Zen Monastery Research Articles

Adolescents’ Change in Motivation as a Result of Buddhist Education: How Does It Make a Difference in Their Learning Outcomes?

AbstractMotivation significantly influences students’ learning outcomes. Changing their learning motivation improves their performance. This study used an exploratory sequential mixed methods approach, with the participation of 140 adolescents attending retreats at three Zen monasteries belonging to the Truc Lam (Bamboo Forest) Zen sect, to examine how they changed their motivation, what made them change, and how the change improved their learning outcomes. The study also evaluated the effect of gender and age on changes in motivation. The results indicated that many teenagers had changed from extrinsic to intrinsic motivation thanks to Dharma lessons, teacher support, and leisure activities. Compared to students who maintained their extrinsic motivation unchanged, they had better learning outcomes. Age, but not gender, had a considerable effect on changes in teenagers’ motivation. These findings provide more evidence for extending Buddhist education and conducting further research on young Buddhist learners’ motivation in various contexts.

Japanese Soto Zen Monastery as a Worldly Institution

Japanese Soto Zen Monastery as a Worldly Institution

Buddhist adolescents’ religiosity: how are its core dimensions correlated with each other and with demographic factors?

ABSTRACT Buddhism is popular worldwide. It has been taught both inside and outside schools to enhance teenagers’ attitudes and behaviour. To evaluate how it works, identifying teenagers’ religiosity and the factors that influence it is essential. This study surveyed 140 teenagers attending retreats at three Zen monasteries belonging to the Truc Lam (Bamboo Forest) Zen sect in Vietnam, using a questionnaire to examine how the core dimensions constituting their religiosity associated with each other and with the demographics. Twelve in-depth interviews with teens were also conducted to explore how religious they were. The conclusion was that the religiosity of teenagers involved three core dimensions: religious understanding, faith and practice, which correlated with each other. Furthermore, age and gender had a considerable association with the teens’ religiousness. These findings may help in expanding religious education.

How Can Buddhist Education Help Adolescents Develop Moral Behavior?

Although Buddhist education has been widely used all over the world, Vietnamese students cannot currently access it at school. Recently, some Truc Lam (Bamboo Forest) Zen monasteries have offered religious education to adolescents in the hope of improving their moral behavior. However, no empirical studies have evaluated the effectiveness of these efforts. As a result, this study examined whether Buddhism helps teenagers develop moral behaviors. The findings showed that Buddhist religious education can enhance adolescents’ understanding of Buddhist doctrines, increase their faith, and promote Buddhist practices. As a result, they committed antisocial behaviors less often.

Long Strange Journey: On Modern Zen, Zen Art, and Other Predicaments by Gregory P. A. Levine

Reviewed by: Long Strange Journey: On Modern Zen, Zen Art, and Other Predicaments by Gregory P. A. Levine Toshio Watanabe (bio) Long Strange Journey: On Modern Zen, Zen Art, and Other Predicaments. By Gregory P. A. Levine. University of Hawai'i Press, Honolulu, 2017. xiv, 328 pages. $62.00. Whether we like it or not, Zen seems to feature everywhere, from a Shiseido perfume bottle to a brand of breakfast cereal, from an advertisement for Mercedes Benz to the sign on a more modest hair salon. Restaurants with "Zen" in their names exist in Dallas, the Real Madrid football ground, Saipan, and Nairobi, among other places. Even in the Veneto region in Italy, where Zen is a well-known family name unrelated to the Oriental Zen, most restaurants with "Zen" in their name offer sushi and other Japanese delicacies. The spread of Zen is truly global. What, however, do we mean by this "Zen"? This wonderful book tries to answer this very question. The main title of the book Long Strange Journey is suitably enigmatic and Zen-like, but the subtitle On Modern Zen, Zen Art, and Other Predicaments is more to the point. The book's main focus is on the modern period and it deals with the discourse of Zen, Zen art, and Zen within more popular manifestations. Gregory P. A. Levine provides many examples of Zen art and Zen in everyday life, including some hilarious cartoons. However, what is most impressive and original is his methodology in approaching this topic. This study is highly erudite, interdisciplinary, against essentialist [End Page 279] approaches, and very aware of the historicity of the subject, but it is also open and honest about its own subjectivity. It is a definitive study of this topic. Let us unpack this. Levine's erudition is astonishing. There are nearly 1,000 endnotes in this volume, which show that much of the evidence is taken from primary material. He warns us that this study is not comprehensive, but this just means that he couldn't include everything. Also, the point of the book is that this is not a survey of the subject but a critical analysis of the phenomenon of modern Zen and Zen art. If you want to know what these are about, this is the book you should read. The introduction and coda give a good overview of the author's approach. The eight chapters start with one on the period from the mid-nineteenth up to the early twentieth century and another on D. T. Suzuki, the most influential modern writer on Zen. Subsequent chapters consider Zen iconoclasm, Zen art, the postwar Zen boom, the postwar Zen influence on art, Zen and humor, and popular and commercial Zen, including Zen design. Long Strange Journey is a highly interdisciplinary, transnational study with North America as the primary focus. Any historian of postwar American art would need this book and anybody interested in Zen art would want to consult it. The book also shows that Levine is very well versed in premodern Japanese Zen art, as his book Daitokuji: The Visual Cultures of a Zen Monastery (University of Washington Press, 2005) also attests. This means he knows a lot about Zen Buddhism, and this new publication is essential reading for the student of modern Zen Buddhism as well, although one should note that it deals more with the history rather than the theology of this religion. It is also a transnational study with North America as the primary focus. One minor complication with such an interdisciplinary work is that some terms are rather esoteric to nonspecialists in particular fields. The greatest contribution of this book is perhaps its nuanced way of dealing with its subject, avoiding an essentialist approach. Unfortunately, the literature on Zen published in both East and West has been, and still is, riddled with comments on the "true" or "correct" Zen. Levine navigates this tricky terrain beautifully. While reading this, I was repeatedly saying "yes!" He is critical of the purist approach but also declares that this book is not intended as Zen-bashing. He resists cynicism, as he is not advocating for relativism or a free-for-all. Though...

The Origin of the Intensive Meditation Retreat Rōhatsu Sesshin 臘八摂心: Prevalence and establishment

The intensive meditation retreat known as Rōhatsu sesshin 臘八摂心, held every year in Japanese Zen monasteries from the morning of December 1st to the dawn of December 8th, appears to have originated under the influence of the Ōbaku 黄檗 Zen sect, which was transmitted from Ming 明 China to Japan in the 17th century. Ming-dynasty Chan had a form of meditation training known as daqi 打七, a retreat that is recorded as having occurred in December. This is thought to have been the source of the Rōhatsu sesshin retreat instituted in Japanese Zen monasteries. Evidence for this is found in the Ōbaku sannnai shingi 黄檗山内清規 (Detailed regulations of Mount Ōbaku), which describes the custom of eating mixed rice gruel 五味粥 on the morning of December 8th, a custom also observed at the end of Rōhatsu sesshin in Japan.

Cross-Cultural Comparisons between the Mughal Tomb Garden of Taj Mahal in Agra (India) and the Dry Landscape Garden of the Ryoan-Ji Zen Monastery in Kyoto (Japan)

AbstractGardens have always meant a lot to people. Gardens are as much about nature as they are about culture. The extent to which gardens carry and embody both similar and different layers of meaning will be demonstrated by comparing two classical gardens, the Taj Mahal tomb garden of the Mughal rulers in Agra, India, and the Ryoan-ji dry landscape garden of the Zen monks in Kyoto, Japan. Parallels will be drawn by offering a (diachronic) analysis of the historical accumulation of layers of meaning associated with each one of these two gardens, and (synchronic) structural comparisons will be drawn by raising two thematic issues in particular, the inside-outside relationship and the nature-culture relationship. The roles that Islam and Zen Buddhism play in the religious meaning making of these two classical gardens turn out to be strikingly similar, in that they confirm rather than transform other layers of cultural meaning.

Does Yoga Induce Metaphysical Hallucinations?: Interdisciplinarity at the Edge: Comments on Evan Thompson’s Waking, Dreaming, Being

Does Yoga Induce Metaphysical Hallucinations?Interdisciplinarity at the Edge: Comments on Evan Thompson’s Waking, Dreaming, Being Owen Flanagan (bio) Waking, Dreaming, Being is an unusual book in many ways. I mention two. First, in some ways it is a memoir. Few philosophers started as a child doing the sort of philosophy that they did as a grown-up. Evan did. Evan grew up in the intellectually fertile world of the Lindisfarne Association, the collaborative of scientists, artists, ecologists, and contemplatives founded by his father, William Irwin Thompson, a polymath, whom I had the pleasure of meeting in 2004 at the Crestone Zen Monastery in Colorado. Evan’s dad taught him Raja Yoga as a boy—when he was seven!—and read him Upanishadic children’s stories. Lindisfarne was the antithesis of a C. P. Snow–style Two Cultures environment where the sciences and humanities, is and ought, and traditional and edgy thought are separated in silos. Besides his father, Evan has had important relations with other “strong poets.” Francisco Varela, the great autopoetic biologist and neuroscientist, was his decade-ish-older soul mate. Bob Thurman, the bombastic Buddhist, was his mentor at Amherst. The Fourteenth Dalai Lama has his ear and vice versa, and when the story of “contemplative neuroscience” is told, whether it succeeds or fails, the Dalai Lama, Varela, Richie Davidson, and Evan will be viewed as its four horsemen. Finally, when I first met Evan in 1990, he was on a post-doc working with Dan Dennett at Tufts. My amateurish reading of influence (partially based on whom he mentions least) is that Dennett’s views, Dennett’s whole way of thinking, are the least congenial to Evan’s thought as I have seen it develop over the years (especially in works like the Em bodied Mind, coauthored with Cisco Varela and Eleanor Rosch, and the monumental Mind and Life). Although Evan never says this, Dennett is, I suspect, too scientistic and too uncomfortable with the attitude of “not knowing,” which Evan is very comfortable with, to have a place in Evan’s pantheon. But I am speculating here. But the first point is simply that this book is a philosophical memoir of a philosopher who, at a very young age, started thinking about the problems that absorb the mature man today. I cannot think of another philosopher like this. Maybe Athenian philosophy was like this. J. S. Mill learned Greek and Latin early, but not Indian philosophy! (Gosh, Evan even met his life partner Rebecca Todd when he was a boy!) Even Galen Strawson, Peter’s son, did not start studying philosophy until he was 21. I started younger than Galen when my father gave me Aquinas’s Summa Theologica to settle some theological doubts, but I was nowhere near as young as Evan. In any case, this book is, or can be read as, a memoir of a rare kind of life, a lifelong philosopher’s [End Page 952] life, where lifelong does not mean from one’s twenties to one’s death, of which there are many examples. Many people who will not read this book would not admire the “raised by hippies” feel of it. New Age types might like it too much. Analytic philosophers might well say that the memorial qualities are interesting and make for honest admission of early socialization or brainwashing, which, depending on one’s perspective, Evan may or may not have adequately examined critically. The second point is that the book is methodologically pluralistic, radically interdisciplinary. It is a methodological tour de force, but only if you approve of a genuinely interdisciplinary inquiry. I do. But many don’t and won’t. In defense of radical interdisciplinarity is the fact that the nature of the self, consciousness, persons, and good lives are human problems, not the problems of only one discipline, locked off in one discipline’s proprietary silo. Some reflective people might agree with this, but nonetheless say that fairly strict divisions of labor and piecemeal approaches are warranted, because although these topics are not ultimately in the domain of any one discipline, individuals or groups of individuals are not equipped to see all sides at...

The Buddha and the Bathwater: Defilement and Enlightenment in the Onsenji engi

This article examines origins of Onsenji, a temple at Arima hot springs, together with a set of closely related tales of other sites of curative bathing where religious exemplars encounter Buddhist deities of healing, to explore narrative and doctrinal patterns of engi genre. It suggests how a common literary trope, of deities who appear as lepers to test compassion and perception of their followers, serves institutional priorities of particular local sites and how contents of these tales articulate Buddhist claims about pollution and purity, ignorance and insight, and sickness and salvation. It argues that soteriology of these stories, in which mental defilements are shown to be origin and engine of all human suffering, express in narrative form meaning of term engi as a Buddhist technical term for theory of dependent origination.KEYWORDS: Onsen engi-Gyoki-Yakushi-lepers-bathhouses-healing(ProQuest: ... denotes non-US-ASCII text omitted.)ON THE SEVENTH day of fourth month of 1452, Zuikei Shuho ... (1392-1473)-literatus, historian, diplomat, confidant of Ashikaga Yoshimitsu ..., and abbot of Zen monastery Shokokuji ...-left his residence in Kyoto and journeyed to Arima Onsen ... The Arima hot springs were but a day's journey from capital and attracted members of capital elite long before and long after Zuikei's mid-fifteenth century visit. The Nihon shoki ... notes that sovereign Jomei ... (593-641) traveled to Arima Onsen in autumn of 631 and again in autumn of 638, spending a period of three months there during each visit (nkbt 68: 229, 232). Although Jomei was first royal pilgrim of record, many other eminent visitors were to follow. Arima's later patrons included such figures as Regent Fujiwara no Yorimichi ... (990-1074), Abdicated Sovereign Horikawa ... (1079-1107), Abdicated Sovereign Go-Shirakawa ... (1127-1192), Toyotomi Hideyoshi ... (1536-1598), and Tokugawa Ieyasu ... (1542-1616), who all traveled to hot springs for healing waters and sacred blessing of Medicine Master Buddha, Yakushi (...; Sk. Bhaisajyaguru). The early fourteenth-century handscroll Zegaibo-e ... describes Arima as the place where Medicine King appears and where Bodhisattva Gyoki ... experienced his blessings. There is a sacred image of Yakushi and medicinal waters of hot springs flow from Buddha's body (Umezu 1978, 100).During his three-week stay at hot springs, Zuikei visited Onsenji ..., temple of hot springs that enshrined sacred image of Yakushi; there he listened to history of temple while viewing a painting (Fujiwara 2007a, 11). The painting, Onsenji engi-e ... (Illustrated origins of Onsenji), still exists. It is a large-format hanging scroll in ink and colors on silk dating from late-thirteenth or early-fourteenth century.1 Accounts of temple's history are also extant in multiple textual sources. The earliest iteration of narrative is in Tachibana no Narisue's ... Kokon chomonju ... (Notable tales old and new) of 1254. It next appears in Onsenyama juso yaku no ki ..., written in 1279 by resident Buddhist monk of Onsen jinja, temple-shrine at hot springs.2 It is found as well in fourteenth- century Onsenji engi ..., account that Zuikei heard (Kato 2010, 251). Although each of these retellings contain essentially same story, they should not be conflated. Engi are neither unitary nor stable entities. They migrate across time, literary format, and media. They constitute a composite and fluid genre, one in which multiple narratives and diverse interests are sutured together to formulate a single and singular history. Zuikei's description of having listened to history of temple while viewing a painting also reminds us that textual and visual modes were often coarticulated and that engi should also be understood as performative: they belonged to repertoire of picture recitation (etoki . …

Spiritually Bilingual: Buddhist Christians and the Process of Dual Religious Belonging

Spiritually Bilingual:Buddhist Christians and the Process of Dual Religious Belonging Jonathan Homrighausen Sociologists studying convert Buddhism in America have found that a surprisingly large number of Buddhists also identify as Christian.1 However, little empirical literature examines these Buddhist-Christian “dual religious belongers.”2 This study aims to fill that gap. Based on extensive interviews with eight self-identified “Buddhist Christians” of varying levels of doctrinal and experiential understanding, this study examines the conversion process of these dual belongers and how they combine these religious traditions. Building on Michael von Brück’s contention that one’s first religion is like a mother tongue, I compare taking on a second religious tradition to learning a second language.3 As practitioners become more “fluent” in the second religion, they differentiate the two religions more clearly while combining them more seamlessly in their daily lives. methodology This study employs grounded theory and a qualitative, inductive methodology. Grounded theory is designed to elucidate the dynamic changes involved in a social process, with rich descriptions of categories and explanations for variations between different people’s experiences.4 While the use of qualitative methods with a small sample size means that my results have little statistical significance, such methods have been used in recent research on conversion and dual belonging and yield deep theoretical insight.5 Eight participants for this study were solicited via word of mouth, personal acquaintance, and posting in a Buddhist-Christian Yahoo Group. In particular, I focused on Buddhist-Catholic practitioners to limit my sample group. Interviews were conducted and recorded in person or on the phone over a three-month period in fall, 2011. Interviews were open-ended, each lasting from sixty to ninety minutes. Several participants later received a draft of the paper to ensure they felt adequately represented; five participants responded. Names of participants have been changed for [End Page 57] confidentiality. To complement these interviews, I also incorporate written accounts of Buddhist-Christian conversion from both Catholic and Protestant authors.6 participants’ backgrounds It can be difficult to define Buddhist identity in the West, as many people who regularly practice meditation in a sangha do not self-identify as Buddhist.7 This study focuses on those who both practice Buddhist and Christian spirituality and belong to religious groups of both traditions. The eight participants have a range of religious expertise and commitment to both traditions. In terms of Catholic identity, six are laypeople (one in a secular religious order), one a priest, and one a nun. Three participants are theology professors. Seven have been Catholics from birth. One spent a decade living in a Buddhist monastery, two of them are roshis, and five give Buddhist teaching or meditation instruction formally. Seven of them practice various forms of Ch’an or Zen, while one practices Tibetan Buddhism. Cathy went not from Catholicism to Buddhism, but from Buddhism to Catholicism. A former Mormon and Unitarian, she began learning meditation at a Ch’an temple. This Ch’an temple normally only reached out to the Chinese community, but there was a Taiwanese nun there who wanted to reach out to non-Chinese community members. After practicing there for a few years, Cathy moved to another location, where she could not find any sangha that fit her needs. After attending Mass with a friend, she decided to become Catholic because she needed a community. It was not a hard transition for Cathy, who described feeling in meditation “some kind of entity, whether you call it God or Creator or atomic process.” She was confirmed as a Catholic in 2011. Rachel has been a nun for fifty years and a practicing Zen Buddhist for thirty, ten of those years living and working in a Zen monastery in the mountains of California. She described feeling an emptiness in her faith, a lack of practical knowledge of how to attain the spiritual goals that her Catholic tradition had for her. After hearing Zen teacher Cheri Huber speak at a conference, she took Huber on as her teacher. She has facilitated meditation workshops for many years. Though meditation instruction is not her full-time ministry, “meditation is my life … so in a sense...

Measuring the Effects of Zen Training on Quality of Life and Mental Health Among Japanese Monk Trainees: A Cross-Sectional Study

Previous studies have reported that the practice of meditation can have beneficial physiologic and mental effects. Therefore, Zen trainees who regularly practice meditation might have high quality-of-life scores and high levels of general mental health; however, no previous study has tested these relationships. This article reports on a study that examined how rigorous professional training affected the International Quality of Life (QOL) Assessment Short Form-36 (SF-36) and General Health Questionnaire-28 (GHQ-28) scores of Zen trainees in Japanese monasteries. This was a single-center questionnaire-based study. The study was conducted in Rinzai Zen monasteries. SUBJECT INTERVENTIONS: Anonymous and confidential surveys containing the SF-36 and GHQ-28 were distributed by mail, and 256 questionnaires were collected from Rinzai Zen monasteries. One hundred ninety-eight complete questionnaires were collected and the participants were divided according to their training length: group I (<1 year), group II (1-3 years), and group III (≥3 years). One-way analysis of variance and Tukey test for multiple comparison were conducted on normally distributed data, and the Kruskal-Wallis test was performed on non-normally distributed data. The SF-36 seven subscale scores (physical functioning, role-physical, body pain, general health, vitality, role-emotional, and mental health) of the longer-length training group were significantly higher compared to other groups. The SF-36 MCS (mental component summary) score among the groups were significantly different, and the scores of group III were significantly higher compared to the scores of group I. Furthermore, the GHQ-28 total and subscales (somatization, anxiety, social dysfunction, and depression) scores of longer-length training were significantly lower (better). These findings suggest that Zen professional training, including inward-attention practices, improves the QOL and general mental health of trainees, even in a tough and distressing environment. However, detailed qualitative and longitudinal studies are required to fully assess these effects.

Muroji: Rearranging Art and History at a Japanese Buddhist Temple by fowler, sherry d. Daitokuji: The Visual Cultures of a Zen Monastery by levine, gregory p. a.

Muroji: Rearranging Art and History at a Japanese Buddhist Temple by fowler, sherry d. Daitokuji: The Visual Cultures of a Zen Monastery by levine, gregory p. a.

禅宗修行道場における食環境と健康に関する栄養学的研究

We first analyzed the dietary records at a Zen monastery from the viewpoint of nutrition and food intake. The means of the total energy, protein and fat intake were significantly lower than a normal diet. The amounts of other nutrients had the same tendency. The mushrooms and seaweed intakes were extremely better than any other food groups. In addition, we conducted investigations regarding the diet and health of Zen monks training at Zen monasteries to examine their nutrient intake and health condition. The nutrient consumption of Zen monks was high carbohydrates, high dietary fiber, low fat, and low cholesterol, and this was especially conspicuous in the non-animal food consumption group. There were no concerns about their blood parameters. However, a decrease in their QOL is a concern. Finally, to clarify the difference in the serum lipid and blood glucose levels between young Zen monks and middle-aged Zen monks, we investigated their nutrient intake and health conditions. In both groups, no distinct difference was observed in their HDL cholesterol and triglyceride levels. However, the total cholesterol and blood glucose levels of the young group were remarkably higher than those of the middle-aged group. Therefore, this study suggested that physiological changes in the body due to aging affected the total cholesterol and blood glucose levels.

Ch'an/Zen-Catholic Dialogue Spreads a "Welcome Table" at the 2009 Annual Meeting

Ch'an/Zen-Catholic Dialogue Spreads a "Welcome Table" at the 2009 Annual Meeting Francis V. Tiso A retreat program designed by the participants in the ongoing Ch'an/Zen-Catholic Dialogue explored the dialogue of religious experience and the dialogue of life, set amid the redwoods of Guerneville, California. The 28–31 January 2009 meeting was cochaired by the Rev. Heng Sure of the Berkeley Buddhist Monastery and the Institute for World Religions, Berkeley, California, and by Most Rev. John C. Wester, Bishop of Salt Lake City, Utah. Sr. Mary Ann Donovan of the Jesuit School of Theology, Berkeley, led an experience of lectio divina based on John 15:1–17, Jesus's simile of the vine and the branches. Rev. Victoria Austin of the San Francisco Zen Center gave an "encouragement talk," which would typically be delivered to Zen retreatants. She referred to the Gospel passage, noting: "We don't prune the vine because it is dead, but because it has the capacity to be fruitful. We don't purify the mind to get rid of dirt, but to return to the mind's original purity, which is the source of our conscience and is the true life within us." Rev. Jan Chosen Bays of Great Vow Zen Monastery in Oregon observed that "Vows make our life energy more focused, keeping us from losing purpose and meaning. Vows prune away unnecessary things. When we ask for help with the challenge of being faithful to our vows, we call up and encounter unexpected sources of support and 'grace.' " The Ch'an Buddhist presentation focused on meditation experience, which was described as "recovering the natural state of the mind." Prof. Martin Verhoeven of the Pacific School of Religion pointed out that in meditation "we are returning to the origin, not moving forward to 'gain something.'" Linking ethical engagement with contemplation, he said, "When the mind of a meditator is motivated to act out of genuine compassion, its action is accurate and correct. Action is neither driven nor obstructed by ego or sentiment." These comments resonated with Rev. Heng Sure's presentation on the statement on the environment from the recent Gethsemane III conference "Simple and Sufficient," in which Buddhist and Christian monastics embraced an ecologically valid way of life. Urging the group to notice the connections between contemplation and ethical action, Bishop John C. Wester commented: "This [End Page 145] work embodies mercy by lifting people up; it embodies justice as it arises out of our common humanity." Because of the financial challenges that all three sponsoring institutions are facing, it was decided to conclude formal sponsorship of the Ch'an/Zen-Catholic Dialogue with this meeting. However, participants agreed to work together to reconstitute the dialogue regionally. A steering committee was designated to undertake new logistical arrangements and to draft a narrative of the previous seven years of dialogue for posting on our respective websites. Bishop Wester summarized the convictions of participants, both Buddhist and Catholic, by observing: "It is impossible not to be affected by this experience. Dialogue in this atmosphere has had an impact on my own way of ministering to others. I feel that my faith, sensitivity, compassion, and reverence have been enhanced by participating in these meetings." Participants in the 2009 dialogue meeting included Rev. Heng Sure, Berkeley Buddhist Monastery; Bishop John C. Wester, Salt Lake City; Dr. Snjezana Akpinar, Dharma Realm Buddhist University; Rev. Gigen Victoria Austin, San Francisco Zen Center; Rev. Jan Chozen Bays, Great Vow Zen Monastery; Sr. Phyllis D'Anna, SND, Zen Center, Palo Alto; Sr. Mary Ann Donovan, SC, Jesuit School of Theology at Berkeley; Dr. Ron Epstein, Dharma Realm Buddhist Association; Mrs. Lorraine Moriarty, Society of St. Vincent De Paul; Bhikshuni Heng Jiao, City of 10,000 Buddhas; Bhikshuni Heng Liang, City of 10,000 Buddhas; Rev. Canon Francis Tiso, United States Conference of Catholic Bishops; Rev. James Massa, United States Conference of Catholic Bishops; Rev. Thomas W. Devereaux, Diocese of Santa Rosa ecumenical and interreligious officer; Dr. Martin Verhoeven, Pacific School of Religion; and Ron Brown, observer (Cloverdale, California). [End Page 146] Francis V. Tiso United States Conference of Catholic Bishops Copyright © 2009 University of Hawai'i Press...

Japan in Print: Information and Nation in the Early Modern Period (review)

Reviewed by: Japan in Print: Information and Nation in the Early Modern Period Mark Ravina (bio) Japan in Print: Information and Nation in the Early Modern Period. By Mary Elizabeth Berry. University of California Press, Berkeley, 2006. xvii, 325 pages. $44.95. This is a sweeping, ambitious, elegant, and accomplished book. Berry's topic is nothing less than print culture in Tokugawa Japan, and her sources range from shogunal personnel rosters and genealogies, through travel [End Page 191] guides to Kyoto, to the fiction of Ihara Saikaku. These different print genres, she argues, helped to create a common sense of national boundaries and national culture among a large, literate stratum of early modern Japanese society. Tokugawa readers shared a sense of where Japan ended, the location of its most important places, which people were important, and what made for a cultured traveler. Although this common print culture was a precursor of modern Japanese national identity, Berry carefully distinguishes the "nationalism" of early modern print culture from its modern variant. The To-kugawa state was vastly more powerful than any medieval polity, but it did not demand exclusive fealty. "While exercising paramount powers of governance, the shogunate established no direct ties with subjects and exacted no paramount loyalty from them" (p. 230). The coherence of the Tokugawa order was thus as much cultural as political. The book is striking in several ways. First is Berry's surefooted and effective use of the first-person and second-person voices. Historians have long debated how or whether to insert themselves into their manuscripts, and the question has received sustained attention with the influence of ethnography and anthropology. Berry does not trumpet the theoretical bases of her approach but simply inserts us into Tokugawa life. She opens her examination of travel literature with a challenge to imagine that "you lived in Kyoto three hundred years ago and were facing your first trip to Edo, the Tokugawa shogun's capital, some 500 kilometers away. To flesh out this fantasy, let's make you a senior clerk in a firm that retails silk cloth. You are being sent on a temporary assignment from that main shop in Kyoto to a branch in Edo" (p. 1). Berry then details what books you might buy in Kyoto to prepare for your journey: an astonishing array of maps and travel guides detailing not only Edo, but the To¯kaido¯. Berry returns to this "you are there approach" later when she explores travel guides to Kyoto. "Several summers ago I traveled across Kyoto following a tour guide written in 1706 by the Confucian polymath Kaibara Ekiken" (p. 185). She takes us along (with Ekiken) to visit the edifying sights of Kyoto. We visit To¯fukuji, Ginkakuji, and Ninnaji—a list of Kyoto highlights still reproduced by Lonely Planet, Fodor's, and countless Japanese-language tour books. Ekiken's guide, Berry shows, was part of the construction of a readily recognizable canon of important cultural sites. But although we can use Ekiken's writings, he was not writing for us. By physically rather than metaphorically using Ekiken as a guide, Berry dramatizes what Ekiken assumed about his readership: they know "dozens of names of emperors, empresses, princes, monks, priests, nuns, military rulers, generals, writers, artists, dancers, tea masters, and scholars . . . aristocratic and clerical titles . . . the ranking system of Zen monasteries, and the vocabulary of religious architecture and iconography" (p. 194). Although Ekiken's guide, Keijo¯ sho¯ran, is in some ways strikingly similar to a modern travel [End Page 192] guide, it made assumptions about cultural literacy specific to early modern print culture. Equally striking is how Berry playfully but powerfully inserts her own life into a discussion of how "maps are strange" (p. 54). Mapping, Berry argues, is innate: even before language acquisition, children show the ability to perceive complex spatial relationships and abstract them into mental diagrams. Yet all such abstractions involve a linguistic code, which must say some things and cannot say others. Highway maps, for example, are useful because conventions such as single lines for local roads and double lines for faster roads give drivers important information quickly. So do medieval Japanese survey maps, which...

Lee Butler. Review of "Daitokuji: The Visual Cultures of a Zen Monastery" by Gregory P. A. Levine.

Lee Butler. Review of "Daitokuji: The Visual Cultures of a Zen Monastery" by Gregory P. A. Levine.

Daitokuji: The Visual Cultures of a Zen Monastery (review)

Reviewed by: Daitokuji: The Visual Cultures of a Zen Monastery Samuel C. Morse (bio) Daitokuji: The Visual Cultures of a Zen Monastery. By Gregory P.A. Levine. University of Washington Press, Seattle, 2005. lii, 444 pages. $60.00. Daitokuji: The Visual Cultures of a Zen Monastery, written by Gregory P. A. Levine, professor in the Department of Art History at the University of [End Page 516] California, Berkeley, is a collection of four highly informative case studies and an epilogue investigating events in the temple's history. The book also explores the implication of those events in relation to the history of objects at the temple, as well as the way art history has regarded art at Daitokuji in the past. Levine states in his introduction that his book "is an effort to come to terms with art history's Daitokuji as much as Daitokuji's art history" (p. xxxvii). The volume successfully fulfills this mission for in each section he deftly moves back and forth between discussing objects and events and the ways these same objects and events have been presented in previous scholarship. While the importance of Daitokuji to the history of Japanese art and religion is undeniable, surprisingly little has been written on the temple in English. Only two volumes immediately come to mind, Jon Carter Covell's Zen at Daitokuji, a highly idiosyncratic and personal view of the temple and its art which lacks a rigorous methodological focus; and Kenneth Craft's Eloquent Zen, a learned study of the temple's founder Daitō Kokushi.1 Levine's book thus fills several gaps in Western scholarship on Japanese art. Moreover, Levine is ideally suited to undertake a study of the monastery: he is the author of an important doctoral dissertation on the Jukōin, one of Daitokuji's subtemples that houses works by the sixteenth-century painter Kano Eitoku, and he is intimately familiar with the entire monastic complex and its community. Levine clearly sees his book as a corrective to the way Daitokuji and its art have been presented previously. He remarks, "An art history of Daitokuji should ask, therefore, not merely what and how (related to subject, iconography and expression) but where, when and why as well" (p. xlviii). He also wants to challenge what he considers to be the "rhetoric of solitary grandeur and unchanging repose common to many accounts of Daitokuji and other Buddhist temples, especially by Western scholars and visitors to Japan" (p. xlix). Indeed, Japan and Japanese Zen have long had a romantic hold over visitors from the West. Such attitudes were formulated first in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries and, as Levine acknowledges, then perpetuated by poets and artists (often associated with the Beat Generation) after the war, an admittedly extended period when Japanese art studies and religious studies were in their infancy. However, it is certainly not the view held by most art historians and historians of religion who study Buddhist institutions and their art today.2 Thus, while much of Levine's discussion of the [End Page 517] ways past scholarship has misrepresented the temple and its art is highly engaging, on occasion he seems to be critiquing views that are already discredited in the West. The first section of the book investigates the status of chinsō, painted and sculpted portraits of abbots at the temple, and in particular a statue which until recently was understood to be of Shōkei Jōfu, the founder of the Kōrin'in subtemple. Levine was present when an inscription was discovered in the head of the statue indicating that it was originally sculpted to be a representation of the founding abbot of the Baigan'an, another of Daitokuji's subtemples and thus should really be considered to be of Ten'yū Jōkō. As Levine suggests, the identity of the chinsō seems to have shifted after the Baigan'an was abandoned in the nineteenth century. Using this remarkable discovery as a catalyst, Levine reconsiders the category of Zen portraiture and its scholarship, focusing particular attention on why older images are more highly valued by the art historical community when later works, such as the statue at the...

禅宗僧堂における食事日記の栄養学的解析

We analyzed the dietary records at a Zen monastery from the view point of nutritional intake and food ingestion.The mean levels of the total energy intake and protein and fat were 1,119±139kcal, 27.3±5.0g, and 13.1±5.3g, which were significantly lower than the results from a national nutrition survey. The amounts of the other nutrients had the same tendency. We especially recognized the influence of the diet which follows the discipline of avoiding meat and fish, as the remarkably low intake of vitamin B12 revealed.Based on the calculated results of the intake of food it was revealed that no animal products were consumed. The intake of cereal, mushrooms and seaweed almost met the objective, which were extremely better than any other food groups.There was a tendency that rice and barley rice were eaten for yakuseki (dinner). Shiitake and shimeji, which were highly applicable, were used in various dishes for yakuseki. Konbu was the most applicable seaweed for shojiki (breakfast), chujiki (lunch) and yakuseki.

禅宗僧堂における穀類、海藻類、きのこ類の使用状況

禅宗僧堂における穀類、海藻類、きのこ類の使用状況

The Origins of Buddhist Monastic Codes in China: An Annotated Translation and Study of the Chanyuan Qinggui (review)

Reviewed by: The Origins of Buddhist Monastic Codes in China: An Annotated Translation and Study of the Chanyuan Qinggui Albert Welter (bio) Yifa . The Origins of Buddhist Monastic Codes in China: An Annotated Translation and Study of the Chanyuan Qinggui. Kuroda Institute Classics in East Asian Buddhism. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2002. xxx, 352 pp. Hardcover $60.00, ISBN 0-8248-2494-6. The Origins of Buddhist Monastic Codes in China is a welcome addition to works on East Asian Buddhism. The translation alone, the first complete translation in a Western language, guarantees the work's lasting value. The study accompanying it breaks ground in several areas, and will serve as the basis for further research in years to come. The author, Yifa, was ordained as a Buddhist nun at Fo Guang Shan in Taiwan, and received her Ph.D. from Yale University. While it is not unusual to find Western-language publications in the field of Buddhist Studies by Westerners with monastic training who have gone on to complete an advanced degree, Yifa represents a trend by Asian monastics in completing their advanced degrees at Western universities. This may account for some differences in perspective on the sources and figures studied, subjects discussed below. The contents of The Origins of Buddhist Monastic Codes in China are presented in a straightforward and readily understandable manner. The text that forms the focus of study, the Chanyuan qinggui (Rules of purity for the Chan monastery), compiled in 1103 by the Chan Buddhist monk Changlu Zongze (?-1107?), is regarded as the earliest Chan monastic code in existence. Written as a comprehensive set of rules to regulate virtually every aspect of monastic life, the Chanyuan qinggui covers an extensive array of topics: guidelines for itinerant monks; provisions for study under masters at various monasteries; the proper protocol for attending retreats; the procedure for requesting an abbot's instruction; the administrative hierarchy within the monastery, including the duties and powers of monastic officers; the social deportment of monks at tea ceremonies, ritual chanting, and monastic auctions; and procedures for packing belongings for travel, for bathing, and for using the toilet. Not only does the text contain valuable information about monastic life in Song China, but through its promotion by Eisai (1141-1215) and Dōgen (1200-1253) it also became an influential source for monastic regulations in Japan. The book consists of two parts. Part 1, "Context," is comprised of two chapters: "Evolution of Monastic Regulations in China" and "Genesis of Chanyuan qinggui: Continuity and Adaptation." Part 2, "Text," is also comprised of two chapters: "The Author and His Work" and "Chanyuan qinggui in Translation." Both the study and translation are accompanied by ample notation. In addition, the work also includes a Character Glossary, a Bibliography, an Index, and something [End Page 206] called a Finding List to help readers locate corresponding pages in two sources where the text is found. Also included are a series of illustrations and photos depicting aspects of monastic life described in the text. As mentioned above, the value of the translation of the Chanyuan qinggui is undisputable. The translation itself, straightforward and literal, is trustworthy and will be of great use to students and scholars. Many for whom the text was either inaccessible or accessible only through laborious and tentative effort can now enjoy full access to its contents in a relatively free and unobstructed manner. The contents go a long way in furthering our understanding of Chan in practical religious terms as an institution functioning in an actual social setting. In this regard, the text reveals the underpinnings for the behavior at Zen monasteries in contemporary Korea described by Robert Buswell in his The Zen Monastic Experience: Buddhist Practice in Contemporary Korea and in Buddhist monasteries in early twentieth-century China described by Holmes Welch in The Practice of ChineseBuddhism 1900-1950. It also complements the work of T. Griffith Foulk, "Myth, Ritual, and Monastic Practice in Sung Ch'an Buddhism" (in Patricia Ebrey and Peter Gregory, eds., Religion and Society in T'ang and Sung China). Part 1 is equally valuable. The author ably presents her argument in the Introduction, stating that "a work...