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Thursday 20 January 2022

Philip Kapleau

During an introductory workshop at Philip Kapleau’s Rochester Zen Center, one of the attendees stated with confidence, “All religions are one.”

“One what?” Kapleau inquired.

[Philip Kapleau portrait by Molly Macnaughton]

The Third Step East: 199-214; 9, 36, 39, 103, 117, 154-55, 158, 159, 161, 185, 224, 244

The Story of Zen: 6, 21, 92, 225, 244, 254, 292, 296-301, 302, 313, 314-17, 355, 359, 386, 424, 429, 431, 435

Thursday 6 January 2022

Walter Nowick


After serving in the US army during the occupation of Japan, Walter Nowick returned to take up the study of Zen at one of the most severe monasteries in the country, Daitokuji. When, years later, Sean Murphy asked if he had not found the conditions there daunting, Nowick told him: “If you want to play the piano in a certain style . . . you find the person who teaches that style best and do what they say. If you want to do something else, you do something else. But if you want to learn what they have to teach, you follow their directions.”

The Third Step East: 183-97; 9, 73, 84, 217, 229, 230]

The Story of Zen: 239, 247, 290-95, 355, 371