Zen in the Art of Archery: Training the Mind and Body to Become One

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The mind must first be attuned to the Unconcious. If one really wishes to be the master of an art, technical knowledge of it is not enough. One has to transcend technique so that art becomes an “artless art” growing out of the unconscious. In the case of archery, the hitter and the hit are not opposing objects but are one in reality. The bow and arrow are actually just a pretext for something that could just as well happen without them. They are only the way to a goal, not the goal itself. Only the truly detached can understand what is meant by “detachment,” and that only the contemplative, who is completely empty and rid of the self, the ego, is ready to “become one” with the “transcendent deity.” Between the two states of bodily relaxedness on the one hand and spiritual freedom on the other there is a difference of level which cannot be overcome by breath-control alone, but only by withdrawing from all attachments whatsoever, by becoming utterly egoless: so that the soul, sunk within itself, stands in the plenitude of its nameless origin. Grading might happen once or twice a year, and there is a programme of competitions and events around the world. The painter’s instructions might be: spend ten years observing bamboos, become a bamboo yourself, then forget everything and paint.

Zen in the Art of Archery: Training the Mind and Body to

Questo libro mi è stato suggerito per la prima volta con grande entusiasmo una decina d'anni fa da un amico, e trovandolo di recente a buon prezzo in perfette condizioni non ho esitato ad acquistarlo. Caso vuole che abbia poi incontrato nuovamente lo stesso amico e riconoscendo il volume nella sua biblioteca gli abbia chiesto di nuovo un parere. Non ricordava nulla del suo contenuto. Ad ogni modo veniva citato ne L'arte di amare che ho appena concluso, quindi si è inserito bene nel mio attuale flusso di letture. the preparations for working put him simultaneously in the right frame of mind for creating... that collectedness and presence of mind...the right frame of mind for the artist is only reached when the preparing and the creating, the technical and the artistic, the material and the spiritual, the project and the object, flow together without a break.” I got to know about this book from a recording by Alan Watts. It has interesting insights into mastery and teaching, I expected more from Eugen as a student given he only pursued this in his 40s. He who masters both life and death is free from fear of any kind to the extent that he is no longer capable of experiencing what fear feels like.This book is the result of the author’s six year quest to learn archery in the hands of Japanese Zen masters. It is an honest account of one man’s journey to complete abandonment of ‘the self’ and the Western principles that we use to define ourselves. Professor Herrigel imparts knowledge from his experiences and guides the reader through physical and spiritual lessons in a clear and insightful way. In the 1920s Eugene Herrigel, a university professor of philosophy, took up archery in Japan as a way to get closer to an understanding of Zen. Zen in the Art of Archery, published in 1948, is his entertaining account of the process of learning archery.

Zen in the Art of Archery by Eugen Herrigel | Goodreads Zen in the Art of Archery by Eugen Herrigel | Goodreads

Herrigel's book may have inspired Tim Gallwey's 1974 book The Inner Game of Tennis. Both Herrigel and Gallwey approach sport and life as opportunities for learning inner cooperation.The story goes something like this: Eugen Herrigel, a German teaching and living in Japan, set out to understand the meaning of Zen. Realizing it cannot be studied but only experienced, he decided to learn about it through the practice of one of the arts “touched” by Zen, Kyudo (Japanese archery). Out of his experiences came the book Zen in the Art of Archery.

Zen in the Art of Archery Quotes by Eugen Herrigel - Goodreads Zen in the Art of Archery Quotes by Eugen Herrigel - Goodreads

The thing I really appreciated about this short book was how demystifying it was about Zen and how real it was about mastery. Herrigel spends years on archery, hitting plateau after plateau, putting a monumental amount of work into it. You can feel his frustration every time he hits a wall, how much effort that he puts into breaking past these walls, his satisfaction upon finally getting it, his confusion over what his master is asking of him, and the underlying struggle of wrapping his head around detachment. This format holds a huge advantage over something like Inner Game precisely because we can try feel what he feels, struggle when he struggles, and ultimately realize that we just can't do it unless we ourselves train.

The right art," cried the Master, "is purposeless, aimless! The more obstinately you try to learn how to shoot the arrow for the sake of hitting the goal, the less you will succeed in the one and the further the other will recede. What stands in your way is that you have a much too willful will. You think that what you do not do yourself does not happen.” About Zen, despite Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind I don't know enough, or maybe actually too much already, to say anything. Herrigel’s book focuses on the author’s experience learning the religious ritual of archery. Yes, religious ritual, because in modern Japan archery is no longer a sport or combative skill. It is an “artless art” that brings the archer into purposeless action. He must become “simultaneously the aimer and the aim, the hitter and the hit…an unmoved center.” The book takes us through the process of learning this art, as Herrigel learns it himself from his master. Many persons had recommended this little book over the years of high school and college, it being one of the canon of the counterculture like the novels of Kurt Vonnegut, the meditations of Alan Watts or the more scholarly essays of D.T. Suzuki. I resisted, partly because it was so popular, another herd-phenomenon, and partly because it was about archery of all things. But, seeing the thing and how short it was, I finally sat down and read the thing. The instructor’s business is not to show the way itself, but to enable the pupil to get the feel of this way to the goal by adapting it to his individual peculiarities”

Zen in the Art of Archery by Eugen Herrigel | Goodreads

This was one of the first book I read on the subject. Given the choices made by Herrigel later in life, it is unclear what he took away from these experiences.Pirsig, Robert (April 25, 2006). Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry Into Values (Reprinted.). HarperTorch. ISBN 978-0060589462. The Myth of Zen in the Art of Archery" (PDF). Japanese Journal of Religious Studies. 28 (1–2). 2001 . Retrieved 2016-04-28. Many cursory studies of kyudo focus on the spiritual aspect of the sport, with that element being more important than hitting the target. This is partly since the publication of the 1948 book Zen In The Art Of Archery, by the German academic Eugene Herrigal, who studied in Japan with a kyudo master. Herrigel, Eugen (January 26, 1999). Zen in the Art of Archery (Later Printinged.). Vintage Books. ISBN 978-0375705090. The Zen adept shuns all talk of himself and his progress. Not because he thinks it immodest to talk, but because he regards it as a betrayal of Zen.