Singing and Dancing Are the Voice of the Law

A Commentary on Hakuin's “Song of Zazen”

Busshō Lahn

Paperback
978-1-948626-78-1
US $18.00 Indiepubs Bookshop Amazon
eBook available
December 2022

“This is one of the best books on Zen and Zen practice that I have read in years. Busshō uses a well-known Zen song/poem to elucidate the key features of Zen meditation, practice and life….It brings the famous Zen master’s teaching alive while also showing how it is relevant to Zen practice in the 21st century." —Tim Burkett, author of Nothing Holy About It and Zen in the Age of Anxiety

Foreword Book of the Year Finalist (Nonfiction: Religion)

Singing and Dancing Are the Voice of the Law introduces us to one of the great works of Zen literature, “The Song of Zazen.” Zen teacher Busshō Lahn illuminates Hakuin’s enigmatic poem in plain language, unpacking it and applying it to contemporary life. His book offers a wealth of information on the context and content of this eighteenth-century work, clearly evoking its themes of abiding wisdom, meditation, compassionate self-regard, and our own everyday life’s potential to express deep spiritual truth.

Short stanza by short stanza, this exceptionally readable and deeply engaging book shows how the poem’s teachings and invitations are as applicable now as they were when they were first written nearly three centuries ago. Lahn offers readers an intuitive and progressive path of exploration of their spiritual lives, regardless of their faith tradition.

Busshō Lahn is a Zen teacher who leads the Flying Cloud Zen community and is a senior priest at Minnesota Zen Meditation Center. He is also a speaker, retreat leader, and spiritual director. Busshō sees his tradition through a modern but reverent lens, believing that the heart of Zen is accessible to all who seek it. His work imbues secular psychological understanding with needed spirituality and traditional Buddhist material with needed freshness. You can learn more about Busshō at www.flyingcloudzen.org.

“Busshō Lahn has a flair for metaphor, anecdote, and the one-sentence paragraph. He also has a deft way of holding the Zen tradition, including its formality and ritual: lightly, with real appreciation and understanding born of experience, but without even an ounce of piety. You’ll have so much fun reading this book you’ll forget how inspiring it is.” —Norman Fischer, Zen priest and author of When You Greet Me, I Bow: Notes and Reflections from a Life in Zen

“This is one of the best books on Zen and Zen practice that I have read in years. Busshō uses a well-known Zen song/poem to elucidate the key features of Zen meditation, practice and life….It brings the famous Zen master’s teaching alive while also showing how it is relevant to Zen practice in the 21st century.” —Tim Zentetsu Burkett, author of Nothing Holy About It and Zen in the Age of Anxiety

“A deeply personal invitation to dive into your life and awaken your heart of wisdom. With wit and insight, this book calls you into intimacy with yourself and into joyful, authentic, compassionate engagement with what is.” —Ben Connelly, Author of Inside the Grass Hut and Mindfulness and Intimacy

“In this engaging and insightful book, Busshō Lahn takes us on a deeply personal, and yet universally accessible and resonant journey through Zen practice, and our common spiritual humanity… Anyone interested in the spiritual path, whether they be Zen practitioners or not, will benefit greatly from reading this rich work.  Highly recommended.” —Rev. Seifu Singh-Molares, Executive Director, Spiritual Directors International

“'Don’t miss your life!' It is Busshō Lahn’s plea and invitation. This is not a Zen roadmap for your life. Rather, you are being offered a mirror. Look at your life—your suffering, your compassion, your wisdom, your sorrows and joys. Reflect upon your life through Lahn’s personal, humble, thoughtful and accessible introduction to the Song of Zazen. In so doing, you just may find delight in the one upon whom you gaze. Yes, and freedom and joy in sharing your life and love with others.” —Rev. Mark S. Hanson, Presiding Bishop Emeritus, Evangelical Lutheran Church in America

“At some point in reading this book, I stopped taking notes. Then, I stopped reading altogether and simply sat….Singing The Song of Zazen with Busshō Lahn is like surfacing a melody that’s been in your bones forever. You find yourself singing with a choirmaster who is wise, funny, surprising—and compassionate beyond measure. Just join the chorus.” —Martha E. Stortz, Professor of Religion, Augsburg University 

“Lahn invites readers along on a personal and practical journey – venturing from knowing to unknowing, from expert to beginner – towards utilizing the teachings and practices of Zen for not only those who practice it, but also for outsiders seeking deeper insight into the timeless and universal truth, meaning, purpose, connection, and love of the "beautiful, elegant, humble, and deeply wise tradition" of themselves.” —Hans Gustafson, Ph.D., Director, Jay Phillips Center for Interreligious Studies, University of St. Thomas

“Busshō Lahn’s Singing and Dancing Are the Voice of the Law offers an indelible contribution to our understanding of Zen—a wisdom tradition that has enriched my practice of Christianity for over thirty years. This playful and profound teacher doesn’t just write about Zen, he shows us Zen-ness.  Through his captivating personal stories, Busshō helps us to notice more of the realness and feel more of the rawness in our own experiences. He reminds us that the true test of Zen is what happens off the cushion. Highly recommended for all those who aspire to live with a beginner’s mind and a more compassionate heart.” —Diane M. Millis, PhD, author of Re-Creating a Life, Deepening Engagement, and Conversation—the Sacred Art

“This book is for me staggering in its depths of wisdom. As I plunged in, I realized not only the power of the words that Hakuin Ekaku’s poem carries, but more directly Busshō Lahn’s reflections that made them a living text… I’m deeply indebted to Busshō and this Buddhist wisdom text that brought my own journey closer to myself and my life’s experience, and to others as well.”  —Rev. Ward Bauman, Director, Episcopal House of Prayer, ret.

“Engaging and profound, Lahn’s insights will be much welcomed by readers looking to deepen their meditation practice. Although grounded in Zen Buddhist philosophy, the essence of his teachings will resonate with people of a variety of backgrounds.” —Library Journal

“This debut nonfiction book meditates on the nature of suffering using an 18th-century Buddhist poem. . . . Hakuin Ekaku was one of the great thinkers of Zen Buddhism, and his hymn ‘The Song of Zazen,’ composed around 1760, is a poetic encapsulation of his philosophy. ‘In his day, Hakuin was to Japanese Zen what the Beatles were to rock ’n’ roll in the 1960s,’ writes Lahn of the poet. . . . With this book, Lahn seeks to bring Hakuin’s poem to that wider audience, demystifying its sometimes-enigmatic verses and applying them to his own modern concerns. It is an unexpectedly breezy work, and Lahn is correct that one need not be a Buddhist to appreciate the simple, if unintuitive, wisdom that Hakuin and his poem offer.” —Kirkus Reviews