Quotes About S?t?

One of the legacies of the popularization campaign is that some of the most prominent S?t? temples are associated with shamanistic and esoteric practices. They are best known to their congregations of lay followers for espousing a syncretic approach to attaining worldly benefits, such as prosperity, fertility, or safety during travels, rather than for traditional Zen practices of meditation and monastic discipline.

The situation in which a native spirit becomes more highly venerated than Buddhist gods by a S?t? temple supposedly dedicated to the practice of zazen, and yet still is recognized as having a malevolent potential requiring exorcism, becomes a focal point for rethinking the function of syncretism in Zen.

The S?t? school of meditation has the saying: "You cannot conceive the inconceivable. Not trying to conceive what is inconceivable is the essence of meditation.

Tenzo Ky?kun, or as I have entitled it in English, Instructions for the Zen Cook, was written over a period of years by Eihei D?gen Zenji (1200–1253), who was intimately familiar with both the Rinzai and S?t? schools of Zen, and finally completed in 1237. More specifically, it was written for D?gen's immediate disciples living with him in a monastery in medieval Japan.