Sharing the Twin-Track Practice of Chan and Pure Land at Dharma Drum Mountain San Francisco Bay Area Center
Sharing the Twin-Track Practice of Chan and Pure Land at Dharma Drum Mountain San Francisco Bay Area Center
Themed as late Master Sheng Yen’s admonition “Hold the stone of the calm mind; Have peaceful soup”, a series of online sessions was held at Dharma Drum Mountain San Francisco Bay Area Center. LIVE streaming dharma assemblies, online meditation group practices, as well as Buddhists classes related to the twin-track practice of Chan and Pure Land were all enclosed.
On March15th and 22nd, the first lecture entitled “The Transformation of Chinese Ch’an Buddhism” was given by Venerable Chang Xing (常惺法師), Director of the Dharma Drum Mountain San Francisco Bay Area Center. The lecture drew high popularity with nearly 400 online attendees from local towns: L.A., Seattle, Toronto, New York, other regions of the US, and even as far as from Taiwan.
On March 15th, Venerable Chang Xing started the lectures by explaining the intent to the sessions; the recent outbreak of COVID-19 makes many people anxious and worried, people wish to have a peace of mind and be free from troubles. Indeed, given the external rapid changes, people may pay more attention to the question of how one could maintain one’s peaceful mind. Learned from Chinese Buddhism teachings, Ch’an practice and Buddha- names recitation are two profound methods, among others, to settle one’s mind. In this series, feasible integration of these two methods and its practices for attaining a peaceful mind were the major concerns discussed.
Inherited from India as early Chan Buddhism, Chan practices had gone through stages of being absorbed into Chinese culture, further assimilation with one another finally transformation into Chinese Chan Buddhism. As Master Sheng Yen once pointed out, the Pure Ch’an Era can be featured as a stage that attained the true essence of dharma teaching; for it didn’t discard the meaning of sutras yet being flexible and embracing of its vivid interpretation. That’s why late Master Sheng Yen concluded that Chan practices are meant to cultivate the mind, whereas also manifest the essence of Dharma teachings.
In addition, in its form of recitation, the method of The Six Recollections -Recollection of the Buddha, Dharma, Sanga, the precepts, almsgiving, and heaven with its prospective joys are also useful approaches for calming the mind. Thus, both Chan practices from Chinese Buddhism as well as the practices of Buddha-name recitation from Pure Land School are the significant approaches that are beneficial to calming our minds
Venerable Chang Xing will share more of DDM's teaching of the two approaches in the following programs from the evolutionary perspective of Chinese Chan Buddhism.