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Zen in America: Five Teachers and the Search for an American Buddhism
This expanded edition of the highly acclaimed investigation of Zen teaching in America, by the founder and editor of America's first Buddhist magazine, lays bare the issues at the heart of the Zen mission. Through in-depth portraits of five American Zen masters, Tworkov creates a trenchant sociological picture of an important strand of American spiritual life. 27 photos.
288 pages, Paperback
First published December 31, 1989
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About the author
Helen Tworkov
8 books33 followersHelen Tworkov is founding editor of Tricycle: The Buddhist Review, the first and only independent Buddhist magazine, and author of Zen in America: Profiles of Five Teachers (North Point Press; 1989). She first encountered Buddhism in Asia in the 1960s and has studied in both the Zen and Tibetan traditions. Since 2006 she has been a student of the Kagyu and Nyingma Tibetan master Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche, and has assisted him in the writing of In Love with the World: A Monk's Journey Through the Bardos of Living and Dying (Spiegel and Grau; 2019) and Turning Confusion into Clarity: A Guide to the Foundation Practices of Tibetan Buddhism (Shambhala Publications; 2014).
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August 18, 2023
Brilliant late-80's survey of the first wave of American Zen teachers.
Tworkov, who later became the founding editor of the Zen journal "Tricycle", writes about five of the seven Americans who, in the mid-1980s, had been acknowledged by their Japanese masters as qualified to independently teach Zen at their own centers. Zen in America includes a chapter on each, describing their family background, their first encounters with Zen, and their experience in the role of teacher. While Tworkov is a sympathetic listener, she does not gloss over the tensions that emerged in some of their Zen communities or their occasional missteps as teachers.
Tworkov's insightful book provides a salutary reminder that Dharma transmission under Zen is no guarantee as regards the nature of teaching or the ethical standards of the teacher. The Zen lineage includes the same differences of emphasis, and even conflicts, that are found across the generations of a normal family. These differences reflect personality as well as differences in the institutional environment that shaped their development as Zen teachers.
While Tworkov's book focuses on the first generation of American teachers, it is useful to look at the rough transition made by earlier Japanese Zen teachers who arrived in the United States in the 1960s. This wave comprised four “major missionaries” of Zen: Shunryu Suzuki, Taizan Maezumi, Joshu Sasaki, and Eido Shimano. Each had received Dharma transmission from leading Japanese teachers, yet three of the four caused major public sex scandals as teachers in the US: first Maezumi, then Shimano and Sasaki. The only one of the four whose reputation was unblemished was Suzuki. Clearly, their background as autocratic teachers in Japan's patriarchal monastic Zen institutions left them ill-prepared to guide US Zen communities with an important female membership.
Given the shortcomings of the preceding Japanese teachers, it is perhaps not surprising that their American heirs also faced problems. The most prominent in this regard was Richard Baker, who became abbot of the San Francisco Zen Center shortly before the 1971 death of his teacher, Shunryu Suzuki. Baker resigned his position in 1984 after disclosing an affair with the wife of one of the Center's benefactors, following which several other female members of the community revealed they had had affairs with Baker before or during his tenure as abbot.
Baker's autocratic style of running the San Francisco Zen Center was paralleled by Bernie Glassman's leadership of the Zen Community of New York. He opened Greyston Bakery to sell baked goods to shops and restaurants in Manhattan, initially providing jobs for Zen students but later employing inner city residents, including the homeless. Glassman, like Baker, had enormous entrepreneurial drive and both pursued business and real estate deals that elevated the profile of Zen in America. However, while they saw business as an opportunity to integrate Zen practice into the real world, their business preoccupations created a tension with students, who felt that their spiritual needs were being ignored.
A different style was evident in the other two male teachers interviewed by Tworkov: Robert Aitken and Jakusho Kwong. Neither had the innate leadership qualities or drive of Baker or Glassman, but their personal struggles to define the role that they should play as Zen teachers makes them more sympathetic characters, at least as recounted by Tworkov.
The account of Maureen Stuart, the first female American Zen teacher is also fascinating. She provided guidance and leadership for female practitioners during the various sex scandals of the 1980s. Interestingly, while Stuart is critical of the personality flaws of Zen teachers involved, she focuses less on questions of sex (Are teacher/student relationships always wrong?) and more on how these teachers treated people (Were they respectful of the women involved and of the broader Zen community?)
An excellent book for those looking for historical perspective on America's Zen tradition. Highly recommended.
Tworkov, who later became the founding editor of the Zen journal "Tricycle", writes about five of the seven Americans who, in the mid-1980s, had been acknowledged by their Japanese masters as qualified to independently teach Zen at their own centers. Zen in America includes a chapter on each, describing their family background, their first encounters with Zen, and their experience in the role of teacher. While Tworkov is a sympathetic listener, she does not gloss over the tensions that emerged in some of their Zen communities or their occasional missteps as teachers.
Tworkov's insightful book provides a salutary reminder that Dharma transmission under Zen is no guarantee as regards the nature of teaching or the ethical standards of the teacher. The Zen lineage includes the same differences of emphasis, and even conflicts, that are found across the generations of a normal family. These differences reflect personality as well as differences in the institutional environment that shaped their development as Zen teachers.
While Tworkov's book focuses on the first generation of American teachers, it is useful to look at the rough transition made by earlier Japanese Zen teachers who arrived in the United States in the 1960s. This wave comprised four “major missionaries” of Zen: Shunryu Suzuki, Taizan Maezumi, Joshu Sasaki, and Eido Shimano. Each had received Dharma transmission from leading Japanese teachers, yet three of the four caused major public sex scandals as teachers in the US: first Maezumi, then Shimano and Sasaki. The only one of the four whose reputation was unblemished was Suzuki. Clearly, their background as autocratic teachers in Japan's patriarchal monastic Zen institutions left them ill-prepared to guide US Zen communities with an important female membership.
Given the shortcomings of the preceding Japanese teachers, it is perhaps not surprising that their American heirs also faced problems. The most prominent in this regard was Richard Baker, who became abbot of the San Francisco Zen Center shortly before the 1971 death of his teacher, Shunryu Suzuki. Baker resigned his position in 1984 after disclosing an affair with the wife of one of the Center's benefactors, following which several other female members of the community revealed they had had affairs with Baker before or during his tenure as abbot.
Baker's autocratic style of running the San Francisco Zen Center was paralleled by Bernie Glassman's leadership of the Zen Community of New York. He opened Greyston Bakery to sell baked goods to shops and restaurants in Manhattan, initially providing jobs for Zen students but later employing inner city residents, including the homeless. Glassman, like Baker, had enormous entrepreneurial drive and both pursued business and real estate deals that elevated the profile of Zen in America. However, while they saw business as an opportunity to integrate Zen practice into the real world, their business preoccupations created a tension with students, who felt that their spiritual needs were being ignored.
A different style was evident in the other two male teachers interviewed by Tworkov: Robert Aitken and Jakusho Kwong. Neither had the innate leadership qualities or drive of Baker or Glassman, but their personal struggles to define the role that they should play as Zen teachers makes them more sympathetic characters, at least as recounted by Tworkov.
The account of Maureen Stuart, the first female American Zen teacher is also fascinating. She provided guidance and leadership for female practitioners during the various sex scandals of the 1980s. Interestingly, while Stuart is critical of the personality flaws of Zen teachers involved, she focuses less on questions of sex (Are teacher/student relationships always wrong?) and more on how these teachers treated people (Were they respectful of the women involved and of the broader Zen community?)
An excellent book for those looking for historical perspective on America's Zen tradition. Highly recommended.
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