zenwarrior

"The question I'd have to ask, though, is when did trees or plants in pots become bonsai instead of trees or plants in pots?" -Craig Cowing

My guess would be right about the time people started calling them "Bonsai".
Just as there was no such thing as "ZEN" until people started calling it "ZEN".


With the risk of facing persecution for using the terms "east" and "west", one thing I've learned in studying "eastern" philosophy about the "west" is that we have this obsession with trying to make everything black and white. Everything has to hold an exact definition, when did this or that start, how did it directly effect this or that.

I think the east understands more the limits of language in speaking of these topics like zen and how it may relate to everything else.. Maybe that is why a few words in Japanese etc. can mean so much more than we could ever begin to describe in English. Many things are simply understood. I speak very little, but I work with the Japanese language everyday, eight hours a day, and this comes up all the time. "Lost in translation" as they say. Zen is merely and word my friends and so is "Bonsai".

the big question:

So what are characteristics of bonsai that you think or feel are Zen?
go ahead and keep trying to describe these characteristics and how they relate to our perception of the meaning of this word "zen", the fact remains these characteristics make up the wonderful experience which we currently have labeled "Bonsai", and they are shared by everyone.



oh yeah, and sorry for all the quotation marks.....

__________________



Failure is the key to success; each mistake teaches us something.

-Morihei Ueshiba

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