I was always wondering about the meaning of the name of the zazen hall at Chokoji Temple in Numazu. The meaning is ” dead tree hall”or ” Koboku dou”. It doesn’t sound very happy or lucky to me.

One day at the zazen meeting our priest talked about the meaning of it.

The hall was named by one of the ex-head priests of Ryutakuji Temple. In Hakuin’s teaching, something you have acquired is less valuable than what you have already in yourself. Since we have lots of unneccessary things we can’t see things clearly. We do zazen to get rid of what we don’t need.

When trees lose everything and almost look dead, their inate ability is activated. The same goes for people. We have to believe in our inate power since we are all Buddha originally.

Zen often gives me the totally opposite idea from what I had before. To be free from fixed notions, learning zen is effective. I found it really exciting.