Haus Tao is a Buddhist meditation-, retreat- and study center of the Sati-Zen-Sangha.
Founded in 1986 by Dharmacharya Marcel Geisser, the center is situated in the northeast of Switzerland, 1½ hours from Zurich, close to the junction of the German and Austrian borders.
Haus Tao is open throughout the year, offering a basic meditation and training schedule. The quiet and serenity of the house amid the natural beauty of the surrounding valley lend it a unique quality and spiritual atmosphere, including the joy of meditating to the sounds of the nearby brook and plentiful bird life.
The Sati-Zen-Sangha (Zen Community of Mindfulness) was establihed in 1999 by Dharmachãrya Marcel Geisser at the Buddhist meditation center House Tao in Switzerland. The community stands in the Rinzai Zen Tradition lineage of the Vietnamese Zen Master Thich Nhât Hanh and the Chinese Master Linji Yixuan.
The Sati-Zen-Sangha combines the mindfulness (sati) of traditional shamata-vipashyana meditation with the non-dual perspective of Zen and its significance for practice in everyday life. Sangha is the community of all practitioners. The aim of the Sati-Zen-Sangha is to integrate meditation as the practice of inter-being (interdependent arising of all phenomenons) into interpersonal relationships in daily life and society. The community takes its orientation from the “9 pillars of the Sati-Zen-Sangha”.
Marcel Geisser is one of the most important pioneers in developing a modern, western Buddhism for the German-speaking world. He was born in St. Gallen/Switzerland in 1952 and has devoted himself from an early age to the study and practice of Buddhism, primarily the Zen and Vipashyana traditions. He has studied with masters in Asia, Europe and the USA. His most important teachers were the Vietnamese Zen master Thich Nhât Hanh, the meditation teacher Goenka/India, Zen master Ku San/South Korea, Joseph Goldstein/USA and Tsoknyi Rinpoche/Nepal.
Since 1983, Marcel Geisser has led Zen and vipashyana courses in Switzerland, Germany, Austria and India and gives international lectures and seminars. In 1986 he founded the meditation center House Tao, which he continues to head today. In 1994 he was designated as Dharmachãrya by Thich Nhât Hanh.
Marcel Geisser is actively involved in Interreligious und Inter-Buddhist dialogue, e.g. within the framework of the European Buddhist Union (EBU), as a leading member of the Swiss Buddhist Union (SBU), at international Buddhist conferences and at interreligious events.
Particular issues of concern to Marcel Geisser are the combining of Zen and vipashyana practice and the integration of Buddhist teaching into everyday life. With the Sati-Zen-Sangha he has developed a mode of practice that brings the authentic teachings of the Buddha to support the concrete needs of modern men and women in Europe, and in which the social and humanitarian achievements of the West are joined with the enduring and effective core statements of the teaching (Dharma). The Sati-Zen-Sangha places particular emphasis on interpersonal relations, recognition of the equal validity of the four sanghas (women, men, nuns and monks), the meaning of the teacher-student relationship in the Kalianamitra model of spiritual friendship and the relative character of institutions, rituals and structures.
EMail: info@haustao.ch
Website: www.haustao.ch
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