Great Jukai: Ceremony of Love, Family, and Dedication

Earlier this evening, I was in a Hell Realm with my good friend Frank Villone. Red faced demons, black faced demons, and blue faced demons peered out at me through the tight, smoky passageway. Haunting music was playing relentlessly. I turned a corner, and was confronted with images of starving, tortured, mutilated, and dying beings. Breath came short and skin crawled. I wanted out of there.
Together we traveled through the walkway of the Zen Center in Rochester, New York, which was set up to vividly represent the six realms of unenlightened existence. Each realm revealed to our senses the defilements, suffering, and impermanent nature of the world in which we live.

This is Great Jukai, the most sacred of Buddhist ceremonies that a lay practitioner will ever participate in, it only happens every three years, and the hell realm is just the beginning. I have been a member of the Rochester Zen Center for almost six years, and so this is only my second time participating in a Great Jukai ceremony.

“In Buddhism, traditionally we talk about different realms, or levels, of unenlightened existence,” explained Roshi Bodhin Kjolhede, the abbot of the Zen Center. “You could say that before reaching Buddhahood, or enlightenment, we must all ascend through these six realms. We use our covered walkway to lay out images and music representing these six realms, so that en route to the Buddha Hall for the Great Jukai ceremony we have to go through these—it represents our spiritual evolution through these different realms.”

The gentle touch of Frank’s hand on my shoulder gave me the strength to continue on into the next realm. In our hands we clutched the klesa papers that had been given to us as we entered the tunnel; on these papers were the symbols for greed, anger, and delusion, the three poisons that estrange us from our intrinsically pure nature.

Unfortunately, the suffering in the next realm, that of hungry ghosts and thirsty spirits, was not less than that of the hell realm, just different. Gloved hands reached out of the walls, grabbing for my legs; starved beings seemed to moan from every direction; the blank and empty gaze of addicts penetrated into my awareness.


But the animal realm that came next felt desperate and frightening. Bullet shells were scattered everywhere, traps lay hidden, and the elusiveness of food and nourishment seemed tangible.

“How are you doing, Laura?” Frank asked. “Are you ready to move on?”

I inhaled, looked around, hearing the sounds of gunshots and screeching, and nodded. I knew what came next; this was no time to be timid.



For next came the realm of asuras, the fighting titans who represent the competitive, destructive, and warlike impulses within us. Images of warfare, wealth, consumption, and hatred reflected into me, and I felt the sadness and separation that lay beneath my desires for success and security.


The human realm included pictures of elderly, sick, and dying people interspersed with pictures of people embracing and images of tenderness and connection between children and their elders. A sign hung from the rafters of the walkway that read “The human realm provides the most advantageous foundation to attain Buddhahood. But: 1. Rare is birth as a human being, 2. Scarce is the probability of hearing the Dharma, and 3. Serious is the delusion of our mind,” a succinct reminder of the deeply precious nature of life and the human bodymind.

“There are different ways of looking at all of these realms, and different ways of articulating the essence of it,” said Roshi. “One way of looking at the human realm is that it is a realm of dualism, dilemma, and choice. Animals, people in hellish realms, people in states of addiction and craving—they don’t have the same element of choice…. The human realm is where we can exercise our wisdom in making choices that do not cause unnecessary suffering.”

“The Buddha said that another way of looking at the human predicament,” continued Roshi, “is that of being caught between desires and aversions, our likes and our dislikes… There is a great German saying that ‘whoever has choice has pain.’”


From the human realm, we moved into the sixth realm of unenlightened existence, the heavenly realm, the realm of devas. It often seems curious to people who grew up in an Abrahamic religion that heavenly realms are considered deeply dangerous for those with spiritual aspirations, for the overwhelming comfort can lead to complacency in the face of the suffering of others.

“The deva realm means any existence of comfort or privilege or pleasure, such as being wealthy, beautiful or admired-- when everything is going so well, when there is so much comfort and adoration, it can be more difficult to see into the impermanent nature of things,” said Roshi.



“So, great, you reach a deva realm, you become a wealthy financier of some sort who has houses in the Hamptons and Miami and so forth, and there is then little incentive usually to practice [meditation]. I haven’t heard of people in these kind of deva realms who practice with the rigor of the dharma. It’s true that when you’re in pain, when you’re in a hellish realm, there is more dukkha, more dissatisfaction, more motivation to try to get out of that, to transcend that, but when you’re adrift in pleasure, well, eventually, that becomes hell too.”

After moving through the misty rose light, clouds, and beautiful beings floating in the deva realm, we exited the covered walkway. We stood outside the Buddha Hall under the echoing crisp winter sky. A stone Buddha just sat in the garden, steady and patient and still.

As we entered the Buddha Hall, we removed our shoes and hung our jackets up in the coat room. The air was fresh with light, woody incense, and the deep pounding of the mokugyo-- the large, round wooden percussion instrument that sets the rhythm of our chanting-- was clearly audible, even though it was being played on the upper level of the building. The Ten Verse Kannon Sutra, a chant dedicated to the bodhisattva of compassion, was being chanted by the ninety-some people slowly making their way up the stairs.

Kanzeon, praise to Buddha, All are one with Buddha, all awake to Buddha, the voices of all people joined into one voice, Buddha, Dharma, Sangha, Eternal, joyous, selfless, pure, and it was so easy to feel that way as the chant continued and I slowly, one step at a time, waiting, chanting, being, listening, This moment arises from mind, this moment itself is mind.


After we reached the top of the staircase, Frank and I walked down the aisle towards the altar, embraced by the chants of those who had already taken their seats. We deposited our klesa papers in a bowl at the altar, did a prostration before the Buddha statue, and walked around the circumference of the room before taking our seats on two cushions towards the back of the room.

Jukai is formed from two Japanese words, ju (which means both to give and to receive) and kai (which means precepts).

“The precepts are the morality leg of the tripod of what we call the three essentials of the practice of Buddhism-- the precepts (or morality), meditation (what we call zazen), and wisdom (or prajna),” continued Roshi. “I see upholding the precepts as a way to stop hurting other people and oneself.”

“This goes more to the core of it than looking at morality in terms of right and wrong. Right and wrong I see as just an overlay, a western religious overlay. You don’t need to frame things in terms of right and wrong, all you have to know is whether it causes suffering or not.”

“This is not just a technical, semantic difference-- the right and wrong thing is a judgment that doesn’t need to be there-- it has an absolutist quality to it. We don’t need to go that far. We just need to know whether an action or speech, both of which originate out of thoughts, whether these things cause suffering or not.”

“Giving and receiving are two sides of the same coin-- if you are really giving with a full heart, then you are always receiving-- you cannot give without receiving if the giving is pure, genuine and sincere-- the giving and receiving are like the breath. So, technically, you could say that student who goes to the Jukai ceremony is receiving the precepts, but they are also very much giving to me as the teacher by being able to, in this formal way, usher themselves into the Buddha’s family.”

After everyone had gone to the altar and made their way around to their seat, we sat together in silence before Roshi ascended into the Buddha Hall and prostrated before the altar. After he had taken his seat, the quietude settled around us before the voice of Roshi, gentle and low, introduced the Repentance Gatta:

“We ask the Buddhas and bodhisattvas, who have realized enlightenment, to have compassion for us, to help free us from obstructive suffering, the legacy of our past lives, and to help us share in the merit power that fills the countless worlds. The Buddhas and bodhisattvas in the past were like us, and we will in the future become Buddhas and bodhisattvas,” a gentle reminder of our origins, attachments, and the potential that grows from them.

And then, with one voice, almost one hundred people said together: “All evil actions committed by me since time immemorial, stemming from greed, anger and delusion, arising from body, speech and mind, I now repent having committed.” It is said 9 times in all, deeper each time, and there were tears on my face by the fifth. The air seemed to shine when we again fell into an awakened silence.

Following the repentance, the klesa papers were burned ceremoniously in a metal urn. The flickering of the flames shone off of our faces, and the heavy smell of smoke hung for only a minute before dispersing, lightened, towards the full moon shining in through the windows.

“All of this is a way to embody the meaning of all of this,” said Roshi. “It’s one thing to think about and to talk about it, but to enact it through this drama of picking up the paper, going through the tunnel, ascending into the Buddha Hall, doing a prostration, putting the paper in the bowl and seeing and hearing the paper burn is very dramatic in the silence of the Buddha Hall.”

Next, we recited the 16 precepts that lay practitioners of Buddhism vow to live in accordance with. “The taking of the precepts themselves is another way of embodying them,” said Roshi. “When you have to articulate them, you engage the lips and the tongue and the throat and the larynx and so forth; when you have to engage all of these aspects physically, then it goes deeper than by just thinking about it.”

We say all 16 of the precepts three times each, the energy of compassion and dedication pulsing tangibly in the air. “We do it three times each to hammer it in deeper each time,” said Roshi. “Hopefully by the third time there will be some deeper attention being brought to it.”

The ceremony ends with the Return of Merit. The lead chanter sounds the echoing toned kesu, a large low ringing bowl-shaped bell, while chanting deeply, Homage to all Buddhas and Bodhissatvas. Homage to the living Buddha in the ten directions. Homage to the living dharma in the ten directions. Homage to the living sangha in the ten directions. Buddhas and dharma ancestors have opened wide the gates of compassion; We enter the Buddha’s family. We now return the merit of out efforts to all beings in the ten directions. May all beings attain Buddhahood.

The Return of Merit is a grounding reminder that we take these vows not so that we can feel proud of being such good, moral people, but in order to avoid causing unnecessary suffering in the lives of all beings.

We walked back down the stairs, lighter and different than when we had entered an hour earlier, smiling and loving each other. Frank and I didn’t talk as we put our shoes and jackets back on. Outside in the cold air, we exchanged hugs and laughter with the dozens of glowing people standing in the clear western New York night.

I walked down the curving brick walkway of the garden back to the main building of the Zen Center. I had a cup of tea and a gallon of conversation before I headed towards bed.


The following day, I drove back home to Indiana. I left while the sky was still dark in the east, but it shifted into shades of indigo blue, and then purple, and then pink, as the light stretched to catch up with the rising sun.

It was in this iridescently changing light that I saw the deer. He was dead and strapped to the top of a brown Grand Cherokee. Although his legs were bound together, his head was nodding and bouncing in the rush of wind that flowed over the vehicle moving at 70 mph. His tongue was sticking out, and it flapped at me hauntingly as I passed.

I thought about what the deer’s last few moments must have been like, and contemplated the desperation for survival that pervades the animal realm. I felt the desire to chant, and remembered that I had recorded the previous night’s ceremony.

I plugged my digital recorder into my radio transmitter, and the sounds of the Ten Verse Kannon Sutra swelled through my car’s speakers. I chanted along, hoping to ease the pain of myself, the deer, the hunter, and all beings.

“The Buddha is quoted famously as saying, ‘I teach but two things, suffering and the end of suffering,’” Roshi said. It seemed to me, then and there at 8:00 am on the Pennsylvania Turnpike, dead deer in rearview mirror and chanting in my ears and throat, that that is all that the entire world is ever teaching us.

At one point, in between chants when nothing was being said, I realized that what I was not hearing through the silence of my volume turned all the way up was the sound of yesterday’s defilements crackling as they burned.

I was driving home from my visit home, and I felt at home as I moved at 72 mph down the sun-shadowed highway.

Giving Thanks and Buying Nothing

This Friday, November 23, there will be no new edition of The Oak Leaves as a result of Manchester College's Thanksgiving break.

Nevertheless, there is an even larger occurrence scheduled for November 23. I would like to encourage all of you to participate in the 15th annual Buy Nothing Day, which takes place each year on the day after Thanksgiving ("Black Friday"). This is a great opportunity to question the role of consumption and consumerism in your life.

Buy Nothing Day was started by the good people at Adbusters, which I unreservedly assert is one of the most innovative, intelligent, and politically pertinent magazines currently being published.

More information on Buy Nothing Day can be found at http://adbusters.org/metas/eco/bnd/view.php?id=403.

Carol J. Adams, Author of The Sexual Politics of Meat, Speaks at Manchester College

In her book The Pornography of Meat, Carol J. Adams reveals ways in which advertising and pornography have made inequality tasty, sexy and fun. We don’t see this inequality as anything wrong, she says, because we benefit from it. The dominant paradigm of inequality is at the root of violence against both women and animals.

On November 12, Adams presented her slide show on “The Sexual Politics of Meat.” Afterwards, she met with students for lunch and conversation .

“We live in a world of dominance,” Adams said. “In the western world, we are made to fit into a dualistic structure in which the dominant side is over and against the non-dominant ‘other’…. Women live in sexual objectification the way fish live in water. The water of sexual objectification is all around us.”

The environment of sexual objectification is created by “the male gaze,” which views women not as specific and unique individuals, but as consumable things that are “to be looked at and used.” This is synonymous, Adams said, with the way that the male gaze views animals.

“What is on the plate in front of us is not devoid of specificity; it is the dead flesh of what was once a living, feeling being,” Adams said. “The crucial point here is that we make someone who is a unique being into something that is the appropriate referent of a mass term. Mass terms signal the thingification of beings.”

According to Adams, the role of feminism is to intervene against inequality in order to create equality. She has certainly exerted a great deal of effort towards this goal in her own life. In the 1970s, she and her partner started to run a hotline for battered women.

A difficulty arose when it became necessary to find safe places for the women. When community support failed to rise to meet this opportunity to help, she decided that her home could serve as headquarters until volunteer participation increased.

She also intervenes against the inequality of species-ism through her choice to live a vegan life.

In the absence of the currently all-pervasive power dynamic that is created by advertisements and pornography, society would look much different than it does now. “For one thing, women would no longer die at the hands of their lovers,” Adams said, “and animals would not be slaughtered for food.”

It seems undeniable that that would certainly be an important indication of a more peaceful, less violent, and more just society.

Creating such a society would not be an easy task, because it will require that people collectively open themselves to the pain that has been caused and continues to exist. However, in the long run, the healing will be greater than the difficulty.

“Compassion is a renewable resource,” Adams said. “It is true that when we allow ourselves to be aware of the pain of others, there will be disappointment, anger and grief; but these will not kill us. We are better off feeling the compassion. Many people don’t recognize that it ultimately takes more work to protect yourself from the vulnerability and pain of caring than to just let yourself care.”

Although there is certainly merit in dedicating oneself to equal rights causes and/or a vegetarian lifestyle, one does not need to make such a large commitment in order to bring about positive change to the current conditions of inequality. “I’d like to see male college students call each other out when they objectify women, for them to become more deeply aware that the objectification exists and to recognize it for what it is,” Adams said, “and to begin to accept accountability,”

“I’d also like to see a world in which women feel safe,” Adams continued. “How do we think that there can be equality if there is not safety?”




(This article appeared in the November 16 edition of The Oak Leaves)

Moving up in the World of Science: A Look at the Glass Ceiling from a Different Angle

One could hardly imagine a less likely subject of campus controversy than the architectural configuration of the new Science Center.

However, many members of the Manchester College community have alleged that the staircase in the main foyer (the steps of which are made primarily of glass panels) was designed without proper sensitivity to female students and faculty members, and poses a risk that anyone wearing a skirt or a dress could be inadvertently putting themselves on display.

The MC Science Center was completed in the fall of 2005, after more than 13 years of planning and $17million in expenditures. Later that same year, it was awarded the ABC Award of Excellence by the Associated Builders and Contractors of Indiana. Nearly every detail of the building was considered in relation to both practical and aesthetic concerns.

Other than the glass stairs, that is. Although the treads (the horizontal surfaces that are walked on) are opaque, every vertical surface of the staircase is completely transparent. Although it is extraordinarily unlikely that anyone would ever be fully on display, the upward angle of sight available to those walking on the first floor poses a risk that a student on the stairs may be showing more than she intends to or is comfortable with.

The oversight is noticed and felt by many women in the MC community. “Yes, I have thought about those stairs before,” said Reaunna Murphy, an MC alumna from the class of 2006, “and I think it’s obvious that no one thought about all of the implications of making a staircase like that.”

“I agree that the staircase design was gender insensitive,” said Dagny Boebel, a former MC English and Gender Studies professor. “Actually, before the first faculty meeting in the new Science Center, female faculty members were warned NOT to walk up the stairs if they were wearing a skirt. I know that I have sometimes walked up or down wearing a skirt, but only when I have forgotten that this activity puts me on display.”

One consequence of the glass staircase is the impression that it makes upon prospective students. “Upon walking up to the Science Center stairs on my tour, one of the first things I thought was ‘Wow, thank goodness I didn’t wear a skirt!’” said first-year Becka Lee. “I wanted to make an impression, just not one of that sort.”

“No person should be subjected to being put on display in a manner that is outside of their control,” said Travis Rose, a frequent visitor to North Manchester and a current prospective student, “albeit even a minor one.”

Obviously, Lee decided to enroll at MC despite her observations regarding the
glass staircase. However, the comments of Lee and Rose illustrate the probability that other prospective students (not to mention their parents) have been keenly aware of the stairs’ transparency.

Not all members of the MC community agree that the staircase poses a problem. “In general, MC faculty had an above average amount of input into the design of the Science Center, and that includes four women,” said chemistry professor Dr. Terrie Salupo-Bryant. “The glass staircase is in keeping with the glass design throughout the building, and my opinion is that it looks much better that way.”

Defenders of the staircase design pointed out that the area directly under the stairs is barred off. However, this does not solve the problem, for two reasons.

Firstly, the bars are a mediocre deterrent at best. It is easy to get around the bars, as there is a sizable gap between the bars and the wall. Furthermore, I sat and stood in the barred off area on several occasions during the investigative process, which included a few passing periods. Although I am sure that I was seen by faculty members, not once was I confronted or asked to move.

Secondly, because the treads and the landing of the stairs are opaque, the angle that is the most worrisome is not from directly under the stairs, but from the heavily-trafficked areas slightly further from the staircase.

Opinions varied regarding the best way to respond to the design. The simplest way, many contend, is for students and faculty members to avoid wearing skirts and dresses on days when they may need to be in the Science Center.

“I expect that the administration would say that students are here to learn, not to be fashion icons,” said first-year Wendy Lude. “If students feel exposed [by climbing the Science Center’s stairs] while wearing skirts…. then they should simply not wear skirts.”

Others feel that it is unfair to ask students and faculty to be forced to either alter their attire or to find an alternative route to their classrooms, simply so that the foyer of a building can be aesthetically pleasing. It is also an insufficient remedy, for it doesn’t account for those who either have momentarily forgotten or have not yet considered the implications of the glass risers.

Unfortunately, many feel that it is unlikely that the college will actually do anything to change the situation: “I think if the administration had thought about female students and their skirts before the stairs went in, there would have been changes,” Murphy said. “As it is now, I doubt much will be done to help console upset female students.”

The solution most commonly proposed was for the glass risers to be frosted. This would be inexpensive and fairly simple to accomplish, and would preserve the aesthetic unity and openness of the Science Center’s lobby.

(published in Manchester College's weekly newspaper, The Oak Leaves, on November 9, 2007)

Outdoors in Indiana 7: Salamonie State Park and Reservoir

I am writing this week’s article in my notebook, sitting at a picnic bench in the Salamonie State Forest. The Salamonie Lake is glistening before me in the afternoon sun, and I’m wishing I had brought a picnic.

The Salamonie State Forest and Reservoir are only about a 30 minute drive from campus, which makes me wonder why I haven’t been here sooner.

The forest is huge, and there are two separate boat docks; one is on the Salamonie River and one is here, on the Salamonie Lake. Within the last week I have kayaked on both. For what it is worth, I preferred kayaking on the river, although the lake has a better vista. It is a windy day today, and I must say that kayaking into the wind (or worse, perpendicular to it) was a rather… interesting experience.

There are two entrances into the forest, one on Lost Bridge Road off of 105 and one off of 524. The Lost Bridge area, where I am currently writing, offers camping, boating, hiking, areas for picnicking, and snowmobile trail for use in the winter months.

The picnicking area here is, without hyperbole, sublime. There are several picnic tables, spaced several hundred feet part, each with its own grill. Most of these tables are long the crest of a hill that overlooks the lake, but there is one below me that is directly on the lake’s shoreline; it is only accessible by going down to the boat launching area and walking southeast along the shore about 400 yards.

Yesterday, I visited the area of the forest that is accessible off of 524. There, you can find horseback riding trails as well as a primitive horseman’s camp, hiking trails, primitive and family camping, and (as previously mentioned) a boat ramp onto the Salamonie River.

As I drove into that area of the forest, I noticed a sign marking the entrance onto the “Three Falls Trail.” This trail is not mentioned in the Salamonie State Forest map and info brochure, and sounded intriguing, so I decided to hike it after my kayaking adventure.

Kayaking down the river was a peaceful and invigorating experience. The only sounds were the “Gluck! Gluck! Gluck!” of my paddle entering the water and the “Tschhuhhh” of the wind blowing through the trees. It was the warmest day in over a week, and I worked up a bit of a sweat before returning to the dock.

I did learn a very important lesson, however; if you plan to be boating down a river in a westerly direction, don’t plan on doing it while the sun is setting. The light that gleams beautifully when filtered through the trees can become a bit blinding when reflected off of a body of water.

After I got the kayak strapped back on to the hood of my car, I went to the trailhead of the Three Falls Trail. I hiked through a beautiful stretch of forest, with a lovely open clearing along the way, before I heard the water.

And, after a slight curve in the trail, I saw the falls. They were rushing and white and bubbly and musical, and I couldn’t help but smile. The trail at that point travels alongside a drop off of about 100 feet, the river with its occasional rushing falls flows below it.

It had rained the day before, and the ground was soft underneath my shoes. The wind was still playing with the leaves, and the surroundings could not have been more beautiful. It was by far the nicest hiking trail that I have ever found in Indiana thus far.

All of this, a mere 22 miles from campus! The world is right outside your door... let's go!

(This article appeared in the November 16 edition of The Oak Leaves)