I'm passingly familiar with Zen and Zen Buddhism ... not so familiar, however, that I realized there was a difference between the two (until this morning). In the back of my mind, it has long been something I wanted to read up on more closely ... someday. I've always had the vague notion that Taoist and Zen philosophies on life were very similar, which was the source of my interest.

This morning, I stumbled into this book, The Tao of Zen. It's the next book on my reading list.

Anyone here have any personal experience with, or affinity for, Zen and/or Zen Buddhism?

Note to spblat: I'd encourage you to create a separate forum category for Zen. I don't know how much action it would see, but I think it is separate enough from Buddhism to deserve it's own category ... which is where I would have started this thread, had it existed.

The opening lines of the book ...

I am more familiar with Theravada Buddhism than Zen Buddhism, but I am an expert on neither. In particular I was unaware that "Zen" has a meaning that is distinct from the Buddhism umbrella.

Do you believe this is an error? Keep us posted on your reading. Our Taoismand Buddhism sections see so little activity that I hesitate to dedicate a section to Zen alone.

(Going camping this weekend. Taking along my little copy of The Tao of Pooh.)

My (admittedly inexpert) impression is that Zen is a branch of Buddhism as Christianity is a branch of Judaism. However, as I suggested, I agree that there may not be enough traffic in this region of DH to justify a new category. Heck, you could probably throw all of them into one "Eastern Stuff" lump. Sailor-vee.

Have fun camping; don't spend it all reading a book, though.