Shakyamuni to Sanshin: Buddhist essentials
In a six-part lecture and discussion series, we traced the through lines from foundational Buddhist teachings, through the development of Mahayana teachings and practice, and into the history and teachings particular to the Soto Zen tradition. We saw how all of this underpins our day to day practice at Sanshin and beyond. The series covered a lot of ground rather quickly, with the aim of simply introducing basic ideas and establishing them as central to our practice and understanding. There wasn't enough time to go into depth, and participants were encouraged to use these discussions as starting points for their own ongoing investigation and study. The point was to focus ourselves within the enormity of the Buddhist tradition on the particular elements that have determined why we practice the way we do today at Sanshin.
All of the resources made available to participants in the 2025 series are now available on this page, and we're continuing to add more as they are created. The aim is to establish and maintain a meaningful roadmap of the words and teachings essential to an understanding of Soto Zen so that individual practitioners can launch and continue their own focused exploration.
All of the resources made available to participants in the 2025 series are now available on this page, and we're continuing to add more as they are created. The aim is to establish and maintain a meaningful roadmap of the words and teachings essential to an understanding of Soto Zen so that individual practitioners can launch and continue their own focused exploration.
Who was the Buddha?
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Summary:
Siddhartha Gautama was born 563 BCE in India into the Kshatriya caste as the prince of a small kingdom. His parents received the prediction that he would be either a great king or a great religious leader. Because his father wanted a successor, he tried to keep him at home by giving him everything he could want. However Siddhartha eventually wanted to get out and see the world, so he snuck out with his attendant four times. First he saw an old person, then a sick person, then a dead person, and he was upset by this suffering. The fourth time, he saw a religious person and decided he wanted to live the same way to save people from suffering, aging, sickness and death. As a child, during a festival for planting rice, Siddhartha had seen a bird fly down and eat a worm from the ground. He realized that this was similar to what was happening with the small tribes around his kingdom being invaded and conquered by each other. If he succeeded his father, he would inherit that situation. Instead, he became a religious practitioner and trained with a variety of teachers, but none of those practices answered his questions about suffering. He kept leaving and trying something else without success, and finally sat down by himself under a tree, determined to get to the root of suffering. He attained awakening under the bodhi tree and became Shakyamuni Buddha. Then he found five practitioners with whom he’d previously trained and shared the dharma with them. They accepted these teachings and formed a sangha. This is the establishment of the three treasures—Buddha, dharma and sangha. After his awakening, Shakyamuni spent the rest of his life traveling around northern India (now Nepal) teaching and practicing with others until he was about 80. Nothing he said was written down at the time, but was committed to memory and written down much later, after he died. This is the origin of the Pali canon, which has three parts, sometimes called the three baskets:
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Further reflection: Consider the relationship between the sanbukki (Three Buddha Days) and the Absolute Buddha treasure. Why do we continue to observe these days, beyond showing basic gratitude to the human founder of our tradition? |
The Three Treasures
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Summary:
In Soto Zen there are three kinds of three treasures: manifesting, maintaining and absolute. We find these in Dogen's Kyojukaimon that we hear during ryaku fusatsu. Manifesting three treasures (genzen sanbō 現前三) These are the things that have appeared in the world historically. Shakyamuni was a human being who lived in India 2600 years ago, as we’ve seen. After his awakening under the tree, he deeply understood the functioning of the universe or reality, including the four noble truths and the chain of causation. He went and found people to share this with, and we call his teaching the dharma. Because what he was teaching was really just reality, dharma is actually larger than just what Buddha said, so sometimes it means universal functioning. The people he taught became the first sangha, and this is the origin of the three treasures: the manifesting version. Maintaining three treasures (jūji sanbō 住持三宝) These are the three treasures we still encounter today. We still have Buddha statues or paintings, items that represent awakening to us or remind us of our practice. In early Buddhism in India, there were no representations of Buddha because he was said to be beyond form. When the Greeks encountered Buddhism a century or two later, they made it look like their own ideas of the sacred, and those early statues are really Greek style. Sometimes we consider dharma teachers in this role as the manifesting buddha treasure. 住持 juji is used as a term for a chief clergy in a temple, someone who holds the space. Dogen called his teacher Old Buddha. We also have sutra books that record Buddha’s teachings. Even if it’s just a cheap photocopy, we still treat it as a relic of Buddha. We’re still able to encounter the dharma because of these things as the maintaining dharma treasure. Finally we still have communities of people coming together to practice: to do zazen, work, study and ritual. Some are here now and some have left the physical world but made it possible for us to practice today. More folks will come to practice after we’re gone because we’re making it possible for them. We also have all beings throughout space and time, when we consider the teaching that all sentient and insentient beings preach the dharma. Thus we have the maintaining sangha treasure. Absolute three treasures (ittai sanbō 一体三宝) lit. one body three treasures These are three aspects of one reality. Buddha isn’t one person who attained awakening but the act of awakening to the dharma. There’s no separation between buddha and dharma, and no separation between a person, an action and an object. If buddha, dharma and sangha are already one thing, then the sangha can’t become aware of awakening as an object “out there” and do something called “waking up.” This is called unsurpassable true awakening, annuttara samyak sambodhi. Provisionally, we can say that the absolute buddha treasure is awakening, the absolute dharma treasure is reality and the absolute sangha treasure is interconnectedness or harmony. In this tradition we say that we take refuge in the three treasures. We need a teacher like Buddha to show us the way; we can’t yet see reality for ourselves. We need teachings or dharma if we’re going to understand what suffering and delusion are and how to let go. We need others to practice with for help and support, to reinforce and encourage our practice. To take refuge is to keep coming back to these three treasures and to remember to practice. We need to keep being encouraged by Buddha’s story and example, to keep hearing and studying the dharma, and to keep carrying out practice like zazen, work and ritual with others who have the same aspiration. |
Three kinds of three treasures: click to enlarge
From Hoko's 108 Gates:
Gate 8: Mindfulness of Buddha Gate 9: Mindfulness of dharma Gate 10: Mindfulness of sangha Further reflection: Consider what it means to take refuge, and why we don’t just say we “believe” in the Three Treasures. |
Main branches of Buddhism
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Summary:
After Buddha’s death, the sangha kept practicing and studying and over time, and Buddhism started to spread, in large part along the Silk Road. Transmission happened from the 1st the 7th centuries CE, and the three main groups involved have been characterized as missionaries, merchants and monks. Some travelers were practitioners who were simply carrying out their own practice as they went. Temples and guest houses started to spring up to accommodate them; these become trading centers and established communities. Systems of exchange covered not only things like incense and cloth, but a dana system develops: merchants give money and monks give teachings. Cultural exchange grows as well, with Buddhist art and artifacts influenced by all of the cultures they encounter. Some travelers were missionaries who were intentionally carrying Buddhism in order to spread the dharma. When it gets to China, monks and pilgrims start going back the other way to get access to original texts and work on translations. Silk Road transmission ends with the rise of Islam in Central Asia in the 7th century. Buddhism had already split into three main schools (the three turnings of the wheel); now those became more focused and concentrated. Two schools of Buddhism emerged in India, and one in mainly in Tibet, Nepal, Mongolia:
Theravada: way of the elders This school includes both monks and laity, but laity didn’t have much voice in establishing Buddhism as an institution. Beginning in the first century BCE, Buddha’s teachings are written down as sutras. In general, this is conservative monastic Buddhism that sticks pretty closely to the teachings. It's also the first turning of the wheel, when Buddha taught the Four Noble Truths; of course, the oldest scriptures don’t mention future turnings. Mahayana: great vehicle This is the second turning, when Buddha taught additional things resulting in additional sutras written in the 1st century CE. There is both monastic and lay practice, but laypeople have a stronger voice than in Theravada. In response, new deities, rituals and practices arise and people choose their own path from diverse options, particularly during Silk Road transmission. Vajrayana: lightning or diamond vehicle This third turning confirmed the first two turnings but added additional teachings as a further development of the Mahayana. New texts continued to appear until the 12th century. Vajrayana practice in Japan is known as Shingon, which has a real influence on Zen. Keizan was strongly influenced by Shingon, and much of our ritual practice originates with him. One main difference between these three branches is that the ideal practitioner is different in each school. In order to understand, we have to understand three more basic elements: samsara, nirvana and rebirth. Samsara is the world of delusion, where beings are caught up in the suffering of the four noble truths: this world right here. There are six realms in the world of samsara: devas/gods, asuras/powerful giants, humans, animals, hungry ghosts, and hells. Beings in all of these realms have suffering, even the gods and giants, but the human realm is the only one in which we can practice and awaken. This is Dogen's "pivotal opportunity of human form." Nirvana is where the fires of delusion and suffering have gone out and we’re no longer creating the conditions for rebirth. The key is that we deeply understand that there is no independent, permanent self. Nirvana is said to be a joyful place, stress free, peaceful, full of all the good virtues and a very nice place to be. This is where we go when we leap free of the wheel of birth and death. Early Buddhism inherited the idea of rebirth/reincarnation from the Vedic container in which Siddhartha grew up. The events of this life are said to determine the condition of our next life, and until we free ourselves from delusion, we keep creating the conditions for rebirth into samsara over and over. Buddha knew in his lifetime that that was his last rebirth because he had awakened and stopped creating those conditions. Theravada has the arhats, someone who practices and attains awakening and then jumps off the wheel of birth and death, lands in Nirvana as a Buddha and never returns to this world of samsara. Typically, practitioners are monastic so that they can concentrate on meditation and spiritual practice, free from duties of ordinary life. Mahayana has the bodhisattva, someone who practices and attains awakening but remains in samsara to teach the dharma and liberate all beings from suffering. While arhats are typically monastics, laypeople can become bodhisattvas. Theravadan schools say Buddha’s instruction was to become an arhat and reach Nirvana. Mahayana says this was Buddha using skillful means, offering an attractive goal (Nirvana) in order to lure people away from unwholesome behavior. Manjusri, Avalokitesvara and Ksitagarbha are well known bodhisattvas; there are others. We also think of all of us human practitioners as bodhisattvas because we’re not practicing just for our own gain; our practice is to help others The split signaled the end of the first era of Buddhism; after which it expanded to new countries and became even more diverse. Then, according to Vajrayana tradition, there was a third turning sixteen years after the Buddha’s enlightenment; the first tantric texts appeared in the 3rd century CE, and they continued to appear until the 12th century. Syncretism is key as Buddhism moves to new countries and cultures. On the Silk Road, Mahayana Buddhism encounters Zoroastrianism, Judaism, Christianity and Islam as well as various cultures and languages: Greeks, Iranians, Central Asian cultures. Kings and merchants built temples along the Silk Road, travelers met there and exchanged ideas, andtexts start being translated and studied. When Buddhism goes through Central Asia and gets to China, it encounters Daoism and Confucianism and takes on some of those elements. From Daoism we see living in harmony with nature, effortless action, ways of understanding duality and nonduality, and going beyond intellectual understanding. Early texts were translated into Chinese and Chan develops there before coming to Japan as Zen. From Confucianism we get ethical and social values, moral conduct, right action, teacher-student relationships including transmission, and emphasis on self-cultivation and right effort. When Buddhism gets to Japan, it adds elements of Shinto, which reinforces respect for nature, respect for ancestors and ritual purity. Today Buddhism and Shinto are often blended in Japan: there are sometimes shrines on temple grounds, and weddings are usually Shinto while funerals are Buddhist. The point is that it’s not a straight line from Shakyamuni to Sanshin. It’s a huge story and there are a ton of interesting byways, but it also means that we can’t always assume we know why things are as they are. Not everything we do came directly from Dogen, but that doesn’t invalidate the things that didn’t. “How did we get here?” is an important question. |
Further reflection: Consider why it was the Mahayana teachings that spread throughout Asia via the Silk Road, making Buddhism a universal religion. Take into account the ideal practitioner in each of the three schools. |
Four noble truths
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Summary:
The bedrock of all Buddhist teaching and practice, the four noble truths are one of the things Shakyamuni woke up to under the bodhi tree. He sat down there resolving not to get up until he understood the nature of suffering, and the four noble truths describe his understanding of where suffering comes from -- and on that basis, what we can do about it. 1) Life is characterized by suffering/unease/dissatisfaction Suffering isn't just catastrophic suffering; it's moment by moment unease, as well as birth, aging, illness, and death (physical pain). We want things we don’t have, we have things we don’t want, and we're worried that even good things will disappear. Thus we can see that: 2) Suffering is caused by desire Constantly wanting things to be different, we fall prey to deeply ingrained habits of clinging and aversion. The good news is that: 3) Desire can be broken and liberation from suffering is possible It's possible to see how we perpetuate suffering for ourselves and others and stop doing those things. Life is characterized by suffering, but there’s something we can do to change our relationship to suffering. “Our” suffering stops being self-centered and we stop using it to create identity. Instead we can use it as a way to cultivate compassion for others. 4) The Eightfold Path is the means to wellbeing Buddhism is a practice, not an abstract philosophy or a set of mental gymnastics. There’s something we have to actually do with the body and mind, and we have to do it ourselves. |
Further reflection: Consider the relationship between the Four Noble Truths and the four bodhisattva vows. Take into account the difference between desire and aspiration. |
Eightfold path
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Summary:
The elements of the eightfold path fall into three categories:
We use the word "Right" in front of each element, but this is not "right" as opposed to "wrong." It's in the sense of being in alignment with the way the universe really works, being and doing in a way that doesn’t create additional karma, suffering and disturbance for ourselves and others. These three groups and eight elements help us create a balanced life. Trying to work on any one without others won’t work. For instance, “mindfulness” without zazen or precepts is just frustrating and won’t last. We can see from the image of the wheel that this path is not actually linear; we don’t do one practice and then move on to the next. They arise together. Right view
Right View is about seeing and understanding the four noble truths and knowing that the eightfold path is a better means to a wholesome life than following our desires and delusions. This might sound like an intellectual exercise, but it isn’t. The way to get to grips with right view is on the cushion, settling down in zazen, seeing through our ideas and cravings, and getting that even though we’re baby bodhisattvas and we fall off the path, it’s a good thing and we aspire to live in Buddha’s way. It's not about accepting dogma and doing or believing what someone says. It’s about cultivating our own experiences of clarity. Iit’s what keeps aspiration strong so we don’t give up. Right intention
Right Intention is sometimes translated as right thought, right aspiration or right resolve. The main idea is this: because thought leads to speech and action, it’s important to pay attention to our thoughts and cultivate wholesomeness there. It’s easy to just let our habituated thoughts arise and get dragged around by them, to just react to things without exercising any real intention. Then we deal with the consequences, which may be suffering for ourselves and others. The good news is that we have a choice. We don’t have to just mindlessly react, and we don’t have to feel blindsided by the resulting suffering and powerless to escape. In zazen, we can begin to notice habituated thinking. Usually we don’t pay attention to what’s arising; we just take our thoughts to be a complete and accurate representation of the way the world is. We don’t stop to realize that our thoughts are our own creations and likely to not be the whole story. Right speech
Right Speech is really a critical part of our practice, and it's connected to everything else we do. This is not just about saying nice things to each other. It's about refraining from the four evils: lying, idle/frivolous speech, harsh or abusive speech and divisive speech/ backbiting or malicious gossip. Unwholesome thought can lead to unwholesome speech and then to unwholesome action. Conflict can escalate from just words to physical violence. The whole thing starts to spiral -- suffering leads to more suffering and the creation of more harmful karma for ourselves and others. Right action
Right action arises from right view or right intention. We see reality as it is, which is sometimes called awakening or enlightenment. We understand suffering, interdependence, the true nature of the self, and how these three things are related. When we really understand how this works, right action arises naturally; there's nothing to learn, no decision to be made. We don’t live in our idea of the world or the self but in the actual world of reality. It’s important that we really get that so we’re not living in a fantasy. If we don’t see the reality of the world, we don’t know how to act. We do things based on our delusion or on the way we wish things were. We need to make effort to sit and to see through delusion, because what we do actually matters. Nothing is outside the Buddha way or this one unified reality, including ourselves, so what we do affects others and what they do affects us; there’s no getting around it. We all have a responsibility to take right action because the consequences are bigger than ourselves. Right livelihood
There are five types of wrong livelihood for laypeople: dealing in weapons, human beings, meat, intoxicants, or poison. Ordained sangha are admonished not to make a living by telling fortunes, interpreting dreams, casting spells, etc. We understand work as a manifestation of Buddha nature just as zazen is. There's no separation between spiritual life and work. It's how we carry our practice into the world and also how we observe and study interconnectedness. Work is not something to get through in order to get to practice. That means that what we do to support ourselves has the same considerations as the rest of our practice. We need to constantly remain aware of awakening and not forget to practice, and that includes the time when we’re doing work: at home, at the office, taking care of family responsibilities, whatever. Of course, right livelihood is not isolated from the rest of the eightfold path. For example, we need right view to discern what is and isn’t right livelihood. Work gives us the chance to practice right speech and action, have right intention, etc. Right effort
Right Effort is made up of the four exertions or four endeavors:
We keep unwholesomeness from arising by being aware of what we might call temptation -- avoiding situations where we’re likely to fall into bad habits or make mistakes. When we see that starting, we can do something else. We abandon unwholesome states that have arisen by seeing what’s happening and where things are going, and recognizing the consequences. Then we cultivate the opposite wholesome quality. This is where it's helpful to know something about zazen mind. opening the hand and letting thoughts come and go. Cultivating and perpetuating wholesome states is a matter of putting ourselves into wholesome circumstances: precepts, good friends, healthy activity. Right effort gives us the energy to practice. It's important that our energy is directed to wholesomeness by the support of the rest of the elements of the eightfold path. Otherwise we’re just putting energy into perpetuating our delusion and suffering. We need RE because we have to do our own practice. No one can do it for us; others can only point the way. There’s no liberation outside of our own activity. We rise and fall based on our own diligence. Right mindfulness
Right mindfulness is remembering to practice and bear in mind what Buddha taught. It's remembering what we’re doing and why. It's not focusing on one thing to the exclusion of all else: if we’re doing that, our object is typically the self or ego. Memory keeps coming up in this practice tradition. Chanting is about remembering teachings. When we sit zazen, we drop distraction and remember how things are. Changing our habits of body, speech and mind requires remembering to practice. Right concentration
Understanding of Right concentration (meditation, samadhi) shifts across time and space, from one Buddhist tradition to another. In early Buddhism, concentration was about withdrawal from sense distractions, craving, aversion, etc. to achieve state of equanimity and mindfulness that results in something ranging from content to rapture. Practitioners did this by concentrating on something such that it filled their entire awareness, and also their awareness completely took in the object. How is this different from what we do here in zazen? The key is intentionality, or lack of it. When we sit, we create thoughts because of past karma and the human condition. If we’re in relationship with the thoughts, judging and embroidering them, then there is an “I” that is thinking. If thoughts come and go and we don’t interact with them, there is no subject and object and no "I" that is thinking: this is non-thinking. It's not about concentration by thinking hard about something, but concentration as in distilling something down to the essence: letting go of whatever is extra, what Uchiyama Roshi calls “fabrications.” |
Further reflection: Consider the meaning of “right” before each of the elements of the eightfold path. How do the practice of the eightfold path and the study of nyoho reflect each other? |
Precepts
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Summary:
As we've seen, ethics or morality is one of the three categories in the eightfold path; for us, that means precepts. Three refuges: I take refuge in the Buddha, honored as the highest. I take refuge in the Dharma, honored as the stainless. I take refuge in the Sangha, honored as the harmonious. We take refuge in the three treasures in preparation for receiving the precepts. Three collective pure precepts:
This is the study of good and bad, or wholesome and unwholesome, and going beyond good and bad. In this world of form, embracing moral codes means we follow the rules, the laws of wherever we're living, or guidelines of the sangha. Embracing all good acts is to carry out wholesome activities, or do good work in the world. Embracing and benefiting all living beings means we're not practicing just for ourselves and our own self-improvement, but also helping other beings to be free from suffering. In the larger or absolute sense, we see the actual functioning of reality, and on that basis we don't feel compelled to break laws or moral codes. Our activities in the world are naturally good and wholesome and we don't have any resistance to doing the work we need to do. Because we understand interconnectedness, we can't do other than free beings from suffering because there's no separation between ourselves and others. In this way, we go beyond good and bad in that we don't need to have ideas and judgements about what we're doing and who that makes us. Our movement through the world is not about us. Ten major precepts: First, the precept of not killing. Second, the precept of not stealing. Third, the precept of not indulging in sexual greed. Fourth, the precept of not speaking falsehood. Fifth, the precept of not selling intoxicating liquor. Sixth, the precept of not talking of the faults of others. Seventh, the precept of not praising oneself or slandering others. Eighth, the precept of not begrudging the Dharma or material things. Ninth, the precept of not giving rise to anger. Tenth, the precept of not ignorantly slandering the Three Treasures. These may feel more specific because they're about particular actions. They come from the Bonmokyo, or Brahma Net Sutra. In every case, there is a specific historical reason why the Buddha handed down one of these precepts. Someone in the sangha made a mistake, and Buddha said don't do it again. We also study a larger interpretation of each precept from Bodhidharma: this is the absolute view. Finally there's Dogen's Kyojukaimon, which takes the middle ground between these two. All of these three perspectives shape our practice with precepts. For instance, the Bonmokyo says that if you kill or cause killing, you will be expelled from the sangha. Bodhidharma says that in the world of emptiness, nothing is actually arising or perishing, so there's nothing to be killed and no one to do the killing. Both of those are real or true, but they don't help us so much in daily life. Dogen says in the Kyojukaimon that "By not taking life, one nurtures the seeds of Buddha and is enabled to succeed to the Buddha’s life of wisdom. Do not kill life." It's not an ancient rule and it's not an abstract view: it's our vow. We vow not to kill things, and in that way to cultivate practice and awakening for ourselves and others. Precepts aren't lists of rules and dos and don'ts; they describe the life and activity of the bodhisattva. They're a lifetime study and practice, because they can be very subtle and bring up lots of real conundra. People ask things like what about euthanasia? What about whistleblowing? What about drinking champagne at my sister's wedding? Okumura Roshi frequently reminds us that we can't use the precepts as a yardstick for judging people. I'm better than you because I keep precepts and you don't, or because you fell down and broke that one last week. Precepts are about our own practice and aspiration; we receive them as the basis for our own work and awakening. |
See this page for much more on the precepts from Okumura Roshi and Hoko.
Look here for information on taking the precepts at Sanshin.
Further reflection: Consider the way the Three Treasures are characterized here as the Three Refuges, and the relationship with their absolute form. |
Three marks of existence / Four undeniable realities
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Summary:
There’s more than one version of this teaching in the Buddhist tradition; sometimes it's known as the three marks of existence, sometimes the four dharma seals (四法印 shihoin) depending on context and tradition. Uchiyama Roshi referred to "the four undeniable realities," so we’ll use that version here. It’s said that if a teaching contains these four dharma seals , it’s a real Buddhist teaching. They function like a signature stamp or a trademark. Of course, like many other sets of teachings in Buddhism, the four seals are not actually separate. They arise and function together, but for purpose of sharing the dharma, we have to give them names and boundaries. Impermanence
Impermanence: Everything changes and causes everything else to change. Buddha taught that all conditioned things – things that arise because of a combination of karmic causes and conditions – are constantly arising and falling away, constantly changing in gross and subtle ways. This includes not only objects we encounter in the world of form, like shoes, mountains, cell phones and fence posts, but also our bodies and minds, our thoughts and emotions, and our relationships. Shoes wear out, mountains erode or explode as volcanoes, cell phones become outdated or broken, and we ourselves age and die. The elements that make up the things of the world are impermanent, the causes and conditions that bring them together are also impermanent, so how could the outcome of those causes and conditions not also be so? Causes and conditions not simple to see. They’re deeply interconnected across space and time. There could be a lot of time or space between causes and conditions and the outcome of whatever is arising, and understanding this becomes a matter for faith. We have to deeply experience impermanence in a non-intellectual way, without concepts and theories, in order to truly understand it. In order to function in the world, we have to give names and attributes to things we encounter, but we also have to remember that these are provisional means that allow us to do our bodhisattva work in the world of desire. Any boundaries we set up around things are our own ideas; the true nature of all things is complete emptiness. Thus: All conditioned phenomena are subject to change or impermanence, including physical characteristics, qualities, assumptions, theories, knowledge, ideas, memories and our self concept. Nothing is permanent because, for something to be permanent, there has to be an unchanging cause behind it. Since all causes are bound together, there can be no single ultimate unchanging underlying cause. Everything is arising, changing and perishing together, and this is the way reality works. suffering
Suffering: We want things to be other than they are. Buddha’s first noble truth says that suffering is a characteristic of the human condition. In other words, it’s one of the marks or existence, or one of the undeniable realities. We’re caught up in desire, craving, grasping and attachment, but the things we’re attached to are themselves impermanent, so they’re not ultimately satisfying. We like to label everything we encounter as good, bad or indifferent for ourselves, and then chase after happy things and run away from unhappy things. Thus we constantly want the world to be different, and yet our suffering is of our own making. We can choose another path, still functioning in the world and living comfortably, but without getting stuck. no self
No self: the thing we call “me” or the self is nothing but a temporary collection of elements, or skandhas The five skandhas
The self is just a pile, heap or aggregation of these five constantly changing elements – and not just the self, but everything we encounter. None of these is something we can point to and say this is ME. If so, then there’s nothing we can hold onto as permanent, including a soul. However, this teaching isn’t saying we aren’t valid as individual humans with personalities and experiences. The self is real, but may not be what we think it is. There isn’t a self that persists through time, there isn’t a soul, and we have to give up clinging to those ideas because they’re just fabrications. When we become attached to one or more components or our ideas about them, we have suffering. All this means that we need to get really clear about how we create a sense of self, where we do that skillfully, and where we get stuck and create suffering. To be clear, this is not a practice of suppressing, denying or negating the self with the idea that we need to be heroes or martyrs – that’s just another story coming from the ego, another idea about the self. We simply need to hold lightly our provisional fabrications about who we are. Now we can see why Buddha’s sitting under the bodhi tree and getting to the root of suffering was so important and how we’re still practicing with that every day. nirvana
Nirvana: the fires of delusion and suffering have gone out Nirvana happens naturally when we've seen the true nature of the self and we’re no longer creating the conditions for rebirth. When we see these three or four marks with wisdom, we turn away from suffering and toward nirvana. Because we’re limited human beings, we have confusion and misunderstanding about these three marks and we live in samsara, but the third noble truth says that liberation from suffering is possible. That’s the reality of nirvana. |
Further reflection: Review and consider Uchiyama Roshi's comments on the four seals in Opening the Hand of Thought, pages 6 - 15. |
Dependent co-arising
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Summary:
Everything depends on everything else. There is no one fixed underlying element from which everything derives or arises. That means nothing is permanent and everything is always changing. It also means nothing is random. We may not understand the causes and conditions, but they’re there. Things don’t happen because a force outside of nature is somehow making them happen on a whim. Reality or the universe works the way it works; there’s a reason for things. This is what we’re talking about when we talk about causes and conditions. Cause is like a seed; there’s the potential for something to arise. Conditions are like the soil; certain elements have to be in place for the arising to happen. You can plant a seed on a rock but it won’t grow; you can have a patch of lovely soil, but without a seed, nothing will happen. Causes and conditions come together in a particular way and a particular thing arises or happens. There’s a direct and important relation here to the four noble truths: desire and suffering create one another. They are causes and conditions for each other, making them mutually dependent. Desire gives rise to suffering and suffering gives rise to desire. The eightfold path breaks this cycle. The important thing that Buddha discovered under the bodhi tree is that suffering has a cause: it’s dependent on something (desire). It’s not random and it’s not entirely unpredictable. We have agency when it comes to desire and suffering, and that’s where our practice comes in. There’s something we can do. There’s a verse about dependent arising: when this is , that is, this arising, that arises when this is not, that is not, when this ceases, that ceases. This is another way to understand the three collective pure precepts (cultivate wholesomeness, let go of unwholesomeness, liberate all beings). When the conditions for wholesomeness are there, wholesomeness arises. When the conditions for unwholesomeness go away, unwholesomeness goes away. Dependent arising is often pictured as a twelve-fold chain or a wheel of life. One condition leads to the arising of the next, and this is how our lives in samsara are created.
Teachings about the twelve-fold chain can quickly become quite technical and complicated, and views of this concept have shifted across time and space; there are multiple interpretations. In your own study, make sure you know the source of whatever you’re looking at so you can put it in context. |
Further reflection: Read and study Dogen’s Shobogenzo fascicle called Shinjin Inga (Deep Faith in Cause and Effect). |
Emptiness
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Summary:
Emptiness in Buddhism is not nothingness or the void; it doesn’t mean that nothing exists. It means that all things are empty of an inherent, permanent self-nature because they arise from causes and conditions, and those causes and conditions are constantly changing. What arises from them is also constantly changing, and there’s nothing we can grab or point to and say “this is the fixed essence of this thing; it will always be like this.” It also means that whatever idea, label, judgement we attach to this thing is meaningless on an absolute level. As soon as I decide whether I like this or not, give it a name and write a story about what it means for ME, in the next moment that thing has changed, I’ve changed, and the idea or label doesn’t fit. Thus, emptiness doesn’t mean that things and people don’t exist; it means that because they are deeply impermanent, there’s nothing about them we can hold onto. We can’t really describe emptiness because words are limited. If emptiness is like this, there is something else which does not fit that description and is not emptiness, and that isn’t reality. Emptiness is sometimes called thusness or suchness. It's simply the way things are, reality before our concepts and delusions start carving it up, creating separation, or covering it with fabrications. Provisionally, we often make a pair out of form and emptiness. Form is the concrete manifestation of something that we encounter. It has characteristics, usually a name, and we draw boundaries around it to make it distinct from other forms. Provisionally I can say that a shovel is not a broom, and it’s the broom that I need to use to sweep the zendo. Emptiness is the reality that the shovel and the broom (and I as the user) are just piles of skandhas in this moment. The only reason a broom is called a broom is because I want to use that collection of skandhas in a particular way. The reality is that it doesn’t have a form or a name or a use--it just is what it is. Some causes and conditions resulted in it taking on a certain form here and now, but it’s also a complete manifestation of emptiness. It’s all just the universe functioning the way it functions. As bodhisattvas, we need to live in both of these realities at the same time. If we live only in the world of form, we forget about interconnectedness and the true nature of the self. We make mistakes and fall into the three poisons and create suffering. We can’t ignore the realities that we can’t easily see or don’t yet completely understand. However, if we live only in the world of emptiness, that’s called spiritual bypassing. We still need to move skillfully through the world, making important distinctions and doing our work. If we decide that everything is empty, there’s no self, and therefore what we do doesn’t matter, we’ve gone off the rails. Yes, in the world of emptiness there is no stealing because there’s no thief and no victim and nothing to steal, but that doesn’t absolve us from upholding the second precept. |
Further reflection: Consider the lists of negations we chant in the Heart Sutra and to what they are pointing. |
Nirvana
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Summary:
Nirvana is usually paired with samsara, so we need to understand both. Samsara is this world of greed, anger and delusion that leads to suffering. In the wheel of life linked from the twelvefold chain of causation above, the middle ring shows the 6 realms of samsara (rokudō 六道):
The early tradition said that our delusion and suffering cause us to be reborn over and over again somewhere on this wheel, and the realm in which one landed in the next life depended on one's actions in this life. When one practiced and completely understood the nature of self, and let go of the three poisons, one finally leaped free from this wheel altogether and went to somewhere else called Nirvana. This is the process in early teachings of coming to deeply recognize and understand Buddhist truths and reaching enlightenment, awakening or Nirvana. You're never again reborn into this world of samsara or suffering, but this is a process that takes many, many lifetimes. By doing good your conditions might improve bit by bit until you were finally reborn as a monk so you could finally spend all your time practicing and reach Nirvana. Samsara is a place where the three poisons and our suffering are on fire. Nirvana is a place where those fires have been blown out (that’s the root meaning of the word). Nirvana is where we’ve seen the true nature of the self, the fires of delusion and suffering have gone out and we’re no longer creating the conditions for rebirth. It’s possible to do this if we practice the eightfold path, and the only realm in which we can do this is the human realm. Thus we hear our ancestors saying we should practice while we have the chance. When we talk about samsara and nirvana from the Mahayana perspective, they aren’t two separate things. There’s no such thing as leaving samsara and going somewhere else called Nirvana. They’re both right here and now. Right in the midst of this world of suffering is the world of emptiness. We function in this world of karmic conditions and at the same time we see the impermanence of that, and the illusory nature of the small self that we fabricate. Nirvana is one of those elements in our practice that can’t be described in words. Words are limited and conditioned, which means they arise from something, while nirvana is unlimited, unconditioned reality. In conditioned reality, our view of the world is based on the ways we’re conditioned to think, habituated responses, our limited experience and understanding. Nirvana is unlimited or unconditioned, like waking up from a dream and realizing that existence as you conceived of it was completely illusory. Buddha was silent about what nirvana is like, but there’s a story of a turtle describing dry land to fish using only adjectives from fish’s world: not this, not that. The fish concludes that if it isn’t any of these familiar things, dry land must not exist. The turtle says that just because you can’t imagine dry land, that doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. Just because we can’t imagine nirvana or any of the ineffable elements of our practice, that doesn’t mean they don’t exist and we can dismiss them—thusness, emptiness, awakening, nirvana. |
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Karma and rebirth
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Summary:
Buddha says there is no fixed and permanent self, but early Buddhists believed in reincarnation. Even the Buddha had vision of past lives while under the bodhi tree. How can this be? Think of a flame being passed from one candle to another—first flame is cause of the second, but you wouldn’t say it’s the same flame. Another useful image is one ocean wave setting up the next. We set causes and conditions in motion in this life, and those forces continue after we leave the physical world. There’s no “soul” that’s being issued a new human body; there’s just the continuing functioning of the universe along the trajectory of causes and conditions. Karma is about cause and effect. Doing good and bringing wholesomeness into the world will result in something positive: liberation. Ding evil and bringing unwholesomeness into the world will result in something negative: suffering. This means that our experience of our circumstances is of our own making, just as our practice can only be done by ourselves. We take responsibility for what we do in the world and for the result of that for ourselves and others. The force of our actions of body speech and mind is what shapes our situation or our destiny. However, we need to be careful about blaming others for their own suffering and not helping. (See below Sotoshu as a denomination/Activities in Society/Human Rights) That’s like using the precepts to judge others, which is also not OK. Our effort is about our own practice.\ At some point, those karmic forces can come to an end and we can stop perpetuating the suffering of the twelve-fold chain of causation and transmigration around the wheel of samsara. This is the point of the fourth noble truth. We can cultivate wisdom and compassion, see the true nature of self, and stop doing things that keep us trapped in samsara. If you think so, this could mean physical rebirth, but many North Americans aren’t so comfortable with that; there’s another way to work with these teachings. If our moment-to-moment existence and activity is based on delusion, we’re going to keep setting up suffering in the next moment. We’re going to be born into the next moment (if you will) surrounded by greed, anger and ignorance and clinging to ego. If instead our activity is based on wisdom and compassion, we’re born into the next moment free from that kind of suffering. Experiencing nirvana in this moment, as not separate from samsara, means we’re still here in the physical world, living like normal people, but there’s no attachment to “I.” This is when zazen is doing zazen, sweeping is doing sweeping, walking is doing walking. There’s no separation into a self, an action, and an outcome. There is no one experiencing something, just the activity. No karma is being created, and eventually those forces that perpetuate suffering run out. Dogen says we also need to have faith that just like everything else, our karma is impermanent If you make the effort to establish an ethical life, carry out skillful action and pay attention to what Buddha’s teaching, in this moment you influence the karma you’re creating. We can’t act in the past or the future, but right now we can reaffirm our aspiration to practice rather than perpetuating unwholesome activities. Karma doesn’t have any fixed and permanent self-nature, so at some point it arises and changes and unfolds. You’re not stuck with the circumstances and position you’re in; you can choose right now a life of practice and awakening . Again, we often can’t see the unfolding of karma, so it takes faith to keep at it and trust that your good actions are helping the entire network of interdependent origination. Sometimes we’ve got a big ship to turn and a lot of harmful conditions to work with, so faith is important. |
Further reflection: Consider the relationship between the sila section of the eightfold path and the functioning of karma. |
The bodhisattva ideal
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Summary:
Each of the major streams of Buddhism can be characterized by an ideal practitioner; in the Mahayana, that ideal is the bodhisattva. Bodhisattva means “awakened being,” someone who is qualified, if you will, to leap off the wheel of samsara but chooses to stay here to help liberate others. The bodhisattva’s vow is to be the last one to cross over, having helped everyone else over first. Traditionally, the distinction between the Theravada arhat and the Mahayana bodhisattva was that the arhat was said to practice for his own liberation, and the bodhisattva practiced for the sake of everyone. We need to recognize that this is Mahayana branding. It’s however, important for us to understand what characterizes the bodhisattva. There is a grouping called the Four Great Bodhisattvas, each of the four symbolizing a specific aspect of Buddhism. Kannon / Guānyīn / Avalokitesvara 観音 The bodhisattva of compassion started out in India as a male figure and is now often portrayed as female. There are hundreds and hundreds of forms of Kannon; she’s one of the most popular bodhisattvas in Asia. There are also multiple versions of her name, but overall it’s about hearing the cries of those who are suffering in the world. She appears in the Lotus Sutra, Avatamsaka Sutra, Heart Sutra and elsewhere. She also has her own section in the genre of Buddhist miracle tales, taking whatever form is necessary to save people. Even Dogen was supposedly delivered from danger by Kannon, who is said to have appeared floating on rough seas in order to save him from a terrible storm as he made his way home to Japan by ship from China. Fugen / Pǔxián / Samantabhadra 普賢 The bodhisattva of practice is often depicted holding a lotus flower and riding an elephant to symbolize the great power of Buddhist practice in overcoming all obstacles. Fugen emphasizes that action and conduct (behavior) are equally as important as thinking/studying and sitting zazen. There's also a connection with taking and upholding precepts, and sila section of the eightfold path. He's the protector of all those who teach the Dharma. Monju / Wénshū / Manjusri 文殊 The bodhisattva of wisdom is frequently seen with a sword in one hand to cut through ignorance, holding a sutra in the other, and sitting atop a roaring lion, symbolizing the powerful voice of the dharma. Monju on our altar appears as a monk sitting zazen on the lion; he's usually on the altar in this form in a sodo. In the Shaka Triad (Shaka Sanzon 釈迦三尊), Fugen is on the right, Monju on the left and Shakyamuni in the middle. Jizo / Dìzàng / Ksitigarbha 地蔵 This is the bodhisattva of vast patience and salvation from suffering. While Monju is sometimes shown as a monk, Jizō is almost always shown like this: shaved head, no adornments, no royal attire, nearly always dressed in okesa. He's usually depicted with a shakujō (six-ring staff) and the wish-granting jewel. Shaking the staff awakens us from our delusions, to help us break free of samsara and attain awakening. The jewel signifies Jizō’s blessings on suffering beings. One of his most important activities is to go into hell realms to liberate beings. He's also the protector of children and travelers or pilgrims. Those four are images or personifications of elements that are important for our practice. We might take inspiration from them and let them help us remember our aspiration. However, all of us who practice are bodhisattvas. This is why we frequently recite the four bodhisattva vows. As bodhisattvas, we are physical embodiments of the reality that samsara and nirvana aren’t separate. We are buddha nature, the self is empty, and yet we use this karmic body and our karmic circumstances to do the work of liberating beings. These two realities are completely interpenetrated, |
Kannon
Fugen and Monju
Jizo
Further reflection: Research and consider the relationship between the four great bodhisattvas and the six realms of samsara, particularly the hell and human realms. |
Bonus: buddhanature
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Summary:
A participant asks: what’s the relationship between no-self and buddhanature? Historically, there was a question of whether or not there were beings who were inherently incapable of awakening, condemned forever to go around and around on the cycle of samsara and rebirth. The Mahayana response was that because the self is empty of any fixed and permanent nature (what we call no-self), there was nothing that could be inherently capable or incapable of awakening. Another response was the tathagata-garbha doctrine: that what beings had was the potential to become Buddha. In China people started thinking of this as “Buddha-nature.” That led to two related positions. On the one hand, whatever happens is my karma and I’m resigned to it; there’s nothing I can do. On the other hand, whatever I do is already a manifestation of buddhanature, so I can do whatever I want regardless of rules or ethics. This is where Dogen’s great doubt begins. The Tientai school in which he practiced in China taught original enlightenment (hongaku), rather than acquired enlightenment; in other words, everyone already has buddhanature and it’s not something we acquire. Dogen asked: if we all have buddhanature, then why is practice necessary? Yet there is clearly suffering and delusion in the world and the need to make effort in our practice. In the end, Dogen’s conclusion is that buddhanature isn’t a thing: a state, a potentiality, essence, power or substance. It's being, but not in the sense of existing or not existing. It's functioning: anything that is, is changing and functioning; being is not a static condition. Buddhanature is all beings or all dharmas simply doing what they do as part of universal functioning. Thus the ultimate truth is not some timeless principle, but what is actually going on around us. All beings are buddhanature because of emptiness; that means that buddhanature is not limited to “sentient” beings. Rocks and trees and soda cans and sneakers are all buddhanature. This is why non-sentient beings preach the dharma, simply by being and doing what they are and do. There’s nothing outside of the Buddha way, or outside of universal functioning. Buddhanature is not about what we create out of our perceptions and processing minds. Dogen is careful to say that buddhanature is also not the self or your consciousness or some psychological element. It’s not enlightenment or awakening, or anything like a permanent essence or soul. It’s not anything we can have an idea about and then grab onto; it’s non-substantial and not limited to the mind or the body, or an "object" of "meditation." We don’t “have” or “acquire” buddhanature for two reasons. One is that it’s already here and there’s nothing to get. The other is that from the point of view of the absolute, there is no buddhanature and no one to acquire it. There’s already no separation between an individual being and buddhanature, so any conception of it as “something,” particularly “something out there,” misses the mark. |
Further reflection: Read and study the Bussho fascicle of Dogen’s Shobogenzo. Part One of Okumura Roshi's series of 27 lectures is available from our Dogen Institute. |
What is Soto Zen?
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Summary:
These days we talk about Zen as a distinct thing, but there has never been “a” Zen sect or Zen school. In Japan there are 22 religious corporations registered with the government as being part of the Zen tradition: Soto plus 15 branches of Rinzai, Obaku, and five other splinter groups. Each of these 22 has various affiliated temples. The largest Zen school by far is Soto, with about 15,000 temples. The next largest is one of the Rinzai branches, with 3300 temples, and the numbers go down from there. What holds all of these together as a Zen tradition is the lineage of dharma transmission from Shakyamuni through Bodhidharma in China and then to various ancestors in Japan. All of the Rinzai and Obaku lineages go through Nanpo Jōmyō 南浦紹明 (1235-1308). All of the Soto lineages go through Dōgen Kigen 道元希玄 (1200-1253), the 51st generation from Shakyamuni. As for what happens to the lineage after Dogen, it remains one line for three more generations: Koun Ejo, Tettsu Gikai, and Keizan Jokin. From Keizan there are two lines: Meiho Sotetsu (ours at Sanshin) and Gasan Joseki. Meiho Sotetsu's line goes on for 17 more generations before splitting into two, and then four, and so on. Authentic transmission was a really important theme for Dogen, and we can see that reflected in the way Sotoshu as a denomination is constituted and operated. If so, then it’s important that clergy have standardized training in order to carry that transmission forward legitimately and keep Soto Zen alive. That happens at training temples (senmon sodo), which were originally modeled on the larger training temples in China. Dogen found this kind of body training really important and he wrote a lot of instructions and descriptions about how practice and daily functions should be done: Eihei Shingi, Fukushu hanpo, Tenzo Kyokun. There are also important texts in this tradition containing dharma genealogies, biographies of eminent monks, and records of their talks. Denkoroku (Transmission of the Lamp) is one example. These things create and hold the family style or common heritage. Of course, Dogen’s life and context are critically important for understanding the development of Soto Zen; for that we can look to the various biographical accounts available and to Sanshin's Introduction to Dogen series. It's also important to know something about Keizan, considered the second founder of Soto Zen. He’s remembered for including women and laypeople and for offering things besides zazen that appealed to and supported ordinary people: prayer, ritual, memorial services. This is why Soto Zen spread and became popular. Sotoshu centralized both of these figures, positioning Dogen as exploring the internal self and Keizan as looking outwards and widely spreading the teachings. Although there are two people and two approaches, one internal and one external, these are always explained as being completely connected and consistent with each other. Once Soto Zen was established, it mainly spread in the rural areas or countryside as opposed to urban centers. Rinzai was popular among government officials and nobility; it strongly influenced culture, particularly literary culture. Soto avoided connections with central power centers and concentrated on the common people and meeting simple needs. About four or five hundred years after Dogen’s time, the government set up the jidan seido system of temples and practitioner supporters. It was a way to organize and control temples throughout the country; in later years it became a way to suppress the growth of Christianity. Every household had to be registered with a temple and providing it financial support. In return, the temple provided for the family’s spiritual needs, particularly memorials and funerals. The system was officially abolished during the Meiji period and today remains a voluntary system which still provides the major revenue source for most temples. This was also the time of Gesshu Soko, Manzan Dohaku and Menzan Zuiho, who were important in the reform movement. It was an effort to “return to the old ways” and push out the influences of other schools that had crept in. The point was to do everything according to Dogen’s teachings, particularly authentic face-to-face transmission and revive the "original realization" of the Soto Zen school. Part of this effort was in researching and editing classic texts, including the Shobogenzo. The Meiji Restoration occurred in 1868, overthrowing the existing government and restorating power to the imperial family. The emperor was considered divine and his authority was supported by Shinto theology, so Shinto became the center of society and Buddhist elements are separated and persecuted (haibutsu-kishaku). Somehow Buddhism and Zen survive and today these two traditions coexist. |
See Sanshin's complete lineage here.
Download a fairly comprehensive chart of North American Soto Zen lineages.
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Sotoshu as a denomination
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Summary:
The org chart at right gives a sense of the scope of the organization. We are part of a much larger undertaking, which includes about 15,000 temples and 30 training centers. The infrastructure necessary to manage it all covers everything from governance to education, publications, baika, scout groups, missionary work, social engagement, down to supporting local temples. Sanshin, like all recognized temples in North America, falls under the international section, which has offices in Hawaii, South America, Europe and the North American office in Los Angeles as well as the Soto Zen Buddhism International Center in San Francisco. There are recognized temples in 21 countries outside of Japan. Sotoshu's main headquarters are in Tokyo, run by a leader elected by a parliament of 72 priests that are elected in 36 districts throughout Japan, 2 from each district. This leader chooses a cabinet of himself and seven other priests who together govern the organization. (The head priests of Eiheiji and Sojiji are fairly visible, but they are not the bosses of Sotoshu.) Just like Sanshin (and all other dharma centers incorporated in America as nonprofit organizations) has a board of directors, and some committees and staff, Sotoshu is the same -- just on a much larger scale. Activities in society In addition to standard religious activities, since 1991 Sotoshu has also involved been in three other things: human rights, peace and the environment. An umbrella for this work is its efforts in support of the UN's Sustainable Development Goals. Human rights This effort started in the early 1980s when Sotoshu was criticized for historical discrimination against a particular segment of society called the burakumin, or marginalized villagers. The problem was much larger than Sotoshu, but a Sotoshu representative at a world conference on religion and peace said that this discrimination had never happened and that it was all the work of a small group of activists. There was an outcry, and Sotoshu set up a Human Rights division to investigate and remediate. Teachings about karma can be used to justify discrimination by telling others that they must be having problems now (birth into a lower social class, physical disability, etc.) because of previous bad actions, and there’s nothing you they do now -- they have to just accept their condition and manage on their own. There’s a better interpretation of karma that says that while we need to clearly see and acknowledge current conditions as reality, we start there to do good actions to the best of our ability to create the best possible present. This is why we emphasize vow and repentance; our practice is never complete. Vow and repentance are not about specific unwholesome karmic deeds but about our aspiration to live in Buddha’s way. Practice is not about judging others but about making our own effort. One other element that’s been used to justify discrimination is the teaching of original enlightenment. Buddha nature is already here in everyone, we are taught, and on that basis everyone is the same. However, one argument goes, the natural workings of the universe mean that there is also difference. Since both of these realities are equally true, difference or discrimination is not separate from equality and thus we don’t need to address this kind of suffering because nothing is really wrong. This is spiritual bypassing, living in the world of emptiness and ignoring the world of form. Sotoshu working in several additional areas of human rights that arise from Japanese culture and society, including people affected by leprosy, the return of the remains of forced laborers imported from Korea during WWII, and publishing a magazine, Human Rights Forum. If you read Japanese or have a browser with translation capability, you can read more about Sotoshu's human rights efforts here. Peace From time to time, Sotoshu takes public stands about support for disaster victims and against war. Since 2023 it has released statements on:
If you read Japanese or have a browser with translation capability, you can read these statements and more here. Sotoshu considers international missionary work (in other words, working with overseas temples such as Sanshin) an important element of its peace work. Sotoshu has also examined its own history and engaged in some atonement. In November 1992, it issued a “Letter of Repentance” for its involvement in past invasions and colonial rule. which reads in part: We pledge never to make the same mistake twice. No person, no matter who they are, should be violated or persecuted by others. This is because people exist on this earth as irreplaceable beings. This applies to nations and peoples alike. If we look back, even before the Second World War, our sect has a shameful history of repeatedly glorifying war and preaching in ways that hurt the people of other countries, both at home and abroad. Once again, we repent here and join you in our determination not to repeat such mistakes. From the standpoint of “non-aggression,” the Soto sect asserts that war is wrong for everyone. Environment The Five Principles of Green Life:
Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) The SDGs are international guidelines adopted by the UN in 2015 to deal with issues of poverty, hunger, social inequalities, environmental degradation, etc. There are 17 goals, with an achievement target date of 2030. Sotoshu says about it's commitment to SDGs: For those of us who live by faith, “realizing a society in which no one is left behind” is an important theme that is deeply connected to the meaning of life and the practice of our faith. The teachings of the Soto sect are not limited to the practice of zazen, but also include the practice of asceticism, such as respecting food and water as the very image of the Buddha, consuming them carefully and without waste, and practicing the bodhisattva way of praying and acting to alleviate, even if only a little, the suffering of people living with difficulties. |
Sotoshu organization chart
Further reading in Sotoshu history
Articles: Riggs, David E. “The Life of Menzan Zuihō, Founder of Dōgen Zen.” Japan Review, no. 16, 2004, pp. 67–100. Bodiford, William M. “Dharma Transmission in Sōtō Zen: Manzan Dōhaku’s Reform Movement.” Monumenta Nipponica, vol. 46, no. 4, 1991, pp. 423–51. |
Two founders and two head temples
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Summary:
Within Sotoshu there are several kinds of temples including the two head temples, training temples (senmon sodo), and local temples with congregations. Parallel with having two founders, Sotoshu has two head temples, Eiheiji (Dogen's place) and Sojiji (Keizan’s place). Eiheiji was founded in 1244 CE by Dogen near Fukui City and is still active today as a training temple with more than 200 monks. The original Sojiji was founded in 1321 by Keizan in Ishikawa; it burned down in the late 19th century and Sojiji moved to Yokohama, where it still is today. You can go to these temples as a tourist but you can’t just drop in for zazen, though you may see some liturgy. There are some programs for visitors: company employees, zazen groups, and other community outreach, and there’s a school on the Sojiji grounds. Larger temples can have subtemples run by the same clergy but in different places. Interestingly, although Eiheiji is Dogen’s place, historically it’s had fewer subtemples than Sojiji (150 as opposed to nearly 15,000. Eiheiji is considered the head of dharma lineages, but Sojiji the head of temple lineages. One of Sotoshu’s key terms is ichibutsu ryoso: One Buddha, two founders. On an altar at a Sotoshu temple or home altar, the main image is Shakyamuni; Dogen and Keizan are considered the two founders. These three entities make up the saying. Having one Buddha, two founders and two head temples at the center of Sotoshu is the result of a whole series of compromises that allowed Soto Zen as an institution to hold together under differences of opinion. We need to know that there was a huge branding exercise undertaken after Dogen’s death, and it had a major impact on the way our practice looks today. This is a huge and complex story that bears additional reading and investigation. Today we don’t even question Shakyamuni’s importance within Soto Zen, but this not always taken for granted. In the late 19th century, Soto Zen had to clearly describe itself: name, tradition, founders, head temples, objects of worship and doctrine. However, when it came to designating its founders, leaders couldn’t even agree about including the Buddha as the original teacher of the tradition. One argument was that since buddhanature was already everywhere, we shouldn’t be venerating something or someone else as a separate Buddha. Another line of thought held that the Three Treasures as sources of refuge were the most important. Others suggested that within the Three Bodies of Buddha, Shakyamuni was the nirmanayaka or manifesting form and therefore the lowest and most inferior of the three, so he should certainly not be a main figure of veneration. Leaders turned to Dogen’s teachings to solve the problem. He had taught that there is no other founder than Shakyamuni, and that to think otherwise is to separate oneself from Buddha and from the Buddha way, just like a child might separate itself from its parents and then wander about in poverty. One of Dogen’s important themes was that he wasn’t founding a sect; he believed he was teaching original Buddhism as it has been transmitted from Shakyamuni himself. Now we have one Buddha at the center; what about Dogen and Keizan? Eiheiji has been very careful to curate and promote a particular history, image and story of Dogen in order to safeguard its own legitimacy and position. If Dogen’s teachings are the ultimate authority and Eiheiji is the keeper of Dogen’s legacy, then it’s in charge. This is a very real problem in its rivalry with Sojiji. By 1589, the imperial court recognized Sōji-ji as the head temple of the Sōtō school, above Eihei-ji, but 26 years later, in 1615, the shogun decreed that Eiheiji rules are the house rules for all of Soto Zen -- a victory over Sojiji. The two temples remained rivals for the support of the emperor, but by the time of the Meiji Restoration they had arrived at a truce. Everyone agreed that the Sōtō school followed “the maxims of the founding Patriarch, Dōgen, and the aspirations of the late teacher, Keizan.” This is a pattern we see frequently in Sotoshu history from the 18th century reform movement onwards, and it’s why things might look paradoxical to us today without the context. It’s not uncommon to hear a guideline in one place but see it being completely ignored in another with a wink. Sotoshu is really good a holding two truths simultaneously as a compromise as a way to manage conflict. |
Eiheiji
Sojiji
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Sotoshu Main doctrine
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We are all children of the Buddha and come into this world endowed with the Buddha-Mind (busshin). However, failing to realize this, we live selfish, willful lives, causing much suffering. If we make repentance to the Buddha and take refuge in him, our minds will come to rest, our lives will experience harmony and light, and we will rejoice in being of service to society. We will also experience the deep faith that will allow us to stand up under any hardship. To discover happiness and a life worth living is the teaching of the Soto Zen School.
Two other important statements: Abiding by the True Dharma singularly transmitted by the Buddha-ancestors, the Sotoshu doctrine is to realize shikantaza and sokushin zebutsu. [The Sotoshu Shukan (Constitution)] The Soto sect is based on the teaching of seiden no buppo 正伝の仏法 (authentic transmission of the Buddhadharma), which has been passed down from the founder of the sect to successive generations. It is based on the teaching of zazen, and the peace of mind and body that is obtained by practicing zazen is realized as the form of Buddha (butsu no sugata 仏の姿). All of these are pointing toward two key teachings:
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About page of the official Sotoshu website
Hoko's summary sheet about sokushin zebutsu
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Sutras
Sotoshu identifies four important texts for our practice. These are not texts we generally “study,” as we might in a genzo-e; these are texts chanted in Soto Zen temples (although other than the Hannya Shingyo, we don't usually chant them at Sanshin). The last two from the Lotus Sutra are part of the standard long-form morning service. As for the Shushogi, Hoko says, "At the training temple I only ever chanted it for funerals, though that’s not why it was created. There's also baika song that summarizes the Shushogi."
There are two additional “representative books” that we should know something about:
From a dharma study point of view, there are six more texts we need to be familiar with:
In general, for us as Buddhists, everything starts with teachings of Buddha, so sutras are important as collections of his sermons. Nothing was written down in Shakyamuni’s lifetime; his teachings were only committed to memory. After his death, his disciples were concerned that they were wandering away from the original meaning, so they held a council to collect and organize Buddha's teachings and come up with one standard set. Three disciples were central to this effort; Mahakashapa led the charge overall, Ananda had the best memory of the sutras, and Upali, was the expert on the precepts. Everyone compared what they knew or had heard, and finally came to agreement.
It's important to know that there is sometimes more than one version of a sutra; versions may change depending on time, geography or sect.
- Hannya Shingyo (Heart Sutra): a distillation of the 600 volume Great Wisdom (Prajnaparamita) Sutra down to just 262 kanji. The theme of the sutra is emptiness.
- Shushogi (The Meaning of Practice and Verification): extracts taken directly from the Shobogenzo, compiled during Meiji period and important in popularizing the teachings among laypeople. It consists of five short chapters, an introduction plus Repenting and Eliminating Bad Karma, Receiving Precepts and Joining the Ranks, Making the Vow to Benefit Beings Practicing Buddhism and Repaying Blessings, The overall themes are practicing shikantaza and sokushin zebutsu in everyday life. It's not a text well known in North America; when looking for a text to study, we tend to go straight to the Shobogenzo itself, but its themes are useful for us.
There are two additional “representative books” that we should know something about:
- Shobogenzo (Treasury of the True Dharma Eye): collection of Dogen’s teachings that were given between August 1231 and January 1253; the main point (eye) of the True Dharma that was inherited by the successive ancestors following Shakyamuni Buddha
- Denkoroku (Transmission of the Lamp): Keizan’s teachings to the monks at Daijoji beginning in January 1300, tracing the history of the first 53 ancestors through India, China, and Japan until Keizan himself and telling how dharma was correctly transmitted. There's a chapter for each ancestor : biography, primary theme of the conditions that brought about their awakening, Keizan’s commentary and a concluding verse.
From a dharma study point of view, there are six more texts we need to be familiar with:
- Lankavatara: nature of consciousness and “mind-only” philosophy; importance of sitting practice in realizing the true nature of reality; relationship between perception and reality
- Vimalakirti: the layman Vimalakirti exemplifies the ideal of a bodhisattva living in the world; nature of reality; importance of nonduality; spiritual potential of lay practitioners
- Diamond (from Prajnaparamita literature): emptiness and the impermanence of all conditioned things; nonattachment, nonseparation and nonduality
- Hannya Shingyo/Heart Sutra (from Prajnaparamita literature): essentials of Buddha’s teaching; form and emptiness; the role of wisdom in awakening
- Avatamsaka/Flower Garland: Interconnectedness of all phenomena; universal functioning
- Lotus: universality of Buddhahood; skillful means; transformative power of faith and devotion
In general, for us as Buddhists, everything starts with teachings of Buddha, so sutras are important as collections of his sermons. Nothing was written down in Shakyamuni’s lifetime; his teachings were only committed to memory. After his death, his disciples were concerned that they were wandering away from the original meaning, so they held a council to collect and organize Buddha's teachings and come up with one standard set. Three disciples were central to this effort; Mahakashapa led the charge overall, Ananda had the best memory of the sutras, and Upali, was the expert on the precepts. Everyone compared what they knew or had heard, and finally came to agreement.
It's important to know that there is sometimes more than one version of a sutra; versions may change depending on time, geography or sect.
Sanshin practice vision
See this page for complete information in our practice vision.
