Welcome to the
Treetop Zen Center
293 Country Club Road
Oakland, Maine
muisensei@earthlink.net
www.treetopzencenter.org
207-465-7563
Directions to the Treetop in Oakland
For an alphabetical list
of links
to all pages on this web site
click here
For those of you who don't know us, we are Stefano Mui Barragato and Margaret Ne-Eka Barragato. We are both Zen teachers and priests in the Soto lineage. Stef received dharma transmission from Roshi Bernie Glassman in 1996 and Margaret received dharma transmission from Stef in 2002. Dharma transmission is a special ceremony dating back to about 700 C.E. In this ceremony, an authorized teacher gives the student authorization to teach the Dharma, or the teachings of Buddhism.
Both of us have completed koan study and offer koan study practice to students. A koan is another ancient way in which a teacher works with students. A koan is sometimes a very abbreviated form of teaching, often puzzling to the rational way of thinking. So we work with our guts rather than our minds when we work with koans.
The sitting schedule at Treetop is
Saturday Mornings at 9:30 am
Wednesday Evenings at 7 pm
As an addendum to the schedule,
one of our sangha people, Deborah Kelly,
is guiding those who come early on Saturdays, at 9 am,
in Yoga postures.
On Wednesday evenings we begin with zazen, or meditation, followed with daisan, or formal one-to-one interview between one of the teachers and a student. Daisan is followed with a discussion, a microdharmatalk, or both. In January, 2008 we will begin chanting excerpts from Dogen's Extensive RecordÑa translation of Dogen Zenji's Eihei Koroku. Following the chant of a section we will then sit in silence and out of the silence either comment on the teachings or ask questions. This may lead to a discussion of the text. We will be focusing on all of the excerpts which concern the great zen master, Zhaozhou.
On Saturdays we begin with Service and then zazen, daisan, and probably a dharma talk given by one or the other of us. Sometimes, a senior student will give the dharma talk.
People ask about the lineage we follow. We prefer to think of it as the lineage we walk in or, hopefully, with. The lineage was given by Stef to Margaret; by Bernie Glassman to Stef; by his teacher Taizan Maezumi to Bernie; and so on all the way back to Shakyamuni Buddha. Preceding Shakyamuni are six legendary prior manifestations of Buddha who reach back into the beginningless beginning. Ê
We give this lineage to those students who study and receive the Precepts (Jukai) from us. You'll find a link to the Lineage in the above Òlink to all pagesÓ at the top of this page.
We'd love to hear from you and we'd especially love to sit with you. If you find yourself somewhere near Waterville or Oakland, Maine, come.
Be well.
Stefano and Margaret