TO KNOW YOURSELF
Talks , stories , and articles on Zen
By Albert Low
Charles E. Tuttle Co., Inc
Boston. Rutland, Vermont . Tokyo
PREFACE
This book contains a collection of articles, talks, and stories that I have Written, given, or used over the past seventeen years as teacher and director of the Montreal Zen Center. Some of these first appeared in the Montreal Zen center magazine Zen Gong. These include: “Some Thoughts About Practice”, “Know Yourself”, “the Mountain of Inertia”, “Wonder of Wonder”, “Fear of Failure”, “on Pain”, and “At Sea”. A few of them, including “The Life of Buddha, the Life of Everyone”, “Shrinking Zen”, and “A Sesshin”, were written during my three years tenure as editor of the Rochester Zen Center magazine Zen Bow, and they are reproduced with the kind permission of the Rochester Zen Center. The three commentaries on the koans were originally given as talks during a retreat held in Montreal, but have been edited and enlarged. The style of presentation was considerably changed in order to make them more accessible to general readers outside the Montreal Zen Center, whose members have become used to the language of these kinds of talks.
CONTENTS
Acknowledgments
Preface
PART ONE : ARTICLES
Chapter one: The Life of Buddha, the Life of Everyone
Chapter two: Gleanings
Chapter three: The Trappist’s Dilemma
Chapter four: Shrinking Zen
Chapter five: The Rabbi’s Distress
PART TWO: BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY
Chapter six: The Christian and Buddhist Dark Night of the Soul
Chaptre seven: A Little Boy Goes to Heaven
PART THREE: DHARMA TALKS
Chapter eight: Know Yourself!
Chapter nine: The Mountain of Inertia
Chaptre ten: Some Thoughts about Practice
Chapter eleven: Lighting a Fire
Chapter twelve: Wonder of Wonders
Chapter thirteen: A Glass of Water
Chapter fourteen: On Pain
Chapter fifteen: At sea
Chapter sixteen: Fear of Failure
Chapter seventeen: The Donkey who would
Chapter eighteen: Fascination
Chapter nineteen: Sand Castles
PART FOUR: SESSHIN
Introduction to part four
Chapter twenty: A Sesshin
Chapter twenty-one: The Fourteen reminders
Chapter twenty-twoChosha goes for a walk
Chapter twenty-three: Rinzai Quote
Chapter twenty-four: Jewel mirror Samadhi
Chapter twenty-five: The stone bridge of Joshu
Chaptre twenty-sixQuotes from Joshu
Chapter twentyseven: on Death
Chapter twenty-eight: the Diamond Sutra:
“The Transgression is wiped”
Chapter twenty-nine: Dogen on exertion
Endnotes