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William M Bodiford: Remembering Dōgen: Eiheiji and Dogen Hagiography This is an excellent essay on the history of Eiheiji and its centuries-long fight to become the head temple of the Sōtō Sect and memorialize its founder, Dogen. A fascinating history. from The Journal of Japanese Studies 32.1 (2006) pp1-21
Nishiari Bokusan: All This is Genjo Koan Nishiari Bokusan is the late head of the Soto school. In 2912, Bokusan looked at the fundamental teaching of Dogen, the Genjo Koan. He explains the meaning of this most important fascicle of the Shobogenzo.
André van der Braak: Dōgen on Fullness – Zazen as Ritual Embodiment of Buddhahood Braak discusses Dogen's approach to what Canadian philosopher Charles Taylor calls "fullness" (the goal of spiritual practice), an approach "conceived as the ritual embodiment of buddhahood, expressed through the meditation practice of zazen."
Johannes Cairns: Tracing The Rhetoric Of Contemporary Zen: Dogen Sangha And The Modernization Of Japanese Zen Buddhism In The Light Of A Rhetorical Analysis Of A Weblog This is a BA thesis by Cairns focussing on a rhetorical analysis, via a weblog, of the Dogen Sangha, an international Zen group founded by Gudo Nishijima.
Brett Davis: The Philosophy of Zen Master Dōgen: Egoless Perspectivism Davis explicates Dogen's Genjokoan. from The Oxford Handbook of World Philosophy
Bernard Faure: The Daruma-shū, Dōgen,
and Sōtō Zen Faure examines the influence of the Bodhidharma (Daruma) School on Dogen's teachings and the Shobogenzo. As he says, "The traditional history of...Zen in Japan is not exempt from distortions." Excellent article! from Monumenta Nipponica, Vol. 42, No. 1. (Spring, 1987), pp. 25-55.I suggest you also read Heine's Did Dogen Go to China? for more on Dogen hagiography.
T. Griffith Foulk: History of the Soto Zen School
Steven Heine:
The Dõgen Canon: Dõgen's Pre-Shõbõgenzõ Writings and the Question of Change in His Later Works from The Japanese Journal of Religious Studies, 1997. Heine argues a Three Periods Theory of Dogen's writing suggesting that the main change, which occurred with the opening of Eihei-ji in 1245, was a matter of altering the style of instruction rather than the content or ideology.I suggest you also read Faure's article, The Daruma-shū, Dōgen, and Sōtō Zen, to find more influences on the Dogen hagiography.
Critical Buddhism the Debate Concerning the 75-fascicle and 12-fascicle Shōbōgenzō Texts Heine evaluates the views of Critical Buddhsim on how the two Shobogenzo texts illuminate Dogen's perspectives on original enlightenment thought in terms of his attitude to causality and karmic retribution. from Japanese Journal of Religious Studies 1994 24/1
Koans in the Dōgen Tradition : How and Why Dogen Does what He Does with Koans: Heine analyses how Dogen used koans in his teaching and "that Dogen does not have a single, simple or uniform method of koan interpretation, but he varies rhetorical and narrative strategies to bring out particular ideas concerning specific items of doctrine and ritual." from Philosophy East and West, Vol 54, No. 2, January 2004
Did Dōgen Go to China?: Heine examines the evidence of Dogen's famous trip to China and the meeting with his teacher, Ju-ching. He concludes, Yes, Dogen did go to China but the real story is somewhat different than the hagiography tells. Excellent article from: Japanese Journal of Religious Studies 30/1–2: 27–59 Heine's book on this, Did Dogen Go to China? What He Wrote and When He Wrote It is available from Oxford University Press
A Day in the Life: Two Recent Works on Dōgen's Shōbōgenzō Gyoji [Sustained Practice] Fascicle
Heine reviews 2 books on this, Ishi Shudo's Shobogenzo [Gyoji] ni manabu and Yasuraoka Kosaku's Shobogenzo [Gyoji] jo from Japanese Journal of Religious Studies 35/2: 363-371
Dogen Casts Off "What": An Analysis of Shinjin Datsuraku Heine does a critical analysis of Dogen's 'casting off body and mind (shinjin datsuraku)' questioning, did Dogen's teacher, Ju-ching, really say this or did Dogen mis-hear what his teacher said? from The Journal Of The International Association Of Buddhist Studies Vol 9, 1986 No. 1
Reflections on Translating Dogen: Leighton talks of the joy of discovering (and translating) Dōgen. originally published in Dharma Eye, October 2001
Zazen as an Enactment Ritual: "Buddhist meditation has commonly been considered an instrumental technique aimed at obtaining a heightened mental or spiritual state, or even as a method for inducing some dramatic “enlightenment” experience. " However, Dōgen doesn't see zazen this way. Taigen Dan Leighton explains. originally published in Zen Rituals: Studies of Zen Theory in Practice, edited by Steven Heine and Dale Wright (Oxford University Press, 2006)
Miriam Levering: Dōgen's Raihaitokuzui and Women Teaching in Sung Ch'an Levering explores Dogen's relationship regarding women in the sangha and the role women played in Chinese Chan. from Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies Volume 21 • Number 1 • 1998
David R Loy Language against its own mystifications: Deconstruction in Nagarjuna and Dogen Loy compares these two great thinkers because "Nagarjuna and Dogen ... point to many of the same Buddhist insights because they deconstruct the same type of dualities, most of which may be understood as versions of our commonsense but delusive distinction between substance and attribute, subject and predicate." He then goes on to look at the differences between the two. from Philosophy East and West 1999. Vol. 49, Iss. 3
Douglas K. Mikkelson: Who Is Arguing About the Cat? Moral Action and Englightenment According to Dōgen. A very interesting essay on Dogen's response to Nan-ch'uan cutting the cat, Pai-chang's Fox and the moral consequences of action. Did Nan-ch'uan commit evil by cutting the cat?
Terry C Muck: Zen Master Dōgen Meets a Thirteenth-century Postmodernist A lovely little essay exploring the koan Tokuzan Meets a Rice-Cake Seller. As Muck says, Dogen "offers the seeds of fruitful ideas for a way forward: beyond rationalism, without rancor, toward a true ecumenism of the human spirit." Recommended. from Journal of Ecumenical Studies, 1998, Vol. 35, Iss. 1
Yasuaki Nara: The Soto Zen School in Japan Dr Nara looks at some social issues regarding Soto Zen in modern Japan. Specifically, he focusses on the questions of discrimination and funerals within the school.
Gudo Nishijima:
The whole collection of Nishijima's essays can be found here.
Understanding the Shobogenzo: quite a long essay. Includes his explanation of his SOAR structure (subjective, objective, action and real). Also includes his translation of the Genjo Koan essay.
Japanese Buddhism and the Meiji Restoration: includes Nishijima's introduction to Nagarjuna's Mulamadhyamakakarika, which Nishijima claims is "identical to the theories of Dogen".
Three Philosophies and One Reality: essays based on a series of talks given by Nishijima on Dogen.
‘Place’ And ‘Being-Time’: Spatiotemporal Concepts In The Thought Of Nishida Kitarō And Dōgen Kigen "Perhaps the best known among ... spatiotemporal East Asian concepts are the notions of ‘place’ (basho) of Nishida Kitarō (1870–1945) and the ‘being-time’ (uji) of Dōgen Kigen (1200–1253). This article is an effort at a comparative analysis of these notions, focusing especially on Nishida’s philosophy as a synthesis of Western and Asian philosophical discourses." An interesting essay comparing Nishida and Dōgen's approach to a fundamental philosophical/religious problem. from Philosophy East and West - Volume 54, Number 1, January 2004, pp. 29-51
Inside the Concept: Rethinking Dōgen's Language The article places Dōgen's writing technique in the context of the linguistic changes that were taking place both in China and Japan at the time of his writing as well as the general attitude of Chan/Zen thinkers toward language, arguing that the Chan/Zen critique was not pointed to language as such, but its reified and alienated forms. Dōgen's concept-making could accordingly be seen as an effort to keep language 'alive.' from Asian Philosophy
Vol. 21, No. 2, May 2011
The Existential Moment: Rereading Dogen's Theory of Time Tackling one of Dogen's most philosophical writings, his theory on time, Uji, Raud reinterprets Dogen's Uji "with stress on the momentary rather than the durational" aspects of Dogen time. from Philosophy East and West Vol. 62 No. 2, April 2012.
Kevin Schilbrack: Metaphysics in Dogen "The first section of this essay introduces a definition of metaphysics that, although drawn from the Western philosophical tradition, is, I hope, generic enough to be useful for the study of philosophy outside the West, and then argues for the legitimacy of metaphysics as an interpretative tool for the understanding of Zen Buddhist thought. The second section spells out what I take to be the basic features of Dogen's metaphysics, and the third deals with a rival non-metaphysical interpretation of Dogen's philosophy. from: Philosophy East and West, Vol. 50, No. 1 (January 2000)
Richard Stodart: Painting/A Cake That Satisfies Hunger Artist Richard Stodart takes on Dogen's essay, Bussho (Buddha Nature, and explores "nonthinking in the painting experience". As Hee-Jin Kim comments in this essay: "A picture is not a representation of reality in the philosophical sense".
Otani Tetsuo: To Transmit Dogen Zenji's Dharma Tetsuo looks at the importance of transmission to Dogen, its history in the Soto sect and the significance of dharma transmission today in Soto Japan.
Dale S Wright: Doctrine and the Concept of Truth in Dōgen's Shōbōgenzō Wright looks at what Dōgen saw as the "truth" in practice and belief. "The aim of
this study of the Shōbōgenzō will be to clarify its implicit concept of
truth, and to show how such clarification can shed light on the
meaning of the text as a whole." This is an excellent essay and well worth reading for a better understanding of Dōgen's Shōbōgenzō.
Jimmy Yu: Contextualizing the Deconstruction and Reconstruction of
Chan/Zen Narratives: Steven Heine’s Academic
Contributions to the Field Yu discusses four monographs by Steven Heine: Shifting Shape, Shaping Text: Philosophy And
Folklore In The Fox Koan;
Opening A Mountain: Koans Of The Zen Masters'
Did Dogen Go To China? What He Wrote And
When He Wrote It;
Zen Skin, Zen Marrow: Will The Real Zen
Buddhism Please Stand Up? An excellent introduction to Steven Heine's work with a comprehensive bibliography.
Source: Religious Studies Review • VOLUME 37 • NUMBER 3 • SEPTEMBER 2011 Note: a number of Heine's works are available on this page under 'Heine'.
