Thursday, February 14, 2013

Kobutsu Malone and Eido Shimano

Truman displays post-election newspaper
In 1948, an era somewhat more adult than our own, President Harry  S. Truman won a surprise victory against presidential challenger Thomas Dewey. On election night, some newspapers that went to bed before the results were in declared Dewey the winner in front-page headlines.

After Truman returned victorious to Washington in the wake of a grueling whistle-stop campaign, The Washington Post, in an adult acknowledgment of how wrong it had been, posted a sign outside it's offices: "Mr. President, we are ready to eat crow whenever you are ready to serve it."

These days, of course, it is more common to camouflage or 'spin' mistakes in public. Straight out admissions that might clear the air are tucked away in self-serving closets as if being wrong were not acceptable or even conceivable in human affairs. It's as ludicrous and callous as it is common.

Today -- Valentine's Day -- the Shimano Archive published the response by Zen Studies Society to a $2 million-plus lawsuit filed by Eido Shimano, the one-time director of the society and former abbot of Dai Bosatsu Monastery and the Shobo Ji Zen temple in New York. ZSS is the umbrella agency for both centers. The response, on the face of it, is a powerful repudiation of the exalted status both claimed by Eido Shimano and acceded to by many supporters in the past.

And whatever may come of the suit, still I think it is a good time for reflection by those who have been embroiled in Shimano's longtime sociopathy. There have been arguments and vilifications and panderings and threats and tears and coverups and citings of holy texts and namby-pamby analyses galore ... for years and years and years. Not least since the Shimano Archive got off the ground in 2008. And now, at last, the matter seems to be out in the open, in the New York State Supreme Court.

Kobutsu Malone
Reading the ZSS legal counterclaims, it is hard not to notice that damn near every one of them has been made, implicitly or explicitly, on the Shimano Archive, a web site set up and doggedly maintained by Kobutsu Malone ... or, if you prefer, The Rev. Kobutsu Malone. Where wounded sangha members were overlooked and maligned by ZSS and its supporters, Kobutsu listened. Where there were doubts about the legality of how ZSS was run, Kobutsu listened. Where people ranted and raved about the holy Dharma without taking into account the despair of those who longed for the Dharma, Kobutsu listened. Kobutsu received literal threats. He sometimes doubted himself. But he listened and collected the data that appears today in the Shimano Archive ....

The very same archive from which ZSS today draws its legal strength. ZSS ... the institution that once discounted and derided Kobutsu's efforts... with a lot of help from other organizations and individuals who had a position and status and livelihood to defend. "Let's not throw the baby out with the bath water," they wheedled winningly. "Let's keep our eyes on the unfathomable wonders of Zen Buddhism," "Let's not be distracted by attachments and other delusions." Implicitly and explicitly Kobutsu Malone was demonized as too extreme, too uncaring, too broad-brush, too willing to bring the house of elevated cards down.

And now his work is the very work on which his detractors are legally forced to rely in the New York Supreme Court.

Kobutsu did not do his work in a vacuum. He could not have done what he has done without the help of a lot of other people. Some of them were ashamed and did not want to admit their shame. Some were looking to address the decades of abuse without conceding their own complicity. Some were maneuvering to keep their good name. Robert Aitken Roshi, a man who was likewise sullied in the Shimano affairm, summoned up his courage before he died and released hundreds of documents that had previously been kept under lock and key. But there were less-visible players as well, each with a small and sometimes painful story to tell ... a story kept hidden, as often as not, for decades.

Kobutsu did not do his work alone, but he served as a lightning rod and as a collector of data. Had he not done so, would something called Zen Buddhism be better off? I sincerely doubt it. Kobutsu is my friend so I will not demean him by calling him a hero -- that namby-pamby word used by those who have never seen action -- but I see no reason not to suggest that without him, the shame that is being brought to light would be excruciatingly and exquisitely more painful.

After his election victory, Harry Truman "was invited to a banquet of political reporters, editors, pollsters, radio commentators and columnists. The main course was to consist of breast of crow glace. The Democratic National Committee offered to furnish the tooth picks."

But of course that was an earlier -- and more adult -- time.

Kobutsu is unlikely to ask anyone to eat crow. But those who deserve such a banquet could do worse than eating what's on the plate in front of them.

Given his generosity and his love of wood, Kobutsu might be willing to supply the toothpicks.

16 comments:

  1. Thanks for saying this. Today it is so easy to forget how much resistance there was, all over the place, against any questioning of Shimano. Kobutsu deserves his own Memorial Day at DBZ.

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  2. I'll take your word for it on DBZ but seeing his work in other areas, a rigid belief that he is doing good, framing things in a distinct and leading manner, and being so full of the belief that history is the same in every case -- with such confidence -- I would have never been supportive of him through your recommendation and I would never say thankyou very much. And that goes for your referral of him in the past. That is one thing I most definitely regret and probably always will.

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  3. Nine Bows to the Old Buddha.

    There is nothing wrong, and everything right, with throwing open the windows and letting the light shine in.

    Sitting with the beautiful AND the ugly in this world ... finding that which simultaneously holds and transcends "beautiful and ugly" ... is our Practice, is why we "breath in breath out". So, why should we not simply practice with beautiful and ugly in some Zen Sangha too? If you cannot tolerate looking right in the eye of "ugly" ... be it in a so-called Zen Master or anywhere else ... then you may be missing the point. What's more, though we transcend the ugly, we simultaneously try to fix the ugly we can and make it beautiful.

    Gassho, Jundo

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  4. Thank you, other Jundo (by third Jundo)

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  5. Anyone care to explain to an interested but uninformed reader what exactly is going on here ?
    Adam ?

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  6. Peter -- Roughly speaking, the sexual and financial depredations of an alleged Zen teacher -- depredations observed, reported and ignored over decades -- are now entering the plein air of the judicial system. From the outside, this is a tempest in a teapot since Zen Buddhism is a sliver of a sliver of interest in the human panorama. But for those who are a. interested in Zen Buddhism and b. have been wounded by its manipulations, entering the judicial arena is an important step, one that largely ignores the fairy dust any belief system might throw up and focuses on what factual harm, if any, has been done.

    The dynamics are roughly the same as those in the Vatican-sponsored pedophile scandal: The institution claims it can handle its own problems and is given leeway to do so by the greater society (it's a religion after all). But when the chorus of those who have been wounded rises high enough, there is a tipover point at which the wider society no longer buys into its own earlier credulities and accession to power: "Hey! Wait a minute -- this is a plain old civil crime!" All of a sudden, the legal system, whatever its flaws, becomes a more credible magnifier through which to observe the situation.

    For years and years, Eido Shimano's sexual and fiduciary free-wheeling has wounded many (let's call it sangha) people. His activities were buried, covered up, excused by the 'good will' of those who credited his spiritual mission and accomplishments.

    But now, because a retired or fired Shimano has brought a $2 million suit against the organization that once covered his tracks, the matter has entered a realm that is less inclined to sit still for the eyewash excuses provided by "wisdom" or "compassion" or "understanding."

    Is that an explanation? I don't know. The whole thing is long and faceted ... and I have a facility for not being either informative or brief.

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    1. I knew a little of the case from ZFI Adam..I meant the posts from the various 'Jundos ' whats that about ? Is it as Luz says, trolling ?

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    2. Somebody apparently decided to post a fake me after my original post. Somebody with too much time on their hands.

      Gassho, Jundo

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  7. Hello Peter. Adam is being harassed by trolls. And you know them all too well. :(

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    1. But presumably Luz those are not from the actual people named above...

      Hi, by the way...

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  8. I guess in future, I will be skeptical of all but "Jundo Cohen" when it comes to Jundo's.

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  9. Please pay no attention to the other Jundo.

    Gassho, Jundo

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  10. I totally agree. He is also indispensable in the Joshu Sasaki/Rinzai Ji affair. His work is very important.

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  11. Well said Genkaku. We all have our shortcomings and idiocracies, Kobutsu, you and I certainly do, but none should argue about great service both of you have done in exposing and enlightening us all about the gravity of the abuse of power put in the hands of men such as Shimano and Sasaki. I once was blind, but now I see a little. Thank you both.

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  12. "I was once blind, now I see!!!"

    How convenient!

    Opportunities abound now!!

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