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“In the Western imagination, "Zen" has connotations of hip and cool, liberal and progressive; it is thought to be a fashionable and easygoing spirituality with just the right touch of esoteric exoticism and none of the stuffy and constrictive baggage of dogmatic institutional religions. In Japan, by contrast, Zen is generally associated with the strict discipline of a rigorous spiritual practice and also with a traditional, ritualistic, and culturally conservative religious establishment.”

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“Analogously, the cultural appropriation of "Zen" in the popular culture of the West has often been as superficial as it has been enthusiastic. However, in Western universities these days the pendulum has swung in the other direction; the current academic trend is to use historical and philological scholarship to criticize the idealized spiritual and romantic image of Zen fashioned by earlier generations of writers. In erudite books with clever titles like Chan Insights and Oversights and Seeing Through Zen this this critical—and sometimes polemical—debunking is aimed not only at the ways in which authors like D. T. Suzuki and Alan Watts have presented Zen to Westerners; it is also aimed at the traditional self conceptions and self-presentations of the Zen tradition throughout its fifteen-hundred-year history in Asia.”

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“Applying the historical-critical methods of modern biblical studies, scholars of Buddhism—buddhologists—have shown that canonical Zen texts were in fact written down and revised by later generations of monks and literati rather than being literal transcripts of the words of the masters. To begin with, the story of Bodhidharma, who is said to have brought Zen from India to China sometime around 500 ce, has been revealed to be largely a symbolic fabrication by later generations, even if in part based on an actual historical person. Moreover, much of the foundational Zen lore regarding the words and acts of the golden age of Zen masters in the Tang Dynasty (618–906 ce), it turns out, was edited and embellished by masters and other monks and literati in the Song Dynasty (960–1279). The narratives and teachings recorded in the Transmission of the Lamp [of Enlightenment] literature—from which the episodes and encounter dialogues that appear in the kōan collections were drawn—were subjected to revision not only for pedagogical purposes but also for the sake of pious hagiography and sectarian polemics.”

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“Another classic case in point is the reconstructive origins of the canonical Platform Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch, which is attributed to the seventh-century Chinese Zen master Huineng but in fact seems to have first appeared around 780 ce, "over a century after the events it describes were supposed to have taken place." The earliest versions of the autobiography and teachings of Huineng included in this text were in fact composed by Shenhui and other purported successors in the Southern School in order to differentiate their teachings from, and elevate them over, those of Shenxiu and other teachers of the rival Northern School. While the teachings presented in the Platform Sutra— the only Zen text to be audaciously designated a "sutra"—are indeed a "brilliant consummation" and "wonderful mélange of early Chan [i.e., Chinese Zen] teachings," they can hardly be attributed verbatim to the historical person Huineng. However spiritually inspiring and philosophically rich such classical texts of the Zen tradition may be, we cannot read them as unbiased and unembellished historical records or as innocent of sectarian politics and other mundane motives.”

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“My intent in this book, however, is not just to take a balanced approach between repeating the traditional narratives from the inside and criticizing them from the outside. Rather, my emphasis will be on gleaning what remains viable and valuable in the traditional teachings of Zen after they have been put through the crucible of modern criticism and, moreover, as they are in the process of being transplanted into a modern Western cultural context. I am not just interested in academically learning about Zen; I am also—and, indeed, most of all—interested in personally learning from Zen.”

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“As will be on display throughout this book, Zen has all along been an ironically "iconoclastic tradition." Some of its canonical stories include Bodhidharma (fifth–sixth centuries) telling Emperor Wu that he has gained no karmic merit from all of his meritorious activities, and that the most sacred truth is that that there is nothing sacred; depictions of Huineng (seventh century) tearing up the sutras; Linji (ninth century) encouraging his students to "kill the Buddha"; Ikkyū (fifteenth century) writing erotic poetry about his steamy love affair during the last decade of his life with a blind musician; and "an older woman of Hara" (seventeenth century) boldly retorting "Hey, you aren't enlightened yet!" after she told the eminent master Hakuin of her luminously enlightening experience and he tested her by saying that "Nothing can shine in your asshole. " Contemporary Zen Buddhists should feel free to carry on this irreverent and iconoclastic tradition of destroying false idols of Zen—but only insofar as they have sufficiently imbibed its true spirit and are doing so in a genuine effort to keep it alive and let it thrive.”

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“Taking Zen's lessons seriously need not entail taking Zen's lore literally. After all, the texts of the Zen tradition were not written as academic history books. John Maraldo's judicious and insightful The Saga of Zen History and the Power of Legend makes a compelling case for treating the traditional chronicles and lore of Zen as I do in this book—namely, as soteriological or liberating "legends" rather than as literal accounts of "history" in the modern academic sense uncritically assumed by many modern scholars "who seek only the facts behind the texts and devious motives behind the facts.”

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“However important a role lineage has played in the Zen tradition, it has never been a historically based religion in the same sense as are the Abrahamic faiths. To begin with, it should be pointed out that "Dharma transmission" in Zen is really a matter of "recognition" of spiritual awakening, not the literal transference of anything, such as a robe and bowl, an esoteric teaching or ritual, or even a secret handshake or bowing technique. What is most important to practitioners is awakening itself, not the recognition they receive, however important the latter may be for the purposes of establishing teaching credentials and preserving institutional continuity. After all, one of the greatest Japanese Zen masters and the revitalizer of the Rinzai Zen institution, Hakuin, apparently never officially received a "seal of certification" (inka shomei) from any of the teachers he studied under, even though all Rinzai Zen masters today trace their transmission lineage back to and through him.”

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“Although transmission lineages in Zen begin with the Seven Buddhas of Antiquity, the seventh of which is Shakyamuni Buddha, many Zen practitioners do not understand the core of their practice to depend on the historical existence of even Shakyamuni Buddha, much less the six mythical Buddhas that are said to have preceded him. If historical scholarship were to one day prove that Jesus was a fictional character made up by the authors of the New Testament, that would be doctrinally devastating to Christianity. Christians would have to fundamentally rethink their understanding of the Incarnation as a unique historical event. By contrast, many Zen Buddhists have said that even were it to be revealed someday that Shakyamuni Buddha did not exist as a historical person, the core teachings and practices of Zen Buddhism would remain unaffected.”

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“Starting in the sixth century in China, Zen was formed by way of a creative synthesis of Buddhist teachings and practices imported from India with the Chinese traditions of Confucianism and especially Daoism. Centuries later, starting in the twelfth century, Zen was brought to Japan, where for eight centuries it has developed in conjunction with Japanese culture and Shintō sensibilities. Over the course of the last century, Zen has been imported to the United States and other Western countries, initially from Japan and later also from Korea, China, and Vietnam.”

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“The teachings of Zen have been deployed in opposition to both religious fundamentalism and anti religious secularism. They have also been used to critique consumerism, technological destruction of and alienation from nature, and other perceived ills of the dominant and domineering worldviews and lifestyles of the modern West. All of this is now part of the ongoing development of Zen as a living and increasingly cross-cultural tradition.”

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“The injunction to know oneself can be found in many traditions, including the Western philosophical tradition that goes back to Socrates. According to Zen, however, to truly discover what the self is, we need a more direct path than mere intellectual reasoning.”

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“Looking back, I had many preconceptions and even misconceptions about Zen—dreams of mystical experiences on mountaintops and such. At least in part, I was motivated by a youthful desire to escape the seemingly boring familiarity of my native culture and to seek adventure in an exotic land. In effect, I was fleeing rather than finding myself, insofar as I was yearning for the exciting and extraordinary rather than awakening to the here and now of what in Zen is called "the ordinary mind" or "the everyday even mind”

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“Contrary to some popular opinions and partial teachings, Zen is not, in the end, opposed to rational thought. But it does teach that we need to dig down beneath discursive reasoning by means of meditation, reconnecting intellectual knowledge to a deeper, more holistic wisdom.”

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“All sutras claim to be the teachings of the Buddha, yet they were all were written down much later. Even the earliest sutras, the ones that make up the Pali Canon of the Theravada Buddhist tradition, which has thrived in Sri Lanka and Southeast Asia, were first written down four centuries after the Buddha died. The sutras that form the scriptural basis of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition, which has thrived in Central and East Asia, were composed starting in the first century bce, many being translated from Sanskrit into Chinese by the end of the second century of the Common Era. When these scriptures were brought from India to China, the different schools of Chinese Buddhism distinguished themselves from one another by claiming that one sutra or another is the pinnacle of the Buddha's teaching. The Zen school, however, is different. While Zen Buddhists do study and chant many sutras and other texts, the Zen school is unique in that it does not claim to be based on any written teachings at all; rather, it is based on the Buddha's actual experience of enlightenment. This experience of enlightenment is aid to be attainable by all human beings, insofar as the Buddha-nature or Buddha-mind is universal. In other words, all human beings have the same underlying nature and mind as the Buddha. Yet this Buddha-nature or Buddha-mind must be realized, awakened to, and actualized, and the best method for doing so is the one that the Buddha himself used: meditation.”

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“The Japanese word zen in fact means "meditation" or "state of meditative concentration." In Chinese, zen is pronounced chan. Chan is short for channa, which is how the CHinese pronounced dhyana, the Sanskrit word used in India for practices or rarified states of meditative concentration.”

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“Inspired by Zen, the avant-garde composer John Cage shocked the music world in 1952 when he composed a piece that entailed just sitting in silence at a piano or other instrument(s) without playing a single note for 4 minutes and 33 seconds. He wanted the audience to hear the music that is going on around us all the time.”

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“It is true that, as contemporary critics are fond of pointing out, there is much magic and mischief to be found in the history and lore of the Zen tradition, just as there is in all religious traditions. As we attempt to figure out what Zen has meant for others and what it can mean for us, we have to constantly ask ourselves: What is the vital core, the beating heart of the teachings and practices of Zen? What are the teachings and practices that may well challenge and change the way we think and live? And what are the extrinsic limbs that happen to have grown out of, or been attached to, Zen in particular times and places? What aspects of the tradition may need to be altered, or even amputated, in order to fruitfully realize Zen here and now?”

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“The importance of meditation for Zen is readily apparent in the fact that the word zen itself means "meditation." Zen (Chan in Chinese) is the school of Buddhism that more than any other prioritizes the practice of "seated meditation," called zazen in Japanese. The seminal thirteenth-century Japanese Zen master Dogen at times went so far as to claim that "you no longer have need for incense-offerings, doing prostrations, calling on the name of Amida Buddha, penance disciplines, or reading sutras. Just sit in zazen and cast off your body and mind.”

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“One might wonder: "What good is Zen then, at least as a religion, if it cannot provide us with knowledge about what happens after we die?" But does anyone really know what happens after we die? Of course, one may believe in a Heaven and a Hell, or in rebirth as a human or other kind of being; or one may not believe in such things. But does anyone really know? One may desperately desire there to be an afterlife, and one may give this desperate desire a nice name like "hope" or "faith" rather than a naughty one like "craving" or "attachment." In any case, we have to admit that we don't really know what happens to us after death—or even if anything at all does happen to us. I think the harder and deeper question about death is this: Once we admit that no one really knows what happens, what comportment should we take toward death? Is there a wisdom in the face of death that is not a matter of knowledge about the afterlife?”

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“Whereas some schools of Buddhism distinguish more sharply between the preparatory practice of concentration and the liberating practice of insight, Zen views concentration and insight as two sides of the same coin: when the mind is cleared, settled, and focused, it naturally attains insight and manifests its innate wisdom.”

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“If the average American were to jump right into week long retreat in a Zen monastery, it would certainly feel like an excruciatingly painful practice of extreme asceticism—but so would trying to run a full marathon on the first day one decides to take up jogging. It may be the case that many Zen monasteries tilt too far in the direction of asceticism, even more than is necessary as a corrective to our more hedonistic lifestyle. But it is no doubt true that many of our lifestyles tilt too far in the direction of indulging various desires, an indulgence that multiplies and distorts our natural desires into unnatural cravings.”

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“Abandon all hope, ye who enter here." According to Dante, these lines are written over the gates of Hell. Zen masters, by contrast, have high hopes for going to Hell. For them, out of bottomless compassion, we should want to go to Hell. When asked by a college student in America if he thought people go to Heaven after they die, the modern Rinzai Zen master Fukushima Keidō replied: "Only the ego wants to go to Heaven!”

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“Buddhism was first introduced to China around the first century ce, yet it took many centuries before it was not only properly understood but also creatively appropriated. Even if the speed and ease of transferring information and engaging in intercultural exchange have been greatly enhanced by modern technology, an "appropriate appropriation" of a deep and vast tradition like Zen Buddhism takes at least several generations.”

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“Meditation periods in monasteries can be as long as fifty minutes or more, but this is appropriate only if it does not cause too much discomfort and if one is able to maintain concentration for that long. During intensive Zen retreats, called sesshin, practitioners sit for twelve hours or more per day. But don't let this scare you off, just as it should not scare off beginning joggers to know that some super-athletes run double marathons. Always start where you are. After all, where else could you start?”

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“For Zen Buddhism, historical narratives do matter; stories of the "transmission of the lamp" of the awakened mind down through the ages constitute the narrative thread that holds the history of Zen together, supporting the continuity and authority of its institutional tradition. But what matters most to many sincere Zen practitioners, especially today, is how the teachings and practices embedded in those stories can illuminate and change our lives-not when, where, and by whom they were first taught and written down.”

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“Zazen is by no means a "quick fix" panacea for all psychological ailments. While it does aim to uproot the core causes of our "normal" human spiritual dis-ease, any "abnormal" mental health issues should be addressed before one is ready to engage in the austere rigors of this spiritual discipline.”

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“Our society has largely forgotten the importance of bodily posture for alertness, for digestion, and most importantly for one's psychophysical disposition. Zazen reminds the body, as well as the mind, of the beneficial effects of good posture. Moreover, zazen increases physical as well as mental flexibility, and in general it attunes our minds to the needs of the body, allowing the body to mindfully retune itself.”

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“Simply sit still, with a straight back, eyes partially but not completely closed. . . . Relax all your muscles. . . . Relax your mind. . . . Let the center of your awareness drop down into your lower abdomen. . . . Now breathe–deeply yet naturally. Thoughts will come and go. Just let them be. Don't pay them any attention. Don't feed them any energy, either by grasping on to them or by trying to force them to go away. Just breathe, just be.”

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