Further Readings from Aitken Roshi IV (LAST) ...

[Jundo]

I am going to suggest that we close out this book (but do such things ever truly end??) with 3 chapters ...

Chapter 19 ("The Way and Its Virtue"), Chapter 20 ("Religious Activism and the Tao") and Chapter 21 ("Gandhi, Dogen and Deep Ecology").

By the way ... if anyone would like to make a donation to Aitken Roshi in gratitude for making this book available ...

Welcome to the Dana for Aitken Roshi website. We invite you to join the Friends of Robert Aitken by making a pledge of financial support for Robert Aitken, who is now in frail health and requires extensive caregiving assistance.

In 2004, Aitken Roshi suffered a mild stroke that limited his mobility. Subsequently, he has been hospitalized numerous times for respiratory infections and has needed increasingly more assistance. Last fall, Roshi gratefully accepted the invitation of the Honolulu Diamond Sangha to "come home" and reside at the Palolo Zen Center for the remainder of
his life.

October of 2007 marks one year since Roshi returned to Palolo. During this time, he has become stronger, healthier and has not been back to the hospital. He is in good spirits, continues to work on various projects (including a new book), and often joins the Honolulu sangha for zazen and kinhin in his wheelchair. Yet, Roshi's care needs are substantial. Based on the recommendation of his primary doctor, he now receives 24-hour care to ensure his safety and well-being. In addition to physical assistance with mobility and his personal care provided by skilled caregivers, a part-time assistant is employed to coordinate Roshi's care and to provide secretarial support for his on-going work.

Although at present Roshi is not destitute and has fairly substantial assets, at a cost of over $14,000 per month his and HDS's financial resources are being rapidly depleted. We turn to you, dear friends, for assistance to help defray these ongoing expenses. Please consider joining us in making Roshi's wish to stay at Palolo possible. Your support in the form of an annual pledge will be greatly appreciated, not only by Roshi, but by all who care about Roshi's well-being.

http://aitkenroshi.org/index.html

Gassho, Jundo

[scott]

I bought a copy but then I left it in a hotel room. ... I'll catch up eventually.

[Kyrillos]

Well Aitken Roshi surprised me yet again with his understanding and grasp of the Christian perspective with regard to religious activism. There is a divergnce I would have liked to read rather than the emphasis he had on "social activism". He speaks about the "resistance movements" in the history of the early Church of the 4th century when the Church became Imperially acceptable, and he points out the Montanists of the 2nd Century as an example. Well the Montanists were not a reaction to the Imperial acceptance of Christianity, it was an movement within the forming Church more closely related to what we today would call Pentecostalism in general and in particular to the prophetic teachings of Montanus and one of his cohorts, Priscilla that were said to supercede the authority of the Scriptures.

The real reaction, and experiment that resulted at the time of Imperial enclosure of the Church was monasticism. Monasticism was a response when the Imperial trappings of Rome and Constantinople devolved onto the Church and the hierarchy willingly accepted those trappings, authority and corruption. The early Desert Fathers and Mothers left the cities and the formality of the Imperial Church to liveout fully the injunctions of the Gospel of where the Kingdom of Heaven (or God) resides. Those early monastics like Antony of Egypt and Pachomius,and two hundred years later, Benedict of Nursia, hoped to incorporate the message of the Gospel, with all of its social emphasis, in what became the cenobitic monasteries. It was there that the real social experiments of living together in a society determined to find and live the Kingdom of Heaven took place. Where better could the individual learn of the intimacy Aitken Roshi speaks of, as opposed to the "preoccupation with self", than in the monastery under a Rule that helped one to dimunize his own self-importance and desires and emphasize his sameness, one to another and with God. All the practices of corporate prayer, communal living and sharing, mutual obedience and humility foster the state whereby the monastic "realizes" the Presence of God and can practice that Presence in everything and everywhere.

That understanding and experience is what leads some in monastic life to also recognize the sameness of that understanding outside of their own experience, opening them to the like-mind found in the training and tradition of such things as Buddhism.

Gassho,

Kyrill-Seishin

[BrianW]

The quotation about Gandhi offers a refreshing perspective on social activism. Asked about his "humanitarian" motives in helping those in need Gandhi responds:

I am here to serve no one else but myself, to find my own self-realization through the service of these village folk.

The precept study has been a valuable time of reflection and the last chapters of the book ask us to consider how we may discover self-realization in the service of the world. As I end this study, the scene in the movie "A Year of Living Dangerously" where Billy Kwan, interestingly played by Linda Hunt, makes the statement "What then must we do?" (This was in reference to the poor of Indonesia.) He/she goes on to explain that this is a verse from the Bible and and Tolstoy asked the same question. Taking the precepts I see this as an appropriate koan..."What then must we do?"

By the way if you have not seen this movie I highly recommend it. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0086617/

Gassho,
Jisen