stripping the gurus - Brahma Kumaris Info

ZEN IN THE ART OF SEX AND VIOLENCE 35
As to the actual life and mindset of Zen monks in Asia, then,
when seeking entrance to a monastery as a trainee the prospective
monk will first prostrate himself at the gate for hours or days.
When asked why he wishes to enter the monastery, the
monk should reply, “I know nothing. Please accept my request!”
indicating that his mind is like a blank sheet of paper,
ready to be inscribed by his superiors as they wish. If a
monk fails to give the proper answer, he is struck repeatedly
with the kyosaku until his shoulders are black and blue and
the desired state of mind is achieved (Victoria, 1997).
Having been accepted into the community with that “desired
state of mind,” even monks who were admitted just hours earlier
will exercise authority over the neophyte, preceding him at meals
and on other semiformal or formal occasions.
Those senior monks who have been in training for more than
one or two years seem, to the new entrant, to be superior beings
(Victoria, 1997).
* * *
What, then, of the widespread enlightenment which one might
idealistically wish to attribute to practitioners of Zen?
I once asked Katagiri Roshi, with whom I had my first breakthrough
... how many truly great Ch’an and Zen masters
there have historically been. Without hesitating, he said,
“Maybe one thousand altogether.” I asked another Zen master
how many truly enlightened—deeply enlightened—Japanese
Zen masters there were alive today, and he said, “Not
more than a dozen” (Wilber, 2000a).
Thus, we have over a millennium of Zen teachers “beating the
crap out of” their numerous disciples on a regular basis, to generate
a scant thousand (i.e., around one per year, globally) “enlightened”
individuals. That, however, would never be a reasonable
trade-off, via any “calculus of suffering.” That is so particularly
since such enlightenment primarily benefits only the specific individual
“blessed” by it, not the world at large.
Be that as it may, the “death of the ego” in enlightenment remains
a strong motivation for meditators, in Zen and elsewhere.