Sunday June 8 we will meet at my office at 46 Riverside Drive in Binghamton from 2 until about 3:30 for 15 minutes of silent meditation, followed by a talk and discussion about no mind awareness from the perspective of Zen Master Bankei. Below is a description of Bankei from Amazon’s page of: Unborn: The Life and Teachings of Zen Master Bankei, 1622-1693 by Bankei (Author), Norman Waddell (Translator, Introduction).
“In 1633, at age eleven, Bankei Yotaku was banished from his family's home because of his consuming engagement with the Confucian texts that all schoolboys were required to copy and recite. Using a hut in the nearby hills, he wrote the word Shugyo-an, or "practice hermitage," on a plank of wood, propped it up beside the entrance, and settled down to devote himself to his own clarification of "bright virtue." He finally turned to Zen and, after fourteen years of incredible hardship, achieved a decisive enlightenment, whereupon the Rinzai priest traveled unceasingly to the temples and monasteries of Japan, sharing what he'd learned. ‘What I teach in these talks of mine is the Unborn Buddha-mind of illuminative wisdom, nothing else. Everyone is endowed with this Buddha-mind, only they don't know it. ' "
We will discuss Bankei’s notion of the Unborn, which is exactly the same as my description of no mind awareness. We will carefully consider his wonderful book The Unborn, which can be ordered from Amazon, or found here: http://terebess.hu/zen/mesterek/UnbornWaddell.pdf
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