Zen Buddhism: History, Stories and Proverbs

Sōtō Zen crest

If you’ve been hanging around here much at all, you know that we we’re usually all over the map—quite literally. Every week, we pick a new topic (from all corners of the world) and each one—usually—has just a thread of a connection to the one before (e.g., a decadent dessert we named “Chocolate Nirvana” one week leads us to a discussion of the Buddhist festival of Nirvana Day the next). This week, though, I’d like to stay with some of the Buddhist ideas a little longer. The reason is that while I was working with last week’s posts, I was reminded of a story a friend once told me and I wanted to share it with you. We’ll get to that in a minute. Specifically, I thought it might be interesting to delve a little deeper into what is known as Zen, short for Zen Buddhism.

Now, Zen—by very definition—is indefinable, so that makes this somewhat difficult, but here we go…

Bodhidharma by Blockdruck von Tsukioka Yoshitoshi (1839-1892)

We can start with the history, at least.

Buddhism, as we discussed in greater detail in the post on Nirvana Day, is based on the teachings of the Buddha, an Indian prince who lived about 500 years before Christ. Upon achieving Enlightenment, Buddha taught his disciples the Four Noble Truths, and that the way of life is through the Eightfold Path (For more on that, you might enjoy our What Would Buddha Do? post). In order to live in this way, many Buddhists emphasize the value of meditation. The word for deep meditation in the ancient Indian language Sanskrit is dhyana.

When Buddhism arrived in China, some of the words were imported along with the ideas. And so dhyana entered the Chinese language, where it came to be pronounced “chan-na.”

Later, in the 5^th century, an Indian monk by the name of Bodhidharma came to China. He stressed meditation to the degree that—legend has it—he cut off his eyelids to keep from falling asleep while meditating! Bodhidharma’s style of Buddhism came to be known as the Meditation School, “Chan” for short.

Many Japanese studied in China over the years, and in the 13^th century, Chan Buddhism was brought to Japan by a monk named Eisai. The Japanese pronounced “Chan” as “Zen.”

Zen became even more influential in Japan than it had been in China, so much so that many people now think of it as a Japanese concept.

Conceptualizing Zen

Now, to explain the ideas behind Zen is a much more difficult task than the history (particularly because I can’t claim to truly understand it myself.) Here is an article about it that I think does as well as the written word can (and certainly far better than I…)

I believe, though, that at its core, Zen is about being mindful. It’s about paying attention and being fully aware and involved with whatever you are doing at the moment that you are doing it. (I don’t think many Zen masters would be crazy about the whole multi-tasking idea, but I could be wrong…)

In Zen instruction, ideas are transmitted not by the written word but from the mind of the teacher to the mind of the student. This is often accomplished though the use of stories and proverbs. Which brings me to the story I mentioned earlier on.

As I said, I first heard this quite a few years ago. I don’t remember the specifics, but I was upset about something that hadn’t gone as expected, or more likely, exactly as I had wanted it to, and in a (largely unsuccessful) attempt to calm me down and make me feel better, my friend told me this

Zen story

There was an old farmer in a remote village in China. He was the envy of his village because he owned the only horse in the village.

“This is good,” said his neighbors.