arvingthedivine.com/blog/9-ripping-a-style-apart

Wednesday Morning Service - 10/18/23 - by SokukoJi

Aida Rodriguez On Why Latinos Don’t Claim Blackness, Paul Mooney, Black ...

Zen Monastic - Slavery & Servitude

The attachment below provides information on how slavery/servitude was a solid part of the operational/economic design of temple living. “The Monastic Ownership of Servants or Slaves” in Gregory Schopen’s Buddhist Monks and Business Matters

NOT KNOWING IS MOST INTIMATE

https://www.sfzc.org/teachings/dharma-talks/not-knowing-most-intimate-0

History of Soto Zen Buddhism In North America (various clips)

Soto Zen was first spread to North America by Rev. Hosen Isobe in 1922. It has carried the light of Buddhism in its various activities to this day. We celebrated 100th anniversary in 2022. ----- #SotoZen was first spread to North America by Rev. Hosen Isobe in 1922. At that time, the Buddhist faith was limited to Japanese immigrants. In addition to providing Buddhist services, such as funerals and memorial services, the organization has acted as a base for spreading traditional Japanese culture and entertainment as well as a place where people of Japanese descent can take a break and relax. It has carried the light of Buddhism in its various activities to this day. The Soto Zen Buddhism North America Office was established in 1937 when Zenshuji Soto Mission in Los Angeles was approved as a branch of both head temples, Eiheiji and Sojiji. Following its establishment, the North America Office has performed a variety of activities including registration of temples and priests in North America, training sessions and workshops on rituals and ceremonies, sesshin’e (intensive day-and-night Zen meditation sessions), support and guidance for memorial events and special memorial services. It has also played a role in spreading Soto Zen Buddhism around the globe. When the office was first established, as was already mentioned in the opening paragraph, the main activities of the Soto Mission were focused on dispatching priests to temples built by immigrants who came to North America from Japan and propagation in areas where there was a large Japanese population. We are now three and four generations removed from those that paved the way, and the language has shifted to English. The activities of the Soto Mission have also changed accordingly. Even today, decades after the unfortunate events of World War II, many Japanese people come to North America on business, after getting married, or for studies. Many of these people visit the Mission as a place of refuge, as it is a pure Japanese temple where they can get a taste of home. In keeping with those circumstances, the activities of the office have expanded from mere clerical functions to looking for ways to develop temples for the future and set up various opportunities for the exchange of information and ideas between them. The focus is not only on Japanese temples and, particularly since the 1960’s, Soto Zen has been gaining numbers across racial and cultural boundaries. Thanks to the tireless efforts of missionaries and religious workers, there are currently five Japanese temples in North America and more than 170 Zen centers (temples run by American priests), as well as more than 350 priests. Several temples from among these Zen centers and groups, which may be large or small, have formed a large organization that is engaged in dynamic mission work, including daily Zen training and doctrinal instruction based on Soto Zen teachings and community service in the surrounding communities. A few prime examples of these activities are instruction in Zazen and sermons at Zen groups established within prisons in each area, and spiritual care provided to students and patients by chaplains at schools and hospitals. These types of activities are evidence that as the number of Zen centers increases so does the number of priests. The North America Office receives the support of the Soto Zen Buddhism International Center to hold international missions conferences every year which include training sessions for various rituals. Priests from temples located all over North America come together in one place to talk with each other face to face and discuss their individual circumstances and the problems they come up against. The conferences provide them with the opportunity to sit down together and study rituals and ceremonies, thereby deepening their own understanding. This allows them to take the teachings that have been adapted to the local areas and ensure that they are developed according to the same standards and will bear fruit in the future. There are almost two hundred countries in the world, and each of them has its own constitution and laws; there is no one constitution or set of laws that applies throughout the world. Japan’s laws are not effective in the United States or China, nor are the laws of other countries used in Japan. Each country has its own laws and, by extension, its own moral code. However, Buddhism transcends the boundaries of time and national borders and applies equally to all mankind. Soto Zen Buddhism North America Office Details Address: 123 South Hewitt St, Los Angeles, CA 90012 U.S.A. Phone: 1-213-617-0100 Fax: 1-213-617-0200 Mail: info@sotozen.us Director Rev. Gengo Akiba Administrative Secretary Rev. Gyokei Yokoyama Rev. Ejo McMullen Responsible for general affairs Rev. Dokan Kojima SITE ADMINISTRATOR: #annettelorenzo target="_blank">https://www.facebook.com/annette.lorenzo/posts/pfbid02pruM6B71krXvgtPKgamoyyMCXCV12ZZMrfCQem8EiEJWTjH6uphafSCcVBA5jYJ8l https://www.instagram.com/sotozenwarrior/

Zen Buddhism & Slavery

During my training/employment in the North American Soto Zen Buddhist system - the term 'Zen Slave' was spoken often when describing the 'work/residency'programs common within todays Buddhist systems. Be it a small center or a Monastary within an International system there was a heirachy system that maintained those that are honored and those which serve. The acedmic paper below introduces the documented practice of Slavery within anciet Buddhist organizational system. The question I dare to state: Is North American Zen temples currently practicing a form of slavery? --------------------------- Artical:SLAVERY The definition of the word slavery and the identification of terms such as Sanskrit da!sa and corresponding vocabulary in other languages is contentious. If one understands the concept in terms of obligations, or power relations, however, slaves may be seen as those who owed obligations to many, but were owed few or none by others, thus avoiding the complications introduced by seeing slaves, as in classical law, as things (res). Of course, since the socioeconomic systems of different places and periods vary radically, it is impossible to generalize; in particular, the ties that many people in the premodern world had to the land meant that donations of property to Buddhist monasteries included the labor of those attached to that land. Whether or not such individuals are called serfs, their limited autonomy with respect to the state and to society is clear. In this sense, discussions of slavery can hardly be separated from those of land ownership or practices such as corvée labor, and in each case the whole complex must be investigated in light of thelarge-scale economic systems within which Buddhist institutions existed. While it is important to distinguish actual practices within Buddhist institutions from attitudes toward these practices as found in Buddhist literature, what can be said clearly is that there is almost no indication in any premodern Buddhist source, scriptural or documentary, of opposition to, or reluctance to participate in, institutions of slavery. It is true that the Buddhist monastic codes (VINAYA) of all sects areunanimous in stipulating that it is not permissible toordain a slave, but the reasons for doing so clearly lie not in any opposition to slavery but rather in the wellrecognized reluctance of the Buddhist communities to interfere in previously established relations of social obligation, since it is also forbidden to ordain debtors, those in royal or military service, and so on. Again,when Buddhist texts speak of restrictions on the monastic ownership of slaves, they do so virtually without exception in the context of restrictions on individual rather than corporate ownership of wealth in general, and not with the intention of singling out slave ownership as somehow different from any other type of ownership. Indeed, in Buddhist literature of all varieties, stock descriptions of wealth, even that gifted to the Buddha, regularly include both male and female slaves along with silver, gold, fields, livestock, and soon. Some texts, emphasizing the moral obligation to receive whatever is given in reverence, declare that it is an offense not to accept such offerings, the lists of which regularly include slaves. Although there is a lack of sufficient sources to offer detailed proof, references in the accounts of Chinese pilgrims, as well as several inscriptional sources, make it clear that at least some Buddhist monasteries in India owned slaves. The sources are much better for other areas of the Buddhist world, and here too they are virtually unanimous. There is copious inscriptional and documentary evidence for the institutional monastic ownership of slaves from Sri Lanka, Cambodia, Burma, Thailand, Korea, China, and Japan; Central Asian documents frequently refer to slaves privately owned by individual monks. For example, inKoryo˘-period Korea (918–1392), the Buddhist monastic institution was one of the major slaveholders on theKorean peninsula during the late fourteenth century;the founders of the succeeding Choso˘n dynasty (1392–1910) transferred eighty-thousand monastery slaves to public ownership, leaving “only” one slave for every twenty monks. Slaves were also, however, owned by individual monks, and these remained unaffected by this legislation. Although it is worth stating that the general socioeconomic situation in theocratic Tibet was such that direct parallels are difficult to draw, there can be little doubt that comparable institutions existed there, whether or not the individuals in question were always called bran (slave). Although the details of every circumstance are different, we are compelled to conclude that here, as in so many other cases, individual Buddhists and Buddhist institutions were, much more frequently than not, fully integrated into the societies in which they existed, not challenging the structures or customs of those societies, but on the contrary, often working to strengthen them. See also: Economics; Monasticism; Persecutions Bibliography Agrawala, Ratna Chandra. “Position of Slaves and Serfs as Depicted in the Kharosthi Documents from Chinese Turkestan.” Indian Historical Quarterly 29/2 (1953): 97–110. Law, B. C. “Slavery as Known to Early Buddhists.” Journal of the Ganganatha Jha Research Institute 6/1 (1948): 1–9. Salem, Ellen. “The Utilization of Slave Labor in the Koryo˘ Period: 918–1392.” In Papers of the First International Conference on Korean Studies 1979. Songnam: The Academy of Korean Studies, 1980.

CUKE ARCHIVES - The Best Site To Discover Shunryu Suzki's Buddhist Lessons (My Daily Meditation/Study Moment) - Meet Me There

https://cukeaudio.podbean.com/

Zen Chant

SAMADHI - Basic Theory

Practing Meditation through Breathing Exercises According to the basic theory of the IDENTICALNESS OF MIND AND PRANA, if one can tame her/his breath, the mind will also be tamed. The breathing exercise is, therefor one of the best approaches to Samadhi. The term "breathing exercise" alludes to the conditioning of one's breath through certain repeated manipulations accord8hg to a predeterminded scheme. The commonest methods are either counting the breath, or suppressing or holding it. Of these two approaches the first is perhaps the easiest and safest. It has been highly recommended by many Buddhis teeachers, and widely practicedby most Buddhist meditatorsfor centuries. Unlike the others, this type of meditation may be praccticed without absolute reliance on the constant guidance of the Guru if one has a GOOD KNOWLEDGE OF BREATHING TECHNIQUES and understands principles of DHYANA PRACTICE.

Annette Lorenzo - M.P.A.: What Is Soto Zen?

Annette Lorenzo - M.P.A.: What Is Soto Zen?: https://sotozen.us/aboutus/#aboutus_point1 Name of the School (Shumei ) Sotoshu – The Soto Zen school Tradition (Dento ) The Soto Zen Sc...

What Is Soto Zen?

https://sotozen.us/aboutus/#aboutus_point1 Name of the School (Shumei ) Sotoshu – The Soto Zen school Tradition (Dento ) The Soto Zen School transmits the true (Buddhist) Dharma from Shakyamuni Buddha through the Ancestors. The Soto Zen School endeavors to transmit the true Buddha Dharma that has been handed down generation after generation through our line of Ancestors from the founder of the doctrine, Shakyamuni Buddha, to the present day. The Establishment of the School in Japan (Nihon Kaishu ) The Soto Zen School recognizes two eminent Ancestors as our founders, Dogen and Keizan Zenji. The essence of the Soto Zen School was transmitted from China, eight hundred years ago, during the Kamakura period by Koso Dogen Zenji. The fourth Japanese ancestor of the school was Taiso Keizan Zenji who was instrumental in enhancing the teachings and expanding the school. Founders: Taiso Dogen Zen