Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind: Informal Talks on Zen Meditation and Practice
by Shunryu Suzuki
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Book Reviews of Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind: Informal Talks on Zen Meditation and Practice
Book Review: My favourite book.
Summary: 5 Stars
Please refer to the criticism of this book as well as this review. You will notice that all of the negative reviews dwell on classical Buddhist doctrine, are replete with Buddhist jargon, and display an aspect of bitterness and destruction towards Suzuki's words. All of these points of contention are irrelevant to the nature of Zen and they are made in a way which is anathema to the fruition of Zen. All show ignorance of the presence of the aspect truth in all things. Including doctrines. And all are from encapsulations of truth themselves.Zen is not discovered through doctrine and is certainly never found in choosing between contradictory arguments. It is found in the realisation of the uniformity of all aspects of experience. The unity of experience found in the pluralism of experience. The contradictions exist because of how oneness implies otherness, so the concept of unity itself is a paradox. Making meaning, in the conventional sense, is a process of encapsulation. This is grammatical understanding. It cannot convey Zen understanding, Zen understanding removes the capsule.
Negative reviews of this book exhibit the reinforcement of conceptual borders between concepts which do not exist in Zen understanding, but are always present in the discussion of concepts. Hence good Zen may dissuade you from love of all doctrine. Good Zen will even dissuade you from following Zen. Good Zen will not dispute. Good Zen doctrine will not be persuasive. When there is no persuasion, there is no doctrine, then there is Zen. Zen cannot be understood until after interest in good and bad ideas have dissolved. Good Zen will never tell you in which direction to look. Any particular direction is "nonzense"!
Forget Zen! Just celebrate all things occuring and then walk freely. You have no need to chase truth. The enigma of truth exists in all places. You can experience Zen just by being where you are without complaint (hence meditation!). You cannot ever experience Zen understanding with dispute. Zen is non-dispute. Dispute with circumstances, whether here or there, obliterates understanding of Zen. Only the experience of the absolute truth which all things address is the true understanding of Zen.
So bow down gratefully to ALL things.
Discussing Zen with words is like offering a drink of water served in a seive!
All your sensibilities have passed through you as clouds pass through sky. When you realise the sky is always air and water is never poison you may begin to understand Zen. You are changed in life and death in the same way that air changes in light and dark, as life in changed in wakefulness and sleep. You are changed by death in the same manner that writing changes when you stop reading. In the same way that meaning changes when you stop writing.
If you know the original nature of things, then you will know you can recieve Zen by watching American Gladiators, or by being mugged in the street just as well as you can by reading Suzuki's book or this review. Probably much better! : )
Trying to convey Zen in a book review is as practical an exercise as carrying water in a seive.
Maybe instead of buying a book, buy a Simpsons video and experience Zen through that!
If you read Suzuki's book, forget the doctrine and the Buddhist jargon, the meaning of Zen is not conveyed this way. It's much more effectively discussed in metaphor.
I have never read a book that made a better job of conveying Zen metaphor than this one. A better book does not exist. To contradict the truth of this is to know nothing of Zen. To resist the contradiction is to know nothing of Zen. In Zen there is no dispute; in Zen the aspect of truth present in all things is known.
Unfortunately, words are as apt a vessel for conveying reality in the mind as a crate of bottles are apt for transporting your reflection. Reality cannot be encapsulated in any way. Reality doesn't come in capsule form! How exactly is the notion of reality conveyed with the word "reality"? It really doesn't mean a thing!
Writings carry meaning like little trays of broken glass. Zen is a mindstate that sees reality by looking directly at it, by dissolving ones particular notice of these fragments of glass and becoming aware of only the ether. Suzuki's book therefore is just a flicker in the ether. So is this review. So is the space you are sat in. So are the walls. It's all just breeze in the vapour. Pain and death. Gusts of air.
Metaphor for mind and body: When the vapours that perturb the candle flame are removed, what happens to the candle flame?... The vapours that perturb the candle also provide fuel for the flame. Remove the cause of the buffeting and the burning ceases!
Book Review: UPDATE: Popular, in some circles, but worthless.
Summary: 1 Stars
Being more than a little fond of The Great Matter I've looked thru this book on many occasions and never found anything to warrant close examination. I am amazed at the high praise it receives in these reviews, and I can appreciate some of what the naysayers point out, Sutra study (Mahayana or Theravada) isn't part of the picture here. I wouldn't recommend the Sutras for those new to Zen, but I would expect that what's presented in a book on Zen would have its roots, in some fashion or other, in the Mahayana, whether zazen is emphasized or not. Consequently, I would recommend THE WAY OF ZEN, by Alan Watts, which is a lot more informative and, more importantly, a lot more fun! Yes, I said the F word and if you've read all the reviews here, as I have, you will notice they are rather serious and that alone makes you wonder. (The Watts book is always available 'used' and can also be found in most libraries.) Take Care.
UPDATE: Finally managed to read this book. (How can one avoid it with all the hype surrounding this book & this Master?) Well, I can now say Little Suzuki does try to hitch his wagon to the Mahayana, but with nothing other than cliches. In every instance where he mentions either the Sutras or Zen Masters he follows it with the most insipid comments imaginable. Here's an example from the text (you be the judge):
"This sutra [Prajna Paramita Sutra] says, 'Bodhisattva Avalokitesvara observes that everything is emptiness, thus he forsakes all suffering.' It was not AFTER he realized this truth that he overcame suffering --to realize this fact is itself to be relieved from suffering. So realization of the truth is salvation itself. We say 'to realize,' but the realization of the truth is always near at hand. It is not after we practice zazen that we realize the truth; even before we practice zazen, realization is there. It is not after we understand the truth that we attain enlightenment. To realize the truth is to live--to exist here and now." (pg. 113, 7th printing 1973.)
Every mention is followed by this type of cheerleading passed off as 'insight'. Just look at the each chapter heading and the accompanying quote.
'It is wisdom which is seeking for wisdom.'
Now, that's impressive. There's more. How about:
'The point we emphasize is strong confidence in our original nature.'
Or:
'When you become you, Zen becomes Zen. When you are you, you see things as they are, and you become one with your surroundings'.
Management seminar talk applied to Zen? Richard Baker may have been impressed by such nonsense, but its clear that he and 'the Emperor have no clothes.'
No stars. Worst book ever on Zen. This is nothing more than a shallow attempt to make sitting meditation the be all and end all of Buddhism (just to 'keep things simple,') 'Zen Center' Buddhism. Since this book is considered 'a classic of American Buddhism' you'll probably end up, like me, feeling you probably should read it. Well, at least, check it out of the library before you waste hard earned money.
If you want to avoid the 'intellectual and religious stuff' better to return to your study with the poetry of Cold Mountain or even Mary Oliver! Sands of the Ganges, read the Tang Dynasty Masters, better to struggle with them than be coddled by these guys! Not recommended.
Take care.
'Those with the same disease sympathize with each other...buried in the same hole.' Yuanwu
'Hey! You are all adults! How can you accept this?
What should you do yourself?
Chan Master Chen-Ching (exiled 1080)
(pg.67, Teachings of Zen)
Book Review: CULTIVATE YOUR OWN SPIRIT
Summary: 4 Stars
Though I have always had some interest in Zen meditation, it was reading Susan Blackmore's CONSCIOUSNESS that finally prompted me to examine it more closely. So many people who meditate seem to equate spirituality with total gullibility that I have been leery of its supposed benefits; and my mind is constantly so occupied with the repetition of immature fantasies and irritations that I do not meditate very well. Blackmore's description of meditation as "a weeding of the mind" struck me as exactly what I wanted. Blackmore, as a materialist, believes that consciousness has contingent rather than intrinsic existence, and she maintains that this was what Buddha taught. None of the Buddhists I have spoken to since reading her book agree with her.
Since Zen masters apparently speak only in contradictions, it is hardly clear what Buddha's opinion was. Though S. Suzuki does not specifically describe the nature of consciousness, I am essentially certain that he would say something like: "Consciousness is not intrinsic and it is not contingent; consciousness is intrinsic and it is contingent." It is very easy for any schnook to sound like an enlightened Zen master by simply claiming that opposite things are the same. "Love and hate are one thing. A foolish person is a wise person; a wise person is a foolish person. Emotionally we have many problems, but these problems are not actually problems. Happiness is sorrow; sorrow is happiness." As Suzuki says, "This kind of experience is something beyond our thinking," and "Our true nature is beyond our conscious experience." I am inclined to try to make sense of this by relating it to quantum mechanics: an electron both is and is not a particle, and is and is not a wave. This is a fact that can be experimentally verified, yet is beyond conception. Presumably, if one is enlightened, these seeming contradictions will dissolve away.
One problem is that only an infinitesimal number of people are enlightened, and since Buddha denies reincarnation, the effort of achieving such ephemeral enlightenment might strike one as pointless. "The goal of our life's effort is to reach Nirvana," and then you die. Another problem is that "enlightenment" seems dependent upon the philosophy of the teacher. Disciples of Yogananda Paramahansa become one with God and escape the cycle of reincarnation when they achieve enlightenment. The Dali Lama, who is supposed to be the reincarnation of a previous Dali Lama, admits that he does not know if reincarnation actually happens. This is admirably honest of him, but we are left with the impression that "enlightened" masters are maybe just about as confused as we are.
I initially became interested in Eastern religions after once briefly experiencing that the core of my being was Christ. Since I did not equate this "Christ-self" with the historical man who was Christ, I was just as inclined to think of the core of my being as Buddha. I do not know whether there is reincarnation or not, and I am essentially sure that my present personality will not survive death (I rather hope not!), but I doubt that my sense of "I" will cease to exist. I also am not convinced that our only purpose on Earth is to escape back into pure immutable consciousness, or into the nothingness of mere matter.
Suzuki advises us to practice zazen with no preconceived ideas and with no anticipation of achieving enlightenment. This strikes me as sound advice.
Book Review: A golden book on what the Buddha was really all about.
Summary: 5 Stars
ZEN MIND, BEGINNER'S MIND : Informal talks on Zen Meditation and practice by Shunryu Suzuki. Edited by Trudy Dixon, with a Preface by Huston Smith and an Introduction by Richard Baker. 138 pp. New York and Tokyo : Weatherhill, 1970 and Reprinted.Some years ago I undertook a fairly extensive program of reading in Indian, Chinese, and Japanese Buddhism and in Zen. Most of my Zen books have since disappeared. Only the choicest remain, among which is Shunryu Suzuki's 'Zen Mind Beginner's Mind.'
Buddhism may be said to have begun with the enlightement of the Buddha. Many centuries later, however, when Buddhism entered China, an incredibly elaborate and complex superstructure of Indian scholastic thought had grown up around the Buddha's original insight. The Chinese, with their basically down-to-earth and common sense attitude, had little use for Indian over-elaboration and set about ridding Buddhism of it.
The Chinese, as Lin Yutang says, believe in a reasonable use of reason, and not in reason's excesses. The end product of their effort to rid Buddhist thought of its heavy freight of scholasticism, and to shift the emphasis from theory back to the practical by centering Buddhism once again in the enlightenment experience, became what the Chinese know as Ch'an and the Japanese as Zen.
As Shunryu Suzuki himself pointed out, when freed of unnecessary theory and speculation, Buddhism as Zen becomes something that is basically "quite simple" (page 64). Its essence was brilliantly captured in the thirty-one verses of Third Patriarch Seng-ts'an's 'Hsin-hsin-ming,' the very first Zen treatise in verse. This is a beautiful text that deserves to be far better known, and an easily accessible translation will be found in D. T. Suzuki's 'Manual of Zen Budhism' ('On Believing in Mind,' pages 76-82).
The first verse of the original Chinese may be read as follows, with oblique marks to indicate line breaks:
"To realize the Way is not difficult / If you'd only stop choosing; / Just let go of all of your hate, and love, / And everything will be brilliantly clear" (my transl).
This statement may gain in meaning if we set it alongside an observation made by the great Zen Master Dogen (1200-1253), founder of the Japanese Soto sect of Zen Buddhism and one of the most brilliant philosophical minds Buddhism has ever produced, who wrote in 'Genjo Koan,' the third chapter of his 'Shobogenzo' :
"Conveying the self to the myriad things to authenticate them is delusion; the myriad things advancing to authenticate the self is enlightenment" (Tr., F. H. Cook, 'Sounds of Valley Streams,' page 66).
Suzuki Shunryu, who as a member of the Soto school was a direct spiritual descendant of Dogen, would certainly have understood this. In fact, so far as I can see, the idea expressed by both Seng-ts'an and Dogen Zenji is at the very center of his book.
'Zen Mind Beginner's Mind' is a golden book that may be heartily recommended to all open-minded readers. In it they will find a Buddhism freed of all scholastic superfluities and unnecessary elaboration, and one that returns us to what the Buddha was really about.
Book Review: Among Worst books on the BuddhaDharma ever written
Summary: 1 Stars
This book is factually the pinnacle of depravity of those few books that attempt to propagate the Dharma but end up Blaspheming it instead. Completely and utterly lacking the Jewel mind of an awakened Master of the Buddha Dharma Shunryu Suzuki has managed to produce the Dictionary equivalent of a Successful Disaster in the Buddhist English Literary world. Countless points of innumerable contention lie hidden like Mara in the pages of his book for those of ill equipped comprehensions of the Dharma to enslave the minds into having a wholly incorrect and vile misconception of the Dharma as put forth by the late Shunryu Suzuki. Cross comparatively the book sinks like so much rubbish to the bottom of the swill pool when the intrinsic nature of the book is even loosely examined. Suzukis shallow understanding of the transmundane antithesis of humanistic doldrums and philoanahilistic prose make Buddhism highest goal to be nothing more that sublime misery manifesting itsself as Zazen as opposed to unparalleled enlightenment breakthrough of understanding of the Dharmakaya through unconditional practice of the profundidty of insight through grasp of the Orthodox Dharma and continuous manifestations of faith from determination to uncover the great Matter and come to profound enlightenment through successive multitudes of Kenshos (breakthroughs). Suzukis OWN WORDS that are laughable and yet at the same time sorrowful for his pathetic lack of understanding of the Dharma are as follows: "THE MOST INPORTANT THING IN OUR PRACTICE ARE OUR POSTURE AND OUR WAY OF BREATHING,WE ARE NOT SO CONCERNED ABOUT A DEEP UNDERSTANDING OF BUDDHISM. AS A PHILOSOPHY BUDDHISM IS A....." this is one among a MULTITUDE of pathetic examples of his lack of any grasp of the holly Dharma. Where can you sort out the trash from a mountain of trash? IF you wish to practice shikentaza (blank minded meditation) this is a fine example of it to buy. I truly CRY however honestly cry at the thought that SO many people searching for info on Buddhism find this book and read it and reread it. Buddhism dear friends is NOT a philosophy nor is it nihilistic self indulgent meditation. Meditation is small facet of the innumerable expedients to achieve profound understanding in Buddhism. The Buddha himself on countless occasions you can read will tell you forthwith that UNDERSTANDING is paramount and yet people praise Suzuki for his Blasphemy. But i understand that most praise are from so called "casual" Buddhists that have never even picked up a Sutra much less read one page form one. I lay now my life down to you in promise that this book in no way is the Buddhism of the Ancients, my life i swear to you on this. pick up a scripture if you wish to find out about Buddhism and dont be mistaken by this book or its New Age popularity. In the Orthodox Mahayana Buddhist Dharma.. concerned