Authors:Steven Heine, Dale S. Wright,
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Keywords: buddhism, zen, contexts, texts, koan
Number of Pages: 336
Published: 2000-04-20
List price: $110.00
ISBN-10: 0195117484
ISBN-13: 9780195117486

Koans are enigmatic spiritual formulas used for religious training in the Zen Buddhist tradition. Arguing that our understanding of the koan tradition has been severely limited, contributors to this collection examine previously unrecognized factors in the formation of this tradition, and highlight the rich complexity and diversity of koan practice and literature.

Author: Steven Heine
Publisher: University of Hawaii Press
Keywords: folklore, fox, koan, philosophy, text, shape, shaping, shifting
Number of Pages: 295
Published: 1999
List price: $34.00
ISBN-10: 0824821971
ISBN-13: 9780824821975

According to the "Fox Koan", the second case in the "Wu-men Kuan Koan" collection, Zen master Pai-chang encounters a fox who claims to be a former abbot punished through endless reincarnations for denying the efficacy of karmic causality. Most traditional interpretations of the "Koan" focus on the philosophical issue of causality in relation to earlier Buddhist doctrines, such as independent origination and emptiness. This text examines the "Fox Koan" in relation to philosophical and institutional issues facing the Ch’an/Zen tradition in both Sung China and medieval and contemporary Japa

Authors:Leonard Blusse, Menghong Chen,
Publisher: Brill Academic Publishers
Keywords: sinica, leidensia, batavia, koan, kong, archives
Number of Pages: 168
Published: 2003-08
List price: $119.00
ISBN-10: 9004131574
ISBN-13: 9789004131576

The archive of the Kong Koan constitutes the only relatively complete archive of a "diaspora" Chinese urban community in Southeast Asia. The essays in the present volume offer important and new insights into many different aspects of Overseas Chinese life between 1780-1965. The Kong Koan of colonial Batavia was a semi-autonomous organization, in which the local elite of Jakarta’s Chinese community supervised and coordinated its social and religious matters. During its long existence as a semi-official colonial institution, the Kong Koan collected sizeable Chinese archival holdings with de

Author: John Daido Loori
Publisher: Wisdom Publications
Keywords: practice, koan, study, zen, writings, koans, essential, sitting
Number of Pages: 352
Published: 2005-12-30
List price: $16.95
ISBN-10: 0861713699
ISBN-13: 9780861713691

The Zen tradition has just two main meditative practices: shikantaza, or "just sitting;" and introspection guided by the powerful Zen teaching stories called koans. Following up on his previous book, The Art of Just Sitting, John Daido Loori’s new anthology illuminates the subtle practice of koan study from many viewpoints. Section one examines the history of the study and use of koans in China and Japan, with essays from such important contemporary Zen scholars as Heinrich Dumoulin ("Five Houses of Zen"). Section two includes writings from the masters of Japanese Zen such as Hakuin Ekak

Author: Victor Sogen Hori
Publisher: University of Hawaii Press
Keywords: asian, library, religion, culture, multilingual, nanzan, practice, book, sand, capping, phrases, koan, zen
Number of Pages: 880
Published: 2003-02
List price: $46.00
ISBN-10: 0824822846
ISBN-13: 9780824822842

Zen Sand is a classic collection of verses aimed at aiding practitioners of koan meditation to negotiate the difficult relationship between insight and language. As such it represents a major contribution to both Western Zen practice and English-language Zen scholarship. In Japan, the traditional Rinzai Zen koan curriculum includes the use of jakugo, or "capping phrases." Once a monk has successfully replied to a koan, the Zen master orders the search for a classical verse to express the monk’s insight into the koan. Special collections of these jakugo were compiled as handbooks to a