Dogen's Shobogenzo Zuimonki

The New Annotated Translation—Also Including Dogen's Waka Poetry with Commentary

Eihei Dogen, Shohaku Okumura

• Publisher: Wisdom Publications
• Year: 2022
• eBook ISBN: 9781614295976
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Eastern Philosophy

The clearest and most approachable teachings from Dogen, the most famous thinker and writer in Zen Buddhism. Discover the teachings of the preeminent Zen Master Dogen in his own words, written down by his Dharma successor, Koun Ejo. This edition includes both the Shobogenzo Zuimonki and translations of and commentary on Dogen's luminously evocative waka poetry. Distinct from Dogen's similarly titled magnum opus (simply called the Shobogenzo ), the Shobogenzo Zuimonki can be read as a highly practical manual of Buddhist practice. Consisting of straightforward and accessible teachings and making more limited use of the allusion, wordplay, and metaphor that characterize the essays in the Shobogenzo, this work is an essential read for any student of Zen Buddhism. Among the many topics covered, Dogen especially emphasizes the following points: seeing impermanence, departing from the ego-centered self, being free from greed, giving up self-attachment, following the guidance of a true teacher, and the practice of zazen, specifically shikantaza, or "just sitting." Additionally, this translation of the Shobogenzo Zuimonki has extensive notes, which help to provide you with a new way of approaching the text. The collection of waka poems included in this volume are a beautiful artistic expression of the Dharma. Rarely seen in this large of a collection or with commentary, this poetry offers unique insight into an important expression of Dogen's teachings. By the spring wind
my words are blown and scattered
people may see them
the song of flowers These teachings, which have informed teachers and practitioners alike throughout the centuries, will deepen your knowledge, understanding, and experience of the Soto Zen tradition.

Part One

Shōbōgenzō Zuimonki

Translation and comments by Shōhaku Okumura

Edited by Dōju Layton

EDITOR’S PREFACE

Just as it was to my teacher and his before him, Dōgen Zenji’s Shōbōgenzō Zuimonki is a personally meaningful text to me. When I first began practicing seriously in my early twenties, I was eager to engage with Dōgen’s work. Being mostly unfamiliar with the voluminous lore of Zen, however, I found the more famous Kana Shōbōgenzō to be almost completely impenetrable. When I expressed my disappointment in this, someone in my sangha at the Missouri Zen Center recommended Shōbōgenzō Zuimonki as a more accessible alternative. Although at first I was skeptical that an approachable text could come from the same author, I was soon surprised at just how down-to-earth it really was. Despite the huge expanse of time, space, and circumstance between me and Dōgen’s assembly—I read it for the first time 773 years after its composition, during my commute on an electric light-rail train en route to a biology lab in a city over ten thousand kilometers (over six thousand miles) from Kyoto—I often felt that Dōgen was speaking directly to me.

When my teacher asked me to edit his new translation of Shōbōgenzō Zuimonki, I was excited that I would have the opportunity to study the text closely. Thinking back on my time as a perplexed newcomer, I made an effort to ensure that this text included many explanatory notes for those not familiar with the cultural and historical context of Dōgen’s time. Several translations of Shōbōgenzō Zuimonki already exist, so we felt that providing a bilingual edition with extensive notes would help give the reader a new way of approaching the text. That being said, readers who prefer to have an uninterrupted reading experience will be able to follow the text without a thorough study of the notes. Compared with Dōgen’s other well-known writings, Shōbōgenzō Zuimonki usually does not require comprehensive knowledge of allusions to other Zen texts or specialized Buddhist philosophy and terminology.

All translations found in the introduction and in the notes were made by Shōhaku Okumura unless otherwise noted. Brackets in these translations indicate text that does not occur in the original but rather is added to clarify the intended meaning in English, while allowing the reader to see the Japanese context of Dōgen’s words. For example, bracketed text is often added in order to demonstrate the unstated subjects or objects of sentences (in Japanese, sentences can be grammatical without specifying a subject or an object). In some cases, the words in brackets are merely a best guess as to the proper interpretation, but notes are provided where inferences are particularly uncertain. Occasionally, brackets are also used to clarify terms without adding a note, as in “just sitting [shikantaza],” or “the West [India].”

Japanese transliterations into the Roman alphabet use the Modified Hepburn system. The Japanese text uses the post-1946 “new character forms” (shinjitai) rather than the “old character forms” (kyūjitai) in which Ejō and Dōgen would have written. The paragraph layout of the English and Japanese texts follows the source text for this translation, Dōgen Zenji...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Advance praise for Dōgen’s Shōbōgenzō Zuimonki
• Title Page
• Contents
• Publisher’s Acknowledgment
• Part One. Shōbōgenzō Zuimonki
• Part Two. White Snow on Bright Leaves
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index
• About the Translator
• Copyright