Is Zen dead in Japan?

[Heitou]

Today I was on Facebook watching a Retreat from the Atlanta Soto Zen Center, Silent Thunder Order, the theme was " Vows in Bloom" and they were doing an interview with JoJo Sensei. They were promoting his book Original Frontier, and he said Zen is dead in Japan. As well as Zen will find it's rebirth in America. He also stated it is difficult to be a priest in Japan. Is there any truth in this?

Gassho
Heitou
SatToday

[Tairin]

Isn’t Jundo in Japan?


Tairin
Sat today and lah

[Bion]

Today I was on Facebook watching a Retreat from the Atlanta Soto Zen Center, Silent Thunder Order, the theme was " Vows in Bloom" and they were doing an interview with JoJo Sensei. They were promoting his book Original Frontier, and he said Zen is dead in Japan. As well as Zen will find it's rebirth in America. He also stated it is difficult to be a priest in Japan. Is there any truth in this?

Gassho
Heitou
SatToday

Who is this Jojo person? Is he Japanese? Is he speaking from firsthand experience? I have friends that are monks and priests in Japan and they seem alive and practicing with their sanghas


Sorry for extra lines.

[emoji1374] SatToday

[Jundo]

Today I was on Facebook watching a Retreat from the Atlanta Soto Zen Center, Silent Thunder Order, the theme was " Vows in Bloom" and they were doing an interview with JoJo Sensei. They were promoting his book Original Frontier, and he said Zen is dead in Japan. As well as Zen will find it's rebirth in America. He also stated it is difficult to be a priest in Japan. Is there any truth in this?

Gassho
Heitou
SatToday

Hi Heitou,

That is a very exaggerated statement that some western priests like to make. Some Japanese like to say that Zen is dead in China, only alive in Japan!

What is true is that most of Japanese Buddhism is focused on running local parish temples, whose central activity is performing funeral and ancestor memorial services for parishioners. Although funerals serve a vital social function and comfort the bereaved, the focus at most places is not Zazen, nor other aspects of Buddhist teaching. In fact, most Japanese Zen priests, Soto or Rinzai, after they "graduate" from their few years of education in the monastery, do not continue a regular Zazen practice themselves. Further, most temples are family maintained, where the priest is the son of his father, who was the priest before him. That means that many priests are not there by personal religious feeling, but primarily to maintain the temple and its traditions which are their family home. That is all true.

HOWEVER, there are still many, many priests who are the real deal, centered on Zazen and the path, as much as anyone. There are wonderful Zen teachers here. The great Zen universities are here, with the finest scholars in the world specialized in Zen studies. The great monasteries are here, keeping alive many important traditions and ways which are almost completely neglected and forgotten in the west.

Zen needs YOU too, to do your sitting and practice and keep the path alive.

So, I like to say that, if Zen Buddhism were only like Chinese or Japanese or Korean Zen, it would be dead. If it were only like Atlanta Zen Center or Treeleaf Sangha, it would be dead. However, with all of us, it is very much ALIVE!

Is it difficult to become a priest in Japan? Generally, yes. As I said, most trainee priests are the 20-ish year old sons of temple families, raised in the family temple as their father's apprentice since being a kid, then attending one of the Zen colleges for 4 years, then going into a very strict monastery for about another 2 years. Very few westerners can make it successfully through the Japanese monasteries because of language and the hard lifestyle. Matsuoka Roshi (the founder of Atlanta Soto Zen Center) and Nishijima Roshi were all about opening the priesthood to westerners, many working and family people, who could not make it through the Japanese training system, and about Zazen, Zazen, Dogen, Zazen. I am glad, although we also lose many traditions and skills that way too.

Gassho, J

STLah

[Heitou]

I'm sorry I misspelled his name, Hojo Sensei.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/0764360884...7VNNT0ZV9T57HJ in the video he called himself Hojo Sensei. Guess I'll stay away from those guys.

Gassho
Heitou
SatToday

[Shonin Risa Bear]

At one point there was just this one dude staring at a wall on Mt. Song.

_()_

gassho
d. shonin sat and some lah

[Onkai]

At one point there was just this one dude staring at a wall on Mt. Song.

_()_

gassho
d. shonin sat and some lah

LOL!

Gassho,
Onkai
Sat/lah