| Date | Author | Title | Source | Quotation by Merton |
| 1956/07/19 | Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki | Manual of Zen Buddhism / Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki |
Ltrs: Hammer p. 32
| Today I am mailing ack to the Kentucky university library the most interesting "Manual of Zen" by Suzuki. I am deeply grateful to Mrs. Hammer for having sent it to me. It contains fascinating texts - and somewhat less fascinating pictures. |
| 1957/09/10 | Ludwig Bemelmans | Donkey inside |
Jnl 3 ('52-'60) p. 116
| No easy generalizations about Job and Zen. Job is a big koan. So is everything else. Best book yet about Ecuador-Bemelman's-The Donkey Inside-which I got in the Louisville library. |
| 1960/03/03 | Erich Fromm | Zen Buddhism & Psychoanalysis / Other autors: Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki, Richard De Martino |
Jnl 3 ('52-'60) p. 377
| Must write to Fromm about the new book (Zen and Psychoanalysis) which is on the whole excellent, especially Suzuki's part in it. |
| 1960/11/15 | Abraham Joshua Heschel | God in Search of Man |
Jnl 4 ('60-'63) p. 66
| At the heart of Heschel's splendid book-God in Search of Man-the consistent emphasis on the importance of time, the event in revealed religion, Biblical, prophetic religion. Event, not process. The unique event, not repeated. The realm of the event is the realm of the person. Liberation from the process by decisions, by free act, unique, irreplaceable. The encounter with God. Contrast Buddhism. Yet of Zen - the event of enlightenment. But this is not an encounter. Part of a well-ordered process? "An event is a happening that cannot be reduced to a part of a process." [Heschel] p. 210 "To speak of events is to imply that there are happenings in the world that are beyond the reach of our explanation." [Heschel] |
| 1962/01/21 | Trevor Leggett | first Zen reader |
Jnl 4 ('60-'63) p. 196
| Amakuki Sessan in his commentary on Hakuin's "Song of Meditation" (conferences given on the radio in 1934!!) has a beautiful passage on the right use of all things-close to the very heart of Benedict's idea of poverty and also close to Shaker simplicity. Advantageous use (not wasting), loving use, living use, pure use, spiritual use. |
| 1962/07/24 | Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki | Essentials of Zen Buddhism |
Jnl 4 ('60-'63) p. 233
| In Louisville some weeks ago I found the new Suzuki anthology (Essentials of Zen B[uddhism, New York, 1962])-really a thorough "Reader" and since reading it I am almost irresistibly tempted to write him another letter. Poor good old man. I know he must be flooded with mail as I am, and that he does what I do: puts the letters in a big box and forgets them. |
| 1962/08/24 | Hui-neng | Platform scripture / Hui-neng ; (transl. and with an introd. and notes by Wing-tsit Chan) |
Ltrs: HGL p. 552
| It is a long time since I received the remarkably interesting translation of the Platform Scripture and I ought to have acknowledged it long ago. The translation and the introduction by Wing Tsit Chan are both extremely interesting. It is an invaluable document, and will mean much to everyone who is interested in Zen Buddhism. I have not written about it, as I wanted time to comment fully. I have not had time for that yet, and also I would like to keep the manuscript a little longer and go over it again. I expect to be in the hospital for a checkup in a few days and I will meditate on the text there, I hope. In any case it will get a second and more serious reading. "¦ Keep me posted with regard to all your interesting projects at the Institute for Asian Studies. Fr. Dan Berrigan brought me messages from Fr. Beer and John Wu. I was glad to hear from them. The Chinese books are there but "¦ I think that perhaps I will have to put off serious work in this field until I am replaced as novice master by somebody else and can devote more time to study "¦ |
| 1963/01/28 | Heinrich Dumoulin S.J. | history of Zen Buddhism / Heinrich Dumoulin ; transl. from the German by Paul Peachey |
Jnl 4 ('60-'63) p. 294-95
| Wm. Miller, of the FOR [Fellowship of Reconciliation] and Paul Peachey of the Church Peace Mission were here-and I was eventually strained and tense from all the talk. It was quieter this morning with Peachey alone. We discussed my peace book which is not being published, and his translation of Demoulin's History of Zen which has just appeared. It was a fruitful morning. |
| 1963/03/19 | Jacques Maritain | Dream of Descartes |
Jnl 4 ('60-'63) p. 304
| I read Maritain's essay on Descartes today (in connection with Fenelon, but it is revealing in relation to Zen). The task for Zen in the West is probably a healthy reaction on the part of people exasperated for four hundred years by the inane Cartesian spirit-the reification of concepts, the idolization of reflexive consciousness, the flight from being into verbalism, mathematics and rationalization. Descartes made a fetish of the mirror which Zen shatters. |
| 1963/04/20 | Aelred Graham | Zen Catholicism |
Jnl 4 ('60-'63) p. 314
| I received a letter from Dom Aelred Graham in answer to a card about his book on Zen Catholicism, which I have reviewed (for America). |
| 1963/05/01 | Aelred Graham | Zen Catholicism |
Ltrs: RtoJ p. 244
| Correspondence gets bigger all the time, and things one must answer right away, very often. For instance, this will please you, Dom Aelred Graham and I are now great friends, and I am glad. I reviewed his new book on Zen [Zen Catholicism], after first sending him a letter about it, and we agree thoroughly. He even invited me to come up and have a vacation and rest at Portsmouth Priory. Some chance I'd ever have of getting that permission. But I would really enjoy it. However I hope he may stop by here one day. I think we really look at things very much in the same way. The Zen book certainly showed it. |
| 1963/06/23 | Hui-neng | Platform scripture / Hui-neng ; (transl. and with an introd. and notes by Wing-tsit Chan) |
Ltrs: HGL p. 625
| Paul Sih has sent me the Platform Scripture and it is handsomely done. He wants me to write a review of it, and I will earnestly try, but it is hard to fit in right now. But with a book like this an immediate reaction is not essential. Eventually I hope to come through with something. |
| 1963/11/10 | Robert Charles Zaehner | Matter and Spirit: Their Convergence in Eastern Religions, Marx and Teilhard de Chardin |
Jnl 5 ('63-'65) p. 32-33
| Finished some notes on Zaehner's Teilhardian pamphlet on Matter and Spirit which is good in intention, poor and hasty in execution. Have added this on to the material on Zen for the winter Continuum. Graham Carey wired that he wanted some of Art and Worship in Good Work. |
| 1963/12/17 | Maurice Merleau-Ponty | In Praise of Philosophy / transl. of Eloge de la philosophy et autres essays (Paris 1960) |
Jnl 5 ('63-'65) p. 47
| [Maurice] Merleau-Ponty says: "Nothing can be explained by way of man, for he is not a strength but a weakness in the heart of being, for he is not a cosmological factor but the place where all cosmological factors, through never ending change, alter their meaning and become history" (Eloge de la philosophie [In Praise of Philosophy, 1963]). In my Book Providence, [Note 11: "Book Providenc" is unclear, though this is what Merton wrote in his journal. He perhaps missed a word or words as he was writing. It could possihly read "Book [of] Providence," but that makes little more sense.] Merleau-Ponty is a radical and welcome discovery-he is like Zen, Herakleitos, much more radical and simple at the same time than Sartre, no need of any of Sartre's passion and programs, and no need of Nausea. Does not admit Descartes, radically anti-cogito, anti-Parmenides, anti-Plato. The anti-Plato in me has always been this and never Aristotle. The anti-Plato in me is Zen and Old Testament. His idea of metaphysical consciousness-aware that intelligibility is contingent fact, springing from man's existence and confrontation in history with being as pour soi [for oneself]. (The en soi [in oneself] is unintelligible.) This may seem radically antichristian (certainly anti-scholastic) yet I wonder if after all the Bible would not show it to be very Christian, cf. the approach of the W. G. Kümmel book. |
| 1963/12/22 | Maurice Merleau-Ponty | In Praise of Philosophy / transl. of Eloge de la philosophy et autres essays (Paris 1960) |
Jnl 5 ('63-'65) p. 48
| Merleau-Ponty says: "Je suis a moi au etant au mond" ["I am to myself as being in the world"]. And this would appear to be the exact opposite of what I have been saying for twenty years-that I am my own by withdrawing from the world. Actually I agree with him profoundly. Everything depends on the meaning you give to "monde." If it means the delusions and cliches that stand between a supposed autonomous "I" and the world of phenomena, well, one does not want to belong to this and struggle for existence in it, thinking oneself to be now free, now not free. Who is this self? But if it means one's own situation, then how else can one be anything except by being what he is, and how can he be what and who he is apart from all that goes with him? What is with me? What am I in? That is one reason for a Journal like this, to keep honestly situated. It is also a reason for taking pictures, for instance, yesterday, down at "The Point" in Louisville, with Jim Wygal, and along the river front. To withdraw from where I am in order to be totally outside all that situates me-this is real delusion. Hence the similarity between Merleau-Ponty and Zen. I am inevitably a dialogue with my surroundings, and have no choice, though I can perhaps change the surroundings. "L'interieur et l'exterieur sont inseparables. Le monde est font au dedans et je suis tous hors de moi." ["The interior and the exterior are inseparable. The world is created from within and I am always outside myself."] |
| 1964/05/29 | Hugo M. Enomiya Lasalle | Zen, Weg zu Erleuchtung |
Jnl 5 ('63-'65) p. 107
| Am reading [R. M.] Enomiya Lasalle, in German, on Zen, and like it [Zen, Weg zur Erleuchtung, 1960]. Fascinating picture of shiji, a Zen nest among evergreens in the mountains! |
| 1964/05/29 | William Johnston S.J. | Mysticism of the Cloud of Unknowing |
Ltrs: HGL p. 440
| Thanks for your letter of the 13th. Your project on The Cloud and Zen sounds interesting, and so, though I have made all kinds of resolutions to refuse this kind of thing, I want to make an exception and at least glance at your ms. The rest is up to the Holy Ghost: and time. I will send whatever comment is possible in the circumstances, long or short, and you will have to take your chance on it being either intelligent or idiotic. At present I am reading Fr. Enomiye Lasalle's book in German with very great interest. Naturally I enjoyed Fr. Dumoulin's book as you and he know. I wrote a rather longer and more detailed article published in a more or less unknown new magazine, and I will send it along. I felt that Fr. Dumoulin had been a little unreceptive to Hui Neng, but I think that goes naturally with his instinctive preference for Soto Zen (The Cloud, too, is more like Soto). |
| 1964/06/11 | Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki | Zen and Japanese Buddhism |
Ltrs: HGL p. 569
| Two packages of books have arrived and I am most grateful to you for them and for the kind inscriptions. I have begun immediately with Zen and Japanese Buddhism, which is very clear and has some fine things in it. I am especially struck with the idea of the purposeless life, "filling the well with snow." I suppose all life is just that anyway, but we are obsessed with purpose. I think of this because there was a very purposeful meeting of abbots and novice masters here last week, and we mightily filled all the wells in the country with snow, except that we thought we were doing something else. It is surprising how tired one can get of doing nothing, and how tireless the real "doing" always is. |
| 1964/07/20 | Heinrich Dumoulin S.J. | history of Zen Buddhism / Heinrich Dumoulin ; transl. from the German by Paul Peachey |
Ltrs: HGL p. 170
| It is a great pleasure to receive your letter and to be in contact with you. Needless to say, it makes me happy to be able to tell you directly how much I have enjoyed your book on Zen. It is most valuable, and besides that, it has been presented in a most attractive way. |
| 1964/12/08 | | Cloud of Unknowing |
Ltrs: SofC p. 254
| "¦ In such solitude as I have now I have been renewing my contact with Lancelot Andrewes, not as a steady diet, but his precis for the evening are very wholesome and rich, and I am quite drawn to his spirit. But also to the other and more profound spirit in the English tradition, that of Lady Julian, the Cloud, etc. I have an interesting ms. from a Jesuit in Japan treating the Cloud in its relation to Zen. In fact I also met Dr. Suzuki this summer, and this was a helpful contact indeed, because he really understands what interior simplicity is all about and really lives it. That is the important thing, because without contact with living examples, we soon get lost or give out. |
| 1964/12/08 | Julian of Norwich | Revelations of Divine Love |
Ltrs: SofC p. 254
| "¦ In such solitude as I have now I have been renewing my contact with Lancelot Andrewes, not as a steady diet, but his precis for the evening are very wholesome and rich, and I am quite drawn to his spirit. But also to the other and more profound spirit in the English tradition, that of Lady Julian, the Cloud, etc. I have an interesting ms. from a Jesuit in Japan treating the Cloud in its relation to Zen. In fact I also met Dr. Suzuki this summer, and this was a helpful contact indeed, because he really understands what interior simplicity is all about and really lives it. That is the important thing, because without contact with living examples, we soon get lost or give out. |
| 1965/01/31 | John (Jingxiong) Wu | Golden Age of Zen |
Ltrs: HGL p. 626
| Look how much time has passed since I received your letter and the chapter on Hui Neng [in Dr. Wu's book The Golden Age of Zen]. Time does not obey me, it will not stop for my convenience. This is very strange, but I must put up with it, even though time obeys everybody else. I will have to picket time for this unfairness. Really I enjoyed your chapter on Hui Neng very much, as it has much new material and I like your insight about the quiet revolution on p. 10. Your pages bring out more of the real importance of Hui Neng. I like the concept of playful samadhi, which comes very naturally from you. |
| 1965/03/04 | Kitaro Nishida | study of good / Kitaro Nishida ; transl. by V.H. Viglielmo |
Jnl 5 ('63-'65) p. 214
| Came briefly up to the hermitage after dinner to sweep, get the water bottle to fill, and also read a few pages of a new book, Nishida Kitaro's Study of the Good which Suzuki sent and which is just what I am looking for at the moment. Magnificent! |
| 1965/03/05 | Kitaro Nishida | study of good / Kitaro Nishida ; transl. by V.H. Viglielmo |
Jnl 5 ('63-'65) p. 214
| Nishida Kitaro-just what I am looking for. For example I see my objection to the cliche about "meaningful experienc" (as if it was "meaninglessness" that made experience somehow real and worth while. "Experienc" is made "meaningful" by being referred to something else, a system, or perhaps a report of someone else's experiences, and therefore its quality is diminished. So the ambiguity of meaningfulness is exposed. When experience is "meaningful" in this sense it is unreal-or less real. To live always outside of experience as if this were a fullness of experience: this is one of the basic ambiguities of written thought). |
| 1965/03/26 | Jan Ruusbroec | Oeuvres de Ruysbroeck l'admirable / Jan van Ruusbroec ; trad. du flamand par les Benedictins de Saint-Paul de Wisques par Ernest Hello |
Jnl 5 ('63-'65) p. 221
| Decided to take some bread with coffee this morning instead of fasting (on coffee only) until dinner. The rye bread was good, so was the coffee. And I read Ruysbroeck, thinking of him in terms of Zen. His "essential union" is quite like Prajna [wisdom], and "Suchness." Theological differences great-but the phenomenology is close. |
| 1965/03/31 | Kitaro Nishida | study of good / Kitaro Nishida ; transl. by V.H. Viglielmo |
Jnl 5 ('63-'65) p. 223
| Yesterday morning finished Nishida Kitaro's Study of Good except for the appendix. One of the most remarkably helpful things I have read in a long time-and apart from his pantheistic concept of God, very close to home. |
| 1965/04/03 | Kitaro Nishida | study of good / Kitaro Nishida ; transl. by V.H. Viglielmo |
Jnl 5 ('63-'65) p. 223
| This morning I finished the appendix which gives some idea of the full scope of Nishida's thought. It is most satisfying. Happily there is at least one other of his books in English. The Study of Good is his first. The development from here is not linear but a spiral deepening of his basic intuition of pure experience which becomes "absolute nothingness as the place of existence," and "eschatological everyday lif" in which the person, as a focus of absolute contradiction (our very existence opening on to death is a contradiction), can say with Rinzai "wherever I stand is all the truth." This hit me with great force. My meditation had been building up to this (awareness for instance that "doubt" arises from projection of the self into the future, or from retrospection, and not grasping the present. He who grasps the present does not doubt). To be open to the nothingness which I am is to grasp the all, in whom I am! I have already written my review of Nishida. [Note 20: "Nishida: A Zen Philosopher," Zen + the Birds of Appetite (New York: New Directions, 1968): 67-70.] |
| 1965/04/19 | Quintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus | De Resurectione Carnis |
Jnl 5 ('63-'65) p. 232
| "Fiducia Christianorum resurrectio mortuorum-illam credentes hoc sumus." ["The confidence of Christians is in the resurrection of the dead-we are those who believe this to be so."] (Tertullian, De Res, 1.1) (Study of Medieval exegesis-is a way of entering into the Christian experience of that age, an experience most relevant to us, for if we neglect it we neglect part of our own totality in De Lubac, Von Balthasar, etc.). But it must not be studied from the outside. Same idea in Nishida on Japanese culture and the Japanese view of life. I have a real sense this Easter, that my own vocation demands a deepened and experiential study, from within (by connaturality) of the Medieval tradition as well as of, to some extent, Asian tradition and experiences, particularly Japanese, particularly Zen: i.e., in an awareness of a common need and aspiration with these past generations. |
| 1965/05/26 | Kitaro Nishida | study of good / Kitaro Nishida ; transl. by V.H. Viglielmo |
Ltrs: WtoF p. 168
| You will certainly enjoy the Nishida book [Kitaro Nishida, A Study of Good]. My review is not yet published, as things move very slowly with our quarterly. When it does eventually appear I will be glad to send you an offprint, if you remind me. That will probably be toward the end of the year or early next year. [It actually appeared in Collectanea Cisterciensia in 1967 and in Zen and the Birds of Appetite in 1968.] |
| 1965/08/10 | John (Jingxiong) Wu | Golden Age of Zen |
Jnl 5 ('63-'65) p. 278
| In John Wu's Zen manuscript-this beautiful poem of Tung Shan. For whom have you stripped yourself of your gorgeous dress? The cuckoo's call is urging all wanderers to return home. Even after all the flowers have fallen it will continue its call In the thicket of the wood, among the jagged peaks. |
| 1965/08/11 | Philip Kapleau | three pillars of Zen : teaching, practice, and enlightenment / comp. & ed., with transl., introd. & notes, by Philip Kapleau ; forew. by Huston Smith |
Jnl 5 ('63-'65) p. 279
| Yesterday, Father [William] Johnston, a Jesuit from Sophia University, Tokyo, was here, talking of Zen, Father Dumoulin, Father Enomiya Lasalle, etc. He brought a new book on Zen with a lot of rich new material in it ([Philip] Kapleau's Three Pillars of Zen). I am slowly moving the mountain of books from the novice master's room to the library (novices do the carrying). |
| 1965/10/03 | Philip Kapleau | three pillars of Zen : teaching, practice, and enlightenment / comp. & ed., with transl., introd. & notes, by Philip Kapleau ; forew. by Huston Smith |
Ltrs: HGL p. 518-19
| I was especially interested in your account of [your friends' involvement in] the session at Pendle Hill. Who was the Roshi? Yasutani? There is a good new book out with a lot of material by and on him. (Three Pillars of Zen, by P. Kapleau "¦ Best recent book on Zen I have seen.) But from the way you speak of it, this session sounds a little irresponsible, if people are thinking of suicide. What occurs to me is that most Americans and especially intellectuals are hardly prepared to meet Zen head-on, and I think every American who wants to know something of Zen had better begin with a long study and meditation on the basic principles of Buddhism, the four "Nobl" Truths and the skandhas. Otherwise Zen will be dangerous. This concerted rush for "attainment" under pressure will, I am convinced of it, give most Americans a completely pathological grasp of Zen, something quite the opposite of what it really is "¦ |
| 1966/01/12 | Kitaro Nishida | Intelligibility and the Philosophy of Nothingness: Three Philosophical Essays / Kitaro Nishida ; transl. and introd. by Robert Schinzinger in collaboration with I. Koyama and T. Kojima. |
Jnl 6 ('66-'67) p. 6
| Great experience - reading Nishida's The Intelligible World. How like Evagrius, and yet better. Splendid view of the real (trans-conscious) meaning of Zen and its relation to the conscious and the world. |
| 1966/01/29 | Kitaro Nishida | Intelligibility and the Philosophy of Nothingness: Three Philosophical Essays / Kitaro Nishida ; transl. and introd. by Robert Schinzinger in collaboration with I. Koyama and T. Kojima. |
Jnl 6 ('66-'67) p. 355
| "The world where innumerable individuals, negating each other, are united, is one simple world which, negating itself, expresses itself in innumerable ways," Nishida [The Unity of Opposites]. Importance of contradiction: the contradiction essential to my existence is the expression of the world's present: it is my contribution to the whole. My contradiction and my conflict are my part in the whole. They are my "place." It is in my insight and acceptance that the world creates itself anew in and through my liberty - I permit God to act in and through me, making His world (in which we are all judged and redeemed). I am thrown into contradiction: to realize it is mercy, to accept it is love, to help others do the same is compassion. All this seems like nothing, but it is creation. The contradiction is precisely that we cannot "be creativ" in some other way we would prefer (in which there would be no contradiction). Here N[ishida] is talking only of our historical self in the world of action - history ("from the formed to the forming"). not - our physical being biological self. (no creative freedom, no action - intuition). "The individual is individual only in so far as it participates in the forming of the world." 191 "Intuition separated from action is either a merely abstract idea, or mere illusion." 208 But the acceptance means also work. (Poiesis - artistic creative intuition) "Our true self is there where our consciousness negates and unites [the singular acts]." Nishida. Yet the consciousness is not the whole self or the true self. The point is that the True Self neither is the conscious "I" nor is it the "not-I." But it is not elsewhere than the "I" (which would make it "not-I"). The true self is, acts, is expressed in the meeting of "I" and "not-I." But the "I" seeks to be the True Self by being, acting, expressing itself where there is no "not-I." Yet where there is no "not-I," there is no "I" for the "I" is aware of itself by negation as well as by position. |
| 1966/04/22 | Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki | Mysticism : Christian and Buddhist |
Ltrs: Hammer p. 234
| Many thanks for the Pavese books. I am well into one of them and he is a marvelous writer. I returned Suzuki on Mysticism Christian and Buddhist. I am not et finished with Briffault, The Mothers which is marked for August 31. Could I perhaps have it a little longer? I notice that Muir's Autobiography seems to be marked for that date too, and I am still working on it. |
| 1966/07/20 | John (Jingxiong) Wu | Golden Age of Zen |
Jnl 6 ('66-'67) p. 97
| Difficult to work (at writing) and difficult to get anyone to do my typing since Bro. Dunstan Foretich left. Yesterday, though it was very hot in the hermitage, forced myself to begin the long delayed introduction to John Wu's book [Note 17: Merton's introduction to John Wu's The Golden Age of Zen appeard as "A Christian Looks at Zen" in Zen and the Birds of Appetite]. But I still don't feel I am ready yet. |
| 1966/07/22 | John (Jingxiong) Wu | Golden Age of Zen |
Jnl 6 ('66-'67) p. 99
| Finished the first draft for my preface to John Wu's book on Zen. It is a great relief to get this out of the way. Writing of articles etc. becomes harder and harder. Much more inclined to spontaneous notes, poems etc. Letters are also an enormous chore which I go at with infinite repugnance. |
| 1966/12/22 | William Faulkner | Wild Palms |
Jnl 6 ('66-'67) p. 173-74
| Rinzai and another tremendous bout with Faulkner [The Wild Palms] - this time the convict and the woman and the river. Another fantastic myth, the void, the great power of evil, the alone man, the woman, their relationship, the ark - paradise - hell of snakes where the child is born - the primitive lake-dwelling huts of the cajun - the insensate return. As if the Flood with all its evil lifted humanity to a supreme level of stark, lonely meaning - nameless. The convict, the woman, the child is only a bundle, yet alive, and the boat. Marvelous passages on the River as the Void, from which comes inexhaustible, malignant power. And the frail but indestructible identity of man. And the silent presence of woman. A rending and shattering legend about everything. |
| 1966/12/29 | Augustin Hideshi Kishi | Spiritual consciousness in Zen from a Thomistic theological point of view |
Jnl 6 ('66-'67) p. 175
| Finished Fr. [Augustin] Kishi's book on Zen and St. Thomas [Spiritual Consciousness in Zen from a Thomistic Theological Point of View (Osaka, 1966)] - good on Zen and dutiful on Thomas and not really pulling the two together. |
| 1967/05/12 | William Johnston S.J. | Mysticism of the Cloud of Unknowing |
Ltrs: WtoF p. 332
| I am at present reading a most revealing book by a Japanese scholar, Toshihiko Izutsu, comparing the Sufi mystic Ibn Arabi with Taoists. The first volume only, on Ibn Arabi, is available, I believe. Others will follow which will show the resemblances. This is very important. If you do not know it already I recommend it to you, and it is easily accessible to you, being published by Keio University. Now, you may have received my new book, Mystics and Zen Masters. It is very sketchy and imperfect, but it may perhaps have some useful material in it. If you do not know the treatise on the "Cloud of Unknowing" I think the remarks in my book will indicate that it would interest you. A friend of mine [William Johnston] has written a study of it with some reference to Zen [The Mysticism of the Cloud of Unknowing, 1967]. It ought to appear soon. I wrote a preface to it. I will send you a copy of the book if and when I get one. |
| 1967/05/27 | John (Jingxiong) Wu | Golden Age of Zen |
Ltrs: HGL p. 555
| Recently I heard from John Wu, Jr., but not from John Sr. I must write to him. I wish he could get a publisher for his book on Zen [The Golden Age of Zen] "¦ |
| 1967/06/16 | Eugen Herrigel | Zen and the Art of Archery |
Ltrs: WtoF p. 14
| Father Juenger sent me a nice letter and I must reply sometime. As to the Herrigel book on Zen: actually there are two, one of which is quite good "” Zen in the Art of Archery. |
| 1967/06/16 | Eugen Herrigel | Zen and the Art of Archery |
Ltrs: Hammer p. 251
| F. Juenger sent me a nice letter and I must reply some time. As to the Herrigel book on Zen: actually there are two, one of which is quite good. "Zen and the Art of Archery." |
| 1967/07/18 | Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki | Zen and Japanese culture |
Ltrs: RtoJ p. 310
| Suzuki books: one of the best to start with is a big fancy book called Zen and Japanese Culture, and it ought to be easier to get hold of than some of the others. Then there was a selection of his stuff in Anchor Books (paperback) series but I forget what it was called. Maybe just Zen. Anything of his you can get, try it out. Zen and Psychoanalysis is real good. Another good Zen book is Paul Reps, Zen Flesh, Zen Bones. |
| 1967/07/18 | Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki | Zen and Psychoanalysis |
Ltrs: RtoJ p. 310
| Suzuki books: one of the best to start with is a big fancy book called Zen and Japanese Culture, and it ought to be easier to get hold of than some of the others. Then there was a selection of his stuff in Anchor Books (paperback) series but I forget what it was called. Maybe just Zen. Anything of his you can get, try it out. Zen and Psychoanalysis is real good. Another good Zen book is Paul Reps, Zen Flesh, Zen Bones. |
| 1967/07/18 | Paul Reps | Zen flesh, Zen bones : a collection of Zen & pre-Zen writings / by Paul Reps |
Ltrs: RtoJ p. 310
| Suzuki books: one of the best to start with is a big fancy book called Zen and Japanese Culture, and it ought to be easier to get hold of than some of the others. Then there was a selection of his stuff in Anchor Books (paperback) series but I forget what it was called. Maybe just Zen. Anything of his you can get, try it out. Zen and Psychoanalysis is real good. Another good Zen book is Paul Reps, Zen Flesh, Zen Bones. |
| 1967/10/02 | Hugo M. Enomiya Lasalle | Zen, Weg zu Erleuchtung |
Honorable p. 146-47
| I know the work of the Fathers you mention and have reviewed Fr. [H.M.] Enomiya[-Lasalle]'s book [Zen, Weg zur Erleuchtung] for a magazine of our Order. In fact they tried to arrange for me to come to Japan and visit some Zen centers, which I would like very much to do. Unfortunately it was not possible to obtain permission for this from my religious superiors. I very much regret it. |
| 1968/03/28 | Zenkei Shibayama | flower does not talk / Zenkei Shibayama ; transl. by Sumiko Kudo ; with an introd. by Daisetz T. Suzuki. |
Ltrs: HGL p. 119
| Thanks for your very good letter. It took some time for your own Shibayama book [Zenkei Shibayama, A Flower Does Not Talk] from Yale to reach me but I sent it back as soon as I got it. I hope it has safely reached you. I was speaking yesterday with a man from Vanderbilt University who entertained Shibayama Roshi at Nashville and liked him very much. I still have faint hopes I might meet Shibayama sometime. |
| 1968/05/30 | Shin'ishi Hisamatsu | On Mutually Going Into the Matter of Self / translated by Gishin Tokiwa |
Jnl 7 ('67-'68) p. 113
| Hisamatsu: natural, rational and Zen spontaneity. "This is true self," he says, "going beneath spontaneity." Hisamatsu also says, "There is a big difference between the ultimate self and the self discussed in psychology. When one reaches ultimate self, spontaneity is changed into ultimate spontaneity. Zen spontaneity comes from ultimate self"¦formless self which is never occupied with any form." And he adds, "In western music, great silence is not found." |