Dae Gak

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Zen Master Dae Gak (born Robert W. Genther) was born in 1947 in Massachusetts. In 1969, he received a BA at the American International College in Springfield, MA in psychology and formally undertook Zen training after reading the book Psychotherapy East and West by Alan Watts. In 1970, he was doing graduate work at Kent State University in Ohio when 4 students were shot and killed by The United States National Guard in May of that year. He subsequently co-authored a study based on a surveying of some 7,000 students in the days following the tragedy titled The Killings at Kent State: The Students Perspective.

In the 1970s, Dae Gak studied Zen Buddhism in various Japanese lineages across the country under the guidance of such teachers as Hakuyu Taizan Maezumi, Eido Tai Shimano and Kyozan Joshu Sasaki. Later he would also come to sit retreats with Thich Nhat Hanh. In 1973, Robert finished his graduate work at Kent State with a PhD in Clinical Psychology and moves to Kentucky where he begins teaching psychology and heads the Graduate Training Program in Clinical Psychology at Eastern Kentucky University.

In 1979, the same year he decides to leave Eastern Kentucky University for full time practice of Clinical Psychology in Lexington, KY, Robert has his first meeting with Seung Sahn Soen-sa (the Korean Master who founded The Kwan Um School of Zen). He had written Seung Sahn a personal letter after reading a book by Ann Bancroft in which Seung Sahn invites inquiries and was answered by him. After this correspondence he decides to go to the Providence Zen Center for a chanting retreat, where he meets this prolific Zen Master. As a side note, Seung Sahn often used letters of correspondence between himself and students or the curious as a teaching tool.

In 1980, under the tutelage of Seung Sahn, Robert along with Mara Genther, founded The Lexington Zen Center in the bottom floor of their house. In 1988 Robert receives inka from Seung Sahn and is granted the title of Ji Do Poep Sa Nim giving him authority to teach in the school. In the 1990's Dae Gak completes Furnace Mountain (the main Meditation Hall in Lexington), having worked closely with Zen Master Seung Sahn on finding the ideal location using Korean Feng Shui as a deciding principle.

In 1993 Robert ordained as a monk at Nam Wah Sah Temple (Korean) (or, Nanhua Temple) in Shaoguan China and in the following year receives formal transmission of the Dharma from Zen Master Seung Sahn, making him a Zen Master. Although monks in this tradition are to be celibate, Dae Gak still remained married and in a relationship with his wife. In 1999, Dae Gak returned to lay life with permission from Seung Sahn to do so due to inner turmoil. In 2000 Dae Gak officially breaks away from the Kwan Um School of Zen and begins teaching on his own starting his own sangha over philosophical differences in practice. One should keep in mind that this is precisely what Seung Sahn had done in founding The Kwan Um School.

He now holds many retreats in his main center of operations at Furance Mountain in Kentucky, but also has sanghas in areas as far off as the United Kingdom and Germany to which he visits several times each year.