Thomas Yuho Kirchner, a Zen monk of the Rinzai School in Japan, is the widely respected translator of Zen koan classics, including The Record of Linji, Entangling Vines, and Muso Soseki: Dialogs in a Dream.

He joins host Jon Joseph to discuss Dahui’s Letters. These letters are the critical writings of Dahui Zhonggao, considered the father of koan meditation and the leading figure of the Linji Chan-Zen School in 12th c. China. The letters are timeless in that they provide valuable lessons on koan practice for modern–day meditators.

Kirchner was born in Baltimore, Maryland, in 1949. He went to Japan in 1969 to attend Waseda University in Tokyo for a year, after which he remained in Japan to study Buddhism. He spent three years training under Yamada Mumon as a lay monk at Shofuku-ji before receiving ordination in 1974. Following ordination he practiced under Minato Sodo Roshi at Kencho-ji in Kamakura and Kennin-ji in Kyoto. Following graduate studies in Buddhism at Otani University he worked at the Nanzan Institute for Religion and Culture in Nagoya and subsequently at the Hanazono University International Research Institute for Zen Buddhism. He presently lives at Tenryu-ji in Arashiyama, Kyoto.

On more than a half century of Zen practice, he says, “I have a deep sense that this is a really, really meaningful experience. It has given me a compass for my life. With time, I will be able to face death with peace of mind.”

Source: Wisdom Publications

On Entangling Vines: 

“A wonderful book, a book to take if you are planning to be shipwrecked on a desert island; it is the book I open every day, and teach from every day. It is surprising, lucid, scholarly, alive, and unassuming, and it goes deep.”

—John Tarrant, Director of The Pacific Zen Institute and author of Bring Me the Rhinoceros and Other Zen Koans That Will Save Your Life.

On The Record of Linji:

“A masterpiece of scholarship not only on Linji Chan, but also on Chinese Buddhist language and history―the annotations, which constitute almost two–thirds of the book, explain in astonishing detail the meanings, references, and grammar of each line of text.”

―Buddhadharma: The Practitioner’s Quarterly

Jon Joseph Roshi of San Mateo Zen and PZI created this series to support the hardworking innovators and shining voices of modern Zen: scholars, writers, poets, translators, activists, artists, teachers, and more.

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