The key European philosophers of post-modernism, Wittgenstein, Austin, Derrida and others have all emphasized the importance of the role of language and culture in interpreting the significance of history in the understanding of metaphysical views.　Analysis of texts and their historicity shows that all propositions are context dependent in often very complex ways; not only on the economic structures underlying culture but also on the interpretations of religion and self within those cultures.　There is always a marked inter-dependence between philosophical statement, whether popular or sophisticated, and its cultural frame.　Even science is not free from this perspective as Thomas Kuhn (1962) in his analysis of scientific paradigms has shown.

　　 Western romanticism, closely linked to colonialism and the heroic exploration of cultures in far off lands, Jerusalem, Timbuktu or Lhasa, was having its last throw in the fifties when John Blofield translated Huang Po and interpreted him through the “romantic” vision of the time.　We need to assess Chan and Zen and what previous writers have said of them, anew if we are to discover its relevance to our Western selves in our contemporary scene (Wright 1998).　Zen, far from being independent from history, has, in its rich diversity, always been dependent upon it──as indeed the Buddha, in pronouncing his principle of co-dependent arising, would have suspected and as Suzuki in his later writing also began to understand.

Zen in Europe

　　 Much as we Westerners owe an initial understanding of Zen to the work of Daisetsu Suzuki, we are also indebted to him for considerable confusion.　It has not been easy to relate his

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monolithic vision to the contrasting experience of other Zen/Chan schools.　Only in recent years, with the advent of outstanding, mostly American, scholarship, are we beginning to see our way through the haze.

　　 One of the prime sources of confusion has been the absence of adequate Dharma teaching in the popular literature.　Suzuki’s emphasis and that of recent Rinzai tradition on the ahistorical nature of Zen has led to a situation in Europe where contemporary Zen is sometimes taught as if Zen as Buddhadharma was an irrelevance.　Zen is seen as something basic to all religions, or at least both Buddhism and Christianity.　This has meant that the historical tradition and philosophical underpinning of Sino-Japanese Zen is given little attention, the focus being upon various sorts of practice.　Process and meaning have thus become divorced.　One Christian Zen teacher even seems to pride herself on a lack of understanding of both Buddhist philosophy and Christian theology (MacInnes 1996:95).

　　 This absence of a conceptual basis leads to an unanchored anxiety only too apparent in Towards a European Zen? a report based on a conference in Sweden in 1993 (Karlsson 1994).　With the exception of Ton Lathouwers interesting examination of Zen parallels in Russian literature, most of the other articles are worried examinations of the problems of adapting Japanese Zen ritual, koans and the authority of a Roshi into a Euro frame.　These worries combine with considerable criticism of the social scene in Japanese Zen and doubts about the authenticity of Japanese practice.　This anxiety could be greatly relieved by serious Dharma study and by a concerted examination of the deep contrasts between Christianity and Buddhism, in particular problems around the conception of God.　None of this is being attempted; serious academic work on Buddhist history and culture being left to the Americans.

　　 In fact several of the Zen schools in Europe are currently in

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deep trouble.　Both the school established by Philip Kapleau and the widely influential Association Zen International (AZI) of Taisen Deshimaru are agitated by issues concerning method and teaching and whether the original transmissions to their founders were reliable.　In the case of the Kapleau lineage one key teacher has been dismissed for unethical behavior.　The meditation offered by the AZI has been described by one critic as “loaded with and embedded into a complex ideological and authoritarian system of belief which is insidiously implanted into participants while being labeled as ‘true Dharma’.”　(r. halfmann @ nikocity. de 1999).　Only Thich Nhat Han’s centre in Plum Village (France) where Vietnamese Zen is taught, remains immune from such problems.　Communication between Eastern teachers unfamiliar with the West and Westerners illiterate in Eastern languages and thought is another common problem.　In Britain the Zen situation is more secure; both the Rinzai tradition led by the Austrian nun Myoko-ni (Irmgard Schloegl) and the Soto based tradition of Roshi Jiyu Kennett at Throssel Hole Abbey, being well founded both in practice and teaching, while other new fangled British Buddhisms (The Friends of the Western Buddhist Order and the New Khadampa Tradition) have been subjected to severe criticism in the press in spite of their considerable wealth and popular following.