Kodo Sawaki sets the tone
Uchiyama and Sawaki Roshis
The strongest influence on Sanshin style is Kosho Uchiyama (1912 - 1998), but he was mainly influenced by his teacher, Kodo Sawaki (1880—1965). Uchiyama Roshi’s practice has been carried to America and interpreted for us by his dharma heir Shohaku Okumura, who explains, “The Antaiji style or Uchiyama style of practice is unique even within the Japanese Soto school. The Soto school has 15,000 temples and it’s one of the largest Buddhist schools in Japan, with 800 years of history. However, the practice style that Uchiyama Roshi learned from his teacher Sawaki Roshi was unique in that up to that point, zazen was practiced only within the monastery by training monks as part of their practice to become good priests for their local temples. Not many laypeople practiced, although a small number were interested in Zen and visited the monasteries and practiced with the training monks. When those monks went to their temples, they didn’t practice and they didn’t encourage laypeople to practice.”
Kodo Sawaki wanted to become a monk at the young age of 16, and he went to Eiheiji, one of the head training temples of Sotoshu. He was told that to practice there, he had to find a teacher and ordain as a monk, but he didn’t know any teachers and couldn’t go forward. He became a lay worker at Eiheiji, which gave him the opportunity to observe the practice of the monks, particularly their zazen. On seeing them sitting day after day he felt something deep and sacred, but couldn’t identify the source of that feeling. He later said that he had encountered the real thing before studying what it was, and on that basis, zazen was very special to him.
According to Antaiji’s website:
At one point he had a day off and decided to do zazen in his own room. By chance, an old parishioner who helped out at the temple entered the room and bowed towards him respectfully as if he were the Buddha himself. This old woman usually just ordered him around like an errand boy, so what was it that moved her to bow towards him with such respect? This was the first time that Sawaki Rōshi realized what noble dignity was inherent in the zazen posture, and he resolved to practice zazen for the rest of his life. In his old age, Sawaki Rōshi often said that he was a man who had wasted his entire life with zazen. The point of departure for this way of life lay in this early event.
He was eventually ordained, but his practice was interrupted by his required seven years of army service during the Russo-Japanese War. On returning to civilian life, various circumstances led him to practice at Horyu-ji in Nara, one of the oldest Buddhist temples in Japan and a head temple of the Hosso-shu, or Yogacara, sect. There he became thoroughly familiar with Yogacara teachings, which continued to influence his teaching throughout his life and gave his practice of Soto Zen a particular flavor. One of Okumura Roshi's dharma heirs, Doju Layton, has suggested that:
Because of his substantial impact on modern Sōtō Zen, both in Japan and elsewhere, it is worthwhile to understand the content of Sawaki’s teaching given that his own idiosyncratic synthesis of Buddhist concepts likely persists through his influential lineage. His student Uchiyama once said, “after spending twenty-five years studying under Sawaki Rōshi, I don’t know whether the words I am using are mine or his.” Therefore, investigating the content of those words may well shed light on the doctrinal views of a sizable chunk of Sōtō Zen’s current practitioners, especially those outside of Japan. There is also good reason to believe that his version of Sōtō Zen might differ from orthodox Sōtō doctrine, not only in its eccentric style of presentation, but also in its substance due to his engagement with Yogācāra philosophy. [unpublished paper “Kodo Sawaki and Yogācāra,” 2021]
Doju goes on to explain that while Sawaki Roshi seems to accept and teach a Yogacara view of issues such as whether the world and the small self as we experience and construct them from the information coming in from our senses is real or an illusion (he seems to take them as illusory, while Dogen would say they’re real but only one side of reality), he does so in the service of traditional Soto Zen practice. He doesn’t necessarily view buddha nature as an inherent activity of seeing with the wisdom eye, an activity which is obscured by delusion. He sees both buddha nature and delusion (“thief-nature”) as equally present, and the manifestation of either in any given moment as the result of our own actions. We ourselves determine which one we will actualize.
Thus while Sawaki Roshi didn’t strictly adhere to the Yogacara teaching that we start with our imagined view of the world and practice by moving along a path toward a completely awakened view, never to backslide into delusion again, he explained Dogen’s teaching that practice and enlightenment are one by pointing out that we can manifest either awakening or delusion at any time and can go back and forth repeatedly moment after moment. Zazen is the most effective way to release ourselves from our illusory sense-pictures and actualize awakening, and since we either manifest buddha nature or thief- nature in this moment and nowhere else, there’s no progression along a path and no training toward something to be gained later.
When Sawaki Roshi moved on to teach at a local Sotoshu training temple, he was dismayed to find that neither teachers nor students practiced zazen seriously; the students were there largely to learn the ceremonies and rituals necessary to become temple priests. Again he moved on, but ultimately his devotion to zazen would reshape Soto Zen. “Kodo Sawaki Roshi is commonly acknowledged as the driving force behind restoring the practice of shikantaza, or just sittig, within Soto Zen, the tradition founded by Dogen Zenji,” wrote Uchiyama Roshi. “The goal of this practice is not some special enlightenment separate from sitting. Because of this ‘nothing special’ attitude, even people in the Soto school didn’t take zazen seriously for a long time before Sawaki Roshi appeared.” [Homeless Kodo p. 231]
In 1935 Sawaki Roshi became a professor at Komazawa University and had an enormous influence on that generation of new teachers and clergy, and through them on the teachings and practices of the Soto Zen denomination as a whole. He never had his own temple; he traveled all over Japan visiting training temples, local temples and laypeople’s houses and gained the nickname “Homeless Kodo.” He practiced Zen with many laypeople and called his activities a “moving monastery.” Inspired by him, thousands of laypeople started to practice zazen for the first time.
Kosho Uchiyama carries on
Eventually, Sawaki Roshi borrowed a temple called Antaiji, which was very small and without any lay members, so there was no regular income. While Sawaki Roshi eventually returned to traveling all over Japan, his dharma heir Uchiyama Roshi lived at Antaiji, just sitting and studying Dogen’s teachings and supporting his practice by begging, or takuhatsu. Okumura Roshi recalls, “Practice at official Soto Zen training temples includes learning how to do different kinds of ceremonies for laypeople, but Uchiyama Roshi didn’t practice that way; he really focused on sitting. We didn’t have morning service or any kind of ceremonies except those for ordination. That was his unique style of practice even in Japan.”
Uchiyama Roshi practiced only with Sawaki Roshi. He didn’t spend much time at official Soto Zen senmon sodo (training temples), so he didn’t practice any other part of Soto Zen training. Sawaki Roshi focused on sitting, so Uchiyama Roshi also focused on sitting, knowing that those who wanted to learn ceremonies had other places in which to learn them.
Sawaki Roshi borrowed Daichuji in Tochigi Prefecture as a practice place for his disciples, and he went there once a month to lead a five-day sesshin. Other lay and ordained practitioners frequently joined these sesshin, which included lectures, liturgy and work periods. When Sawaki Roshi wasn’t there, the monks themselves held another seven day sesshin that focused only on zazen, without the other activities. They sat 50-minute zazen periods from 2 am to midnight, with three meal periods. From midnight to 2 am, no one carried the kyosaku, the stick used to hit monks when they were stiff or sleepy, and practitioners could sleep for those two hours sitting there on their cushions. This was a style of sesshin begun by Sawaki Roshi at another temple called Daijiji.
Uchiyama Roshi continued this simple style of sesshin, but after Sawaki Roshi’s death he made some modifications that are still the norm at Sanshin today. For instance, he completely abandoned the use of the kyosaku; he observed that when someone was walking behind the monks carrying it, the ones sitting and the one walking around entered into a silent dialogue. This became a hindrance to really just sitting. Feeling that practitioners tended to turn this and the various other activities such as lectures and work periods into distractions from sitting, he called this approach “sesshin without toys.”
Uchiyama Roshi also decided that human beings need a certain amount of sleep in order to maintain physical and mental health, so his sesshin schedule allowed for seven hours of actual sleep at night rather than two hours’ dozing on the cushion. Under this schedule, he said, there was no excuse for sleeping during zazen. He did not change the 50-minute zazen and 10-minute kinhin periods, and these still make up the pattern of practice at Sanshin.
Kodo Sawaki wanted to become a monk at the young age of 16, and he went to Eiheiji, one of the head training temples of Sotoshu. He was told that to practice there, he had to find a teacher and ordain as a monk, but he didn’t know any teachers and couldn’t go forward. He became a lay worker at Eiheiji, which gave him the opportunity to observe the practice of the monks, particularly their zazen. On seeing them sitting day after day he felt something deep and sacred, but couldn’t identify the source of that feeling. He later said that he had encountered the real thing before studying what it was, and on that basis, zazen was very special to him.
According to Antaiji’s website:
At one point he had a day off and decided to do zazen in his own room. By chance, an old parishioner who helped out at the temple entered the room and bowed towards him respectfully as if he were the Buddha himself. This old woman usually just ordered him around like an errand boy, so what was it that moved her to bow towards him with such respect? This was the first time that Sawaki Rōshi realized what noble dignity was inherent in the zazen posture, and he resolved to practice zazen for the rest of his life. In his old age, Sawaki Rōshi often said that he was a man who had wasted his entire life with zazen. The point of departure for this way of life lay in this early event.
He was eventually ordained, but his practice was interrupted by his required seven years of army service during the Russo-Japanese War. On returning to civilian life, various circumstances led him to practice at Horyu-ji in Nara, one of the oldest Buddhist temples in Japan and a head temple of the Hosso-shu, or Yogacara, sect. There he became thoroughly familiar with Yogacara teachings, which continued to influence his teaching throughout his life and gave his practice of Soto Zen a particular flavor. One of Okumura Roshi's dharma heirs, Doju Layton, has suggested that:
Because of his substantial impact on modern Sōtō Zen, both in Japan and elsewhere, it is worthwhile to understand the content of Sawaki’s teaching given that his own idiosyncratic synthesis of Buddhist concepts likely persists through his influential lineage. His student Uchiyama once said, “after spending twenty-five years studying under Sawaki Rōshi, I don’t know whether the words I am using are mine or his.” Therefore, investigating the content of those words may well shed light on the doctrinal views of a sizable chunk of Sōtō Zen’s current practitioners, especially those outside of Japan. There is also good reason to believe that his version of Sōtō Zen might differ from orthodox Sōtō doctrine, not only in its eccentric style of presentation, but also in its substance due to his engagement with Yogācāra philosophy. [unpublished paper “Kodo Sawaki and Yogācāra,” 2021]
Doju goes on to explain that while Sawaki Roshi seems to accept and teach a Yogacara view of issues such as whether the world and the small self as we experience and construct them from the information coming in from our senses is real or an illusion (he seems to take them as illusory, while Dogen would say they’re real but only one side of reality), he does so in the service of traditional Soto Zen practice. He doesn’t necessarily view buddha nature as an inherent activity of seeing with the wisdom eye, an activity which is obscured by delusion. He sees both buddha nature and delusion (“thief-nature”) as equally present, and the manifestation of either in any given moment as the result of our own actions. We ourselves determine which one we will actualize.
Thus while Sawaki Roshi didn’t strictly adhere to the Yogacara teaching that we start with our imagined view of the world and practice by moving along a path toward a completely awakened view, never to backslide into delusion again, he explained Dogen’s teaching that practice and enlightenment are one by pointing out that we can manifest either awakening or delusion at any time and can go back and forth repeatedly moment after moment. Zazen is the most effective way to release ourselves from our illusory sense-pictures and actualize awakening, and since we either manifest buddha nature or thief- nature in this moment and nowhere else, there’s no progression along a path and no training toward something to be gained later.
When Sawaki Roshi moved on to teach at a local Sotoshu training temple, he was dismayed to find that neither teachers nor students practiced zazen seriously; the students were there largely to learn the ceremonies and rituals necessary to become temple priests. Again he moved on, but ultimately his devotion to zazen would reshape Soto Zen. “Kodo Sawaki Roshi is commonly acknowledged as the driving force behind restoring the practice of shikantaza, or just sittig, within Soto Zen, the tradition founded by Dogen Zenji,” wrote Uchiyama Roshi. “The goal of this practice is not some special enlightenment separate from sitting. Because of this ‘nothing special’ attitude, even people in the Soto school didn’t take zazen seriously for a long time before Sawaki Roshi appeared.” [Homeless Kodo p. 231]
In 1935 Sawaki Roshi became a professor at Komazawa University and had an enormous influence on that generation of new teachers and clergy, and through them on the teachings and practices of the Soto Zen denomination as a whole. He never had his own temple; he traveled all over Japan visiting training temples, local temples and laypeople’s houses and gained the nickname “Homeless Kodo.” He practiced Zen with many laypeople and called his activities a “moving monastery.” Inspired by him, thousands of laypeople started to practice zazen for the first time.
Kosho Uchiyama carries on
Eventually, Sawaki Roshi borrowed a temple called Antaiji, which was very small and without any lay members, so there was no regular income. While Sawaki Roshi eventually returned to traveling all over Japan, his dharma heir Uchiyama Roshi lived at Antaiji, just sitting and studying Dogen’s teachings and supporting his practice by begging, or takuhatsu. Okumura Roshi recalls, “Practice at official Soto Zen training temples includes learning how to do different kinds of ceremonies for laypeople, but Uchiyama Roshi didn’t practice that way; he really focused on sitting. We didn’t have morning service or any kind of ceremonies except those for ordination. That was his unique style of practice even in Japan.”
Uchiyama Roshi practiced only with Sawaki Roshi. He didn’t spend much time at official Soto Zen senmon sodo (training temples), so he didn’t practice any other part of Soto Zen training. Sawaki Roshi focused on sitting, so Uchiyama Roshi also focused on sitting, knowing that those who wanted to learn ceremonies had other places in which to learn them.
Sawaki Roshi borrowed Daichuji in Tochigi Prefecture as a practice place for his disciples, and he went there once a month to lead a five-day sesshin. Other lay and ordained practitioners frequently joined these sesshin, which included lectures, liturgy and work periods. When Sawaki Roshi wasn’t there, the monks themselves held another seven day sesshin that focused only on zazen, without the other activities. They sat 50-minute zazen periods from 2 am to midnight, with three meal periods. From midnight to 2 am, no one carried the kyosaku, the stick used to hit monks when they were stiff or sleepy, and practitioners could sleep for those two hours sitting there on their cushions. This was a style of sesshin begun by Sawaki Roshi at another temple called Daijiji.
Uchiyama Roshi continued this simple style of sesshin, but after Sawaki Roshi’s death he made some modifications that are still the norm at Sanshin today. For instance, he completely abandoned the use of the kyosaku; he observed that when someone was walking behind the monks carrying it, the ones sitting and the one walking around entered into a silent dialogue. This became a hindrance to really just sitting. Feeling that practitioners tended to turn this and the various other activities such as lectures and work periods into distractions from sitting, he called this approach “sesshin without toys.”
Uchiyama Roshi also decided that human beings need a certain amount of sleep in order to maintain physical and mental health, so his sesshin schedule allowed for seven hours of actual sleep at night rather than two hours’ dozing on the cushion. Under this schedule, he said, there was no excuse for sleeping during zazen. He did not change the 50-minute zazen and 10-minute kinhin periods, and these still make up the pattern of practice at Sanshin.
