Although it was the Great Master Keizan Zenji who revived the stories of the transmission of the Way between Ancestors in 1300 in The Denkoroku: The Record of the Transmission of Light, we owe our gratitude to the late Abbess Rev. Jiyu Kennett of the Shasta Abbey Zen Buddhist Monastery for making it available not only in English, but to lay men and women interested in the deeper mysteries of Zen. Kennett struggled with this decision to make a text that was previously only known to the monastic community available to the general public, but in the end decided that it would be useful even if not fully understood.
Master Dogen
In modern Zen Buddhist Monasteries today, including the Shasta Abbey Zen Buddhist Monastery which was home to the late Abbess Rev. Jiyu Kennett, the writings of another in the lineage of ancestors also bears great study. The Shobogenzo-zuimonki and Moon in a Dewdrop were written by the Fifty First Ancestor, the Great Reverend Master Eihei Dogen and are considered of equal importance in the studies of a Zen Buddhist monk or priest as the The Denkoroku: The Record of the Transmission of Light.
Abbess Rev. Jiyu Kennett was a great scholar on the work of Master Dogen and her teachings have been preserved in recorded form for future generations. But it was the Fifty First Ancestor, Koun Ejo, who we owe the recording of Master Dogen’s lengthier teachings and dialogues with Koun Ejo in the Shobogenzo-zuimonki.
Zen Aphorisms and Master Dogen
It is in Moon in a Dewdrop where the shorter teachings of the Master Dogen are recorded as Zen Aphorisms, concise statements which hold within them volumes of truth. This similarity between Moon in a Dewdrop and The Denkoroku: The Record of the Tranmission of Light cannot go unnoticed. Because it is in the short exchange between Master and Disciple, past and future ancestors, that these Zen Aphorisms come to life and bear meaning.
Saint Seigen Gyoshi, The Thirty Fourth Ancestor
“Gyoshi, whilst training under Eno at Sokei-ji asked his master, ‘To what should I pay attention so that I do not fall into some category of spiritual attainment?’ Eno responded, ’What were you doing before you came here?’ Gyoshi answered, ‘I was continually failing to put the Noble Truths into practice.’ Eno asked, ‘In what category are you now?’ Gyoshi replied, ‘Since I am still not putting the Noble Truths into practice, in what category does that place me?” Eno had a deep feeling that Gyoshi was a vessel for the teaching . . . This is hearing what is hard to hear, meeting what is difficult to meet. Even when you cease from contrivances, a degree of holding on to a notion of self may persist and this is to make a mistake for you will surely have fallen into the deep pit called ‘liberation.’” The Denkoroku: The Record of the Transmission of Light.
Seigen Gyoshi’s name means ‘Mindful of Practice’ and was of the Ryu clan from Anjo.
“A bird in its passage
leaves no traces of its flight,
So why look for stages
on that dark and solitary road
which leads deep within?”
Keizan Zenji summarizes the teaching of Seigen Gyoshi
Sources: The Denkoroku: The Record of the Transmission of Light – Keizan Zenji, Shasta Abbey Buddhist Monastery
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