Desire, Devotion, and Excess at the San Francisco Zen Center. In some of these biographies, people later classified as Chan monks were listed in other categories, such as Master Yantou Huo as an ascetic and Master Xingzhi as a benefactor. "To sum up the situation, we have no sources at all from the T'ang which mentions or describe explicitly "Chan" institutions," p. 267. Please keep it in mind. The Board of Directors at SFZC also began election of leaders. In fact, Kapleau never received Dharma transmission in the first place, so there was nothing to rescind. In fact, it was often not based on spiritual attainment at all, most especially so in Japanese Soto Zen, which is the sect of Suzuki, Baker and the San Francisco Zen Center. For an outstanding article on Sanbokyodan Zen, a Zen sect important in the West see, Sharf, Robert, "Sanbokyodan, Zen and the Way of New Religions", Japanese Journal of Religious Studies, Fall 1995, Vol. [21][22][23] Today SFZC is the largest Soto organization with a foothold in the West. Tassajara Bakery was a Zen Center venture promoted by Richard Baker as an extension of the baking practices at Tassajara Zen Mountain Center. Even though the bureaucratic "transmissions" in the Soto church have nothing to do with spiritual insight, the Soto institution does nothing to dissuade people thinking that there is a mind-to-mind connection between its "roshis" and the historical Buddha. After six months, he returned to his position. His first wife contracted tuberculosis and returned to her parents shortly after marriage; his second wife was brutally murdered by an erratic, antisocial monk whom Suzuki had retained as a temple assistant, despite contrary advise from neighbors and colleagues. Examining the work of any of the above-mentioned scholars will greatly reward the interested reader who would like to explore contemporary Zen/Buddhist scholarship. By the seventies he calculates 10-15,000 hours and that by 1987 the most senior practitioners had each meditated some 20- 25,000 hours on the cushion. For an earlier view of the immediate events surrounding Baker, see Butler, Katy, "Events Are The Teachers", The CoEvolution Quarterly, winter 1983, pp.112-123. Shoes Outside The Door, p.135. Foulk disagrees with this view. In 2003 Paul Haller, who received transmission from Sojun Mel Weitsman in 1993, was installed as co-abbot with her. Interestingly, the later versions of the supposed events often have more detail than the earlier versions, implying that we are dealing with literary creations rather than historical biography. Others have told me that my view, informed by historical scholarship (as opposed to Zen's own fictional history), sociology, political and social analysis as well as long personal involvement, has been helpful in clarifying some of the illusion and in reducing some of the pain. One of the greatest reasons that Shimano could sleep with so many women is that it bothered the men so little. San Francisco Zen Center practitioners did make a serious commitment to their practice. It seems that Zen's emphasis on wisdom, while giving compassion only lip service, is really about power. [2] From 1968 to 1971, he traveled to Japan to practice at the primary St monasteries there, including Antaiji, Eiheiji, and Daitokuji. That "something else" is what Michael Downing tries to find in "Shoes Outside the Door: Desire, Devotion and Excess at the San Francisco Zen Center. " Zen Mind? A Zen teacher can certainly assist his students in their practice, can encourage the students to be diligent, guide their meditation practice in both public and private meetings, offer aid in difficult times, talk about Zen texts to enrich the student's sense of the tradition and explicate Buddhist and Zen ideas. A pioneer of gourmet vegetarian cuisine in America, the restaurant's first chefs were Edward Espe Brown and Deborah Madison. For more on the Soto Zen institution in Japan see Foulk, T. Griffith, "The Zen Institute in Modern Japan", pp.157-177, Zen, Tradition and Transition, Kenneth Kraft ed., NY, Grove Press, 1988. San Francisco Zen Center's purpose is to make the teachings and practice of Soto Zen Buddhism widely available, to train teachers, and to help cultivate mindfulness and compassion in the world. He reported being mugged at knifepoint by a man just a block away from the San Francisco Zen Center at 300 Page Street. Soon these Westerners participated in regular services, and new non-Asian students came to outnumber the Japanese-American congregation. It is available on the internet at http://www2.h-net.msu.edu/~buddhism/aar-bs/1999/lachs.htm (here you can also access the other papers from the panel on Ch'an ) or at http://www.darkzen.com/Articles/meansofauthorization.htm (one can also find other essays on Zen at this site). The number of practitioners at SFZC grew rapidly in the mid-sixties. It is hard to avoid the conclusion that Suzuki, in so many ways an admirable person, had a large hand in the problems that followed his death. Rather than report this to the police, Anderson returned to the body over several days to meditate over the corpse. For a peek into a period only shortly before our own, we can use Brian Victoria's book Zen At War. According to the dust jacket, Downing spent three years interviewing 80 people at the center of the Zen Center scandal. University of Michigan, 1987. Downing, who lives in Cambridge, Mass., provides an outsider's view into the incestuous circles at the first Buddhist monastery in the West. Explore and learn more about the San Francisco Zen Center community. At first, I had trouble with Downing's refusal to bend to the dictates of chronology and a quirky writing style that sometimes works and sometimes doesn't. (If the reader wants to argue that Dharma transmission in the Rinzai sect or in the modern Sanbokyodan sect so popular in the West matches the ideal of Zen rhetoric, please feel free to email me at my address listed in the Notes.) "[36], SFZC is connected, in an unofficial capacity, to the following Zen Centers:[1], Coordinates: .mw-parser-output .geo-default,.mw-parser-output .geo-dms,.mw-parser-output .geo-dec{display:inline}.mw-parser-output .geo-nondefault,.mw-parser-output .geo-multi-punct{display:none}.mw-parser-output .longitude,.mw-parser-output .latitude{white-space:nowrap}374626N 1222534W / 37.774009N 122.426075W / 37.774009; -122.426075. Coming Down from the Zen Clouds: A Critique of the Current State of American Zen There is nothing in the description that allows someone in the future to distinguish Suzuki, Hoitsu or any of their heirs from any of thousands of hallowed ancestors. Its raison d'etre is to produce people who possess a fundamental insight into life, people who are not fooled by appearances or ideas. Shoes Outside The Door, p.237. 4.5. [10] The community's sense of crisis sharpened when the woman's husband, one of SFZC's primary benefactors, threatened to hold the organization legally responsible for its abbot's apparent misconduct.[11]. As long as it was understood that Baker was the only Dharma heir of Suzuki, it was exceedingly difficult for any one to question Baker's behavior and style. For an analysis of the idealized, one-dimensional style of describing a roshi, the one of Suzuki in Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind being just one contemporary example, see "Simpleness" in Alan Cole's previously mentioned paper, "It's All in the Framing", p.6. In reality it means, "don't question, don't look!" It is clear that the senior members of Zen Center surrounding Baker were well-indoctrinated vessels of Zen ideology. In the last few decades as opposed to the past, we have had a clear personal view of the actual people involved, Richard Baker being only one. [5] Baker was ordained a St priest by Suzuki in 1966 just before the opening of Tassajara Zen Mountain Center. "Something above ninety percent of us had come from alcoholic families or families that were dysfunctional with the same patterns." Before Victoria's book was published these people, many who were influential in bringing Zen to the west, were routinely presented as flawless examples of Zen attainment. For example, the San Francisco Zen Center, after a scandal involving Suzuki-roshi's dharma heir Richard Baker-roshi, decided to elect its two abbots to four-year terms. Mark Oppenheimeris the author of three other books, includinga memoir of high school debateand atravelogue about crashing bar mitzvahs. Was he perhaps not a fully realized person? [9] The building, designed by Julia Morgan, was built as the Emanu-el Residence Club in 1922 for the Emanu-el Sisterhood. Also see the public letter from Mr. Kapleau toYamada, dated 2/17/86. The Church hierarchy has displayed a consistent concern for protecting and maintaining the eminence of the abusive priests and the holiness of the institution of the Catholic Church, rather than concern for the children and teenagers trusted to their care. Writings featured as biography in Zen are most often an idealized presentation of how a master should perform his role rather than the life of a real person. Zen priest Mel Weitsman served with Anderson as a co-abbot during the remainder of his term, and the tradition of two sitting Abbots continued for the next few decades. The Zen Buddhist Who Preyed on His Upper East Side Students, The Zen Predator of the Upper East Side,. Unlike his predecessors, Suzuki was a fluent speaker of English who actually wanted to come to the United States. For a history of early Soto Zen as well as how the Soto sect has understood Dharma transmission since roughly 1700, see Bodiford, William M., Soto Zen in Medieval Japan, University of Hawaii Press, 1993, p. 215. At the time, Schnyer was just 24 years old, yet he had been a Shimano student since he was a teenager. Baker wrote an introduction to Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind, an edited collection of Suzuki's talks, in which Baker said (p.17), "During the Second World War he [Suzuki] was the leader of a pacifist group in Japan." That Kapleau never received Dharma transmission was exposed in a public letter from Yamada roshi dated,1/16/86. All of this is in the context of Suzuki, the Zen master, being a man whose quality of life is described as: "buoyancy, vigor, straightforwardness, simplicity, humility, security, joyousness, uncanny perspicacity and unfathomable compassion." Zen's highly ritualized activities added a visceral instantiation to the cognitive edifice. We can begin to approach an answer by thinking about the nature of authority. But during the 1960s, Suzuki attracted an eager flock of meditating Westerners, including Baker, who showed up in 1962 and was soon singled out as a possible successor. In fifteen years, the Center's annual budget increased from $6,000, to $4 million. These and any number of other questions, complaints, hurts or criticisms harbored by his disciples, were not raised. This change in demography caused a rift in the Sokoji community. Until recently, the United States had very few natives who possessed that knowledge. Today, one could reasonably assert that of the 30 or 40 important Zen centers in the country, at least 10 have employed head teachers who have been accused of groping, propositioning, seducing, or otherwise exploiting students. Baker Sums It Up defending Deshimaru's teacher Sawaki roshi's wartime involvement dating from 1905 through WWII is available on the internet at, http://www.zen-azi.org/html/guerre_e.html#replybyb. Green Gulch Farm ("Green Dragon Temple", or Soryuji), located in Sausalito, California in a valley on the Pacific Ocean, was acquired by SFZC in 1972. The current crisis in the Catholic Church proves the need for such an institutional analysis. There are also accounts of people receiving transmission from masters who were dead by the time the supposed transmission took place. A descendant of Thomas Dudley,[4] Baker was raised in a family of moderate wealth. Hence, questioning and dissent became a shortcoming of the person expressing such a view. According to this model, mind-to-mind transmission began with an encounter between the historical Buddha Sakyamuni and Mahakasyapa, and continued, in an unbroken lineage, through twenty-eight Indian Patriarchs. 145 41. pp.347-379. Excellent. The idea of electing an abbot is, no doubt, a distinctively American innovation in a centuries-long pattern of religious authority. But how real is this history? San Francisco is not mentioned in Newsom's plans, but Supervisor Dean Preston has proposed a similar action. 2015. He was 67 years old. Suzuki indeed had ordinary and even tragic circumstances in his life, as is shown in Downing's book, who references David Chadwick's book, Crooked Cucumber, for the following details. [1][15], In 1983 Tenshin Reb Anderson received shih from Zentatsu Richard Baker, becoming Baker's first Dharma heir (though Baker disputes this). [3] He has two daughters, Sally and Elizabeth, from a prior marriage to Virginia Baker. [32], These revelations led Baker to resign as abbot in 1984. Ruling year info. His whole being testifies to what it means to live in the reality of the present. There's too much court intrigue and "monastic" gossip, and not enough effort to put the Zen Center and its scandal in the larger story of American Buddhism and the spiritual supermarket's never-ending list of gurus-gone-bad. It depends not on miracles or mystical figures or discoveries of secret books, but merely on our willingness to believe, against evidence if need be, that those things were real. The experience of legitimacy, realness and of being believable hides the underlying power relations. Sasaki, of Rinzai-ji, a Zen center in Los Angeles, is now 106 years old and, as his board members finally admitted in 2013, was groping and fondling unwilling students well into his 11th decade. I suspect I probably said something like that, Schnyer said. The senior members blindly and unquestioningly bought into Zen's mythology and Baker's transmission being above and beyond question. I have been involved with Zen in America for over thirty years during which time there have been many upheavals and problems, some similar to the Baker case described in Michael Downing's, Shoes Outside The Door, others more subtle and less obvious in nature. Institutional mythology, which created a seamless picture of unbroken lineage along with pure, desireless perfection and attainment housed in the body of the master, was not questioned, and hence, remained intact. This article is not saying that there is no place for a Zen teacher. "[33], In the 1980s Baker ordained Issan Dorsey as a priest. For a very fine book review of Shoes Outside the Door, see Crews, Frederick, "Zen & the Art of Success," The New York Review of Books, 28 Mar. Ungerleider.[26]. Crooked Cucumber: The Life and Teachings of Shunryu Suzuki: this link will take you to the website buy this book now The finances are terrible, and the beautiful carriage house on East 67th Street may have to be sold to pay legal debtsor, if he wins the lawsuit, to pay damages to Eido Shimano, the 82-year-old Zen master who built the society up but also, in a way, has destroyed it. When Katagiri left, Tenshin Reb Anderson assumed Abbotship of the Zen Centerserving until 1995. Richard Dudley Baker (born March 30, 1936) is an American Soto Zen master (or roshi), the founder and guiding teacher of Dharma Sanghawhich consists of Crestone Mountain Zen Center located in Crestone, Colorado and the Buddhistisches Studienzentrum[1] (Johanneshof) in Germany's Black Forest. Alan Sherman, Vintage Books, 1995 (reprint edition), 1995, pp.170-195 discusses a number of aspects of the penal system, its disciplinary power and the simple instruments from which it derives its power: hierarchical observation, normalizing judgment, and their combination-the examination. [3] Because his family moved around frequently, he lived in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Indiana, and Pittsburgh growing up. Students that come to practice at the monastery from September through April must undergo the tradition known as tangaryo. Many women and others in the Zen community have suffered as a result, and we regret and apologize for our collective failure to stop this harm. He remained abbot there until 1984, the year he resigned his position after it was disclosed in the previous year that he and the wife of one of SFZC's benefactors had been having an ongoing affair. Ask Kai C about San Francisco Zen Center. 3. In the wake of Baker's resignation, SFZC transitioned to a democratically elected leadership model, until in 2010 there was a new introduction of a predesignated slated of board members. Some Zen followers believe that Zen is only concerned with enlightenment and is not concerned with personal behavior or with ordinary morality. Please see the Covid-Related Openings and Closings Updates page as well as the Calendar. For some thirty years a significant group of scholars have been investigating the development of the Chan sect in Chinese Buddhism. Baker's friends and supporters say the Zen Center never regained the spark and spiritual power of the Suzuki/Baker years. The deeper you go into practice, the deeper you find your teacher's mind is, until you finally realize that your mind and his mind are Buddha's mind. (It should be noted that Suzuki could read English.) He then arrived in San Francisco, California in 1960beginning to sit with Shunryu Suzuki in 1961. critical insights into Zen/Buddhism have strongly influenced my views: Robert Buswell, Alan Cole, Bernard Faure, T. Griffith Foulk, Robert M. Gimello, Peter N. Gregory, John Kieschnick, John R. McRae, A. Charles Muller, Mario Poceski, Robert H. Sharf, Morten Schlutter, Gregory Schopen, Brian Victoria, Albert Welter and Dale Wright. If some one would like copies, please email me at: slachs@worldnet.att.net . Join the San Francisco Zen Center Membership Program. This new Buddha is also alive and homegrown and hence more immediate and real. Zen priest Mel Weitsman served with Anderson as a co-abbot during the remainder of his term, and the tradition of two sitting Abbots continued for the next few decades. Sitting meditation (zazen) is available live online Monday through Friday mornings, Saturday mornings, and Monday through Friday evenings. Yet, after Tatsugami Roshi, one of the important training teachers from Eiheji, one of the two main Soto Zen training monasteries in Japan, conducted only one training period at Tassajara, Zen Center's monastery in California, Suzuki "arranged" for him not to return because his American students were so dissatisfied. Interestingly, Suzuki did not mention "spiritual attainment," but rather commitment. Because the newcomers' indoctrination into Zen ideology was incomplete, their unfortunate reliance on common sense prevented them from viewing Baker's eccentricities as qualities of an enlightened Zen master. He remained abbot there until 1984, the year he resigned his position after it was disclosed in the previous year that he and the wife of one of SFZC's benefactors had been having an ongoing affair. Suzuki's arrival came at the tail end of the Beat movement and just prior to the social movements of the 1960s, both of which had major roots in San Francisco. There are some good, and unavoidable, reasons for Americans dependence on Japanese roshis (and, more recently, as Americans have become interested in Tibetan Buddhism, for their dependence on foreign teachers like the Dalai Lama). I am also thankful to Mark Baldwin, Sandra Eisenstein, Simeon Gallu, Grace Luddy, Kevin Matthews, Bruce Rickenbacher and Marlene Swartz for many hours of discussion, helpful suggestions, and editorial assistance. Others were more forgiving, but their trust in me and my integrity was permanently shaken. Despite this, few people interviewed seemed to be aware that by continually repeating the transmission story without reflection and without making the effort to understand what they were part of, they were in fact becoming an integral component in the creation of a new myth-which was then used by people like Richard Baker. Was Baker's commitment to Zen practice much greater than a number of other of Suzuki's close, very committed senior disciples? Find classes, retreats, practice periods, and many more offerings in the San Francisco Zen Center calendar of events. He reported being mugged at knifepoint by a man just a block away from the San Francisco Zen Center at 300 Page Street. #28 of 84 Specialty lodging in San Francisco. Suzuki-roshi, as his students called him, died of cancer in 1971. There is a saying, "It is difficult to convince a man of something if his paycheck depends on his not understanding it." Jerry Brown, poet Gary Snyder, Esalen founder Michael Murphy, author Ken Kesey and other leading lights of the Zen intelligentsia on the West Coast. I don't know for certain but Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind was published in 1970, only one year before Baker himself received Dharma transmission and the title, Zen master. So it is natural to ask, why did Suzuki's and Baker's students mention this so often? One student said that when the senior priests were questioned about some aspects of Baker's behavior, the answer was, "Richard has Transmission." What I mean by the "Zen" institution, for the simple purpose of this conversation, is the organized set of structures that support the standard model of Zen. I dont know, he said. Yet for reasons known only to him he proceeded to make Baker his only American Dharma heir. Five years later (in 1988), roughly fifteen months after Anderson had become abbot of the San Francisco, Anderson was arrested for brandishing this same firearm in public. The duo published a book of recipes in 1987 titled The Greens Cookbook. Analysis or active use of "the discriminating mind" is frowned upon, or worse, it is viewed as a sign of having too large an ego. The Zen Studies Society was marked by frequent turnover. The suit cost the SFZC $35,000 to $40,000 in legal fees at a time when it was under financial pressure. Classes and workshops from our Online Programs, resources for beginners, zazen (meditation) and chanting, Dharma talks, and live online practice sessions with teachers. Also see his forthcoming book on early Chan texts for a unique dissection of early lineage claims and their supporting texts . 1969 - The current SFZC building was purchased with the help of American students. Baker and the senior priests dismissed any questioning of Baker's behavior or activities as a lack of insight into enlightenment on the part of the questioner. In 1983 Tenshin Reb Anderson received shih from Zentatsu Richard Baker, becoming Baker's first Dharma heir (though Baker disputes this). In the early 1990s the Board of Directors at the Zen Center created the "Ethical Principles and Procedures for Grievance and Reconciliation" for its members, for conflict resolution mediation guided by Buddhist precepts. Was it all really such a big deal? 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