Zen Action/Zen Person is made the more readable by its inclusion of examples taken from everyday experience. In drawing the essential distinction between "not thinking" and 'without thinking," Kasulis analogizes "not thinking" to the state of the insomniac worrier who rolls over, takes a deep breath, and makes a conscious effort to blank his mind and stop all thought (p. 74). He analogizes 'without thinking" to thoughtlessly saying "ouch" upon stubbing a toe, or to the one who gazes thoughtlessly over his lawn after mowing it. The insomniac example is a good example of "not thinking"-the conscious rejection of further conscious thought. The examples of "without thinking" are inadequate;let us see why.

Clinical studies of Zen masters have shown that the Zen state is one in which there is no judgment,categorization, nor habituation of experience.

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Kasulis is aware of the earliest of these studies (Naranjo and Ornstein, 1971), stating that "every click (experience) is a first click (experience)" to someone in this state of mind (p. 163). We grant that there is no self-conscious reflection in saying "ouch" or blankly gazing over the lawn, as Kasulis says.But the Zen person would do neither. For there is a component of emotional display in the "ouch" reaction, which the non-judgmental, non-categorizing Zen attitude precludes. The Zen master's stubbed toe is fully experienced, but it requires no further verbalization. Nor is the dazed gaze of the weary lawn-mower, unintentional and self-forgetful as it may be, analogous to the undimming perceptual receptivity of the Zen master. These examples are misleading if they leave the impression that surprised or dazed unthinking moments (Jap.: bonyari/boketto shite) are ,phenomenologically similar to the flood of unanalysed immediacy, "the presencing" by which we should characterize Zen masters. Zen non-reflection is not the un-selfconscious thoughtlessness of the animal, the child, the insane, the exhausted laborer, or the fool caught off guard. They all lack the unhabituating and continuous total awareness--the undimmed and non-verbal at-one-ness with their experience-that the Zen master attains through years of discipline.

Zen Action/Zen Person tends to slight the role of discipline and dedication, so crucial to the Japanese and so rare in the modern West. That most of Kasulis' examples fail to capture the fullness of the Zen masters' experiences is very understandable, and Kasulis himself admits the limitations of some of his examples.To equate mere thoughtless reaction with the spontaneity of Zen

enlightenment,as he does (pp.88 ff.)answers the troublesome old query, "In what sense are all beings already enlightened? " with, "They all have pre-reflective experiences." But it fails to treat the concomitant question, "Then what is the need for discipline, what the need to do anything at all, much less sitting in meditation? " The latter may be answered in the master's ability to put himself in a fully selfless and fully aware, non-habituating state of mind at will, fully feeling every moment as totally new and unique. But all this is a question of emphasis rather than of error, and our own preferences may be skewed in an opposite direction. Kasulis' more important theme is importantly correct: that further examination of pre-reflective states (enlightened or not) may give new dimensions to our understanding of personhood in terms of act.

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It is to be regretted that Zen Action/Zen Person took so many years to publish--but it is good to have it in hand at last! Kasulis' discussion of important terms like mu, basho, jisetsu, is too rich to encapsulate here, but deserves full reading by scholars and Zen practitioners alike. Kasulis brings together seminal insights of Taoist, Zen, and contemporary philosophy, reaching towards new understanding of man's being-in-the-world, and of the non-being which is prior to and makes possible that being. He finds points of compatibility between Dogen and Hakuin, representing rival schools of Soto and Rinzai Zen. He finds close kinship in Buddha's process philosophy, Basho's haiku,:and Morita's psychotherapy, miles and millenia removed. In a study of millenia, a decade is not long, and Kasulis' sources are not old, but they are aging. 90% of his references are more than a decade old. none are younger than five years. Much interesting scholarship has emgerged since his Yale dissertation, and it would be interesting to have Kasulis' responses to other comparative scholars. Cleary and Kodera have brought out new translations of Dogen, while Leebrich and A.C. Graham have improved on previous translations of the Lao-tzu and Chuang-tzu, respectively. Bossert and Steffney have compared Zen and phenomenology, while others like Akishige, Izutsu,Hirai, and Sekida have discussed the Zen mind in ways particularly relevant to Kasulis' interest in psychotherapy. But we have surely not heard the last from this insightful interpreter of Zen.

Zen Action/Zen Person is a good book about Zen. It shows us that there is more of philosophical significance in the Japanese tradition than it is normally credited with having. It makes good sense of some Buddhist thinkers, and explains what others would have wanted to say if they had had both the interest and the linguistic abilities to be philosophically consistent, as Kasulis does. But it is not only a book about Zen; it is a major and creative philosophical reconstruction. It demonstrates that Japanese Zen can be intelligible to a western intellectual on his own terms-while clearly recognizing its deep roots in a very foreign context of culture and language. It demystifies much confusion created by the metaphysical language of his predecessors, after Suzuki. It traces pregnant parallels between the Zen world-view and western phenomenology, particularly of Heidegger and Husserl. In so doing, Kasulis not only finds fruitful new directions for an understanding of persorlhood, but opens a wide door to more creative Japanese-American philosophical dialogue.