But some sangha just have a giant chip on their shoulder about the Church, and so become the jutting jaw we hear about every year in the carol. You know: "Four colleybirds, three French hens, two turtle doves, and a big honkin' juttin' Zen jaw." In so doing, they surrender all Yule to a fanatical fringe that speciously demands ownership of it, and their own religious convictions to crass competition.
We Boreals have a deep physiological need to confront the terrifying cold and black of Dark Solstice, and so the symbols of light and fire, of evergreen, ever-living, winter-fruiting vegetation, and general contempt of death and fear, crop up repeatedly throughout our hemisphere. It's perfectly logical to find religious significance in natural phenomena, the only indisputable scripture there is. That's why Rohatsu – marking the time the Buddha sat under a symbol of the cosmos for eight days straight and was reborn in the laser light of the morning star – is in December. The Jews commemorate a lamp that burned for eight days without oil; Greeks and Romans sacrificed to the Harvest God, who dies every year and is reborn the next. And Christians celebrate the birth of their Saviour – bringer of light, defeater of death – though he was actually born in March.
In other words, they celebrate the effect of Christ's coming, not its fact, but sadly that's more insight than many contemporary Christians can muster. And so they've made the Season of Peace a battleground. "Jesus is the reason for the season!" is not a cry of gratitude; it's a rebuke to people who take their kids to see Santa Claus.
So it's game, point, and match to sanctimony. But wait, here's Team Zen, taking the ice! Will they make this a game?
No.
Some Zenners campaign to remove Christmas trees from airports; razor Christ-themed carols from school "Winter" concerts; even ban Santa from the mall. (I don't even know where to start with those.) Others just wall themselves up in their little cells and chant loudly in fake Chinese to fend off any errant strains of Bing Crosby that might filtre through their double-glazing.
This in spite of the fact that Christmas is the most Buddhist of holidays; arguably more, actually, than it ever was Christian. It's Sekitō Kisen all over again:
Darkness is a word for merging upper and lower,
light is an expression for distinguishing pure and defiled.
The four gross elements return to their own natures like a baby taking to its mother:
fire heats, wind moves, water wets, earth is solid;
eye and form, ear and sound, nose and smell, tongue and taste—
thus in all things the leaves spread from the root.
The whole process must return to the source.
Noble and base are only manners of speaking;
right in light there is darkness but don’t confront it as darkness,
right in darkness there is light but don’t see it as light.
Light and dark are relative to one another like forward and backward steps.
Read this chant – possibly for a first honest time – and tell me it ain't a fair-dinkum Zen Christmas carol.
The only reasonable Zen response to the ancient rite of Jul is acceptance. Acceptance of its universal origin; of its truth; and crucially, of the Dharma, which clearly passes right down the middle of it.
We are in the delusion-slashing business. I respectfully suggest we apply those skills, now they are more vital than usual, to restoring the true meaning of – and demilitarising – Christmas.
May we look deeply, every one.
(Photo of Irish Christmas card courtesy of Shirley Wynne and Wikimedia Commons, from an album of Christmas cards collected by Georgina Pim of Crosthwaite Park, Dun Laoghaire, Dublin, between 1881 and 1893.)
October is an odd time in North America: for these thirty-one days, you can buy a pumpkin here. Any other time, you get: "What, are you crazy?" (One of us must be.)
And it only gets weirder: virtually none of the pumpkins Canucks and Yanks buy by the metric tonne this month will be eaten. Come All Saints Day, they will be thrown in the garbage. Even the thousands that were never cut.
Why are overseas readers now aghast? Because on all other continents, people know pumpkin for excellent food. One of the most versatile vegetables on earth, useful in every course of a meal, it's both delicious and nutritious. I've no idea why North Americans have demoted it to a gourd, but if it weren't for that Druid holiday we dug up and transplanted across the sea, this First Nations masterpiece (utterly unknown to the Druids) would have gone extinct here a century ago. If the irony gets any thicker, we can carve our jack o' lanterns out of that instead.
Or you can; I pickle mine. Pickles – a staple of Japanese monasteries – anchor the flavour plates I build for sesshins. (It's an ancient Zen art intended to pique mindfulness with a shotgun blast to the senses). And the pumpkin ones are my favourite: marrowy, neon orange, and sweet spicy-sour, with just a hint of musky bitterness from the lime.
The recipe:
PUMPKIN SESSHIN PICKLES
(Makes about 3 1/2 pints. Note that after step 3, you will have to wait 24 hours before continuing.)
7 cups raw pumpkin, peeled and cut into 1-inch cubes
2 sticks cinnamon, shredded
2 1/3 cups cider vinegar
2 1/3 cups sugar
15 whole cloves
1/2 teaspoon whole black pepper corns
1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes
2 teaspoons whole allspice
1 tablespoon whole coriander seeds
2 inches gingerroot, sliced thin
lime slices, 1/4 inch thick, one per jar
dried cranberries ("craisins")
canning jars and lids
1. Cover the pumpkin cubes with water, bring to a boil, reduce heat, and lightly blanch, about 10 minutes. (Not longer; they'll cook another three times before you're done.) Drain immediately to avoid overcooking.
2. Put all other ingredients except lime slices and cranberries in a large pot and bring to a boil. (Warning: hot syrup boils over very quickly; stay present and alert.) Turn heat down to lowest setting, cover the pot, and simmer for 15 minutes.
3. Add the pumpkin cubes and bring back to a boil. Then cover the pot, lower heat, and simmer for 3 minutes. Afterward, remove the pot from the burner and set it aside for 24 hours.
4.Next day: Sterilise jars in a water bath canner. Heat the pumpkin and syrup mixture to boiling, then lower heat and simmer for 5 minutes.
5. Remove the jars one at a time from the hot water, drop in four to five cranberries, and ladle in hot pickles to 1/2 inch from the rim. Be sure to include spices.
6. Slide a lime slice between the pickles and the jar's side, fit a sterilised lid, screw the band down tight, and return the sealed jar to the water bath. Repeat until all the pickles are packed.
7. Turn up the heat under the canner and process (cook) the jars for an additional 5 minutes after the water has returned to a boil.
10. Remove the jars from the water and allow them to cool naturally until the lids pop. Store in a cool dark place for at least a month before opening. (Any that don't pop should be stored in the fridge and eaten first.)
Specific points on pickling jack o' lanterns:
To insure fresh pickle stock, carve your jack o' lantern on Hallowe'en and refrigerate the scraps; if you light it with a candle, line the lid with aluminium foil. Make your pickles next day, peeling off any soot or scorched flesh with a vegetable peeler. Later, when you eat them, you'll recognise bits of eye and teeth on your plate.
