The induction of D??gen into the modern academic world, or per�haps more accurately, the academic world's first real engagement with D??gen came about 1924 when Watsuji Tetsur?? (1889�1960) published a provocative essay entitled "Shaman D??gen." It was this essay that to many of Watsuji's contemporaries seemed to rescue D??gen from what they considered to be his entrapment for nearly seven centuries in the sectarian embrace of the S??t?? school. Watsuji insisted that D??gen no longer should be thought of as belonging exclusively to the monastic community. Claiming, instead, that D??gen "belongs to mankind," Watsuji with this declaration initiated the non-sectarian study of this thirteenth-century figure and in effect commenced what are called D??gen Studies [Dagen kenkyii] in modern times.As one way of exploring what it might possibly mean to say that D??gen "belongs to mankind," the Kuroda Institute held a conference on D??gen at Tassajara Springs, California from October 8 to 10, 1981. The essays of this volume are a part of its result.