A common interpretation of the Zen master Dōgen (1200–1253) is that he advocated a minimalist form of Buddhism centered exclusively on shikantaza, or “just sitting.” This reading often relies on a famous passage in the Bendōwa that appears to dismiss traditional Buddhist rituals. However, contemporary scholarship—especially the work of T. Griffith Foulk, Carl Bielefeldt, and William Bodiford—has challenged this anti-ritual interpretation. When Dōgen’s broader corpus is considered, especially the Eihei Shingi and Tenzo Kyōkun, it becomes clear that Dōgen did not merely tolerate ritual as a secondary feature of monastic life. He positively taught ritual, prescribed it in detail, and treated it as an essential component of Buddhist training. Rather than functioning as optional devotional exercises, chanting, bowing, offerings, liturgy, communal etiquette, and monastic forms constitute embodied expressions of what Dōgen understood as the unity of practice and realization (shushō ittō). Properly understood, zazen and ritual are not competing approaches but inseparable dimensions of a single Buddhist path.

The “Just Sitting” Directives

The primary evidence for the minimalist interpretation is found in Dōgen’s early writings, most notably the Bendōwa (1231). In this text, Dōgen writes: “You need not burn incense, make prostrations, recite the Buddha’s name, practice repentance, or read sutras. Just wholeheartedly sit, and thus drop off body and mind” (Dōgen, 2010, p. 11). Similarly, in the meditation manual Fukanzazengi (1227), he emphasizes the self-sufficiency of zazen: “The zazen I speak of is not learning meditation. It is simply the dharma gate of joyful ease, the practice-realization of complete enlightenment” (Dōgen, 2002, p. 30). Read in isolation, such passages can appear to reject ritual and devotional forms in favor of seated meditation alone. Yet that conclusion becomes difficult to maintain when these statements are read alongside Dōgen’s later monastic regulations and ritual instructions.

Ritual as Essential Practice in the Eihei Shingi

Dōgen’s own institutional activity as the founder of Eihei-ji contradicts any literal anti-ritual reading of the Bendōwa passage. In the Eihei Shingi, his comprehensive monastic code, Dōgen gives detailed instructions governing ceremonies, offerings, prostrations, chanting, monastic etiquette, and communal observances. As T. Griffith Foulk (2004) observes, “The specific rituals that seem to be disavowed in the Bendōwa passage are all prescribed for Zen monks, often in great detail, in Dōgen’s other writings. In Kuyo shobutsu, Dōgen recommends the practice of offering incense and making worshipful prostrations before Buddha images… In Chiji shingi he stipulates that the [monks] should burn incense and make prostrations (shoko raihai) and recite the buddhas’ names” (p. 239). Foulk’s observation demonstrates that the Bendōwa passage cannot reasonably be interpreted as Dōgen’s rejection of ritual. Such an interpretation is contradicted by Dōgen’s own later writings, in which he repeatedly mandates incense offerings, prostrations, chanting, formal ceremonies, and communal liturgy. The apparent contradiction is resolved once the Bendōwa is read as rejecting ritual performed as a substitute for awakening rather than ritual understood as the embodied enactment of awakening. In this light, the ritual world of Eihei-ji was not marginal to Dōgen’s teaching but one of its clearest historical realizations.

Practice Beyond the Cushion: The Tenzo Kyōkun

Dōgen’s view of ritual becomes even clearer in Tenzo Kyōkun (Instructions for the Cook, 1237), where he expands the meaning of practice beyond formal meditation to include every movement of daily life. He writes, “Handle even a single leaf of green in such a way that it manifests the body of the Buddha” (Dōgen, 1996, p. 37). He further warns against dividing activities into “spiritual” and “mundane”: “Do not think that because this is ordinary work it is not the Buddha Dharma. … You should transform the self in the midst of working with the ladle” (Dōgen, 1996, p. 38). These instructions show that for Dōgen, awakened practice is not confined to the meditation hall. Cooking, serving, cleaning, and attending to communal responsibilities are all concrete forms of Buddhist realization. By the same logic, prostration, chanting, and ceremonial observance are not secondary additions to zazen. They are equally modes through which the practitioner enacts the Buddha Way with the body.

Embodied Practice in The Essential Dogen

This embodied understanding of practice is also illuminated in Tanahashi and Levitt’s presentation of Dōgen. They write that bowing is an act through which one expresses respect for the Buddha, the Dharma, the Sangha, and the practice place itself, thereby sanctifying the space of training (Tanahashi & Levitt, 2013, p. 16). They further emphasize that bowing is not merely symbolic but a full expression of practice in bodily form: “To bow all the way to the floor and to bow standing are awesome presence in motion and stillness” (Tanahashi & Levitt, 2013, p. 17). Read in this way, bowing is not separate from zazen but another mode in which Dōgen’s understanding of practice-realization becomes visible. The body in prostration and the body in seated meditation both enact the same awakened discipline, differing in form but not in underlying significance. Tanahashi and Levitt also broaden Dōgen’s understanding of practice beyond the meditation hall, emphasizing that “mindfulness and a respectful heart in each moment are applied equally in meditation and other daily activities including work, interaction with others, and cleansing one’s body” (Tanahashi & Levitt, 2013, p. 19). They explain that this way of living allows practitioners to “clearly see, understand, and value what is right before us as none other than the wholeness of life itself” (p. 19). In this framing, even ordinary objects and actions participate in awakening: “even our eating bowls are the body and mind of buddha ancestors” (p. 19). Rather than treating ritual and daily labor as secondary to zazen, this interpretation presents them as part of the same continuous field of practice-realization.

The Continuing Sōtō Understanding of Ritual and Everyday Practice

Modern Sōtō teachers have continued to interpret Dōgen’s teaching as an integration of zazen, ritual, and everyday activity rather than as an exclusive emphasis on seated meditation alone. Their writings reinforce the understanding that ritual functions not as an alternative to awakening but as one of its indispensable embodied expressions. Dainin Katagiri Roshi consistently taught that Zen practice must be lived through the body rather than understood merely as an intellectual doctrine. In Returning to Silence, he explains that authentic Zen practice is realized in the activities of everyday life, where ordinary actions become expressions of Buddha-nature (Katagiri, 1988). Within this framework, bowing, chanting, ceremonial practice, work, and daily responsibilities are not viewed as religious ornamentation but as opportunities to embody the Buddha Way. This interpretation closely parallels Dōgen’s insistence that cooking, cleaning, eating, and communal responsibilities are themselves forms of practice-realization. Kosho Uchiyama Roshi offers a complementary perspective. As one of the most influential twentieth-century Sōtō teachers, Uchiyama strongly emphasized zazen as the indispensable heart of Zen practice. Following his teacher Kōdō Sawaki, he described zazen as “good for nothing,” meaning that it is practiced without striving for personal gain or attaining special experiences (Uchiyama et al., 2004). Yet Uchiyama did not reject ritual or everyday forms of practice. Rather, he understood careful attention to ordinary activities as inseparable from zazen itself. His teaching demonstrates that even among teachers who strongly emphasize “just sitting,” the realization of Zen naturally extends into daily conduct, relationships, work, and mindful care for one’s environment.

What Scholars Say

Scholars increasingly argue that the tension between “just sitting” and ritual is resolved once Dōgen’s doctrine of practice-realization is taken seriously. Carl Bielefeldt (2004) argues that Dōgen’s famous statements about “just sitting” should not be interpreted as abolishing traditional Buddhist practices; rather, zazen itself is the supreme ritual and the rest of monastic life extends the sacred space of the meditation hall (p. 205). This reading helps clarify why Dōgen could elevate zazen without dismissing other practices. Zazen is central, but it does not stand apart from monastic forms. Instead, ritual, etiquette, chanting, bowing, and work all become extensions of the same awakened discipline. Shohaku Okumura (2012) similarly explains that communal forms protect the practitioner from turning Zen into a private, ego-centered project: “If we only practice zazen and ignore the forms of the sangha, we easily fall into the trap of ‘my practice’ or ‘my enlightenment.’ Ritual and communal forms are the ways we drop the small self and move in harmony with others” (p. 84). Taken together, these scholars support the conclusion that Dōgen did not merely allow ritual to coexist with zazen. He taught ritual as essential because awakening, for him, must take concrete form in the body, in the monastery, and in the rhythms of communal life.

Conclusion

The evidence presented here suggests that ritual is not peripheral to Dōgen’s Buddhism but constitutive of it. Zazen remains the heart of practice, yet Dōgen consistently taught that awakening must be embodied through ritual, communal discipline, work, etiquette, and liturgy. The Eihei Shingi is therefore not an appendix to Dōgen’s teaching but one of its fullest expressions. To separate “just sitting” from the ritual life Dōgen established at Eihei-ji is to divide practices that Dōgen himself understood as inseparable manifestations of practice-realization. The strongest reading of the evidence is therefore not merely that Dōgen did not reject ritual, but that he actively taught it, institutionalized it, and regarded it as an essential part of Buddhist training.

References

Bielefeldt, C. (2004). Just sitting? Dōgen’s take on zazen, sutra reading, and other conventional Buddhist practices. In S. Heine & D. S. Wright (Eds.), The Zen canon: Understanding the classic texts (pp. 197–219). Oxford University Press.

Dōgen. (1996). Dōgen’s pure standards for the Zen community: A translation of Eihei Shingi (T. D. Leighton & S. Okumura, Trans.). State University of New York Press.

Dōgen. (2002). Fukanzazengi. In K. Tanahashi (Ed.), Moon in a dewdrop: Writings of Zen Master Dōgen. North Point Press.

Dōgen. (2010). Treasury of the true dharma eye: Zen essays by Dōgen (K. Tanahashi, Ed. & Trans.). Shambhala Publications.

Foulk, T. G. (2004). Dōgen. In R. E. Buswell Jr. (Ed.), Encyclopedia of Buddhism (Vol. 1, pp. 238–240). Macmillan Reference USA.

Katagiri, D. (1988). Returning to silence: Zen practice in daily life. Shambhala Publications.

Okumura, S. (2012). Living by vow: A practical introduction to eight essential Zen chants and texts. Wisdom Publications.

Tanahashi, K. (Ed.). (1985). Moon in a dewdrop: Writings of Zen Master Dōgen. North Point Press.

Tanahashi, K., & Levitt, P. (Eds. & Trans.). (2013). The essential Dogen: Writings of the great Zen master. Shambhala Publications.

Uchiyama, K., Wright, T., Warner, J., & Okumura, S. (2004). Opening the hand of thought: Foundations of Zen Buddhist practice (Rev. ed.). Wisdom Publications.

Similarly, Buddhist ethics, grounded in the First Precept, to refrain from taking life, frames killing as a source of suffering (dukkha) that reverberates through individuals and societies. The teachings emphasize interdependence: harm inflicted on others ultimately harms oneself and the broader web of life. War, especially when fueled by anger, fear, or delusion, represents a profound breach of this ethical commitment. It conditions further violence and obscures the clarity required for compassionate action.

Against this backdrop, rhetoric that threatens the destruction of an entire people or civilization must be evaluated with moral seriousness. Statements attributed to Donald Trump suggesting such annihilation are ethically indefensible under both traditions. Catholic teaching would reject them as violations of human dignity and the moral limits on force; Buddhist teaching would see them as arising from and reinforcing unwholesome mental states, with grave karmic consequences.

Moral responsibility does not end with leaders. Ethical traditions consistently hold that those who endorse, enable, or remain willfully indifferent to grave wrongdoing share in its consequences. To support rhetoric or policies that normalize mass harm is to participate, however indirectly, in the erosion of moral boundaries that protect life.

A consistent ethical stance, therefore, requires more than opposing violence in the abstract. It calls for clear discernment, moral courage, and a refusal to legitimize threats against entire populations. In both Catholic and Buddhist frameworks, the measure is the same: actions and words must align with the preservation of life, the reduction of suffering, and the recognition of our shared humanity.

I’ve been thinking about bearing witness and doing good. This last month I’ve been thinking of it in terms of my practice and the state of our country. Part of the current state of our country is clearly rooted in racism. Racism is not just a matter of people with obviously hateful attitudes. It is also the quieter decisions, the excuses, and the systems that treat some people as less worthy of safety, dignity, and belonging. There are multiple definitions of racism, but I find this one to be helpful and clear.

Racism is a system of advantage and oppression based on race, maintained through policies, practices, and cultural norms that reinforce racial hierarchies, whether or not individuals consciously intend to be racist.

When we talk about racism, we are not only talking about slurs and insults. We are also talking about how society is built, who is seen as fully human, and whose suffering is ignored or explained away. Today we see this when American citizens are racially profiled and it is called “immigration enforcement.” When someone is stopped because they are brown, or Black, or have a certain last name, that is not neutral law enforcement, that is racism being justified with legal language. We also see it in dehumanizing images, such as posting pictures of Barack and Michelle Obama’s heads on ape bodies. This is not just “bad taste” or “edgy humor.” It echoes a long and brutal history of comparing Black people to animals, in order to justify slavery, segregation, and violence. It is clearly racist, and it is morally outrageous.

If a person cannot see that, or refuses to admit it, the issue is not subtlety. It is a refusal to recognize the humanity of others. And when a platform says, “someone else posted it,” but will not apologize, moderate, or hold anyone accountable, that is not neutrality, it is participation. If we care about ethics and morality, if we care about spiritual practice, then we have to care about this.

A Brief and Honest History of Racism in the United States

This history is painful but naming it clearly is part of honoring those who have suffered, and it helps us not repeat the same patterns in new forms.

Slavery and Its Legacy

• African slavery in the United States was formally present from the early 1600s
• Enslaved Africans were recorded in Virginia as early as 1619
• Slavery became legally and economically central in the colonies, and later the United States
• The Thirteenth Amendment, adopted in 1865, formally abolished slavery, except as punishment for a crime
• Racist systems then continued through convict leasing, sharecropping, and discriminatory laws

Slavery was not just about unpaid labor. It was a system that required the idea that Black people were less than human. That same logic still shows up today in dehumanizing images and in policies that treat Black communities as disposable.

Violence against Black People and Black Churches

After the Civil War, white supremacist terror was used to keep Black people “in their place.”

• The Ku Klux Klan and similar groups used lynching, threats, and public violence to create fear
• Black churches, which have long been centers of spiritual life, organizing, and community, were attacked and burned
• This violence continued into the twentieth and twenty first centuries

Examples include the 1963 bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, where four Black girls were killed. More recently, in 2015, a white supremacist murdered nine Black worshippers at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina. Many other Black churches have been burned or vandalized, before and since.

These are not random acts. They are attacks on the bodies, spirits, and gathering places of Black people.

Racism against Jewish People in the United States

Anti-Jewish hatred, or antisemitism, has also been part of United States history. Jewish people have faced:

• Employment and housing discrimination
• Restrictions at universities and clubs
• Stereotyping and scapegoating in media and politics

In recent years, the 2018 mass shooting at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, was one of the deadliest attacks on Jewish people in United States history. The shooter was motivated by antisemitic conspiracy theories. There have been many other attacks and threats against synagogues, Jewish schools, and community centers.

Antisemitism is deeply connected to racism and other forms of hatred. All of these systems share a logic that says some groups are dangerous, less human, or a threat to “real” Americans.

Immigration, Racial Profiling, and Who Is Seen as “American”

Racism also shows up when immigration policy is used as a shield for discrimination.

• Chinese immigrants faced the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, which explicitly targeted one ethnic group
• Japanese Americans were forced into internment camps during World War Two
• Latino, Muslim, Arab, and South Asian communities have been heavily surveilled, profiled, and detained, especially after September 11, 2001

When American citizens are stopped, questioned, or detained because they “look foreign,” what is really happening is racial profiling. Calling that “immigration enforcement” does not erase the racism behind it.

When Platforms and Leaders Fail to Acknowledge Racism

When racist content appears on a website, a social media feed, or a public platform, there is a basic moral responsibility:

• Acknowledge that it is racist
• Apologize for the harm caused
• Remove it and, if appropriate, fire or discipline the person responsible
• Commit to better supervision and moderation going forward

If someone refuses to do even that much, they are not just “uninformed,” they are choosing not to see. And if we find ourselves making excuses for clearly racist acts, it may be time to honestly examine our own hearts.

Goodness and Bearing Witness

Buddhism is often associated with inner peace, meditation, and personal transformation. That is important, but so are core teachings about action.

• See reality clearly
• Avoid causing harm
• Develop compassion and wisdom

Seeing Clearly: Ignorance and Awakening

The root of suffering is ignorance or delusion.

“All tremble at violence, all fear death. Comparing others with oneself, one should neither kill nor cause to kill.”
— Dhammapada, verse 129

Racism depends on a failure to “compare others with oneself.” It relies on the idea that “they” do not feel as deeply as “we” do, that “they” are less worthy of protection. When we deny racism where it clearly exists, we are participating in ignorance, not wisdom.

Doing Good and Avoiding Harm

Buddhist ethics, or sila, are not just about our private minds. They are about what we say and do in the world.

“Avoid all evil, cultivate the good, and cleanse your own mind, this is the teaching of the Buddhas.”
— Dhammapada, verse 183

Avoiding evil does not only mean refusing to personally insult or harm others. It also means not supporting systems or images that dehumanize people. Cultivating good includes speaking up, creating safer spaces, and standing with those who are targeted. “Cleansing your own mind” includes looking honestly at any racism, bias, or indifference that lives in us, and working to transform it.

Bearing Witness

I took vows as a Buddhist Priest which express a commitment to work for the liberation of all beings, not just oneself. One common formulation is:

“Beings are numberless, I vow to save them.
Delusions are inexhaustible, I vow to end them.
Dharma gates are boundless, I vow to enter them.
The Buddha way is unsurpassable, I vow to realize it.”

If beings are numberless, and we vow to serve them all, there is no room to quietly accept that some people are treated as less than human because of their race, ethnicity, or religion. If delusions are inexhaustible, then racism and the denial of racism are exactly the kinds of delusions we are called to confront.

Zen teacher Bernie Glassman, who worked deeply in social justice and interfaith peacemaking, spoke about bearing witness as a core spiritual practice. He described three tenets: not knowing, bearing witness, and loving action.

“To bear witness is to plunge into the unknown and then to let the universe itself reveal the healing action that needs to be taken.”
— Bernie Glassman, see the Zen Peacemakers’ explanation of the Three Tenets at Zen Peacemakers

Bearing witness to racism means we do not turn away. We allow ourselves to truly see the suffering caused by racism, without immediately trying to minimize it, explain it away, or rush past it. From that honest seeing, compassionate action can arise.

Truths

When we put history, ethics, and spiritual practice together, some core truths become clear:

• Racism causes suffering
  Individuals, families, and whole communities carry trauma from generations of slavery, discrimination, violence, and dehumanization
• Seeing racism is the beginning of healing
  Refusing to acknowledge it keeps the wound open
• Naming racism is a moral and spiritual act
  Silence and “neutrality” in the face of obvious harm are forms of participation
• Bearing witness is part of Buddhist and most Christian practice
  We are asked to see suffering clearly, to stand with those who are harmed, and to let compassion guide our actions
• Choosing to stop harm is doing good
  Apologizing, changing policies, holding people accountable, and examining our own hearts are all expressions of right action

My Perspective

From my perspective, if you cannot see the racism in racially profiling American citizens under the name of “immigration enforcement,” or in posting the Obamas’ heads on ape bodies, then the work is not out there, it is inside. It is time to pause, to reflect deeply, and to ask what you might be unwilling to see.

If something racist appears on a platform you run, and your response is to deny, deflect, or shrug, that is not spiritual maturity, and it is not ethical leadership. A sincere response would be to say, “This is wrong, it is racist, it causes harm, and I am sorry it happened here.” Then, to take real steps to prevent it from happening again. My practice does not ask me to be perfect. It asks me to be honest, to cultivate compassion, and to keep turning toward what is real, even when it is uncomfortable. Racism is real. The suffering it causes is real. Our responsibility to bear witness and to do good is also real. If we are willing to see, to listen, and to act, then our spiritual practice can become part of healing, rather than part of the problem.

During my tenure, advocacy groups often criticized those of us working within immigration detention. They assumed that participation itself implied indifference or harm. That assumption does not reflect the reality I witnessed daily. Many Public Health Service officers worked under extraordinarily difficult circumstances with a clear ethical commitment to patient care. We were not policy-makers; we were clinicians and public health professionals trying to reduce suffering where it already existed.

Concrete practices mattered. We implemented telemedicine systems in 1998 to ensure access to specialty care. This included mental health services. We did this long before such models became routine elsewhere. Individuals received comprehensive history and physical examinations within seven days of arrival. This care is often more thorough than what many Americans receive in the community today. When people were released, we worked to connect them with community organizations, ensure continuity of medications, and reduce the risk of care disruption.

That commitment extended beyond U.S. borders. I participated in a deployment to Guatemala during a mass migration event involving individuals from China. Even with limited resources, we conducted full physical examinations. We performed tuberculosis screenings and provided treatment to those in need. The human cost of migration was unmistakable. It was one of the saddest times in my PHS career and the one when I felt least able to help. I still remember riding on a bus to the airport. I watched the Guatemalan countryside pass by. A woman quietly remarked that she wished these people could escape to China. Her statement captured both despair and moral complexity.

Bearing Witness and Doing Good

I am also a Buddhist priest, and my understanding of this work is shaped by the Buddhist commitments to Bearing Witness and Doing Good. Bearing witness requires entering places of suffering without turning away, without denial, and without premature judgment. Doing good is not abstract moral purity; it is the daily, imperfect act of alleviating suffering where one stands.

A teaching that has deeply informed my understanding of care partnership comes from Chodō, who spoke of Jizō Bodhisattva, the bodhisattva who vows to enter the hell realms and not abandon those trapped there. Jizō does not wait for the world to be just before offering care. He does not ask who is deserving. He goes where suffering is greatest and remains present. For me, immigration detention often functioned as a kind of hell realm, not because of the individuals working within it, but because of the profound isolation, fear, and loss experienced by those confined there.

Much of our work was precisely this: staying present, providing care, and refusing abandonment in a place many preferred not to see. That, to me, is care partnership, not rescue, not endorsement of the system, but accompaniment within it.

If we are serious about justice and human dignity, we must be able to hold two truths at once: that immigration detention raises profound moral concerns, and that compassionate, competent health professionals inside those facilities have worked, often quietly and imperfectly, to bear witness and do good in the midst of suffering.