Buddhism and Zen"Bhante, I’ve long treasured a walking conversation I enjoyed with a Zen Buddhist at Bodh Gaya in India. Here in the U.S., we are fascinated with Zen. Please tell me, Bhante, what exactly is Zen?" "The word Zen sounds Japanese, but Zen came from India," Bhante answered. "We have a word in the Pali language — Pali is the language Buddha used — jhana. And in the other ancient language of India, Sanskrit, the word is dhyana. Ihana or dhyana means meditative absorption. "So," he continued, "when an Indian Buddhist monk called Bodhi Dharma went to China, the Chinese people pronounced the word not as jhana, but as chan. Even today, Chinese say chan. Now, when this chan, this way of meditative absorption was taken to Japan, the name was Japanized and became zen. So, the original word is jhana; in Sanskrit it is dhyana; Chinese call it chan; and Japanese call it zen. "Good," I said, "then Zen is a method of meditative absorption." "All meditation," he replied. |
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