Priest and Teacher Training in Living Vow Zen

Most practitioners of Zen are lay, but every so often, one might feel a deep call to service. Ordination, becoming a Zen priest, represents a heartfelt commitment to sangha service, the liturgical forms, Buddhist ethics, and a life of practice. Ordination vows are seen as life vows and should be approached with respect and some hesitation. 

In Living Vow Zen, there are some prerequisites to priest candidacy and an expectation that one will acquire certain competencies prior to ordination. Most essentially, the priesthood represents a commitment to live by the precepts, serve the sangha, and embody our tradition for the benefit of all beings.

Living Vow Zen's priest lineage has its roots in the Japanese Soto tradition through Peggy Houn Jiyu-Kennett, roshi, the first woman to be authorized to teach by the Soto school in Japan.

There are two levels of ordination, unsui (clouds and water) and osho (senior). In Living Vow Zen, to be initially ordained, unsui candidates must demonstrate a number of competencies. To review in general terms, these competencies include: pastoral skills; an ability to perform Zen ceremonies and forms; an understanding of Soto Zen; a capacity to meet people as they are; self awareness; leadership; public speaking; a priestly presence (hard to articulate but easy to recognize); and a means to support themselves with right livelihood. LiVZ also requires some retreat experience in other traditions and a minimum of 100 full days of sesshin. 

Before ordination, a committee reviews the candidates performance, holds the candidate's feet to the fire, and offers support along the way. Ordination is conferred by a LiVZ senior priest through the authority of her or his own ordination and precepts transmission, in consultation with the ordination committee and the Living Vow Zen Guiding Teachers Council. After ordination, unsui are supervised by, and serve under the authority of, their ordaining teachers and therefore must remain in shoken relationship with their ordaining teachers or another LiVZ senior priest in order to continue to serve as priests.



Unsui ordination represents a public vow to practice intensively, to offer pastoral and liturgical services, and to support the well-being of the sangha and all beings. It reflects a commitment and stability of heart and practice. Ordination publicly affirms the significance and prominence of the role of the dharma in one’s life, in the same way that a marriage ceremony might be said to publicly affirm a commitment and relationship to one’s long-time partner; as James Ford says, "nothing changes, and everything changes."



It is entirely possible and even likely that most priests would choose to remain unsuis for their entire lives. Not all priests are called to teach. To be an unsui is a noble calling to serve the dharma and sangha with one's deepest heartfelt commitment and no gaining idea. It is a pure and complete expression of the bodhisattva vow.


For those Zen students -- either ordained or lay -- for whom teaching might be a good fit, we offer supervised internships. In Living Vow Zen, being a priest is not a necessary step along the way to becoming a fully authorized Zen teacher. LiVZ does not privilege ordained over lay practice but views them as equally meaningful forms of practice in the West. Interns begin their teacher training as practice leaders. At some point, a practice leader might be granted permission to offer talks and eventually, when appropriate, dokusan. These permissions are granted incrementally by one's shoken teacher and may be rescinded at any time. 

After a practice leader has interned in teaching for five to ten years, if they demonstrate the inclination and capacity and if their shoken teacher deems it appropriate, their teacher may offer the first stage of dharma transmission (permission to teach independently). For one to receive this first stage of transmission, due to the associated teaching responsibilities, one must have attended many days of sesshin (guidelines below), demonstrated insight through koan study and other careful appraisals with one's shoken teacher, and demonstrated commitment and skill in teaching. Dharma transmissions are granted by fully transmitted teachers through the authority of their own transmission in recognition of experience, insight, and teaching competencies.

For a priest, the first stage of transmission is called denkai and confers the title "osho," or "senior priest." For a lay teacher, this stage of transmission is called "dharma entrustment" and confers the title "dharma holder." An osho may receive shoken students, offer the precepts, and ordain unsui, though they may not offer dharma transmission to dharma heirs until they have received the second stage of transmission. (A dharma holder has the same authorities as an osho, minus ordaining priests.)

Years later, an osho or dharma holder might also receive the second stage of transmission called denbo, or full transmission, if one's shoken teacher determines it fitting. In a sense the most important stage of transmission, at this time one receives the title of "sensei" and may offer transmission to dharma heirs and function as an entirely independent Zen teacher. 

The third stage or "final transmission" is called inka shōmei and confers the title "roshi," meaning "old teacher" or "master teacher." Inka shōmei, which means the "legitimate seal of clearly furnished proof," commemorates a Soto teacher who has given years of service and is also the traditional acknowledgment of mastery in the Rinzai tradition. My transmission in the Seon lineage traces its roots to Linji, the founder of both the Korean Seon and the Japanese Rinzai traditions. Inka shōmei in Living Vow Zen therefore commemorates our lineage roots in both the Soto and Linji traditions.

While titles, roles, and permissions in LiVZ as practice leaders and unsuis can be revoked by their shoken teachers, dharma transmissions and final ordination as an osho cannot be rescinded, though all spiritual leaders in LiVZ serve at the pleasure of the Guiding Teachers, just as the Guiding Teachers serve at the pleasure of the LiVZ Board of Trustees.

Some Soto Zen groups require a 90 day residential ango as part of senior priest formation. In Living Vow, we do not hold this expectation. There are many people who do not have the economic privilege to walk away from earning a living to complete extended periods of residential priest training. Many people have family members to support, be they elderly parents, partners, or children, some of whom may be ill. Many people only get a few weeks off from work each year, and we do not encourage them to forego familial responsibilities. I don't hold up as a model the historical Buddha's abandonment of his wife and child, but his wealth and privilege protected them from destitution. Not everyone is born a prince. Many of us long for a more diverse population of Soto practitioners in American convert sanghas, and the 90 day ango requirement can be an undue burden for those with family responsibilities.



James Ford, roshi, a former Soto Zen Buddhist Association board member, was central in developing Boundless Way Zen's ordination process through which I was trained. Living Vow Zen's guidelines for ordination are similar. Regarding ordination, James writes that some priests are fortunate enough to have the formal cloistered experience ranging from several years to ninety day retreats. When possible, this is encouraged. However, due to family and work commitments and a general lack of financial support for monastic practice, practitioners in the West experience the cloister more commonly by repeatedly attending sesshin, briefer but more intensive meditation retreats, over many years. Based on this vision of the cloister experience, in LiVZ we offer a path to priesthood that allows for a person to honor other life responsibilities. This path requires steady daily practice in between sesshin and a long period of maturation, and this training is deep and transformative. 

In LiVZ, our aspiring priests and lay teachers will attend sesshin over and over through years and decades. Generally, in addition to demonstrating deep insight (usually through the completion of our koan curriculum), a strong ethical orientation, and determined and skillful teaching, our guideline is that only after about 300 days of sesshin and at least a dozen years of consistent training might a priest receive denkai and the title osho from their teacher. A lay student would require similar experience to receive dharma entrustment and the title of dharma holder. While online sesshin was necessary during the pandemic, our experience is that even a brilliantly translated online container for practice does not have the same power for the way, so we expect the vast majority of sesshin days to have been in person. Denbo, or full transmission, may be offered only to mature practitioners and experienced teachers with about 350 days of sesshin experience and a minimum of fifteen years of steady training. By the time I was given inka shōmei by David Rynick, roshi, I had sat over 400 days of sesshin and practiced weekly with my sangha and religiously at home over nearly two decades. While a monastic will likely spend more days on retreat, Living Vow Zen's weaving of intensive sangha practice and daily home practice allows for a deep integration of intensive training and ordinary life. In Living Vow Zen, I aim to pay forward the profound training that I received over the last few decades.

LiVZ's model where priests are generally expected to earn their own living allows for an admirable path that also honors the life of vow. We have no expectation that our sangha will support our priests financially. This means that we expect our priests to work in the world according to right livelihood in ways that contribute to the well-being of the larger society, perhaps as educators, social workers, therapists, ministers, and more. This model appears to be the most common way the dharma has transmitted to the West, encouraging lay folks to practice with priests rather than creating and supporting a separate monastic class. This allows the dharma to penetrate the lives of every day citizens and creates an integrated community. We work in this world to save all beings in accordance with our bodhisattva vows. 

I appreciate Living Vow Zen's model of ordination and teacher training for a number of reasons. First, to me, it makes sense that not all priests would be teachers, just as not all monks would serve as teachers, and not all teachers would be priests. The emphasis for the unsui is the life of vow, devotion to sangha, and liturgical and communal service. Among other services, our priests correspond with prisoners, visit sick sangha members in hospitals and their homes, offer grief counseling, and officiate ceremonies marking life's most significant transitional moments. Priests perform liturgical rituals at sangha meetings and sesshin. We officiate weddings, funerals and other ceremonies. We might even attend climate demonstrations in robes. And in daily life, priests and lay teachers avoid causing harm, practice good, and try to alleviate suffering. When we screw up, we atone and vow to do better. We lovingly attend our children and spouses, and we endeavor to care for colleagues, co-workers, friends, and acquaintances as we care for sangha-mates, extending our sense of sangha to include the entire world.

Life as a Zen priest or lay Zen teacher in this world is a challenge and an opportunity to live every moment according to the vow to save all beings, not in some grandiose way but moment after moment.

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