Talks, Videos, Books

Bearing Witness

Much of Zen practice, including many teaching techniques used by Zen masters, is aimed at bringing the Zen practitioner to this same place of unknowing, of letting go of what he or she knows. After walking through Auschwitz and Birkenau, there is an end to thought. We are numbed. All we can do is see the endless train tracks on the snow, feel the icy cold of a Polish winter on our bare hands, smell the rotting wood in the few remaining barracks, and listen to the names of the dead.

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A Day with Bernie Glassman

Since the 1980s, Roshi Bernie Glassman has become a familiar figure to readers of Buddhist journals like Tricycle and Shambhala Sun. But now the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, and Time magazine can scarcely report on the explosion of interest in American Buddhism without mentioning street retreats — penniless week-long excursions into lower-Manhattan led by Roshi Bernie –and the Greyston Foundation, a mandala of for-profit and not-for-profit businesses that serve the poor in Glassman’s adopted neighborhood of Yonkers, NY. Indeed, the vision of urban renewal and human reclamation only dimly imagined by ’60s radicals is vividly embodied in the work Glassman and his community have done in this often forgotten corner of affluent Westchester county.

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Forgiveness

In thinking about the possibility for forgiveness, my first thought was that I don’t have the power to forgive anyone; in fact, it’s hubris for me to think that I can forgive someone else. At the same time, as a Zen Buddhist teacher, I believe that we are all one body, that no one is excluded from the Circle of Life. All of us–men, women, children, the killers, the killed, the tormentors, and the tormented–are billions of cells of one body.

If this is the case, whom are we forgiving? If we’re all one, what does it mean for an SS officer to ask a Jew for forgiveness ?

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Founders’ Excellent Adventure

Always challenging, always surprising, Roshi Bernard Tetsugen Glassman is one of the most provocative figures of American Buddhism. An aeronautical engineer who began his Zen practice in the late fifties, Glassman is one of the dharma heirs of Taizan Maezumi Roshi, and upon Maezumi Roshi’s death, was given charge of his worldwide sangha.

Yet it seems the life of the settled Zen teacher cannot satisfy the restless, visionary mind of Roshi Bernie Glassman. At his base in Yonkers, New York, he established a multifaceted social service agency called the Greyston mandala, showing a capacity unique in the Buddhist world to attract high profile supporters and millions of dollars in public funding.

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Harvard Divinity School Lectures: Bearing Witness

For me the three Zen Peacemaker tenets of not-knowing, bearing witness, and loving actions are almost the answer to everything.

It is very important that we understand what is meant by them. From the questions you sent in this week, I sense that there is still confusion about what is meant by “not-knowing,” and “bearing witness.” When there is loss or fear, if one can bear witness to what is happening, the terminology becomes very different; You would no longer necessarily use words like “loss.” Certainly, when loss occurs, you are not bearing witness, so you talk about it as loss. Or when the fear rises, you are not bearing witness, and you deal with fear. But as one bears witness, radical changes occur.

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Holy Week in the Streets

I wish to talk about going on the streets during Holy Week, the week of Easter, the week of Passover, one of the saddest and most joyous times of the year. I go on the streets at other times of the year, too, and each occasion is special in its own way, but the streets feel different during Holy Week. The re-membrance and caring that spring to life during that time are unmistakable and unforgettable To give you a feel for what I mean, let me describe the 1996 Holy Week street retreat.

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A House of One People

One obvious obstacle to a House of One People is that not all people want to come together in a spirit of oneness, certainly not those who spill blood in the name of Christ or Allah or Jehovah. Celebrating diversity, however, is also not simple. In our secular society it’s all too easy to minimize the differences between the religions. Many claim that all religions are nothing other than different manifestations of some ultimate reality. Christ, Buddha, Muhammad, and Confucius are all put into one neat category, as though they’re interchangeable.

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Issan Dorsey

I think of Issan Dorsey as the shadow in many people’s lives. He was a drug addict, he was gay, he appeared in drag, and he died of AIDS. For many years he lived right on the edge, befriending junkies, drag queens and alkies who lived precariously like him, on the fringes of society. When he died, a Zen teacher and priest, he was still befriending and caring for those whom our society rejected then and continues to reject now, people ill with the AIDS virus.

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Memories of Maezumi Roshi

I first met Maezumi Roshi in 1963. At that time, he was a young Soto monk working in Los Angeles at Zenshuji under Sumi Roshi, then Sokan of North America. I attended a small zazenkai at Zenshuji. Although I had some familiarity with zazen, walking mediation was new for me. So I asked Sumi Roshi, “What are we doing during walking meditation?” Sumi Roshi turned to Maezumi Sensei and indicated that he should answer. “When we walk, we just walk,” was the young monk’s reply. Even today I am struck by the simplicity and directness of this teaching. It has guided me throughout all these years.

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Bernie Glassman Sees No Boundaries

In the inner city of Yonkers, New York, Roshi Bernard Glassman has a big vision, big ambition and a big vow to help all beings in need. If his audacious experiment works, he hopes (with a smile) it will replicate all over the universe.

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The Three Pure Precepts and Bodhidharma

Bodhidharma is us, all of us. It’s our teachers that come from Japan, from the west, carrying the torch. It’s all of us coming from wherever we came from, gathered here. Why did we come here? What are we carrying? What are our teachers carrying? What is it that we want to receive? And what is it that we don’t want to receive?

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Reflections on the Beginnings of the Zen Peacemaker Order

Starting from scratch means starting from unknowing. You get a piece from here and you get a piece from there and you put them together. We have no idea how the end will look. We may have a vision of how we’d like it to look, but we don’t really know. This is a very hard practice, but if we can start with unknowing, with no right and no wrong, then there’s no problem. Nothing can come out wrong.

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Partnership Beyond Death

I followed a daily schedule.

In the mornings I took a bath. Then I sat in front of my wife’s picture. Sometimes I listened to music. Sometimes I looked at the birds outside.

I read and re-read the teachings of Ramana Maharshi, whom she admired. I played with her dogs. I read her journals.

During the rest of the day I worked on the formation of the Peacemaker Community and developed its web site. I was available to teachers and senior students, usually by phone.

Sometimes I laughed and said that in comparison to the way I worked over the past 30 years, I was not doing anything. But when the sun went down I was exhausted and I went to bed early. For I was actually working very hard. I was bearing witness.

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Bearing Witness in the Streets and in Auschwitz

Greyston Mandala

Clips from Jane Pauley show and CBS 60 Minutes show on Greyston

Bernie Glassman and Zen Peacemakers

Auschwitz Bearing Witness Retreat (1996) Trailer: Michael O’Keefe

Bernie and Mr. YooWho give Clown Dharma Talk at San Francisco Zen Center

Instructions to the Cook: A Zen Master’s Recipe for Living a Life that Matters: DVD by Christof Wolf, S.J.

Directed by Christof Wolf, S.J., Produced by Ron Schmidt, S.J. and Christof Wolf, S.J., Edited by Jason Schmidt Bernard Glassman teaches a distillation of Zen wisdom that can be used as a guide for business, social ventures, peacemaking or just life. The documentary demonstrates the uniqueness and human impact of Glassman‘s work and life. Not only a Zen teacher, he works as a peacemaker in the field of interfaith dialog throughout the world. He has helped change a whole neighbourhood in Yonkers (New York). The film shows how one can live a life that matters.

Gate of Sweet Nectar: Krishna Das

Bernie Glassman in Berlin, 2011

Becoming a Mensch

Japan Tour

Roshi Bernie Glassman leads a group of Zen students thru the temples, monasteries and tradition associated with his lineage and the development of Buddhism in Japan. During the bus ride, he narrates his understanding relating to the places and people the group visits.

To purchase any of the following books, please use the following Donate Button to pay fees. List what the fees are for in the comments bloc on the Donation Page. Shipping and Handling Fees are included in the prices. You can also send a check payable to Zen Peacemakers to Laurie at PO Box 460, Sunderland, MA 01375. If you prefer paying by phone, call Laurie at 1-(413) 367-5278, she will tell you the fee required and she will take your credit card information.

 

Donate (tax deductible, proceeds go to supporting the work of the Zen Peacemakers) to receive Signed Book by Jeff Bridges and Bernie Glassman. $50 or more. (Includes shipping and handling fees.)

Purchase (unsigned) to support work of Zen Peacemakers and to Enjoy! $28 (Includes shipping and handling fees.) Instructions to the Cook: Living a Life that Matters, by Bernie Glassman and Rick Fields (Hardcopy) $15.00

InstructCook

Read more on Instructions to the Cook

Based on a 13th-century Japanese manual of the same title, this guide to modern-day Zen practice also details the history of Glassman’s work in the world. An abbot of Zen communities in New York City and Los Angeles, Glassman is also the founder of the Greyston Mandala, a network that includes a commercial bakery, apartments for the homeless and other not-for-profit community development projects in Yonkers, a suburb of New York City. In Zen Buddhist tradition, the preparation of a meal is used as a metaphor for leading a meaningful life. Glassman and Fields (coauthor of Chop Wood, Carry Water) detail the five main “courses” of life: spirituality, study, livelihood, social action, and relationship and community Most widely recognized of the Greyston ventures is the successful bakery. Besides being a teacher of Zen and a noted social activist, Glassman is a pragmatic businessman. His description of how he and others who work with and for the jobless and homeless of Yonkers dealt with government agencies, banks, suspicious residents and the vagaries of the marketplace will satisfy the appetites of readers whose interest is as much in business practice as in Zen practice. In setting out his guidelines for conducting business, e.g., establishing self-directed management teams and sharing success with the community, Glassman occasionally strikes an imperious tone (reflecting the authority invested in Zen leaders), but the menu he offers is fresh, appealingly presented and thought- provoking.

Bearing Witness, by Bernie Glassman and Eve Marko (Hardcopy) $22.00 witness

Read more on Bearing Witness

Zen practitioner and non-profit community developer Bernie Glassman offers powerful teaching stories that illustrate ways of making peace one moment at a time. Each chapter focuses on an event or person and demonstrates how a particular peacemaker vow is put into practice. Through these stories and Glassman’s personal testimony we come to understand the essence of peacemaking.

Infinite Circle: Teachings in Zen by Bernie Glassman, (Hardcopy) $19.95;

(Paperback) $13.95

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In Infinite Circle, one of America’s most distinctive Zen teachers takes a back-to-basics approach to Zen. Glassman illuminates three key teachings of Zen Buddhism, offering line-by-line commentary in clear, direct language:1. The Heart Sutra: the Buddha’s essential discourse on emptiness, a central sutra of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition. 2. “The Identity of Relative and Absolute”: an eighth-century poem by Shih-t’ou His-ch’ien, a key text of the Soto Zen school. 3. The Zen precepts: the rules of conduct for laypeople and monks.His commentaries are based on workshops he gave as Abbot of the Zen Community of New York, and they contain within them the principles that became the foundation for the Greyston Mandala of community development organizations and the Zen Peacemaker Order.

To purchase any of the above books, please use the following Donate Button to pay fees. List what the fees are for in the comments bloc on the Donation Page. Shipping and Handling Fees are included in the prices. You can also send a check payable to Zen Peacemakers to Laurie at PO Box 460, Sunderland, MA 01375. If you prefer paying by phone, call Laurie at 1-(413) 367-5278, she will tell you the fee required and she will take your credit card information.

 

 

 

Product Details
On Zen Practice: Body, Breath, and Mind by Hakuyu Taizan Maezumi and Bernard Glassman (Oct 2002)
Product Details
Hazy Moon of Enlightenment: On Zen Practice III (The Zen Writings Series) by Hakuyu Taizan Maezumi and Bernard Tetsugen Glassman (Jun 1978)
On Zen Practice (Zen writings series) by Hakuyu Taizan Maezumi and Bernard Tetsugen Glassman (Jun 1977)

Books in German

Es geht ums Tun und nicht ums Siegen: Engagement zwischen Wut und Zärtlichkeit, by Bernie Glassman and Konstantin Wecker, September 2011 (Hardcopy in German) Bernard Glassman & Konstantin Wecker

Anweisungen für den Koch: Lebensentwurf eines Zen-Meisters von Bernard Glassman, Rick Fields, Theo Kierdorf und Hildegard Höhr von edition steinrich (Gebundene Ausgabe – April 2010)
Zeugnis ablegen von Bernard Glassman und Peter Cunningham von Theseus (Gebundene Ausgabe – 2001)
Das Herz der Vollendung von Bernard Glassman von Theseus (Gebundene Ausgabe – 1. März 2003)