Satori (or the Lack Thereof)

This weekend I was re-reading Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind by Shunryu Suzuki. The preface by Huston Smith, professor of philosophy at MIT, starts out by contrasting the "two Suzukis": Daisetz Suzuki (1870–1966), who "brought Zen to the West single-handed", and Shunryu Suzuki (1904–1971).

Whereas Daisetz Suzuki's Zen was dramatic, Shunryu Suzuki's is ordinary. Satori [awakening, or understanding] was focal for Daisetz, and it was in large part the fascination of this extraordinary state that made his writings so compelling. In Shunryu Suzuki's book the words satori and kensho, its near-equivalent, never appear.

When, four months before his death, I had the opportunity to ask him why satori didn't figure in his book, his wife leaned toward me and whispered impishly, "It's because he hasn’t had it"; whereupon the Roshi batted his fan at her in mock consternation and with finger to his lips hissed, "Shhhh! Don't tell him!"