Raven Roshi dispenses small bites of wisdom, that more than fill the mind. Some of these koan-like segments are humorous, some are insightful reminders:

"One evening Porcupine asked, 'What is the place of honor in the practice?' Raven said, "To be truly Porcupine takes practice.' Porcupine asked, 'Come on, Roshi, you don't mean just to be true to myself!' Raven said, 'To everybody else.'"

However, many of Raven's lessons were hard to grasp - either from the writing/presentation, from not having a deeper understanding of Buddhist teachings and wisdom, or both - it's difficult trying to grasp plays on words embedded within a vast philosophy, without yourself having a thorough understanding of the philosophy.

Zen Master Raven: The Teachings of a Wise Old Bird by Robert Aitken is a series of Zen teachings told through forest animals. Aitken was a retired master of the Diamond Sangha, a Zen Buddhist society he founded in Honolulu in 1959 with his late wife Anne Hopkins Aitken. His introduction to Zen was as a prisoner in World War II. After the war, he obtained a B.A. in English Literature and an MA in Japanese from the University of Hawaii.

Zen is not an easy subject and especially not an easy one to pick up by reading a book. Aitken uses the raven as his central character. The reason for using the forest animals was done for a few reasons. The most important reason was to allow him to modify the koans to make them a little easier to understand. The character animals play their roles further helping the reader understand.  There are also brief explanations in the Notes at the end of the book.

The reader will follow the Raven from his search for meaning and through his teaching of the forest animals and interactions with others. Some of the meanings jump out the readers, some require more thought, others still left me wondering.  Aitken takes his life long study and makes it accessible to the curious.  His characters aid in the understanding and the language used is simple enough for most readers.  A well-done work that teaches and entertains.

A very confusing book, I don't think I understood any of it. It is quite long and sounds like it's trying to be meaningful but I did not get anything out of reading it. I found it in the humour section but didn't find it funny either. Really not sure what the point is.

Koan told by a raven and the teachings of Buddha explained, even if it's not possible to explain koan, by animals. An old way to teach Buddhism revisited. I'm not the best person to review this stuff but I have to say that I liked to read them a lot.

Koan raccontati da un corvo e gli insegnamenti di Buddha spiegati, anche se spiegati é decisamente una parola grossa, da animali. Un vecchio metodo per insegnare la via del maestro, peccato che io non sono la persona giusta per scrivere una recesione sul libro, quindi posso solo dire che mi é piaciuto.

THANKS TO NETGALLEY FOR THE REVIEW!