Teachers
Sante Poromaa Roshi & Kanja Odland Roshi
Sante Poromaa Roshi has been practicing Zen since the early eighties, and teaching full time since 1998. After giving up his plans of a career as an artist he started his zen practice as a student of Philip Kapleau Roshi, the author of The Three Pillars of Zen, and he later became a student of Kapleau’s successor, Bodhin Kjolhede Roshi.
Kanja Odland Roshi started Zen training in 1984 as a student of Philip Kapleau Roshi and Bodhin Kjolhede Roshi. Also Kanja Roshi studied art before she dedicated her life to Zen practice. In 2001 she became the first female zen teacher in Sweden, and since then she has been teaching full time.
Together they lead The Swedish Zen Buddhist Society (Zenbuddhistiska Samfundet) and the training at Zengården. Both have received formal approval (inka) to teach in the Cloud-Water Sangha tradition which follow the Japanese zen master Daiun Sogaku Harada Roshi’s tradition. Together they have appointed five successors: Karl Kaliski Sensei (Cloud Water Zen Centre, Glasgow), Sangen Salo Sensei (Sanneji, Finland), Dharman Ödman Sensei (Göteborg Zen Center), Mitra Virtaperko Sensei (Tampere Zen Center, Finland) and Kansan Zetterberg Sensei (Stockholm Zen Center & Zengården).
Teishos
Here you can downoad recorded teishos in mp3 format by our teachers:
Kanja Odland - Refuge and Preparation
Kanja Odland - Remembering the Source
Sante Poromaa - Four Veils (part 1)
Sante Poromaa - Four Veils (part 2)
Click here for an interview with Sante Roshi (by Lilou Macé)
Kansan Zetterberg Sensei
Kansan Zetterberg Sensei is one of Sante Roshi and Kanja Roshi’s five successors. Kansan started practicing Zen at Stockholm Zen Center in 2009. He was ordained a priest in 2023, and received dharma transmission in 2024. Kansan lives at Zengården where he shares the responsibility of leading the training, together with his teachers. In addition to his work at Zengården Kansan Sensei is also the main teacher at Stockholm Zen Center.
In 2001 Kansan finished 10 years of music studies with a masters degree in double bass at the Royal College of Music in Stockholm. Before his priest ordination he worked as a full time musician, with focus on jazz and improvised music.
Dharman Ödman Sensei
Dharman Ödman Sensei has been practicing Zen with Kanja Odland Roshi and Sante Poromaa Roshi since 1999. He spent many years at Zengården and has been active as sangha leader at both Stockholm Zen Center and Helsinki Zen Center. He received dharma transmission in 2019 and today he is the teacher of Göteborg Zen Center. Dharman Sensei visits Zengården a few times every year to lead sesshins and ceremonies.
Our Lineage
Bodhin Kjolhede Roshi
Roshi Bodhin Kjolhede was born in 1948 in Michigan and received a B.A. in Psychology at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor prior to coming to the Rochester Zen Center in 1970. He was ordained in 1976, and completed twelve years of koan training under Roshi Philip Kapleau before beginning to teach in 1983.
In 1986 Roshi Kjolhede was appointed by Roshi Kapleau as his Dharma-successor and Abbot of the Rochester Zen Center. This appointment marked the culmination of a sixteen-year teacher-student relationship, the last decade working intimately together. Since then Roshi Kjolhede has worked with students from all over the United States, and from Canada, Mexico, Europe and New Zealand, and has sanctioned several Dharma heirs. In 2022 he handed the leadership of the Rochester Zen Centre over to two Co-Directors: Sensei Dhara Kowal and over to two Co-Directors: Sensei Dhara Kowal and Sensei John Pulleyn.
Philip Kapleau Roshi (1912–2004)
Philip Kapleau started his spiritual search after his experiences as a court reporter at the Nuremberg trials after the Second World War. He also worked for the International Military Tribunal in Tokyo.
In 1953 he returned to Japan and went through thirteen years of Zen training under two of Japan’s most famous zen masters: Harada Daiun-Roshi (1870-1961) and his Dharma-heir Yasutani-Roshi. Having been ordained by Yasutani-Roshi and authorized to teach, Kapleau returned to USA in 1966 and created the Rochester Zen Center.
After two decades as Abbot of the Rochester Zen Center, he passed on the leadership to Roshi Bodhin Kjolhede. Philip Kapleau died May 6, 2004, sitting among friends and students in the garden of the Rochester Zen Center. He was 92 years old.
Philip Kapleau Roshi is well known as one of the teachers instrumental in bringing Zen practice to the west. He wrote many books,including The Three Pillars of Zen, the first book on Zen practice to be published in English. He founded the Rochester Zen Center in 1966 and he also taught in Sweden regularly from 1981. Zengården traces its origins back to the Zen group founded around those teaching visits. Today we are part of the Cloud-Water Sangha, the group of independent Zen Centers formed by Roshi Kapleau's successor, Bodhin Kjolhede Roshi.
Roshi Kapleau trained in Japan, in the Harada-Yasutani lineage of Zen. The Harada-Yasutani lineage was founded in the 1950s by two prominent Zen teachers, Daiun Sogaku Harada Roshi and Hakuun Ryōkō Yasutani Roshi. Unlike many Japanese Zen masters at that time, both Harada Roshi and Yasutani Roshi felt it was important to make Zen practice more readily accessible to ordinary people with work and family commitments, and also to the many westerners who were arriving in Japan looking for authentic Zen practice. Philip Kapleau was one of the first westerners to become their student, from 1951. After 13 years of training in Japan, Kapleau returned to America and in 1965 was authorised by Yasutani Roshi to teach. He continued teaching and writing for over thirty years.