of the Japanese Zen in the west...

so people should reflect on this...
To me, it looks like a big cognitive dissonance, like for a Christian being Catholic and Protestant at the same time

if Nembutsu solves your problems why spending hours in Zazen or meditating on koans ? Unless you are not sure on either roads...

But if you link master Xu Yun 's talk I am happy to listen to it..
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Re: Are Zen teachers awakened?

Post by Matt J »

Cognitive dissonance only if one denies emptiness, and accepts boundaries. Maybe the distinctions are sharper amongst Japanese Pure Land followers, I do not know.

Here is the talk from Hsu Yun:

https://thebamboosea.wordpress.com/2012 ... n-blofeld/

From Sheng Yen:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m9vxoMMUmEU

A 50 page paper on the subject from Sharf:

https://www.academia.edu/27245357/On_Pu ... eval_China

Prior thread:

https://www.dharmawheel.net/viewtopic.php?f=69&t=24489
neander wrote: Thu Feb 18, 2021 8:43 pm To me, it looks like a big cognitive dissonance, like for a Christian being Catholic and Protestant at the same time

if Nembutsu solves your problems why spending hours in Zazen or meditating on koans ? Unless you are not sure on either roads...

But if you link master Xu Yun 's talk I am happy to listen to it..
"The world is made of stories, not atoms."
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Re: Once DT Susuki went back to Pure Land practice

Post by karmanyingpo »

neander wrote: Thu Feb 18, 2021 8:43 pm
Matt J wrote: Thu Feb 18, 2021 7:52 pm Where does it say he did not find Satori and went back to Pureland? His actions in this talk sound pretty Zen.

The Pureland/Zen dichotomy is largely a forced one, IMHO. Plenty of Zen masters had a foot in both. And Chan master Xu Yun has a brilliant talk where he demolishes such a dichotomy.
neander wrote: Thu Feb 18, 2021 7:09 pm I find it interesting that DT Suzuki who spent a good part of his life evangelizing Zen in the west confessed at the end of his days he did not find Satori and actually went back to the Pure Land.

https://www.threewheels.org.uk/reflecti ... hist-poet/

He was for sure a big gun if not the biggest in the West as the forefront of the Japanese Zen in the west...

so people should reflect on this...
To me, it looks like a big cognitive dissonance, like for a Christian being Catholic and Protestant at the same time

if Nembutsu solves your problems why spending hours in Zazen or meditating on koans ? Unless you are not sure on either roads...


But if you link master Xu Yun 's talk I am happy to listen to it..
Not really pure land here but isn't this a misunderstanding of nembutsu?
I don't think nembutsu is suppose to be done to solve all your problems... Nembutsu is for being reborn into Buddha Amitabha's PureLand however that is understood... Right? Although I am sure that practicing Nembutsu seriously and in a meditative way with good meditation technique can also yield meditative experiences and enlightened experience

Whereas Zazen is more for direct experience of liberation, seeing the true nature of the mind. Right? Same for koan practice, to cut through delusion and ultimately to help the practitioner have enlightened experience?

Plus ZaZen seems to lean more towards "self power" conventionally speaking while Nembutsu leans more toward "other power"

So I think they seem complimentary to me..

KN
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Re: Are Zen teachers awakened?

Post by Budai »

I think most schools of Buddhism, including Zen by far, outline a Path to Enlightenment. Nembutsu is known to lead to Enlightenment because it is the recitation of the Name of a Powerful Buddha. I have seen Teachers propound this idea, and it makes sense considering. Enlightenment solves all of our problems. :smile: . However, if one approaches Buddhism, understanding Ekayāna, Buddha is Buddha, one need not to discriminate between Schools and have some sort of complex. Buddhism is meant to integrate within itself, and like a large community, we are all one Sangha, not seperate. So it's okay to take any Path neccessary to the Mountaintop, incorporating any Teaching or Dharma Gate, as long as that helps one with acheiving Enlightenment. With such an outlook, one can make swift progress on the Buddhist Path. Breathe. :namaste:
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Re: Once DT Susuki went back to Pure Land practice

Post by Ruhan »

karmanyingpo wrote: Fri Feb 19, 2021 1:09 am
neander wrote: Thu Feb 18, 2021 8:43 pm
Matt J wrote: Thu Feb 18, 2021 7:52 pm Where does it say he did not find Satori and went back to Pureland? His actions in this talk sound pretty Zen.

The Pureland/Zen dichotomy is largely a forced one, IMHO. Plenty of Zen masters had a foot in both. And Chan master Xu Yun has a brilliant talk where he demolishes such a dichotomy.

To me, it looks like a big cognitive dissonance, like for a Christian being Catholic and Protestant at the same time

if Nembutsu solves your problems why spending hours in Zazen or meditating on koans ? Unless you are not sure on either roads...


But if you link master Xu Yun 's talk I am happy to listen to it..
Not really pure land here but isn't this a misunderstanding of nembutsu?
I don't think nembutsu is suppose to be done to solve all your problems... Nembutsu is for being reborn into Buddha Amitabha's PureLand however that is understood... Right? Although I am sure that practicing Nembutsu seriously and in a meditative way with good meditation technique can also yield meditative experiences and enlightened experience

Whereas Zazen is more for direct experience of liberation, seeing the true nature of the mind. Right? Same for koan practice, to cut through delusion and ultimately to help the practitioner have enlightened experience?

Plus ZaZen seems to lean more towards "self power" conventionally speaking while Nembutsu leans more toward "other power"

So I think they seem complimentary to me..

KN
There is a subtle similarity between Zen Soto and Pure Land Buddhism, which is then inscribed in that long process of Japanese history, which sees the Buddhist sects attempting to simplify the practices so that they can reach the laity. And this process of simplification we see well with the "logical" passage from Honen (which from a certain point onwards emphasizes the saving function of the repeated recitation of the Nembutsu from which faith and total abandonment to Amithaba also arise) to Shinran (for whom only faith in Amitabha saves and the recitation could - obviously this is a rhetorical procedure, in practice it was not exactly like that - be performed even once: faith is enough); not to mention the even more radical Ryonin, an itinerant monk for whom the recitation of the Nembutsu by a single person was enough to save everyone, given the interdependence between all beings; but let's leave it aside given its marginality compared to Honen and Shinran.
This extreme simplification must be read in social terms: putting the emphasis on recitation can be fine if you are referring to monks, who have all the time in this world to recite the Nembutsu even thousands of times a day. Shinran simplifies further in order to reich the laity even more consistently; it is as if he were saying: "dear lay people, as long as you have faith in Amitabha, practice alone is useless; practice as well as you can, even a little, but just have faith". This more "light" approach was more suitable for the laity.

Dogen does something similar by emphasizing that it is zazen itself that is already (in a certain sense) enlightenment, buddha nature. He too had to simplify - in a certain sense - the ch'an that arrived in Japan through Eisai mainly linked to the Linji school. We must not - obviously - exaggerate the emphasis on this simplification, but in a certain sense the pages of Dogen in which awakening and zazen (praxis) itself are identified, go in the direction of a simplification for the laity.

Dogen states in the Shobogenzo, Chapter 88:
  • 《If you think practice and awakening are different, as ordinary people do, then there must be some kind of mutual perception between the one sitting in zazen and the awakening of him. This is false, because there can be no discrimination within the awakening.Although disturbances and illusions come and go during zazen, they too manifest themselves within the samādhi of enjoyment and are therefore transformed into enlightenment, without interfering or breaking anything. They too are the extremely profound and infinitely strong activity of the Buddha.》
And he continues:
  • It is the opinion of ordinary people that practice and awakening are not one. Practice itself is enlightenment, and the initial decision to seek the Way also contains total and perfect enlightenment. There is no awakening separate from praxis. It is very important to understand this.

    Since praxis is awakening, awakening is endless and praxis is without beginning. Thus Śākyamuni and Mahākāśyapa, Bodhidharma and the sixth Patriarch Daikan Enō, and also all the Buddhas and Patriarchs, knew that praxis is awakening.

    From the very beginning, practice and awakening are inseparable. Even our first step in the practice of the Way transmits the wonderful practice of realization and contains within itself the original and innate illumination. Buddhas and patriarchs have always taught that praxis is enlightenment and that we must never abandon praxis. If we eliminate the awareness of the original awakening, the wonderful practice pervades body and mind and becomes true practice.

    During my various travels in the China of the great Sung dynasty, I have seen many Zen monasteries housing from five or six hundred monks, up to several thousand, where people sat in zazen, day and night. When I asked the abbots of those monasteries - they were all men who transmitted the seal of the Buddha-mind - what the essence of the Buddha's Dharma is, they told me that praxis and awakening are not two different things.》
Obviously we must not exaggerate. Things aren't simplified to the point where just doing two minutes of zazen makes you (even just in that time frame) enlightened :D
It would be a senseless interpretation of Dogen's intentions. But that there is a tendency to "simplify", to meet the needs of the laity by making the awakening less (at least apparently) unattainable for a simple layman than the Linji school and then especially Rinzai (which puts a greater emphasis on discipline and incessant effort, being explicitly addressed - by Eisai himself in "Kozen gokokuron" - especially or in a certain majority to military hierarchies, rather than to the laity in general).

We are obviously not at the levels of Shinran, but in Dogen there is a similar tendency towards simplification, to meet the needs of the layman by saying "even the beginning of the practice puts you in the practice of awakening, you can do it!" (I quote the Shobogenzo again) :
  • 《 [...]the initial decision to seek the Way also contains total and perfect enlightenment. [...] Even our first step in the practice of the Way transmits the wonderful practice of realization and contains within itself the original and innate illumination. 》
To this, however, there is a contrary tendency (perhaps more similar to that present in Honen): if it is true that practice and enlightenment in a certain sense coincide and even a first step places enlightenment inside (at least in an absolute sense), it is equally true that then the practice of zazen must never be abandoned(given that practice and enlightment are the same), not even by an awakened one.

This is interesting because it could be a form of reaction to the mixture of monks and political power: as if to say, monks do monks even if they have received the attestation of enlightenment!

  • Conclusion:


What I said was just meant to be an integration and a starting point. This does not deny that for Dogen, liberation does not occur through external influences / powers and this is the point that divides Pure Land Buddhism from all the Ch'an / Zen schools. It is absolutely true that the Nembutsu cannot be understood as a form of simple relaxation, although I cannot deny that perhaps someone has spoken of the fact that the recitation of the nembutsu - in addition to saving - has some psychophysical benefit. Although this approach usually comes mostly from those who deny the salvific character of the nembutsu. Not being an amidist practitioner, I suspend judgment.

On the other hand, between Soto and Amidism (both Jodo Shu and especially Jodo Shinshu) there is a subtle similarity in the common simplification (albeit qualitatively and also quantitatively different) in terms of attempt to reach the laity.
Last edited by Ruhan on Fri Feb 19, 2021 3:48 am, edited 2 times in total.
neander
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Re: Once DT Susuki went back to Pure Land practice

Post by neander »

Matt J wrote: Thu Feb 18, 2021 10:10 pm Cognitive dissonance only if one denies emptiness, and accepts boundaries. Maybe the distinctions are sharper amongst Japanese Pure Land followers, I do not know.

Here is the talk from Hsu Yun:

https://thebamboosea.wordpress.com/2012 ... n-blofeld/

From Sheng Yen:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m9vxoMMUmEU

A 50 page paper on the subject from Sharf:

https://www.academia.edu/27245357/On_Pu ... eval_China

Prior thread:

https://www.dharmawheel.net/viewtopic.php?f=69&t=24489
neander wrote: Thu Feb 18, 2021 8:43 pm To me, it looks like a big cognitive dissonance, like for a Christian being Catholic and Protestant at the same time

if Nembutsu solves your problems why spending hours in Zazen or meditating on koans ? Unless you are not sure on either roads...

But if you link master Xu Yun 's talk I am happy to listen to it..
I read the links thanks.

I see Nembutsu can be stretched far beyond what I thought (up to your Buddhanature) and understand better the dual practice rationale.

Initially, I thought that it was like a religious trick from the Pure Land clergy in order to increase their potential followers but in reality, I know too little about the Pure Land movement apart from some bits and pieces related to the Sengoku Jidai period in Japan, therefore, I suspend my judgment as is something that I need to study and explore more as it is vaster matter than I thought.
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Re: Once DT Susuki went back to Pure Land practice (Split from: Are Zen teachers awakened?)

Post by Ayu »

I moved this off topic from here https://www.dharmawheel.net/viewtopic.p ... 01#p540601 to here. If you do not agree with this subforum for this side topic, please let me know.
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Re: Once DT Susuki went back to Pure Land practice (Split from: Are Zen teachers awakened?)

Post by oryoki »

DT Suzuki describes his Kensho in the book The Field of Zen. The book
contains 15 chapters based on articles and talks given by the famous Zen translator Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki (1870 - 1966). The book was edited by Christmas Humpreys who founded The Buddhist Society of London in 1924. In the first chapter entitled Early Memories, Suzuki mentions his own Kensho experience while working on Mu. After that he could solve Zen koans. The book also contains chapter The Meaning of Satori. When after that he became practitioner of Pure Land?
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Re: Once DT Susuki went back to Pure Land practice (Split from: Are Zen teachers awakened?)

Post by oryoki »

I did read about D.T. Suzuki of course in Wiki, but I got the impression, that he promoted Zen, especially in the West, because he had a significant result (achieved Kensho) based on practical experience. While his fascination with Pure Land in later years is certain, I got the impression, from reading Wiki, that it was purely philosophical.
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Re: Once DT Susuki went back to Pure Land practice (Split from: Are Zen teachers awakened?)

Post by Queequeg »

When you guys say Suzuki took up Pure Land, what does that mean? You guys talk about Pure Land as is it's a monolith. It's far from it.
There is no suffering to be severed. Ignorance and klesas are indivisible from bodhi. There is no cause of suffering to be abandoned. Since extremes and the false are the Middle and genuine, there is no path to be practiced. Samsara is nirvana. No severance achieved. No suffering nor its cause. No path, no end. There is no transcendent realm; there is only the one true aspect. There is nothing separate from the true aspect.
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Re: Once DT Susuki went back to Pure Land practice (Split from: Are Zen teachers awakened?)

Post by Malcolm »

Queequeg wrote: Fri Feb 19, 2021 2:53 pm When you guys say Suzuki took up Pure Land, what does that mean? You guys talk about Pure Land as is it's a monolith. It's far from it.
I always rather admired Ippen, for example. I enjoyed the book on his life and writings, No Abode, the Record of Ippen.
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Re: Once DT Susuki went back to Pure Land practice (Split from: Are Zen teachers awakened?)

Post by neander »

I saw on Youtube some weeks ago a conference where they explained that towards the end of his life he confessed he did not find satori and therefore went back to the Pure Land

You can find an analysis of his Pure Land writings in ML BLUM Suzuki Daisetsu and Pure Land Buddhism

He probably never abandoned Pure Land Buddhism but put more emphasis on Zen during a period of his life realizing at the end he did not find what he was looking for.

Zen practitioners will be more precise than me.

you can find the details you requested related to his last days in my previous link that is a first-person account

https://www.threewheels.org.uk/reflecti ... hist-poet/

"Living with D. T. Suzuki during his last days, how often I witnessed him enjoying Pure Land documents, especially articles written by Shinran, the founder of Shin Buddhism, and also a great number of poems composed by Saichi Asahara, one of the Shin Buddhist devotees who we call the Myokonin"
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Re: Once DT Susuki went back to Pure Land practice (Split from: Are Zen teachers awakened?)

Post by PadmaVonSamba »

Don’t automatically assume that, because outwardly they emphasize different practices, that inwardly there is an inherent difference between zen and pure land. Both rely on completely abandoning attachment to ego. Each is profound in its own way but the end result is the same. Even satori mustn’t be held onto. Once you reach a level of understanding as he had, you can practice any path you want. I’m sure that if Suzuki knew how to milk a cow, he’d be just as able to milk a goat.
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Re: Once DT Susuki went back to Pure Land practice (Split from: Are Zen teachers awakened?)

Post by SilenceMonkey »

I always thought DT Suzuki came from a pureland family...

And maybe it seems strange that he is involved with both pure land and zen because in japan, schools seem to be much more sectarian and separate than they were in china.

My advisor in undergrad was a DT Suzuki scholar. A lot of his research focused on DT Suzuki and his relationship with Pureland tradition.
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