Asian Religions Lecture Series
Directed by Edward A. Burger (Commonfolk Films, 2016, 78 min.) One Mind is a rare cinematic portrait of life inside one of China’s most austere and revered Zen communities. The monks at Zhenru Chan Monastery continue to uphold a strict monastic code established over 1200 years ago by the founding patriarchs of Zen in China. In harmony with the land that sustains them, the monks operate an organic farm, grow tea, and harvest bamboo to fuel their kitchen fires. At the heart of this community, a group of cloistered meditators sit in silence for 8 hours every day. Suggesting a Zen version...
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Kôans (kongan) are often described as nonsensical or paradoxical questions, posed by Chan/Zen masters to their students, that are designed to confound the discursive intellect and trigger an awakening to an ineffable state beyond the reach of all dualistic thinking. Most Kôans, however, do not take the form of questions. They are, rather, ostensiblyverbatim records of dialogues between ancient Chan patriarchs and their disciples, which came to be held up as customary topics of discussion in the contexts of public debate in a lecture hall and individual consultation in an abbot’s private...
