The Roots of Goodness: Zen Master Dogen's Teaching on the Eight Qualities of a Great Person

Learn to nurture the eight qualities of an extraordinary person within yourself through the wisdom of Zen master Dōgen.

The Buddha taught that every person is capable of greatness by practicing eight key qualities in their life, from having few desires and not engaging in useless arguments to knowing what is enough. These timeless teachings were later expanded upon by the prolific thirteenth-century Zen master Eihei Dōgen in his final teaching before his death—values that, despite their age, perennially ring true.

In The Roots of Goodness, the late Japanese Zen teacher Kōshō Uchiyama Röshi bridges the gap between the eras of these ancient masters and today, delivering insightful, relatable, and rich commentary that brings these eight qualities into focus and directly applies them to the complexities of modern life. Translator Daitsū Tom Wright, a longtime student of Uchiyama, provides a full translation of Dōgen’s original work as well as a faithful translation of Uchiyama’s commentary, supplemented with a historical background of Dōgen, an exploration of how the teaching of the eight qualities impacted Uchiyama’s life and work, and a personal introduction that grounds the importance of this teaching in modernity. This book seamlessly weaves together ancient wisdom with Uchiyama’s beloved humor and style, offering a path for using these qualities to more fully embrace Buddhist practice and answer the age-old question: How does one become a truly good person?

KŌSHŌ UCHIYAMA, born in Tokyo in 1912, received a master’s degree in Western philosophy in 1937 and became a Zen priest three years later under Kōdō Sawaki Rōshi. Upon Sawaki’s death in 1965, he became abbot of Antaiji, a monastery then located on the outskirts of Kyoto. In addition to developing the practice at Antaiji and traveling extensively throughout Japan, lecturing and leading sesshins, Uchiyama  Rōshi wrote over twenty books on Zen, including translations of Dōgen Zenji in modern Japanese with commentaries, as well as various shorter essays. He was an origami master as well as a Zen master and published several books on origami. He died in 1999.

DAITSŪ TOM WRIGHT was born and raised in Wisconsin. After being active in the civil rights and anti–Vietnam War movements, he went to Japan in 1967 and lived there for over forty years, teaching English and other subjects at Ryukoku University in Tokyo. He was ordained by Uchiyama Kōshō Rōshi as a Buddhist priest in 1974 and continued to receive his teachings until 1998, the same year that Wright received transmission from Takamine Dōyū Rōshi. This book is the latest in a series of Uchiyama Rōshi’s works Wright has translated into English, including Opening the Hand of Thought. Wright, who now lives in Hawai‘i, is married and has one son.