Brigitte D'Ortschy
Encyclopedia
Brigitte D’Ortschy (May 31, 1921—July 9, 1990), or Koun-An Doru Chiko, was an architect
Architect
An architect is a person trained in the planning, design and oversight of the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to offer or render services in connection with the design and construction of a building, or group of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the...
, journalist
Journalist
A journalist collects and distributes news and other information. A journalist's work is referred to as journalism.A reporter is a type of journalist who researchs, writes, and reports on information to be presented in mass media, including print media , electronic media , and digital media A...
, translator
Translation
Translation is the communication of the meaning of a source-language text by means of an equivalent target-language text. Whereas interpreting undoubtedly antedates writing, translation began only after the appearance of written literature; there exist partial translations of the Sumerian Epic of...
, author
Author
An author is broadly defined as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created. Narrowly defined, an author is the originator of any written work.-Legal significance:...
, and the first Zen master
Zen master
Zen master is an umbrella title sometimes used to refer to an individual who has been recognized by an authorized Zen lineage holder and teacher as having met his or her own teacher's standards of realization or insight. These standards vary widely in different traditions, and may vary among...
from Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
in the Sanbo Kyodan
Sanbo Kyodan
Sanbo Kyodan is a Zen sect derived from both the Rinzai and Soto traditions of Japanese Zen.-History:...
school of Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
.
Biography
Brigitte D”Ortschy grew up in Berlin. As a teenager she became intrigued by the reading of Angelus SilesiusAngelus Silesius
Angelus Silesius was a German Catholic mystic and poet.-Life:Silesius was born in Breslau , Silesia as son of Polish noble and German mother...
, Meister Eckhart
Meister Eckhart
Eckhart von Hochheim O.P. , commonly known as Meister Eckhart, was a German theologian, philosopher and mystic, born near Gotha, in the Landgraviate of Thuringia in the Holy Roman Empire. Meister is German for "Master", referring to the academic title Magister in theologia he obtained in Paris...
, Teresa of Avila
Teresa of Ávila
Saint Teresa of Ávila, also called Saint Teresa of Jesus, baptized as Teresa Sánchez de Cepeda y Ahumada, was a prominent Spanish mystic, Roman Catholic saint, Carmelite nun, and writer of the Counter Reformation, and theologian of contemplative life through mental prayer...
and Chuang-tzu. She completed her education by studying architecture and engineering in Berlin and Graz. The sociological and psychological aspects of architecture were one of the main fields of her studies. In 1945 she received her diploma in architecture.
From 1947 to 1950 Brigitte D’Ortschy worked as a research assistant at the Technical University of Munich in the field of the building history and archaeology. 1950 she accepted an invitation by the Washington State Department and went to the USA to gain experiences in urban and regional planning for the rebuilding of postwar Germany. She concluded her graduate studies at the University of North Carolina
University of North Carolina
Chartered in 1789, the University of North Carolina was one of the first public universities in the United States and the only one to graduate students in the eighteenth century...
and worked for the Planning Commission of Philadelphia. During this time she met Frank Lloyd Wright
Frank Lloyd Wright
Frank Lloyd Wright was an American architect, interior designer, writer and educator, who designed more than 1,000 structures and completed 500 works. Wright believed in designing structures which were in harmony with humanity and its environment, a philosophy he called organic architecture...
.
In 1951 Brigitte D’Ortschy became a founding member of the Bavarian Committee for Urban and Regional Planning. In 1952 she took the initiative to bring the exhibition “60 years of Living Architecture” on the work of Frank Lloyd Wright to Munich. In 1953 Frank Lloyd Wright invited her to work for him in his architectural atelier in Taliesin West (Arizona). Frank Lloyd Wright’s concept of ‘organic architecture’ resonated with Brigitte D’Ortschy. It also sharpened her awareness of physical form as ‘cultural language’ and helped her later to grasp the characteristic features of Japanese culture.
In 1954, on her return to Europe, she became the coordinator of the German section of the international ‘Triennale’ exhibition in Milano. In the following years she organized exhibitions in Hälsingborg (Sweden), Milano, Israel, Berlin and Munich. In addition she did design work (i.e. she furnished dwellings of the house of Finnish architect Alvar Aalto), gave lectures and wrote articles for the trade press.
In 1960 she traveled to Israel to prepare the first exhibition about the Art and Craft of Israel in postwar Germany, setting it up in Munich and Berlin. Besides her professional life she engaged in intense discussions and exchange of letters with leading thinkers of her time on the many aspects of science and religious philosophy. During these years she read the book ”Zen and the Art of Archery” by Eugen Herrigel
Eugen Herrigel
Eugen Herrigel was a German philosopher who taught philosophy at Tohoku Imperial University in Sendai, Japan, from 1924-1929 and introduced Zen to large parts of Europe through his writings.While living in Japan from 1924 to 1929, he studied kyūdō, traditional Japanese archery, under Awa...
. “This book about Zen....awakened in me the feeling that Japan was holding sth. extremely important for me” [1]she later writes. Up to 1963 she worked both as a freelance architect and for the Bavaria Film Company while continuing to publish articles and a series of books about architectural design. In 1963 she decided to move to Japan.
Zen-training and teaching
Shortly after her arrival in Japan Brigitte D’Ortschy met Zen-Master Haku’un YasutaniRyoko Roshi ( 1885–1973) and in April 1964 she began her rigorous Zen-training under him in the Fukusho-ji in Tokio and in the Mokuso-in in Kamakura. She earned a living as lecturer at the Waseda, Yokohama and Tokio universities, and being an articulate writer, she wrote many articles about traditional Japanese culture and its Zen schools of art. Brigitte D’Ortschy underwent the entire Koan-training which she completed in 1972 when she received Inka Shomei. Yasutani Haku’un Roshi bestowed on her the Dharma name ‘Doru Chiko Daishi’ and she became his Dharma heir. In 1973 Yamada KounYamada Koun
, or Koun Yamada, was the former leader of the Sanbo Kyodan lineage of Zen Buddhism, the Dharma heir of his teacher Yasutani Haku'un Ryoko. Yamada was appointed the leader of the Sanbo Kyodan in 1967, 1970 or 1973 and continued to differentiate the lineage from other Japanese Zen traditions by...
Ken Enko Zenshin Roshi (1907–1989) held the Hasan-Sai ceremony for her and she inherited his Dharma too. Yamada Koun gave her the name Koun An Roshi. From then on she was called Koun An Doru Chiko Roshi (=Daishi). In 1983 Yamada Roshi confirmed her as an authentic Zen-Master in her own right (Shoshike) of the Sanbo Kyodan
Sanbo Kyodan
Sanbo Kyodan is a Zen sect derived from both the Rinzai and Soto traditions of Japanese Zen.-History:...
lineage. Koun An Doru Chiko Roshi is the 85th generation after Shakyamuni Buddha and the 35th generation after Dogen Zenji.
In the San’un zendo in Kamakura she befriended her Zen companion Philip Kapleau
Philip Kapleau
Philip Kapleau was a teacher of Zen Buddhism in the Sanbo Kyodan tradition, a blending of Japanese Sōtō and Rinzai schools.-Early life:...
who was then writing his zen classic ‘The Three Pillars of Zen”. She designed the cover of this book and translated it into German. Those parts of Phillip Kapleau’s book which were originally written in Kanbun she translated anew into English to keep her German translation as faithful as possible. The German edition (Die Drei Pfeiler des Zen) was eventually published in 1969. During these years Hugo Makibi Enomiya Lassalle SJ became her Zen companion, as well as the Californian Jesuit Father Thomas Hand, one of the first catholic priests in the San’un zendo and pioneer of the Christian/Buddhist dialogue. Her long friendship with Father Hand is documented in an exchange of letters spanning 20 years.
From 1973 onwards, together with Yamada Koun Roshi she held the first Sesshin in Germany. In 1975 she established her own zendo in Munich. This zendo grew into a community of zen disciples from all over the world. Koun An pursued her teaching during intense summer training periods. She shielded her zendo and her students from public limelight in order to guarantee an intense and authentic zen-training and did so also in line with her view that “spiritual training is always free”.
Under the pseudonym of ‘Michael Mueller’ Brigitte D’Ortschy published a teisho (dharma talk) about the koan “MU”. With the title “ZEN” (photos by Eberhard Grames) it was published in 1984 for the first time.
Until her death in 1990 she spent the winter months in her garden hut (Jap. ‘hanare’) in Kita-Kamakura, Yama-no-uchi, and continued her own Zen training. With the support of Yamada Koun Roshi in the San’un Zendo in Kamakura she translated the classic texts of Zen-Buddhism from the Chinese and Japanese originals into English and/or German: “Hui-Neng” (Eno) (638-713) ‘The Dharma-Treasure Rostrum Sutra of the Great Master, the Sixth Patriarch’, “Sosan no hanashi”, and complete classic koan collections, like ‘Mumon Ekai: Mumon-kan (The Gateless Gate), ‘Setcho/Engo: Hekigan Roku (The Blue Cliff Record), Keizan Jokin: Denko-Roku (Transmission of Light), Wanshi Shogaku: Shoyu Roku (The Book of Equanimity), etc. and wrote her own teisho (Dharma talks) about all of the respective koan. Her contribution in the context of Christian/Buddhist dialogue is most comprehensively documented in her exchange of letters over 15 years with a Carthusian monk who was her disciple.
While Yasutani Haku’un Roshi is regarded as the pioneer of Zen in the USA, Koun-An Doru Chiko Roshi is regarded as the first German Zen-Master with students from all over the world.