 | |
List Price: $16.95 | | Publisher: Wisdom Publications
Salesrank: 68883
|
| Our Price: $10.14 |
| Used Price: $10.48 |
|
| Media: Paperback |
|
Editorial Review:
This landmark presentation at last makes heard the centuries of the voices of Zen’s women. Through exploring the teachings and history of Zen’s female ancestors, from the time of the Buddha to ancient and modern female masters in China, Korea, and Japan, Grace Schireson offers us a view of a more balanced Dharma practice, one that is especially applicable to our complex lives, embedded as they are in webs of family relations and responsibilities, and the challenges of love and work.
Zen Women: Beyond Tea Ladies, Iron Maidens, and Macho Masters Reviews:
A Great Gift and a Must Read! 
2009-12-07 - The gift of this book is to us, the readers. Grace Schireson has devoted herself to Women's Zen practice. ( Read 'women' as anyone disenfranchised.) These stories, many haven't been told before, give us a flavor of what it has been like to be a woman finding her way in a male dominated practice. They are grouped into chapters by focussing on founders, convents, sexuality, work, dharma heirs, family. This way we get to see our own lives in the lives of the historical women. Their stories are still alive for us. We can let the energy from the past guide in our lives now whether we are lay practitioners, nuns, priests, from other traditions, whoever we are we have lessons to learn from these women who came before us.
Grace Schireson helps us learn in her fun, factual, forward, fascinating style. Yes, a Great Gift to give to us and a Must Read for women and men who want to continue a path of empowerment
Thought Provoking
2009-11-24 - Grace Schireson's Zen Women: Beyond Tea Ladies, Iron Maidens and Macho Masters is a must read. It is a thought provoking, honest reflection and engagement with Zen history. Without being heavy handed or dismissal of the tradition, she re-envisions a honest critique of the prevailing assumptions about Zen. These assumptions revolve largely around the male monastic interpretation of Zen that have excluded the reality of the experience of women in Zen practice. By re-thinking the role of women in Zen, Schierson allows for a more inclusive, original, and creative approach to Zen. I highly recommend her work. She shares many wonderful stories about the women that made great sacrifices to practice Zen. It will be an empowering read for women and men, and those of us that may have intuitively felt something was missing from Zen, and knew there was more to this wonderful practice.
Long overdue, but well worth the wait
2009-11-15 - From the first bhikkhunis to Bodhidharma's woman disciple, this book takes another look at Zen's rich history, making a strong argument for the inclusiveness of Zen practice, as opposed to the (often) exclusiveness of its institutions. Also interrogates the notion of a typically theatrical machismo as the only true expression of Zen practice.
Having said that, the author has no axe to grind, preferring to invite these women to the table of Zen's official history and, whenever possible, let them speak for themselves, rather than simply lament (and lay blame for) their often historical exclusion.
Excellent, incredibly important book.
