Who We Are
GUIDING TEACHER
Myoki (Bright Vessel) Marcia Nehemiah, Sensei, began practicing and studying with Seiso Paul Cooper, Roshi in 2011. Along with Seiso Roshi and others, she co-founded Two Rivers Zen Community. She received Jukai from Seiso Roshi in 2013 and received lay entrustment in 2020. She has been the guiding teacher of TRZC since 2023. A published author and poet, Myoki Sensei has been involved in her community as a member of a writers collective and an environmental advocacy group, and was co-founder and past president of an organization assisting older adults. She is an avid reader and enjoys birdwatching and long walks in the woods.
PRACTICE LEADERS
Daiki (Great Vessel) Jim Palmer is a long-time spiritual practitioner who spent six years as a formal student at Zen Mountain Monastery in Mt. Tremper, NY. He has been an active member of TRZC since 2020, and he received Jukai in 2024. As a way of deepening his understanding, he has explored many of the world’s mystical traditions, always with an eye toward uncovering the common ground which underlies many of them and which often intersect with the teachings of Zen Buddhism. He is a self-employed artist.
Ensho (Complete Illumination) Christopher Cornell has been practicing with TRZC since 2018 and received Jukai from Seiso Paul Cooper Roshi in 2023. He is currently studying to be a lay teacher and facilitates Wednesday Evening Dharma on the first Wednesday of each month. He is married with four beautiful children, and lives in Englewood, Florida. He wishes you well.
Founders & Influences
Seiso Chugai Paul Cooper, Roshi is an ordained priest and formally transmitted teacher in the Soto Zen lineage of Dainin Katagiri, Roshi. He was co-founder and guiding teacher at the Two Rivers Zen Community until 2023. He is co-founder of and guiding teacher at the Barre Zen - Kokyoji in Barre, VT. He is a member of the Soto Zen Buddhist Association and the American Zen Teachers Association as well as the award-winning author of many books, his most recent being Zen Master Yueh Shan & Thinking's Bad Rap: A Practitioner's Guide (2026 Hohm Press). He practices Sui Zen (blowing Zen) on the shakuhachi (bamboo flute). https://www.barrezen.org/
Eihei Dōgen Zenji (1200–1253) was a monk, philosopher, and poet who established the Sōtō Zen lineage in Japan. After traveling to China to resolve a profound doubt regarding the nature of practice, he returned to Japan to transmit the radical non-dual realization that practice and enlightenment are not separate — the act of meditation itself is the expression of awakening. The Shōbōgenzō, “Treasury of the True Dharma Eye,” is his masterwork.
Dainin Katagiri (1929-1990) became a monk at the age of eighteen. He practiced at Eiheiji monastery and Taizoin temple, received a master’s degree from Komazawa University, and worked in the international division of Soto Zen headquarters before coming to the United States in 1963. He taught at the San Francisco Zen Center and Tassajara Zen Mountain Center as assistant to Shunryu Suzuki Roshi. He was the founding teacher of the Minnesota Zen Meditation Center and Hokyoji Zen Practice Community. He is the author of seminal works such as “Returning to Silence,” “You Have To Say Something,” and “The Light That Shines Through Infinity.”
Shohaku Okumura, founder and guiding teacher of the Sanshin Zen Community, was born in Osaka, Japan, in 1948. In 1970, he was ordained in the lineage of Kodo Sawaki Roshi by the late Kosho Uchiyama Roshi, and received dharma transmission from his teacher in 1975. He is one of the foremost living Zen masters and is widely recognized for his influential translations, commentaries, and teachings on the writings of Eihei Dogen Zenji.
