The meditation school that points directly at the mind: zazen, the koan, and transmission outside the scriptures, from Chan China to Zen Japan and the modern West.
Zen is the Mahayana school of seated meditation. It claims a transmission from the Buddha's own silence, was formed as Chan in Tang China, and divided in Japan into the Soto and Rinzai lines, whose argument over gradual sitting and the koan's sudden breakthrough continues.
Zen across the site
Sources
Primary
- Dogen, Shobogenzo (13th century).
Secondary
- Heinrich Dumoulin, Zen Buddhism: A History (2005).