Endless Path Zendo | Roshi Rafe Martin

Recorded June 13, 2024. Tangen Harada Roshi, (the monk, Tangen-san, in "The Three Pillars of Zen") was an extraordinary human being and extraordinary Zen teacher, one with particularly close ties to our Kapleau-Roshi lineage. As the preface to the new book of his life and teachings "Throw Yourself Into the House of Buddha" says: “He didn’t travel the world to spread the Dharma....

Recorded June 8, 2024. The first 18 minutes of this recording are the “teisho proper,” focusing on the essential worth — and challenge — of ongoing lay Zen practice.   If you stop there you’ll have a short and direct teisho. But the rest of the recording adds resonance.  Roshi Martin then reads Kipling’s, “The Miracle of Purun Bhagat,” a tale that presents the essence of renunciation, the ancient...

Recorded May 18, 2024 If we mean to fulfill our life journey, our personal pilgrimage to maturity — which is the point of Zen practice — what we seek can’t be somewhere far off, but must be in our own back — or front — yard.  Gateless Barrier, (Wu-men Kuan, Mumonkan), Case 37: “Chao-chou: The Oak Tree in the Front Garden” goes like this: The Case A monk asked Chao-chou, “What is the meaning of Bod...

Recorded May 4, 2024. May 6, 2024 is the 20th Anniversary of the passing of Roshi Philip Kapleau. Rose and Rafe Martin were his personal disciples. They traveled with him, shared meals with him, watched movies with him, were his attendants for various formal functions, stayed with him by his invitation in Mexico, New Mexico, and Florida. Roshi Kapleau also chose Rafe to be his editor for his two f...

Recorded on April 27, 2024 This talk, given by Roshi Rafe Jnan Martin, explores case 35 of the Gateless Barrier: “Which is the True Ch’ien?” This wonderfully creative koan uses a T’ang era ghost tale of a young woman divided from herself, to help us uncover our own real Self today. It’s the old old story of Identity — the essential quest of myth and folklore worldwide — recast as a koan with the p...

Recorded on April 20, 2024. This talk, given by Roshi Rafe Jnan Martin, explores case 38 from the Gateless Barrier - "Wu-tsu's Buffalo Passes Through the Window."  A most interesting koan!  In the case, a buffalo's massive head, horns, shoulders, legs and hooves all pass easily through the latticed window. So, why can't the tiny tail pass through? Impossible! Crazy! -- and...

Recorded April 13, 2024. Roshi Rafe Jnan Martin explores the meaning of the Buddha's birth, which took place roughly 2600 years ago.  A birth that is so remarkable prompts us to ask:  Where did someone come from who was able to so quickly give up all wealth and privilege, and by devoting himself fully to the great anguish of our common human condition, realize a way of helping all beings? Wha...

Recorded March 30, 2024. Roshi Rafe Jnan Martin shares Case 36 from The Blue Cliff Record "Ch'ang Sha Wandering in the Mountains." With Ch’ang Sha’s spring time stroll in the hills we discover (and clarify) that ongoing Zen practice means a full life, not isolation. The Buddha got up from under the Bodhi Tree. The point of Zen — if we can speak in such terms — is not to stay forever...

Recorded March 23,  2024. Roshi Rafe Martin completes his exploration of the Zen pilgrimage of Te-shan and the things he carried as he matures from youthful firebrand into refined and mature teacher.  In this teisho, Te-shan is carrying his bowls to the noon-day meal. Is he early? Is the meal late? What is "the last word"? Does he have it or doesn't he? Does anyone? And how about us...

Recorded on March 17, 2024. In this second teisho on the trilogy of Te-shan koans, Roshi Martin looks at Case 4 of the Blue Cliff Record: “Te-shan Carries His Bundle.” In the previous teisho Te-shan set down the backpack of brilliant commentaries on the Diamond Sutra he’d been lugging around. Here he carries his bundle of monk’s gear and, post-satori, seems hardly to know what to do with it. Selec...

Recorded March 16, 2024 At the start of this two-day sesshin, Roshi Rafe Jnan Martin delivers the first in a trilogy of teishos on the koans of Te-shan — and the things he carried. Setting down his backpack of brilliant commentaries on the Diamond Sutra, Te-shan personally discovers that even the greatest knowledge is like a drop of water tossed into a vast ravine, compared to realization of his o...

Recorded on March 9, 2024. Rose Martin is a lay ordained, senior student of Sunyana Graef Roshi, who is the founder and Abbot of the Vermont Zen Center and a Dharma Heir of Philip Kapleau Roshi (author of The Three Pillars of Zen ). Along with her husband, Roshi Rafe Martin, Rose is a personal disciple of Philip Kapleau Roshi, and is presently head of zendo at Endless Path Zendo. In the Footsteps...

Recorded on March 2, 2024. Roshi Rafe Jnan Martin explores Case 97 from the Blue Cliff Record - "The Diamond Sutra and Being Reviled." In commenting on the koan he uses the 2500 year-old story of the robber, Angulimala, (Grisly-Garland"), to bring alive a Buddhist vision of paying back karmic debts and facing head-on the causes of our own suffering. The koan itself is as follows: &q...

Recorded February 24, 2024. Roshi Rafe Jnan Martin explores Case 92 from the Blue Cliff Record (Hekiganroku) .  In this exploration, Roshi Martin points to "where the vast ocean meets the shallows of our actual life." The case:    One day, the World-Honored One ascended to the rostrum. Manjusri struck the table with   the gavel and said, “Contemplate clearly the Dharma of the Dharma-King...

Recorded on Saturday, February 17, 2024. The traditionally recognized date of the Buddha's Parinirvana is February 16, which is the date of his complete entrance into nirvana, his death that is understood as a great fulfillment and completion of his life and his vow. Roshi Rafe Jnan Martin details and explores the meaning of this event to the historical Buddha as well as to our own lives, und...

Recorded on February 10, 2024. Roshi Rafe Martin explores Case 32 from The Gateless Barrier - A Non-Buddhist Questions the Buddha (also known as The Buddha Responds to an Outsider). An outsider asked the World-Honored One, “I do not ask for the spoken; I do not ask for the unspoken.” The World-Honored One just sat still.  |  The outsider praised him, saying, “The World-Honored One with his great c...

Recorded on February 3, 2024. Roshi Rafe Jnan Martin discusses vows - the vow of the Bodhisattva, our own vows, Zen practice vows, and how vows play out in our lives.  In raising the question - where do vows come from - Roshi Martin brings us to the Jataka tales (past lives of the Buddha), explaining how all the Pali tradition Jataka follow from a single mythic vow that arose when Sumeda (a past l...

Recorded on January 27, 2024. Roshi Rafe Jnan Martin explores Layman Pang's Beautiful Snowflakes (Case 42 in the Blue Cliff Record). Photography: Snow at Endless Path by Rafe Martin Books by Roshi Rafe Martin Talks on YouTube More information at endlesspathzen.org

Recorded on January 20, 2024. Roshi Rafe Jnan Martin continued to read and comment on selections from The Heart of Shobogenzo.   Roshi Martin leads into the talk by sharing writings of Blake and Emily Dickinson illustrating how - paraphrasing Hakuin - Zen is something that has always been right here, wherever human beings are.    Referenced: The Heart of Shobogenzo, translated by Norman Waddel and...

Recorded on January 13, 2024. Roshi Rafe Jnan Martin offers the first teisho of the new year.  He addresses the subject of why we practice and, as lay practitioners, the forms that dedicated practice could take. Referenced is Case 17 of the Blue Cliff Record (Hekiganroku):  A monk asked Kyorin, “What is the meaning of Bodhidharma’s coming from the west?”  “Sitting long and getting tired.” Photogra...

Recorded on December 16, 2023. Roshi Rafe Jnan Martin offers a teisho in preparation for Jukai (taking precepts) that will be done by EPZ community members on New Year's Eve.  The talk begins with a selection of winter haiku. Referenced: Haiku Volume 4 - Autumn Winter by R.H. Blyth Taking the Path of Zen by Robert Aitken Zen Baggage: A Pilgrimage to China by Red Pine Road to Heaven: Encounter...

Recorded on December 9, 2023 during the final day of the EPZ Rohatsu sesshin. Roshi Rafe Jnan Martin shares the story of the Buddha's great enlightenment - the moment when "after life times of effort, [and after] six very intense years of practice, he glanced up at the morning star and realized the falling away of all self centeredness; the universe itself entered and awoke."  Refer...

Recorded on December 3, 2023 during the second full day of the EPZ Rohatsu sesshin. Roshi Rafe Jnan Martin starts with a discussion of how to engage with teisho.  He then moves to an exploration of the deep realization that emerged from the Buddha's leaving home and koans as an expression of that teaching. Books and magazine articles referenced: A Zen Life of Bodhisattvas The Gateless Barrier...

Recorded on December 2, 2023 during the first full day of the EPZ Rohatsu sesshin. Roshi Rafe Jnan Martin on why we sit ...and why the Buddha left home..."going to place he knew not, by a road he knew not of." Books and articles mentioned: The Practice of Chinese Buddhism 1900-1950 by Holmes Welch The Wheel of Life: The Autobiography of a Western Buddhist, by John Blofeld "It! It! I...

Recorded Saturday, November 18, 2023. Roshi Rafe Jnan Martin reads and comments on Zen Master Dogen's extraordinary "One Bright Pearl" (Ikka Myōju) from The Heart of Shobogenzo , translated by Norman Waddell and Masao Abe. Note: A few of the Chinese names in this talk may sound a bit similar; to see the text, use the link above and go to page 31! - Hsüeh-feng I-ts'un was the te...