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Selling Water by the River: A Manual of Zen Training
By Jiyu Kennett
New York, Pantheon Books, 1972. 317 pp. $10.00.

Selling Water by the River is "a manual suitable for Western people who are sincerely seeking true Zen but not trying to copy Eastern ways and manner[s]" (p. v)-so states Chisan Koho, the late Chief Abbot of the Sojiji Temple in his foreword to this work. As fairly warned, the book is not for those Westerners "trying to prove that they have a smattering of the culture of the mysterious East" (p. xxiv), nor is it for those seeking an instant spirituality. It is not for those who feel they must travel to rural monasteries, master the art of cooking Chinese vegetables, or even become accomplished in the use of chopsticks in order to partake of Eastern wisdom. But rather, this text is for those who understand that Oriental food is just as nourishing when eaten with a fork. "Do not travel far to other dusty lands, forsaking your own sitting place; if you cannot find the Truth where you are now, you will never find it" (Dogen, quoted by Kennett, P. xxv).

Zen is a religion-"an intuitive religion and not a philosophy or a way of life" (p. 12). In its most simple form, Zen is a method, a tool,

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by which one comes to repeat the realization experience of Shakyarnuni Buddha, the historical founder of Buddhism. Zen is the end product of the transmission of the doctrines and the methods which passed from the Buddha in India to China, to Japan, and now is being passed to the West.

The doctrine is by no means esoteric. The first prerequisite is faith. Like all religions, Zen requires faith:

After all, if you do not believe that you have the potentiality of Buddhahood, you are never going to discover its existence. . . . You must believe that Shakyamuni Buddha discovered his Buddha Nature for himself by realizing his own innate enlightenment along with the universe from the beginning of time, and that because he realized it, you can realize it too (p. XXV).

The second prerequisite is moral perfection-"the smallest infringement of the Precepts will bring down strict censure" (p. 32). (So a fond farewell to a few more.) While some of the Buddhist Precepts are more or less universally recognized and not foreign to most of us (such as not killing, telling mistruths, or stealing), many are uniquely Buddhist. Buddhist morality has a monastic tendency at times reminiscent of medieval Christianity. Rules forbidding eating after twelve noon or inhibiting sleeping on "high or broad" beds may well prove to be stumbling blocks to many Western converts.

Once this morality is achieved, one's attention is then focused on the practice of meditation. Zazen is sitting meditation. The importance of this practice is often lost in a preoccupation with the physical-the full lotus position. While the full lotus is desirable, this sitting position is purely secondary to the religious insight which Zazen is meant to produce.

Too often, the use of meditation is taken out of its proper context. No doubt there are physical benefits to be derived from the practice of "sitting," but in contrast to the assertions of some misguided authors of "Zen" manuals, the purpose of meditation is not to cure such grievances as tuberculosis, gallstones, overweight, or diarrhea. Nor is meditation's purpose to escalate you to holiness-"If once you think that you are becoming holy as a result of visions," warns our author, "all progress must stop immediately" (p.28).

Through the legitimate practice of meditation, one is led ultimately to the proper understanding of how things are-that nothing is permanent, that there is no-soul, and that this world as currently known is unsatisfactory. These truths are the essence of Buddhism. Intellectual knowledge of these doctrines is insufficient-what is being sought is the intuitive understanding of how things are. If intellect alone were sufficient, every professor of Asian Studies would be a Buddha, when, in fact, it is the intellectual, the book-learned, the professor if you will, who takes the longest time to grasp the doctrines of Zen Buddhism. Even assuming that one is relatively "simpleminded," a great deal of hard work is still required. The student of Zen "will be expected to meditate from three in the morning until nine

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at night; he will be watched minutely and his slightest action regulated" (p.32). The results of these endeavors is a complete and dramatic change of one's entire mode of being. It is a revolution of the most immediate nature.

It is after only the briefest of introductions, concerning the life of the Buddha and the basic Buddhist doctrines, that the author approaches what the book is meant to be-a manual of Zen training with the emphases placed on the basic ritual patterns and not on peripheral considerations. For all practical purposes, the book consists of basically two units: the author's introductory explanations of various procedures and doctrines (Book 1), and the primary sources which explain, develop, and/or illustrate (Books II-IV) and are meant to be read in conjunction with Book 1.

Most of the subject units (for example, meditation, compassion, koans, etc.) illustrate the relationship that the specific practices have with the general teachings, as all activities in Zen are perceived as being directed toward the whole. The text and selections chosen by Kennett clearly illustrate the Zen belief that "the correct ordering of daily life is … the heart of Buddhism" (p. 94):

All trainees then take the toothbrush and make gassho, reciting the following:

I take the toothbrush that all living things may profit;

May they understand the Truth quickly and become naturally pure.

The reader need not despair, however; the severity of many regulations found in the original sources are often tempered by Kennett's realistic and supportive suggestions. She is well aware of the limitations of her Western readers as a result of her own experiences and thus is sensitive to the difficulties Westerners are most likely to en counter.

Zen is an Eastern faith, but the author would be among the first to assert that Zen cannot remain culturally static. Indeed, it would be most non-Buddhist to assert permanency in a world marked, according to Buddhist belief, by impermanency. She well understands that the West must make adjustments just as each culture has had to make its individual adjustments in order to adapt Buddhism to its own unique culture.

Although a proselytizer for the faith, Kennett's intention is "to provide a comprehensive work for those who wish to study Zen as a religion, with the intention of entering the priesthood" (p. xxi) and not to provide bedtime reading for those with only a casual interest in Zen.

Arthur E. Lederman
Patricia Bjaaland
Boston University
Boston, Massachusetts