Endless Path Zendo | Roshi Rafe Martin
Endless Path Zendo, is a lay Zen Buddhist community. Intimate and non-institutional in atmosphere, we are dedicated to realizing the Buddha Way in the midst of our own ordinary lives, finding our center of gravity in the creativity of Zen, and the Way of the Bodhisattva.
Zen teacher (roshi) Rafe Jnan Martin began traditional Zen practice in 1970, becoming a personal disciple of Roshi Philip Kapleau, author of The Three Pillars of Zen. After Kapleau Roshi’s retirement, he practiced with Robert Aitken Roshi, founder of the Diamond Sangha, then from 2002-2016 worked intensively with Danan Henry Roshi, founding teacher of the Zen Center of Denver and a Kapleau Roshi Dharma Heir as well as a Diamond Sangha Dharma Master.
Rafe received full lay ordination in 2009, and in 2012 received inka—recognition of his successful completion of the Diamond Sangha/ Harada-Yasutani koan curriculum, along with authorization to begin teaching. In 2016 he received full Dharma Transmission as an independent Zen teacher.
An award-winning author and storyteller whose work has been cited in Time, Newsweek, The NY Times, and USA Today, Rafe has a master’s degree in English literature and literary criticism and is a recipient of both national and state awards, including the Empire State Award for the body of his work. His writing has appeared in Tricycle, Lion’s Roar, Parabola, The Sun, and Inquiring Mind, among other journals of religion and myth. He has given talks at Zen and Dharma Centers around the US and Canada, as well as such venues as the American Museum of Natural History, Zuni Pueblo, and The Joseph Campbell Festival of Myth and Story.
His most recent books are A Zen Life of Buddha (Sumeru 2022), The Brave Little Parrot (Wisdom Publications, 2023) and A Zen Life of Bodhisattvas (Sumeru, 2023).
Endless Path Zendo | Roshi Rafe Martin
Bodhidharma Day and The Oak Tree in the Front Garden
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Recorded October 4, 2025.
In honor of Bodhidharma, the founder of what we now call Zen Buddhism, Roshi Martin comments on the koan of the "Oak Tree in the Front Garden" and talks about a conversation with Robert Aitken Roshi and the relationship of Zen practice to actual happiness.
More on this koan will be found in Roshi Martin's upcoming book " Finding your Buddha Smile: Coming h\Home to What Zen is Really About."
Referenced:
- Zen Master Dogen -- Shobogenzo: Treasury of the True Dharma Eye - Translated by Kazuaki Tanahashi
- William Blake -- Songs of Experience and The Marriage of Heaven and Hell.
- John Daido Loori -- The True Dharma Eye: Zen Master Dogen's Three Hundred Koans
- Books by Roshi Rafe Martin
- Talks on YouTube
- More information at endlesspathzen.org