Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #135292 in Books
• Published on: 1964-12
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 144 pages

Customer Reviews

A must have if you want to know about Zen
I was interested in Zen before I read this book and now I am fascinated by it. The book is clearly written by a good authority on the subject and for once by a practitioner of Zen! I found it an engrossing read as it manages to convey the spirit of what to many Westerners appears to be a completley mystifying philosophy. This is a must for those who are interested in Zen or have an intrest in Oriental philosophy.

A treat of a treatise.
Zen is possibly one of the most difficult things to describe in words, yet Suzuki manages to do just that. The texts are thoroughly enlightening, well-structured and thought-provoking. The introduction by C.G. Jung to me seems superfluous and awkward and I still cannot understand why it is there; skip it the first time you read the book, and as I am sure you'll return to this book after a while, you can glance over it while re-reading the book. Then you'll understand why I think it is totally out of place in this otherwise magnificent book.
My overall advice is simple: if you are reading this review, you care enough about Zen to buy a book about it. This is the one you should be going for.
And trust me: you'll learn why you care about Zen.

Simple and eloquent
This is a short (Suzuki's part of the book is almost exactly 100 pages) collection of essays which first appeared during the First World War. The age of the collection may put some people off - more hip and contemporary writers are, of course, far more attractive to us modern readers, despite the fact that what Suzuki is writing about extends back hundreds of years. To disregard this book on those grounds would be a mistake. Suzuki's style is excellent, he writes clearly, simply and eloquently and there is plenty of freshness in what he has to say.

The essays themselves are all fascinating and certain to interest any serious student of Zen, as well as being a good introduction to many Zen principles for the less dedicated reader. Suzuki addresses familiar questions - "What is Zen?" and "Is Zen Nihilistic?", for example - and also expounds on practical Zen and the essential aim of Zen ("to acquire a new viewpoint"), among other things. His longest essay is devoted to an excellent discussion of the koan and there is a short but fascinating article on the traditional Zen meditation hall and the life of a monk.

Suzuki's contribution to the book, then, is a beautiful one, and I would say an excellent and accessible introduction to his works. What makes the book that little bit different for me, however, is the foreword, a 20-page essay by Carl Jung. In this, Jung writes "Great as is the value of Zen Buddhism...its use among Western people is very improbable". I wonder what he would have to say if he could see the world today.

So, in a nutshell - rather short, but worth a look.