Dogen Studies (Paperback, Enlarged ed.)

The induction of D gen into the modern academic world, or per-haps more accurately, the academic world's first real engagement with D gen came about 1924 when Watsuji Tetsur (1889-1960) published a provocative essay entitled "Shaman D gen." It was this essay that to many of Watsuji's contemporaries seemed to rescue D gen from what they considered to be his entrapment for nearly seven centuries in the sectarian embrace of the S t school. Watsuji insisted that D gen no longer should be thought of as belonging exclusively to the monastic community. Claiming, instead, that D gen "belongs to mankind," Watsuji with this declaration initiated the non-sectarian study of this thirteenth-century figure and in effect commenced what are called D gen Studies [Dagen kenkyii] in modern times. As one way of exploring what it might possibly mean to say that D gen "belongs to mankind," the Kuroda Institute held a conference on D gen at Tassajara Springs, California from October 8 to 10, 1981. The essays of this volume are a part of its result.