The Truth about Zazen

Zen is the Japanese word for Ch’ana that is Chinese for Dhyana.The

US Government states: This state is penultimate to Samadhi or “absorption.”

In dhyana, Atma (soul) alone shines and hence the person is in a state of total awareness. In focused thought, there is no awareness, let alone the total awareness experienced in dhyana and samadhi states.

Now, Japanese Zen simply creates a High Ceremony out of Dhyana that has become the performance art we call Zazen.Clearly, the Chinese Zen masters of old where against any sort of Ritualized Ceremonial “sitting” but they never spoke against Dhyana.  

So, we get a big hint that Dhyana is not only relegated to “sitting”, for if that was the case then anytime anyone sat they be in Samadhi.So what we can ascertain is that Dhyana is not of any posture, of a ceremony or rite, but of the ‘awareness of the Soul Light or Buddic Light that some schools of Zen talk about. This awareness clearly then is not dependent on anything, and thus Dhyana and Samadhi are not dependent on anything either.