Inauguration Ceremony of Abbot Dingming at Wanfu Temple, Fuqing, China, Nov. 22 2019

I was honored to be invited to attend the inauguration ceremony for Ven. Dingming's 定明installation as a new abbot of the newly rebuilt Wanfu Monastery 萬福寺 on Nov. 22, 2019.  I presented a couplet to celebrate this event. This was also my second visit to Fuqing 福清 after eighteen years. For a detailed report, see https://www.ichanfeng.com/2019/21/22/32731.html.

Prof. Huang Pei's Letter

I am grateful to Prof. Huang Pei for sending this encouraging letter. It showed up from a pile of files.

1953 edition of The Development of Chinese Zen after the Sixth Patriarch by the First Zen Institute of America

A good friend gave me this previous book published by the First Zen Institute of America.

"Founded in 1930 the First Zen Institute of America is a non-profit religious organization that introduces Rinzai Zen to lay students, provides information on Zen Buddhism and on Zen Master Sokei-an Sasaki to the public through its publications and archives, and offers opportunities for Zen practice."

http://www.firstzen.org/

Correction of A mistake in My Article on Kawaguchi's Obaku canon in Nepal

Prof. Takayama Ryūzō 高山 龍三 has kindly pointed out a mistake in my article on the Obaku canon in a recent book on the Buddhist canon in modern East Asia. In page 9 of this article, (Wu 2017 "Finding the first Chinese Tripitaka in the West : Early European Buddhology, the 1872 Iwakura mission in Britain, and the mystery of the Obaku canon in the India office library ," in Jiang Wu and Greg Wilkinson (eds.) 『Reinventing the Tripitaka: Transformation of the Buddhist Canon in Modern East Asia.』3-39), I stated that there is no record about Kawaguchi's name in the Obaku canon accounting book (全蔵漸請千字文朱点). Actually, as Prof. Takayama pointed out, he has clearly stated about this in his paper and his book about Kawaguchi's travel in Nepal. Here is the reference of this paper and the relevant page.

高山龍三 1999 「河口慧海献上の蔵経を求めて―1998年ネパール報告」『黄檗文華』118号14-27 1999年 5月1日This paper was later included in 高山龍三 『河口慧海への旅―釈迦生誕地に巡礼した人々』勉誠出版 2011.

Kawaguchi's name was often recorded as 川口慧海 which I may have missed when I checked the accounting book. In addition, in an email to me (July 8, 2018), he listed the following notes about where we can find Kawaguchi's record in the Obaku canon accounting book:

01 朱点簿第2２番

02 慧海名記載以前の日付あり、明治35（1902）年

03~06 川口慧海購入の朱点（日付けなし）


07 慧海の次の購入者（明治37年11月、1904年 慧海第二回旅行は同年10月出国）

Jonathan Spence's 2007 Letter

I am grateful to the helps I received during the years from colleagues and senior scholars. I just found a letter from my files dated back to Jan. 9, 2007. Dr. Jonathan Spence's kind words encouraged me to continue my research as a junior scholar. He is truly a gentleman. He later wrote an elegant blurb for my book which I quote below.