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Primary VolumeP 31 • Number 2 int• Summer 2014 2] Winter Kyol Che 2015 January 3 - April 3 at Providence Zen Center Please Join Us And Awaken Your Insight! See your guiding teacher for information on obtaining a scholarship Sit for one week or more! [email protected] - www.providencezen.org - 401-658-1464 PRIMARY POINT Summer 2014 Primary Point 99 Pound Road, IN THIS ISSUE Cumberland RI 02864-2726 U.S.A. Telephone 401/658-1476 Did They Pass On? www.kwanumzen.org Zen Master Soeng Hyang .............................................................4 [email protected] online archives: Not Just a Human World www.kwanumzen.org/teachers-and-teaching/ Zen Master Seung Sahn ...............................................................4 primary-point How Can You Answer? Zen Master Su Bong ....................................................................6 Published by the Kwan Um School of Zen, a nonprofit reli- gious corporation. The founder, Zen Master Seung Sahn, 78th Patriarch in the Korean Chogye order, was the first Korean Zen Transmission Ceremony Excerpts Master to live and teach in the West. In 1972, after teaching Zen Master Su Bong ....................................................................8 in Korea and Japan for many years, he founded the Kwan Um sangha, which today has affiliated groups around the world. He What If I Am Unable to Pay the Rent? gave transmission to Zen Masters, and inka (teaching author- ity) to senior students called Ji Do Poep Sas (dharma masters). Zen Master Ji Haeng ....................................................................9 The Kwan Um School of Zen supports the worldwide teaching You Have a Big Nose! That’s Enlightenment. schedule of the Zen Masters and Ji Do Poep Sas, assists the member Zen centers and groups in their growth, issues publi- Ty Koontz..................................................................................10 cations on contemporary Zen practice, and supports dialogue among religions. If you would like to become a member of the Encounters with Zen Master Su Bong School and receive Primary Point, see page 31. The circulation Zen Master Dae Kwan ...............................................................11 is 2,800 copies. The views expressed in Primary Point are not necessarily those Transmission Ceremony for Zen Master Ji Haeng .....................12 of this journal or the Kwan Um School of Zen. © 2014 Kwan Um School of Zen Inka Ceremony for Terence Cronin ...........................................14 [3 Wisdom Is Not Something You Carry Around in Your Head Founding Teacher Zen Master Seung Sahn Zen Master Dae Bong ................................................................19 School Zen Master Zen Master Soeng Hyang Song of Dharma Nature Zen Master Seung Sahn .............................................................25 Editor-in-Chief Ken Kessel JDPSN Kwan Um School of Zen Centers ...................................28, 29, 30 Editor for Europe Zen Master Ji Kwang Membership in the Kwan Um School of Zen–America .............31 Editor for Asia Kathy Park Managing Editor Tamarind Jordan Managing Editor for Europe Eduardo del Valle Pérez Book Review Editor Judy Roitman JDPSN Layout and Design James Gouijn-Stook Content Editor Ben Gleason Proofreader Peter Voke Manufacturing Manager Eugene Lim Publishing Advisor Paul Majchrzyk JDPSN Special thanks to: Sławomir Golański, Stephanie Maciel, Brian Tam, George Tang. Cover: Zen Master Su Bong and Zen Master Seung Sahn in Korea. Date unknown. Courtesy of Kraków Zen Center. PRIMARY POINT Summer 2014 International School Zen Master’s Note Did They Pass On? Zen Master Soeng Hyang his year marks the 10th anniversary of Zen Master Seung Sahn’s passing and Tthe 20th anniversary of Zen Master Su Bong’s passing. What huge gifts they both are to our sangha and the world. No past tense for those two! They are alive and well in all of the important bodhisattva ways. Actu- ally, all they have done is turn in their rusty rental cars and taken off to continue the great work of life and death. So we will eternally thank them for all their gifts, their strong practice, and of course wisdom and generosity. Their humor, lack of pretentiousness and their sometimes unorthodox behavior enable them to always make me smile when I think of them. The biggest tribute we can give to them is for each of us to aspire to emulate their great effort and compassion. Three bows to them both. Photo: Kwan Um School of Zen Archives 4] Not Just a Human World Zen Master Seung Sahn This world is changing very fast. Recently, I went to Mos- when old age and death approach, there is much suffering. cow to take part in a large conference called the Global In a way, if you have much money, there is more suffer- Forum. The idea of this conference ing; if you have no money, there is no was very interesting: How can we suffering. Also, if you have too much save this world? Soviet President Gor- thinking, too much understanding, bachev had invited over six hundred then there is more suffering; if your people—prominent religious, politi- mind is simple, there is no suffering, cal, scientific and business figures— and it is possible to accept old age and from many countries. Gorbachev per- death as a natural process. This simple ceives that this world is in danger. His mind is don’t know mind. The don’t mind is very wide. He isn’t attached to know mind does not check, does not the idea of Communism. hold, does not want, is not attached to Human beings have proven them- anything. It only keeps a one-pointed, selves to be very stupid animals. We simple direction. have broken the natural world—bro- But if you are holding your opin- ken the air, mountains, rivers; killed ion, your condition, your situation, animals; fought each other. We don’t then this world attacks you. First, your understand our own correct situation mind attacks you; then your family, or the correct way. In human life, your friends, all the people you meet keeping the correct way is very dif- attack you; your society, your culture, ficult. People get money, become fa- time and space, everything attacks you. mous, have this possession or that, but Photo: Kwan Um School of Zen Archives If you put it all down, this world and PRIMARY POINT Summer 2014 PRIMARY POINT Summer 2014 time and space cannot touch you. imbalance in this world. Who made Then you can control this world, you this imbalance? Human beings hold- can control time and space. ing on to their opinion, condition Human beings always want some- and situation have made this imbal- thing, and this wanting never ends, ance, this suffering in the world. so our life is always complicated, al- Only a short time ago, everyone ways suffering. Putting it all down was afraid of nuclear war. Now every- means making life very simple, like one is afraid of AIDS. Always, every- a clear mirror. The name for this one is afraid of dying. But if you keep mirror-mind is Great Love, Great your correct function, correct situa- Compassion and the Great Bodhisat- tion, correct relationship moment tva Way. Originally everything is to moment, you can never die. Then very simple, very harmonious. Only you make harmony and balance in when “I” appears do things get com- this world; that’s how you help this plicated and suffering begins. When world—not only human beings, but “I” disappears, this whole world is the entire universe. That’s a very wide yours. When “I” appears, you lose Us mind. world. Western history always talks about For instance, in West Germany change from the outside, so West- some people are wary of unification. Photo: Kwan Um School of Zen Archives ern societies have many revolutions. Why? Because East Germany is very Eastern mind means inside revolu- poor. So “I don’t like” appears. That’s animal mind, not tion, not outside. It means sharing our world with the human being’s mind. East Germany has had much suffer- sun, animals, trees, all of life. Many Western people have ing; West Germany is prosperous. We must put down our been attracted to meditation because of these ideas. When prejudices and live in the world with the sky, the trees, the your life becomes correct, you become harmonious with [5 air and other people. the rest of the universe. At this conference in Moscow, the religious and politi- The Buddha always talked about this idea: love and cal leaders of the world got together and talked about how compassion, harmony with everything in the universe. He to save this world. Now they are all concerned about ecol- talked about equality and love. Everything in the universe ogy, about the environment, about pollution in the air has its job: tree has tree’s job, bird has bird’s job, human and in the water. They talked about how to fix the prob- being has human being’s job. Only human beings don’t lems of the world, how to raise enough money, things like understand their correct job. that. In my talk to them, I explained that this is not just So any kind of Zen practice means making your mind the human beings’ world; our universe includes animals, very simple, which means don’t know mind. Don’t know birds, plants, air, sky, everything. When there is harmony mind means understanding human beings’ original job. in all these things, the world is harmonious. When there The Buddha practiced unceasingly for six years. Bodhid- is no harmony, there is a problem. So the problems of this harma sat for nine years. Why? He already had enlighten- world are only a result; this result is from primary cause. ment, so why did he sit for nine years in the cave at Sorim? If you don’t understand primary cause, you cannot fix the He realized that the time was not ripe for his teaching, so results.
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