Since the Buddha’s time, certain practitioners have chosen to leave the household life to dedicate themselves completely to formal Buddhist training. Undergoing a ceremony of ordination in which they took monastic vows, these monks and nuns lived the remainder of their lives within a Sangha – community – of other ordained people. In modern Western Zen, you will find a thoroughly confusing situation where ordained people who live fully monastic lives are rare, most ordained people are called “priests” and live householder lives, and practitioners who are not ordained often teach the Dharma and lead lay Sanghas (functions historically reserved for ordained people). What is the use – if any – of continuing with a tradition of “ordination?” I discuss the value of monks, priests, and lay practitioners in the context of Zen as it is currently manifesting in the United States.
Quicklinks to Article Content:
The Value of Monastics
The Value of Clergy
The Value of Lay Practitioners
Supporting All Three Practice Paths in the Greater Sangha
I believe it is essential for the legitimacy and survival of Zen that we preserve, honor, and support the monastic path, whether that path is walked for a period of critical formation or – much more rarely in modern Zen – for a lifetime. I also believe that the evolution of largely lay practice centers in the West has necessitated the growth of a clergy role in Zen, and that the need for such clergy has decoupled the tradition of monastic training from ordination and the transmission of the lineage traditions. Many Sanghas are now thriving while being served by clergy who have not spent a significant amount of time in monastic training, but who have many years – if not decades – of other kinds of Zen training, experience, and service. In addition, an increasing number of talented lay teachers are contributing to the Zen tradition in the West, sometimes functioning more or less as clergy but without having received any formal “ordination.”
I confess to being someone who is attracted to strong, austere traditions with clarity around different paths, stages, and roles. After 30 years of practicing Zen in the United States, however, I am becoming more and more comfortable with (I hesitate to say resigned to) the rather complex, ambiguous, and organic way the traditions of ordination, monastic practice, clergy roles, and Dharma teaching have evolved here.
Sometimes I’m afraid we’re too ready to adapt a 2,500-year-old tradition to suit our own desires and unwillingness to make sacrifices, but I think Zen is enlivened and enriched by the contributions of monastics, ordained clergy, and lay practitioners. I hope that those of us who treasure the Chan and Zen tradition will come to acknowledge those contributions while also clarifying these three paths somewhat. Without getting proscriptive or expecting conformity, perhaps we can help Zen practitioners understand the important differences between these paths, which have – not surprisingly, given the prevalence of Christianity in the West – ended up resembling paths in the Christian tradition more than anything historically Buddhist.
As I now discuss the value of each of the three paths in Western Zen, one at a time, I will talk about each one as if it is the most vital path. That is: Vital for the practitioner’s spiritual fulfillment and liberation, and vital for the strength, vitality, and longevity of the Sangha. I won’t worry about comparing or contrasting except where it is directly relevant. I won’t refrain from praising a path out of concern that it will make you feel bad because it’s not the path you walk. Which path someone chooses is a deeply personal matter, and in my experience it’s more like a path chooses you. Your ideas about good and bad, better or worse, should you or shouldn’t you, don’t really enter into it. You just feel compelled, or your life takes shape around you. The important thing is not which path you walk, but whether you walk your own path wholeheartedly. Obviously, if all three paths are vital, our Zen tradition will benefit from having people on all three of them.
The Value of Monastics
When I use the term “monastic,” I am referring to someone living a renunciate lifestyle, whether male or female. This gets around having to use the term “monk” and assume you’ll know it includes women, or having to keep saying “and nun” even though that term is strongly associated with celibacy and may or may not apply.
What is a “renunciate lifestyle?” The Buddha’s monastic disciples were (and still are) said to have “left home.” By contrast, Buddha’s lay disciples were called “householders.” This wording points to the essence of the difference between monastics and the rest of us. Of course, you may or may not own a house, or you may live in an apartment. What’s of importance is not the nature of your domicile, but your maintenance of a place in society – a place which requires a home of some kind, if you are not going to end up living in danger and squalor on the streets. Some of us maintain an extensive “space in society,” including a spacious home, a car, extended family, relationships with friends, roles in the community, hobbies, leisure activities, creative expression, and of course the livelihood necessary to support all of this. Others of us live more simply, of course, so most people end up somewhere on a spectrum between all-encompassing engagement with the world and the maximized simplicity of monastic life.
Still, there is deep significance to the choice to leave home to absorb yourself completely – body and mind – in Dharma practice. Buddhist monastics don’t do this because there is something inherently wrong with worldly life, but simply because such a life requires a huge amount of your time, attention, and energy. When I decided to be ordained as a monastic, it was because I didn’t want to have to do anything else. Renunciates surrender the comforts, pleasures, and responsibilities of ordinary life to live in a way the prioritizes silence, stillness, and formal Dharma practice. In some Buddhist lineages, monastic life is defined by an extensive set of vows which forbid practitioners to handle money and own more than the basic requisites for existence, making them entirely dependent on donations from the faithful for survival. In Chan and Zen, monastic life came to be defined by residence in a monastery, including a communal schedule and rules governing almost all aspects of life, including eating, bathing, clothing, and speaking.
Almost everything in a monastic’s life is explicitly oriented toward awakening to and according with Reality. While the renunciate life is austere, it also has immense rewards. Without external responsibilities and distractions, a monastic can allow their perceptions of self and the world to be deconstructed by Dharma practice. Surrounded by teachers, fellow practitioners, and the supportive forms of training, they can explore internal landscapes that may at times be daunting or disorienting. When they chafe at the limitations of renunciate and communal life – which is inevitable – they are brought face to face with their doubts and aspirations. Once a monastic has broken through and awakened to their true nature, the renunciate life shows itself to be a perfect embodiment of the precious and luminous nature of Reality, lacking for nothing.
Within the context of the larger Sangha – acknowledged from the beginning of Buddhism to be composed of both renunciates and householders – monastics play an essential role, even if they continue to live an extremely simple life and don’t take on clergy roles. Monastics often maintain places of deep practice where those of us with full worldly lives can go to immerse ourselves in meditation, stillness, and profound Dharma. They remind us that all the conditional things on which we rely for happiness are impermanent, and that spiritual fulfillment and peace is found within. Monastics also challenge us, because the extremity of their choice to live a renunciate life suggest that awakening is nothing less than a matter of life and death.
Traditionally, “ordination” in Buddhism has been a ceremony marking the beginning of someone’s life as a renunciate monastic. It is not a recognition of clergy skills, insight, or ability to teach the Dharma. The purpose of ordination has been to lend formality and community support to a monastic’s intentions, and to publicly identify them to the householder members of the Sangha as being in need of material support. Later in their training, a monastic might be empowered to teach, but this is not the purpose of their ordination. We don’t ordain monastics to produce Dharma teachers and clergy, we ordain them because we want to honor their desire to commit everything they have to the process of awakening. The purpose is awakening itself.
However, over the millennia, ordained Buddhist monastics have naturally ended up at the center of temples and monasteries, often transitioning to more of a clergy function after a period of inwardly focused monastic training. Today, in both the West and in the countries where Buddhism originated, people who live a fully renunciate lifestyle for more than a few years are very rare. However, even a few years spent in monastic practice can be transformative, and the places where you can go to experience monastic practice preserve this vital tradition.
The Value of Clergy
Inevitably, Buddhists throughout history have built temples and monasteries and – more recently – Zen centers, or places for lay people to practice and create community. Once you have a physical place or a stable community, the need arises for people to care for the Sangha. Inevitably, a Sangha (Buddhist community) will be maintained by many people, not just someone designated formally as “clergy.” Currently, in my relatively small Sangha of 115 people, we have over a hundred volunteer roles! In addition, modern Zen centers – most of which are composed of over 90% lay practitioners – are tending more and more toward shared leadership. Senior members of the Sangha are not just involved in financial and legal decisions as part of a board of directors but also help teach and make decisions about things like programming and liturgy. Not only is a single (usually male) abbot calling all the shots an outdated mode of operation, Zen centers quickly get too big and complex for one person to manage by themselves.
Still, I think most Zen practitioners will agree that if our Sanghas are run entirely by committee, something essential about our Zen practice will be lost. Zen is a lineage tradition, in which the fundamental matter of awakening is confirmed between teacher and student. A student of Zen who desires to help share and transmit the tradition not only needs to familiarize themselves with its inherited richness – including texts, teachings, zazen, ceremonies, retreat practice, history, and customs – they need to demonstrate to their teacher that they have awakened to their true nature, at least to an extent sufficient for them to appreciate the vast amount they do not yet understand.
Once a teacher transmits the Dharma to their student, the student assumes the responsibility for helping others awaken. In Zen, assisting others in awakening is a personal and intuitive process. All possible tools are employed, not just explicit Dharma teachings or private formal interactions between teacher and student (called sanzen or dokusan). For example, a teacher may have a sense that practitioners in the Sangha would benefit from adjusting a retreat schedule to be more challenging (or less challenging), or from studying a particular text. The teacher might assign someone to a practice role that will bring them up against a personal koan, or encourage the community to relax in celebration. Ideally, a teacher will not try to control or interfere with everything, thereby discouraging other Sangha members from taking ownership, but also will have the creative freedom to adjust Sangha practice – both mundane and formal aspects – at a moment’s notice, to keep things fresh and responsive to the needs of students.
Someone trained in the tradition and responsible for guiding practice is, in essence, a clergy person. The history of religion, of course, is rife with examples of where people ordained as clergy abused their position, and some respected religious traditions, such as the Quakers, have found ways to do without them. However, for a community to function without at least one clergy person requires much more involvement, time, and energy from community members. Most lay Zen practitioners are happy to help out and volunteer, but they are too busy with their own lives to take on the kind of responsibility for the overall well-being of the Sangha that a designated clergy person offers.
Some Zen practitioners end up feeling called to serve as clergy and receive ordination as priests as they embark on the necessary training to do this. Generally speaking, this ordination is indistinguishable from monastic ordination, or Shukke Tokudo – literally, “leaving home to accomplish the way” – even when the trainee is not leaving home or committing to an extended period of renunciate practice. I think this is very unfortunate, as it undermines the significance of someone making the choice to leave everything behind to devote body and mind to full-time monastic practice. However, some kind of ordination is obviously appropriate for someone who wants to train to serve the Sangha as a clergy person. If one of my students ever wants to walk this path, I plan to adapt the Shukke Tokudo ceremony and conduct a “priest ordination.” Our Chan and Zen lineage traditions do not include such an ordination, but to create one seems preferable to using a monastic ordination ceremony when it doesn’t apply.
What does someone do once they have set out on the path of clergy training? In some lineages trainees spend a prolonged period in monastic training, in others just a few months’ worth of it, in still others they are expected, instead (or in addition), to do a lot of sesshin. Sesshin is a 5-7 day silent residential meditation retreat (see Episode 21 – Sesshin: 24-7 Silent Meditation Retreats for more), and by the end of their training – depending on the lineage – priests are expected to do between 75 and 300 days of sesshin.
In addition, Zen priests are expected to become intimately familiar with their lineage tradition. The training differs by lineage, temple, and teacher, but the Soto Zen Buddhist Association’s standards for participating in its “Dharma Heritage” ceremony (essentially acknowledging someone as an independent teacher) include at least five years of training under the guidance of a mentoring teacher, at least five years in residential Zen practice or living a temple-centered life, experience with all the traditional practice and service roles in the Sangha, familiarity with core Buddhist and Zen texts and teachings, and an ability to give instruction in zazen and lead ceremonies. Before certifying their student can teach independently, a mentoring teacher will also – in theory – observe that the student has cultivated deep self-awareness and stability, and conducts themselves ethically and appropriately.
There is no way to estimate the value of Zen practitioners who love the tradition so much, and love the Sangha so much, that they rearrange their lives to serve as priests. Such people are not only dedicated to their own awakening, but also to cultivating and sustaining the three treasures of Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. So many of us owe our lives to Dharma practice. We can’t imagine having lived out our lives in the constricted and isolated state we were in before we encountered Buddhism. We want this precious manifestation to thrive for our own sake and cherish the opportunity to make it available to all those who seek it. Our devotion and dedication deepen every time we see someone’s eyes brighten with realization, every time we see someone tear up when moved by the ancestor’s words or by our rich religious tradition, every time we watch someone shed another unnecessary mental burden and approach their true nature.
As is the case in many religious traditions, there is significantly more need for Zen clergy than there are people available to serve. While the large, established Zen centers in the United States – let’s say, those over 25 years old, with more than 200 members – tend to accumulate and retain priests (and lay people) qualified to teach Zen independently, leading to rich and varied offerings, most Zen centers are still led by their founding teacher. The chances of the founding teacher ordaining, training, and transmitting a student who is able and willing to take over care of their Sangha – and that the Sangha will want that person as a priest – is very slim. Most Sanghas pay little or nothing to their priest, requiring the clergy person to have an outside source of income. This usually means the priest has many other commitments besides to the Sangha, or has to be retired. Often, the obvious successor to a founding teacher is not much younger than the founding teacher is, meaning the care of the Sangha will be in question again relatively soon.
If you are determined to serve the three treasures of Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha and make practice available to transform people’s lives, you might not need to renounce your worldly life and become a monastic, but a similar kind of surrender and sacrifice is required. Zen is just getting established in the West, and becoming a Zen priest is almost never attached to a living wage or a guarantee of long-term job security or retirement benefits. Almost all Sanghas are in the fledgling stage – growing, but also fragile. Entire cities, states, and countries are currently devoid of Zen centers, waiting for brave, entrepreneurial souls to bring them the Dharma. People are hungry for it, logging on to online offerings despite awkward differences in time zones.
Taking care of a Sangha is like gardening. As a clergy person, you can’t really take responsibility for a thriving community. Every Sangha member contributes to the situation, and people are only showing up for a tradition that has been handed down through the millennia. Through your training, you have learned how to create the right conditions for Sangha connections to grow and for people to deepen their relationship to the Dharma – the rest is out of your hands! However – to mix metaphors, sorry – an inspired clergy person can serve as a catalyst, motivating others with their deep faith, encouraging others with their vision, and embracing others with their compassion. They also show up all the time to open the door – perhaps the most important thing!
The Value of Lay Practitioners
There have always been serious lay practitioners of Buddhism. Lay practitioners are, generally, householders – in the sense I discussed earlier, of maintaining an active place in society. They are also “lay” in the sense that they are not “professional” or professed – they aren’t ordained and haven’t taken special vows with respect to monastic or priest training. As much as they love the Dharma, as seriously as they practice, their main focus remains their families, careers, and roles in society that are not explicitly about Buddhism.
It might be tempting to think of lay practitioners as “everyone else” in the Sangha – those that can’t be monastics or priests, or those that don’t want to take those paths. We might think of lay practitioners as those who are served by monastics and priests, or as those who have to compromise their dedication to the Dharma because of their other responsibilities.
However, this is not how Zen – or Mahayana Buddhism – considers lay practitioners. In fact, those who seek to practice and manifest the truth in the midst of their lives, just as they are, are the model for everyone, ordained or not. Without any special designation, without seeking the privilege of setting aside all practical considerations in order to devote themselves to formal practice, lay practitioners aim to surrender to radical nonduality.
How can the Dharma be dependent on special conditions? How can Reality-with-a-Capital-R be limited to the silence of retreat, the simplicity of a renunciate life, or the comfort of explicit vows celebrated by the Sangha? It is people who awaken as parents, caretakers, laborers, coworkers, concerned citizens, hospice companions, and friendly bus drivers who prove the efficacy of the Zen/Buddhist path. It is people who face the trials and tribulations of illness, loss, grief, and injustice, and yet find strength and peace, who inspire others to practice. Taking the quiet and humble roles within Sangha of bookkeeper, board member, or caretaker of altars, lay practitioners manifest the purest of bodhisattva aspirations.
Domyo and senior lay practitioners at Bright Way Zen
When a lay person has practiced a long time, the Dharma seeps into them. They become completely who they are, dropping pretensions and worries, comparisons and ideals. Bodhisattvas are enlightening beings who take innumerable forms and serve in innumerable ways, and it’s impossible to say when and where their service to sentient beings will be of great benefit. Within the context of Sangha, a monastic or priest may be given special roles or treatment. However, when that monastic or priest is undergoing surgery, an especially kind and attentive nurse may be more important than Shakyamuni Buddha. A Sangha depends on the community that surrounds it, meaning it is served by bodhisattvas who keep the lights on, the roads passable, and democratic institutions healthy.
Sometimes a lay practitioner is given Dharma transmission or some other kind of empowerment to teach or serve some clergy functions. This is a source of profound encouragement for all lay people, proving that they, too, can awaken and accord with Reality, without changing who they are. Perhaps even more inspiring are the lay practitioners who continue their practice year after year, decade after decade, showing up to participate in Sangha despite not having any special titles or designations, just because practice is part of who they are.
Supporting All Three Practice Paths in the Greater Sangha
As human beings, we are inclined toward comparison – to others, or to ideals. It’s doubtful whether this is ever helpful, but it certainly isn’t when it comes to the three paths of practice in Zen – monastic, priest, or lay. Your path may be perfectly clear to you – in which case, count yourself lucky! Many – if not most – of us have to go through a period of discernment when it comes to which path we should take, or at least we need to make peace with the path we find ourselves on.
It can be very difficult in a tradition like Buddhism, with 2,500 years of emphasis on monastic practice, to conclude we’re meant to walk the lay path without also concluding our practice is at least a little bit inferior. It’s also easy, if we find ourselves training or serving as clergy but have not done monastic practice, to be somewhat defensive about that fact. And a longing for ordination – what might appear to be a special confirmation of your inherent spiritual worthiness – is not unusual.
I hope that we can all take a larger perspective, recognizing that all three paths are integral to the long-term vitality of the Zen tradition. This means celebrating and supporting those who choose the renunciate path, supporting them financially, and also supporting the monasteries and institutions that provide us all with opportunity for monastic training, whether for a week or a lifetime. This means recognizing the value of Zen clergy, encouraging people to serve in this way, building up financial support for priests, and paying attention to the needs for clergy in founder-led Sanghas and in areas with no Sanghas at all. And this means centering the value of lay practice in our teachings, encouraging people to awaken in their lives just as they are.
