INTERNATIONAL BLASPHEMY DAY: Make Room for the Misfits!

**Kokuu** · 09-30-2015, 08:35 PM

Ango, the sewing, the Jukai, the book club, the zazenkai's. The emphasis on practice and the dharma here is amazing. This may be a misfits club, but I think anyone with a keen eye for zen would be proud of all the work we do, and that's just the lay part of it.

**Seido** · 09-30-2015, 09:29 PM

Thank you Jundo,
What you say here is why I'm here. Depending solely on special organizations and teachers, following "have to do this and that" type non-sense defeats the non-point of Zen. Just sit.

If you NEED someone to give you a pat on the back, to tell you you made it, you've lost the Tao of Zen, you've lost your beginner's mind.

"You have to leave room for people who travel a different road." Does this make you the Elvis of Zen?

Gassho,
Ken
SatToday

**Rich** · 10-01-2015, 02:14 AM

It's the organizations that feel a need to certify teachers that is a blasphemy. This is a mind to mind , teacher to student direct transmission. That's the only event to be verified and maybe some lineage history. All the education and personal practice history is irrelevant and none of their concern. We don't need a Zen church to certify teachers.

AZTA is a teachers club and it needs act like a teachers club and not like a religious organization.

The opinions expressed above are solely those of the rebel and anti church zealot that I am. 😊 -)

SAT today

**Kyotai** · 10-01-2015, 02:56 AM

Thank you.

Gassho, Kyotai
sat today

**Jundo** · 10-01-2015, 03:43 AM

Hello Fellow Blasphemers,

This talk (minus the raised pinky hand gestures and rolling eyes) is also now available for audio download at TREELEAF PODCAST:

September 2015 Talk - Make Room for the Misfits! | TREELEAF ZENDO PODCAST

http://treeleaf.podbean.com/e/september-2015-talk-make-room-for-the-misfits/

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! »

Gassho, J

SatToday

**Ishin** · 10-01-2015, 05:47 PM

I always knew my non-self was better than everyone else's non-self. Now if I could just find someone else to confirm that for me.

Thank you Jundo. And thank you all you misfit blasphemer wierdos that make this place great.

Gassho
Ishin
Sat Today

**Ishin** · 10-01-2015, 09:08 PM

I feel compelled to add to this. I sat and watched a Zen teaching today by someone whose name and sangha shall remain un-named, but I couldn't help but feel that the person giving the talk was missing the mark a bit about the "benefits" of Zen practice. It then occurred to me, perhaps one thing you can say about an online sangha is that much of what we do is out there for the whole Zen world to see and critique. It seems to me that this kind of format makes it LESS likely that the dharma being taught is abusive or misguided. Not only this, but I must say I admire the teachers here who put themselves out there in this regard, not hiding in some small little sangha somewhere with sycophants who don't know any better. Could online dharma have some aspects that are perhaps "better" than other traditional methods?

I feel very grateful to be part of this sangha, real life, online, or in the matrix.

Gassho
Ishin
Sat Today

**Kyonin** · 10-01-2015, 11:32 PM

Hi Jundo,

This talk really hit home with me. I'm a like a mutant, misunderstood by the world I swore to protect

And I'm happy with that.

Thank you for this teaching.

Gassho,

Kyonin

**Byrne** · 10-03-2015, 05:57 AM

Thank you for the most important teaching.

Phish.

Meh...

Gassho

Sat Today

**Byrne** · 10-04-2015, 07:00 AM

Jundo,

What is meant by the term "ancestor" or "patriarch" when referring to guys like Hui Neng? Is that just a matter of lineage or does it mean something else as well?

Gassho

Sat Today

**Jundo** · 10-04-2015, 12:56 PM

Originally posted by Byrne

Jundo,

What is meant by the term "ancestor" or "patriarch" when referring to guys like Hui Neng? Is that just a matter of lineage or does it mean something else as well?

Gassho

Sat Today

Hi Byrne,

These days, it is pretty clear that "Bodhidharma" and "Hui-neng" and some of the others were not historical figures or, at least, a large part of the legend is from someone's religious imagination ...

thezensite: Bodhidharma as Textual and Religious Paradigm

http://www.thezensite.com/ZenEssays/Philosophical/Bodhidharma_as_Paradigm.html

Faure uses structural criticism to analyse Bodhidharma's life as a literary piece belonging to the genre of hagiography, rejecting obsolete concepts of historical individuality and all methodological extremes to reach a new, limited understanding of Bodhidharma's coming from the West

thezensite: Legends in Ch’an: the Northern/Southern Schools Split, Hui-neng and the Platform Sutra

http://www.thezensite.com/ZenEssays/HistoricalZen/Legends_in_Chan.html

This essay will look at the debate between the so-called Northern and Southern Schools and how this evolved to become one of the enduring stories in Chan Buddhism and the role the Platform Sutra played in this history.

However, each does represent someone somewhere stretching back generation by generation,

And each and all do teach Timeless wisdom.

Therefore, we might say that each represents an archetype, a paradigm, standing for and embodying Truth.

By the way, we prefer "Ancestor" these days, because "Patriarch" is such a sexist term. One aspect of the Timeless Truth is that there is no "male" or "female" about this.

I hope that helps.

Gassho, J

SatToday

**Byrne** · 10-04-2015, 04:19 PM

Thank you. That makes much more sense.

Gassho

Sat Today

**Joyo** · 10-05-2015, 12:30 AM

From one social misfit, backslider, black sheep I will say thank you for this teaching.

Gassho,
Joyo
sat today

**Joyo** · 10-05-2015, 12:35 AM

the road less travelled quote - Google Search

https://www.google.ca/search?q=the+road+less+travelled+quote&es_sm=122&biw=1242&bih=606&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ved=0CCYQsARqFQoTCJD0zuWKqsgCFYGXHgode2sCHA#imgrc=l3gj1O2jd14vUM%3A

**Jundo** · 10-05-2015, 01:59 AM

Originally posted by Byrne

Thank you. That makes much more sense.

Gassho

Sat Today

"Moses" and the story about the Exodus from Egypt may not be quite "historical fact" according to independent scholars ...

Man versus myth: does it matter if the Moses story is based on fact?

http://www.theguardian.com/film/2014/nov/30/moses-man-versus-myth-ridley-scott

As Ridley Scott prepares to release another blockbuster based on the exodus, the row has reignited the debate over whether Judaism’s historical saviour actually existed

... (I always had my doubts myself about Charlton Heston parting of the Red Sea

) ...

... yet the story remains timeless for all of us, a symbol pointing the way to Liberation of the oppressed, all religious beliefs aside.

So with Bodhidharma, Hui-neng and others as guides to our Liberation.

Gassho, J

SatToday

INTERNATIONAL BLASPHEMY DAY: Make Room for the Misfits!

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