PURIFYING ZEN: WATSUJI TETSURŌ'S SHAMON DŌGEN . Translated and with Commentary by Steve Bein . Honolulu : University of Hawaii Press , 2011 . Pp . xvi + 174 . Paper, $24.00 .
摘要
Shamon Dōgen is an especially important essay on the thirteenth‐century founder of the Sōtō Zen sect in Japan by leading modern Kyoto School thinker Watsuji Tetsurō, which was originally published in 1926, nearly 700 years after Dōgen returned from gaining enlightenment under the tutelage of mentor Rujing at Mt. Tiantong temple during a four‐year long trip to China. This book provides an excellent and very much long‐awaited full translation of the text, which could be translated as “Monk Dōgen,” or “Dōgen, A Monk,” but is wisely left untranslated here, along with introductory and concluding essays situating its place in the context of contemporary studies of Zen Buddhism and Japanese intellectual history more generally. As Bein explains, Shamon Dōgen“single‐handedly rescued Dōgen from obscurity” in that by the early twentieth century, he was still known primarily as the leader of a medieval religious movement, rather than as a philosophical and literary giant who belonged and deserved to be analyzed in terms of circles of world historical figures. Of particular interest is chapter nine, on “Dōgen's ‘Truth,’ ” which covers critically four of the Zen master's major fascicles in the Shōbōgenzō on metaphysics and language, including “Raihai Tokuzui,”“Busshō,”“Dōtoku,” and “Kattō.”
