Chan Buddhism in the Song
Creators: name: Sun, Xuejing
Publisher: name: Database of Religious History (DRH)
Year: 2021

description: Originating from the early Mahayanian meditation (Skr. Dyana) practices, Chan禪 Buddhism gradually developed into a highly indigenous form in China since the sixth century. A famous, yet simplistic, four-part motto adapted from the Platform Sutra has been widely used by Chan communities to characterize the Chan idealogy: “special transmission outside the scriptures; not established upon words; directly pointing to human heart-mind; realizing the Buddhahood by seeing one’s Buddha-nature.” Chinese Chan Buddhism reached new heights during the Song. Unlike the decline of many Buddhist schools following the unrest of the late-Tang period (mid 8th-9th cent.), the Chan school continued to gain popularity during the turmoil times of the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms (907-979). To enhance their political regimes, regional rulers in southern China began to sponsor, instead of individual monks, multiple generations of Chan masters belonging to the same lineage. This pattern of state endorsement of Chan lineage families, institutions, and literature continued into the new dynasty of Song, which became a hallmark of Song Chan Buddhism. The picture of a “Golden Age of Chan” embodied by noble Tang masters as painted in Chan literature has led to a long-standing stereotype that deterioration characterized much of the Song Chan Buddhism. However, behind such narratives reconstructed by the Song authors, modern scholars have begun to acknowledge that it was during the Song that the Chan school took its fully mature form. Intellectual and artistic achievements associated with Song Chan Buddhism have significantly enhanced Chinese culture in general. New developments within Song Chan Buddhism have had a profound impact on the Chan traditions (Jpn. Zen; Krn. Seon) throughout East Asia. Compared to its earlier stages, Song Chan Buddhism presented many new features that would continue to dominate the Chinese religious landscape for several more centuries. First and foremost, Song Chan Buddhism distinguished itself by the advent and expansion of new styles of Chan literature: Gong’an公案 (Jpn. Koan), or “public cases,” are short stories of a Chan master’s commentaries on a previous dialogue or vignette of a past Chan patriarch. Gong’an became a standardized Chan literature genre from the eleventh century and was used largely as a pedagogical tool to elicit doubt and sudden enlightenment from the disciples. Yulu語錄, or “recorded sayings,” documents the sayings of great Chan masters and were popular among both monastic communities and elite sponsors. Qinggui清規, or “rules of purity,” provides detailed guidance for Chan monastic life. Denglu燈錄, or “lamp histories,” are narratives of a fairly coherent Chan family lineage starting from the Sakyamuni Buddha to Bodhidharma, down to the Chan masters of the Song. It was from such abundant literature that a distinct "Chan" identity emerged, emphasizing the lineage transmissions and the master-disciple relations. Second, Chan Buddhism during the Song maintained unusual relations with the imperial circles. The compilation of Chan literature, especially that of the denglu燈錄, was under the collaboration of Chan communities and high court officials, often entitled with the name of a particular imperial era. It was also during the Song that public monasteries (as opposed to private hereditary monasteries where the succeeding abbacies could be decided by private sponsors and the current abbots) of Chan began to receive state sponsorship, official recognition, and political regulation with their abbacies appointed by the government. Third, while many sects -among which the Yunmen雲門, Linji臨濟, and Caodong曹洞 were the most dominant- coexisted during the Song, in comparison with the competent histories of Tang Chan (especially the confrontation between the "Southern" and "Northern" schools), Song Chan Buddhism displayed a non-sectarian nature in general. The major doctrinal dispute, however, was perhaps the different approaches to enlightenment between Mozhao默照, “silent-illumination” (enlightenment through silent meditation) and Kanhua看話, “reflection on gong’an” (enlightenment through concentration on gong'an stories), which were advocated by sects of Caodong (Jpn. Soto) and Linji (Jpn. Rinzai) respectively. Despite doctrinal differences, the rise and fall of Song Chan lineages, as suggested by recent scholarship, were more closely associated with the change of regional sponsor networks. Fourth, apart from its distinct lineage identities, the Chan school shared common monastic practices and rituals with other contemporaneous Buddhist groups. The syncretistic tendencies of Song Chan Buddhism–especially with the Pure Land practices–would continue through the Yuan (1271-1368) and became more prominent in Ming (1368-1644) Chan Buddhism.