Monday, January 15, 2024

Looks Like Rinzai; Looks Like Soto

If you read recent books written by many scholars, you will find various opinions about Zen literature or Zen thought; or what is Bodhidharma’s way; whether Bodhidharma was a historical person or not; what is shikantaza; what is koan practice. But, in short, I don’t say all of them [laughs], but most of the teachers and scholars are talking about their own dragon. It is easy to analyze or to compare one dragon to another because they are carved into some form already. So, ”Ah this is a Soto dragon [laughs], or this is a Rinzai dragon [laughing].” But the Soto way is not so easy to figure what it will be [laughs]. Looks like Rinzai; looks like Soto [laughs, laughter]. Maybe Soto [laughs].

cuke.com/ig for links to the source of the photo. Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture 68-10-12-B as found on shunryusuzuki.com, edited by PF. Go to instagram.com/cuke_archives for the Instagram version.