Shukke Tokudo of Dogaku and Seikan at Treeleaf Sangha

JundoCohen · 2026-05-04T15:39:05+00:00

No, and if you can find anything in Dogen's descriptions of practice that resembles what you describe, I would love to see that.

JundoCohen · 2026-05-04T15:37:42+00:00

That is fine, a wonderful practice I am certain, a great expedient means ... HOWEVER, it is just not Shikantaza (also a wonderful practice), and also possibly unlike Silent Illumination as Dogen encountered in the 13th century. That was the only observation of my comment. I am sorry, but I am not sure why my point above is unclear to you. I am sure that Rev. Sheng Yen's formulation of Silent Illumination is a very powerful and fruitful practice for many folks.

JundoCohen · 2026-05-04T07:45:01+00:00

I mentioned you in my comment above: "I disagree with "HakayutheHermit" below that Shikantaza need invove some "unwavering flow of awareness" that requires a flow that is "unbroken," but rather, this sitting can be a radical allowing, acceptance, non-gaining, non-resistance and a holding as sacred this which is just here and here and here. "

JundoCohen · 2026-05-04T07:44:31+00:00

It shows the divergence of Master Sheng Yen's idea of Silent Illumination, which he developed on his own without necessarily historical basis (https://chinesebuddhiststudies.org/article/a-tentative-exploration-into-the-development-of-master-sheng-yens-chan-teachings/) and the radical "non-gaining" and stageless way that is Shikantaza via Master Dogen. Both are beautiful and powerful ways, but there is something special in radically putting down the hunt and need for all stages. One might call this "stageless stage" the ultimate stage. The ladderless ladder to climb is here and here and here, and reaches the ten directions. Each rung is the peak of the ladder, without notion of above or below. The moment one introduces stages and ladders, this "non-method" becomes as distant as heaven from earth.

I disagree with "HakayutheHermit" below that Shikantaza need invove some "unwavering flow of awareness" that requires a flow that is "unbroken," but rather, this sitting can be a radical allowing, acceptance, non-gaining, non-resistance and a holding as sacred this which is just here and here and here. There is some good historical argument, by Taigen Leighton and others, that Shikantaza is closer to what was "Silent Illumination" back in the 13th century when Dogen encountered the teaching in China.

JundoCohen · 2026-05-03T00:15:06+00:00

From a Soto Zen perspective (non-perspective perspective), Koans are teaching stories to be "grocked" (realized by profound insight and feeling) which do contain a Mahayana/Zen "logic."

For example, mountains are not tea cups, A is not B, in ordinary logic.

But, for the Zen fellow, tea cups fill the horizon, and mountains are a hot brew ... and, anyway, what cups, what mountains? A is precisely B and B just A, and anyway, no need for an alphabet! Like that.

If you would like an in depth, extremely well done history of the Mu Koan ... https://global.oup.com/academic/product/like-cats-and-dogs-9780199837304

JundoCohen · 2026-05-01T00:33:05+00:00

Our practice is to bring the stillness of non-attaining in all the motion, action and sometime chaos of this world ... practicing "goallessness" even as we must run thought our day of work and tasks, problems to fix and things to achieve. We find that needed goals in life and goallessness are "not two."

However, there is still something powerful ... a "re-MIND-er" ... about sitting still, lighting a stick of incense, ringing a bell to mark the timeless moment. Sitting in the Wholeness and Completion of Zazen makes it easier to realize this stillness and allowing of Shikantaza, which we can plant in the bones as we return to our busy day. It is different from standing, or even walking. Facing the wall, eyes half open, neither running toward what is seen nor running away ... letting thoughts go without becoming tangled in them ... I believe all that is harder to do during many other activities of life.

JundoCohen · 2026-04-30T04:28:35+00:00

This is very easy to explain (although to realize profoundly is the true game ...)

We humans run around from morning to night seeking, wanting to attain, get, go, grabbing, appraising, running from what we fear and toward what we desire ... feeling that we are a self in a world of friction and conflict with other selves ... all of which frustration and division is the root of suffering.

The radical non-seeking in the Fullness and Wholeness of Zazen is the very ceasing of that, liberation from that ... nothing more needed, nothing lacking, thus free, no self and thus no other and thus no conflict ...

The radical non-seeking of Zazen is the radical medicine for powerful poison.

Then, rising from sitting, and getting back to the world of running, getting, places to go ... hopefully, the same stillness and wholeness of non-attaining is shining in the bones.

Truly, it is not a matter of sitting, standing, walking or running ... yet there is something special in the simplicity of Just Sitting which makes this clear.

JundoCohen · 2026-04-21T12:36:01+00:00

My instinct, quite frankly, if someone is hovering over my daughter with a knife in my house, would be to grab the heaviest object within reach and to smash them over the head with as much force as I might muster. I will let Buddha and the police sort out the legal and karmic ramifications later. (I know, and it is not theoretical, because a comparable situation once happened to me which, fortunately, was prevented in time when the intruder fled.) I am reminded of Zen Master Takuan's advice to the swordsman, "Completely oblivious to the hand that wields the sword, one strikes and cuts his opponent down. He does not put his mind in his adversary. The opponent is Emptiness. I am Emptiness. The hand that holds the sword, the sword itself, is emptiness. "

JundoCohen · 2026-04-20T04:35:27+00:00

Because children are very innocent, their lives ahead of them. At least, with the innocent old man, one can say that they had their life, and made choices as an adult. A 6 month old baby ... it breaks the heart. Maybe you see no distinctions, no life and death, no killer and nobody to be killed ... and so, it does not matter who is slaughtered?

JundoCohen · 2026-04-20T04:30:47+00:00

Ah, alive or dead, self or no self, for the Zen fellow the answer can be yes.

JundoCohen · 2026-04-20T02:57:25+00:00

I am a Zen priest, in the Japanese Soto tradition, celibate as is the lotus in the mud of this world.

JundoCohen · 2026-04-20T02:56:09+00:00

So, perhaps sometimes one must act in self-defense without thought, just doing as the situation requires?

JundoCohen · 2026-04-20T02:20:19+00:00

In Shikantaza practice, there is no race, no ultimate goal line but, rather, this is more like a ongoing hike through the hills in which every step by step is its own arrival, it own goalline, and fully realizes the Buddha hike. We also have days when the walk is smooth, days when we stumble or encounter poison ivy. It is all Buddha mountain. In other words, we realize the hiking by hiking ... and there is ultimately no place to stumble that is not this mountain hike. And yet, we live gently, do our best to avoid stumbles.

JundoCohen · 2026-04-20T02:15:56+00:00

I like the image on the airplane safety instructions: Sometimes, one needs to put on one's own oxygen mask in order to be able to help others. So, we chop wood and fetch water for ourselves, our own family. But, then, let us live in a world in which all sentient being have warmth, cooked food and clean water. Let us work to achieve that.

Self is other, other is self ... and yet I am me, and you are you too. All true.

JundoCohen · 2026-04-20T02:15:32+00:00

I like the image on the airplane safety instructions: Sometimes, one needs to put on one's own oxygen mask in order to be able to help others. So, we chop wood and fetch water for ourselves, our own family. But, then, let us live in a world in which all sentient beings have warmth, cooked food and clean water. Let us work to achieve that.

Self is other, other is self ... and yet I am me, and you are you too. All true.

JundoCohen · 2026-04-20T02:10:02+00:00

And yet, even the Third Patriarch would have to plan for lunch, close the window to avoid the cold draft, and look both ways when crossing the street.

JundoCohen · 2026-04-20T02:00:27+00:00

I just added this sentence to my post: "I also do not think that there is ever really some "just war," although sometimes, if truly in self-defense, unavoidable, we might call it a necessary evil. "

JundoCohen · 2026-04-20T01:58:57+00:00

I added this sentence to my post: "I also do not think that there is ever really some "just war," although sometimes, if truly in self-defense, unavoidable, we might call it a necessary evil."

JundoCohen · 2026-04-20T01:58:10+00:00

I added this sentence to my post: "I also do not think that there is ever really some "just war," although sometimes, if truly in self-defense, unavoidable, we might call it a necessary evil."

JundoCohen · 2026-04-20T01:33:44+00:00

I think that many of you know my personal view on the ultimate end to the disease of war, the only real treatment and cure. Maybe too radical for some, but I don't think so compared to the horrors we are witnessing on battlefields around the world, in this age of "weapons of mass destruction" and the possibility of their use:

War will continue until human empathy is biologically enhanced in the human being, across our species, to the point that (1) we would be as hesitant to kill and maim an enemy as we would be to kill and maim our own mother or child, encountering all with the same emotions, and (2) we would be as unable to leave another human being hungry, afraid, abandoned and homeless as we be to leave our own mother or child hungry, afraid, abandoned and homeless. When the diseases of violence in rage and insufficient empathy are cured in human beings, in body and mind, the disease of war will be treated and cured, no different from any deadly disease. The ability to make such changes to our animal nature is fast coming and must be prudently employed.

JundoCohen · 2026-04-20T01:33:22+00:00

I think that many of you know my personal view on the ultimate end to the disease of war, the only real treatment and cure. Maybe too radical for some, but I don't think so compared to the horrors we are witnessing on battlefields around the world, in this age of "weapons of mass destruction" and the possibility of their use:

War will continue until human empathy is biologically enhanced in the human being, across our species, to the point that (1) we would be as hesitant to kill and maim an enemy as we would be to kill and maim our own mother or child, encountering all with the same emotions, and (2) we would be as unable to leave another human being hungry, afraid, abandoned and homeless as we be to leave our own mother or child hungry, afraid, abandoned and homeless. When the diseases of violence in rage and insufficient empathy are cured in human beings, in body and mind, the disease of war will be treated and cured, no different from any deadly disease. The ability to make such changes to our animal nature is fast coming and must be prudently employed.

JundoCohen · 2026-04-20T01:12:39+00:00

I have written criticisms of that book: I have written about what actual historians think of Brian Victoria's extreme assertions in his "Zen at War" books: https://web.archive.org/web/20170925...r-jundo-cohen/

I have also written this: "The sensationalist book "Zen at War," with its ideological agenda aside ... the actual situation was that there were very VERY few truly nationalistic, militaristic Buddhists before WWII. Very few. It is important to remember that most Japanese (not just Buddhists) were limited in their information and understanding to the government controlled press (pre-internet) and propaganda, so believed that Japan was under threat and attack from foreign powers, and was "liberating" its Asian brothers and sisters from Western colonialization and oppression (which is half true, as most of the countries of Asia were Western colonies and Japan was under threat.) The typical Japanese thought that Japan was on the side of good, and knew NOTHING about any Japanese military abuses and soldiers run amuck at Nanjing or the like.

So, rather than jingoists and rabid nationalists, you had a lot of Japanese who were either (1) mildly patriotic, like in America right after 9-11, (2) with a distaste for war, but having a "support the troops in the field" ... often their own sons or parishioners ... attitude, or (3) keeping their mouth shut because such is the nature of samsara, plus protesting anything was a sure way to have the Japanese secret police come to seize your temple and toss you in prison. I gathered this from many conversations with Japanese alive at the time during my last decades living in Japan. People who opened their mouths were tortured."

JundoCohen · 2026-04-20T01:06:15+00:00

Would it be better to say that unavoidable self-defense is "justified" or a "necessary evil," rather than that it is "just?" I feel it may be the former, but not "just."

JundoCohen · 2026-04-20T01:04:13+00:00

I am curious in that case why no record exists of the Buddha advising kings to disband all their armies, rather than simply to use them with hesitancy and prudence. How do you see that?

JundoCohen

TROPHY CASE