andrewducker | (no subject)

When John Daido Loori was a monk at the Los Angeles Zen Center, he remarked one day to Maezumi Roshi: "I have resolved the question of life and death."
"Are you sure?" Maezumi asked.
"Yes," replied Loori.
"Are you really sure?"
"Absolutely," Loori answered.
With that, Maezumi threw himself violently upon Loori and began to strangle him. Gasping for breath, Loori struggled to escape, but to no avail. Finally he swung back his fist and struck his teacher, knocking him aside.
Maezumi rose to his feet and brushed himself off. "Resolved the question of life and death, eh?" he laughed, and walked off.
Later, still bearing the marks of his teacher's fingers on his throat, Loori passed a senior monk, Genpo Sensei.
On seeing his bruises, Genpo did a double take. "Told Roshi you'd resolved the question of life and death, did you?" he said, and strode away laughing.

--from Sean Murphy's One Bird, One Stone: 108 American Zen stories, Renaissance Books, 2002. Reprinted in The Sun, October 2002