Buddhism - Society: Key Words

Question	Answer
Zen	A form of Mahayana Buddhism. In China it is called Chan, in Korea, Seon and in Vietnam, Thien. It holds to the Tathagata-garbha notion that we are already all enlightened.
Bodhidharma	The semi-mythical Indian Buddhist who probably founded Zen in the 6th century CE before taking it to China. In Zen mythology, the twenty-eighth Zen Master.
Dhyana/ Jhana	‘Meditation.’ The word from which Chan and Zen are both derived.
Zazen	‘Sitting meditation’. The type of mecitation Zen specifically emphasises.
Satori	A sudden insight into the truth, coming like a thunderclap.
Kashyapa (aka Mahakashyapa, ‘Great Kashyapa	A disciple of the Buddha. The mythical first Zen Master. During one of his teaching sessions, Buddha answered a question by simply holding up a flower. Kashyapa alone understood.
The Flower Sermon	The story of Kashyapa and the flower.
Daoism/ Taoism	A Chinese religion which is still hugely important in South-East Asia today. Strongly influenced early Zen.
Wu Wei	A Daoist notion. Action through inaction, thought to bring about harmony with the universe.
Yin and Yang	Daoist notions. The contradictory, but necessary, forces in all things.
The Five Houses of Zen	The major schools of Zen, all of which developed during the Tang Dynasty in Imperial China (618-907 CE).
The Rinzai school (Chinese: Lin-ji)	One of the two most important of the Five Houses of Zen.
Ensai (c. 1191 CE)	The founder of Rinzai. Son of a Shinto priest.
Gong-ans	Harsh methods in interviews. Important in Rinzai.
Koans	Enigmatic riddles (eg, ‘What did your original face look like, before you were conceived?’) Important in Rinzai.
Kensho	Insight into one's true nature (which is emptiness). Important in Rinzai.
The Soto school (Chinese: Caodong)	One of the two most important of the Five Houses of Zen. Emphasised Zazan (see above).
Dogen (1200-1253)	The founder of Soto. A wandering ascetic who admired Gautama Buddha and tried to emulate his earliest followers.
Shikantaza	‘Just sitting’. Important in Soto.
‘Pure Land’	A term used from early times to denote the field of peace and purity surrounding all Buddhas.
Pure Land Buddhism	Buddhism associated with devotion to a Bodhisattva called Amitabha (Amituo Fo in China; Amida in Japan).
Amitabha	Means ‘Everlasting Light’. He is held to be the Buddha of complete love or infinite light.
Dharmakara	A king who resolved to become a Buddha in a future life and create a “Buddha-realm” outside space and time. He expressed this in 48 vows. After many aeons, he became Amitabha.
Dharmakara’s 18th vow	“If I were to become a Buddha, and people, on hearing my name, were to have faith and joy and recite it only ten times, but not be born into my Pure Land, may I never gain enlightenment.”
Dharmakara’s 19th vow	That he would appear before those who called upon him at the moment of death in order to save them.
Sukhavati	Amitabha’s Pure Land. Sanskrit for “Happy Land”, and thought to be located in the western region of the universe. Only one of several Pure Lands in Buddhism.
The Amitabha Sutra	Tells the story of Dharmakara. It also tells a person how to obtain rebirth in Sukhavati:
The Infinite Life Sutra	Says rebirth in Sukhavati is a matter of remembering Amitabha’s name and repeating it several nights before death.
The Amitayurdhyana Sutra	Permits a person to scrape into the Happy Land on a bare minimum of personal worth, due to Amitabha’s grace.
Jodo-shu	One of two Pure Land schools in 13th century Japan.
Honen (1133-1212)	The founder of Jodo-shu. Taught that believers can achieve entry to the Pure Land merely by chanting Amitabha’s name.
Nembutsu (Chinese: nianfo).	In Jodo-shu, the practice of repeatedly chanting the name of Amida.
Jodo Shinshu	One of two Pure Land schools in 13th century Japan.
Shinran (1173-1262)	The founder of Jodo Shinshu. Originally a disciple of Honen, who also believed the world was in Mappo.
Tariki	‘Other power’, ie, Amida’s power. Emphasised by Jodo Shinshu.
Henry Steel Olcott (1832-1907)	An American who designed the Buddhist flag.
Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860)	A German philosopher who admired Buddhism’s ethical code.
Sir Edwin Arnold (1832-1904)	An English writer. Published ‘The Light of Asia’ (1879), a popular poem based on the life of the Buddha.
Herman Hesse	Influential German writer. In 1922, published his short novel Siddhartha, based on the life of the Buddha.
Jack Kerouac (1922-1969)	The central writer of the ‘Beat Generation’. Incorporated Zen motifs and ideas into novels.
The Fourteenth Dalai Lama	The current leader of Tibetan Buddhism.
‘The Dorje Shukden dispute’	A practice that concerns the propitiation of a protective deity, Shukden, and which the Dalai Lama has come to condemn in an increasingly vocal manner.
Kung Fu	A 1972-75 US TV series featuring David Carradine as a Shaolin (a variety of Chan Buddhism) monk.
Robert Pirsig	US author of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance (1974).
Inculturation	An English word. The gradual acquisition of the characteristics and norms of a culture or group by a person, another culture, etc.
Buddhist Modernism	A type of Buddhism that has emerged from the dominant discourses of western modernity.
Stephen Batchelor	Director of studies at Sharpham College for Buddhist Studies and Contemporary Enquiry. Proponent of Secular Buddhism, which claims the Buddha never meant to make mysytical claims.
Buddhism Without Beliefs (1997)	Batchelor’s most well-known work.
Paul Knitter	Paul Tillich Professor of Theology, World Religions and Culture at Union Theological Seminary in New York City, and a leading advocate of interreligious dialogue.
Without Buddha I Could Not Be a Christian (2009)	Knitter’s main work. Advocates ‘dual belonging’ – that one can belong to Buddhism and Christianity at the same time.

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Buddhism - Society: Key Words

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