“Bringing the Tree Back to Asia”

A Story of Musangsa Temple

Editors’ Note: Musangsa, the home temple of the Kwan Um School of Zen, is hosting the thirteenth Whole World Is a Single Flower conference next year. For many of us, it will be an opportunity to come home and dive deeper into the dharma energy of Korea, where Zen Master Seung Sahn’s great wisdom was cultivated. 

For this occasion, we interviewed Zen Master Dae Bong, who has spent more than two decades of his life teaching at and supporting the growth and development of Musangsa. We hope this interview helps readers be touched by Zen Master Seung Sahn’s great vow.

The interview was conducted by Myong An Sunim JDPS and Bop Yo Sunim for Primary Point.

Primary Point: Could you please share with us what was the vow and vision of Zen Master Seung Sahn to build Musangsa?

Zen Master Dae Bong: Sometimes we would ask Dae Soen Sa Nim why he came to the West, and he would give different kinds of answers. One time he said, “Korean Buddhism is like an old tree. Difficult to grow new branches. So I cut a piece, take it to the West, plant it in this new soil, then another tree blooms, and then I take some of that and bring it back to Asia.” He said he realized even when he was a young monk that he could not teach the way he wanted to in Korea. Korean Buddhism is 1,700 years old, and its traditions and ideas are very strongly held. But modern society is changing very fast. If Korean Buddhism cannot also change, how will it be able to connect to modern Korean society?

So one idea he had was as I just said: take a piece of it, take it to the West where there’s no Buddhist tradition, and let it grow in a modern society. Nurture it and then bring some of that back to Asia. 

The last major project Zen Master Seung Sahn worked on during his life was creating Musangsa. He wanted our international school to be connected to the roots of our Zen practice, teaching in Korea and in Asia. He thought that was very important. If you have a tree, and if it doesn’t have roots, it won’t grow well and may die. So he wanted that connection to be strong. So he was cross-fertilizing Korean and Asian Buddhism, while at the same time developing and helping with many other Asian masters, helping Buddhist practice to grow in the West. Many purposes at once. Knocking many balls into the holes. This was his great vow.

I heard from Oh Jin Poep Sa Nim (Andrzej Stec), who was living at Musangsa in the early 2000s, that he one time asked Zen Master Seung Sahn, “Why are you making Musangsa?” Dae Soen Sa Nim said to him, “So our foreign teachers and students can come here, sit on this Korean mountain, experience the dharma energy of Korea and Gyeryongsan Mountain, and realize they are not finished.” Of course, all our teachers and students understand our job is life after life after life. We vow, “Sentient beings are numberless, we vow to save them all.” When all sentient beings are saved, we finish. Being able to practice here, get energy and go home, we can spread Buddhism with a stronger and wider mind.

Another time when asked, “Why did you come to the West?” he said, “In this world there are two kinds of hungry people: body hungry and mind hungry. Body hungry people cannot get enough food, so they suffer and die. They don’t hurt many people. Also we can take away their hunger easily by giving them food. Mind hungry people have enough, but want more, want more, want more. Mind hungry people make a lot of suffering for many, many beings. Rich countries have many mind hungry people. They make lots of suffering for others—for people, plants, animals, birds, fish, air, water, everything. So I will go to the West, teach dharma, and practice. I’ll teach them how to get enough mind and take away their mind hunger. Then helping each other and world peace is possible.” 

One time Zen Master Seung Sahn told me, “A good pool player hits a ball and it goes in the hole. A great pool player hits a ball, which hits another, and another, and another, and they all go in the holes.” Zen Master Seung Sahn had a purpose that hit all of our weaknesses and blind spots and helped everyone realize where we can be if we learn the buddhadharma and practice. We can open our hearts and minds and become wide beings. Then we can have lives and societies that are beneficial to everybody.

PP: How did this project appear?

ZMDB: When Zen Master Seung first came to the West, he stayed in America for several years, concentrating on his new American students. This must be where he felt the energy needed to be. After starting Providence Zen Center in 1972, he found students who established Zen centers in Cambridge, New York, and New Haven. New York, Harvard, and Yale were all well known in Korea, and thus significant places for Zen centers to be established. They each are also strong energy points in America, so that made much sense from that view, as well. There was also a strong Korean Buddhist presence in Los Angeles, and he was able to establish a Zen center there, and subsequently, in Berkeley. Until the fall of 1975, he spent approximately three months on the East Coast and three on the West Coast, initially. On the East Coast, his base was Providence Zen Center. On weekends, he'd alternate between Cambridge, New Haven, and New York to lead weekend Yong Maeng Jong Jin retreats. At one point, he spent more extended time in Cambridge to take English lessons at Harvard. On the West Coast, his base was in Los Angeles. Eventually, his travels extended to Chicago and Kansas, where Zen centers were established, and he had many more destinations during those months.

In the fall of 1975, he first returned to Korea with Mu Bul Sunim, Mu Gak Sunim, and Larry Rosenberg. They toured many temples, with a base at Hwagyesa Temple in Seoul, and then later that same season, the three American students began Kyol Che at Jonghyesa Temple, the Zen temple in the Sudoksa complex. Zen Master Seung Sahn returned to America at that point, continuing his travels here as before.

The next time he went to Korea was in 1978 with a much larger group of students from America and Europe to do a more extended tour of the temples there. This allowed his Western students to get a stronger flavor of our lineage’s Korean roots by being in the culture, seeing the major temples and strong practice venues among Zen Master Seung Sahn’s lay students, contemporary Zen masters, and practicing monastics. In the group were many of his senior students as well as other serious practitioners. This was their first taste of our tradition’s primary point, an essential part of our founder’s teaching.

In 1978, he was invited to Poland and Europe for the first time, and after that each year he began to stay one month in Europe, one month in Korea, and ten months in the United States. As his teaching in Europe developed and many Zen students and Zen centers began to appear, he spent more time in Europe and less time in the States, especially as some of his American students had become teachers. 

I remember around 1983 or ’84, he told the American Zen centers that he would let the Ji Do Poep Sas do the teaching, lead retreats, and give interviews in the United States. He would give more time to teaching in Europe. He had the great vision to train his local students in each country to make and run practicing places and to become the leaders and teachers, Ji Do Poep Sas, and, later, Zen masters. He also continued to bring students to Korea, including a few big trips, in 1978, 1980, and 1982. 

In 1984 he brought a group of Western sunims to Hwagyesa Temple and officially started the Seoul International Zen Center. They then held our first international three-month Zen retreat (Kyol Che) at Sudoksa Temple in 1984–85. For the next three years, we continued having the international winter retreat at Sudoksa. Also, the Seoul International Zen Center at Hwagyesa was open to anyone who wanted to practice in our Kwan Um School style. The Zen center was part of the Korean temple, had some of its own Kwan Um–style daily practice, and also interacted with the temple and the Korean monks and lay followers in numerous ways. 

After there were some changes at Sudoksa, we weren’t able to have our three-month winter retreat there anymore. At this time, Zen Master Seung Sahn actually asked the administrators of Sudoksa to build an international Zen center where he could send many people, but they decided not to.

So when they weren’t able to offer the winter Kyol Che there, Zen Master Seung Sahn spoke with his good dharma friend Byeok Am Kun Sunim at Shinwonsa Temple, and asked him if it would be possible to hold the international winter retreat there. Byeok Am Sunim agreed. We continued to have international winter retreats there for the next twelve years. I sat the first three retreats there and three others later, after I became a teacher. They were great! Everyone loved Shinwonsa and Byeok Am Kun Sunim. The retreats were very strong, quiet and focused. 

For the first retreat we had no teacher. Zen Master Seung Sahn came down in the beginning and in the end, and I believe Do An Sunim (now Zen Master Dae Kwang) was the head monk. We didn’t have kong-an interviews. But Byeok Am Sunim would come and teach us about correct temple behavior. We had monks, nuns, laywomen, and laymen all sharing one building. And that went on for twelve years.

Meanwhile, in 1988, he brought Mu Deung Sunim, who later became Zen Master Su Bong, to Asia full-time. Later, we began to also have the three-month summer retreat at Hwagyesa. At Hwagyesa we were in the middle of a busy temple, so it wasn’t quite as isolated and focused as the winter retreat.

In 1992, I became a Ji Do Peop Sa and in 1993, Zen Master Seung Sahn told me to come to Korea and help him and Zen Master Su Bong there. Su Bong Sunim was traveling often to Hong Kong, to Australia, to South Africa, and helping Dae Soen Sa Nim in Korea. Zen Master Seung Sahn sent me to Shinwonsa to lead the winter Kyol Che. 

We started having two winter retreats, one at Shinwonsa with no coming, no going, everyone stayed three months. And we had another one at Hwagyesa like our retreats usually are, where people can join for one week, two weeks, three weeks, and so on. We also held the summer retreat at Hwagyesa. This arrangement continued for quite a while. 

Sometime in the 1990s, Dae Seon Sa Nim realized that while he’s alive, he has the influence to allow us to be in a Korean temple and maintain our style of having the four Buddhist families (traditionally monks, nuns, laymen, and laywomen) live and practice together, even on retreats. But he thought the temple administrators would go back to the traditional ways if we were in a Korean temple after he passed away. So he decided that we needed to make our own international temple. This was the beginning of the efforts to get some land and build Musangsa.

I remember around 1996, when I was at Hwagyesa helping Dae Soen Sa Nim, after Su Bong Sunim passed away, he began saying “We must make our Zen center on the army land at Gyeryongsan Mountain!”

PP: How was it decided to pick the current location?

ZMDB: Zen Master Seung Sahn told Koreans that he had a dream in which the Gyeryongsan mountain spirit (traditionally pictured as an old man with a tiger) appeared and told him to build an international temple in Shindo-an. Shindo-an is the southeastern quarter of Gyeryongsan. Gyeryong Mountain is not the biggest mountain nor the most beautiful in Korea, but it is considered uniquely spiritual because of its unusual location and shape.

Zen Master Seung Sahn told us that a very old book in Korea predicted that in the future eight hundred great dharma teachers will appear from under Guk Sa Bong (National Teachers’ Peak) on Gyeryongsan, and then the mountain’s dharma light would spread all over the world.

Shindo-an has an interesting history. It is made up of two valleys, one below the main peak named Cheon Wang Bong (Heavenly King’s Peak), and the other below Guk Sa Bong. Originally, Shindo-an was chosen to be the capital of the Choson Dynasty in 1392 because of its powerful geomancy. But in 1394 it was decided that the capital would instead be a rice village on the Han River, which is now Seoul. Because of its powerful geomancy, it was declared that Shindo-an could only be rice farms, so as not to develop a town to rival Seoul.

Zen Master Seung Sahn really hoped and wanted to make available this possibility and opportunity to sit in a dharma land that had hosted dharma practice for 1,700 years. 

I remember driving down with Dae Soen Sa Nim a number of times to this area. It’s about 180 kilometers south of Seoul. We looked at pieces of land that were available to buy in Shindo-an, but he didn’t feel any of them were suitable. One time, we saw a piece of land that was quite nice on the mountain. It has quite peaceful energy, and now we actually own it. But when we were looking at this land, Zen Master Seung Sahn pointed to an adjacent piece of land and said that is the energy point below Guk Sa Bong. We were able to buy it and have since acquired the other piece as well.

PP: What was the construction process like?

ZMDB: We bought that land in 1999. In May of that year, he sent me down here with two Korean laymen and a construction crew, and the construction was started. We all lived in a hotel for a few weeks until two container boxes for the laymen and me and a temporary shelter for the construction crew were built. 

My container box had our “Buddha Hall” where I practiced. It was also where we received visitors, and it had a bedroom/office for me, and a shower. Our toilet was a typical construction-site plastic toilet. There was no kitchen. We ate every day in a tofu and rice restaurant in the village below our “temple.”

We made a deal with the restaurant in the village, and two of us ate over there three times a day, except when occasionally Zen Master Seung Sahn would take me to another place to eat. And we made another deal, so that they would come up and feed the construction workers, who lived in a little shack on the property, five times a day, because that’s how it works on Korean construction sites. Three meals, plus mid-morning and mid-afternoon snacks for the workers. Mid-morning was always juk (Korean porridge), mid-afternoon was noodles. I often joined the construction workers for the snack meals. We lived like that for eight months, through the summer, autumn, and winter. People started coming around and wanting to know what was going on. 

PP: What were the first years of Musangsa like after finishing construction? How did you get things going?

ZMDB: The first building that was completed was the meditation hall building, which includes a meditation hall with an altar on the second floor, and bedrooms and a tea room on the first floor. We used the meditation room in the same way that our Zen centers around the world use their dharma room. We did all our formal practice there—bowing, chanting, sitting, dharma talks, and formal meals.

In March of 2000 we had a big official opening ceremony, and a lot of our foreign monks and nuns came down from Hwagyesa and moved in. We turned my container box into the kitchen. We started practicing every day and followed a daily schedule of waking up at 3 a.m., bowing, chanting, and sitting, meals, work, and evening practice.

In the summertime we held our first three-month Kyol Che at Musangsa. That’s how we got going. A few years later, the dormitory building was completed with a floor for women and a floor for men. The first floor is the kitchen, pantry, dining room, and some bathrooms. The container box became our temple office. 

The last project Zen Master Seung Sahn oversaw during his life was the building of the Musangsa Buddha hall. I had a feeling that he was keeping his body going at least until that was done. And then when his body was truly finished, he went. For Musangsa, for me and perhaps for many of the people, we were ready to continue on our own at that point. 

I often wondered why Dae Seon Sa Nim had us build a separate Buddha hall from our dharma room. Our other Zen centers do all the formal practice in one room, but at Musangsa, we have daily chanting and sometimes dharma talks in the Buddha hall, and bowing, sitting, and other dharma talks in the meditation hall. He wanted us to have a wider view and experience that also understood and connected with the wide range of Buddhism in Asia, where it has grown and developed for 2,500 years.

Zen Master Seung Sahn taught us to be independent, like Bodhidharma, who went to a cave and meditated until his students appeared. Bodhidharma didn’t live in a Chinese temple. He didn’t ask the emperor to support him or build him a temple. He went and did something himself. We didn’t ask the Chogye Order or Hwagyesa to support us financially. We keep naturally appreciative relationships with them. I am grateful for the opportunity to live and practice in Korea, and that the roots of our Kwan Um teaching and practice come from and through Korean Buddhism and the 1,700 years of Korean sunims and laypeople who have kept it alive and share it with us. But we made Musangsa by ourselves, with the support from those who became our members and students, and anyone else who wants to help. Zen Master Seung Sahn impressed upon me that this was important, and I saw that is also how he lived. He had us make our Zen centers ourselves. For any project, he only asked his students to support it financially. He never went beyond his own students for support. His students might raise money from the general public in a style that fits their culture. For example, when we were building Musangsa, our Su Bong Zen Monastery in Hong Kong held a fundraising dinner that took many months to prepare. It was wonderful, and many Hong Kong Buddhists—who liked what Zen Master Su Bong was doing and who heard of Zen Master Seung Sahn and respected him—came to the dinner to support a good Buddhist cause. It was fantastic, fun, and it raised a lot of money. Sometime Primary Point should interview Zen Master Dae Kwan Sunim about it. Zen Master Seung Sahn attended and only gave a dharma talk. He didn’t talk about money at all. This taught me a lot about independence and the correct dharma way of a sunim.

Musangsa has an independent legal structure under Korean law as a nonprofit religious organization. And of course, we’re in a foreign country following their tradition and the developments made by Zen Master Seung Sahn. So making harmonious and smooth relations is essential. That is also our correct practice in any situation. Otherwise, why would they let us stay?

We have managed to be faithful to Zen Master Seung Sahn’s intentions, vision, and teaching, while keeping harmonious relationships with the people, country, and surrounding culture—and we’ve done it independently. 

In the years since Dae Seon Sa Nim left his body, somehow we have managed to survive and grow financially. Even some of our sunims have been shocked that we have been able to do it. I have to say sometimes I wonder too, “How do we do it?” 

I feel, for sure, that Zen Master Seung Sahn is still helping us. What has been my approach? Go straight, don’t know, for all beings. We practice sincerely, follow our school’s teaching, which includes making harmony with everybody in the society we’re in, appreciating our situation and each other, and having gratitude for this opportunity. And we try to manage things carefully and hopefully wisely. This helps us build up faith in ourselves and also faith in people around us.

PP: Could you please tell us what is unique about Musangsa?

ZMDB: Zen Master Seung Sahn wanted to bring the style that he and his students created in the West to Korea and Asia. This includes the monastics and laypeople living and practicing together, as well as our teaching and practice style, which connects well with modern life and society. We have been able to do so, and as time goes on, we’ve kept Zen Master Seung Sahn’s teachings and the Kwan Um School of Zen style, with some adaptations for living in a traditional Buddhist culture, for twenty-two years in Korea.

Another thing that is unique about Musangsa is that we have many lay and monastic non-Koreans coming here to practice, live, and run the temple. It is truly an international Zen center.

Also, most temples in Korea have a large, flat area in front of the Buddha hall. This gives people a comfortable feeling. But because of our location, Musangsa doesn’t have this feature. The land slopes quite sharply away in front of the Buddha hall. This is simply because we are on the side of the mountain. I have always felt the land here is a lot like Zen Master Seung Sahn’s energy: strong, with a clear direction. If you don’t practice strongly and sincerely here, you will sort of roll off the mountain, so to speak. If you let go of everything, practice sincerely, do your best to make harmony with the community, you can find your center inside and get fruitful results. I think Musangsa is developing in line with Zen Master Seung Sahn’s vow.

PP: Why did Zen Master Seung Sahn insist on having four Buddhist communities (monks, nuns, laymen, and laywomen) practicing together?

ZMDB: I talked with him about that. He said this is the way Buddha’s original community of students first practiced. He also said that there are two benefits to having the four Buddhist communities practicing together: first, individuals (and groups) are less likely to become arrogant, and second, everyone’s wisdom grows more quickly.

Occasionally a Korean monk or nun wants to come practice here. We talk with them about our style and a few of the differences in our retreats. Teachers may come who are laymen, laywomen, nuns, monks, and they need to bow to any of them and respect them. Also, laypeople may participate for less than three months, one week minimums, so some people may come and go. If the Korean monastics are open to this style, then they can join and try. Some have done very well. One Korean nun sat summer Kyol Che here. While she was here, she totally followed our situation, very smooth, very harmonious. I have visited her since and actually she is quite traditional. I asked her, “What was the best part of the retreat?” She said many people think only sunims could sit Zen retreats. That summer, some high school kids came and sat in the retreat for a week. She saw that the high school girls not only sat for one week, but they signed up for a second week as well, and they could do it fine. Seeing that really touched her. 

If you don't have those experiences, you don’t know. That’s why Zen Master Seung Sahn puts everybody together. It helps people not become arrogant and everyone learns to follow the temple situation. In Asia, many laypeople want to sit with monks and nuns if there is the opportunity. They want to practice with people who have given up the usual social life and devote themselves to living in groups, in communities, to dharma and to practicing. 

In our school, laypeople can live in Zen centers and temples too. This is rarely true in Asia. Most of our school’s centers have been started and run by laypeople. Practicing together is wonderful for both laypeople and monastics. Laypeople can get wisdom about things that sunims don’t have experience with, and sunims can learn about things that laypeople don’t know about. Zen Master Seung Sahn said the main difference is that sunims can do together action with others who want to practice all the time. And when laypeople have families and jobs, they cannot. That is the difference. The effort to attain our true nature, to uncover our true love, compassion, and wisdom, and help others is the same. Everyone’s wisdom can grow more quickly. That is the main reason Zen Master Seung Sahn emphasized the four Buddhist families practicing and supporting each other together.

PP: Did Zen Master Seung Sahn give you instructions on how to teach in Asian countries where Buddhism already existed?

ZMDB: One time I asked him “How to teach people in Asia?” He said “Same as we teach everybody!” Then I said “I know what you mean. But Buddhism in the West is about a hundred years old, and Buddhism in Asia is almost 2,500 years old.” 

Then he said, “Three things are very important. First, make clear what is Theravada Buddhism, what is Mahayana Buddhism, what is Zen Buddhism. Second, clarify what is meditation and what is wisdom. Third, make substance, truth, and function clear.” 

I use the Compass of Zen to share some of the basic teachings of Theravada, Mahayana and Zen: the three insights of Theravada, six insights of Mahayana, the one insight of Zen; the three practices of Theravada, the six paramitas of Mahayana, and what “cut off conceptual thinking” in Zen means. Zen Master Seung Sahn wrote the Compass of Zen so we would become familiar with teaching from these branches of Buddhism. 

Next, we have a wonderful teaching about meditation. When you’re doing something, just do it! The words are easy, but it is actually quite difficult to do. It is not our habit. This is wonderful teaching because it connects our practice and everyday life.

We teach that wisdom arises from don’t-know. Wisdom is the ability to become one and act harmoniously, to keep the correct situation, correct function, and correct relationship. 

And we make substance, truth, and function clear. This is a slightly different way to teach wisdom than has traditionally been taught. In the Tang dynasty, great masters talked about “essence and function.” I think Zen Master Seung Sahn separates substance (before-thinking nature), truth (see clearly, hear clearly, and so on), and function, because our experience moment-to-moment isn’t clear. 

When you look at the sky without thinking, you experience blue without the thought of “blue.” This is important—to be aware of the sensations of the eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, and mind. When we see and hear this way, without making I, it is purifying the senses. This is not an intellectual process.

For me, an important part of practice is realizing our hindrances, how we make something, what we make, and taking that away.

PP: Do you see how this teaching can spread and grow in the future?

ZMDB: Bodhidharma had four students, and a few generations later, his teaching and practice style spread all over China. Eventually, the Sixth Patriarch, Hui Neng, appeared, and Zen really became Chinese. I am sure that will happen with Zen Master Seung Sahn and the Kwan Um School of Zen teaching in the West. We only have to practice sincerely and strongly, make our direction clear, and slowly American style, Polish style, Mexican style, German style, Russian style Buddhism will appear. This is natural. And in each country, it will include more than just our school, because there are many types of Buddhism now being practiced by the people in each culture. I love the organic, alive way Zen Master Seung Sahn experienced and lived in the world. He didn’t make strict lines between things—between the Kwan Um School of Zen and Korean or Chinese Buddhism, between laypeople and sunims, between himself and others. He taught us to reflect back on ourselves, to have a big question and realize don’t-know, put down our I-my-me and help others. He allowed us and this world to grow naturally, organically. He taught anyone who appeared and knew if our direction becomes clear, and we are practicing sincerely, something wonderful will grow.