page_title: Dharma transmission
section_title: White Plum Asanga
hierarchical_section_title: Dharma transmission / Contemporary use in the Zen-traditions / White Plum Asanga
caption_attribution_description: Michel Genko Dubois Shiho
context_page_description: In Zen-Buddhism, Dharma transmission is a custom in which a person is established as a "successor in an unbroken lineage of teachers and disciples, a spiritual 'bloodline' theoretically traced back to the Buddha himself." The dharma lineage reflects the importance of family-structures in ancient China, and forms a symbolic and ritual recreation of this system for the monastical "family".
  In Rinzai-Zen, inka shōmei is ideally "the formal recognition of Zen's deepest realisation", but practically it is being used for the transmission of the "true lineage" of the masters of the training halls. There are only about fifty to eighty of such inka shōmei-bearers in Japan.
  In Sōtō-Zen, dharma transmission provides access to only a relatively low grade. It is listed as a requirement for the very lowest ecclesiastical status, that of an instructor third class further training is required to become an oshō.
context_section_description: In the White Plum Asanga, Dharma transmission comes first, and qualifies one as a sensei. This may be followed by inka, the final acknowledgemment:
  … once you have transmission then your teacher is sort of watching to see how you’re doing as a teacher – on how you are conducting yourself and, after a period of time, if the teacher has confidence in your understanding and ability to teach (that you are conducting yourself with integrity and clarity) then, at some point, the person will get the final seal of approval – which is what inka is. There is nothing particularly mysterious about it.
caption: Michel Genko Dubois (left) and Dennis Genpo Merzel performing "mind to mind" in Dubois's shiho ceremony.
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