Pioneer Valley Zendo is a Soto Zen zendo

Zendo

or is a Japanese term translating roughly as "meditation hall". In Zen Buddhism, the zen-dō is a spiritual dōjō where zazen is practiced...

 established in 1976 in Charlemont, MA as a sister-temple to Antai-ji

Antai-ji

is a Buddhist temple that belongs to the Sōtō school of Zen Buddhism. It is located in the town of Shin'onsen, Mikata District, in northern Hyōgo Prefecture, Japan, where it sits on about 50 hectares of land in the mountains, close to a national park on the Sea of Japan...

 in Japan

Japan

Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

, where Kosho Uchiyama

Kosho Uchiyama

was a Sōtō priest, origami master, and the former abbot of Antaiji near Kyoto, Japan.The author of more than twenty books on Zen Buddhism and origami—of which Opening the Hand of Thought: Foundations of Zen Buddhist Practice is best-known—Uchiyama graduated from Waseda University with a masters...

 was roshi

Roshi

is a Japanese honorific title used in Zen Buddhism that literally means "old teacher" or "elder master" and sometimes denotes a person who gives spiritual guidance to a Zen sangha or congregation...

. Koshi Ichida, Eishin Ikeda and Shohaku Okumura

Shohaku Okumura

Shohaku Okumura is a Japanese Soto Zen priest and the founder and guiding teacher of the Sanshin Zen Community located in Bloomington, Indiana, where he and his family currently live...

 were the zendo's original founders, and the place was run by Reverend Issho Fujita

Issho Fujita

was born in Niihama, Japan and was head teacher at Sōtō Zen practice center Pioneer Valley Zendo in Charlemont, MA. Fujita did studies in Child psychology at Tokyo University, but abandoned these studies and became a Zen monk...

 (1954 - present) from 1987 until 2005. Eishin Ikeda, who had later been leading the Bean Town Sangha (founded by Eishin Ikeda and Michael Flessas

Michael Flessas

Michael C. Flessas , is the birth name of actor Michael Flessas. Flessas' most notable film role was Angry Man in the Cannes Film Festival 2000 Palme d'Or winning film Dancer in the Dark directed by Danish film director Lars von Trier. Originally, the director himself considered playing the role...

) whose first meetings where held on the second floor of a book store in Arlington, Massachusetts and returned as the present resident priest in 2006.