Zen Master Wu Bong

Wu Bong Soen Sa Nim (Zen Master Jacob Perl) is the Guiding Teacher for a number of Zen Centers in Europe, and is the Head Teacher of the European Kwan Um School of Zen.  Prior to meeting Zen Master Seung Sahn and becoming his first American student in 1972, Soen Sa Nim practiced with Suzuki Roshi at the San Francisco Zen Center, and devoted one year to practicing with Tarthang Tulku at the Tibetan Nyingmapa Meditation Center in Berkeley, California.  He helped Zen Master Seung Sahn in establishing the Kwan Um School of Zen in Poland in 1978.  In 1984 he received inka (authorization to teach) and began to teach regularly in the United States and in Europe.  Soen Sa Nim graduated from Brown University where his concentration was mathematics and holds a fourth degree black belt in Shim Gum Do, a Korean art of swordsmanship.  In 1993, Soen Sa Nim received the transmission of Dharma and became the seventy-ninth Patriarch in his lineage.