After six months, he returned to his position. The suit cost the SFZC $35,000 to $40,000 in legal fees at a time when it was under financial pressure. Interestingly, one of the oldest members of Zen Center, a psychologist, did an "informal poll" of people who had been at Zen Center for more than eight years. Thanks to Mr. Oppenheimer's efforts, women have come forward, some even using their names; we think this kind of courage can only embolden other survivors of abuse to speak out. This is the sort of detail, which might be useful to both present and future students, but it is absolutely missing from all of the completely standard biographies of Zen masters through the ages. Had he misused confidences given to him in dokusan (a private meeting between teacher and student pertaining to the student's practice, an extremely important element in Zen training) for self-serving reasons? Was he hypocritical for reprimanding his students for flirting while he carried on numerous affairs with his female students, including one that ruptured his best friend's marriage? [1] San Francisco Zen Center's web site now comments: "Although the circumstances leading to his resignation as abbot in 1984 were difficult and complex, in recent years, there has been increased contact; a renewal of friendship and dharma relations. Foulk doubts that the Chan sect existed as a separate sect with its own monastic institutions during the Tang dynasty. [20] Zen Hospice Project provides hospice care for individuals of any or no religion who are looking for a compassionate end to their life. For a history of early Soto Zen as well as how the Soto sect has understood Dharma transmission since roughly 1700, see Bodiford, William M., Soto Zen in Medieval Japan, University of Hawaii Press, 1993, p. 215. While leader of the SFZC, Baker's purchase of a new white BMW became a focal point for much of the anger and resentments that Zen Center members felt towards him. For an outstanding article on Sanbokyodan Zen, a Zen sect important in the West see, Sharf, Robert, "Sanbokyodan, Zen and the Way of New Religions", Japanese Journal of Religious Studies, Fall 1995, Vol. Remember the senior student who quoted Suzuki as saying, " Dick's commitment is at another level, so the rest of us simply were not in a position to criticize him." Their sins are far worse than what goes on in Zen circles. Was he acting primarily with his own self-interest in mind? We did something great. For an analysis of the idealized, one-dimensional style of describing a roshi, the one of Suzuki in Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind being just one contemporary example, see "Simpleness" in Alan Cole's previously mentioned paper, "It's All in the Framing", p.6. It is interesting to note that these beliefs persisted strongly even into the year 2000, roughly the time of Downing's interviews when there had been thirty-five years of sexual and financial scandals in the Zen community in America. It allows bureaucratic transmission, but it also uses "historical" biographies of eminent masters presented as desireless beings, the koans, and the many Zen stories and dialogues (mondo) to legitimize and to enhance authority, that make clear that transmission is given because of a deep insight into reality or spiritual attainment. Mark Oppenheimeris the author of three other books, includinga memoir of high school debateand atravelogue about crashing bar mitzvahs. Cole, who teaches at Lewis and Clark College, also has two very provocative books soon to be published, one on the Mahayana sutras and the other on early Chan texts and the "birth" of Chinese Buddhas. You wont find anybody within the Zen Studies Society who has tolerated this stuff from start to finish, Schnyer said. It also spun off its business and stopped pretending that work without compensation was "spiritual practice.". Nor did anyone even think to view the situation through the lens of the Buddhist teachings themselves or even the particular teachings of their beloved founder Suzuki. There appeared to be a vast cultural divide between the Zen Center students of Suzuki and Japanese Zen monks that showed itself both in America and in Japan. Stay connected. Kwong's transmission was later completed by Suzuki's son, Hoitsu.[1][11][12]. It is because one was wrong about him, because one misinterpreted the states of his soul and drew as sharp a line as is possible between oneself and him, as if he were something utterly incomparable and strangely superhuman-that he gained that extraordinary power with which he could dominate the imagination of whole peoples and ages. The Zen understanding of wisdom imputes Foucault's "single gaze to see everything constantly" to the Master. Explore and learn more about the San Francisco Zen Center community. This is not surprising if we remember that in Soto Zen "spiritual attainment" is rarely a criterion for Dharma transmission. In one well-known collection, the famous Grand Master Yunmen is not recorded at all. [2] As the American Dharma heir to Shunryu Suzuki, Baker assumed abbotship of the San Francisco Zen Center (SFZC) shortly before Suzuki's death in 1971. In the 1960's and 70's, San Francisco Zen Center students, like most other Zen students in the U.S.A., thoroughly accepted (among a range of glaring historical inaccuracies) the idealistic Zen rhetoric, including the notion that Dharma transmission is only about spiritual attainment, that all roshis are essentially equal, and that Zen institutions in East Asia are apolitical and divorced from the state. It could fairly be said that what is effectively transmitted by Dharma transmission is institutional authority, rather than religious wisdom. Members had not the slightest inkling that their view of Zen was controlled. Suzuki had asked Baker to locate a farm in the area for entire families to live a Buddhist life while working together. But in the 1960s and 70s, American Buddhists needed the foreigners. Why do we need to rehash this one again? In addition, the few American students of his who went to Japan came back disappointed, which upset Suzuki because he thought these students would then think less ofBuddhism. A Zen teacher can certainly assist his students in their practice, can encourage the students to be diligent, guide their meditation practice in both public and private meetings, offer aid in difficult times, talk about Zen texts to enrich the student's sense of the tradition and explicate Buddhist and Zen ideas. In the 1960s, four major Zen teachers came to the United States from Japan: Shunryu Suzuki, Taizan Maezumi, Joshu Sasaki, and Eido Shimano. It was like a "game" of Zen where if any one speaks out or asks the wrong question, the "game" is ruined or finished, at least for that person. Baker's friends and supporters say the Zen Center never regained the spark and spiritual power of the Suzuki/Baker years. Located atop a bumpy 10-mile (16km) road which is difficult for some vehicles to climb, Tassajara offers shuttles to and from the retreat for those inclined to forgo trying to make the trek on their own. It is a performance meant to confirm and display the current master's significance, authority and attainment. If youre going to do this, youre going to do it on your own, but Im not going to nurse you. For me he was perfect Somebody looking from the outside could say thats why we stuck with him all the time. In his letter, Zournas, who had resigned the presidency in July, details for the lawyers benefit how the various board members reacted to a motion that Shimano and his wife, then the organizations treasurer, be fired. Learn about the latest news from affiliate sanghas with Tova's newsettes and other timely articles. And what was Suzuki's intention here? SFZC will continue to offer classes, talks, workshops, and sangha gatherings through the Online Practice Center and residential guest student practice opportunities at all three temples. Finding Safe Harbor: Buddhist Sexual Ethics in America by Stephanie Kaza, Shoes Outside the Door: Desire, Devotion, and Excess at San Francisco Zen Center by Michael Downing: book review by Vladimir K. buy this book A monastery and retreat center in a remote mountain valley in the Ventana Wilderness SFZC Online Resources for beginners, zazen (meditation) and chanting, Dharma talks, live online practice sessions with teachers, as well as classes and workshops from our Online Programs. Despite extraordinary personal shortcomings, Eido Shimano continued to wield spiritual authority throughout his time at the Zen Studies Society. Is it any wonder that the inevitable abuses that we have seen for the last thirty years should follow? This imputation of power and attainment has given one Zen roshi after another the power to abuse their position while remaining beyond reproach. After failing to re-create his Zen empire in Santa Fe, N.M., he settled in Crestone, Colo., where he presides over a much smaller Zen center. #28 of 84 Specialty lodging in San Francisco. No one took the opportunity to stand back and view the entire affair from any sort of sociological, anthropological, psychological or religious-historical perspective. Berger begins, "Every human society is an enterprise of world-building. It was not surprising, then, that when trouble arose at the Center it was mostly assumed that something must be wrong with the members themselves; that it was because they did not use or handle well Suzuki's pure teaching. They weren't so much about about money (Chapter 27, if that's your cup of tea). One student expressed it as, "some of the senior priests were in it for a payoff-Transmission," another stated it as, "They were ambitious, and only Richard could give it [transmission] to them, because he was the only one who had it." While jogging through Golden Gate Park, Anderson deviated from the path to urinate in some bushes. He also ran a temple virtually under the control of Japan's repressive fascist era government. Understandably, Suzuki may not have been able to read across the Japanese-American cultural divide and therefore not see the character flaws of Baker that were obvious to some of his unenlightened American students. But for Schnyer this constantly refreshing membership was proof that the sangha did disapprove of Shimanos treatment of women. For an earlier view of the immediate events surrounding Baker, see Butler, Katy, "Events Are The Teachers", The CoEvolution Quarterly, winter 1983, pp.112-123. We may however, ask, "What commitment was Suzuki referring to?" It is clear from Downing's interviews that Zen Center members assumed that there was no ideology to be questioned, i.e., the unreliable history of Zen, the hagiographic picture of the lineage, along with its mythology of Dharma transmission, unbroken lineage, and enlightened Zen masters. Also see the public letter from Mr. Kapleau toYamada, dated 2/17/86. The Examiner reports that Preston has wants to use the mostly vacant 555 Fulton as . With this investment it is understandable that one might not want to question too closely the teacher's behavior. Ungerleider.[26]. In 1966, Suzuki and Baker scouted Tassajara Hot Springs, located in Los Padres National Forest behind Big Sur, as a possible location for the envisioned monastic center. The situation is now reversing, as the Japanese, in particular, abandon Buddhism as an old relic, while it continues to find adherents in the West. For more on the Soto Zen institution in Japan see Foulk, T. Griffith, "The Zen Institute in Modern Japan", pp.157-177, Zen, Tradition and Transition, Kenneth Kraft ed., NY, Grove Press, 1988. There was a widespread conceit in their thinking that they were the center or "cutting edge" of Zen in America, not cognizant that many other Zen groups were forming city/country Centers and also experimenting with the ideas of setting up monasteries, group practice, communal living and forming a sangha. San Francisco Zen Center has begun to offer on-site meditation, Dharma talks, programs, classes, and other events. Richard Baker also survived. Founded in 1972 by the San Francisco Zen Center and Zentatsu Richard Baker, the site is located on 115 acres (0.47 km 2) in a valley seventeen miles (27 km) north of San Francisco [1] and offers a variety of workshops and classes throughout the year. In America, it is common in Zen and other communities led by a charismatic teacher to view events that could generate questions such as these not as real life-problems, but as "skillful means" employed to convey the essence of "the teaching." According to revelations that have tumbled out over the past two years, and which I chronicle in-depth in a new e-book, Shimano has spent 50 years preying sexually on his students. It is mentioned often enough that Downing, interestingly calculates the hours that individual senior members had meditated. Interestingly, the later versions of the supposed events often have more detail than the earlier versions, implying that we are dealing with literary creations rather than historical biography. The idea of the enlightened Zen master authenticated through the ritual of dharma transmission and maintained by an unbroken lineage going back to the historical Buddha is at the heart of the Zen tradition. He then drove after the alleged mugger and followed him into a housing project with the revolver (unloaded) in hand, being arrested minutes later by a police officer with his own gun pointed at him.[36]. Baker himself was quick to remind his flock that he was the only American to receive Dharma transmission from Suzuki Roshi. Downing reveals that by 1969 Suzuki had made it known to Baker and others at the Center that Baker was to be his Dharma heir. If some one would like copies, please email me at: slachs@worldnet.att.net . Anybody who traveled to Japan, as many American Buddhists would, quickly learned that every monastery there had its own variations on the traditionas with any other religious practice, there is no one true form. Eighteen years later, there is still lingering bitterness about his overthrow. What they really found is another story of flawed human behavior. Some of these students began calling their group City Center, and they incorporated in 1962 as the San Francisco Zen Center.[1][2][3][4][5]. Tassajara baked bread for student and guest consumption since 1967, and Edward Espe Brown's Tassajara Bread Book, demonstrated consumer interest. I have been involved with Zen in America for over thirty years during which time there have been many upheavals and problems, some similar to the Baker case described in Michael Downing's, Shoes Outside The Door, others more subtle and less obvious in nature. [1] Zen Hospice Project was the subject of the Netflix 2018 Academy Award-nominated[24] short documentary End Game,[25] about terminally ill patients in a San Francisco hospital as well as at the Zen Hospice Project house, featuring the work of palliative care physician BJ Miller and other palliative care clinicians. This recommended class series offers listeners an overview of the fundamentals of Buddhism and Zen. 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