Dogen’s texts : Manifesting Religion and/as Philosophy? (1st ed. 2023)

This book addresses the question of how to properly handle Dogen’s texts, a core issue that became critical during the Meiji period in which the philosophical appropriation of Dogen became apparent inside and outside of the monastery.

In present day Dogen studies, most scholarship is informed by a number of factions representing Dogen.  The chapters herein address: the Zennist (j. zenjoka) emphasising practice, the Genzonians (j. genzoka) shifting the attention to the close reading of Dogen’s texts, the laity movement opening up both the texts and the practice to people in modern society, and the Genzo researchers (j. genzo kenkyuka) searching for the authenticity and truth of Dogen’s writings.  The book aims to clarify the rightful place of Dogen: in the monastery, in denominational studies, or in modern academic philosophy?  It brings forth various viewpoints on Dogen, and analyzes the relations of these viewpoints from the premodern to modern times.  The collected volume appeals to students and researchers in the field while establishing hermeneutic standards of reading and proposing new, original, and critical interpretations of Dogen’s texts. Chapter From Uji to Being-time (and Back): Translating Dogen into Philosophy is available open access under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License via link.springer.com.