Jing-reed's Musings from Thailand

Becoming A Buddhist Monk

Several days ago I briefly described, and presented a video, about the process of becoming a Buddhist monk here in Thailand.  Several years ago when my neighbor and very good friend Pae [also known as 'Justin'] went through the ordination process, I later wrote about it.  Even posted it on another of my personal web sites, 'Chiang Mai Tales'.   This is the link to the complete story of Justin's ordination.

Many years ago I also went though the Buddhist ordination process, though mine was in 1955 and occurred at the Eiheiji monastery [永平寺] in western Japan.  Many of the features of the process were similar, though couched in the customs and traditions of Japan.  I have also written about that process, and the events which led up to it, in 'The Repository'. This is the link leading up to my own Buddhist ordination process.

The attached video of the Eiheiji monastery was taken by my good buddy from Oz, Yakov Smirnoff when he visited there several years ago.

"Established in 1244 and Japan's most active zen meditation monastery since the late 16th century, Eihei-ji, Temple of Eternal Peace, is about 30 minutes by bus from Fukui and is home to about 50 elders and 250 black-robed trainees. This serene community, set on the slopes of a mountain and surrounded by cedars, is moss-green in summer, and serenaded by cicadas. In winter, snow arrives to transform the complex into a glistening white mountainscape."

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New Banner

In an attempt to keep this blog interesting I occasionally change the masthead. This new banner design contains a digitized version of my Japanese 'hanko' [name stamp].

In 1954, when I was working in Japan, for the U.S. government, I became friends with a most remarkable person, the abbot of a small rural Soto Zen temple.  Rev. Shimizu becama a personal friend and mentor during my four year stay in Hokkaido.  During one of our many conversations he suggested that I get a personal hanko, or name stamp. In Japan it is the custom for all adults to have a personal name stamp which is used in lieu of a personal signature and is used in all documents, office paperwork, contracts, art, or any item requiring acknowledgment or authorship.

And to this end he transformed a part of my surname into Japanese kanji characters, striving to combine the phonetic sounds with kanji characters which had a connection to nature..   And so I became 栗巣帝 [Kirusutei].

   栗 'Kiru' can be traslated as 'chestnut tree',
   巣 'su' means 'bird nest',
   帝 'tei' means 'along the royal way'.

Time Passes . . .

[Usually this blog contains rather impersonal bits of news and things that interest me.  Today's posting is much more personal, a bit of personal history.]


Reading about the death of gay Cpl. Andrew Wilfahrt in Afghanistan yesterday opened a personal repository of memories more than half a century old.

I recalled the day in October of 1955 that I learned that Sp3 Gregory Bartoni, a Korean linguist attached to the ASA, had been killed in Korea.  No, not from warfare, since the Korean War had ended three years previously, but rather a tragic jeep accident on an icy road. He had also died in a foreign land, far from his native home and his immediate family.  Also far from his military lover, who was stationed on the northern Japanese island of Hokkaido.

Gregg and I had first met at Fort Devins, Mass. where we were assigned to a two man room during the first part of our 'intelligence training'. Later we would both attend a year's training at the Army Language School in California, where he was assigned to the Korean department, and I would be studying Russian. Both languages were necessary during the 'cold war' of the time. We both eventually worked collecting intelligence for the Army Security Agency, a super secret military wing of the National Security Agency.

I know it may sound a bit corny and perhaps overly romantic, but it was love at first sight.  And we were both aware of it from the time I walked into our two man room. I remember well that Gregg was reading a book by John Donne, a contemporary of Shakespeare, and listening to some Vivaldi.  We spent that first evening drinking beer and getting to know each other.  We found that our interests, in classical music, opera, literature, botany, film and art, dovetailed like a perfectly mitered joint.  His family was from Greece and Italy, and mine was from Slovakia, though I also had a bit of Mediterranean ancestry..  Both of us had joined the military not out of any über patriotic reason, but rather as a way of escaping the draft and not having to shoot anyone or be shot at.

We knew that somehow destiny had arranged for us to become lovers and lifetime partners. It was certainly not something that we announced to all our military buddies, but rather they adduced it for themselves, and were accepting.  They knew us first as individuals and worthy of their friendship, and if we happened to be gay that was our business. [This was long, long before the introduction of DADT.]

Towards the end of our year's language study we drove down to So. California to spend the three day 4th of July holiday with my mother, since my birthday also occured during this period.  Bozhena, my mother, almost immediately adopted Gregg as a second son. In fact it was during dinner at a restaurant that weekend that she casually mentioned that we seemed to be very much in love.  So I didn't have to have the long dreaded , "Hey mom, I'm gay" talk with her since she had figured it out all by herself, and as I learned, even approved of my choice of a life partner.

Gregg was sent to Korea, and I went to Hokkaido, both horrifically cold in the winter months.  After a year of writing at least once a week, we made plans to spend a lengthy R & R in Kyoto. And then we planned to visit some gay language school friends stationed in Kyushu in southern Japan. This was in September of 1955.   Certainly the most memorable vacation of my life and Gregg felt the same.

In October two of my letters to him were returned to me having been stamped "Undeliverable".  Perplexed I wrote to the unit commander where he was stationed, and soon received a reply that he unfortunately had been killed in a jeep accident.  The first love of my life had been unceremoniously snatched from me and my future shattered.

Some six months later I was visiting with a Buddhist priest friend there in Hokkaido, an elderly gentleman of immense wisdom and compassion, who was the abbot of a small zen temple.

Then suddenly I was talking about Gregg and his death.  I was even talking about our relationship, not knowing how Shimizu-roshi would respond to my revelations.  He was silent.  Then he began to gently explain that it was normal to love and expect our relationships to last forever, but it was this very aspect of human behavior that the Buddha had pondered and attempted to comprehend.  The message of Buddhism was that all of life was impermanent, transitory, and whenever we attempted to hold on too tightly, we were bound to suffer the consequences.

Reverend Shimizu sighed ever so softly.  We had been speaking in English, but he suddenly reverted to Japanese and said, "Hardest of all to love are the cherry blossoms."   Then, as if to make sure I understood, he repeated it in English.  He gazed out of the open room, the shoji had been left open to let in the gentle night air.  He looked  to the verdant hillside beyond, now bathed in the light of the nearly full spring moon.  In the foreground there was an old cherry tree and even in the pale moonlight, petals could be seen drifting to the ground below. I knew that his phrase held a special significance, but had not yet grasped the meaning.

He continued, "There is a seventh century collection of poetry, The Monzen, which begins with the lines, 'Time passes and nothing endures, the delicate cherry blossoms least of all".

The pauses in his conversation were obviously as important as the information within the words, phrases and sentences.  "The blossoms in spring, the song of the nightingale in summer, the red maple leaves in autumn and the first snow of winter are the most moving of all beautiful things,.......... but which of them lasts forever?..........Human life is no different."

"Perhaps most important, and difficult, is to learn an appreciation and acceptance of the moment.  Like the refreshing breeze of summer your young friend has moved on.  Your life was enriched by his presence, inspired by his knowledge and comforted by his love, and now you are faced with the ultimate reality that nothing  physical lasts forever."

He continued by quoting the entire poem of that anonymous author of so long ago.  Someone who, it appeared, had faced the same emptiness that had gripped my being.


     Time passes and nothing endures,
     the delicate cherry blossoms least of all.

     A storm in the night and we are parted from the blossoms;
     They are gone in the morning.
     These few words and tears alone remain.

     Love them, those blossoms that fall so quickly.
     Realize that the ancient pine too,
    After a thousand years, will wither.

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Tony Scott - Zen Meditation

 

I first purchased the Tony Scott 'Music for Zen Meditation and Other Joys'' album in 1964, and have always had various incarnations of it [LP, cassette tape, CD] by my side as I performed my wanderings around the globe. Very pleasant sounding combination of clarinet, Japanese koto and shakuhachi.

From the original liner notes [by Alan Watts and Tony Scott:

"This superb record is not only a delight to the ear but an event in musical history.

For it took Tony Scott, Western jazz clarinetist to coax two of the greatest masters of traditional Japanese music to join him in an unrehearsed session of purely spontaneous playing.Ordinarily, Japanese classical music - as performed on the koto (table harp) and shakuhachi (bamboo flute - is extremely rigorous and formal, but Scott, like the Pied Piper, charmed Yuize and Yamamoto into this free-floating improvisation by his skill in playing the clarinet in the mood and style of bamboo flute, in some ways the result is more Zen than Zen - in the sense that, today, Japanese Zen Buddhism and the many arts associated with it have settled too firmly into the rigid- though nonetheless expert - ruts of traditions. Early Chinese Zen, so close in spirit to the Taoism of Lao-tzu and Chuang-tzu was much more spontaneous , and this record recaptures its feeling quite remarkably.

Zen is a way of living ( not a theory), through which peolple experience themselves, not as separated beings, but as one of the whole universe, of which every individual is a unique expression. The Zen artist, therefore, puts both his skill and his instrument…flute or harp, brush or potter's wheel, at the disposal of the Tao, the Way of Nature, so that his art becomes as natural as the clouds and the waves…which never make aesthetic mistakes. as a Chinese poem says:

     In the scenery of spring there is nothing superior, nothing inferior:

     Flowering branches are by nature, some short, some long. "

Found a excellent video which captures the spirit of the music.  Both music and video encapsulate the essence of everyday zen, not the rigid formal zen practice of monasteries, but the living zen which we encounter in our daily lives.  

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Zen GPS

     [With thanks to  Steve]

A Moment of Zen

 

A moment of Zen with Tony Harris, and in less than a couple of seconds.  No doubt a personal experience of "Instant Satori ©".

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Moment of Zen - This World Wears Tony Harris Out
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Health Care Crisis

Eihei-ji — Temple of Eternal Peace — 永平寺

Eihei-ji (永平寺, Temple of Eternal Peace) is one of two main temples of the Sōtō sect of Zen Buddhism. Its founder was Kigen Dōgen, who in 1244 initiated construction of the monastery in western Japan. Eihei-ji is located about 10 km (6 mi) east of Fukui in Fukui Prefecture.  An  impressive structure totally constructed from wood and with rock foundations, it is surrounded by, and an integral part of the mountainous terrain covered by large cryptomeria trees. 

 Due to the presence of heavy snow in the winter months it abounds in covered walkways connecting all parts of the large monastery complex. The atmosphere of tranquility is enhanced by a stream that flows through the inner courtyards. The temple is a true testament to the ability of the ancient Japanese to fuse architecture and nature in a seamless and timeless totality.

A friend from Australia, who is a travel writer, and knowing that I had been a novice monk at Eiheiji many years ago, visited there a couple of weeks ago and spent considerable time video taping the buildings and extensive mountain gardens.  He later added the lyrical sound of a shakuhachi [Japanese bamboo flute] to the video.   This is a wonderful presentation which captures tthe beauty and spirit of The Temple of Eternal Peace.

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TODAY'S MOMENT OF ZEN

Wavy Gravy once asked a Zen Roshi, "What happens after death?"

The Roshi replied, "I don't know."

Wavy protested, "But you're a Zen Master!"

"Yes," the Roshi admitted, "but I'm not a dead Zen Master."

Shamelessly / or / Shamefully lifted from Grow-a-brain.

ZEN 'N STUFF

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Zen and Buddhism have been an integral part of my life for over 50 years.  Even played the shaven-head routine at Eiheiji in western Japan.  However, I am not now a practicing Buddhist.  Not a practicing religious anything for that matter.  Curiously it was my stint as a monk that released me forever from the necessity to belong to any organized group, and for which I chant a profound 有難うございます- thank you very much [for this wisdom]. And yet, and yet, I find 'zen' in nearly every aspect of my daily life from that first satisfying early morning urination to the sound of the birds at midday and the refreshing taste of an exquisite Vietnamese coffee at sunset.  It is all a part of the totality. And when we learn to shift our focus just a midge it becomes evident that the totality is indeed zen.

And a daily dose of haiku can be, if you are so inclined, a wonderful adjunct in this respect.

It was Robert Pirsig who wisely intoned, "The Zen you find on the tops of mountains is the Zen you bring up there."  And there are echoes of the same sentiment in all of many books on zen and the orient by Alan Watts.  For me, and I can only quantify by my own personal experience, I find the zen experience to be such an integral part of living that the two cannot be separated. 

Is Zen illogical?   [Alan Watts, The Way of Zen]

Illogical is not the right word.

Because, what often appear in Zen to be paradoxes are statements that make perfect sense in another system of logic than that to which we are accustomed. We in the West are accustomed to a kind of logical thinking that is based on exclusiveness — “either-or”. 

Chinese logic, on the other hand, is based on “both-and”.

…Chinese logic [recognizes] that black and white are inseparable, that they in fact need each other, and so it is not a matter of making a choice between them.

“To be or not to be” is not the question — because you cannot have one without the other.

Not-being implies being; just as being implies not being.

A new favorite zen story [from ‘growabrain’]:

A zen master lay dying. His monks had gathered around his bed, from the most senior to the most novice monk. The senior monk leaned over to ask the dying master if he had any final words of advice for his monks. The old master slowly opened his eyes and in a weak voice whispered, "Tell them Truth is like a river."  The senior monk passed this piece of information in turn to the monk next to him, and it circulated around the room.

When the words reached the youngest monk he asked, "What does he mean, 'Truth is like a river'?"

The question was passed back around the room to the senior monk who leaned over the bed and asked, "Master, what do you mean, 'Truth is like a river'?"

Slowly the master opened his eyes and in a weak voice whispered, "OK, Truth is not like a river."

Listening to Life

Did some web investigation on Anthony de Mello SJ, yesterday. A friend has been including quotes from him occasionally in her email messages, and became curious about de Mello as a person. De Mello’s writings, in the form of stores, parables, and zen-like koans, are not at all what one would expect from a Jesuit priest. Certainly not the usual “God-Father-Son, Jesus, Mary, Joseph and all the blessed Catholic saints”, as well as “thus saith the Pope” balderdash. Very ‘eastern/universal’ in their wisdom. Have noticed that de Mello has become widely quoted in recent years and pops up where you would least expect him.

Born in 1931 in Goa, Anthony de Mello, S.J. was a Jesuit Priest from India and director of the Dadhana Institute of Pastoral Counseling in Poona, India. De Mello insisted that spirituality is the most practical thing in the world — to experience the happiness that belongs to you and which surrounds you daily; to eliminate unwanted suffering from your life; to understand the most basic of all life's questions: "Who am I?"; these couldn't be more practical and these are the substance of spiritual pursuit.

He challenged people to encounter the God behind all the words, concepts and religious formulas. Though he was a Jesuit, he even went so far as to point out the capacity of 'religion' to interfere with our relationship with God. This brought him considerable criticism from various quarters, including the Vatican. He died in 1987.

A Google Search of “Anthony de Mello” resulted in a return of over 100,000 pages!

Concerning his book “One Minute Wisdom”:

Each spiritual anecdote is a conversation between the Master and his disciples.
The following is from the Introduction of the book:

"The Master in these tales is not a single person. He is a Hindu Guru, a Zen Roshi, a Taoist Sage, a Jewish Rabbi, a Christian Monk, a Sufi Mystic. He is Lao-tzu and Socrates. Buddha and Jesus. Zarathustra and Mohammed. His teaching is found in the seventh century B.C. and the twentieth century A.D. His wisdom belongs to East and West alike. Do his historical antecedents really matter? History, after all, is the record of appearances, not Reality; of doctrines, not of Silence.

"It will only take a minute to read each one. You will probably find the Master's language baffling, exasperating, even downright meaningless."

As DeMello says of his work: "This, alas, is not an easy book! It was written not to instruct but to Awaken. Concealed within its pages (not in the printed words, not even in the tales, but in its spirit, its mood, its atmosphere) is a Wisdom which cannot be conveyed in human speech. As you read the printed page and struggle with the Master's cryptic language, it is possible that you will unwittingly chance upon the Silent Teaching that lurks within the book, and be Awakened and transformed. This is what Wisdom means: To be changed without the slightest effort on your part, to be transformed, believe it or not, merely by waking to the reality that is not words, that lies beyond the reach of words.

"If you are fortunate enough to be Awakened thus, you will know why the finest language is the one that is not spoken, the finest action is the one that is not done and the finest change is the one that is not willed."

The Fragrance of the Rose

The disciples were absorbed in a discussion of Lao-tzu’s dictum:
Those who know do not say;
Those who say do not know.

When the master entered,
They asked him what the words meant.
Said the master, "Which of you knows the fragrance of a rose?"
All of them indicated that they knew.
Then he said, "put it into words."
All of them were silent.

Liberation

"How shall I get liberation?"
"Find out who has bound you," said the Master.
The disciple returned after a week and said,
"No one has bound me."
"Then why ask to be liberated?"

That was a moment of Enlightenment for the disciple,
who suddenly became free.

Now curiously, in both Google searches it immediately becomes evident that a vast number of the pages were from the Vatican denouncing Father de Mello and pointing out that his writings [many published books, which have become very popular] DO NOT carry the Vatican’s, specifically that Catholic-Nazi Ratzinger’s, approval. Seems that Fr. de Mello is seen by the ‘Church’ as somewhat of a heretic. Didn’t toe the Vatican line. Stepped outside their rigid box. Horror of horrors, he thought for himself, and actually expressed it. Anyway these official Vatican Notifications denouncing his writing were to be found in English, Latin of course, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, German, Polish. . . well, you get the picture.

NOTIFICAZIONE DELLA CONGREGAZIONE PER LA DOTTRINA DELLA FEDE SUGLI SCRITTI DI PADRE ANTHONY DE MELLO, SJ , 22.08.1998

With the present Notification, in order to protect the good of the Christian faithful, this Congregation declares that the above-mentioned positions are incompatible with the Catholic faith and can cause grave harm.

The Sovereign Pontiff John Paul II, at the Audience granted to the undersigned Cardinal Prefect, approved the present Notification, adopted in the Ordinary Session of this Congregation, and ordered its publication.

Rome, from the offices of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, June 24, 1998, the Solemnity of the Birth of John the Baptist.

+ Joseph Card. Ratzinger, Prefect

. . . . . “and can cause grave harm”. Yeah sure, god forbid that the congregation should actually begin thinking, and worse still that they should question the BS that the church has been selling for the last 2,000 years.

From another web site:

De Mello censure reflects Vatican misgivings about Eastern thinking
By JOHN L. ALLEN JR.
NCR Staff

“Nobody can be said to have attained the pinnacle of Truth,” Jesuit Fr. Anthony de Mello once wrote, “until a thousand sincere people have denounced him for blasphemy.”

By that standard, Aug. 23 [1998] brought de Mello a bit closer to the mark, as the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith condemned the works of the Indian Jesuit -- known for his attempts to bridge Eastern and Western spirituality-- for “relativizing” faith and thus leading to “religious indifferentism.”

In the United States, reaction has consisted largely of puzzlement among de Mello supporters, both as to the content and the timing of the statement, and alarm among publishers.In India, meanwhile, Jesuit officials have suggested that the Vatican action may have been prompted by writings published after de Mello’s death, which do not fairly represent his thinking.

In a July 23 letter, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger alerted the presidents of the world’s bishops’ conferences to the impending declaration. He also asked the bishops to try to withdraw de Mello’s books from circulation, or to ensure that they’re printed with a notice indicating they may cause “grave harm” to the faith (NCR, Aug. 28).

Seems to me that it is all about the Catholic Church’s centuries year old struggle to retain control and little by little that control is being lost as people do begin to think for themselves, as more and more sources reflect a view of the ‘Spirit’ which is beyond the rigid confines of the Church.

Well I may, or may not agree, with all that Fr. de Mello has written, but he has certainly become MY patron saint. May even put a picture of him next to my favorite statue of Buddha. Both of whom were merely men, human beings with a larger view of the possibilities of the human spirit. Much larger, evidently, than the Vatican is capable of envisioning.