Kategoria BISAC: Philosophy >> Zen

Written by the legendary swordsman Musashi Miyamoto, The Five Rings (c.1645) is more than just a manual on sword-fighting techniques: its Zen philosophy offers tactics and strategies as relevant to personal success today as they were to 17th-century samurai. The Five Rings speaks to every age about the essential roles of harmony and self-mastery in our lives. Of the many translations of The Five Rings, David K. Groff's translation background as a long-time resident of Japan, native-level fluency of Japanese, and an accomplished martial arts study means that he is...

Working Hard to Become Spiritually Elite?

Have you ever wondered why you can't find the path to enlightenment? Have you struggled with expensive meditation techniques and special diets, elite teachers, and all manner of other crazy notions just trying to one day, finally, awaken to complete freedom and total peace (perhaps with a hefty dose of bliss as well)?

Stop

In "You're Trying Too Hard," Joey Lott explains exactly that--you are trying too hard, and you will never achieve your goals precisely because you already ARE freedom. Stop trying everything under the sun to bring...

Zen was popularized in the West largely through the writings of Dr. D.T. Suzuki, who followed the school of Rinzai Zen. Although it remains relatively unknown in the West, Soto Zen eventually attracted the greatest number of followers in Japan. With its gentle, more intellectual approach, Soto Zen relies on deep meditation (zazen) rather than the sudden, direct method (using koan) of Rinzai Zen, in striving for enlightenment.
The Shobogenzo Zuimonki consists largely of brief talks, horatatory remarks, and instructional and cautionary comments by the Soto Zen Master Dogen (1200-1253)....

Gleaned from the author's experiences over many years Yoga and Zen training as well as from conversations with teachers, folk stories and temple magazines, this is a fascinating and enlightening compendium of tales from the Yoga and Zen traditions. Stories such as these are used in many spiritual schools' teaching - they're the flint or steel that makes the spark which, when nurtured daily, fires the imagination, heralds enlightenment and insight.

This book is a translation and study of the Vajrasamadhi-Sutra and an examination of its broad implications for the development of East Asian Buddhism. The Vajrasamadhi-Sutra was traditionally assumed to have been translated from Sanskrit, but some modern scholars, principally in Japan, have proposed that it is instead an indigenous Chinese composition. In contrast to both of these views, Robert Buswell maintains it was written in Korea around A.D. 685 by a Korean adept affiliated with the East Mountain school of the nascent Chinese Ch'an tradition. He thus considers it to be the oldest...