Zen: Taiun Michael Elliston, Sensei

Taiun Michael Elliston Sensei, fully transmitted Zen priest, began studying with the Zen Buddhist Temple of Chicago’s founder, Soyu Matsuoku Roshi, in Chicago during the 1960s. He established and has been the Abbot of the Atlanta Soto Zen Center since 1977. 2007 marks the 30th year of continuous operation of ASZC. Taiun became Matsuoka-roshi’s disciple in 1966 and was ordained in 1970. Taiun received Dharma Transmission in 1983, and he received Transmission more formally into the Soto school by Rev. Shohaku Okumura Roshi in August of this year. More About Taiun Michael Elliston Sensei was born on a farm outside Centralia, Illinois in 1941, and grew up in that small town after a brief time in Chicago. Completing high school with honors, he returned to Chicago, attending the Institute of Design at the Illinois Institute of Technology, receiving a B.S. In 1964 and an M.S. in 1970. From 1966 to 1970 he taught art and design at the University of Illinois, Chicago, and at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Sensei’s involvement with Zen began in 1966 when he met Matsuoka-Roshi, founder and head teacher of the Chicago Zen Buddhist Temple. After two years of training under Matsuoka-Roshi’s supervision and at his suggestion, he underwent a combined initiation and discipleship ceremony, and was given the dharma name Taiun, meaning “Great Cloud”. Sensei was registered with the Soto Shu in Japan July 13, 1969 (Priesthood Register No. 164, Soto Zen Headquarters, Tokyo, Japan) and ordained as a Zen Priest March 22, 1970. He continued his duties at the Chicago Zen Center until 1970, when he moved to Atlanta, at the same time Matsuoka-roshi moved to Long Beach. Leaving Kongo-roshi in charge of Chicago. In the early 1970’s he began offering Zen meditation and teaching, and in 1977 he founded the Atlanta Soto Zen Center (ASZC). Matsuoka-roshi presented the title of “roshi”, which he called “the P.H.D. of Zen”, to Sensei in a special ceremony at ASZC on September 20, 1983. Sensei continues to offer his services as the head teacher of ASZC, encouraging the numerous members to lead a Zen life, and to maintain a harmonious balance with the demands of family and livelihood. As abbot, he oversees the training of disciples and priests, as well as ministering to the needs of a growing group of members and newcomers. The Center has prospered owing to the sincerity of practice of its members, and the shared commitment and support of many qualified trainees and teachers who have adapted Sensei’s ordinary-everyday style of Zen practice and training. In the last two years, Sensei has also completed “Shuso” training and a precepts ceremony with Seirin Barbara Kohn of Austin Zen Center (Suzuki lineage) and also completed a transmission ceremony with Shohaku Okumura-roshi in August of this year, thus bringing together three lineages of Soto Zen in America.

Mindfulness Ctr.: Skip Ewing

Skip Ewing is an ordained Tiep Hien (Order of Interbeing) member, and the founder and coordinator of the Nashville Mindfulness Center. He was ordained in June of 2006 by beloved Zen master and Nobel Peace Prize nominee Thich Nhat Hanh in a ceremony held in the the Lower Hamlet at Plum Village in Thenac, France. He is an experienced meditator and practitioner of many years and has had the immense good fortune of studying with some of the world’s most renowned spiritual teachers. Best known as a prominent and highly successful singer-songwriter, Skip’s songs have always evinced and cultivated elements of spiritual awareness, loving kindness, and a deep reverence for life. Of this years celebration, Skip has said, “Gathering together in the name of peace, if just to sit queitly with no other aspiration, is a noble act, one of generosity and unselfishness. Any peace we generate in ourselves is truly peace on earth. Together, we are the collective consciousness of humanity. Peace is only possible in this way. That is why our togetherness is so important.”

One Dharma: Lisa E. Ingham

Lisa has been meditating and practicing Buddhism for over 18 years. She began her practice in the Zen Buddhist tradition with the Nashville Zen Center, studying closely with several Zen Masters and attending numerous mediation retreats. Wishing to broaden her exposure to Buddhist practices and teachings, Lisa has also studied and practiced in the Theravada tradition since the late 90’s. In 2006 Lisa co-founded One Dharma Nashville, a meditation group that isn’t affiliated with a specific tradition, but focuses on the core practices of loving kindness, compassion and mindfulness, which reflect foundational Buddhist teachings. Lisa has taught meditation to prison inmates in Tennessee and gives talks on Buddhism to various religious and secular groups in the area. Currently she offers one on one meditation instruction for newer students who are seeking personal guidance. Lisa is a visual artist whose work is inspired by the theme of impermanence, one of Buddha’s core teachings. She focuses most of her paintings on subjects of nature that spend only a brief time fully alive; these subjects serve as a metaphor for the temporal nature of life itself. You can view Lisa’s art at www.lisaernst.com. Also Appearing: Tom Neilson Tom Neilson, Ph.D. Tom Neilson has been interested in Buddhism since childhood and has been an active practitioner of Buddhism since the early 1990's. He is also a clinical psychologist in private practice in Nashville. He is interested in the integration of the various schools of Buddhism, particularly Theravada and Mahayana Buddhism, and attends the One Dharma meditation group. Tom is also interested in the integration of Buddhism and western psychology, the poetic and artistic expression of spiritual insight, and the transformative potential of art of all kinds. He practices vipassana and metta meditation, and also has an interest in Soto and Rinzai Zen. He is currently working with Buddhist teacher Jeff Collins. Major influences include Shunryu Suzuki, J. Krishnamurti, Ken Wilber, Stephen Levine, Dogen, Nagarjuna, Charlotte Joko Beck, Ezra Bayda, John Tarrant, and Pema Chodron.

Insight Speakers

Venerable U Pannasiha has had extensive training in both Theravada Buddhist Philosophy (Abhidamma) and Meditation (Samatha) in Myanmar. He has been a monk for over 20 years and received full ordination at the age of 20. He has a Ph.D. equivalent from the Buddhist Sangha and has spent 3 years as a forest monk meditating in isolation around Mandalay and Mingun. Bhikkhu Nyanasobhano is an American Theravada monk who was ordained in Bangkok in 1987. For ten years he taught Buddhism and meditation at the Buddhadharma Meditation Center near Chicago. He is the author of three books: Landscapes of Wonder, Longing for Certainty and most recently, Available Truth. His essay, ‘Across the Fragrant Field’, was included in Shambala Sun’s anthology of The Best Buddhist Writing 2004.

Shambala: Acharya David Schneider

Born in 1951 in Louisville, Kentucky, David Schneider was the first child of Marc, a Jew and engineer and Georgia, his southern Baptist sociologist mother. David rapidly acquired three sisters, the rudiments of a standard boomer education, and a bi-religious, Southern upbringing, involving. Saturday School and Sunday School. He grew up in Pittsburgh, PA . He began to practice Zen meditation with a local group at Reed College, in Portland, OR and attended sesshins with Joshu Sasaki Roshi in 1970 and 71. In January, 1971, he met Shunryu Suzuki Roshi, and he says, that did it. In April of the same year, he saw Suzuki Roshi and Trungpa Rinpoche together at the San Francisco Zen Center, and that really did it David dropped out of Reed College to move into Zen Center. He took up studies under Richard Baker Roshi, and in 1977, he received ordination as unsui or "cloud-water person." He did many academic and practical jobs as part of community life there, which ran from 1972-85. The 1983 scandal at SF Zen Center led to the departure of Baker Roshi. In 1984, in the formal shuso ceremony, David was ordained as a head monk at the Hartford Street Zen Center in San Francisco. In 1985 David was formally accepted by Trungpa Rinpoche as a student. He attended Vajradhatu Seminary in 1986 and staffed Seminary again in 1988. David wrote Street Zen, a biography of Issan Dorsey, published in 1993 by Shambhala Publications, and again in 2000 by Marlowe. Street Zen won several prizes, included "Best Buddhist Book of the Year" in 1993. In 1994 he co-edited with Kazuaki Tanahashi a collection of zen stories, titled Essential Zen. In 1995, Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche appointed David Director of Shambhala Europe by, a position he held until 2003. David now works for Vajradhatu Publications Europe; he continues as well to pursue writing projects - currently, a biography of Beat poet and zen master Zenshin Philip Whalen - as well as calligraphy exhibitions. Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche appointed David to the post of acharya in 1996.