Dōgen Zenji

Dōgen Zenji (道元禅師; also Dōgen Kigen 道元希玄, or Eihei Dōgen 永平道元, or Koso Joyo Daishi) (19 January 1200 – 22 September 1253) was a Japanese Zen Buddhist teacher born in Kyōto, and the founder of the Sōtō school of Zen in Japan. He was a leading religious figure of his time, as well as being an important philosopher. Image File history File links File history Legend: (cur) = this is the current file, (del) = delete this old version, (rev) = revert to this old version. ... Image File history File links File history Legend: (cur) = this is the current file, (del) = delete this old version, (rev) = revert to this old version. ... is the 19th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... Events University of Paris receives charter from Philip II of France The Kanem-Bornu Empire was established in northern Africa around the year 1200 Mongol victory over Northern China — 30,000,000 killed Births Al-Abhari, Persian philosopher and mathematician (died 1265) Ulrich von Liechtenstein, German nobleman and poet (died... is the 265th day of the year (266th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... For broader historical context, see 1250s and 13th century. ... For other uses, see Zen (disambiguation). ... A silhouette of a Buddha statue at Ayutthaya, Thailand. ... Kyoto )   is a city in the central part of the island of HonshÅ«, Japan. ... For the vegetable, see Celosia. ... A philosopher is a person who thinks deeply regarding people, society, the world, and/or the universe. ...

The Avataṃsaka SÅ«tra (Chinese: ; Pinyin: ) is one of the most influential scriptures in East Asian Buddhism. ... The Lotus Sutra or Sutra on the White Lotus of the Sublime Dharma (Sanskrit: Saddharma PuṇḍarÄ«ka SÅ«tra; 妙法蓮華經 Chinese: MiàofÇŽ Liánhuā JÄ«ng; Japanese: Myōhō Renge Kyō; Korean: Myobeomnyeonhwagyeong) is one of the most popular and influential Mahāyāna sutras in East Asia and... Perfection of Wisdom is a translation of the Sanskrit term prajñā pāramitā (Hanzi. ... The Heart of Perfect Wisdom Sutra or Heart Sutra or Essence of Wisdom Sutra (Sanskrit: प्रज्ञापारमिताहृदयसूत्र Prajñāpāramitā Hridaya SÅ«tra; Chinese: 般若波羅蜜多心經, BōrÄ›bōluómìduō XÄ«njÄ«ng; Japanese: 般若心経, Hannya Shingyō; Korean: Pannya Shimgyŏng) is a well-known Mahāyāna Buddhist sutra that is very... The Infinite Life Sutra, or Larger Pure Land Sutra, is a Mahayana Buddhist text associated with Pure Land Buddhism. ...

Early life

Dōgen was born into a noble family. His father may have been Koga Michichika (久我道親), a high-ranking minister in the imperial court, while his mother was likely the daughter of Fujiwara Motofusa (藤原基房), who had once been a regent in the court^[1]. Dōgen's father died when Dōgen was three years old, and his mother when he was eight, which strongly impressed Dōgen with the Buddhist notion of impermanence (Japanese: 無常 mujō). Imperial Court in Kyoto was the nominal ruling government of Japan since 794 until the Meiji Era, in which the court was moved to Tokyo and was integrated into the Meiji government. ... Impermanence (Sanskrit: anitya; Pali anicca; Tibetan: mi rtag pa; Chinese: 無常, wúcháng; Japanese: mujō) is one of the essential doctrines or the three marks of Buddhism. ...

Early training

At the age of thirteen^[2], affected by this early glimpse of impermanence and faced with the possibility of a career as part of the aristocratic Fujiwara family, Dōgen decided to become a monk^[3]. Initially, he went to Mount Hiei, the headquarters of the Tendai school of Buddhism. While there, he studied the Buddhist sūtras, and became possessed by a single question: The Fujiwara family (藤原氏 Fujiwara-uji) was a powerful family of regents in Japan who had a sort of monopoly to the Sekkan positions, Sesshō and Kampaku. ... For other uses, see Monk (disambiguation). ... Mount Hiei (Jp. ... Tendai (Japanese: 天台宗, Tendai-shÅ«) is a Japanese school of Mahayana Buddhism, a descendant of the Chinese Tiantai or Lotus Sutra school. ... There are a great variety of Buddhist texts. ...

This question was, in large part, prompted by the Tendai concept of "original enlightenment" (本覚 hongaku), which states that all human beings are enlightened by nature and that, consequently, any notion of achieving enlightenment through practice is fundamentally flawed^[5]. Buddha-nature (originally in Sanskrit, Buddha-dhatu - Buddha Element, Buddha-Principle) is a doctrine important for many schools of Mahayana Buddhism. ... Media:Example. ... Bodhi (बोधि) is the Pāli and Sanskrit word for the awakened or knowing consciousness of a fully liberated yogi, generally translated into English as enlightenment. It is an abstract noun formed from the verbal root budh (to awake, become aware, notice, know or understand), corresponding to the verbs bujjhati (P...

As he found no answer to his question at Mount Hiei, Dōgen left to seek an answer from other Buddhist masters. Dōgen went to visit Kōin, the Tendai abbot of Onjōji Temple (園城寺), asking him this same question. Kōin said that, in order to find an answer, he might want to consider studying Chán in China^[6]. Kōin sent Dōgen to Myōan Eisai in Kyōto, a leading Tendai monk who had been to China and brought back the practice of Rinzai Zen in 1191. In 1214, Dōgen went to study with Eisai at Kennin-ji Temple (建仁寺), and—upon Eisai's death the following year—he continued his study under Eisai's successor, Myōzen (明全). In 1221^[7], Myōzen conferred Dharma transmission upon Dōgen, acknowledging that he had learned the teachings. Two years later, Dōgen decided to make the dangerous passage across the East China Sea to China to try to find an answer. His teacher Myōzen accompanied him on the trip. Mii-dera ), formally called Onjō-ji ), is a Buddhist temple located at the foot of Mount Hiei, in the city of ÅŒtsu, in Shiga Prefecture. ... Chán is a major school of Chinese Mahāyāna Buddhism. ... Myōan Eisai, founder of the Rinzai School of Zen, 12th century. ... The dry garden at Ryōan-ji, a Rinzai Zen temple in Kyoto. ... San-mon (三門, or sammon, main door), bôketsurô （望闕楼) Kennin-ji ) is a Zen Buddhist temple in Kyoto, Japan. ... Dharma transmission (Chinese: 傳法, ChuánfÇŽ or 印可, InkÄ›, Korean and Japanese: Inka) is the formal confirmation by a master of Zen or Chan Buddhism of a students awakening. ... The East China Sea is a marginal sea and part of the Pacific Ocean. ...

Travel to China

In China, Dōgen first went to the leading Chan monasteries in Zhèjiāng province. At the time, most Chan teachers based their training around the use of gōng-àns (Japanese: kōan). Though Dōgen assiduously studied the kōans, he became disenchanted with the heavy emphasis laid upon them, and wondered why the sutras were not studied more. At one point, owing to this disenchantment, Dōgen even refused Dharma transmission from a teacher^[8]. Then, in 1225, he decided to visit a master named Rújìng (如淨; J. Nyōjo), the thirteenth patriarch of the Cáodòng (J. Sōtō) lineage of Zen Buddhism, at Mount Tiāntóng (天童山 Tiāntóngshān; J. Tendōzan) in Níngbō. Rujing was reputed to have a style of Chan that was different to the other masters whom Dōgen had thus far encountered. Zhejiang (also spelled Chehkiang or Chekiang) is an eastern coastal province of the Peoples Republic of China. ... A koan (pronounced ) is a story, dialog, question, or statement in the history and lore of Chan (Zen) Buddhism, generally containing aspects that are inaccessible to rational understanding, yet that may be accessible to intuition. ... Caodong (Chinese 曹洞宗) is a Chinese Zen Buddhist sect founded by Dongshan Liangjie and his Dharma_heirs in the 9th century. ... Ningbo (Simplified Chinese: ; Traditional Chinese: ; Pinyin: ; Wade-Giles: Ning-po; literally Tranquil Waves) is a seaport sub-provincial city with a population of 1,219,900 in northeastern Zhejiang province, Peoples Republic of China. ...

Under Rujing, Dōgen realized liberation of body and mind upon hearing the master say, "Cast off body and mind" (身心脱落 shēn xīn tuō luò). This phrase would continue to have great importance to Dōgen throughout his life, and can be found scattered throughout his writings, as—for example—in a famous section of his "Genjōkōan" (現成公案):

Shortly after Dōgen had arrived at Mount Tiantong, Myōzen had passed away. In 1227^[10], Dōgen received Dharma transmission and inka from Rujing, and remarked on how he had finally settled his "life's quest of the great matter"^[11]. Dharma transmission (Chinese: 傳法, ChuánfÇŽ or 印可, InkÄ›, Korean and Japanese: Inka) is the formal confirmation by a master of Zen or Chan Buddhism of a students awakening. ... For other meanings of Inca, see Inca (disambiguation). ...

Return to Japan

Dōgen returned to Japan in 1227 or 1228, going back to stay at Kennin-ji^[12], where he had once trained under Eisai. Among his first actions upon returning was to write down the Fukan Zazengi (普観坐禅儀; "Universally Recommended Instructions for Zazen"), a short text emphasizing the importance of and giving instructions for zazen, or sitting meditation. However, tension soon arose as the Tendai community began taking steps to suppress both Zen and Jōdo Shinshū, the new forms of Buddhism in Japan. In the face of this tension, Dōgen left the Tendai dominion of Kyōto in 1230, settling instead in an abandoned temple in what is today the city of Uji, south of Kyōto^[13]. In 1233, Dōgen founded the Kannon-dōri-in^[14] in Uji as a small center of practice; he later expanded this temple into the Kōshō-hōrinji Temple (興聖法林寺). In 1243, Hatano Yoshishige (波多義鎮) offered to relocate Dōgen's community to Echizen province, far to the north of Kyōto. Dōgen accepted due to the ongoing tension with the Tendai community, and his followers built a comprehensive center of practice there, calling it Daibutsuji Temple (大仏寺). While the construction work was going on, Dōgen would live and teach at Yoshimine-dera Temple (Kippōji, 吉峯寺), which is located close to Daibutsuji. In 1246, Dōgen renamed Daibutsuji, calling it Eihei-ji. This temple remains one of the two head temples of Sōtō Zen in Japan today, the other being Sōji-ji. Kodo Sawaki practicing zazen Zazen (坐禅) is at the heart of Zen Buddhist practice. ... For other senses of this word, see Meditation (disambiguation). ... Jōdo ShinshÅ« ), also known as Shin Buddhism, was founded by the former Tendai Japanese monk Shinran Shonin. ... Byodoin Uji (Japanese: 宇治市; -shi) is a city on the southern outskirts of the city of Kyoto, in Kyoto Prefecture, Japan. ... Echizen (越前国; -no kuni) was an old province of Japan, which is today the northern part of Fukui prefecture. ... Karamon Eihei-ji (永平寺) is one of two main temples of the Soto sect of Zen Buddhism. ... Sōji-ji (總持寺) is one of two main temples of the Soto sect of Zen Buddhism. ...

Dōgen spent the remainder of his life teaching and writing at Eiheiji. In 1247, the newly installed shōgun's regent, Hōjō Tokiyori, invited Dōgen to come to Kamakura to teach him. Dōgen made the rather long journey east to provide the shōgun with lay ordination, and then returned to Eiheiji in 1248. In the autumn of 1252, Dōgen fell ill, and soon showed no signs of recovering. He presented his robes to his main apprentice, Koun Ejō (孤雲懐弉), making him the abbot of Eiheiji. Then, at Hatano Yoshishige's invitation, Dōgen left for Kyōto in search of a remedy for his illness. In 1253, soon after arriving in Kyōto, Dōgen died. Shortly before his death, he had written a death poem: Shikken (執権) was the regent of the shogun in the Kamakura shogunate in Japan. ... Hōjō Tokiyori (北条時頼; 1227-1263, r. ... Kamakuras location in Japan Crowds of visitors in Kamakura (Tsurugaoka Hachiman Shrine) Great Buddha at Kōtoku-in Kamakura (Japanese: 鎌倉市; -shi) is a city located in Kanagawa, Japan, about 50 km south-south-west of Tokyo (to which it is linked by the railway line to Yokosuka). ... General Akashi Gidayu preparing to commit seppuku after losing a battle for his master in 1582. ...

Fifty-four years lighting up the sky.

A quivering leap smashes a billion worlds.

Hah!

Entire body looks for nothing.

Living, I plunge into Yellow Springs.^[15]

Dōgen's Zen

At the heart of the variety of Zen that Dōgen taught are a number of key concepts, which are emphasized repeatedly in his writings. All of these concepts, however, are closely interrelated to one another insofar as they are all directly connected to zazen, or sitting meditation, which Dōgen considered to be identical to Zen, as is pointed out clearly in the first sentence of the 1243 instruction manual "Zazen-gi" (坐禪儀; "Principles of Zazen"): "Studying Zen ... is zazen"^[16]. In referring to zazen, Dōgen is most often referring specifically to shikantaza, roughly translatable as "nothing but precisely sitting", which is a kind of sitting meditation in which the meditator sits "in a state of brightly alert attention that is free of thoughts, directed to no object, and attached to no particular content"^[17]. Shikantaza (只管打坐) is literally translated as only focused on doing sitting. More often it is called: just sitting or silent illumination. It is the main meditation technique of the Soto school of Zen Buddhism. ...

Oneness of practice-enlightenment

The primary concept underlying Dōgen's Zen practice is "oneness of practice-enlightenment" (修證一如 shushō-ittō / shushō-ichinyo). In fact, this concept is considered so fundamental to Dōgen's variety of Zen—and, consequently, to the Sōtō school as a whole—that it formed the basis for the work Shushō-gi (修證儀), which was compiled in 1890 by Takiya Takushū (滝谷卓洲) of Eihei-ji and Azegami Baisen (畔上楳仙) of Sōji-ji as an introductory and prescriptive abstract of Dōgen's massive work, the Shōbōgenzō ("Treasury of the Eye of the True Dharma"). The Shōbōgenzō (正法眼蔵), lit. ...

For Dōgen, the practice of zazen and the experience of enlightenment were one and the same. This point was succinctly stressed by Dōgen in the Fukan Zazengi, the first text that he composed upon his return to Japan from China: "To practice the Way singleheartedly is, in itself, enlightenment. There is no gap between practice and enlightenment or zazen and daily life"^[18]. Earlier in the same text, the basis of this identity is explained in more detail:

The "oneness of practice-enlightenment" was also a point stressed in the Bendōwa (弁道話 "A Talk on the Endeavor of the Path") of 1231: Maya (illusion) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia /**/ @import /skins-1. ... Dharma (Sanskrit: धर्म) or Dhamma (Pāli: धम्म) in Buddhism has two primary meanings: the teachings of the Buddha which lead to enlightenment the constituent factors of the experienced world In East Asia, the character for Dharma is 法, pronounced fÇŽ in Mandarin and hō in Japanese. ...

Writings

Title page of an 1811 edition of Dōgen's Shōbōgenzō

Dōgen's masterpiece is the aforementioned Shōbōgenzō, talks and writings—collected together in ninety-five fascicles—on topics ranging from monastic practice to the philosophy of language, being, and time. In the work, as in his own life, Dōgen emphasized the absolute primacy of shikantaza and the inseparability of practice and enlightenment. Image File history File links Download high-resolution version (991x768, 240 KB) [edit] Summary Photo de la page de garde de lEdition Honzanban (1811) du Shobogenzo. ... Image File history File links Download high-resolution version (991x768, 240 KB) [edit] Summary Photo de la page de garde de lEdition Honzanban (1811) du Shobogenzo. ... The Shōbōgenzō (正法眼蔵), lit. ... The word fascicle derives from the Latin fascis (bundle). Fascicles are the sections of a book, usually a reference work, that because of its length, is issued in parts so that the information may be made available to the public as soon as possible rather than waiting years or decades...

While it was customary for Buddhist works to be written in Chinese, Dōgen often wrote in Japanese, conveying the essence of his thought in a style that was at once concise, compelling, and inspiring. A master stylist, Dōgen is noted not only for his prose, but also for his poetry (in Japanese waka style and various Chinese styles). Dōgen's use of language is unconventional by any measure. According to Dōgen scholar Steven Heine: "Dogen's poetic and philosophical works are characterized by a continual effort to express the inexpressible by perfecting imperfectable speech through the creative use of wordplay, neologism, and lyricism, as well as the recasting of traditional expressions"^[21]. Waka (和歌) or Yamato uta is a genre of Japanese poetry. ... Steven Heine, Ph. ...

Legacy

Dōgen's most notable successor was Keizan (瑩山; 1268–1325), founder of Sōjiji Temple and author of the Record of the Transmission of Light (傳光錄 Denkōroku), which traces the succession of Zen masters from Siddhārtha Gautama up to Keizan's own day. Together, Dōgen and Keizan are regarded as the founders of the Sōtō school in Japan. Keizan ç‘©å±± Jokin Zenji, also known as Taiso Josai Daishi, was the second of the great founders of Soto Zen in Japan. ... Sōji-ji (總持寺) is one of two main temples of the Soto sect of Zen Buddhism. ... Denkoroku, Record of the Transmission of the Light, by Keizan Jokin Zenji, gives brief koan-style accounts of the Zen transmission between successive patriarchs in the Soto Zen Buddhist lineage from Shakyamuni Buddha to Dogen Kigen Zenji, who brought Soto Zen teaching to Japan. ... Siddhartha and Gautama redirect here. ...

Notes

References

External links

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to:

Dogen

• Dogen Translations Translations of Dogen and other works by Anzan Hoshin.
• Genjo Koan, a text written by Dogen (annotated English translation entitled Truth Unfolding)
• translations of the Shobogenso incomplete, an ongoing project by the Soto Zen Text Project
• Understanding the Shobogenzo by Gudo Nishijima