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Photograph by Ven. Anzan Hoshin roshi
eMirror Vol. 11, No. 48 Friday, November 28th, 2007 Edited by Ven. Jinmyo Renge osho
Quotes from teisho are run sequentially in the eMirror
There are so many mysteries and joys to be uncovered in the ten directions of this world. The smell of incense, the sensation of the breath, the taste of rice all point to the ten directions. In each direction and in all directions spaces are opening as further spaces. The feeling of the hand dissolves into numberless sensations, all coming and going and expansive, opening into effervescence, opening into a transparency between sensations and spaciousness. As our practice opens further to how experiences really are, as we work with the dimensionality of the space of present experience, we begin to recognize that the whole space of the ten directions of this universe are found in each point of space and that each point of space pervades all spaces. Saha, Abhirati, Sarvagandhasugandha, any possible space of experiencing are all containing and pervading each other and are all arising as the Dharmadhatu, the Total Field of All Possibilities. And the Total Field is arising within the Awake and Aware Space that has been realized and transmitted by the Buddhas and Awakened Ancestors. And this is your own nature. It is what you are experiencing as these ten directions, and as the posture of zazen.
This evening, please, enjoy yourselves.
- Ven. Anzan Hoshin roshi, concluding teisho 3: "Fields of Awakening" in the the teisho series "Five Fingers, Ten Directions: Commentaries on Eihei Dogen zenji's text 'Jippo'", presented Sunday, May 13, 2001.
Upcoming Events
Fusatsu and the Vow of Samantabhadra Chanting of the Precepts will take place on December 12th and 26th. The Vow of Samantabhadra will be chanted on December 19th.
Rohatsu O-sesshin Rohatsu O-sesshin will begin at 8:00 p.m. on Saturday, December 1st and will end at at 8:00 a.m., December 8th, following the ceremony of Jodo-e which commemorates the Buddha's Awakening. Ven. Anzan Hoshin roshi will continue the current teisho series "Doing Not-Doing part two: Commentaries on Eihei Dogen zenji's Kyojukaimon and Fusatsu". On Saturday, December 1st, the 6:00 a.m. formal sitting and the 9:30 a.m. general sitting will take place as scheduled. On Saturday December 8th the 6:00 a.m. formal sitting and the 9:30 general sitting are cancelled. There are no other sittings during the week of O-sesshin that associate or general students may attend.
Shukke-Tokudo At 7:00 p.m., Saturday, December 8th, Chunen ino will be acknowledged as a taiko or monastic senior. Ven. Chunen Rampal ino has been a student of the Roshi since 1996. He received postulant vows for monastic ordination following the May 1999 Sogaku-ki O-sesshin, and received Transmission as a practice advisor during the Joya (New Year's celebration) of 1999/2000. He began training in the monastic post of Chiden on May 22nd, 2003. He received ordination as a full monastic on May 24th, 2002. On July 18, 2004 he began training in the monastic training post of Tando. On February 17th, 2006, he was appointed to the training post of Ino by the Roshi. He has now completed five years of training as a full monastic. Chunen ino will reaffirm the precepts and then will present a Senior's Dharma Talk. Seating is limited so please register early by sending an email to schedule at wwzc dot com or by leaving a message on the Zen Centre office answering machine at 613-562-1568.
A Note to Preliminary and Public Students Concerning O-sesshin During an O-sesshin the schedule is such that there is no time to meet face to face with preliminary students or to reply to email correspondence sent by public students. Public students are asked to send their weekly or bi-weekly practice journals, as these will be reviewed. But unless there is something that needs an immediate reply, you will not receive an email reply until the week following the O-sesshin.
Dainen-ki December 12th is the anniversary of the day on which the Roshi’s Teacher, Ven. Yasuda Joshu Dainen roshi died.
Hermitage The Roshi will begin a period of hermitage on Wednesday, December 12th, which will end at 10:00 a.m. on Sunday, December 16th, when he leads monastics in Acalanatha Sadhana.
Oryoki for General Students On Saturday, December 15th, general students who attend the 6:00 a.m. formal sitting may participate in oryoki practice led by Jinmyo osho. Associate or visiting public students who are in retreat at the monastery on that day may also participate in oryoki. Dana is $10.00. You do not need previous experience of oryoki to attend. For more information or to register please send an email to schedule at wwzc dot org.
Joya (New Year's Celebration) On Monday, December 31st at 10 p.m. until Tuesday, January 1st at 12:00 a.m. we will celebrate Joya or New Year's. Join Zen Master Anzan Hoshin, Ven. Shikai osho and Ven. Jinmyo osho and the monastics of the Northern Mountain Order in ringing in the New Year with 108 recitations of the Mahaprajnaparamita Hridaya sutra mantra. Following the sitting there will be an array of shojin-ryori (Zen vegetarian cuisine) dishes for an informal feast. There is no better way to begin the year. Dana is $25. Please register by sending an email to or telephone the Zen Centre office (613) 562-1568. The Tuesday 6:00 a.m. formal sitting is cancelled.
Introduction to Zen Workshop Ven. Jinmyo Renge osho will present the next Introduction to Zen Workshop at Dainen-ji on Saturday, January 5th. For more information please see: http://www.wwzc.org/programs/Introduction_To_Zen_Workshop_Ottawa.htm. For information concerning our Long-distance Training Program, please visit this Web Page: http://www.wwzc.org/programs/longDistance.htm.
Zen Classes On Nov 28th, Shikai osho and Chunen ino received 20 students and their teacher from the Merrivale High School as part of a field trip of their World Religions Class. On Nov 28th Chunen ino received two students from Brookfield High School for the second of two classes. These classes are by invitation from the Continuing Education Department of the Ottawa Carleton District School Board.
Recorded Teisho Schedule Saturday, December 1st general sitting - Turning the Wheel of the Way: Zen Master Anzan Hoshin's commentaries on Eihei Dogen zenji's "Gyoji: Continuous Practice": "Yunju's Bothering" (teisho 10 of 44).
White Wind Zen Community Website Updates A Dharma Talk presented by Ven. Shikai Zuiko osho entitled "Every Breath You Take" has been posted on the Website. The direct link is: http://www.wwzc.org/dharmaTalks/Home-EveryBreathYouTake.htm
A Dharma Talk presented by Ven. Chunen ino entitled "It's Worse Than you Realize, but Better Than You Think" on the subject of the Four Noble Truths has been posted on the Website. The direct link is: http://www.wwzc.org/ItsWorseThanYouRealize.htm
Retreats Isshin sat one-day retreats on Monday and on Thursday in her home on Gabriola Island. Paul Kadziora began a retreat at 3:00 p.m. on Thursday which will end this evening (Friday) at 9:10 p.m.
To Schedule a Retreat Please email schedule at wwzc dot org to schedule a retreat, even if you have made verbal arrangements with a practice advisor or a Dharma Teacher. Emails sent to that address are routed to all members of the Practice Council who will need this information for the purposes of meal planning, preparing tapes for your retreat and planning samu assignments. Retreats are defined in the following way:
Half-day Retreat (you would need to arrive 15 minutes before the actual starting time) Begin at 6:00 a.m., end at noon. Or begin at 9:30 a.m., end at 6:00. Or begin at 3:00 p.m., end at 9:10. Partial Retreat (You would need to arrive 15 minutes before the actual starting time) Begin at 6:00 a.m., end at 6:00 p.m. Or begin at 9:30 a.m., end at 9:10 p.m. Full retreat (you would need to arrive by 5:45) Begin at 6:00 a.m., end at 9:10 p.m. Please remember to bring a change of clothes suitable for samu (caretaking practice). If staying overnight, please remember to bring a sleeping bag, a towel and other such necessities. If you have been diagnosed by a medical doctor as having allergies to specific foods, please contact the tenzo, Jinmyo osho at rengezo at vianet dot ca, a week in advance of your retreat to inform her of dietary restrictions as this affects food purchases and meal planning. The suggested dana for retreats is $40 a day, which covers the basic cost of food and other materials. Donations above this figure are very welcome and all donations are tax deductible. There is also a retreat schedule for public students posted on our Website at: http://www.wwzc.org/Resources/Public.student.retreat.schedule.htm Public Students’ Retreats For retreats to be mentioned in the eMirror, public students are asked to send an email to schedule at wwzc dot org after they sit a retreat mentioning the date of their retreat and whether it is a partial, half-day or full retreat. Please also include the name of the city in which you live.
Samu Weekend Report From the Shissui
The final same weekend of 2007 took place this past weekend. A total of 28 students attended and worked on a wide variety of projects throughout the monastery. Here is a list of some of the “highlights”: A large portion of the attic was re-insulated. This involved cleaning the previous loose-fill insulation and adding a few more inches of new insulation. Bolts were installed at the rafters to help strengthen the floor joists; plumbing venting was redirected and then a new plywood sub-floor was installed. A new set up shelves was constructed in the covered balcony to house the air-conditioners, fans, dehumidifiers and humidifiers that are needed through the building at various times in the year. This will greatly simplify access and set up of these units. The new section of shelving built at the last samu weekend was was painted and installed in the Shuryo and adds further book capacity to this study hall. More work was done to clarify and organize the pantry, furnace room and workshop. Plastic window film was added to many of the more leaky windows on the first floor to help keep out the cold and work was done in the grounds to protect the more tender plants over winter and to shut down the pond, stream and waterfall and store the rain barrels. Painting was done in the stair well to the 3rd floor archiving and common room. Thank you to the Roshi and Jinmyo osho for designing and preparing the two wonderful midday meals enjoyed by the participants of the weekend and to Shikai osho for creating the excellent refreshments.
Thank you to the following students for their work during the samu weekend: Chunen ino, Senbo shuso, Jido anagarika, Muryo, Gillian Higenbottam, Elizabeth Katz, Nathan Krahn, Paul Kadziora, Bruce Libman, Jennifer Comeau, Sean Moreland, Guillaume Albert, Francois Fournier, Nathan Comeau, Kent Swinburne, Marie-Andree Gougeon, Sophia Stevenson, Jack Deyirmendjian, Alexis Fiset, Doug Somers, David Kelleher, Samantha Drouin, Caroline Kadziora, Graham Mayeda, James MacAulay, Denise Beaudot and Marrie Schryer. Gassho, Saigyo chiden (shissui)
Office of the Tenzo Dogen zenji taught that the work of preparing and serving meals was "a matter for realized monks who have the mind of the Way or by senior disciples who have roused the Way-seeking mind." In alignment with this, part of Zen Master Anzan Hoshin's samu for the Community involves personally overseeing the activities of the ancient office of tenzo. Jinmyo Renge osho serves as tenzo and Mishin tando and Saigyo chiden offer assistance as tenzo-anja. The following meals were prepared on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday evenings, prior to sittings:
Monday Yakuseki Green spinach udon noodles and puffed tofu with sliced daikon rounds and tong ho (chrysanthemum greens) and garlic stems in a broth with shoyu, slivered ginger and Michiu cooking wine; salad of blanched sugar snap peas and snow peas dressed with a very green sauce of pureed and strained mint leaves, mirin, Xiaoxing wine, ngoc mam, lime juice and extra virgin olive oil; baechu and kkugdugi kimchi.
Tuesday Yakuseki Stir-fried yu choy, ung choy tips, and Napa cabbage with lime and shoyu; pork back ribs, trimmed into portions, marinated in a tonkatsu style sauce with garlic, shoyu, and sesame oil and then slow-roasted; eryingi and oyster mushrooms and red onions in braised in kimchi broth; gohan cooked with perilla seeds and garnished with gomasio.
Thursday Yakuseki Minestrone (San Marzano tomato soup with sofrito, porcini and eryingi and large shitake mushrooms, pepperoncino, basil, oregano, thyme, red wine and ziti); sauteed Shanghai bok choy and baby bok choy with butter; roasted atsuage tofu squares with a jerk and cumin sauce and red onions; salad of Lebanese cucumbers, frisee, mache, and radicchio with lime and extra virgin olive oil.
Students attending sittings on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday evenings may make arrangements to join residents for meals prepared by the Office of the Tenzo. Please email schedule at wwzc dot org at least one day in advance; Contribution is $10.
Thank You If you would like to thank someone for a contribution they have made, please feel free to send an email to Jinmyo osho at rengezo at vianet dot ca, but be sure to type "eMirror" in the subject line.
From Chunen ino: Thank you to the Roshi leading the monastics in Shinrei every morning; to Shikai osho for several reminders to practice and for explanations on the use and mis-use of language across cultures; to Jinmyo osho for clarification of forms and procedures for the residents of Dainen-ji particularly on the 3rd floor; to Mishin tando for continuing with e-mail exchanges while on a work related trip to Jamaica, to Saigyo chiden for preparing for and overseeing severals dozen tasks during the samu weekend, and for looking after Nanzan; to Carl Anderson to Media Site work; to James MacAulay for help with computers. From Saigyo chiden: Thank you to the Roshi for beautiful Bodhidharma portrait which now hangs in the 3rd floor common room; to Senbo shuso for the gift of winter trousers; to Muryo for her assistance and expertise as shissui-anja (assistant to the caretaker) and for her work to draw detailed electrical plans of the building. Thank you to Guillaume Albert, Nathan Comeau, Carys Carrington, and Jennifer Comeau for samu and to Nathan Krahn for helping to collect supplies needed for the samu weekend.
Ongoing
Training Sessions and Short Residential Training Periods for Associate and General Students There are a number of options available to associate and general students who wish to practice more intensively, such as sitting a full or partial retreat for one or several days, or extending their practice at home to include two or three rounds. In addition, associate or general students may register for a "training session". This requires making a commitment to a one-week, month-long, or three month period during which they would attend all of the formal sittings at the monastery, morning and evening with the exception of Tuesday evening and Sunday morning (which are reserved for formal students and monastics) while continuing to live at home. The training sessions are intended to allow students to experience what it is like to participate in the monastery’s full schedule. Formal sittings are led by Roshi and include chanting practice and more extensive use of the forms. Students engaging in a training session would also have more opportunities to meet with Dharma Teachers or practice advisors to discuss their practice. At the end of a training session, students would return to their normal schedule. There would be no extra dana involved in practising a training session. With the Undo serving as a dormitory space students can register for periods of residential training at Dainen-ji for anywhere from overnight to several weeks. This involves attending the practice schedule, evening meals, participation in regular soji (cleaning the practice halls) and samu (care-taking). During the days one would go to one’s job or could do extra sitting and study outside of a retreat schedule. The dana for this is $40 a day; work scholarships can also be arranged. To register for a training session or residential training, please send an email to schedule at wwzc dot org or telephone the Zen Centre office at (613) 562-1568 and leave a message. When scheduling a training session, please remember not to include dates that fall within a sesshin or an O-sesshin.
Samu Request for Assistance, Office of the Treasurer As part of clarifying and streamlining the financial processes of White Wind Zen Community, we would like to have pairs of students rotate to help process dana contributions on a weekly basis. To date, most of this work has been done by Mishin tando with the assistance of one or two other students, but it is time to restructure the system so that the work of the Office of the Treasurer becomes more manageable and more students are helping with this responsibility. If you would be available on Saturdays prior to the General Sitting for about a hour (from 8:15-9:15 a.m.), your help will be appreciated. Please email Mishin at trytel dot com. Training will be provided. No special financial skills are needed other than an eye for detail and accuracy.
Archiving Samu Since 2002 the teisho presented by the Roshi and the Dharma Talks given by the Dharma Teachers have been recorded directly onto CD and copies made available to students. Prior to this time all of the recordings were made on cassette tape. Over the last years the monastics, with the help of several students, have worked to transfer the taped material onto CD, not only because cassette tape technology is fast becoming outdated but because the early tape recordings are deteriorating quickly and may soon become unplayable. To lose these teaching would be disastrous. We are presently making direct CD copies of all of the early tapes so that there is a back-up copy available should anything happen to the master tape which makes it unplayable but there is much work to be done. There are still over 100 tapes from the 1980’s and 1990’s that need to be re-mastered, relabeled and copied and this constitutes many hundreds of hours of work. If you are able to commit to a regular weekly schedule of two or three hours samu to continue this vital work, please let us know by writing to tapes at wwzc dot org. Full training will be given.
Daily Samu Samu each day to prepare the monastery for the arrival of the students is a very important practice for the monastics. Any help to assist the monks with brightening and clarifying the practice environment is very much appreciated. If you are able to come early before a sitting to do samu, please consult the samu notice board situated between the side entrance doors to find a task which has not been done recently. If you have any questions about the task please ask any monastic.
Improvements to the Second Floor Washroom A project that has been on the high priory list for a number of years is the renovation of the second floor washroom. Even though this is the most frequently used washroom in the building it has never had any substantial improvements apart from being painted last year. Work on this washroom, which was scheduled to be taking place late this year or early next year, will again need to be delayed due to the necessity of a urgent roof repair to the west side of the roof. This repair will cost in the region of $13,000 and as this is considerably higher than our available budget we have had to cut back on other important work. Because of this, we have decided to fundraise in order to gather sufficient money to make the improvements to the washroom. The work to be done will include a new sink and cabinet and a new ceiling light, fan and exhaust. This will cost in the region of $1000 to complete. Students are encouraged to donate towards this project so that it can be scheduled some time in the winter and the improved facilities will be available by 2007. Improvements to this room will benefit every student that comes to the monastery for sittings. Thank you for your generosity to help with this project. Gassho, Saigyo chiden, shissui.
CDs Available to the Public A selection of CDs of teisho and Dharma Talks is available on our web-site. The page is found at http://wwzc.org/CDWebSales/CDWebSales.htm or follow the link for Dharma Texts and CDs on the home page. Over time more teisho and Dharma Talks from the over 2500 presentations made by the Roshi, Shikai osho and Jinmyo osho will be made available for purchase.
Ongoing Project: "All is Change" Dainen-ji, being a 135-year-old building, is continuously in need of maintenance and the costs associated with this can be astronomical when such things as roof repairs or painting are needed. This is something that we cannot afford to do, yet must do and so the "All is Change" project has been created. The "All is Change" project is very simple. Most of us have a bowl or a jar or some other kind of container that we keep somewhere at home and fill up with loose change because it's too heavy to carry around. Many hundreds of dollars has been collected so far both in loose change and Canadian tire money which has been put towards the building maintenance fund. If anyone would like to contribute to this fund, each penny will be appreciated.
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