BUDDHISM IN AMERICA

The father's words reflected the pain in his face, as he talked about his teenage son.

“At first he said he was an atheist and didn't want any part of religion,” the father said. “But lately he has been saying he's an agnostic, so maybe that's promising. Sure, we would have liked him to follow our example.”

These words of disappointment could have been spoken by millions of Christian or Jewish parents whose children showed no interest in the family faith. In this case, however, the father was an American‐born converted Buddhist.

Yet, us disillusioned as it may sound, the father's lament may be an indication that Eastern religion has reached a new stage in America, a stage in which many “founding” fathers and mothers are secure enough in their religious beliefs to want to see them adopted by their children.

Eastern religion has enjoyed several periods of growth among non‐Oriental Americans since the end of World War II — the first with the Beat generation in the late 40's, then a larger wave with the peace‐and‐love generation of the mid‐60's, which sought self‐awareness as one antidote to the Vietnam War and general disillusionment with American institutions. Most of the wanderers of those generations have moved on to the next stimulus by now, their interest in meditation and harmony either diverted or disrupted.

But as the 1970's make their last inscrutable stand, a smaller core of converts to Buddhism is building distinctly American communities combining the teachings of Zen with the demands of contemporary American life. In clusters of varying size across the country, the largest of which are centered in Rochester, New York City, Los Angeles and San Francisco, an estimated 500,000 Americans are quietly practicing some form of Buddhism.

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Perhaps the best example of community‐building among contemporary Buddhists is the Zen Center on the comfortable east end of Rochester, where about 300 members, who live in houses and apartments throughout the city, are finding a Buddhist focus for their lives.

The Zen Center consists of two large old houses, now joined by an archway, with a peaceful garden and meeting hall out back. Just inside the front door, a wall of photographs resembles a suburban community‐house bulletin board. There are snapshots of a Buddhist Thanksgiving (since many Buddhists are vegetarian, the turkey is released in a game preserve rather than eaten); snapshots of children wearing goblin costumes on Halloween; snapshots of the center's softball team.

Every Sunday, 150 to 200 people walk or bicycle to the center (they are discouraged from driving cars for environmental and good‐neighbor reasons) for the 8 A.M. meditation. They are almost all Caucasians, ranging in age from 18 to well over 65; most are trim and healthy looking. As they arrive at the front door, they are already withdrawing into the silence of the next few hours, taking off their shoes, putting on brown robes, finding a spot in one of the austere but airy rooms where they can assume a full lotus position. With eyes half‐closed, they will empty their minds of distractions.

The meditation is broken into three half‐hour segments, punctuated by walking meditation exercises through the house. After the meditation, the group gathers to chant — in English and listen to the words of the center's roshi, or “venerable teacher,” Philip Kapleau.

The natural feeling of the rooms in these houses is enhanced by the woodwork, which has been stripped of paint. Carpets and simple furniture complement the plants arranged in front of every window. The food, shared by the staff following the meditation session, is magnificent — steaming dishes of grain, fresh vegetables from a farmers’ market, homemade applesauce and breads, cheeses, hearty soups. (“We don't let new people work in the kitchen,” says one of the center's monks. “We believe you need experienced, calm people there. Good karma creates good food.”)

In the center, there are statues of Buddha in prominent places, of course, but little else speaks of Buddhism's Eastern origins or the 13 years Philip Kapleau spent in Japan. It is his objective to help people make Zen an American way of life rather than a foreign religion, to “keep the spirit of Zen but give it an American dress. If Zen Buddhism is going to grow in this country,” says Roshi Kapleau, “we must get rid of foreign cultural encrustations.”

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Philip Kapleau is one of 10 or 12 bona fide roshis teaching in America today. (Since there is no central Buddhist organization, roshis are known mainly by reputation.) He was born in 1912 in Connecticut and worked as a court reporter for the United States at the Nuremberg trials and later at war trials in Japan. He says he was impressed with the way the Japanese dealt with their role in the atrocities of the war compared with the way Christian Germany dealt with its past. He was introduced to the Buddhist notion of “karmic retribution” — for inflicting pain, a harvest of pain will be reaped — and determined to explore Buddhism. In 1952, with no knowledge of the Japanese language, he gave up his job in America and sought a Japanese master, eventually studying under three, one of whom was Dr. D.T. Suzuki. In 1965 he decided he had “grown stale” and came home to America — a 53‐year‐old man who shaved his head and considered himself ready to share Zen Buddhist

He established his first center in Rochester in 1966 with a nucleus of people. Today the Zen Center has American affiliates in Denver, Chicago and Boston. There are four centers Canada, one in Mexico City, one Costa Rica and one in Poland; the Zen Center's estimated membership is 750 worldwide.

The center supports itself with membership dues ranging from $20 to $50 quarter; fees for training programs and seminar workshops; voluntary contributions, and royalties from Roshi Kapleau's three books. The Rochester center has a staff of 28, none of whom, including Roshi Kapleau, earns a salary.

Today, Roshi Kapleau sees more older people moving toward Buddhism. In the 60's it was mainly the young. “They were disillusioned and in despair, many of them on the verge of suicide,” he says. “They felt the Establishment was insincere, not meeting genuine needs. A lot of young people were in drug trouble, looking for something. Many of them had no skills and could be called irresponsible.

“Young people wanted something simple, something worthwhile. I had to show them they could change their karma [a Buddhist and Hindu term meaning a self‐caused inevitability]. To do so meant to take responsibility for their own lives. I had to show them enlightenment came from within.”

Buddhism does not seek converts; proselytizing is foreign to it. “In Zen, the idea is almost to push people away,” says Roshi Kapleau. “A person needs real ardor and perseverence to attain a higher order of enlightenment.”

Roshi Kapleau tells this story: “A young man once came to a venerable master and asked, ‘How long will take to reach enlightenment?’ The master said, ‘Ten years.’ The young man blurted: ‘That long?’ The master said, ‘No, I was mistaken. It will take you 20 years.’ The young man asked, ‘Twenty years?’ and the master said, ‘Come to think of it, maybe 30.’ “

Buddhism eludes easy definition. A group of psychiatrists once engaged Roshi Kapleau to explain Zen to them. He obliged by silently munching a ripe banana. When a student asked what it all meant, the roshi rubbed the banana peel in the student's face and said, “You have just witnessed a first‐rate example of Zen. Are there any questions?” Most of the psychiatrists said they still didn't get it and pressed their speaker for a definition. Roshi Kapleau thought awhile and said, “All right. Zen is a flea copulating with an elephant.”

Knowing how the roshi feels about definitions, I nevertheless persisted in asking him for one.

“A pathless path that has to be walked, not talked about,” he said. “A path between two extremes, self‐indulgence and self‐mortification. The realization that we exist on two levels relative to time and space, and transient, beyond time and space. Does that do? Leave it blank or answer it yourself.”

According to a recent survey, there

may now be two million adults in this country involved in some form of Eastern religion. In a Gallup survey of “experiential” movements — groups stressing personal spiritual discovery — this total fell behind other movements such as transcendental meditation (six million), yoga (five million), charismatic renewal (three million) and mysticism (three million).

In her book, “Buddhism in America,” Emma McCloy Layman estimates that 500,000 native‐born Americans have made some form of personal commitment to Buddhism, but, she adds, “The influence of Buddhism in America has been and will continue to be greater than membership figures would lead us to expect, and it is here to stay.” Dr. Layman notes that meditation practices have already been integrated into some psychiatric methods and some Christian worships, and she says Buddhist concepts of “suffering, impermanence and nonself have already been widely accepted.” She predicts many people will be influenced by Buddhism to seek a “simple life

“If you are in touch with yourself through meditation, you can influence other people,” Roshi Kapleau says. “If you are in touch with deeper forces, you can propel these forces. You can be a powerful transmitter.”

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Ruth Sandberg's face is serene; her body is as lithe as a teen‐ager's, but she is a grandmother who spends six months a year in Florida and six months teaching hatha yoga in Rochester.

“When my husband died, I was still searching,” she says. “It was my good karma that a friend gave me a clipping about the roshi's first book. I read it, and as soon as I could, I hopped on plane to Rochester. The minute walked into this center, I knew I was home. Sitting on that cushion, meditating, I lost all my hang‐ups.”

During a Saturday workshop, Mrs. Sandberg demonstrates exercises to assist in meditation. To a novice whose muscular legs are resisting the lotus position, she points out sweetly: “An inflexible body is the sign of an inflexible mind.”

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“Pain” is a word frequently used by Buddhists around the country. At the Zen Center of Los Angeles, a tranquil priest named John Daishin Buksbazen told me how the pain of the politics and the assassinations in 1968 sent him to meditation. At the Tibetan Buddhist Nyingma Center in Berkeley, a gracious student, Kimberley Bacon, told of the emptiness that led her around the country, searching for something. And many can tell stories like Zenson's, a 30‐year‐old priest in the Zen Center.

Zenson grew up in a small town outside Rochester. He hung posters of Mickey Mantle on his wall, played sports and experimented with drugs in the 60's. He went to Denmark for a while, afraid of being drafted. He had abandoned his parents’ Christian beliefs early on.

One day a friend told him about the Zen Center. His first response to meditation was the pain of a posture that was impossible for his leg muscles, thickened from years of playing sports. It took him six months to stretch his ligaments so he could sit in the full lotus position, legs crossed, each foot resting on the opposite thigh. Sitting longer and longer, hands in his lap, eyes downward, counting his breaths, he learned not to think about sports or sex or the traffic outside the building or dope or any of his troubles. He learned simple woodworking and clerical tasks, and he learned to take his meals in silence, as is

“I can only say what it has done for me,” Zenson says. “Since I came here, I have had a sense of oneness with the world. It's ongoing, ever‐deepening.”

Two years ago he was ordained as a priest, shaved his head and adopted the name of Zenson ‐ son of Zen. (Roshi Kapleau gives names to his priests and monks that approximate Western sounds.)

“My parents came to my ordination,” Zenson says. “I once heard one of my relatives say, ‘He's such a nice boy. How did he get mixed up in that Buddhist thing?’ They didn't understand. Buddhism was the cause of my being a nice boy. I think they were surprised when they came here. They expected me to be into some dark, weird place. Look around you. This is a nice place, isn't it?”

Meditation is only one part of the path to enlightenment. Another important part is the dialogue with the roshi, what Roshi Kapleau calls a “kneeto‐knee, eyeball‐to‐eyeball confrontation,” neither intellectual nor spiritual, but rather like a joust using water pistols and beanbags as well as lances and spiked clubs.

In his recently published book, “Zen: Dawn in the West,” Roshi Kapleau writes that it is his job to “take away much that is foreign to your true nature: the sticky beliefs, chesty opinions, petty rationalizations, illusory ideals and deluded thoughts, all of which imprison you as in a cocoon.”

Descriptions of these meetings with the master, called dokusan, remind me of the old joke about the seeker of truth who struggles for 20 years to find the ultimate guru on top of a mountain, only to be given

the advice that “life is a fountain.” When the visitor protests the shallowness of this advice, the guru asks, “You mean it's not?” After spending two days around the unpretentious Roshi Kapleau, I began to see a level of truth in the joke.

One time a student asked him, “What is Buddha?” The roshi replied, “Who are you?” The roshi agrees this might sound like pretty weak stuff, but he adds the student “came to awakening as a result of this exchange.”

Although a roshi is allowed to do some outrageous things (tease, taunt, whack with ritual stick or smack the student on the side of the head), the roshi is not above criticism. (Roshi Kapleau's books include anecdotes about pupils who whacked their masters back.) Roshis have been known to be wrong. “The role of the teacher is to preserve the student from the teacher's influence,” says Roshi Kapleau. “You cannot lean on the teacher. He will push you away.” Each student is also given a riddle, called a koan, to ponder for five or 10 years. When he autographed a book for me, the roshi inscribed: “To George: In the seas birds fly, in the air fish swim.”

Deeper Zen meditation comes in four ‐ and seven‐day periods of seclusion called sesshin, in which fasting and silence produce alternate moments of despair and joy. With no deity to cling to, seven days of sesshin are a plunge into the inner self.

At a recent sesshin, the members were resting in the garden when they heard the unmistakable sounds of a prowler being chased by police in the next yard. None of the meditators stirred for fear of losing the intensity needed for a seven‐day seclusion.

Some Westerners question whether Buddhism is a religion at all. As it moved from India to China to Japan and then to the West, it has constantly acquired divergent, even opposite, ways. There are celibate priests, married priests, divorced priests. (Roshi Kapleau is married. His wife lives with their teenage daughter in Toronto and leads a spiritual group under an Indian teacher.) There are hermit sects and worldly sects. There is no god or dogma. But since it has its priesthoods and its rituals, since it deals with the meaning of life and death, since it fills the same deep needs that Judaism and Christianity fill for others, since it proposes life of spirituality, it fits all other criteria of a religion.

All the forms of Buddhism stem from one man, an Indian named Siddartha Gautama, who enjoyed a 95‐year ministry six centuries before Christ. His thousands of disciples called him the Buddha, a Sanskrit word for “enlightened one.”

Different Oriental cultures, different teachers, have created vastly different forms of Buddhism, many of them practiced in the United States by people of Chinese, Japanese, Korean and Tibetan ancestry and culture. For Americans of European background, the interest has most often been in Zen Buddhism, an adaptation of part of a Chinese word for meditation, ch'an. Zen is not a worship of a god, and it is not an intellectual philosophy but rather a series of disciplines that includes sitting in a meditative position for long periods of time. Very long periods of time. For a deeper understanding, a sense

Some Buddhists feel Christians and Jews can comfortably adapt most Buddhist teachings. C. T. Shen, a Chinese‐born industrialist who sponsors many Buddhist activities in the New York area, says Christ and Buddha had “similar visions” but that Buddha had more time to complete his vision because he lived 80 years and Christ lived only around 33.

The Death of Master Hofuku (Pao‐fu)

The master called his monks together and said, “During the last week my energy has been draining ‐ certainly no cause for worry. It's just that death is near.”

A monk asked, “You are about to die. What meaning does it have? We will continue living. And what meaning does that have?”

“They are both the Way,” the master replied.

“But how can I reconcile the two?”asked the monk.

Hofuku answered, “When rains it pours,” and wrapping his legs in the full lotus, calmly died.

‐“The Wheel of Death,” by Philip Kapleau•

One of the central beliefs of Buddhism is that life endures over a longer cycle than mere

Reprinted by permission of Harper Row, 01971 by Philip Kapleau. birth and death. As Roshi Kapleau wrote in “The Wheel of Death,” human life has “an unseen subterranean existence and appears at other places in other times and other shapes. The lesson from the deaths of some Zen masters is that dying is just another step, a time of ceremony and insight.”

One of the most persistent criticisms of Eastern religions is that they lack the activism of Western groups — the philanthropic, educational and community‐spirited zeal of the major Western religions.

In his recent book, “Turning East,” Dr. Harvey Cox, the Harvard theologian, praised many of the techniques and results of Eastern religion, but said he was suspicious of “inward” movements that were uninvolved with other humans who had not yet reached, or sought, their brand of enlightenment.

Nevertheless, he described Oriental meditation as “a step toward escaping illusion and ego, and toward seeing the world of impermanence and suffering for what it is.” He called Christianity “one pole of the dialectic of action and repose, being and doing,” and he predicted that Christianity would act as a “prism” to “transform” Buddhism.

Most Buddhists have heard Dr. Cox's criticism of inward movements and have an answer. “We are a lot like the Quakers,” says Dr. Michael Taizen Soule, a biologist and full‐time official at the Los Angeles Zen Center. “Quakers do more good than anyone, but they do a lot of work on themselves first. If you have a beneficial impact on yourself, after a while you can't help but act properly.”

“When one purifies himself,” says Zenson, the priest at the Rochester center, “one purifies society. You start where you are. You beautify your building. We won an award fur the best restoration work in our part of town, and we didn't even ask to enter the competition. We help clean up the city. We live in harmony with our neighborhood.”

What has Buddhism accomplished in America? Some members are sure the Vietnam War ended because of the mural pressure vibrated outward by meditation sessions. Some Buddhists feel Ameri cans have toned down their lives, cleaned up their towns, evaluated what services and efforts were necessary, because of Buddhist thinking.

The writing they cite most frequently is the book by E. F. Schumacher, “Small Is Beautiful,” and the chapter “Buddhist Economics,” in which

the author writes, “Consumption is merely a means to human well‐being; the aim should be to obtain the maximum of well‐being with the minimum of consumption.”

“You can inflame people's minds subconsciously,” Roshi Kapleau says. “When we hold a sesshin, our friends as far away as Poland say they can feel the vibrations across the ocean. That is the basis of prayer. People who are developed in Zen can cast positive forces into the world. They can influence millions of people. It is happening already.”

Roshi Kapleau cites an old Buddhist adage: “A small master hides himself in the mountains; a great master hides himself in the marketplace.” The era of seclusion is over for many Buddhist groups, which are finding their mission right out in the bustle and, some would say, hustle of the marketplace.

The face of American Buddhism includes self‐improvement courses, publishing ventures and Tibetan self‐healing techniques offered by the Nyingma Center in Berkeley; photography and cultural studies and advice on how to care for the dying, all offered by the Los Angeles Zen ‘Center; college degrees offered by the Nampa Institute, an unaccredited college in Boulder, Colo., which is as close in spirit to Woodstock as it is to Orient.

The Tibetan teacher Tarthang Tulku Rinpoche urges his disciples at the Nyingma Center to make their wisdom available to the world. Thus, handsome 24‐page brochure boasts “There's something for everyone” at the institute. He insists these courses are offered not to evangelize but as way of sharing wisdom for its sake.

Native‐born blacks and whites are also joining more traditional Oriental groups. Paul Kennedy, a 23‐year‐old Irish‐American Rutgers graduate, recently became the first non‐Oriental monk ever ordained by a Chinese Buddhist group, when he joined the Temple of Enlightenment in the Bronx.

Most Oriental Buddhist groups have cultural programs for children to keep their Japanese or Chinese or Korean traditions, yet their worship services closely resemble Protestant church services, with Western‐style hymns and altars. These Oriental‐American groups have almost nothing to do with groups like the Zen Center of Rochester, which are trying to shed all “foreign cultural encrustations” on the path to enlightenment.

Many of the frustrated young people who discovered Buddhism in the 60's are now sober not‐so‐young couples of the late 70's. Many are raising modest families of a child or two. Their worldly skills are producing decent incomes, and the American‐born Buddhists are trying to build communities.

The neighbors on Arnold Park in Rochester seem to have accepted the quiet people who come to meditate, but some citizens in New York City, Iowa and Minnesota have, within recent months, stalled land sales to Buddhists. Roshi Kapleau has taken great effort to avoid the child‐nabbing charges occasionally leveled against some cults, and he recently received approval from a Rochester minister before the minister's 17‐year‐old daughter was allowed to visit the center. The Japanese‐born roshi in Los Angeles, Taizan Maezumi, tries to visit families of his members when he travels across the

The Buddhists seem to know they are not for every American, and indeed they have no room for every American. Meditating requires intense motivation. The ones who come have some real desire for spiritual, moral, philosophical or intellectual uplifting.

Dedicated Buddhists feel their way of life offers something important to Americans who can understand it. Joseph Lippman, a former Congressional aide who came to Buddhism through his two sons and is now the dean of the Nyingma Institute in Berkeley, says he believes life is going to get more painful in America — both spiritually and physically. He says Buddhism can teach people to live with less, to be content with themselves, to cope with the diminishing pleasure and greater pain that will accompany the last quarter of this

Can these perceptions be transmitted from one generation to another? Unlike Ca‐ tholicism, with its first communion at the age of 7, or Judaism with its bar and bat mitzvah at the age of 13, Buddhism has no rites of passage for children.

Richard and Vicky Wehrman moved from Missouri to be close to Roshi Kapleau, to raise their children as Buddhists, if possible, in a polyglot society.

“My daughter is going to Catholic school this year because it was the best alternative,” says Mrs. Wehrman. “She takes religion 45 minutes a day, but they”re not trying to convert her. And as Buddhists, we are wary of setting up programs for our children, but lately my daughter has come to the center for some of the celebrations.” Buddhists tend to want their children to be exposed, not indoctrinated.

“When we first moved into our neighborhood, we used to sit on the floor to eat, but the children felt strange about bringing their friends home, so we got chairs. We try to have a middle‐class style for them, but we do have altars around the house. I don”t think anybody says anything to the children about being different.”

Actually, some Buddhist parents say the most noticeable aspect of their Buddhism is their vegetarianism. But even that is becoming commonplace in schools and offices these days. Though not all Buddhists are vegetarian, those who are like to take some credit for the rising consumption of fruits and vegetables.

The Los Angeles Zen Center has a day‐care center for children, and allows the children to improvise their own Buddhist rituals; other groups are leery of early exposure because of memories of their own Jewish or Christian childhoods. The Rochester group has been concentrating on American‐style holidays (New Year's Eve parties, with a traditional Buddhist drivingout‐of‐ghosts; Halloween; Thanksgiving).

Some parents do not transmit their Buddhist beliefs to their children. Alan Temple, a leader of the Rochester center who lives and works in a suburban neighborhood, says he is “hurt” that his 22‐year‐old son has no interest in Buddhism.

Other families have more success. The Wehrmans try not to appear “unusual” to their two teen‐age children, but they do conduct meditations in their home, and they see signs of passing the practice to the next wave.

“My son resisted for a long time, but lately he has been coming around,” Mrs. Wehrman says. “The other day we were all cross with each other for some reason. A lot of bad vibrations in the house. My son said, ‘Mom, we'd better have a sitting.’ So he put on a robe and got a cushion and he began to sit. He only lasted five minutes, and we all lasted longer than he did, but we got good karma back into our house.”

Sylvan Busch, a commercial artist who is president of the Zen Studies Society in New York City, says his 27‐year‐old son has just started to attend the center's meetings. Mr. Busch, who has been practicing Zen Buddhism since 1958, says he never tried to influence his son's choice. “1 knew if he was curious he would look in.”

Of the future of Zen Buddhism in America, Mr. Busch says: “We have made a good start. But with pockets of 200 people here and 200 people there, we can't really be considered established. Bringing a new religion to a country as big as the United States is not easy. But we are doing a lot of good; we are putting down roots.”

Roshi Kapleau has been thinking about putting down new roots as well. He has recently decided to build a new headquarters on 200 acres in Denver. A female disciple, Toni Packer, will run the center in Rochester as an affiliate. “Most Zen teachers move around,” he says of his decision. “There is no concept of an irreplaceable guru. Part of Zen training is not to let people get dependent on you. They must stand on their own feet.” ■