90 Zendo

I arrived at the temple for Sunday morning zazen and service at 8:30, a full twenty-five minutes early, that first week after our class had concluded. There were three or four persons already present. The master had told us evening students simply to tell the person who greeted us at the temple, if we came, that we had taken the class and needed to be shown only how to enter and to exit the zendo.

"Good morning."

"Hi."

I was greeted by Mark, a man in his early thirties, who showed me how to carry my hands in shashu as I walked within the temple. He demonstrated how to bow from the waist, hands still in shashu, as I crossed in front of the main altar, how to step with my left foot first into the zendo and then, palms together in gassho, how to bow from the waist again.

"No!" he whispered.

I stopped.

He told me not to pass in front of the central altar in the zendo but rather to walk clockwise around it until I found any vacant mat and cushion I liked except for the two mats and cushions to be occupied by the doshi, the master, and the doan, the person who would keep time for zazen, ring the bells, and lead the chants. Then I watched as Mark and others arranged items on the two altars in the buddha hall and laid out mats and cushions for the service and talk to be held after an hour of sitting meditation in the zendo.

A dozen people arrived.

"Hi."

"Good morning."

"Hello."

We greeted each other by putting our palms together and bowing. Then we stood near the door or sat on the dilapidated couch pushed up against the west wall and waited. I sat at one end. Just to my left on the window sill were eight or ten faded old toys, each small enough to enclose in my hand, a sad collection. I knew instantly that toddlers and young children were infrequent visitors. There was not much talking. There was not even much looking at one another, for that matter, an etiquette I later learned was part of the practice.

"Eye contact creates needless expectation," the master explained.

Hmm.

At 8:55 a woman removed a wooden mallet from a noose made of rope hanging from a thick wooden block called a han which also hung from ropes tied to two balusters of the stairwell six feet up. With the mallet three times in succession, pausing one beat after each strike, she struck the han hard and then struck it again a dozen or so more times in progressively rapid succession, a hammering called the rolldown, and then after a final pause of one beat she struck the han with one hard concluding strike. This was the signal for us to file slowly one at a time into the zendo. There, to the left of the statue of a sitting buddha on the altar, a yellow zinnia bent slightly forward from a small blue vase. To the right a single white candle burned in a brass candlestick. In a small brass pot between flower and candle a slender green stick of incense planted in sand released its thin curl of gray smoke.

We sat.

At 9:00 the doan struck the inkin three times to begin zazen.

A few seconds later the master entered.

We sat.

We breathed.

At 9:25 the doan struck the inkin twice to signal kinhin, Zen walking meditation, and for ten minutes in single file clockwise twice around the altar we took baby steps as the master had instructed. Kinhin always reminded me of the 1960 lithograph "Ascending and Descending" by M.C. Escher, a laminated poster of which my wife had tacked to the wall at the top of our stairs at home.

At 9:35 the doan struck the inkin to signal the end of kinhin.

We sat.

We breathed.

At 9:55 in the buddha hall the shoten struck the big bell on the wall to announce the service and in the zendo the doan struck the inkin in response to signal the end of zazen. When the master exited the zendo, the doan struck the inkin one last time and, counterclockwise so as not to pass in front of the altar, in single file we all exited the zendo and took positions again with appropriate bows at the mats and cushions that had been carefully laid out in a rectangle on the floor. To each side of the brass buddha sitting at the center of the mantel of the main altar were a bouquet of flowers and a burning candle. In a small brass pot of sand below the buddha there burned two thin green sticks of incense. In a black ceramic pot a charcoal briquette smoked and smouldered. When everyone had found a place and stood quiet and still, the shoten—the temple attendant responsible for preparing and lighting the altars, for arranging the mats and cushions before the service, and for announcing the service—struck the big bell secured to the wall in a rolldown identical to the rolldown earlier on the wooden han. Assisted by the jisha, attendant to the doshi, the master offered both stick and powdered incense at the altar to the accompaniment of bells and bows. To a third rolldown, this time by the doan on the inkin, we turned in the direction of the altar, and to rings of the inkin we all performed three full prostrations, hands in gassho, bowing first from the waist, next kneeling, then bending all the way down, and finally pressing our foreheads to the floor. To more bells and more incense we sat. Tucked under the front of each mat was a small, thin, glossy white book of sutras, chants, and teachings bound by a black plastic spiral. The doan announced the page of the chant for the day and sang its title—"Heart of Great Perfect Wisdom Sutra"—and when she struck with a wooden baton a big brass bowl on a pillow beside her together we all recited in an odd monotone without pause or inflection the designated chant.