I'm back from the retreat at Tokei-in temple in Shizuoka Japan. A fun time was had by all.Usually we get about 20 people at these things. But with the change from September to July we didn't have so many participants this year. But that's no big thing. In fact it was kind of nice to have just nine people. It makes things a lot more manageable and provides an opportunity for everybody to get to know each other. I thought it was great. And the weather, which I'd feared would be intolerably hot and humid, was actually better than it usually is in September. You shoulda been there!
I've been on this computer all morning trying to sort out where I'll be going after I get back to the USA. Anybody got a cheap apartment they want to rent to a guy who's hardly ever around? Seriously. I'll consider pretty much anywhere in the world. Hit me up.
Anyhow, I'm sick of being behind the computer so I'm gonna make this another short one (notice that I deftly resist saying "That's what she said" here. It is because of my tremendous will power!).
About the previous post, people keep thinking I'm saying there's no value at all to the sutras. I'm not. They are very valuable. But Buddhists view their so-called "sacred texts" in a way that is utterly different from how such texts are viewed in most religions.
I think that when I say "Buddhist texts are not the inerrant word of God" or words to that effect, people tend to stick "...and therefore we can discard them" at the end of that statement in their minds. They do this because that's the way we've been taught to look at the scriptures of the Western religious traditions. Either they're the inerrant word of God or they're trash. That's why religious people get so bent out of shape when anyone questions their scriptures.
But there's a huuuuuuuuge middle ground between "inerrant word of God" and "trash." This is the ground that Buddhist sutras occupy.
Somebody quoted Nishijima saying:
"In Buddhism there are fundamentally two ways that can be used to pursue the truth. One is practising Zazen and the other is reading the scriptures (sutras). But some people deny that there is any value in reading Buddhist scriptures and place too much emphasis on the value of practicing Zazen. They insist that Buddhism does not consist of philosophical theories. They say that practicing Zazen only is sufficient to attain the truth and that Buddhist scriptures are useless and in fact harmful to this purpose. Master Dogen, however, did not think so; he esteemed the value of reading the scriptures. He thought that reading the scriptures was an indispensable part of attaining the truth. So he wrote down the true meaning of reading the Buddhist scriptures in this chapter. In his opinion, Buddhist scriptures are not only the Buddhist sutras, but also the Universe itself which shows us and teaches us the true meaning of our lives."
Then someone else said, "That sounds like the Old Nishijima, before the 'all you need is to straighten the spine and balance the Autonomic Nervous System' Nishijima." There is no "all you need is to straighten the spine and balance the Autonomic Nervous System Nishijima." His view on the value of Buddhist philosophy has not changed at all. He busts his ass even at age 90 to try to explain Buddhism in a philosophical way.
I feel the same way as Nisjhijima about the sutras and the writings of Dogen. Or else why would I have written a whole book trying to explain Dogen? Duh!
Whatever.
Also on the "things that bug me" tangent, there's a guy in Europe saying to some of the Dogen Sangha people there that monks in the Japanese Zen tradition don't deserve to call themselves monks because they're not celibate and don't follow the Vinaya regulations to the letter.
To that I can only answer in the words of the great 60s cult band The Monks, "I'm a monk, you're a monk, we're all monks!"
There are a lot of people who feel this way about Japanese-style Buddhist monks, and a lot who don't. The guy who said this comes from the Korean Zen tradition, where this is a thorny issue. When Japan occupied Korea from the early 20th century until 1945 they changed the rules there and allowed Buddhist monks to marry. When the Koreans threw off the shackles of Japan, some of the Buddhists decided to go back to the old celibate system and some did not. This caused some friction that remains today. Those who reject the non-celibacy thing do so because they see it as a corruption brought over by the nasty Japanese. Those who stayed with the non-celibate style see the easing of regulations concerning celibacy as a good and natural progression of Buddhism.
For Westerners, the idea of non-celibate Buddhist monks doesn't seem so outlandish. We had the Protestant Reformation a few hundred years ago that allowed Christian clergy to marry and generally not be celibate. And Rabbis and Imams have never been required to be celibate. So we generally don't worry ourselves too much when we hear about non-celibate Buddhist monks. But in Asia it's still controversial. And some Westerners who have lived in Asian cultures have picked up on this as well.
It would be different if non-celibacy for Buddhist monks in the Japanese tradition was something that was made up just to placate Westerners, or if it was something weirdos like me had invented. But that isn't the case. There is about 150 years of tradition behind it. In fact non-celibacy for Buddhist monks goes back a long ways before the Japanese government made it official in the 1860s. How do you think the sex based meditation exercises in the Tibetan Tantric tradition developed?
In any case, I'm a bit uncomfortable with the term "monk" myself, but not because I'm not celibate. I think the word "monk" tends to make Western people envision something like Catholic-style monk-hood. For example, it makes them imagine people who enter a monastery and live there for the rest of their lives. But that's not the case in Zen and never has been.
I use the word "monk" sometimes for lack of anything better to call myself. Gradually people are coming to understand what a Zen monk is. I also use it because once my teacher, Nishijima Roshi said to me, "You're a monk." So I accept his definition.This is a pretty convoluted subject and maybe I'll get into it in a more detailed way one of these days.
ADDENDUM
Here's a good article on this subject by James Ford.
