Shundo David Haye – Zen Priest

‘At Tassajara we have a very difficult time to practice our way. For almost one year we are trying very seriously to practice our way and the more we make our effort to practice our way, we are involved in big problems. You can see what we are doing at Tassajara. There are more than forty people and they each have their own understanding of Zen, more or less. “This is Zen”. “This is Zen”. That is the trouble. Because you practice zazen you cannot practice; you cannot have Tassajara. Even though they are there they cannot do it. Why? Because they practice zazen. So I think the best way is not to practice zazen — (laughter). Just to live in Tassajara, like a bird. Then you can practice zazen. Birds or badgers know what is zazen better than students in Tassajara.’ (from the Suzuki Roshi Archive)

We looked at this talk in the Monday group last week. At the beginning, Suzuki Roshi says he is still studying to find out our way, and concluded that there was no Buddhism and no Zen. This was his stance in the face of his first crop of Tassajara students thinking they had figured things out through their intense practice.