LETTERS OF TRANSMISSION IBD

Sinopsis

You hold in your hand a unique treasure.áThere are thousands of spiritual teachers, but true Zen masters-those who can transmit, who can midwife a student to awakening-are rare.áSome may write books or essays, but their real work is done individually with students in person.áAlfred Pulyan (1896-1966) was one of those rare Zen masters who can transmit, but his method of transmission came not through personal contact, but rather through an exchange of letters with his students.áHe worked primarily by mail and had notable success triggering enlightenment in serious students through the power and rapport of his letters.áA fortunate side-effect of his method is that it is written down, and thus potentially available to others-providing one can find any of his letters.áááááááááááThose collected here are from a correspondence with Richard Rose in 1960 and 1961 and provide an invaluable look under the covers as a Zen master goes about his thankless work.ááááááááááááRose was already awake when he heard about PulyanâÇÖs ability, having had a definitive spiritual experience in 1947 at age thirty.áHe contacted Pulyan for the purpose of learning how to transmit what heâÇÖd become, pretending to be a seeker while continually pressing Pulyan to reveal method.áAt times in these letters Pulyan seems to be onto him, but with unbelievable patience and incredible mastery he works to crack RoseâÇÖs nut and at the same time tells him what heâÇÖs doing and how and why heâÇÖs doing it.ááááááááááááPulyan wrote his letters in longhand, with extensive margin notes.áFor this book, I have edited them to include those notes in the main text, and made other minor edits to help the letters read more smoothly.ááRoseâÇÖs letters are not included in this book, except for his initial inquiry that kicks things off.áááááááááááNot much is known about PulyanâÇÖs life, and in fact heâÇÖs somewhat of an enigma.áMuch of what is known he tells us himself in these letters.áConflicting reports have him being born either in New York or London, but at any rate he turned up in New York City sometime after World War I and lived most of his life there.áHe is of an age where he might have served in the war, but no record of it exists.áFrom these letters we know he studied mathematics and worked as an accountant, office manager, and executive.áIn the late 1950âÇÖs he and his wife Madeline bought 12 acres in rural Connecticut where they and some friends settled in.áOne of these friends was the young woman who was PulyanâÇÖs teacher and who was responsible for his realization.á(HeâÇÖll tell you the story in one of these letters.)PulyanâÇÖs only known published writings are articles in The Aberree, a journal in circulation from 1954 through 1965.áThe best known of these, 'The Penny That Blots Out the Sun,' is included at the end of this book.