Zen Master Tales: Stories from the Lives of Taigu, Sengai, Hakuin, and Ryokan

Description

A lively collection of folk tales andBuddhistteaching stories from four noted premodern Japanese Zen masters-TaiguS chiku(1584-1669),SengaiGibon (1750-1831),HakuinEkaku(1686-1769), andTaiguRy kan(1758-1831). Zen Master Tales collectsnever beforetranslatedstoriesof four prominent Zen masters from the Edo period of Japanese history (1603-1868).Drawn froman erathat sawthe"democratization" ofJapanese Zen, these storiespaint a picture ofrobust, funny, and poignantengagementbetween Zen luminaries andthe emergentch_x043E_ninor "townsperson" cultureof early modern Japan. Here we find Zen monks engaging with samurai, merchants, housewives, entertainers, and farmers. These masters affirmed that the essentials of Zen practice-zazen, koan study, even enlightenment-could be conveyed to all members of Japanese society in ordinary speech, including even comic verse and work songs. Against the backdrop of this rich tableau, Zen Master Tales serves not only as a text for Zen students but also as a wide-ranging window onto the fascinating literary, material, and social history of Edo Japan. In hisintroduction, translator Peter Haskel explains the history of Zen "stories" from the tradition's Golden Age in China through the compilation of the classickoancollections and on totheerafrom which the stories in Zen Master Tales are drawn. What was true of the Chinese tradition, he writes-"its focus on the individual's ordinary activity as the function, the manifestation of the absolute"-continued in the Japanese context. "Most of these Japanese stories, however unabashedly humorous and at times crude, impart something of the character of the Zen masters involved, whose attainment must be plainly manifest in even the most humble and unlikely of situations."

PETER HASKEL received a PhD in East Asian Studies from Columbia University. He is the translator of Bankei Zen- Translations from the Record of Bankei, Great Fool- Zen Master Ry kan-Letters and Other Writings, Letting Go- The Story of Zen Master T sui, and Sword of Zen- Master Takuan and His Writings on Immovable Wisdom and the Sword Taia.

"In his first-rate translation of the tales of Zen masters Taigu, Sengai, Hakuin, and Ryokan, Haskel captures the spirit and the humor of these unique teachers. Like Haskel's previous books on Zen masters Bankei, Ryokan, and Tosui, he brings these eccentric Zen men to life. In the introduction he reminds us how these tales or myths, though not exact factual histories of these men and woman, may be what the spirit of Zen is all about."-Arthur Braverman, author of Mud and Water: The Zen Teaching of Master Bassui "In Zen Master Tales, Peter Haskel offers us an everyday view of four of the greatest and quirkiest Zen masters of Japan. Most of these tales are appearing here in English for the first time and ring true like folk stories rather than formal encounter dialogues. So the book goes down like a hot chocolate on a wintry night."-Dosho Port, author of The Record of Empty Hall: One Hundred Classic Koans "Zen Master Tales opens the world of Zen through its stories and reveals who and what we really are. It tells the truths of Zen in a manner I think best for our age, both skeptical and seeking."-James Ishmael Ford, author of Introduction to Zen Koans "Well-researched presented in a cool, relaxed, and easy-to-read manner."-Buddhistdoor Global