In 2013 I began writing a book about Chan Buddhism. Six years later, after dozens of rewrites, it was published. I titled the book Exploring Chan because exploring has always been my relationship with this subject. The more I have learned about Chan, broadly speaking, the more I have realized there is much more to know about it. So I write as a fellow explorer on a jouney of discovery. For me, Chan has always been about the journey. But it would be narrow-sighted to assume that my journey exists in a vacuum.
Forword
In 2013 I began writing a book about Chan Buddhism. Six years later, after dozens of rewrites, it was published as Exploring Chan, an Introduction to the Religious and Mystical Tradition of Chinese Buddhism. I emphasize "exploring" in the title because the more I have learned about Chan, broadly speaking, the more I have realized there is much more to know about it; thus, I present the topic as a fellow explorer on a jouney, one that still continues today. Over the years, I've come to realize that my own journey shares much common ground with other people's travels in the domain of the spirit. The seeds of chan as we know it today were born and germinated in the ancient Indus River Valley during South Asia's bronze age (the Harappan civilization), long before India became the India we know today. Thanks to those early mystics, we now have a robust tradition called Chan--a profoundly useful tool to help with the difficulties and challanges life asserts upon us.
Having a sense of the historical foundations of Chan can help us appreicate the context in which Chan is taught and practiced today, and provide a degree of reassuance that our efforts will be rewarded. For this reason, nearly half of the book reviews the development of Chan, from the earliest times that historical records exist, to the present; while the remainder of the book covers practice topics from my own experience, along with the experience of others who I've had the pleasure of knowing.
I present, below, a modestly abridged version of the introduction to give readers an idea of the scope, presentation and perspective of the work. Footnotes and references have been omitted here but are plentiful in the original text. As always, we encourage comments and questions, which can be submitted at the bottom of the page, or though our online contact form.
Chuan Zhi, November 2022
A strange thing happened when I was very young. Our old farmhouse was perched on a small hill overlooking a quiet pond in the middle of a forty-acre farm in the rural heartland of southern Illinois. A barbed wire fence separated a small grassy yard from a horse pasture, which sprawled over acres of green fields.
It was a hot, humid, summer day as I watched a thunderstorm plod its way over the farm, offering a dramatic show of lightning and thunder. Its egress broke a long heat wave, leaving the air clear and cool. Energized by the change of climate, I ran down to the old barn to play in the fresh mud.
After some time, I stopped what I was doing and looked up at a cloud passing overhead, brilliant white against a clear blue sky. In that instant, a barrage of perplexing and unsettling questions came to me. What is this? Who am I? Why is this me instead of someone else?
Now, over fifty years later, this memory stands out as the oddest from my childhood. It was the first time I can recall reflecting upon the nature of existence and identity. It’s also my earliest memory that includes vivid recollections of the day itself, from the sound and smell of the rainstorm to the excitement and fear of being alive.
Such moments may be common among us, but the question of existence—who is it who is experiencing this life?—continued to gnaw at me throughout my adolescent years and beyond. As a young adult in college, I might have been characterized as nerdy: when I wasn’t studying physics or mathematics, I was reading the works of Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Douglas Hofstadter, and Paul Feyerabend, absorbing myself in the orchestrations of Mahler and Shostakovich, or developing my juggling skills. Inwardly, however, I suffered tremendous anxiety and at times severe depression. On the edge of consciousness, existential questions continued to gnaw at me.
As a physics student, one day I encountered the work of Blaise Pascal , a prominent physicist, mathematician, and theologian of the seventeenth century. I was especially moved by a comment he left in his notes:
For after all what is man in nature? A nothing in relation to infinity, all in relation to nothing, a central point between nothing and all and infinitely far from understanding either. The ends of things and their beginnings are impregnably concealed from him in an impenetrable secret. He is equally incapable of seeing the nothingness out of which he was drawn and the infinite in which he is engulfed.
Pascal’s thoughts unsettled me. They reinforced my feeling that the questions to which I was seeking answers were likely unanswerable. Later, during my senior year, I discovered the Blue Cliff Record , a collection of Chan (chán 禪) writings (kung-ans) intended to be used as seeds for contemplation ; a Chinese method for becoming aware of something called “Buddha-nature.” The book opened new and peculiar pathways for me to explore and gave me a comforting sense that I wasn’t alone on my quest to understand reality and my place in it. It also gave me hope that there might be real answers to my existential questions. Maybe Pascal was wrong and the infinite in which we are engulfed can be realized. I didn’t know, but I had a strong desire to find out.
Years later, I would turn to the ascetic practice of Chinese Chan to which the Blue Cliff Record had first introduced me. I would discover, however, that the aspect of Chan I was interested in—that which focused on contemplation and meditation—did not exist independently of its religious framework. This befuddled me. I was interested in the ascetic and mystical disciplines of Chan to help answer burning ontological questions, not the mindless passivity and unquestioned adherence to dogma I associated with religious practices.
Yet I came to learn that embracing Chan meant embracing Buddhism, because Chan was described, explained, and taught through Buddhist language and practice. As I delved into Chan’s religious side, I found many aspects paradoxical, confusing, and at odds with the spiritual practice it purported to represent. Looking to others for clarity was futile, for people seemed to view Chan in one of two distinct and mutually exclusive ways: either it was a religion characterized by a specific set of practices, beliefs, and ideologies, or it was a form of mysticism characterized by contemplation , meditation, and detachment from worldly affairs. I found nobody during those early years who could bridge the divide for me, who could connect the two together. So I set out to do it on my own.
Being alive is extraordinary. Perhaps it’s our ability to ponder existence in the first place that differentiates us from other forms of life. We often call it self-awareness, but what is self-awareness? When we look closely, we see that what we think of as our “self” is an artifact of the senses which allow us to feel, see, hear, smell, taste, and think. Put them all together, add a bit of experience, and a self is born. Over time, we come to identify ourselves through our experiences, both their sensory aspect and our mental interpretations of them. At some point along the way, we conclude: this is me. Soon we learn to judge and evaluate and begin forming opinions and perspectives based on our interpretations of those experiences; we decide what to enjoy and what to dislike, who to hate and who to love. As our sense of identity grows through this process, we become increasingly trapped within it. Our lives may then come to feel fractured, leaving us angry, moody, anxious, depressed, and disillusioned. To alleviate the pain, we may seek distractions with drugs, video games, gossip, social media, sex , talk, careers, social life, TV, radio, books—the list of options is endless. But if we turn our gaze inward, toward the source from which consciousness arises, we can exit the cacophony of this mental anguish and heal the fractures.
To explain what mystical -Chan is about, consider that we each live in a kind of “reality bubble ” created by our experiences. Mysticism offers a means to break out of this bubble, to get beyond the limitations imposed by an illusory ego that constructs its own limited and narrow view of reality. From it, we experience salvation because we are freed, or saved, from ourselves—our ego-selves.
The idea that the ego —that which gives rise to a sense of identity—is a mere illusion has become a recent topic of interest in Western culture and many books have been written about it. From the Chan perspective, however, we’re interested in understanding it only as it pertains to helping us transcend it. The challenge is that this understanding requires we enter a kind of recursive, self-referential loop, because that which is discovered is that which does the discovering. In Part Two, we’ll explore Chan’s methods for entering this loop.
The landscape of Buddhism is much different today from that of a thousand years ago. Consumerism, social media, science, and technology have all helped create a distinct shape of reality for us that could not have been imagined by our ancient ancestors. While some aspects of modern society obviously distract from living a contemplative life, advances in our understanding of the world through the physical, biological, and social sciences have provided unbiased and irrefutable evidence of the value of turning our gaze inward. This simple activity is known to lead to better sleep , fewer medical and psychological problems, improved relationships, and greater overall contentment. Science can’t do the work, the “spiritual labor ,” for us, but, for those of us who embrace the scientific method as a means for better understanding the world we live in, we can use the outcomes of scientific investigations to inspire and motivate us to lead more contemplative lives.
A great deal has been learned over the last century about the meaning, process, and experience of spirituality, as well as the religious institutions that have been created around it. The biological sciences have revealed underlying principles that account for feelings and emotions described as numinous , or otherworldly, by those who have experienced them, and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI ) and electroencephalography (EEG) have provided many insights into the physiology of mental states experienced during meditation. Studies have also suggested profound effects at the genetic level which lessen the risk of disease and increase longevity.
Scientific insights aside, Chan as a mystical practice is purely experiential. It eludes attempts to define or explain it. Just as we can’t know what it’s like to hike the Pacific Crest Trail unless we get on it and start walking, neither can we know Chan’s mystical path unless we embark on it. Both require psychological preparedness and physical fitness, as well as courage and discipline. And both require faith that the journey will be worth taking in the first place.
The expression and interpretation of mystical experience, as well as details of the experiences themselves, are necessarily mediated by culture, language, and the religious paradigm, but the essence of the experience, I argue, is not dependent upon these things (Chapters 10-13, 18). If we consider the religious artwork and poetry created by people across the globe for centuries, it’s obvious that mystical experience shares uncanny similarities across cultures, religions, and even time itself (Chapter 17).
Although I began Chan as a mystical practice , a great many people enter through its religious portal, aligning themselves with its institutional form before engaging with it as a spiritual discipline. There are also many who enter through the religious gateway, get stuck there, and go no further. In fact, some Chan scholars, as well as some self-proclaimed Chan/Zen Buddhists I have spoken with, deny that Chan offers a mystical approach to Buddhism in any way. One scholar I know, for example, views Chan entirely as a socioreligious construct mediated by politics, social dynamics, ceremony, and various expressive forms of religious idealization. Similarly, Peter L. Berger, sociologist and theologian, considers Chan’s mystical aspect a social construction which induces alienation , veiling reality from anyone who gets caught up in it. While these aspects can play into the complex religious structure and identity of Chan, unless we look within—the mystic’s “practice”—we will, indeed, as Berger argues, become prisoners of the religious paradigm; our identity will become mediated by the institution, our personal “reality bubble ” replaced by that of the religious collective.
Chan is most commonly viewed in its institutional context, and Alan Cole , author of Patriarchs on Paper: A Critical History of Medieval Chan Literature, offers a plausible explanation for why. Although the term “Chan” means meditation, he suggests that during the mid-Tang dynasty the “perfect master” came to replace the meditation master: “What came to be known as the ‘Chan tradition’ (chanzong) only emerges when chan stopped meaning meditation and took on this sense of ‘perfect’.” To his point, anyone visiting a traditional Chan temple in China or a Zen temple in Japan will observe veneration for, and often total allegiance to, the principal ecclesiastical authority who may even be regarded as a Buddha. This phenomenon has, to a large extent, carried over to Zen and Chan training centers in the West.
Yet, although devotional ancestor and master worship became a central feature of institutional Chan, there are still tens of thousands of Chan monks and lay practitioners who sit for hours daily in meditation, some of whom participate in devotional Buddhism when off the cushion. Taigen Dan Leighton reasonably suggests, however, that in many cases this type of sitting following formal protocols may be entirely “a ceremonial, ritual expression whose transformative quality is not based on stages of attainment or meditative prowess.” Which begs a question: what is going on in the minds of those who are, in fact, sitting on a cushion? Are they meditating or not? If so, are they doing it in the context of religious ritual or not? If they are truly meditating, does it matter? Having visited both monastic and home-spun sitting groups in which the only instructions given were “just sit,” “watch your breath ,” “just breathe,” or even “watch what other people are doing and copy it,” it’s likely that some people who practice Zen or Chan don’t engage with it as a mystical discipline. Without the right kind of guidance and motivation, practitioners may never experience true meditation. In such cases, the formal act of sitting may indeed be purely ceremonial and unrelated to the spiritual journey. Yet, for those who engage with Chan as a path of salvation —as a vehicle for transcending suffering—I contend that it’s nothing other than a mystical discipline , regardless of the institutional context. This view is rarely presented by scholars.
Robert Sharf , author of Coming to Terms with Chinese Buddhism, suggests that the reason this subject is so often skirted by scholars is because of “daunting hermeneutic problems involved in what might be called the comparative phenomenology of meditation.” For this reason, bias toward viewing Chan predominantly in its institutional form may have evolved naturally, considering the essentially ineffable quality of mystical experience. Since the spiritual realm of feelings doesn’t lend itself to analysis or discourse, authors tend to stay away from it. As Chan master Hsu Yun succinctly expressed it, “Learning adds things that can be researched and discussed. The feel of impressions can’t be communicated.” We might be able to accurately describe a car to someone who has never seen one before, but how do we describe the color blue to someone without vision ? Herein lies the fundamental challenge for any author who attempts to enter this treacherous domain: spiritual experiences are subjective and can’t be communicated. They can only be experienced.
Since we are considering two semi-distinct aspects of Chan, hereafter I’ll follow Robert Sharf ’s convention of referring to small-c chan as the mystical practice and large-C Chan as its institutional religious counterpart, although he explains them slightly differently: “[t]he former refers to Chinese Buddhist dhyāna techniques writ large, and encompasses a wide array of practices that made their way from India to China beginning in the first and second centuries C. E. […] Large-C Chan refers to a specific lineage or school […] that was based on the mythology of an unbroken, independent lineage of enlightened masters…”
In the West, the term Zen is most commonly associated with Japanese expressions of Chinese Chan. I sometimes use the terms interchangeably, however, since both originate from the transliteration of the same Sanskrit word, dhyāna , meaning “to dwell.” Although Zen is the term more commonly known in the West today, I’ll use it principally when referring specifically to Japanese-oriented approaches and reserve the term Chan for Chinese approaches.
In Vietnam , the term for Chan is Thiền , and in Korea , Sŏn (Seon), but these terms are less frequently encountered in the Occident. Although they all originated from Chinese Chan, Zen, Sŏn, and Thiền have each developed distinctive characteristics and practices that departed, to various degrees, from Chan’s presentation in China. We’ll explore how and why in Part I, keeping in mind that the spiritual disciplines presented by each are affected little by the religious forms that contain them.
Over the last few decades, scholars have examined the political, social, and economic forces that created and shaped Chan during its formative years, and have offered insights on how those forces may have shaped today’s presentation of Chan and Zen. Some of those writers we can thank for these insights—most of whom were or are devoted Zen or Chan practitioners themselves—include the late John R. McRae and his wife Jan Nattier , Tilmann Vetter , T. Griffith Foulk , Alan Cole , Brian Victoria , Christopher Ives , Morton Schlütter , Stuart Lachs , Robert H. Sharf , Albert Welter , David Keightley , and Steven Heine. Their valuable thoughts, along with those of others, are sprinkled throughout this book as I attempt to paint a broad picture of Chan Buddhism, exploring its historical, sociological, religious, and mystical contexts. I also reflect on various ways that Chan is conceived and practiced in Western society today in relation to its origins and development in India and China, and offer some practical guidance to readers who may be interested in practicing chan, joining sitting groups, or sharing practice with others.
Along the way, I will address a series of related questions: (a) How and why did Chan arise in China as a unique expression of Chinese Buddhism? (b) How and why did the Chan institution invent its characteristic lineage system and what is its significance? (c) How has state sponsorship shaped the presentation of Chan and Zen throughout the Orient? (d) Why is there a seeming disparity between the mystical practice of Chan and its religious expression? (e) How does one “do” Chan as a mystical practice, and why would someone want to? (f) How can the religious presentation of Chan be simultaneously supportive and subversive to ascetic practice ? And (g) How might a practitioner of Chan best engage with the Chan institution to ensure healthy spiritual growth?
Before we get started, some terms frequently used throughout the book are best explained early, as their meanings in our context may differ from those the reader is familiar with:
Buddhism: Buddhism is, of course, a religion, but it differs from the conventional occidental notion of religion in that there are no universally agreed-upon canonical texts defining it, and there is no universal concept of a personified deity. While chan is a practice that can readily be done by anyone—given adequate preparedness and motivation—discussing chan requires the language of Buddhism, as it was Indian Buddhism, combined with other religious and social movements in China, from which it was born. The two terms closest to the heart of Buddhism are Dharma and Buddha.
Dharma: Dharma (Pāli, Dhamma) is often translated as Universal Law or Ultimate Truth, and refers to the underlying governing principles of reality, which are not identifiable through the senses or rational thought. It also refers to the teachings of the Buddha, as well as to the myriad “things” (dharmas ) that flutter in and out of existence in a constant state of flux (dharmakāya ). In the Buddhist canon , it has taken on many other meanings, including righteousness, conscience, nature, duty, phenomena, virtue, and justice. The term is thought to have originated in pre-Buddhist Vedic culture, where it meant order and law.
Buddha: In Sanskrit, Buddha means one who is fully awake and conscious. In Buddhism, the term Buddha is commonly used in three main contexts: first, as a reference to Siddhārtha Gautama of the Shakya (Śākya) clan—sometimes referred to affectionately as Shakyamuni (“hermit of the Śākyas”); second, as a reference to the essential-nature inherent in all things; and third, as a reference to the ideal (“celestial ”) form of an enlightened being. Other terms for the celestial Buddha are Amitāyus , Amitābha , and Amida. “Bodhisattva,” in early Buddhist texts, refers to the Buddha before he became the Buddha, but the term is now commonly (and confusingly) used to describe either someone who wishes to live in accordance with self-sacrifice and Dharma, or someone who has become fully spiritually awakened and “returns to the world to help others.” The Buddhist canon suggests that after experiencing enlightenment, the Buddha referred to himself, illeistically, as the Tathāgata , lit. “one who has arrived at suchness.” The teachings of the Buddha were posthumously preserved orally in sutras (Skt., sūtras; Pāli, suttas) before being put into writing several hundred years later. The sutra tradition, however, is riddled with questions of authenticity, a (sometimes heated) topic explored in Part One of this book. The basis for all the Buddha’s teachings was to transcend suffering.
“Suffering”: The Sanskrit term duhkha (duḥkha ), simplistically translated as suffering in English, describes all the myriad ways that life tortures us: sadness, anger, grief, fear, disillusionment, anxiety, hate, pain, etc. Transcending duhkha is the central theme of Buddhism. In Sanskrit, the realm of suffering in which we live is called samsāra, for which there is no English equivalent. Through specific practices described in the Buddha’s Four Noble Truths , one can escape samsāra and enter nirvāṇa , the realm of egoless awareness, sometimes referred to as “Buddha-nature” or “True Self.”
“True Self”: The term True Self describes awareness when it’s stripped of ego -identity, or ego-self. Common synonyms for True Self include Buddha-nature or Dharma-nature (fó xìng 佛性; Skt., Tathāgatagarbha), essential nature, essential being, original nature, and essential Self. In the Indian Vedas and Upanishads , it’s referred to as Brahman , and in China as Xīn 心. Xīn is typically translated to English as Mind, but it also includes the concepts of heart , intelligence, center, core, and soul. Chan training employs various methods for gaining awareness of this “Self,” which is ever-present yet rarely known because of the ego’s overwhelming bias toward sensory modes of perception.
Meditation (Dhyāna): Meditation is a broad categorical term that, in popular culture, describes both mindfulness and contemplation , as well as meditation. The term meditation is now often identified with various practices and states of mind which are precursors to meditation (in its original intended meaning), such as mindfulness practices that lead to withdrawal of the senses (pratyahara) and concentration practices (dhāraṇā ) that lead to calmness of mind (santi). Dhāraṇā involves focusing the mind on a specific thing, or “ seed,” such as an idea or thought, an image held in the mind, a sensation, etc.; while dhyāna implies a mind which has entered an egoless state of awareness. The term Chán—though derived from Chán-na, the early Chinese transliteration of dhyāna—has acquired additional meanings that differentiate it from its Sanskrit namesake, a topic we’ll explore throughout this book.
Spirituality: Spirituality (jīn gshén xìng 精神性) derives from the Latin term spiritus, meaning breath, soul, courage, and vigor, and refers to connecting with our “inner life” (nèixiǎn 内想), which is devoid of judgment, bias, interpretation, opinion, and belief. Spirituality is characterized by Self-absorption and contemplation (chénsī 沉思).
The term spirituality is often used broadly and indiscriminately in contemporary culture to mean a variety of things, from belief in ghosts to a religious belief in a personified God. In this book, I use spirituality to refer to the ascetic ’s practice of contemplating and detaching from worldly affairs. I don’t use the term in a religious context, which would associate it more with institutional forms of worship than with Self-absorption.
Enlightenment: Enlightenment refers to spiritual awakening, or the recognition of the ineffable Self. In the 1930s, D. T. Suzuki , one of the foremost voices in Japanese Zen during the early 20th century, popularized the term enlightenment from his translation of the Japanese term, satori; a convention started by Max Müeller (1823-1900). Originally, enlightenment referred to a European social movement during the 18th century described by Immanuel Kant as “freedom to use one’s own intelligence.” In Chinese, the experience of enlightenment or “new spiritual awareness” is wù 悟. In Sanskrit, the term for spiritual awakening is bodhi (बोधि), and the term for ultimate liberation or salvation is nirvāṇa (निर्वाण). In the early Buddhist canon , enlightenment was closely linked to the release from suffering.
There are various enlightenment experiences, from small glimpses of Self to full-blown ecstatic “ revelation” (Chapter 18). The experience of enlightenment—mystical awakening—is not unique to Chan. Other mystical traditions recognize the same thing using different terminology and models to express it. It has, for example, been regarded as akin to the Christian alchemists’ philosopher’s stone , the Sufis’ ( Islamic mystics ’) Marifa ( المعرفة), and the Jewish Kabbalists’ ayin.
Religion: Religion, in the context of this work, is an institutional social framework governed by rules, beliefs, ethical codes of conduct, procedures, and rituals , all of which ensure conformity of thought and action within its body of followers. Religion is embodied by subliminal (unconscious ) archetypal motifs. At its heart is a shared belief system that strengthens and perpetuates the institution but can isolate it and its members from the world at large—a phenomenon Peter Berger calls alienation —as well as from those outside the institution who do not share its core beliefs.
Archetypal Motifs: Archetype (diǎnxíng 典型) derives from the Greek noun archetupon (ἀρχέτυπον), which means first-molded, beginning, origin, pattern, or model. An archetype is thus the distilled essence of something that reveals its fundamental intrinsic form or nature. For example, a triangle drawn on paper may be considered the archetype of a structural principle and a statue of the Buddha an archetypal representation of Self. Psychological archetypal motifs are visual and emotional themes that are believed to have arisen through evolutionary processes, and manifest across all cultures and civilizations. They are especially prominent in religions, being represented in statuary, frescos, paintings, hymns , chants, and canonical texts.
Mysticism: The term mysticism (sham zhǔyì 神秘主義) evolved from the Greek word mustērion (μυστηριον), meaning that which is secret, hidden, and remains unknown. A mystic is one who delves into that which is unknown—more specifically, that which cannot be known through the senses. This concept arises in many religious traditions, including Chan, where the aim is to abandon what is known in favor of what is not known, through disengagement with worldly affairs. As “mysteries” are discovered and become known, the mystic assimilates them and continues further into the unknown. Chan provides a mystical (shénmì 神秘) tradition of Chinese Buddhism, just as Judaism offers Kabbalism , Islam offers Sufism, and Christianity offers spiritual alchemy (insofar as the ancient alchemists were Christians ).
“ self ” vs. “ Self”: Throughout this book I refer to the concept of self in two ways: small-s “self” (zìwǒ 自我; Skt., ahaṃkāra) refers to our usual notion of who we are—our identity—which is created and shaped through sensory experience, while large-S “Self” (Skt., antarātma) I use to refer to our original nature , our fundamental essence, aspects of which can be known once we are able to see beyond ego -moderated awareness. I also use the term Self to refer to evolved instinctual patterns beyond our conscious awareness which manifest as emotions to spur us to action. In Chan, Self is sometimes represented symbolically with an ox , or more specifically, a wild Asian water buffalo (Chapter 14).
A note on language
Many of the terms used in Buddhism originate from Sanskrit or Pāli sources, the primary languages through which Buddhism spread as it moved out of India and split into different schools. Today, we recognize the Pāli canon as associated with Theravāda Buddhism, that school which evolved as Buddhism spread south from India into Sri Lanka , Myanmar, Thailand , Cambodia , and Malaysia. Mahāyāna Buddhism, which spread dominantly into central Asia and China, adopted the older classical language of Sanskrit.
Linguists warn us that our worldview is shaped profoundly by our language and its grammar. In discussing religions endemic to cultures whose languages are significantly different from ours, we must consider that it may be fundamentally impossible to accurately describe and interpret them. To address this problem, I sometimes include original terms in Chinese Hanyu Pinyin and hanzi (pictographic characters), as well as Sanskrit and Pāli transliterations, to allow the reader the opportunity to investigate key concepts elsewhere if desired.
In Summary
This book is the culmination of my observations, perspectives, and experiences from several decades of engagement with Chan in both its mystical and institutional forms; as such, it would be impossible to separate my views from the narrative. It’s my hope that the reader will take everything presented here with a degree of skepticism that will ignite an independent critical examination of what’s true and what’s false, what’s imaginary and what’s real, for another’s word on matters of the spirit can never be as satisfactory as one’s own discoveries.
In Part One, we’ll explore the religious and spiritual backdrop from which Chan emerged, starting in ancient India and moving through time to the present. We’ll see how Chan evolved through a creative process of invention, spiritual insight, political wrangling, and creative writing that lasted for nearly a millennium. We’ll consider how the mystical tradition of chan may have had roots in antiquity, and we’ll also explore some of the consequences of institutionalization, politicization, and militarization of Buddhism. In Part Two, we’ll examine some chan training methods, and I’ll offer specific exercises for the reader interested in trying them. In Part Three, we’ll look at a variety of experiences commonly encountered as we delve into our inner lives, and in Part Four, I’ll address some problems and potential dangers that can occur and offer suggestions on ways to avoid them.
My own journey began with a fascination with the philosophical and ontological insights presented in Chan’s canonical texts, and I present some of these in Part One. Much later, I began practicing chan, and practice is the focus of the remainder of the book. Only recently have I become intrigued by the institutional presentation of Chan, and I have integrated my thoughts on this topic, along with those of contemporary scholars, throughout the book.
I hope you enjoy this exploration into the mysterious realm of Self and the religious expression that emerged from it in China called Chan.
The book is available online through many booksellers including Amazon.