The True Dharma Eye.

The True Dharma Eye

Zen Master Dogen,

John Daido Loori, commentary and verse

Shambhala Publications, Inc.

300 Massachusetts Av, Boston MA 02115

www.shambhala.com

1590302427 $39.95 1-800-733-3000

The True Dharma Eye: Zen Master Dogen's Three Hundred Koans is a compilation of koans by the thirteenth-century Zen Buddhism master Eihei Dogen. First published in Japan in 1766, this new version features extensive commentary and interpretation for each koan by the abbot of Zen Mountain Monastery of Mount Tremper, New York, John Daido Loori Roshi. For example, one koan's main case is "Longya was once asked by a monastic, 'What is the meaning of the Ancestor's [Bodhidharma's] coming from India?' Longya said, 'I will tell you when the stone tortoise speaks." The commentary examines this response, and similar responses that appear at first glance to be a refusal to answer, in various lights--that perhaps the meaning of the Ancestor's coming is as inconceivable as the existence of a speaking stone tortoise, or perhaps by hearing the voice of the stone tortoise one can truly begin to understand. Each koan has a capping verse; in the previous case, it is "East Mountain moves over water; / the stone woman gives birth to a child in the night. / Outstanding, awesome--/ the teachings of the insentient. / If you listen with the ear, you will never get it; / when you hear with the eye, everything is clear and undisguised." Cross-references, lineage charts, and biographical notes round out this excellent and highly accessible primary source for students, practitioners, and scholars of Zen Buddhism.