Cultivating the Empty Field
Title | Cultivating the Empty Field PDF eBook |
Author | Taigen Dan Leighton |
Publisher | Tuttle Publishing |
Pages | 137 |
Release | 2000-08-01 |
Genre | Religion |
ISBN | 146291652X |
Cultivating the Empty Field is a modern translation of the core of Chinese Ch'an master Hongzhi's Extensive Record. First to articulate the meditation method known to contemporary Zen practitioners as shikantaza ("just sitting") Chinese Zen master Hongzhi is one of the most influential poets in all of Zen literature. This translation of Hongzhi's poetry, the only such volume available in English, treats readers to his profound wisdom and beautiful literary gift. In addition to dozens of Hongshi's religious poems, translator Daniel Leighton offers an extended introduction, placing the master's work in its historical context , as well as lineage charts and other information about the Chinese influence on Japanese Soto Zen. Both spiritual literature and meditation instruction, Cultivating the Empty Field is sure to inspire and delight.
Cultivating the Empty Field
Title | Cultivating the Empty Field PDF eBook |
Author | Zhengjue |
Publisher | |
Pages | 91 |
Release | 1991 |
Genre | Philosophy |
ISBN | 9780865474741 |
These rich and dense teachings might be read most usefully as one reads poetry. Hongzhi employed a style more holographic than the rational, expository style of Western thought; each of his paragraphs encapsulates the whole teaching.
Cultivating the Empty Field
Title | Cultivating the Empty Field PDF eBook |
Author | Taigen Daniel Leighton |
Publisher | |
Pages | 153 |
Release | 1989 |
Genre | Hua yan Buddhism |
ISBN |
Silent Illumination
Title | Silent Illumination PDF eBook |
Author | Guo Gu |
Publisher | Shambhala Publications |
Pages | 161 |
Release | 2021-03-09 |
Genre | Religion |
ISBN | 0834843498 |
Our natural awakening—or buddha-nature—is inherent within all of us and waiting to be realized. Buddha-nature has the qualities of both silence and illumination, and by working with silent illumination meditation you can find your own awakening. Distinguished Chan Buddhist teacher Guo Gu introduces you to the significance and methods of this practice through in-depth explanations and guided instructions. To help establish a foundation for realizing silent illumination, he has translated twenty-five teachings from the influential master Hongzhi Zhengjue into English, accompanied by his personal commentary. This book will be an indispensable resource for meditators interested in beginning or deepening their silent illumination practice.
Visions of Awakening Space and Time
Title | Visions of Awakening Space and Time PDF eBook |
Author | Taigen Dan Leighton |
Publisher | Oxford University Press |
Pages | 339 |
Release | 2007-05-11 |
Genre | Religion |
ISBN | 0199886474 |
As a religion concerned with universal liberation, Zen grew out of a Buddhist worldview very different from the currently prevalent scientific materialism. Indeed, says Taigen Dan Leighton, Zen cannot be fully understood outside of a worldview that sees reality itself as a vital, dynamic agent of awareness and healing. In this book, Leighton explicates that worldview through the writings of the Zen master Eihei Dōgen (1200-1253), considered the founder of the Japanese Sōtō Zen tradition, which currently enjoys increasing popularity in the West. The Lotus Sutra, arguably the most important Buddhist scripture in East Asia, contains a famous story about bodhisattvas (enlightening beings) who emerge from under the earth to preserve and expound the Lotus teaching in the distant future. The story reveals that the Buddha only appears to pass away, but actually has been practicing, and will continue to do so, over an inconceivably long life span. Leighton traces commentaries on the Lotus Sutra from a range of key East Asian Buddhist thinkers, including Daosheng, Zhiyi, Zhanran, Saigyo, Myōe, Nichiren, Hakuin, and Ryōkan. But his main focus is Eihei Dōgen, the 13th century Japanese Sōtō Zen founder who imported Zen from China, and whose profuse, provocative, and poetic writings are important to the modern expansion of Buddhism to the West. Dōgen's use of this sutra expresses the critical role of Mahayana vision and imagination as the context of Zen teaching, and his interpretations of this story furthermore reveal his dynamic worldview of the earth, space, and time themselves as vital agents of spiritual awakening. Leighton argues that Dōgen uses the images and metaphors in this story to express his own religious worldview, in which earth, space, and time are lively agents in the bodhisattva project. Broader awareness of Dōgen's worldview and its implications, says Leighton, can illuminate the possibilities for contemporary approaches to primary Mahayana concepts and practices.
Zen Buddhism: How Zen Buddhism Can Create A Life of Peace, ...
Title | Zen Buddhism: How Zen Buddhism Can Create A Life of Peace, ... PDF eBook |
Author | |
Publisher | |
Pages | |
Release | |
Genre | |
ISBN |
Bring Me the Rhinoceros
Title | Bring Me the Rhinoceros PDF eBook |
Author | John Tarrant |
Publisher | Shambhala Publications |
Pages | 210 |
Release | 2008-11-11 |
Genre | Religion |
ISBN | 0834823497 |
A provocative and playful exploration of the Zen koan tradition that reveals how everyday paradoxes are an integral part of our spiritual journey Bring Me the Rhinoceros is an unusual guide to happiness and a can opener for your thinking. For fifteen hundred years, Zen koans have been passed down through generations of masters, usually in private encounters between teacher and student. This book deftly retells more than a dozen traditional koans, which are partly paradoxical questions dangerous to your beliefs and partly treasure boxes of ancient wisdom. Koans show that you don’t have to impress people or change into an improved, more polished version of yourself. Instead you can find happiness by unbuilding, unmaking, throwing overboard, and generally subverting unhappiness. Author and Zen teacher John Tarrant brings the heart of the koan tradition out into the open, reminding us that the old wisdom remains as vital as ever, a deep resource available to anyone in any place or time.