Friedrich Fenzl
Myoshin Friedrich Fenzl (born November 4, 1932 in Kienberg ; † December 8, 2014 in Salzburg ) was an Austrian Shin Buddhist and European Buddhism pioneer.
Life
Fenzl was born into a German-Bohemian civil servant family. Early on, he met the family's strict Catholic attitudes with doubts and resistance. A very keen interest in the Far East and in particular Japan led him to the study library there after the family moved to Salzburg due to the war , where the Buddhist catechism fascinated him and made him aware of Buddhism .
When he met the Berlin Buddhist Harry Pieper in 1955 after a life crisis and became an avowed Buddhist, his path began as one of the first European Shin Buddhists. As early as 1962 he became the foreign secretary of the 'Buddhist Community Jodo-Shin-Europe' and editor of its small magazine 'Mahayana'. In 1968 he received from Nishi Hongan-ji , the main temple of the Jōdo Shinshū School Honganji-ha in Kyoto, a scholarship to Ryūkoku University to study Buddhism there, and had to give up his post as a university official. In addition to studying the teachings of Jōdo-Shinshū and the history of Japanese Buddhism , he also worked on projects such as the German translation of Shinran's Tannishō .
On his travels through Japan and on his visits to Shin temples, he got to know religious and everyday life and was trained in Ikebana and the Japanese tea ceremony .
1970 Fenzl returned to Europe to teach Shin Buddhism , inspired by Kōshō Ōtani . He regularly gave lectures in Salzburg and invited other Buddhist lecturers to do so.
He participated in the establishment of an Austrian Buddhist Union and was elected Vice President of the European Buddhist Union and member of the board of the Scheibbs Buddhist Center in 1976 . In 1977 he founded the Salzburg Buddhist Community , which functions as a cross-tradition association of Buddhists in the Salzburg and Upper Bavaria area . It offers activities such as meditation evenings, lectures, discussions, interreligious encounters, introductions to Buddhism for school classes, festivals and excursions.
Fenzl published numerous articles in Buddhist magazines, especially in German-speaking countries, but also in Japanese and Taiwanese publications.
Since the founding of the Austrian Buddhist Religious Society (ÖBR) in 1983 and the official recognition of Buddhism as a religious community in Austria, Fenzl has held positions in it and has designed television programs ( The Teaching of Buddha ).
He paid particular attention to questions of social ethics and Buddhist education. His activities included the Buddhist hospital and prison chaplaincy, participation in the hospice movement and care of migrants and fellow citizens of Asian origin. Fenzl has been actively involved in interreligious dialogue since the 1990s . In 2002 he was appointed honorary president of the Salzburg Buddhist Community. In 2006 he received a special honor from the Nishi Honganji for his services to the promotion of Shin Buddhism in Europe.
literature
Volker Zotz : The search for a social Buddhism. Friedrich Fenzl and Jodo Shinshu . Kairos Edition (Luxembourg) 2007, ISBN 2-9599829-6-7 .
See also
Web links
- Homepage of Jodoshinshu Austria with texts by Friedrich Fenzl
- Fenzl biography in 'Helmut Klar - Zeitzeug zum Geschichte des Buddhismus in Deutschland', pp. 90–94
Individual evidence
- ^ Obituaries in the Salzburger Nachrichten
- ^ Paul Chalupny, Eva Reinecker and Michael J. Greger: Temple Foundation Festival November 11th . Salzburg State Institute for Folklore, 2016.
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Fenzl, Friedrich |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Fenzl, Myoshin Friedrich |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Austrian interpreter and pioneer of European Buddhism |
| DATE OF BIRTH | November 4, 1932 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Loučovice CS , (Kienberg on the Vltava) |
| DATE OF DEATH | December 8, 2014 |
| Place of death | Salzburg |