Precepts retreat with Hosshin

July 1 - 6, 2025
Public Jukai-e ceremony on Sunday, July 6, 10 am, followed by potluck lunch 

Our annual precepts retreat focuses on the study of the sixteen bodhisattva precepts that Buddhists receive as guidelines for living a life of practice.  The daily schedule includes zazen, presentations from the preceptor and ensuing group discussions, work periods, and silent communal meals. A precepts ceremony (jukai-e) is held during the last day of the retreat, during which those receiving the precepts will make their vows and receive a dharma name and a rakusu, or small robe, which they will have sewn beforehand. 

In-person participation in the whole retreat, as well as the rakusu sewing retreat (April 7 - 14, 2025), is required for precepts recipients. There will also be room for additional practitioners to register to participate in-person for all or a selection of days. Others may participate virtually.  Everyone is welcome to attend the jukai-e in support of the recipients. There will be a potluck lunch following the ceremony.

Receiving the precepts

We receive the precepts from a preceptor, but they really come from the Buddhas and ancestors.  The preceptor is a person between the recipient and Buddha.  Our traditional belief is that the precepts are transmitted from Bibashi Buddha, the first Buddha, from the very beginning.  The reality to which Buddha awakened is the source of these precepts.  That's our faith.  I can't "give" the precepts to anybody.  They aren't my possessions; they were transmitted to me from my teacher, and his teacher transmitted them to him.  The recipient does not become "my" possession either.  Even Buddha said that he had no disciples.
  -- Shohaku Okumura

The sixteen-fold pure precepts

Three Refuges

• Taking refuge in the Buddha
• Taking refuge in the Dharma
• Taking refuge in the Sangha

Three-fold Pure Precepts

• Embracing moral codes
• Embracing all good acts
• Embracing and benefiting all living beings

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Ten Major Precepts

• Not killing
• Not stealing
• Not indulging in sexual greed
• Not speaking falsehood
• Not selling intoxicating liquor
• Not talking of the faults of others
• Not praising oneself or slandering others
• Not begrudging the Dharma or material things

• Not giving rise to anger
• Not ignorantly slandering the Three Treasures

For further basic context and teachings related to the precepts in our tradition and at Sanshin, we encourage you to visit Sanshin Source.

An aspiration to receive lay precepts arises from a steady and well-established practice with a sangha.  It's good to have been practicing regularly and consistently at Sanshin or within the Sanshin network for at least a year before considering making a commitment of this kind.  You will want to know that Soto Zen practice really is meaningful for you and that you wish to continue to maintain a steady practice after receiving the precepts.  You should also have begun to get a sense of the basic teachings of Buddhism and Soto Zen, and started to participate in sesshin, even if for only a day at a time.

​Jukai-e is not a reward for time served, an elevation in rank, a stamp of approval on your practice so far or any kind of end in itself; it's only the beginning of a committed lay practice.  Neither is it a badge of membership in Sanshin's sangha or a commitment to any preceptor or teacher.  You remain free to practice anywhere and with anyone.  Your commitment is to Buddha and the practice.

​When you receive lay precepts you will receive one dharma name.  At Sanshin, laypeople sometimes use their dharma names as middle names.  Novices and teachers have two dharma names and often use one of them as a first name while practicing with the sangha.  Your lay rakusu will be blue, while novices wear black and transmitted teachers wear brown or other colors in accordance with the tradition of our denomination.  Since we are direct descendants of Kodo Sawaki, one of the leaders of the 20th century nyoho-e movement, our rakusu do not have rings.
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If you live outside of Bloomington and it's possible to take precepts with a teacher in or closer to your hometown, please engage with and support that group rather than traveling to Sanshin to do so.  You need your local or regional sangha, and it needs you.  Continuing your practice of living with the precepts is much more difficult without in-person practice with a sangha, even if it's only a few times a year.

Due to the amount of work and preparation required, a maximum of six practitioners may receive lay precepts at Sanshin each year.  Full in-person attendance at the precepts retreat (July 1 - 6, 2025) as well as the rakusu sewing retreat (April 7 - 14, 2025) is required for recipients; neither partial attendance nor virtual participation is an option.  

Information & logistics

Precepts retreat Daily schedule

Tuesday, July 1
3:00 pm - Welcome meeting & oryoki meal orientation
5:10 - Opening comments & zazen
6:00 - Dinner
7:10 - Zazen
8:00 - Kinhin
8:10 - Zazen
9:00 - End of Day

Sunday, July 6
04:40 - Wakeup
05:10 - Zazen
06:00 - Kinhin
06:10 - Zazen
07:00 - Breakfast
07:30 - Soji (temple cleaning)
08:00 - Break
09:00 - Preparation for jukai-e
10:00 - Jukai-e
11:00 - Photo, cleanup and reset
12 pm - Potluck lunch/cleanup
End of retreat

Wednesday, July 2 - Saturday, July 5
04:40 - Wakeup
05:10 - Zazen
06:00 - Kinhin
06:10 - Zazen
07:00 - Breakfast
07:30 - Soji (temple cleaning)
08:00 - Break
09:00 - Presentation and group discussion
10:50 - Break
11:10 - Zazen
12 pm - Lunch/break
01:00 - Work period (For precepts recipients, work period will frequently be devoted to preparing for the jukai-e.)
02:50 - Tea
04:00 - End of work/break
05:10 - Zazen
06:00 - Dinner/break
07:10 - Zazen
08:00 - Kinhin
08:10 - Zazen
9:00 - End of day

food practice during the retreat

During sesshin and retreats at Sanshin, we carry out meals in the zendo using oryoki.  We sit at low tables and follow the procedures used at Antaiji.  This video introduces the steps of the meal (though some details have changed since it was recorded), and this one shows the use of the oryoki set for breakfast.  We also use the opening dinner as an opportunity to review the meal procedures by explaining the steps as we do them.  If you have your own oryoki set you're welcome to bring it, but we have plenty of (lay) sets for use by participants during the retreat.

​how we source food for sesshin & retreats

During sesshin at Sanshin, we simply sit, sleep, and eat. During the precepts retreat, we incorporate the additional layers of daily discussions about the precepts and communal work periods in which we explore the precepts concretely.​ Living out this schedule together for three, five, or seven days at a time, we embody in a very concentrated way a central question in our practice: how do we live without causing each other suffering? 

​In this context, including three silent communal meals each day, we can’t help but notice that in order to live, we all need, as Rev. Tatsuzen Sato writes for Sotoshu, “to put other forms of life such as those of animals and plants into our mouth.” Less obvious is that underpinning this dynamic is the interaction of countless beings in the growth, harvest, and transport of living food. Our food practice, like zazen, teaches and embodies interconnection. Eating fresh vegetables grown in nearby soil during sesshin and retreat meals can be a simple and direct reminder for us.

Relating to the local community and environment through the basic necessity for food has been a given in sanghas across the world through most of Buddhist history. In our modern context of supermarkets, industrial-scale agriculture, and widespread environmental degradation, it takes some intention to participate in this long tradition, and to do our best to avoid some of the harms to nonhuman and human beings inherent in much of our current global food system. 

With this in mind, we aim to purchase a substantial portion of food for our practice activities from nearby small farms, gardens, and people that work to produce and provide food sustainably -- and to grow what we can as a sangha ourselves. Coordination efforts in this direction are built into the job description of Sanshin’s operations manager.​

Picking up sesshin produce at Stranger's Hill Organics in Bloomington. September, 2023

​for travelers

For those traveling to Sanshin from out of town, note that Sanshin can provide neither guest rooms nor transportation to and from the temple each day. You may sleep in the zendo with your own bedding or camp in the yard with your own gear if you wish. There is no extra fee for this. See our zendo stay and camping guidelines here. Some may prefer to rent a nearby hotel room or other temporary housing. ​

In-person participation without Taking precepts

Practitioners who are not formally receiving precepts may register for all or a selection of full retreat days with communal meals. Alternatively, practitioners in the area may drop in for one or more zazen and/or work periods as they wish (no registration or fee).  

If you have further questions about the logistics of retreat registration and attendance, please email us.

virtual participation without taking precepts

Virtual participation (without receiving the precepts) via Zoom in scheduled zazen and discussion periods is welcome.​

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About the preceptor
Hosshin Shoaf

This year, our precepts retreat will be led by Hosshin Michael Shoaf, a dharma heir of Okumura Roshi. Hosshin found his way to meditation in his senior year in high school but didn’t really come to Zen practice until 1990 after reading Zen Mind, Beginners Mind. He moved to Bloomington in January of 1981 to enter Indiana University to study painting, sculpture and art history, finishing his studies in 1985. In 1986 he started a construction company thata focused mainly on remodeling and renovation. 

Six years later Hosshin met Myoyu Andersen Roshi and began a 17-year practice with her that blended Soto and Rinzai Zen.  At the same time he was part of a sitting group in Bloomington that later encouraged Okumura Roshi to consider that city as his base of operations.  In 2009 he officially became a student of Okumura Roshi's at Sanshin.  He ordained in 2013, was shuso during the 2018 ango (practice period), and received dharma transmission from Okumura Roshi in 2024.

These days, along with temple duties as work leader, Hosshin considers himself a cabinet and furniture maker, thoroughly enjoying the design process, finding it as satisfying as painting or sculpture.  He lives in the woods in a 100 year old log cabin on the outskirts of town and is in the process of renovating it until he dies.

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Registration for the 2025 retreat has not yet opened.