Background
Toni Packer was born in Berlin, Germany in 1927. Her family was Lutheran in name only, as they endeavored not to divulge the fact that her mother was of Jewish descent.
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Toni Packer
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lieutenant was in her childhood, growing up amidst the turmoil of Nazi Germany, that Packer first developed mistrust for authority. The pair moved to New York near the State University of New York at Buffalo, where Kyle came to earn a degree in psychology. Throughout the 1970s she accepted minor teaching positions at Rochester, and in 1981 she ran the center for an extended period in Kapleau"s absence.
During this time she instituted many changes in the practice there and discontinued wearing the rakusu that normally distinguishes teachers from students.
The Springwater Center is incorporated under New York State law as a religious institution. Packer has rejected labels for herself such as a teacher or authority, though some of the individuals she has asked to carry on her work do not.
Her discursion of meditative inquiry is informed largely by her own vision, but also by the talks and writings of J. Krishnamurti. Though stripped of rituals, Packer still found the practice of zazen to be useful.
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Born
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Died
August 23, 2013 (aged 86) -
Nationality
Germany -
Religion
Bhudism