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Comment by jimhefferon | Hacker News Reader

> the modern mindfulness movement, inherited from fairly recent Burmese innovations

I had not heard that. I had understood it to have something to do with interest in Zen, which had a revival in the West starting in the mid 1900's. But I admit I don't really know anything about it. Does someone have a reference?

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Zen and Vipassana are the two major Buddhist practices which had revivals in the 20th century and gained popularity in the west.

Vipassana was originally popularized amongst westerners by S. N. Goenka[1] who was a Hindi expat in Burma, where he learned the practice. Many of his western students went on to be prominent teachers[2].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S._N._Goenka [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Students_of_S._N._Goe...

It's interesting to me that the thesis of Suzuki's 'No Mind' is that what marks the beginning of Chan as a separate tradition and lineage is a de-emphasis or some might say rejection of meditation. This distinction was certainly lost in the West and mostly lost in translation to Zen in Japan (a cursory glance at Suzuki's books prior to No Mind suggests this was relatively new information to him).

> S. N. Goenka[1] who was a Hindi expat in Burma

He was born in Mandalay, Burma and grew up there. I wouldn't call him an Indian expat in Burma, more like Burmese-Indian.

Good point.

> Hindi expat in Burma

Hindi is a language. I think you meant Hindu.

Thank you.

I don't have the answer to your question, but I don't see the connection between mindfulness and Zen to be as direct as you're suggesting. I've been highly influenced by a lot of the mindfulness writing out there, but Zen actively turned me off for a long time, because it's a lot of "deep" paradoxical puzzle/koan things, anecdotes that make no sense, emphasis on "enlightment" etc. Contrast that with a lot of modern day mindfulness stuff which is highly, highly influenced by Buddhism but basically extracts the most practical stuff, meditation practice, awareness of thoughts/feelings, recognition of egotistical cravings, acceptance of impermanence, etc.

That depends a lot on the Zen school and the texts you were reading. Zen is based on direct experience. That being said, in some schools, such as Renzai, koans are used as a tool. However, most sangas you attend, especially in the west, will focus more on the direct experience of meditation to start, which is more or less the same sort of thing one is taught by most mindfulness / MBSR / MBCT regimens.

Bear in mind that Zen is a form of Buddhism, and as such, has religious and philosophical depth. That being said, as with many such traditions, the point is for a practitioner to directly experience the religious revelations if the practitioner is drawn to the religion. Most sanghas are perfectly happy to teach a secular lay practitioner how to meditate if he/she is open, honest, and respectful regarding intentions. In that case, you won't be given koans (assuming the school of Zen you are visiting uses them) or dharma talks. You'll be taught how to meditate. Just like with mindfulness training, that starts with the counting and experience of the breaths.

Mindfulness is just a tool to train the mind. What you use that for is up to you.

Zen employs mindfulness as well as other tools for spiritual cultivation.

The fan-down teaching and the idea of insight practice for laity started in XIX century in Burma after British conquest.

First group meditation for laypeople took place in 1911.

So this is fairly new idea.

[] https://tricycle.org/magazine/meditation-en-masse/

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