Making Connections With The Class

The Mt. Baldy Zen Center has many similarities with The Middle Land Chan Buddhist Monastery. Both are Buddhist Zen Centers that offer a variety of classes and events available at different levels to people of any background. Each also features a meditation hall, a chanting or lecture hall, a dining hall, and living quarters. Additionally, both centers were established by influential Zen Buddhist figures from abroad. The Mt. Baldy Zen Center was established in 1971 by Kyozan Joshu Sasaki Roshi of Japan, while The Middle Land Chan Buddhist Monastery was established in 2008 by Grand Master Wei Chueh, a modern Buddhist Monk from Taiwan. Both feature traditional Zen Buddhist practice that has been brought by these influential figures from East Asia to incorporate into Western culture. The biggest difference between these two Buddhist centers is the schools of Zen that each practice. Mt. Baldy Zen Center is in the Rinzi-Ji school, while The Middle Land Chan Buddhist Monastery has its roots in the Linji school of Chan Buddhism. According to Buddhism Without Boundaries,

"Chan and Zen share much in common, both being derived from the same meditation-based practice originally termed jhana/dhyana. The main historical difference is that the Chinese practice of Chan predated the Japanese practice of Zen. There are also cultural differences. For instance, Chan is influenced by Taoism as well as elements of Confucianism and may also incorporate some Pureland practices. After all, Buddhism, Taoism, and Confucianism are China's three major religions and have exerted notable influence on each other, co-existing side by side...Names will also differ in pronunciation by language: Linji (Chinese) vs. Rinzai (Japanese)...The overall teachings remain the same, but teachers' instructions may vary between the two traditions" (Buddhism Without Boundaries).

Furthermore, "Western Chan has been preserved through lineages in Taiwan, escaping the religious persecution and repression that occurred during the Cultural Revolution in Mainland China" (Buddhism Without Boundaries). This repression of Chan Buddhism during the Cultural Revolution in Mainland China is comparable to the repression of the Tamils by Sinhalese Buddhists in Sri Lanka that we read about in Buddhism Betrayed?. Although Tamil Buddhists and Sinhalese Buddhists were engaged in an ethnic conflict as opposed to Chan Buddhists in China, who were discriminated against solely due to their religious affiliation, this connection reveals the prevalent theme we have discussed in class throughout the semester about how inherently linked religion and politics are. Buddhism has been brought to the West in order to expand and preserve the long-standing traditions. "Unlike Zen laypeople in Asia, whose main practice is to support the monastic establishment, Western Zen lay practitioners want to understand Zen deeply and to practice it thoroughly, regardless of what their life circumstances may be" (DharmaNet International). Religion and ritual in the West appears to be less stringent than in Eastern Countries. A partial explanation for the exportation of Buddhism from the East to the West is therefore religious persecution and repression by some Eastern countries such as China and Sri Lanka.