Paper short abstract:

This talk will examine the characteristics of what became after the fifteenth century the very foundations of the Rinzai branch. In origin, these are traceable to Shūhō Myōchō, whose innovative doctrinal conceptions would, as I show, serve at length as framework for Japanese Rinzai Zen writ large.

Paper long abstract:

Rinzai Zen presents itself as the Japanese variation of the Linji branch of Chinese Chan, but its teachings have evolved over the course of history and it includes today some aspects fundamentally different from its original continental model. One of the main characteristics of Rinzai Zen can be seen in its reinterpretation of the practice based on kōan (C. kanhua Chan/J. kannna Zen), and in particular in its use of kōan series – as opposed to Chinese single-kōan practice – that follow a pre-established system of progression.

The origin of this characteristic has long been sought in the reforms carried out during the eighteenth century by Hakuin, but closer examination reveals the presence of a quite similar structure in what is called "missan-zen," that is, in the approach to Zen that was current from the end of the fifteenth to the middle of the seventeenth century. Going back even further in time, we find traces of this approach as early as the fourteenth century, with several clues pointing to a probable origin for this turning point in the larger evolution of Japanese Zen towards Shūhō Myōchō, more often referred to by his national master title, Daitō. In this talk I will present the various potential arguments for considering Daitō to be the one who gave a new direction to Zen practice.

The Zen missan is based above all on a way of approaching texts, and more specifically the textual collections of kōan. Commentary, in particular, was no longer to be an exercise in explaining or interpreting the text, but a practice aimed at spiritual progression, an approach found already in Daitō in a different form that I will present. The status given to the collections of kōan certainly constitutes Daitō's greatest innovation, the one concept that fundamentally modified the evolution of Zen in both its Rinzai and Sōtō branches. In this paper, I will examine the major principles of this then still novel approach, as well as the range of its subsequent implications.