Harada Sekkei Roshi ~ The Original Condition ~ Zen Buddhism
Nov 9, 2025
Explore the transformative teachings of Harada Sekkei Roshi, emphasizing zazen as the culmination of enlightenment rather than a sequential path. Discover the dangers of seeking future satori and how it can undermine your Zen practice. Learn to let thoughts rise and fall, allowing for true awakening. Delve into the steps to enter samadhi through active engagement with Dharma, and understand kensho as a process of shedding ego. Ultimately, embrace a single-minded approach to zazen for profound realization.
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insights INSIGHT
Practice Is Already Realization
Zazen is not a step-by-step practice aiming at a distant goal but the full expression of enlightenment itself.
Practice and realization are one integrated process rather than sequential stages.
volunteer_activism ADVICE
Listen, Think, Then Practice
Listen carefully to teachings, think deeply about them, and then put them into practice in that order.
Avoid setting standards to judge your practice; just sit until you forget the sense of 'just' and 'sitting'.
insights INSIGHT
Beyond Learning Equals Acceptance
Beyond-learning means allowing thoughts and emotions to arise and pass while recognizing them as the way.
Awakening is realizing that ordinary mental events are the ultimate rather than obstacles to it.
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Harada Sekkei Roshi (1926-2020) was the abbot of Hosshin-ji, a Soto Zen training monastery and temple, in Fukui Prefecture, near the coast of central Japan. He was born in 1926 in Okazaki, near Nagoya, and was ordained at Hosshin-ji in 1951. In 1953, he went to Hamamatsu to practice under Zen Master Inōe Gien (1894-1981), and received inkashomei (certification of realization) in 1957.In 1974, he was installed as resident priest and abbot of Hosshin-ji and was formally recognized by the Soto Zen sect as a certified Zen master (shike) in 1976. Since 1982, Harada traveled abroad frequently, teaching in such countries as Germany, France, the United States, and India. He also led zazen groups within Japan, in Tokyo and Saitama. From 2003-2005, he was Director of the Soto Zen Buddhism Europe Office located in Milan.Harada Sekkei Roshi died on Saturday, June 20, 2020 at the age of 93. He had been in hospice care for more than a year at a small hospital run by one of his students in the town of Obama, Fukui Prefecture.These selected pointers have been taken from various newsletters as well as the text, The Essence of Zen: The Teachings of Sekkei Harada.https://www.amazon.com.au/Essence-Zen...Music: Swami Madhuram - 'Rainy Day Retreat'.For more of Swamiji's music please find it here: https://insighttimer.com/swamimadhuram
🙏 May whatever goodness arises from these readings/offerings be for the benefit of all sentient beings.
Wisdom of the Masters