Date: February 22, 2025
Venue: Sri Aurobindo Ashram, Delhi Branch
On February, 22, 2025, Mr. Narendra Murty, Research Associate, BhāratShakti, was invited to deliver a talk to a group of about 30 devotees from Argentina as a part of the Birthday Celebrations of the Mother at Sri Aurobindo Ashram, Delhi Branch. The subject of the talk was “The Fundamentals of Zen”.
To the participants who were primarily a Spanish speaking audience, the presentation was interpreted into Spanish by their team leader Marcello, a long-time devotee of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother. The presentation was based on Mr. Murty’s award winning book An Oak Tree in the Garden – Exploring the World of Zen.
In his presentation, Mr. Murty presented the following fundamental concepts of Zen:
- Zen is not a philosophy, a metaphysics or a doctrine. In fact, it is anti-philosophy in sharp contrast with mainstream Buddhism which has developed one of the most elaborate philosophical systems of the world.
- Zen doesn’t respect any authority or tradition.
- Zen doesn’t have any holy scriptures.
- The central emphasis of Zen is on meditation and realizing one’s own Buddha-nature. And the human ego is a false construction.
- One of the central pillars of Zen is present moment awareness. This was illustrated by the Zen story titled Every Minute Zen.
- Zen is anti-intellectual. Zen Masters are strictly against intellectual probing and seeking. And against the acquisition of knowledge which is not relevant to the essential practice of realization of Buddha-nature. To achieve this, they employ two strategies: Coming up with absurd answers for a perfectly logical question. Or by employing the method of Koan which is a nonsense riddle which was no rational solution. The students are asked to meditate on such nonsense riddles so that the intellect tires out trying to find a rational solution which finally leads to a silent mind thereby paving the way for genuine meditation.
- Zen doesn’t separate ordinary life from the sacred dimension. For Zen, Nirvana is not opposed to Samsara as in traditional Buddhism, but Samsara IS Nirvana. The presentation came to a conclusion with the spiritually elevating declaration by the Zen Master Hakuin:
This very Earth, the Lotus paradise;
This very body, the body of Buddha
The lively interactive session was extremely well received by the audience. The session was also marked by a lot of laughter and active participation.