In Our Time - Zen (4/12/14)

[Serial_Apologist]

Anyone taking the trouble to have listened to this morning's Braggfest (repeated shortened at 9.30 tonight) will have come to the famous conclusion that "Those who speak do not know; those who know do not speak" - a famous saying from ancient Chinese Taoism, Zen Buddhism's closest spiritual antecedent according to Alan Watts - neither of whom were given mention in a programme that seemed to go out of its way to dismembering all associations with 1960s alternative culture bar one brief mention at the end, and dissociating Zen's protagonists in the 1950s/60s in the West as hoodwinked misrepresenters of a tradition characterised by an impenetrable inscrutability accordant, one could not avoid being led to deduce, with the stereotyped "oriental mind".

I've no idea from where the programme devisers found the three protagonists geared up to enlighten a shamefully underbriefed Bragg, but, rather than shed light on any universality to be found in its insights, or their foresighted appositeness in today's world, their "expertise" appeared to consist in presenting the subject like most of the others in the series, which is to say as merely part of some tick box exercise in cultural inclusivity.

In short, another opportunity for our public broadcasting service to make a valuable, even-handed contribution to sorting the rational wheat from today's "multicultural discourse" from the chaff of mystification tragically wasted; but if you don't believe me, here is the link to the programme:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b04sxv29

[Bryn]

Ah koan, you will, you will, you will reach enlightenment.

[Quite agree re. the NAFFness of the programme, by the way.]

[vinteuil]

... I find my own zen in "not-listening-to-Melvyn".

If not 'the answer' - [ there is no answer... ] - it is 'an answer'.

What an odd word 'answer' is.
Repeat the word 'answer' to yourself twenty three times.
Write it down twenty three times. Is that really how you spell it?

Is that an answer, or has it lost all meaning?

answer
answer answer
answer answer answer
answer answer answer answer
answer answer answer answer answer
answer answer answer answer
answer answer answer

answer

Simplify, simplify.

Ignore "Lord" Barg....







.

[vinteuil]

.

After a long and arduous journey, a young man arrived where the teacher of his choice had been made a Peer of the Realm. When the student arrived, the teacher was wittering away about everything and nothing. Greeting his master, the young man received no greeting in return. And to all his questions, there were no replies, but endless wittering. Realizing there was nothing he could do to get the teacher's attention, the student went to another part of the same forest and built himself a house. Years later, when he was sweeping up fallen leaves, he was enlightened. He then dropped everything, ran through the forest to his teacher and said "You are Lord Barg, and I claim my £10. Your witterings were endless and empty, but they led me to the endlessness of sweeping up fallen leaves, and all that that entails. Thank you."

Moral : shallow nothingness can lead to an understanding of deep nothingness

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

no hands clapping eh

[Serial_Apologist]

no hands clapping eh

"Unhand me here" - Macbeth

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

noh hand huh

[ardcarp]

Anyone taking the trouble to have listened to this morning's Braggfest (repeated shortened at 9.30 tonight) will have come to the famous conclusion that "Those who speak do not know; those who know do not speak" - a famous saying from ancient Chinese Taoism, Zen Buddhism's closest spiritual antecedent according to Alan Watts - neither of whom were given mention in a programme that seemed to go out of its way to dismembering all associations with 1960s alternative culture bar one brief mention at the end, and dissociating Zen's protagonists in the 1950s/60s in the West as hoodwinked misrepresenters of a tradition characterised by an impenetrable inscrutability accordant, one could not avoid being led to deduce, with the stereotyped "oriental mind".

I've no idea from where the programme devisers found the three protagonists geared up to enlighten a shamefully underbriefed Bragg, but, rather than shed light on any universality to be found in its insights, or their foresighted appositeness in today's world, their "expertise" appeared to consist in presenting the subject like most of the others in the series, which is to say as merely part of some tick box exercise in cultural inclusivity.

In short, another opportunity for our public broadcasting service to make a valuable, even-handed contribution to sorting the rational wheat from today's "multicultural discourse" from the chaff of mystification tragically wasted; but if you don't believe me, here is the link to the programme:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b04sxv29

I did listen, and wasn't sure whether (a) I was stupid for being bored, or (b) this was a c**p edition of IOT.
Either way, I ended up with no greater knowledge of Zen. Glad to hear an expert's view!