©2005-2025 Mark A. Foote
I attended the five-day Denko-e sesshin at Jikoji Zen Center, two weeks ago.
Vanja Palmers from Switzerland, who led the sitting, suggested in his opening talk that everyone should try to include everything in their awareness (with nothing left out): although he acknowledged there might be difficulties in the posture, he suggested that by including ...
Twenty-second Case: Hsueh Feng’s Turtle-Nosed Snake
Hsueh Feng taught the assembly saying, ‘On South Mountain there’s a turtle-nosed snake. All of you people must take a good look.’
Ch’ang Ch’ing said, ‘In the hall today there certainly are people who are losing their bodies and their lives.’
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It’s been a revelation for me to read that Kobun Chino Otogawa started sitting the lotus at age 7, wrestled in the lotus with his brothers, and could get in and out of the lotus without using his hands. Of course, his father was the abbot of a Zen temple in Japan.
At the close of a sesshin I attended, Kobun said it was his third sesshin ...