Practice as a drug

Certain Buddhists like Shunryu Suzuki advocate practice as a mind altering action similar to taking mind altering drugs (prescription or otherwise) to have a quieting or exhilarating affect. Of course they do not admit this directly, but they are not honest in regard to their religion or their beliefs, and have a tradition of deception and misrepresentation, including what they claim Zen to be, and what they claim as their lineage. For example, Zen did not arise out of Buddhism, as they try to claim. The seeing that is Zen is not interested in modifying what is seen or how it is seen. The organism and the environment already endlessly interact to affect this, so why try to alter it further? Buddhists and others are endlessly confused and their teachings are also confused. Most teachings are. Zen is not a teaching like this. It is a gang of old characters who make wise cracks about seeing and are not chasing their tales trying to find a solution to "what is", what the organism and the environment are already doing. At the age of 14 Alan Watts had converted to Buddhism. By age 40, when Watts was writing The Way of Zen, he had come full circle. He declared himself not be be a Buddhist, a Christian, or even a Zennist. After Watts died in 1973, his message was marginalized for a time by the many new Buddhist zazen centers in the West. Today, as these centers run out of reasons to exist, the message of Watts is being heard anew. Zen is being looked at intensely in a way it hasn't been looked at since Watts died. The drug of Practice is wearing off. The unborn of Bankei does not depend on any practice or any drug

Submitted August 09, 2017 at 01:56AM by ChristInZen http://ift.tt/2vKHOlC