Zen or Ch'an

03 Oct 1994 12:03

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Myths of the sect. Attitude towards the intellect. History of its lay following --- artists, literati, samurai. And authoritarianism. Introduction to the West and influence there. Origins of koans. And AI. Comparison to analytical philosophy (all those paradoxes, claims that things are pseudo-problems, etc.). Hu Shih once wrote a paper arguing that koans began as analytical paradoxes, which were intended to have logical (but perhaps counter-intuitive) answers; I don't know how well that idea has held up, but I like it.

I have a micro-collection of Zen documents.

To read:
• Bernard Faure, Chan Insights and Oversights: An Epistemological Critique of the Chan Tradition [blurb]
• Steven Heine and Dale S. Wright (eds.), The Zen Canon: Understanding the Classic Texts
• Brian Victoria, Zen at War
• Duncan Ryuken Williams, The Other Side of Zen: A Social History of Soto Zen Buddhism in Tokugawa Japan [Blurb, ch. 1.]
• Shoji Yamada, Shots in the Dark: Japan, Zen, and the West [blurb]