Let knowledge and new perspectives
color your journey
It’s wonderful to dip into the diversity of interpretations regarding the tradition of meditation. Reading offers a chance to deepen your understanding of the concepts associated with the tradition of mediation no matter where you are on your journey.
Here is a list of books that you may find helpful. You can start anywhere you wish, go where your curiosity leads you.
BEGINNING
John Daishin Buksbazen, Zen Meditation in Plain English
Shunryu Suzuki, Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind
Charlotte Joko Beck, Everyday Zen
Peter Matthiessen, Nine Headed Dragon River
Robert Aitken, Taking the Path of Zen
Jack Kornfield, A Path with Heart
John Daido Loori, The Still Point
Taizan Maezumi, Appreciate Your Life
Thich Nhat Hanh, The Heart of the Buddha’s Teaching
Pema Chodron, When Things Fall Apart
Chogyam Trungpa, Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism
ESTABLISHING
Kaz Tanahashi (editor), Beyond Thinking: A Guide to Zen Meditation
Zhengue Honghzhi, Cultivating the Empty Field: The Silent Illumination of Zen Master Hongzhi.
Dogen, The Wholehearted Way
Bernie Glassman, Instructions to the Cook: A Zen Master’s Lessons in Living a Life That Matters
Peter Mattheissen, Are We There Yet?: A Zen Journey Through Space and Time
Damien Keown, Buddhist Ethics: A Very Short Introduction
Dan Taigen Leighton, (tran.) Cultivating the Empty Field
Shohaku Okumura, Living by Vow: A Practical Introduction to Eight Essential Zen Chants and Texts
Zenkai Shibayama, Gateless Barrier: Zen Comments on the Mumonkan
Shunryu Suzuki, Branching Streams Flow in the Darkness: Zen Talks on the Sandokai
DEEPENING
Francis Cook, Transmitting the Light: Zen Master Kaizan’s Denkoroku
Red Pine, The Zen Teaching of Bodhidharma
Dogen, Moon in a Dewdrop: Writings of Zen Master Dogen
Dogen. How to Cook Your Life: From the Zen Kitchen to Enlightenment
Dongshan, Just This Is It: Dongshan and the Practice of Suchness
Burton Watson, (tran.) The Analects of Confucius
Burton Watson, (tran.) Zhuangzi: Basic Writings
Ben Connelly, Inside the Grass Hut: Living Shitou’s Classic Zen Poem
Philip Yampolsky, The Platform Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch
Andrew Ferguson, Zen’s Chinese Heritage: The Masters and Their Teachings
Lex Hixon, Living Buddha Zen
Steven Heine (ed.). Zen Ritual: Studies of Zen Buddhist Theory in Practice
