Rōshi
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.............................................. (老師) (Japanese: "old teacher"; "old master"; Chinese pinyin: Lǎoshī) is an honorific title used for a highly venerated senior teacher in Zen Buddhism. ............) is a common word for teacher or professor withou........ the religious or spiritual connotation of rōshi. Chinese Chán Buddhism uses the semantically relate......................norific to a significantly older Zen teacher considered to have matured in wisdom and to have attained a superior understanding and expression of the Dharma (Japanese: mujōdō no taigen) . Typically, a rōshi will have received dharma transmission (Jap: inka shōmei) many years ago and although often the abbot or spiritual director of a monastery may in fact be too old to carry these responsibilities.[citation needed] .......s basic training. Historically, the term rōshi wil........n Soto (the Rinzai roshis can also be addressed as "shike") [...] [T]here is a kind of committee, called the "shike-kai", consisting of all Japanese Soto shike. There is no foreign shike, as far as I know. The shike-kai can appoint anyone as a shike whom they consider their equal, i.e. who has done genuine training and study, cultivated himself and reached whatever understanding that might be considered enlightened enough to match the enlightenment of the other shike. So shike appointment can be called horizontal in a way.[web 1]}}
===Western Zen===......... monk training halls.[web 1][1]
In the west, Rinzai and Soto-uses of the term have been mixed:
Rinzai Zen came first to the West, so a roshi was understood as someone who was a Zen master with certain credentials. With the introduction of Soto, the emphasis on personal relationship was grafted on, making a complex term that merged the official and legal with the personal and affectionate. To complicate matters further, the Diamond Sangha, the Los Angeles Zen Center and the Rochester Zen Center lineages have combined elements of both modern-day Soto and Rinzai Zen. It’s no wonder there is ambiguity and diversity in the usage of roshi in the West.[2]
In the Sanbo Kyodan, a lay organization that combines Soto and Rinzai elements, a person is called rōshi when they have received inka, indicating they have passed the kōan curriculum and received Dharma transmission.
Criticism
The use of the term roshi in the U.S. and Europe has at times led to confusion and controversy.[3][4][5][6][web 2] Stuart Lachs has argued that Zen institutions in the West have often attributed a mythic status to the title rōshi with harmful consequences.[web 3]
See also
References
- ^ Bodiford & 2008 276.
- ^ Buddhadharma Dictionary: Roshi
- ^ Ogata, 37
- ^ Seager, 107
- ^ Katagiri, 184
- ^ Gard, 193
Web references
- ^ a b Cite error: The named reference
Antaiji10was invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ Muho Noelke, Ten points to keep in mind about dharma transmission
- ^ Richard Baker and the Myth of the Zen Roshi by Stuart Lachs, 2002
Sources
- Bodiford, William M. (2008), Dharma Transmission in Theory and Practice. In: Zen Ritual: Studies of Zen Buddhist Theory in Practice (PDF), Oxford University Press
- Gard, Richard A. (2007). Buddhism. Gardners Books. ISBN 0-548-07730-4.
{{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter:|coauthors=(help) - Katagiri, Dainin (1988). Returning to Silence: Zen Practice in Daily Life. Shambhala Publications. ISBN 0-87773-431-3.
{{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter:|coauthors=(help) - Ogata, Sohaku (1975). Zen for the West. Greenwood Press. ISBN 0-8371-6583-0.
{{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter:|coauthors=(help) - Seager, Richard Hughes (1999). Buddhism In America. Columbia University Press. ISBN 0-231-10868-0.
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