Tenney Nathanson – a Dharma heir of Joan Sutherland – is the resident teacher at Desert Rain Zen. He is also a professor in the English Department at the University of Arizona. He briefly worked with Eido Roshi at the Zen Studies Society New York Zendo in the late ’70s but tells me that heContinue reading “Tenney Nathanson”
Category Archives: Uncategorized
Mitra Bishop
The image on the cover of my book, The Story of Zen, is of the zendo at Mountain Gate Sanmonji in New Mexico. It is located in a township, Ojo Sarco, that we couldn’t find it on our road map when we drove there. Nor is there signage other than the post box number atContinue reading “Mitra Bishop”
Geoffrey Shugen Arnold
The head of the Mountains and Rivers Order – and the man who succeeded Ryushin Marchaj as abbot of Zen Mountain Monastery – is Geoffry Shugen Arnold. They are both Dharma heirs of the founder of the Order, John Daido Loori. “I wasn’t raised in a religious home,” Shugen tells me, “but, when I wasContinue reading “Geoffrey Shugen Arnold”
Konrad Ryushin Marchaj
When I visited Zen Mountain Monastery in June 2013, the abbot at the time – Konrad Ryushin Marchaj – was leading a wilderness retreat listed in the program calendar as “Born As the Earth: Wilderness Skills Training.” It was described as an opportunity to learn “basic outdoor skills and engage the teachings of the wildContinue reading “Konrad Ryushin Marchaj”
Joan Sutherland
In the Harada-Yasutani koan curriculum as passed down through Robert Aitken and his heirs, when one resolves a particular koan, one may be given examples of responses given by one’s ancestors in the lineage. One of my ancestors – although she is actually younger than I – is Joan Sutherland. Joan is Dharma teacher, butContinue reading “Joan Sutherland”
Seiho Morris
Seiho Morris is an ordained Rinzai priest who was working in an addiction treatment center when I interviewed him in 2018. At the time, he was preparing to lead a retreat in Cincinnati for people engaged in 12 Step programs. I assume the retreat was related to his work at the treatment center, but heContinue reading “Seiho Morris”
James Ford
James Ford founded the Boundless Way Zen centers in New England and later established the Empty Moon Sangha in California. He was also, until his retirement shortly after I met him, a Unitarian minister. We first met in his office at the First Unitarian Church of Providence, Rhode Island – located on the corner ofContinue reading “James Ford”
Tenku Ruff
Tenku Ruff is concerned that Zen in the west is too often presented from the perspective of white boomer males. Currently she is board president of the Soto Zen Buddhist Association – the youngest person to ever hold that office – and is engaged, she tells me, in leading the association through “a generational shift.”Continue reading “Tenku Ruff”
Seiso Paul Cooper
Seiso Paul Cooper took jukai – the ceremony in which one formally accepts the precepts and declares oneself a Buddhist – for the first time with Eido Shimano in the Rinzai tradition in the 1980s. He was unable, however, to form a personal relationship with Shimano as a teacher. “I’d just see him on retreatsContinue reading “Seiso Paul Cooper”
Richard Bryan McDaniel 