Does The Wizard of Oz touch a spiritual chord in each one of us because it has a certain Zen to it? Glinda, the Good Witch of the North, is clearly a Zen Master. She sets Dorothy on the Yellow Brick Road to spiritual enlightenment. When Dorothy, the Scarecrow, the Tin Man, and the Cowardly Lion let go of their conscious yearning and free their minds to function spontaneously and inharmony with the cosmos, brains, heart, and courage flow easily and effortlessly. Ultimately, Dorothy attains satori, the Zen experience of "awakening." She finds her true Self, her higher consciousness, her ultimate Oneness with the cosmos--and her home.
Shunryu Suzuki’s extraordinary gift for conveying traditional Zen teachings using ordinary language is well known to the countless readers of Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind. In Zen Is Right Here, his teachings are brought to life powerfully and directly through stories told about him by his students. These living encounters with Zen are poignant, direct, humorous, paradoxical, and enlightening; and their setting in real-life contexts makes them wonderfully accessible. Like the Buddha himself, Suzuki Roshi gave profound teachings that were skilfully expressed for each moment, person, and situation he encountered. He emphasized that while the ungraspable essence of Buddhism is constant, the expression of that essence is always changing. Each of the stories presented here is an example of this versatile and timeless quality, showing that the potential for attaining enlightenment exists right here, right now, in this very moment.
Founded by Bodhidharma centuries ago in China, Zen and its teachings have since spread widely, exerting a tremendous cultural influence not only across Asia, but also the modern West. To this day, Zen inspires young and old, from all walks of life, to see the world with fresh eyes—beyond our usual assumptions and prejudices. This compendium of a thousand years of Zen teaching presents the essence of the tradition through stories, sayings, talks, and records of heart-to-heart encounters with Zen masters. The great expositors of the tradition, whose voices are recounted here, encourage us to let go of our clinging and intellectual grasping, and to open ourselves to embrace reality exactly as it is.
The tradition of Chan Buddhism—more popularly known as Zen—has been romanticized throughout its history. In this book, John R. McRae shows how modern critical techniques, supported by recent manuscript discoveries, make possible a more skeptical, accurate, and—ultimately—productive assessment of Chan lineages, teaching, fundraising practices, and social organization. Synthesizing twenty years of scholarship, Seeing through Zen offers new, accessible analytic models for the interpretation of Chan spiritual practices and religious history. Writing in a lucid and engaging style, McRae traces the emergence of this Chinese spiritual tradition and its early figureheads, Bodhidharma and the "sixth patriarch" Huineng, through the development of Zen dialogue and koans. In addition to constructing a central narrative for the doctrinal and social evolution of the school, Seeing through Zen examines the religious dynamics behind Chan’s use of iconoclastic stories and myths of patriarchal succession. McRae argues that Chinese Chan is fundamentally genealogical, both in its self-understanding as a school of Buddhism and in the very design of its practices of spiritual cultivation. Furthermore, by forgoing the standard idealization of Zen spontaneity, we can gain new insight into the religious vitality of the school as it came to dominate the Chinese religious scene, providing a model for all of East Asia—and the modern world. Ultimately, this book aims to change how we think about Chinese Chan by providing new ways of looking at the tradition.
A helpful A-to-Z guide to the terms, central concepts, and history of Zen Buddhism by the acclaimed scholar and author of Concentration. From the seemingly unlimited field of knowledge and sayings by Zen masters, theosophist Ernest Wood has carefully compiled a reference guide that details the most important Zen ideas, along with a general history of the growth of Zen in China and Japan. Presenting names and terms in alphabetical order, Zen Dictionary is an ideal reference text for any student of Zen. From the seemingly unlimited field of knowledge and sayings by Zen masters, theosophist Ernest Wood has carefully compiled a reference guide that details the most important Zen ideas, along with a general history of the growth of Zen in China and Japan. Presenting names and terms in alphabetical order, Zen Dictionary is an ideal reference text for any student of Zen.
This modern-day commentary on Dogen’s Instructions for a Zen Cook reveals how everyday activities—like cooking—can be incorporated into our spiritual practice In the thirteenth century, Zen master Dogen—perhaps the most significant of all Japanese philosophers, and the founder of the Japanese Soto Zen sect—wrote a practical manual of Instructions for the Zen Cook. In drawing parallels between preparing meals for the Zen monastery and spiritual training, he reveals far more than simply the rules and manners of the Zen kitchen; he teaches us how to "cook," or refine our lives. In this volume Kosho Uchiyama Roshi undertakes the task of elucidating Dogen's text for the benefit of modern-day readers of Zen. Taken together, his translation and commentary truly constitute a "cookbook for life," one that shows us how to live with an unbiased mind in the midst of our workaday world.
Grab a pencil. Relax. Then take off on a mind-boggling journey to the ultimate frontier of math, mind, and meaning as acclaimed author Dr Clifford Pickover, Dorothy, and Dr Oz explore some of the oddest and quirkiest highways and byways of the numerically obsessed. Prepare yourself for a shattering odyssey as The Mathematics of Oz unlocks the doors of your imagination. The thought-provoking mysteries, puzzles, and problems range from zebra numbers and circular primes to Legion's number - a number so big that it makes a trillion pale in comparison. The strange mazes, bizarre consequences, and dizzying arrays of logic problems will entertain people at all levels of mathematical sophistication. With numerous illustrations, this is an original, fun-filled, and thoroughly unique introduction to numbers and their role in creativity, computers, games, practical research, and absurd adventures that teeter on the edge of logic and insanity. The Mathematics of Oz will have you squirming in frustration and begging for more.
Widely praised in hardcover as a fascinating and important addition to religious and cultural studies, Sacred Matters reveals the remarkable ways that religious practices permeate American cultural life.In a country where references to God are as normal as proclaiming love of country, support for the military, or security for the nation's children, religion scholar Gary Laderman casts his eye over our deeply hidden spiritual landscape, questioning whether our conventional views even begin to capture the rich and strange diversity of religious life in America. A compelling read, Sacred Matters shows that genuinely religious practices and experiences can be found in the unlikeliest of places-in science laboratories and movie theaters, at the Super Bowl and Star Trek conventions, and in Americans' obsession with prescription drugs and pornography. When devoted fans make a pilgrimage to Graceland because of their love for Elvis, Laderman argues, their behavior doesn't just seem religious, it is religious-enacting a well-known ritual pattern toward saints in the history of Christianity. In a dramatic reframing of what is holy and secular, Sacred Matters makes a powerful and illuminating case that religion is everywhere-and that we have barely begun to reckon with its hold on our cultural life.
The Ten Commandments tell us how to behave, but they don't say much about the inner awareness from which outer behavior springs. Do the right thing, of course-- but better yet, find your inner light and doing the right thing becomes as natural as breathing. THE ZEN COMMANDMENTS offers ten powerful nudges toward that light. Drawing on sources from Zen stories and the Bible to jazz and rock 'n' roll, from American movies to Tibetan meditative techniques, Dean Sluyter steers clear of dogma and emphasizes what works-- a sort of spiritual street smarts. He shows that the state of boundless freedom and happiness isn't something distant or exotic, but is right here, while you're stuck in traffic or taking out the trash. And revisiting the Ten Commandments, he shows how on a deeper level they offer some surprising enlightenment wisdom of their own. “The book is extremely well written and joyously entertaining.” —Publishers Weekly “With sparkling clarity and wit, Sluyter's ten suggestions lay out the practical essentials of the path. My suggestion is: listen to this guy.” —Lama Surya Das, author of Awakening the Buddha Within “Dean Sluyter clearly presents simple but profound ways to live one's life consciously and skillfully. He teaches that the source of universal truth not only rests in the heart of every one of us, but is the essence of what ultimately brings us true happiness and freedom. This is a wonderful book with rich wisdom and deep insight.” —Rabbi David Cooper, author of God Is a Verb “No matter what your religion (or lack of it), this book shows how to live the kind of life people ache for. It turns out to be pretty simple.” —Jane Cavolina, co-author of Growing Up Catholic
Elder examines how artists such as Brakhage, Artaud, Schneemann, Cohen and others have tried to recognize and to convey primordial forms of experiences. He argues that the attempt to convey these primordial modes of awareness demands a different conception of artistic meaning from any of those that currently dominate contemporary critical discussion. By reworking theories and speech in highly original ways, Elder formulates this new conception. His remarks on the gaps in contemporary critical practices will likely become the focus of much debate.
