Question
Hello dear Master,
You said there is no religion in Zen, all right,
no deities either, likewise, all right.
I like prayer; it is very soothing and very powerful.
Prayer to whom, to what? To God, to the Self.
For me, prayer is inseparable from practice.
Does Soto Zen practice no prayer, not even to Buddha, the person, or to the Buddha state?
Silence, Nothingness, listen to our prayers and bring us back to them.
That is what I believe, or rather feel.
Take care, and thank you for this website and these mondos.
xavier77
Master Kosen’s answer
Wrong. There are times devoted to prayer within traditional Zen practice, but not during zazen.
Kosen