A certain kind of Zen has broken away from it's religionist roots, and with all due respect to traditional Buddhism, has established a frontier in universal Enlightenment.
Simply stated most people aren't really interested in the moon. What they want is a confidence inspiring finger pointing at the moon. I was initiated into the Nichiren Sect in 1966, but it was encountering Zen as delineated by D T Suzuki that some ten years later I came to understand the true seismic significance of the historical Buddha. Suzuki has been pilloried as a heretic by some Buddhist religionist. The second patriarch of Zen Buddhism was allegedly executed as a heretic at the insistence of Buddhist dogmatist when in his 90s about 1,400 years ago.
At the time of the extinguishment of the dinosaurs the largest mammals were about the size of rats. To consider the emergence of an awakened life-form from the chemical inevitabilities that lead to life is to consider the fact of one's own awareness. The Awareness which is the substrate of our own consciousness was present in our progenitors, and exists in us through a unbroken chain of sexual transmission. The seed of life sends forth the vine and the flower of that vine is the Universe awakening to its self.
This is what Zen is.
