STEADFAST IN THE MIDST OF TURMOIL

INSIDE BUDDHADHARMA

the thirteenth-century founder of Soto Zen in Japan, wrote in his evocative (“Flowers of Emptiness”) that “the time and place that the blue lotus flowers open and spread are in the midst of fire and in the time of fire” (Gudo Nishijima and Chodo Cross, ). Dogen lived in a time of political uncertainty, violent weather, and cultural change. Perhaps these difficulties inspired Dogen to take up the poetic image of