In 2002 Jiun Hogen, Roshi ordained her as Osho and until 2005 Enko guided students in her zendo. Then she became seriously ill. On November 2, 2006 Enko Hogen, Osho passed away in her birthplace Bilthoven.

The End of the End

Paul McCartney's last album contained a song titled 'The End of the End'; in the first verse he sings:

At the end of the end
It's the start of a journey
To a much better place
And this wasn't bad
So a much better place
Would have to be special
No need to be sad

The Noorder Poort sangha has had to say farewell many times during its brief existence. Zen master Gesshin Prabhasa Dharma left this world in 1999. Many Zen practitioners in previous years 'moved over to the other side'. Zen master Thich Man Giac died in the Temple in Los Angeles in October 2006. In November in the Netherlands we had to say farewell to Zen teacher Enko Hogen.

Enko Hogen Osho belonged to the first occupant group of the Noorder Poort. She had just been ordained as unsui by Prabhasa Dharma, Zenji.

This is how her friend Wieneke remembers Enko Hogen.

When you go home after a meeting with a satisfied feeling in your belly, then you can call it warm friendship. Else was still your name in October 1989, when we and another forty people climbed the mountain with the medieval mystic Hadewych. We arrived that weekend in Hadewych's eighth vision where we stopped at the foot of the mount with the guide.
"Until here," said the guide, "I can go with you." At the end of that weekend in the village of Vogelenzang (Bird song) we knew, you and I, that we both practiced Zen. With a farewell - "Will you also come next spring?" - our friendship started.

We both lost people important to us in these years. First Prabhasha Dharma, Zenji and Mimi Marechal, then your mother fell ill and died - your brother, your sister, my brothers… I could always talk to you about everything without having to change or fake my feelings; there was always true immediacy between us. It was not in your nature, nor in mine, to escape difficult aspects of life. We managed to solve our rare disagreements by being honest, by talking. When you moved from Overveen to Wapserveen and became Enko, I expected to see you as a friend only at Noorder Poort, but you could always surprise me.

Tiredness was a recurrent theme in your life. In the first place it was the illness MS that made you do less than the average person. That was also something we found each other in: feeling deliciously tired together.

From the book "Nothing Special: Living Zen" by Joko Beck you wrote me the following quote: "In our life it is all about openness itself, which is joy. Joy includes everything that is, suffering, happiness. In our life it is all about that kind of remedy."

Does foreknowledge exist? I do not know. You had to be operated upon. The Noorder Poort sympathized, people of the sangha offered support, and the three of us, Marleen, you and I smiled during a walk in the wood of Bilthoven about our old plan to start a zen living group. After the period of chemotherapy, your hair started to grow again.

Somewhere in 2002, when I was talking about the future, you looked at me sharply and said: "It remains to be seen whether I'll ever reach sixty…" - as if you knew? Soon after you had been informed that you did not have much longer to live, the sesshin in Spain started. Marleen decided to stay with you. In Spain Jiun Roshi dedicated the sesshin to you and, despite the fact that not all participants knew you personally, we sat with our attention dedicated to you. On the phone, you said "I have felt it". Jiun Roshi quotes Emperor Su-Dsung : "What shall I do for you when you are a hundred years old?" T here we could bite our lips to pieces: the koan of the seamless pagoda.

What remains is a feeling of deep gratitude when remembering your courage, and all the good things you did for us, and the last weeks in the Leendert Mees house, where you no longer ate and finally died. Thanks to especially the commitment of Marleen, Herma and Dick, we - people from the sangha, family, friends - managed to be with you day and night. And now you have gone up the way which was only intended for you, the fifth. Farewell sweet Else Enko, we will always miss you.

The end of end is the beginning of a journey to a much better place. No better preparation to this journey than practicing deep meditation, deep absorption, and to live in attention, harmony and satisfaction. Prabhasa Dharma, Zenji said it - short and concise: "Die now, live later!" Every moment is a moment to die; every moment is a rebirth. Do not wait till the last minute; do not imitate it on the meditation cushion. That which we think, say and do now gives direction to our future, also at the end of end. The Zen exercise is an exercise in living and dying; doing that we do not have to be frightened for death. A Zen practitioner asked once his Zen master: "Is there any life after death?" The Zen master answered: "THIS is the life after death!"

The end of the end is the beginning of a journey to a better place. What is this better place? Build a seamless pagoda!