Question

Hello, and thank you for this great opportunity.
My name is John Paul Gamiere, and I am an aspiring
Anthropologist. My main intrests lie in Ethnobotany,
Shamanism, Ethnomusicology, and Altered States of
Consciousness. My question to you concerns the use of
hallucinogenic drugs by Shamans. After researching shamanic
journeys, I have found many similarities to the experience one
has in deep zen meditation. The main experiences both venues
seem to share are a deep sense of awareness of a spiritual
existance, and a reinforcement that the physical world is not
a "true" reality. Do you believe that these assumptions are
valid? And if so, do you believe that using hallucinogens is a
valid path to spiritual enlightenment? It seems that other cultures
have achieved a detachment from the physical with hallucinogens.
Such cultures are the various groups of South American indians,
Native Americans of the Southwest, and Siberian and African
cultures. Even though all these cultures are radically different,
they all seem to share-- along with zen -- a similar vision of our
spiritual nature.


Answer from Master Kosen

What people who don't practice zazen don't understand,
it's that it cannot be compared to anything, for the simple reason
that zazen contains everything and cannot then be described as
a special condition. It is at the centre of all phenomena, for its form
itself and for its immobility. It is then neither hallucinogenic nor
non-hallucinogenic. If you took a drug, as powerful as it can be,
and that you find the energy to take the posture and by doing it
to abandon body and mind, the effects of this drug are automatically
overwhelmed and you go back automatically to the original condition
of the buddhas. There will be left of the drug only its chemical effects,
and the reactions it provokes on your conciousness will disappear after
a while. If hallucinogenic drugs open the conciousness to the relativity
of what we believe to be reality, and can this way open to us an important
though dangerous door, they cannot lead us to the spring of all things if
we don't have the experience of zazen. There is no other way to discover
this essential consciousness than to take with one's body the posture
of the buddhas.


* Retour: Kosen online

Mondo On the same theme : Psycology

zazen or psychotherapy?

What happens if a neurotic person, with a difficult youth practices Zazen intensively, not doing psychotherapy? Will his neurosis heal? Can he get to a deep understanding of zen, even staying neurotic? Thanks Peter
...

Psychosomatic diseases.

I am a psychologist in dealing with patients with psychosomatic diseases. The research tells us that those who have difficulties in the access to the imaginary field and, for instance, the recalling of dreams, is one of the conditions to the emergence of that kind of symptoms and illnesses (allergies, auto-imunitary disfunctions, cancer, ..) But...


Reincarnation and Japan

To Whom It May Concern: I am acquainted with a man whom claims re-incarnational memories. He claims that he has experienced many incarnations, that one was of a Zen-monk from Southern Japan, at a monastery just outside of the Prefect of Osaka, and that he was a member of a select group that worked on a project for the Emperor of Japan; in that...


I do not know what to do with my existence.

Please Mr Kosen, I need assistance... I do not know if it is or it has been, all my life for these last years is a perpetual escape forward. I do not know what to do with my, existence, I set off on ways which will not take me anywhere, I get completely discouraged and that ends up feeding my bitterness, my melancholy, my despair and especially ...



To know more about mondo

You may want to see other themes of this mondo online, or ask your own question : see Mondo online : questions to zen Master Kosen Thibaut

Subscribe to our YouTube channel


Zen meditation : retreats

Next sesshin : from 08 May 2024 to 12 May 2024 - Information and registration to this zen retreat

Spring Camp 2024 : Zazen the méditation Zen, Caroux Temple near of Montpellier


Authentic reality, vulgarity are only words in a dream, Buddha and living beings, random forms, When you are here, bring back your light towards the inside. Enlighten the surroundings. Open your hands and refuse nothing.

Fuyo Dokai

Donate to the Sangha

Let's help the Kosen Sangha and the Yujo Nyusanji zen temple


Mondo

Questions to zen Master Kosen

Boddidharma, buddhist monk

Master Kosen

Follow his teachings in the Montpellier Zen dojo and in the great sesshins at Yujo Nyusanji zen temple


Kusens

Listen to and download last teachings (in french) of Master Kosen in Montpellier's dojo