Making Love with Light : Contemplating Nature with Words and Photographs

This book of exquisite photographs arises from the premise that unless we love nature, we will not work to save it from exploitation and eventual destruction. The rich mixture of photographs, Zen poems, and essays presented on these pages is intended to open our hearts to the wild and the wilderness, and to direct us to the ways in which we can heal the earth.

The Zen master John Daido Loori, who is widely known for his efforts to make creative expression an integral part of spiritual practice, here inaugurates a new art form: Zen photography. Itâ s a modern continuation of an ancient tradition that looks to art as an expression of the enlightened mind. The camera thus becomes a contemporary version of the Zen brush, as Loori captures moments of exceptional, unrepeatable beauty. Each image is a seed for contemplation.

John Daido Loori is one of the West's leading Zen masters. He is the founder and spiritual leader of the Mountains and Rivers Order and abbot of Zen Mountain Monastery.

His work has been most noted for its unique adaptation of traditional Asian Buddhism into an American context, particularly with regard to the arts, the environment, social action, and the use of modern media as a vehicle of spiritual training and social change.

Loori is an award-winning photographer and videographer, and his art and wildlife photography form the core of a unique teaching program that integrates art and wilderness training, and cultivates an experiential appreciation of the relationship of Zen spirituality to our natural environment.