Eijun Linda Cutts (born 1947) is a
Sōtō Zen
Sōtō Zen or is the largest of the three traditional sects of Zen in Japanese Buddhism (the others being Rinzai and Ōbaku). It is the Japanese line of the Chinese Cáodòng school, which was founded during the Tang dynasty by Dòngshān L ...
priest practicing in the lineage of
Shunryu Suzuki, a Senior Dharma Teacher at the
San Francisco Zen Center
San Francisco Zen Center (SFZC), is a network of affiliated Sōtō Zen practice and retreat centers in the San Francisco Bay area, comprising City Center or Beginner's Mind Temple, Tassajara Zen Mountain Center, and Green Gulch Farm Zen Center. Th ...
. Cutts is a
Dharma heir
In Chan and Zen Buddhism, dharma transmission is a custom in which a person is established as a "successor in an unbroken lineage of teachers and disciples, a spiritual 'bloodline' ('' kechimyaku'') theoretically traced back to the Buddha hims ...
of
Tenshin Reb Anderson
Tenshin Zenki Reb Anderson (born 1943) is an American Buddhist who is a Zen teacher in the Sōtō Zen tradition of Shunryu Suzuki. He is a Senior Dharma teacher at the San Francisco Zen Center and at Green Gulch Farm Zen Center in Marin County, ...
, having received Dharma transmission from him in 1996.
She served as co-abbess of the San Francisco Zen Center from 2000 to 2007, and had first begun practice at the San Francisco Zen Center in 1971;
later, she was ordained a priest by
Zentatsu Richard Baker
Richard Dudley Baker (born March 30, 1936) is an American Soto Zen master (or roshi), the founder and guiding teacher of Dharma Sangha—which consists of Crestone Mountain Zen Center located in Crestone, Colorado and the ''Buddhistisches Studien ...
in 1975. Currently living at
Green Gulch Farm Zen Center
Green Gulch Farm Zen Center, or Sōryu-ji (蒼龍寺 '' Green Dragon Temple'') is a Soto Zen practice center located near Muir Beach, California, that practices in the lineage of Shunryu Suzuki. In addition to its Zen training program, the center ...
, as abbess she had been aware of the significance in being a woman in a leadership position in religion that has historically been a
patriarchy
Patriarchy is a social system in which positions of dominance and privilege are primarily held by men. It is used, both as a technical anthropological term for families or clans controlled by the father or eldest male or group of males a ...
. In this vein, within her first year as abbess she instituted the ceremony in which female ancestors could be honored.
She became Central Abbess of San Francisco Zen Center in 2014.
See also
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Buddhism in the United States
The term American Buddhism can be used to describe all Buddhist groups within the United States, including Asian Americans, Asian-American Buddhists born into the faith, who comprise the largest percentage of Buddhists in the country.
American Budd ...
*
Timeline of Zen Buddhism in the United States
Below is a timeline of important events regarding Zen Buddhism in the United States. Dates with "?" are approximate.
Events
Early history
* 1893: Soyen Shaku comes to the United States to lecture at the World Parliament of Religions held in C ...
Notes
References
*
*
Clergy from Minneapolis
San Francisco Zen Center
Soto Zen Buddhists
Zen Buddhist priests
1947 births
Living people
American Zen Buddhists
Buddhist abbesses
Buddhist feminists
American feminists
Religious leaders from the San Francisco Bay Area
Women Buddhist priests
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