Discovering the True Self

Kodo Sawaki's Art of Zen Meditation

By: Kodo Sawaki, Arthur Braverman - editor translator and introduction

Narrated by: David Shih

"You can't see your true Self. [But] you can become it. Becoming your true Self is zazen."

As an orphan in the slums of Tsu City, Japan, Kodo Sawaki had to fight his way to adulthood, and became one of the most respected Zen masters of the twentieth century. He had a great understanding of Dogen Zenji's teaching and he knew how to express Dogen's philosophy. Sawaki's primary mission was to bring all people to an awareness of the Self, which he believed came through Zen meditation.

His humor and straightforward talk garnered Sawaki followers from all walks of life. Though he remained poor by choice, he was rich in spirit. Two of his students who became known in America as well as in Japan were Kosho Uchiyama, abbot of Antaiji Temple and author of Opening the Hand of Thought, and Gudo Nishijima, Zen teacher and translator of Dogen's Shobogenzo.

A student of Kosho Uchiyama, Arthur Braverman has compiled an anthology of Sawaki's writings and a garland of sayings gathered from throughout his lifetime. One of a few collections of Sawaki's teachings published in English, his life and work bracket the most intriguing and influential period of modern Zen practice in Japan and America.

©2020 Arthur Braverman (P)2022 Tantor

Narrator Mistakes Nonfiction For Drama

The book itself is throughly mediocre among Zen literature, but worthwhile. The narrator, however, seems to be a frustrated or aspiring voice actor desperate for a role. It eventually becomes unbearable to listen to his dramatization of what should be simply reading quotations. EVERYTHING is injected with some strange urgency of tone and silly raspiness to it whenever Sawaki is quoted. The printed book would be preferable.