Sōtō Zen
All branches of Buddhism take as their original teacher and example the historical Buddha, Shakyamuni Buddha, who lived 2500 years ago in India. After centuries of transmission from teacher to teacher in India, Buddhism made its way to China. The specific teachings of Zen (or Ch’an in China) developed in the 7th century and were greatly influenced by Taoism. The first Chinese ancestor, the Indian monk Bodhidharma, passed on the lineage through 23 generations of Chinese teachers, resulting in five schools of Zen teaching. “Cao-dong” (“Sōtō” in Japanese) formed in the Tang Dynasty, more than a thousand years after the Buddha. Today, the main variants of Sōtō and Rinzai Zen, are the living legacy of this unfolding of the Buddha’s teaching as it moved from culture to culture and was expressed in many languages and forms of ceremony and teaching.
In thirteenth century Japan, the Tendai monk Eihei Dogen traveled to China with his Rinzai teacher, with whom he had been practicing. He found the master he regarded as his true teacher, Tiantong Rujing, and inherited the Sōtō lineage from him, returning to Japan to transmit these teachings. The lineage continued to be passed down for another 39 generations in Japan up to Shunryu Suzuki Roshi, the Japanese monk who brought this unique and precious practice to America in the middle of the 20th c, passing it on to his American students.
The fundamental practices of the Sōtō school are two: shikantaza, or “just sitting,” seated meditation without any gaining idea, fully expressing our true selves through this body and mind. The second is practicing with the ethical precepts of Buddhism, the expression of the mind of Buddha which is awake to the unity of all phenomena as well as the uniqueness of each thing. The flavor of Sōtō Zen is a very down-to-earth practice of “everydayness,” which teaches awareness of one’s own body and mind, and compassion for all beings. We cultivate presence, awareness, and at peace with equanimity with everything that we meet in our lives.
Shunryu Suzuki Roshi
Shunryu Suzuki Roshi, a Japanese Zen Buddhist priest of the Soto tradition, came to San Francisco in 1959 at the age of fifty-four. Already a respected Zen master in Japan, he had come to minister to the Japanese community of San Francisco, but was impressed by the seriousness and quality of “beginner’s mind” among Americans he met who were interested in Zen practice. As more and more people of non-Japanese background joined him in meditation, he eventually decided that his path in the United States was to foster Zen practice in America. San Francisco Zen Center came into being, and Suzuki Roshi was its first abbot. He remains undoubtedly one of the most influential Zen teachers of our time. Some of his talks have been collected in the books, Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind and Branching Streams Flow in the Darkness: Zen Talks on the Sandokai, as well as Becoming Yourself: Teachings on the Zen Way of Life.
Austin Zen Center
Zenkei-ji, Austin Zen Center, continues the legacy of Suzuki Roshi. Founded by one of his disciples, Zenkei Blanche Hartman, for more than two decades it has offered authentic Sōtō teachings, practices and ceremonies infused with the spirit of beginner’s mind. Two other temples in central Texas, Houston Zen Center and San Antonio Zen Center, are guided by teachers in the same lineage; we cooperate closely in our offerings and visit each other regularly. We maintain close ties with San Francisco Zen Center, in an exchange of teachers and students visiting and practicing together.
Come join us!