In This Body, In This Lifetime
By Sozen Nagasawa Roshi
Foreword by Paula Arai
Translated by Kogen Czarnik
Edited by Esho Sudan
Available for the first time in English, an intimate look into the private lives and spiritual experiences of 30 nuns and laywomen practicing under pioneering female Zen master Sozen Nagasawa Roshi in World War II-era Japan.
Born in 1888, Sozen Nagasawa Roshi was a pioneer of women’s monastic Zen practice in Japan. With a profound wish to become a nun from a young age, she persevered through the extreme social pressures and material difficulties facing women of her generation to become an abbess who trained hundreds of students (primarily women), won equal rights for Japanese nuns, and established organizations to support nuns and laywomen practitioners.
Known for her compassion and fierceness, Nagasawa Roshi used a rigorous koan practice to guide her students to kensho (enlightenment). As more and more students awakened, she asked them to write about their experiences. These stories were initially published in a Japanese magazine and subsequently compiled into a book published in Japan called Collection of Experiences in Zen Practice.
In This Body, In This Lifetime is a selection of 30 of these first-person accounts, exclusively from women and appearing for the first time in English. These stories offer an intimate look into the personal lives and spiritual determination of women who longed to end their suffering and awaken to their true nature despite the obstacles they faced.
A rare glimpse into Zen practice in World War II–era Japan, these inspiring women confront loss, grief, food shortages, air-raid sirens, and a cultural crisis with grit and courage as they persist in their efforts to end their suffering and the suffering of all.
"Inspiring, subtle—from whispers to shouts, the long-shuttered voices of deeply spiritual women, finally heard. These stories invite us to realize the power of the monastic form and its gift to every mind willing to stop and see, to enter the ineffable. Wonderfully uplifting and delightful read!" —Roshi Enkyo O'Hara, founder of Village Zendo in New York City and author of Most Intimate: A Zen Approach to Life's Challenges
"In This Body, In This Lifetime is an extraordinary personal account by thirty Japanese nuns and lay women of their Zen training under the guidance of the Abbess Sozen Nagasawa Roshi, mostly in intense sesshins held just after the second world war. It is a record of their incredible determination to break through the veils of dualistic ignorance and achieve kensho. Who said that women are the weaker sex? Each account resounds with the dragon’s roar of their total dedication beyond pain and exhaustion to awakening here and now. Mu Mu Mu. . . ." —Jetsunma Tenzin Palmo, author of Cave in the Snow and founder of Dongyu Gatsal Ling Nunnery
"The stories in In This Body, In This Lifetime will move and amaze you. They are about the transformations in the lives of ordinary women who practiced Zen wholeheartedly under the guidance of their wise, firm, and compassionate teacher, the Zen Abbess Sozen Nagasawa Ni-Roshi. The setting is post–war Japan, a time of cultural collapse, that echoes the present in many ways. Savor these stories for the hopeful resolve to face the future that they so simply and eloquently express." —Norman Fischer, Zen priest and poet, author of When You Greet Me I Bow and Selected Poems 1980-2013
"The Nun Roshi Nagasawa engaged in a tremendous struggle to revitalize female monastic practice in modern Japan. These testimonies of the torments and breakthrough-awakenings of her students, nuns, and laywomen are astonishing, inspiring, and especially meaningful now, given that about half of the hundreds of dharma-transmitted Zen masters in the Western world are female." —Kazuaki Tanahashi, author of Zen Chants
"In This Body, In This Lifetime is more than a book—it is a profound testament to thirty women who, under Sozen Nagasawa Roshi’s guidance, transcended patriarchy and war-torn Japan to awaken to their true selves. Reading their stories, I found myself in tears, deeply moved by their resilience and grace, and feeling an unshakable connection to my Japanese sisters. Their courage, resilience, and transformation echo the shared struggle to create space for women in Zen and beyond, reminding us of the enduring strength of women’s voices and the limitless possibilities of awakening, no matter the era or challenge." —Christie Chang, PhD, President of Sakyadhita Taiwan
"This is a marvel of a book on the awakening experiences of remarkable and courageous women in early 20th-century Japan. What determination and depth of practice we can be instructed by!" —Roshi Joan Halifax, Abbot, Upaya Zen Center