- As for the blog's name: -


I was @ Gustav Ericsson's sight, - Anzenkai, and I was looking at Nishijima Roshi’s calligraphies over there. Particularly there is one - "seki shin hen pen" - about which Gustav has earlier said in a blog post that it is Nishijima's favorite phrase from Master Dogen.

This seemed strange to me. It was not what I would expect Nishijima Roshi's favorite phrase to be. It seemed it could be some Rinzai master's favorite quote, - it seems to express continuous and constant sincerity, - but it did not seem to fit my view of the way Nishijima Roshi saw things.

So - consequently - I tried to think what would I expect his favorite quote to be. But all phrases I could think of did not seem to fit just what I might have had in mind.

So I tried to come up with what I would see it as, - and what I have come up with - is - "this universe out here".

- And this seems to be the right name for this blog here too.


- Definitely.                                                 ________________________

Kalo on “Zen” II

- I translated the text in the last post rather meticulously sentence by sentence. - Unlike my habit is, - I did not attempt to fundamentally relate to the spirit of the whole unit to be translated, and try to reflect it in the translation to be done.

I did not think I could observe things from the point of view of enlightenment, and so I did not think I could grasp the fine intention of the passage and construct my translation in a living manner in its light.

Therefore I translated as I did. - I tried to remain as loyal as possible to the meaning of each sentence without relying on my own self confidence with regard to the understanding of the text.

However I had some second thoughts. - Generally this isn’t the best way to translate a spiritual text. - Definitely. - So I still don’t think I made a mistake, - and I knew earlier it could be translated more beautifully, but I thought I would present also a somewhat freer translation, not one that is as carful as the one in the last (main) post.


- So here it is, - in case you find interest: -

- “The truth, in the end, is eternally none but one and all who dwell in it know it. Words alone – which are ever incapable of presenting and describing this truth – are the source of the distortions and misrepresentations. Indeed, the measure of distortion is minimal as the speech is serving great teachers. On the other hand, the measure of distortion related anyway to all use of words, might arrive at enormous and hindering measures none the like. And that is about those men [and women] who innocently practice ‘Zen’, analyzing and interpreting its ways and purpose and sometimes – but translate a ‘Zen’ story from one language to another – without having attained Enlightenment. (- ‘Satory’, - as to avoid any misunderstanding) These men are as pseudo bakers unable to tell flour from waste and never the less – they dare and knead a bread of gravel and serve it to the hungry audience. The result – the consequence – severe damage to both the servers and the recipients alike.”.

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