Personal Reading

[Bokucho]

Good Morning/Afternoon/Evening All,

I'm sure this has been asked before, however I can't find it anywhere, but I'm curious about everyone's personal favorite literature. I'm wanting to read some older sutras but I seem to have a difficult time finding translations that are more Soto oriented, and I was hoping other people have had more luck than I have. The free translations I can find seem to be all over the place, and I was hoping to come across some other resources that have a more Zen approach. As of right now my local library is shut down due to the ongoing pandemic, so I've had a difficult time accessing free reading material. It would also be nice to see some other reading material that everyone else loves. Zen Mind, Beginners Mind is wonderful, and I really enjoy Moon In A Dewdrop. Excited to hear people's responses!

Gassho,

Joshua
Sat Today

[Tai Do]

Hi Joshua,
I don't know if I can be of use to you, but for the Sutras I am now reading a Portuguese anthology of the Sutra Pitaka organized by subjects and not sutras. But I also like the English Tripitaka, which is available for free download or payed physical book (https://www.bdkamerica.org/translati...buddhist-canon). By the way, the Shobogenzo translation there is that of Nishijima Roshi. Hope it can help you.
Gassho,
Mateus
Sat/LAH

[Bokucho]

Mateus,

Thank you so much for the response! I feel as though there are never enough hours in the day to read as much as I'd like, and I'm always looking for books and literature to add to my list. I've just downloaded the Shobogenzo you've recommended as well as bookmarked the Tripitaka. If you find anything else please feel free to send them my way as I'm always open to new (to me) reading material!

Gassho,

Josh
Sat Today

[Kokuu]

Hi Joshua!

The Platform Sutra (Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch) is available online in a good translation by Philip Yampolsky: https://terebess.hu/zen/PlatformYampolsky.pdf

This is a version of The Lotus Sutra: https://www.bdk.or.jp/document/dgtl-...Sutra_2007.pdf

The Nishijima/Cross translation of Shobogenzo is fully available online: Volume 1, Volume 2, Volume 3, Volume 4

The Zen Site also contains numerous articles on Dogen and other Soto Zen folk and teachings: http://www.thezensite.com/

SotoZen-Net has a translation of the Denkoroku (Transmission of the Lamp) by Soji Keizan, legendary accounts of all of the Buddhas proceeding Dogen: https://global.sotozen-net.or.jp/eng...oku/index.html

Access to Insight contains English translations of the vast majority of the Pali Canon of early Buddhism: https://www.accesstoinsight.org/ptf/index.html

Otherwise, if you can get it at the moment, I really like the small book of Ryokan's poetry, One Robe One Bowl: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/..._Robe_One_Bowl
Also, Most Intimate by Roshi Pat Enkyo O'Hara: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/...-most-intimate


Gassho
Kokuu
-sattoday/lah-

[Bokucho]

Kokuu,

Such wonderful resources, this is exactly what I was searching for! I've bookmarked everything recommended and will pursue each as time allows! As of right now with essentially my whole country quarantined I have ample time to read. Perhaps in the future we may have discussions on the recommended reading.

Gassho,

Joshua
Sat Today

[Kokuu]

Hi Joshua

If others have more time to read at the moment, it may be that we could set up an extra reading group, Dogen in the time of Covid or similar!

Our current book club book, Realizing Genjokoan, is an excellent primer for reading Shobogenzo.

Gassho
Kokuu
-sattoday/lah-

[Bokucho]

That does have a nice ring to it! I would love to read Realizing Genjokoan, do you know if it's available to read anywhere for free? If not I can purchase it, though I must be careful, if I purchased everything I set out to read I think I'd be broke haha!

Gassho,

Joshua
Sat Today

[Kokuu]

Hi Joshua

I do not think it is available for free but it is well worth getting if you can.

It is very easy to spend a lot on dharma books!

If you don't have the money right now I can send you my copy.

Gassho
Kokuu
-sattoday/lah-

[Bokucho]

Hi Kokuu,

That is so incredibly kind of you, however I went ahead and ordered it. It seems to have great reviews and is highly recommended. I too would offer to send anyone copies of any of my books should they not have means to read them! If anyone needs anything feel free to send me a PM and I'll let you know what I've currently got!

Gassho,

Joshua
Sat Today

Sent from my Pixel 3 using Tapatalk

[Kokuu]

Hi Joshua

That's great. It is well worth having and is our current book in our Book Club, although we are quite some way in now: https://www.treeleaf.org/forums/foru...EAF-ART-CIRCLE

But you can go through the threads and read what others have said and add your bit!

Gassho
Kokuu
-sattoday/lah-

[Tom A.]

Yesterday I listened to Steve Hagen’s ‘Buddhism: it’s not what you think’ at work and thought it was pretty good. Without getting too judgmental, there were some questionable passages that *almost* veer into Deepak Chopra territory regarding science, knowledge and truth. I’m curious if anyone else here has read that book and what their views are on it.

Gassho,
Tom

Sat


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[Meitou]

Hi Joshua!

The Platform Sutra (Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch) is available online in a good translation by Philip Yampolsky: https://terebess.hu/zen/PlatformYampolsky.pdf

This is a version of The Lotus Sutra: https://www.bdk.or.jp/document/dgtl-...Sutra_2007.pdf

The Nishijima/Cross translation of Shobogenzo is fully available online: Volume 1, Volume 2, Volume 3, Volume 4

The Zen Site also contains numerous articles on Dogen and other Soto Zen folk and teachings: http://www.thezensite.com/

SotoZen-Net has a translation of the Denkoroku (Transmission of the Lamp) by Soji Keizan, legendary accounts of all of the Buddhas proceeding Dogen: https://global.sotozen-net.or.jp/eng...oku/index.html

Access to Insight contains English translations of the vast majority of the Pali Canon of early Buddhism: https://www.accesstoinsight.org/ptf/index.html

Otherwise, if you can get it at the moment, I really like the small book of Ryokan's poetry, One Robe One Bowl: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/..._Robe_One_Bowl
Also, Most Intimate by Roshi Pat Enkyo O'Hara: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/...-most-intimate


Gassho
Kokuu
-sattoday/lah-

This is a great list Kokuu! As a compulsive and hopelessly addicted reader I'm always curious about what other books people love - I've had some beautiful experiences based on other people's recommendations that I would never have discovered on my own.
I'd be interested to see what Treeleafers lists of say top 10 books look like, Zen related yes, but also general reading.
I'd also like to know if there are works of fiction that folks here regard as Zen or general Buddhism related?
Gassho
Meitou
Sattoday lah

[Jundo]

Yesterday I listened to Steve Hagen’s ‘Buddhism: it’s not what you think’ at work and thought it was pretty good. Without getting too judgmental, there were some questionable passages that *almost* veer into Deepak Chopra territory regarding science, knowledge and truth. I’m curious if anyone else here has read that book and what their views are on it.

Gassho,
Tom

Sat


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk Pro

Hi Tom,

It has been quite some time since I have read any Steve Hagen, but I will offer the impressions I recall. Unlike most of the writers who try to tie Buddhist and Zen ideas in with physics and other sciences, his versions are rather serious, and not new agey fluff and wild speculation. For example, he does not drop in stretched interpretations of quantum mechanics, relativity etc. in ways in which the same probably should not be used. He is rather conservative in his scientific speculations, as I recall. In fact, I recall vaguely feeling that he might even be too focused on the physical and material even for my tastes (I do not recall exactly my reasons for feeling so, however).

I consider myself rather of the same character, and while I do not expect Buddhism to agree with modern science in all ways, or to be confirmed in all ways by scientific discoveries, I demand that my Buddhism not obviously conflict with modern scientific understanding of how the world works. I also think that there are several areas where Mahayana Buddhism and science overlap (e.g., in understand how the mind creates our experience of life based on its modeling of data from the senses, various fluid visions of time, ideas of non-self and the like). For example, here is an example of my ramblings on such topics.

https://www.treeleaf.org/forums/showthread.php?16707-Night-sky-observations&p=235875&viewfull=1#post235875

Gassho, J

STLah

[Tom A.]

Hi Tom,

It has been quite some time since I have read any Steve Hagen, but I will offer the impressions I recall. Unlike most of the writers who try to tie Buddhist and Zen ideas in with physics and other sciences, his versions are rather serious, and not new agey fluff and wild speculation. For example, he does not drop in stretched interpretations of quantum mechanics, relativity etc. in ways in which the same probably should not be used. He is rather conservative in his scientific speculations, as I recall. In fact, I recall vaguely feeling that he might even be too focused on the physical and material even for my tastes (I do not recall exactly my reasons for feeling so, however).

I consider myself rather of the same character, and while I do not expect Buddhism to agree with modern science in all ways, or to be confirmed in all ways by scientific discoveries, I demand that my Buddhism not obviously conflict with modern scientific understanding of how the world works. I also think that there are several areas where Mahayana Buddhism and science overlap (e.g., in understand how the mind creates our experience of life based on its modeling of data from the senses, various fluid visions of time, ideas of non-self and the like). For example, here is an example of my ramblings on such topics.

https://www.treeleaf.org/forums/showthread.php?16707-Night-sky-observations&p=235875&viewfull=1#post235875

Gassho, J

STLah

Thanks Jundo,

I bet on Huike's left arm that I'd be more charitable if I read the book instead of listening to it while distracted :-)

I agree that he doesn't drop in wild fluff or speculation, he does throw around the word "truth" in this book a little too much for my taste. The reason that it gets a little cringeworthy is that he doesn't define "truth" (or different kinds of truth, provisional truth, ultimate truth, subjective truth etc... he seems to think "truth" is one thing) and seems to move the goal post around when talking about truth. Two of the "worst" passages were something like (and my memory might be faulty as it was an audiobook and I was working):

Truth can't be known in science because experts tend to be wrong sometimes.

And:

You have to be a skeptic in the greek sense of the word and question everything because modern scientific skeptics are just cynics.

Now that I got that out of the way, I want to praise this book:

It probably saved me years of confusion in the sense that I used to think my problems in general were a "bad" thing when in reality I have to take the bad with the good and there's no way around it. To put it another way: no mud, no lotus.

That I'm deluded in some ways and I can't do much about it makes sense to me as we are biological creatures conditioned by such karmic seeds of biology and environment.

He did a very good job at explaining "no gaining mind," that of I practice with gain in mind then it is wrong view.

He does a very good job at explaining some koans and stories in a way that isn't confusing.

Tom,
Gassho

Sat

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[Kokuu]

I'd be interested to see what Treeleafers lists of say top 10 books look like, Zen related yes, but also general reading.
I'd also like to know if there are works of fiction that folks here regard as Zen or general Buddhism related?

Hi Meitou!

I am not sure I could even make a top ten but at the moment I am reading a book by Rebecca Solnit, who is an essayist, feminist, environmentalist and also Buddhist (she is talking at Upaya soon). In the book, which is a history of her awakening to injustice and her relative invisibility as a woman, she talks about seeing feminism as part of her bodhisattva vow.

Of novels, those which are explicitly Buddhist/Zen include:

Siddhartha by Herman Hesse (I tend to read this once a year)
A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki who I believe is a Zen priest and her book talks of Dogen and Soto nuns.
Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders which won the UK Booker Prize in 2017 and talks about the Tibetan Buddhist bardo realms between incarnations, although I must admit to have not got around to reading it yet!
Someone also recently recommended a detective novel set in Tibet called The Skull Mantra.
Out of Nowhere claims to be a Zen mystery set in San Francisco with the protagonist living at the Zen Center!

Thersa Matsuura is a friend of mine and has written several great collections of short stories based on Japanese folklore, many of which have a Buddhist element. Like Jundo, she is a long-time transplant from the US, having lived most of her adult life in Japan. Actually, I bet if I asked she would do a reading for us at Treeleaf!

Terry Pratchett's Discworld book on religion, Small Gods, features The Order of Wen the Eternally Surprised, which is a sect rather resembling Buddhism (also given away by their other name 'the men in saffron')

“I nearly committed a terrible sin," said Brutha. "I nearly ate fruit on a fruitless day."
"That's a terrible thing, a terrible thing," said Om. "Now cut the melon.”

Be interesting to see what other Buddhist fiction members have come across.


Gassho
Kokuu
-sattoday/lah-