TREELEAF ZENDO PODCAST
Episodes
Saturday Oct 03, 2015
October 2015 Zazenkai Dharma Talk (Wild Ways of the Precepts in Japan)
Saturday Oct 03, 2015
Saturday Oct 03, 2015
Reading: "Wild Ways of the Precepts in Japan"
It is not known if the precepts in sixteen articles resulted from
Dogen’s own innovation or if he borrowed this group from another source.
[Dogen, in a writing describing the ordination ceremony for his
priests] states that the ordination ceremony described therein is
exactly the same as the one conducted by [Dogen's Teacher in China]
Ju-ching in 1225 when he administered the precepts to Dogen. The
reliability of that assertion, however, seems doubtful. [from "Dogen and the Precepts" by Prof. Steven Heine]
Further reading and discussion for this talk are available on the Treeleaf forum:October 2nd-3rd, 2015 - OUR MONTHLY 4-hour ZAZENKAI! »
Wednesday Sep 30, 2015
September 2015 Talk - Make Room for the Misfits!
Wednesday Sep 30, 2015
Wednesday Sep 30, 2015
When SweepingZen asked for a talk on International Blasphemy Rights Day (September 30th), I joked that I do that with most of my posts!
A nice thing about Buddhists is that we rarely kill, burn at the stake
or imprison our critics, dissenters, heretics and the doctrinally
different (although we have our scattered extremists too, the same as
any religion). We are pretty non-violent, but even we aren’t totally
immune from forbidding and punishing blasphemy and unwelcome voices.
Keep room in Zen Buddhism for the misfits, square pegs, tradition
breakers and “original non-thinkers” on the edges. Learn to distinguish
the con artists, shysters, abusers and predators from those who have
simply walked their own path, attended the “monastery of hard knocks”,
are doing something good even if not how you would do it. Having “set standards” and “required training paths”
is useful and generally necessary for helping to assure substance,
experience, dedication and ethics in our teachers. Someone can do a lot
of harm when falling down in those things, like an untrained doctor or a
drunken lawyer. However, keep room for exceptions and “special cases”
too. Look at who the priest has become, not so much only how she or he
got there.
Further reading and discussion for this talk are available on the Treeleaf forum:INTERNATIONAL BLASPHEMY DAY: Make Room for the Misfits! »