Dharma Class with Murshid Wali Ali Meyer
Sokei-an Sasaki was the Zen teacher from whom Samuel Lewis received the Dharma Transmission. Sasaki’s method was soul to soul communication, a meeting in the Buddha nature that is present but un-awakened in most of us.
Nyogen Senzaki was on the West Coast and Sam learned to perfect his skill in meditation and ability to unravel koans with him. Sam would meet Sasaki in 1931 in New York City a few months after this Zen Master opened his zendo. Both Sasaki and Senzaki were of the same direct lineage as Soyen Shaku who introduced Buddhism to America at the Chicago Exposition before the turn of the 20th century.
(Registered Students may scroll down, or click HERE to go to the Monthly class links!)
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The lineage of the Sufi Ruhaniat started by Samuel Lewis is blessed to have a deep strain of Buddhist transmission woven into its heart. There were little to no writings of Sokei-an available during Sam’s lifetime. Now they are available, and very inspiring. I think he gives the clearest exposition ever of Zen Buddhism and points the way directly to Buddhahood. Wali Ali studied this new material as part of the biography on Samuel Lewis that he is writing, and he was inspired to start a class on these teachings and practice.
The live class with Wali Ali included deeply absorbing Sokei-an’s teachings in his translation and commentary on “the Sutra of the 6th Patriarch”, his lectures embodied in a work called “The Zen Eye”, and his autobiography “Holding the Lotus to the Rock”. We meditated according to Sokei-an’s instructions, which include incorporating several basic ko-ans. As Sokeian liked to say “Everyone is welcome, and no one will be pursued if they leave.”
If interested in obtaining the recordings, please contact Barakat Bryan: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Each recording will contain the full class as presented, including the silent meditation periods for those who wish to follow along with the actual pace of the classes. With most meditation periods placed at the end of a track, one has the option to skip forward without missing the other teachings. The audio recordings may be downloaded to be listened to on your mp3 device, and the video recordings will play on YouTube.
Click HERE for the full Table of Contents of the classes in a pdf file (configured for 2-sided printing).
Registered students may use the links below to access the classes:
Classes 01-03 | Classes 04-07 | Classes 08-11
Classes 12-15 | Classes 16-20 | Classes 21-24
Classes 25-29 | Classes 30-31 | Classes 32-35
Classes 36-40 | Classes 41-43 | Classes 44-46
Classes 48-49 | Classes 50-53 | Classes 54-56
Classes 57-60 | Classes 61-66 |
In September and October of 2018, Murshid presented six more general Dharma Night Classes, with Buddhist and other Dharma tradition teachings mixed with Sufi practice as well:
Classes 67-69 | Classes 70-72