JESUS REDEEMED US FROM THE CURSE OF THE LAW

That's what it said on one of those little light-up signs on wheels with the flashing arrows parked in front of a low slung baby-blue brick building on the road to the Southern Dharma Retreat Center (SDRC) near Asheville, Tennessee, where I led a retreat last weekend. Actually, SDRC is "near Asheville" in much the same was as Tassajara is "near Big Sur." Which is to say it's not really all that near. It takes an hour and some to get there from Asheville up a winding mountain road and then an unpaved single lane driveway that seems to go on forever around a lot of very precarious drop offs. The driveway is shared by some other houses up in them there hills, so at times you have to back up and pull into little tiny, hard-to-see turn-off to let hairy guys in big ol' pick up trucks loaded with firearms pass by. Actually, I didn't get a good look at any of those guys or their trucks. But I did hear gunfire during one of our sittings. And when I passed by that church on the way up I was behind a big red pick-up truck with a bumper sticker that said, "I'm a coon hunter." Raccoons, right? Uh-huh. On the way into SDRC I went over several bridges that spanned a winding waterway called French Broad River. I wondered if it was OK to name a river French Broad River without specifying which French broad it was named after. (By Brad Warner)

Dear Ven. Brad Warner,

Thank you very much for your beautiful report from SDRC. I have enjoyed so much for your beautiful description of the scenery, but at the same time I have so much worried about your dangerous situations in going there.

I have received an Email letter from my disciple Ven. Ingrid Antonijevic from Chile, who asked me to introduce her to you, and so I will write my email letter soon.

With best wishes Gudo Wafu Nishijima

On the accomplishment of Mūlamadhyamakakārikā (MMK) in English

To all members of Dogen Sangha International and Dogen Sangha Groups,

Recently the co-translator of MMK in English[1], Ven. Brad Warner and I, have arrived at the last process of accomplishing the translation. Therefore it is necessary for us to co-operate together for accomplishing the translation mutually, and so it is necessary for me to concentrate my efforts to do such a job. So it is necessary for me to ask all members of Dogen Sangha International and Dogen Sangha Groups that I would like to stop the posting Dogen Sangha Blog for several months.

Of course I do not stop posting my answers to your questions at all, and so I would like to ask you sending your questions as before, and I will sent my answers to your questions as soon as possible.

I am very sorry that I have to stop writing my opinion in Dogen Sangha Blog for so long time, but at the same time the publication of MMK in Eglish is my obliged duty, and so it is necessry for me to beg your permission.

With best wishes Gudo Wafu Nishijima


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Note from technical administrator:
[1] original text of MMK in Sanskrit: see Repositorium of Indica et Buddhica (to download it one must have signed up for free as a registered user of Indica et Buddhica).

Continuing Dogen Sangha Blog

To All Members of Dogen Sangha and Dogen Sangha International,

First of all I would like to ask your pardon that I have suddenly stopped the Dogen Sangha Blog because of my necessary entrance into a hospital, but fortunately I have been permitted to leave the hospital today, that is, the 1st, April, and so it has become possible for me to begin the Dogen Sangha Blog again. Therefore I would like to apologize to all members of Dogen Sangha and Dogen Sangha International for my entrance into the hospital, and I would like to report to you the reopening the Blog again.

Therefore I would like to express my sincere apology to all members of Dogen Sangha's and Dogen Sangha International's members whole-heartedly.

Gudo Wafu Nishijima