The Sound That Perceives the World

Calling Out to the Bodhisattva

Kosho Uchiyama

• Publisher: Wisdom Publications
• Year: 2025
• eBook ISBN:
  9781614299752
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Buddhism

Musings and autobiographically informed commentary on the human condition through the lens of the Kannon-gyo—chapter 25 of the Lotus Sutra—connecting Zen and Pure Land Buddhism through the practice of venerating and chanting the names of buddhas and bodhisattvas.

The Kannon-gyo is chapter 25 of the Lotus Sutra, and its focus is the bodhisattva of compassion, Avalokiteshvara, known in China as Guanyin, and in Japan as Kannon or Kanzeon. The text describes the many ways in which calling out the bodhisattva’s name—Namu Kanzeon Bosatsu—can relieve suffering.

Most schools of Zen Buddhism, and especially the Soto school, eschew such practices as chanting the names of buddhas and bodhisattvas, along with venerating such figures.

The eminent Soto Zen master Kosho Uchiyama Roshi, however, while doing hard physical labor early in his career, could not practice zazen—that is, formal sitting meditation. He came to appreciate the Kannon-gyo and the practices related to it. In particular, he took to reciting Kannon’s name, as recommended in the text of the Kannon-gyo.

Later in life, Uchiyama Roshi suffered from illness that again prevented him from practicing formal Zen, so he returned to the Kannon-gyo and the practice of chanting. He went so far as to assert that chanting Kannon’s name is completely equivalent to zazen, that the two practices are simply two sides of the same coin—a revolutionary idea seemingly at odds with Zen.

Chanting practice is especially accessible, as it can be done while working, traveling, or suffering from illness, and other activities that would ordinarily get in the way of formal Zen practice.

With these practices, the Kannon-gyo, and Kannon herself as a backdrop, Uchiyama Roshi muses about the purposes of religion, the goals of religious practice, and the meaning of enlightenment—and their relation to suffering itself.

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Contents
• Foreword
• Translator’s Preface
• Translator’s Introduction
• Appreciating the Kannon-gyo
• Preface
• Introduction
• 1. My Personal Connection with the Kannon-gyo
• 2. The Sound That Perceives the World
• 3. The Main Thread of the Buddhadharma
• 4. An Unobstructed View of Life and the World
• 5. The Religious Meaning of Suffering in the World
• 6. Resolving Problems with Money versus Emancipation through Religion
• 7. God’s Yardstick versus Our Human Yardstick
• 8. Before Yardsticks, Part 1
• 9. Before Yardsticks, Part 2
• 10. The Sound of Silence
• 11. “One Mind”
• 12. The Reality without Language and the Undefiled Self
• 13. The Buddha Who Practices within Delusion
• 14. The Scenery of My Life
• 15. The Difficulty of Maintaining Bodhisattva Vows
• 16. Single-Mindedly Chanting the Name of Kanzeon Bosatsu as the House Where We Live
• 17. Freedom and the Twelve Links of Dependent Origination
• 18. My Mind Is Like the Weather
• 19. The Relaxed and Spacious Life
• 20. Everything We Encounter Is Our Life
• 21. The Thirty-Three Forms of Avalokiteshvara
• 22. Where I Place My Weak Mind
• Afterword
• Afterword by Shusoku Kushiya
• Appendix 1. The Kannon-gyo, Chapter 25 of the Lotus Sutra
• Appendix 2. Uchiyama Roshi’s Postscript to the Kannon-gyo
• Appendix 3. Appreciating the Ten-Line Kannon-gyo
• Bibliography
• Index
• About the Author and Translator
• Copyright