Kyōzan Jōshū Sasaki, Rōshi
Kyōzan Jōshū Sasaki, Rōshi (1907-2014) was an eighth generation lineal descendant of the great Tokugawa-period systemizer of Rinzai Zen Buddhism, Hakuin Ekaku (1686-1769). Entering the Zuiryō-ji monastery in Hokkaido in 1921 at fourteen, Sasaki became the disciple first of the fierce Banryū Zenso (Matsubara; 1848-1935) and later the powerful Jōten Sōkō (Miura; 1871-1958), from whom he received dharma transmission (inka) in 1947. After years of training and teaching at the Zuigan-ji monastery in Matsushima and at Shōjū-an in a remote area of the Japanese Alps, he was asked by Daikō (Furukawa; 1872-1968), the abbot of the head temple of Myōshinji, to introduce his unique teaching of Tathāgatha Zen to America in 1962. Teaching tirelessly for fifty-two years, until his death in 2014, he established Zen Centers in Los Angeles and Mt. Baldy, California, in Jemez Springs, New Mexico, and throughout North America, Puerto Rico and Europe.
-from the back cover of About Tathāgatha Zen, by Jōshū Sasaki, ©2014
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About Tathāgatha Zen
This book is Jōshū Sasaki's first published writing, which he asked to be transmitted as part of his legacy to his students. It was published by Rinzai-ji Press on the eve of the fifty-second anniversary of his coming to America.