Nalanda Buddhist Society opens JB outreach centre

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WALK THE WALK: An organisation which believes in holistic education is doing its bit for underprivileged schoolchildren by offering free tuition classes

JOHOR BARU, Malaysia -- THE Nalanda experience has found its way to Johor with the opening of the Nalanda Education & Outreach (NEO) Centre in Taman Johor Jaya here recently.

<< Dr Tan Ho Soon gives dhamma talk to devotees at the shrine hall of the Nalanda Education & Outreach (right) in Taman Johor Jaya. Pix by Chuah Bee Kim

The event also coincides with the 10th anniversary of the Nalanda Buddhist Society founded in 2003 by Dr Tan Ho Soon.

NEO chairman David Yap said that the non-governmental organisation believes in giving knowledge and wisdom to achieve integral human development.

Yap said the centre is recruiting volunteers to tutor children in their school subjects.

"The children who can come here for tuition are from poor families regardless of race or religion," Yap said.

"At our centre in Taman Sri Serdang, Selangor, volunteers of different faiths tutor children from primary and secondary schools in various subjects for free," Yap said.

Tan, who was also present, said that the society had helped 1,200 students to-date.

"Nalanda introduces something new every two years. In 2005, we started the Nalanda Dharma School to provide knowledge, skills and values to teens aged 13 to 18.

"In 2007, the Nalanda Institute was established to offer courses on Buddhism and leadership training. More than 8,000 people have attended the free courses.

"Two years later, we opened the Nalanda Centre in Taman Sri Serdang, followed by the Pustaka Nalanda (Nalanda Library) in 2011.

"It is believed to be the only computerised Buddhist library where members can source books online.

"It has a collection of over 3,000 titles comprising Pali scriptures, Buddhist encyclopaedias and reference books," Tan said.

Nalanda has become one of several acknowledged centres of Buddhist education of the Theravada tradition in the country.

The NEO centre at 30, Jalan Dedap 26, Taman Johor Jaya, is open from 9am to 11am daily, with chanting sessions on Sunday mornings. For details, call 07-350-3870 or visit www.nalanda.org.my.

The two-storey venue offers accommodation to visiting monks, and has a library, shrine hall, meditation room and training rooms for volunteers.

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Former Abbot of Zen Studies Society sues for "breach of contract"

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New York, USA -- Disgraced former Abbot of Zen Studies Society (ZSS), Eido Shimano and his wife Aiho Shimano, are currently suing ZSS for damages in excess of US$ 2 million. The suit was filed in a New York court. The couple allege that ZSS breached their contract with them and claim that they have not received any retirement payments since August of 2012.

<< Eido Shimano, former Abbot of Zen Studies Society

Among other matters mentioned in the suit is that the ZSS had withheld a significant collection of spiritual and artistic items which were used to decorate the New York Zendo and DBZ properties and were used in various services at ZSS New York and DBZ Zendos. Shimano claims that these items were purchased using their own funds and sometimes by gift.

Mr. Shimano had been the abbot of the Zen Studies Society (http://www.daibosatsu.org/) since 1965. He resigned in December of 2010 amid a backdrop of allegations about the married abbot’s sexual liaisons with his students and with other women.

The rumors began to unravel when, in 2008, the University of Hawaii at Manoa unsealed some papers donated by Roshi Robert Aitken (1917-2010), a leading American Buddhist and founder of the Buddhist Peace Fellowship (http://www.bpf.org/). A large portion of these allegations which have been documented over at the Shimano Archive. Myoshin-ji in Japan also recently announced “no connection” to Shimano or his lineage in December.

As of press time, the ZSS has made no court-legal response. The following is an open letter to the public explaining their position on the matter (issued via via zenstudies.ccsend.com, Jan 31, 2013).

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Dear Sangha and Dharma Friends,

The Zen Studies Society Board of Directors would like to provide you with an update on several significant issues and challenges currently facing the Zen Studies Society.

As most of you are aware, we asked Eido Shimano Roshi, the Founding Abbot of the Zen Studies Society, to resign from the Board in July of 2010 after a student revealed an affair with him. He acknowledged that breach of our ethical guidelines, and the Board duly reported the sexual misconduct incident to our insurance company. We also asked Eido Roshi to retire as Abbot of the Zen Studies Society; he did so in December 2010, and Shinge Roko Sherry Chayat Roshi was appointed Abbot on January 1, 2011.

While we fully acknowledge and are deeply saddened by this incident and allegations of other ethical breaches on Eido Roshi’s part, we do remain grateful for his visionary work in founding New York Zendo and Dai Bosatsu Zendo and for his five decades of inspiring teaching. We wanted to provide appropriate care for our teacher and his wife, Aiho Yasuko Shimano, after their retirement, and we trusted that we could come to a harmonious and reasonable agreement with them on a retirement pension. We have since tried in good faith to negotiate a retirement settlement with a succession of five different attorneys representing the Shimanos. Progress has been quite slow, and we have been required to keep these discussions confidential.

Then on January 3 of this year, through their newest attorney, the Shimanos filed a multi-million-dollar public lawsuit against the ZSS. We are profoundly disappointed in the court suit, but will continue to seek a settlement that supports our non-profit financial responsibilities appropriately. Litigation is a very expensive process; we intend to finance a defense that protects the mission and well-being of the ZSS in a manner guided by Board Best Practices and non-profit standards.

As a result of this filing of a public lawsuit, confidentiality has been lost. We are now able to share more information on how we have moved to address Eido Roshi’s ethical misconduct and negotiate our financial responsibilities to him. The details about the lawsuit and the history of our financial negotiations with the Shimanos are as follows:

The lawsuit filed by the Shimanos in January of this year charges ZSS with discontinuing to pay them according to a Deferred Compensation Agreement (DCA), which Eido Roshi presented to the Board in December 2010, when he was about to retire. Although the DCA had been written in 1995, it wasn’t signed until the year 2000 (by then-Vice Abbot and Board President Jiro Fernando Afable). No financial planning to support the agreement was done, and no funds were ever put aside for it by former Boards that were led by Eido Roshi. The DCA called for a pension of 70 percent of Eido Roshi’s and Aiho-san’s final year of salary, plus ongoing housing costs, life insurance, housing insurance, health insurance, phone, and utilities. The DCA mandated a four percent annual salary increase, and we anticipated that the annual costs other than salary would increase proportionately, if not at a higher rate. One of our projections showed DCA expenses would exceed $1.8 million dollars over the first fifteen years (starting in 2011). The DCA is for life, though, so the duration and total payments could not be known with any degree of certainty. The Board made monthly payments to the Shimanos during 2011 and most of 2012, while attempting to restructure the unfunded DCA into something more manageable. In 2011, direct payments to the Shimanos and other costs associated with support of the DCA totaled $98,534.57. Note: Sangha donations were not used for those payments; they have been used only for operating costs at our two facilities. During this period, we communicated to Eido Roshi on numerous occasions our concern regarding the lack of funding for the DCA.
In addition, there are serious issues concerning both the validity of the DCA and whether it is appropriate to make payments under the DCA when Eido Roshi may be liable to the Society for actions he has taken that have harmed the Society. In August 2012, we were advised to discontinue pension payments to the Shimanos until a settlement could be reached through legal negotiations. We are continuing to pay their health insurance premiums. In December of 2012, the ZSS Board advanced a proposal for binding arbitration to decide a fair settlement. On January 3, 2013, the Shimanos rejected arbitration, and brought a multi-million-dollar lawsuit against the Zen Studies Society that includes a demand to pay the DCA in full as well as actual and punitive damages regarding their claim of ownership of buddhas, gongs, scrolls, and other items required for daily practice at the ZSS’s centers.

We wish to share additional information about how the ZSS Board has addressed Eido Roshi’s ethical misconduct:

In September 2010, the ZSS Board turned to the Faith/Trust Institute (FTI) for professional guidance in responding to Eido Roshi’s sexual misconduct. In early September of that year, FTI led a meeting with Eido Roshi and the Board, as well as with the Sangha and the Board, at New York Zendo Shobo-ji. Their recommendations were: 1) that Eido Roshi end his tenure as Abbot; 2) that any students who wished to study with him could do so, but not under ZSS auspices; 3) that he make a public apology acknowledging his misconduct and his regret for harm done to ZSS; 4) that a formal financial audit for ZSS be undertaken; 5) that new ZSS leadership consult with Zen colleagues who had gone through similar restructuring to address misconduct issues; and 6) that the Board read Marilyn R. Peterson’s At Personal Risk: Boundary Violations in Professional-Client Relationships. All of these recommendations were followed (see below for a progress report on the audit process). Regarding Point 3, Eido Roshi did send an open letter of apology to the Sangha following the FTI meetings in September. However, many members had left after the 2010 announcement of the teacher-student affair, never to return. ZSS fundraising and sesshin attendance were badly affected by the negative publicity involving that most recent incident and the accompanying renewed attention to past allegations of sexual misconduct. In December 2010, Eido Roshi wrote a letter to The New York Times that accused Mark Oppenheimer, the journalist who wrote an article about the teacher-student affair that Eido Roshi himself had previously openly acknowledged, of “obtaining his information from second and third-hand sources.” In this letter, Eido Roshi stated, “the opinions expressed therein are neither factual nor backed up by proof,” adding, “I have not resigned because of these false accusations.” His letter to the Times, while not published there, found its way to the Internet, resulting in a further deterioration of the ZSS’s reputation in the Buddhist community at large and in a huge wave of letters to the ZSS Board (many in the form of open letters published on the Internet) calling for Eido Roshi’s immediate removal. As a result of these developments, Eido Roshi was asked not to participate in sesshins at DBZ or Shobo-ji, and the Board established a restricted access policy for him: visits were to be made only when necessary, and required a formal request and approval as well as supervision by a Board member or designated person. We did not wish to put any student at risk, and furthermore we had been advised that his unsupervised presence would be an insurance liability for the Society. In May 2011, Board members held a meeting with Eido Roshi mediated by the founder of An Olive Branch to discuss allegations of sexual misconduct and a way forward. The Board wished to acknowledge problems and address them. Eido Roshi refused to work further with the Board on this topic. At the end of August 2011, Shinge Roshi hosted an Open Sangha meeting, facilitated by An Olive Branch, at Dai Bosatsu Zendo. The goal was to address openly all concerns and issues, acknowledge past failures, and to seek Sangha feedback on how best to move forward. A historical timeline of ZSS events was presented, developed, and discussed. Attendees had the opportunity to bring up any and all issues of ethical misconduct. During his meeting many instances of affairs between Eido Roshi and his students over the years were referenced. In October 2011, Shinge Roshi wrote an open letter of apology, saying, “In the weeks since our Sangha Weekend facilitated by An Olive Branch, I know we have been feeling deeply saddened by what we heard. I want to express my sorrow for those harmed by affairs with their teacher, for the many who have suffered feelings of betrayal and disillusionment, and for the ensuing bitterness and divisiveness that have occurred”. In January 2012, new members with professional non-profit experience joined the ZSS Board. Three facilitators from An Olive Branch led the Board in a Non-Profit Best Practices weekend retreat at Dai Bosatsu Zendo in August 2012, and in an all-day Mission, Vision, Values retreat at New York Zendo in October 2012.

In addition, regarding current ZSS finances, ZSS board representatives met with Citrin Cooperman, an audit firm, in October 2012 to review ZSS financial procedures for 2011 to ensure that ZSS employs Best Practices in its accounting processes. We have retained Citrin Cooperman to conduct an audit of the 2012 books. We are also working closely with Veris Consulting, a specialist in non-profit accounting, on improving our system and procedures. Additionally, during the past two years the Board has engaged Goetz Fitzpatrick, LLC and the Law Offices of Eric Grannis to ensure that the Board maintains the highest fiduciary standards.

The events of these past few years have caused serious blows to our ability to raise the funds necessary for the continued operation of our temples. As a result, even discounting the financial liability of having to defend the Society from the Shimanos’ litigation, we are now considering whether the sale of assets may be necessary. Please be assured, however, that we are doing everything possible to insure that our centers will weather these challenges and go on to a bright and vibrant future.

Despite our present difficulties, there is great enthusiasm for the practice at both New York Zendo Shobo-ji and Dai Bosatsu Zendo Kongo-ji. We just finished a dynamic and restorative Martin Luther King Jr. Weekend Sesshin at Shobo-ji, with 30 participants. Many of the 33 students who participated in December’s Rohatsu Sesshin at DBZ said it was one of the best they had ever attended. We had an excellent group of fifteen residents during our last training period at DBZ, with three ordinations; nine students will be receiving the Precepts on the last day of Holy Days Sesshin this April.

We humbly request the continuing support and counsel of the Sangha. We will keep you updated as we continue to do our best to uphold our ethical, administrative, and fiduciary responsibilities to the Zen Studies Society.We wish you good health and happiness in the New Year. May 2013 bring a peaceful resolution and ever-deepening practice.

Let True Dharma Continue!

Gassho,

The Zen Studies Society Board of Directors:
Shinge Roko Sherry Chayat, Abbot

Soun Joe Dowling, President

Shoteki Chris Phelan, Vice President

Shinkon Peter Glynn, Treasurer

Jikyo Bonnie Shoultz, Secretary

Hokuto Dan Diffin

Tamon Jeff Hovden

Genno Linda King

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Thai society rediscovers the values of the Buddha to combat materialism and economic crisis

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Bangkok, Thailand -- In June, celebrations were held to commemorate 2600 years of illumination of the "Awakened One". In a conference, hundreds of faithful, monks and nuns discuss the value of faith and the challenges of modernity. The risks of globalization, promoting an education system capable of forming good citizens.

Against the materialism prevalent in society, the obsessive search for money, worldly possessions and the pervasive spiritual crisis, Thai Buddhists state that "the path to enlightenment" indicated by the "awakened" is the only way to create "a world of peace."

Coinciding with the celebrations for Buddha's enlightenment 2600 years, better known as "Buddha Chayatee (BC)," the faithful wanted to promote meetings and events aimed at reinforcing the centrality of faith and religion in the life of the nation. Even Thailand, in fact, in recent years has promoted a politics focused on economics, personal success, while neglecting the spiritual and religious element.

The scandals that have hit some monasteries and leading figures of Buddhism has emphasised local fractures and increased dropouts. For groups and individuals that seek to raise the value of religion, the teachings of Buddha are still essential for peace and harmony locally and internationally.

From June 4 to 30 across Thailand events and commemorations of the 2600 remember the enlightenment of Buddha were held. On the final day, the "Public Stage" movement opened a meeting at Buddhamondhol Buddhist Center in Bangkok, attended by hundreds of people, including monks, nuns and faithful.

At the heart of the encounter, the value of religion past and present, along with ways to encourage and promote Buddhism in Thai society. The role of schools and educational establishments need to be stepped up however, called to promote among students the teachings of the Buddha and their value for contemporary life.

62.8 million people live in Thailand, of which 10 million are concentrated in Bangkok. The vast majority, almost 95% profess Buddhism, while 4% are Muslims (especially in the south) and 1% Christian, of which 300 thousand Catholics. For this reason the country is still considered the world centre of religion, with over 33 thousand monasteries and institutes across the area, even if it is going through a period of deep crisis in vocations and practice of worship.

For famous columnist Somchai Preeechasilp the cause lies in a growing materialism, combined with the severe economic crisis. Globalization, he said, poses challenges to the principles of Buddhism, to the values and morals that people should use concretely strengthen their spirituality.

Prapapatra Niyom, director of the Buddhist Path School (BPS), explains that the institutions are responsible for developing all aspects of the person in the students: physical, mental, emotional and social. It has launched a pre-school for children, with the aim of forming children who are educated and formed and able to best represent the future of the nation. From an early age pupils are called to recite morning prayers, meditate on the teachings of the Buddha for at least five minutes a day and use it as a maximum in the resolution of everyday problems.

As is the case with little Saifon, whose name means "drop of rain", blind since birth, but who has wanted to be "illuminated" by following the example of the "master". A college student named Yarnapatra Yodkaew finally remembers that every good Buddhist faithful must develop three characteristics: discipline in preserving the teachings of the enlightened, the search of solitude for personal meditation and intelligence to understand the way forward when called to address a problem or a challenge.

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Asia Society Exhibit Explores Pakistan's Buddhist Past

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Buddhism may not come to mind these days when people think of Pakistani culture, but that religion's practice and philosophy was prevalent in the kingdom of Gandhara, which was centered in present-day Peshawar. A new exhibit at the Asia Society in New York, "The Buddhist Heritage of Pakistan: Art of Gandhara," is the first American show in decades to examine works from this chapter of Pakistani history, featuring objects that illustrate the artistic flourishing that occurred there from the first century B.C.E. to the fifth C.E.

Sculptures, reliefs, columns and decorative artifacts serve as both art and as historical items, and their aesthetics reference the Buddhism that took root in Gandhara, as well as Greek, South Asian and other influences that contributed to the region's society. The religion grew in importance in Pakistan as the result of trade along the Silk Road and greater exposure to East Asia. Contact with other societies and periods of great support for artists created significant and dramatic works of art.

But while the artifacts in question are the product of fluid and mobile cultural exchange, today these pieces rarely travel. The last time Gandharan art traveled to the United States was 1960, when Asia Society held a similar exhibit.

And this time, getting the objects to the United States took longer than expected. The exhibit opened in August after months of delay, the result of bureaucratic breakdown at a period of rocky US-Pakistani relations. Communication troubles between national and local governments within Pakistan and an eventual devolution of Asia Society's case meant that Chiu and the institute had to make additional requests and visits to ensure that the exhibit would open at all. Trips to Karachi and Lahore took place during periods when the State Department issued strong travel advisories for Pakistan, and at times coincided with public contention between the United States and Pakistani governments about anti-terrorism initiatives in the region.

"I traveled there on a number of occasions, and certainly security is an issue when you travel to Pakistan," says Chiu. "I would say that one of the more difficult things for us was not so much me going to Pakistan, but actually getting the Pakistani representatives from museums U.S. visas to come to New York!"

Representations of the Buddha are central to both the study of Gandhara and to its art. Buddhas and bodhisattvas have their own section in the exhibit and their diversity is striking. Many figures are swathed in drapes, like Grecian figures, but reflect South Asian influences as well. Many show the Buddha as a full-bodied, richly detailed person, a significant departure from earlier depictions of the religious figure.

"Prior to this, the Buddha was represented symbolically, either through his footprint or a parasol or other representation," says Chiu. "This is really an occasion where we can see the Buddha as a human being in art."

Like these statues that influenced other depictions of the Buddha -- as well as Buddhist ideology -- across Asia, Chiu believes that this show may offer Americans some influence in understanding Pakistan's diverse history.

"This is a really unique opportunity for people to see these fantastic cultural treasures that have come all the way from Pakistan that probably will not leave the country for many decades to come," she says. "They also offer us a glimpse to another side of Pakistan, to a much earlier Buddhist culture, when this part of the world was very pluralistic and Buddhist culture was all about a great deal of tolerance."

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