Class

Befriending Zen Koans (Tuesdays, Feb 10–Mar 17)

Recurrent

7:00 PM - 8:30 PM

Location
Online
Description

“What is your light?”  “What does the Bodhisattva of Great Compassion do with so many hands and eyes?”  “Holy or ordinary?”

Koans are short Zen dialogues that open inquiry into the heart of practice and awakening. They are meant to be challenging. When the Zen tradition holds up a story, saying or inquiry as a koan, it’s asking for our deep respect, “a long loving look at the real,” an invitation to enter into dialogue with something inconceivable about our lives. Koans are boundlessly open to exploration and unfolding. Right where a koan is elusive and ungraspable is a door to something elusive, ungraspable, and also liberating, right here.
Join Befriending Zen Koans: Intimate Inquiry into Dynamic Dialogue, a discussion-based class where we can offer and receive support and encouragement to meet the dynamic challenges of these stories, Zen practice, our lives and this world of suffering. Each week, we will bring up a koan for active discussion. Koans arise from dynamic dialogue and intimate conversation is where they thrive, turn over, shimmer, kick, shout, whisper, smile and roll over for a belly pat.
Schedule

Dates: February 10, 17, 24, March 3, 10, 17
Time: 7:00 PM–8:30 PM ET
Location: Online via Zoom (link will be provided to registrants before the first class.)

Registration

Registration deadline — February 8, 11:59 PM ET
Financial assistance deadline — February 1, 11:59 PM ET

Fee (sliding scale) — $225-$360

  • See our Equitable Pricing Model here to determine your rate.
  • No one will be turned away due to financial constraints.
  • If you’re unable to pay at the lowest rate, please use this form to apply for an exemption by the financial assistance deadline.

Questions? If you have any questions or concerns about registration, please contact us at info@brooklynzen.org.

Instructor

Charlie Korin Pokorny (he/they) grew up in Hyde Park on the South Side of Chicago. Charlie received a masters in religious studies, focusing on Zen, from Stanford in 1994. He has been teaching graduate courses at the Institute of Buddhist Studies since 2011, including classes on Buddhist thought, history and practice, with a focus on traditions of East Asia and especially Zen. Charlie was ordained as a priest by Reb Anderson in 1999 and received dharma transmission in 2018. He practiced as a resident at Tassajara and Green Gulch Farm and studied koans with Daniel Terragno. Together with his wife, Sarah Dōjin Emerson, they served as head priests at Stone Creek Zen Center 2014-2022. They were then invited to become teachers at the Brooklyn Zen Center and moved with their children to Brooklyn in 2022.

 

Banner image: Cover art from Book of Serenity by Thomas Cleary (Hudson, NY: Lindisfarne Press) 1990.

 


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Donations

BZC relies on donations to sustain its spaces, teachers, and staff. Learn more about supporting us here.

 


COVID Protocol

We ask that all participants be fully vaccinated and boosted. Masks are optional. Please see the BZC Covid Protocol for more information.

 

Fee
$225-360
Questions?
info@brooklynzen.org

To request a refund for this program you must notify BZC in writing at least 2 days before the beginning of the program. This supports the organizing effort involved in managing registrations and cancellations.

Befriending Zen Koans (Tuesdays, Feb 10–Mar 17)
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