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Orchard Grasses

· Essays, Reflections, Sangha News, Zen Training ·

by Linda Shinji Hoffman

Orchardist and Sculptor, Linda Shinji Hoffman shared on her blog, Apples, Art, and Spirit, about her experience being Shuso during the Spring 2021 Ango. The following is a slightly edited version.

As spring slides into summer, I wanted to share about the last three months. I’ve been on an intense retreat—some of it quarantined in my studio, some of it at Zen Mountain Monastery, and some of it following our spring schedule at Old Frog Pond Farm & Studio in Harvard, Massachusetts.

Last winter I was asked by my teacher, Shugen Roshi, to serve as Shuso, or Chief Disciple for the three-month training period we call ango. The ango training period dates back to the time of the Buddha. In his time, the monastic life mostly involved wandering across northern India, sharing the dharma and receiving support from householders. However, the summer monsoon season often made the way impassable—dangerous for the monks and nuns to be out walking alone. Instead, they gathered in one place—in shelters and groves—practicing together and living near their teacher. These intensified three-month periods were called vassa (literally “rains” retreat) in Pali and later ango—or “peaceful dwelling”—in Japanese. 

Shugen Roshi extending the sheppei (a symbol of empowerment) to Shinji before her talk.

At Zen Mountain Monastery we practice ango in the spring and the fall. The shuso can be either a layperson or a monastic. Their role is to inspire the sangha with their devotion and commitment to practice. The training period ends with a ceremony where the chief disciple gives their first talk on a koan and is then challenged by the sangha with live questions.

On the last Sunday in May, my time as shuso ended with a talk on the koan, “Dongshan’s Essential Way.” Dongshan was a 9th-century Chinese Zen master. The koan is a brief teaching dialogue between a student and their teacher. This koan begins with the student saying, “I cannot see the essential path; I still can’t become free of discriminating consciousness.”

What is this essential path? The student can’t see her way. Is it hidden? Who is hiding it? What is hiding it? And why is this student asking the question right now, today?

I gave my talk on the last Sunday in May. It was followed by questions from other students, and then congratulatory poems. The ceremony marked the completion of my transition to become a senior student in the order, and the opportunity to take on a more important role within the sangha.

Many of you know how much I love Zen practice and, specifically, training at Zen Mountain Monastery. A full matrix of activities shapes the practice here: zazen (meditation), liturgy, body practice, art practice, work practice, study of the teachings, and face-to-face encounters with a teacher. Most importantly, it is following the rigorous monastic schedule, putting aside one’s own desires, and joining with the community. It is said that being in community is like being in a rock tumbler. We need each other to bump up against, to be polished. However, to put it most simply, Zen training is the study of reality as it really is when we are not confused, when our mind is not obscured by attachments and clinging to that which is not real. We aspire through our practice to move among the myriad contradictions and complications of this world with equanimity and compassion, to be fully present, to do good and not cause harm.

I didn’t feel I could write about this rite of passage until it was over. There were moments when I knew for certain my teacher had made a grave mistake in assigning me this role. I could not do this. But I also knew there was no way out. Of course I was going to do what I was asked to do. I was going to give it everything I could. And the sangha was there with love and support.

Now that I’ve had a little time back home, and have hung up my new white robe and am wearing jeans, t-shirt and work boots again, I wanted to share with those of you who are curious a little about this rite of passage. There is an audio recording of the shuso hossen ceremony and a video available on the Monastery’s Livestream page.

And now I can focus on the farm! I look forward to reconnecting with my Old Frog Pond community. We’re preparing the grounds for Emergence, our 15th Annual Outdoor Sculpture Exhibit, which opens on August 1 with twenty-five sculptors bringing new work to the farm. We’ve scheduled a series of storytelling events, African Drumming, Sacred Fires, and Plein Air Poetry. The apples are ripening. It looks like mother nature is providing a bountiful and beautiful crop. 

The verse that the end of my koan was:
Wet with morning dew
The tips of the ten thousand grasses
All contain the light of da
y.

The ten thousand grasses in Buddhism are the phenomenal world. All the myriad things – all our physical experiences, our sense objects, our karma. Go where there are no grasses. Go where there are no conditioned experiences, go beyond desires – go beyond fear. How do we do that? This period of training was a great teaching that whether pruning an apple tree or officiating a service, cultivating the seeded rows or sitting among clouds; to practice fully is to move freely among and to meet every blade of grass. 

Orchard grasses are strong, they compete with the young apple trees. Several times in a season, I work with our farmers to weed around each one. We cultivate the soil to support their fruiting growth.

To learn more about Old Frog Pond farm and studio, visit https://oldfrogpondfarm.com/
Shinji’s forthcoming memoir, “The Artist and the Orchard,” will be published in October by Loom Press.  

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Spring Ango 2020

· Sangha News, Zen Training · , , , ,

by Jeffrey Gyokudo Roberts

Even though the Catskills are frozen and quiet right now, if I close my
eyes, I can already hear the returning song of the Hermit Thrush and
smell the tulips blooming.  Slowly the Esopus Creek, covered in ice,
will loosen its grip on Winter and Spring will come.

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Meet the Chief Disciple

· Conversations, Sangha News · , , ,

An interview with Ely Seiryu Rayek

by Diego Antoni

Seiryu knows his way from Mexico City to Mount Tremper inside out. He doesn’t even need to spend the night in New York City anymore, as when he was less familiar with the subway and the bus to Mount Tremper. He has now been coming to ZMM from his home in Mexico City several times a year since his first trip in 2007.

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Shuso’s Letter Spring Ango 2019

· Sangha News, Zen Training · , , , , , ,

Dear Sangha,

Not being a native speaker of English, living my 75th year of life, hard of hearing—surely I was way back in the line of candidates for Chief Disciple. Thus, it was a big surprise when Shugen Roshi asked me to be Chief Disciple for Spring Ango. Immediately a line from the Shuso Hossen
Ceremony became real and very present for me: “I feel like a mosquito trying to bite an iron bull.” Fears of incompetence arose in my consciousness.

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Dharma Action Initiative – June 2018 Update

· Beyond Fear of Differences, Earth Initiative, Sangha News · , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

This is a brief update on the MRO’s Dharma Action initiative – progress to date, ongoing work, and events and meetings that have been planned.

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Shuso’s Letter Spring Ango 2018

· Sangha News, Zen Training · , , , ,

Dear Sangha,

On Mt. Tremper we are alive in cold February. The wind stings, the ice cracks underfoot, and at night we are dazzled by bright, bright stars. What a privilege it is to live on this mountain and feel the earth turn from season to season and to share our practice with the sun and snow. Now the sun swings around and begins to consider Spring 2018, and we begin to consider Ango. Again, like softening earth, we’ll deepen our practice and find what grows within us.

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Sharing space with the Buddha

· Sangha News · , , , ,

On September 3, in addition to opening the Fall 2017 Ango training period, the Monastery also held a different sort of opening ceremony. Shugen Sensei and Hojin Sensei performed an eye opening for two new images, created specifically for the the main altar in our zendo.

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Photo by Will Carpenter

Fall 2017 Ango

· Sangha News · , , , , ,

The Mountains and Rivers Order training schedule cycles through periods of intensification and relaxation, mirroring seasonal changes and giving us varied opportunities to study and practice. The spring and fall quarters are ango (“peaceful dwelling”), ninety-day intensives that continue an ancient tradition dating back to the time of the Buddha, when the sangha gathered in forest groves during monsoon season to support each other in their practice and receive teachings from the Buddha and his senior disciples.

Each ango has a theme drawn from the Buddhist teachings. This Fall 2017 Ango, the sangha will be taking on the teachings of Prajna Paramita, the Perfection of Wisdom, one of the foundational teachings of Mahayana Buddhism. We will engage this with selected texts together during the ango’s Buddhist study sessions, art practice and retreats.

The training and practice of the chief disciple is another important facet of ango training. When a junior student is ready to make the transition to being a senior student, the teacher will ask him or her to serve as chief disciple for the training period, leading the ango and offering their sincere and wholehearted practice as a model for the sangha. The ango culminates with a special right of passage for the whole community: Shuso Hossen.

For more information about this Fall Ango and the various activities both at the Monastery and the Temple, please check out our website.


Shuso’s Letter

Photo by Constanza Ontaneda

Photo by Constanza Ontaneda

Dear Sangha,

As the year ripens and summer wanes, we come together once again for the fall training period. Shugen Sensei has asked me to be the chief disciple this ango. I’m delighted and deeply grateful for the chance to serve in this fashion. My aspiration for the next few months is to trust unreservedly in the love of the sangha, and not to withhold my love for this life, with its highs and lows, its thorns, its precipices, its peaks, and its abysses. Although I don’t always know how to do that, still, this is my vow. Please guide me in my practice.


Throughout the ango, we’ll be studying Prajna Paramita, the Perfection of Wisdom, traditionally personified as the Mother of All Buddhas. We’ll focus in particular on the Perfection of Wisdom in Eight Thousand Lines. As we take up this ancient teaching, let’s embody Prajna through the practices of generosity, discipline, patience, enthusiastic effort, and meditation. In this manner, together with all beings, we give birth to the wisdom that neither arises nor ceases.

When Daido Roshi used to visit Fire Lotus Temple, he would often say, It’s because the fire burns that the lotus can bloom. May the fire burn hot—and the lotus bloom—for each of us this fall.

Nine bows,
 


Patrick Yunen Kelly, MRO took up formal Zen training in 1994 and began practicing with the MRO in 2000, after moving to New York City from California. He became an MRO student in 2001 and received Jukai from Daido Roshi in 2004. He also completed several years of residential training at Zen Mountain Monastery as well as at the Zen Center of New York City. Yunen now lives in Brooklyn with his partner, Constanza Ontaneda, MRO and their two cats, Liza and Tropy. He is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in biochemistry and molecular biology and likes to spend his free time refining his art practice. You can see his work at paintingyunen.com.

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Falling into Summer

· Sangha News, Zen Training · , , , , ,

Shuso Hossen with Valerie Meiju Linet

With the onset of summer, our Spring Ango training period came to a close with multiple displays of dedication and playful inquiry. First, on May 17 and 18, art presentations were held at the Zen Center and at the Monastery, giving ango participants the chance to share their work. Over the course of the ango, we took up the Karaniya Metta Sutta as an entry point for creative explorations. The results came in photos, poems, sculptures, video, watercolors, collage and in just about every size and shape you could imagine. (Medium, short, small, or otherwise!)

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