Maura "Soshin" O'Halloran,  Pure Heart, Enlightened Mind

A Zen Buddhist Love Story about Death

1. The Story of the Book, Pure Heart, Enlightened Mind

2. Background of Zen Buddhism
        Mahayana Buddhism:
            Two-fold truth of form and emptiness
            Bodhisattvas and Buddhas

3. Zen Buddhism
        Meditation School of "mind-to-mind transmission"
        Two major schools in Japan: Rinzai - koan practice; Soto - shikan taza - "sitting-only" founded by Zen Master Dogen
        Maura's master's school: Combination of the two

4. Two kinds of love: a) Human love, b) Awakened love - compassion - without attachment
5. Two kinds of death: a) Physical death, b) Spiritual death, the "Great Death"
6. Religion of "Gods and Buddhas" - Zen Master "Go" or Go Roshi

7. Turning points:
        A. Maura awakening to the reality of life in a Zen monastery
        B. Initial breakthrough with the practice of the koan Mu. -
            "Suddenly I understood why we must take care of things just because they exist."
        C. Climactic confrontation with self over the prospect of having to marry the old monk Tetsugen.
        D. Encounter with lay woman
        E. Death and Eulogy

8. Ten Oxherding Pictures
9. Sekida, Zen Training: Pure Experience and nen-theory
        Nen: thought-instant
        First thought-instant, second thought-instant, third thought-instant (ex.: "hurt"; "I'm hurt"; "I'm aware I'm hurt")
        Pure first-nen or thought-instant is samadhi; absolute samadhi is to be unconditionally present in the oneness of first-nen
        Pure first-nen is immediate experience; it is a kind of pure experience.