EIHEI DŌGEN : DŌGEN’S EXTENSIVE RECORD A Translation of the Eihei Kōroku

Eihei Dōgen, the thirteenth-century Zen master who founded the Japanese Sōtō School of Zen, is renowned as one of the world’s most remarkable religious thinkers. As Shakespeare does with English, Dōgen utterly transforms the language of Zen, using it in novel and extraordinarily beautiful ways to point to everything important in the religious life.

He is known for two major works. The first work, the massive Shōbōgenzō (Treasury of the True Dharma Eye), represents his early teachings and exists in myriad English translations; the second work, the Eihei Koroku, is a collection of all his later teachings, including short formal discourses to the monks training at his temple, longer informal talks, and koans with his commentaries, as well as short appreciatory verses on various topics. The Shōbōgenzō has received enormous attention in Western Zen and Western Zen literature, and with the publication of this watershed volume, the Eihei Koroku will surely rise to commensurate stature.

Dōgen’s Extensive Record is the first-ever complete and scholarly translation of this monumental work into English and this edition is the first time it has been available in paperback. This edition contains extensive and detailed research and annotation by scholars, translators and Zen teachers Taigen Dan Leighton and Shohaku Okumura, as well as forewords by the eighteenth-century poet-monk Ryokan and Tenshin Reb Anderson, former abbot of the San Francisco Zen Center—plus introductory essays from Dogen scholar Steven Heine, and the prominent, late American Zen master John Daido Loori.

• Hardcover
• 752 pages, 6.50 x 9.25 inches
• ISBN 9780861713059

Eihei Dōgen founded the Japanese Sōtō School of Zen, and is renowned as one of the world’s most remarkable religious thinkers. As Shakespeare does with English, Dōgen utterly transforms the language of Zen, using it in novel and extraordinarily beautiful ways in his voluminous writings. Born in 1200 to an aristocratic background, he was ordained a monk in the Japanese Tendai School in his early teens, but became dissatisfied with Japanese Buddhism. After traveling in China from 1223 to 1227, he returned to introduce to Japan the Sōtō lineage and the large body of Chan teaching stories, or koans, which he had thoroughly mastered. From 1233 to 1243 he taught near the cultural capital of Kyoto, then in 1243 moved to the remote northern mountains and founded the temple Eiheiji, still one of the headquarter temples of Sōtō Zen. There, until his illness and death in 1253, he trained a core group of monks who spread Sōtō Zen throughout the Japanese countryside. Dōgen’s writings are noted for their poetic and philosophic depth, though aimed at spiritual practitioners. His two major, massive works are Shōbōgenzō (True Dharma Eye Treasury) andEihei Kōroku (Dōgen’s Extensive Record). Although not studied for many centuries aside from Sōtō scholars, in modern times Dōgen’s writings, through translation, have become an important part of the spread of Buddhism in the West.

Other books by Eihei Dōgen:
Dogen’s Shōbōgenzō Zuimonki
How to Raise an Ox

Taigen Dan Leighton, Soto Zen priest and successor in the Suzuki Roshi lineage, received Dharma Transmission in 2000 from Reb Anderson Roshi and is Dharma Teacher at Ancient Dragon Zen Gate in Chicago. After residing for years at San Francisco Zen Center and Tassajara monastery, Taigen also practiced for two years in Kyoto, Japan. Taigen is author of Zen Questions: Zazen, Dōgen, and the Spirit of Creative Inquiry; Faces of Compassion: Classic Bodhisattva Archetypes and Their Modern Expression; and Visions of Awakening Space and Time: Dogen and the Lotus Sutra. He has edited and co-translated several Zen texts including: Dōgen’s Extensive Record: A Translation of Eihei Koroku; Cultivating the Empty Field: The Silent Illumination of Zen Master Hongzhi; Dōgen’s Pure Standards for the Zen Community; and The Wholehearted Way; and has contributed to many other books and journals. Taigen teaches online at Berkeley Graduate Theological Union, from where he has a PhD. He has taught at other universities including Saint Mary’s College, the California Institute of Integral Studies, and in Chicago at Meadville Lombard Theological Seminary and Loyola University Chicago. Taigen has long been active in social justice programs, including Peace and Environmental Activism.

Other books by Taigen Dan Leighton:
The Art of Just Sitting
Faces of Compassion
Zen Questions

Shohaku Okumura is a Soto Zen priest and Dharma successor of Kosho Uchiyama Roshi. He is a graduate of Komazawa University and has practiced in Japan at Antaiji, Zuioji, and the Kyoto Soto Zen Center, and in Massachusetts at the Pioneer Valley Zendo. He is the former director of the Soto Zen Buddhism International Center in San Francisco. His previously published books of translation include Shobogenzo Zuimonki, Dogen Zen, Zen Teachings of Homeless Kodo, and Opening the Hand of Thought. Okumura is also editor of Dogen Zen and Its Relevance for Our Time; and SotoZen. He is the founding teacher of the Sanshin Zen Community, based in Bloomington, Indiana, where he lives with his family.

Other books by Shohaku Okumura:
The Sound that Perceives the World
Dogen’s Shōbōgenzō Zuimonki
Mind Sky
Squabbling Squashes
Deepest Practice, Deepest Wisdom
The Mountains and Waters Sutra
The Zen Teaching of Homeless Kodo
Realizing Genjōkōan
Living by Vow
Opening the Hand of Thought