SasakiRoshiZen.net

This is a website created to make available Zen talks of Kyozan Joshu Sasaki Roshi. Here are presented a fraction of the total talks that he made.

 

Joshu Sasaki was born in Japan in 1907, and ordained as a monk when he was fourteen in Rinzai school of Zen Buddhism. In 1947 at age 40 he received position of Roshi. Sasaki Roshi came to the United States in 1962 and lived here until his death in 2014. He helped found Zen centers in the U.S. and around the world, and led practice with dedication.

 

The documents presented here are predominantly talks of Sasaki Roshi which he gave in Japanese. He would commonly speak for 2- 3 minutes at a time,  and then it would be translated into English. Sasaki Roshi was very engaged in trying to have high quality translation.

 

Most of the documents here are transcribed Teishos. Teisho is formal talk given by Roshi. Usually they happened once a day, at the same time in the morning, during seven day Dai-Sesshin. All the participants of Dai-Sesshin would attend, and the public was also welcome. The participants would sit in Zazen and begin and end the talk with chanting. Teisho was scheduled for one hour. The talk would have as a focus a case or chapter from a Zen text such as Rinzai Roku, Mumonkan, or Blue Cliff Record.