In This Body, in This Lifetime: Awakening Stories of Japanese Soto Zen Women

Available for the first time in English, an intimate look into the private lives and spiritual experiences of 30 nuns and laywomen practicing under pioneering female Zen master Sozen Nagasawa Roshi in World War II-era Japan.

Born in 1888, Sozen Nagasawa Roshi was a pioneer of women’s monastic Zen practice in Japan. With a profound wish to become a nun from a young age, she persevered through the extreme social pressures and material difficulties facing women of her generation to become an abbess who trained hundreds of students (primarily women), won equal rights for Japanese nuns, and established organizations to support nuns and laywomen practitioners.

Known for her compassion and fierceness, Nagasawa Roshi used a rigorous koan practice to guide her students to kensho (enlightenment). As more and more students awakened, she asked them to write about their experiences. These stories were initially published in a Japanese magazine and subsequently compiled into a book published in Japan called Collection of Experiences in Zen Practice.

In This Body, In This Lifetime is a selection of 30 of these first-person accounts, exclusively from women and appearing for the first time in English. These stories offer an intimate look into the personal lives and spiritual determination of women who longed to end their suffering and awaken to their true nature despite the obstacles they faced.

A rare glimpse into Zen practice in World War II-era Japan, these inspiring women confront loss, grief, food shortages, air-raid sirens, and a cultural crisis with grit and courage as they persist in their efforts to end their suffering and the suffering of all.

ESHO SUDAN (editor) is a Soto Zen nun and teacher based in Japan. She teaches the Baikaryu style of chanting and has worked as an editor for various monastery publications in Japan, the United States, and Australia for more than two decades. KOGEN CZARNIK (translator) is a Zen Priest in the Soto tradition, in the lineage of Tangen Harada Roshi. He is the editor of Throw Yourself into the House of Buddha. KOJUN SOZEN NAGASAWA ROSHI (1888-1971) was a pioneer of women’s monastic Zen practice in Japan. She received ordination from Daiun Sogaku Harada Roshi, who arranged for her to train at Shogen-ji, a men-only monastery known for its rigorous practice. In 1935, she established Kannon-ji, a temple for nuns, where she guided generations of nuns and laywomen to an awakening experience. A fierce advocate for equal rights for female Zen practitioners, she also served as vice president of the Soto Schools Nuns Organization (established in the mid-1940s) and the Japan’s Nuns Organization (established in 1951).