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85-634: The Siku Quanshu , literally the Complete Library of the Four Treasuries , was a Chinese encyclopedia commissioned by the Qing dynasty 's Qianlong Emperor in 1772, and completed in 1782. It is the largest collection of books in imperial Chinese history, comprising 36,381 volumes, 79,337 manuscript rolls, 2.3 million pages, and about 997 million words. The complete encyclopedia contains an annotated catalogue of 10,680 titles along with

170-404: A gōng'àn . Thus, by the time of Dahui Zonggao (1089–1163) , this practice was well established. Dahui promoted and popularized the practice extensively, under the name of "observing the phrase zen" ( kanhua chan ). In this practice, students were to observe ( kan ) or concentrate on a single word or phrase ( huatou ), such as the famous mu of the mu-kōan , and develop

255-443: A kōan . According to Hori, a central theme of many kōan is the 'identity of opposites': [K]ōan after kōan explores the theme of nonduality. Hakuin's well-known kōan , "Two hands clap and there is a sound, what is the sound of one hand?" is clearly about two and one. The kōan asks, you know what duality is, now what is nonduality? In "What is your original face before your mother and father were born?"

340-565: A Chan master would cite a story about a famous master and then demand that his students comment." Later on, certain questions (like: "Why did Bodhidharma come from the West?") developed independently from the traditional stories and were used in the same fashion. Schlütter also notes that "most commonly used gongan in the Song originally came from the influential Transmission of the Lamp , although

425-962: A compendiums of 3,593 titles. The Siku Quanshu surpassed the 1403 Yongle Encyclopedia created by the previous Ming dynasty , which had been China's largest encyclopedia. Complete copies of the Siku Quanshu are held at the National Library of China in Beijing , the National Palace Museum in Taipei , the Gansu Library in Lanzhou , and the Zhejiang Library in Hangzhou . The Qianlong Emperor of

510-540: A comprehensive treatment of one subject an "encyclopaedia" is a catachresis known already in medieval China, where the term leishu , properly a collection of classical texts on many fields, came to be applied to similar treatments of one subject only, for instance the use of jade". Chinese scholar-bureaucrats compiled about 600 leishu traditional Chinese "encyclopedias" between the 3rd and 18th centuries. About 200 of these are extant today, and 10-20 are still used by historians. Most were published by imperial mandate during

595-446: A corollary to this, Ta-hui warned that the intellectuals who in his day were the ones most interested in kōan meditation would be the least likely to succeed at it, given their tendency to think. His advice to them, therefore, was to cease completely any effort to resolve the kōan and "to give up the conceit that they have the intellectual tools that would allow them to understand it." The primary effort required in this enterprise

680-617: A highly literary approach, such as ascribing specific meanings to the cases, or become too involved in book learning. Dahui Zonggao is even said to have burned the woodblocks of the Blue Cliff Record , for the hindrance it had become to the study of Chán by his students. During the late Song dynasty (11th–12th century), the practice of assigning specific gōng'àn to students for contemplation had become quite common and some sources contain examples of Zen masters (e.g. Touzi Yiqing) who became enlightened through contemplating

765-532: A natural response to the tyranny imposed on the people under the Ming. The Qianlong Emperor commissioned seven copies of the Siku Quanshu . The first four copies were for the emperor himself and were kept in the north, in specially constructed libraries in the Forbidden City , Old Summer Palace , Shenyang , and Chengde . The remaining three copies were sent to the south, where they deposited in libraries in

850-475: A new contemplative technique, he also invented a whole new kind of Chan in the process." Whatever the case, Dahui was extremely influential in shaping the development of the Linji school in the Song. Dale S. Wright also writes that Dahui: [...] maintained that the hua-t'ou had no meaning and that any intellectualization, any conceptual thinking at all, would obstruct the possibility of break- through. As

935-402: A sense of "great doubt" within until this ball of doubt "shattered", leading to enlightenment. Dahui's invention was aimed at balancing the insight developed by reflection on the teachings with developing śamatha , calmness of mind. This idea of observing a key phrase or word was Dahui's unique contribution, since the earlier method of gōng'àn contemplation never taught the focusing on

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1020-403: A single man, but rather the hundreds and thousands of bodhisattvas of the three realms and ten directions . This principle accords with the spiritual source, tallies with the mysterious meaning, destroys birth-and-death, and transcends the passions. It cannot be understood by logic; it cannot be transmitted in words; it cannot be explained in writing; it cannot be measured by reason. It is like

1105-455: A single word, nor did it teach to develop a "ball of doubt that builds up before finally shattering." According to Wright, instead of focusing on the full narrative of a kōan , Dahui promoted "intense focus on one critical phrase, generally one word or element at the climax of the kōan ." Dahui also taught that meditation on just one huatou of a single gōng'àn was enough to achieve enlightenment, since penetrating one gōng'àn

1190-415: A specific lineage or school. This formal authorization or confirmation ({{|zh|印可|yìn kě}}, Japanese: inka , Korean: inga ) was given by their teacher and was often part of a process of " dharma transmission " ( Chinese : 傳法 ) in a specific lineage. This formal act placed the "confirmed" Chan master in a special unique position as an interpreter and guide to the gōng'àn . The importance of

1275-507: A standard reference work for generations. The 1980-1993 Zhongguo Da Baike Quanshu or Encyclopedia of China is the first comprehensive (74 volume) Chinese encyclopedia. Compilation began in 1978, and the Encyclopedia of China Publishing House published individual volumes from 1980 through 1993. There is a 2009 concise second edition, as well as CD-ROM and online versions. The (1981–83) Zhonghua Baike Quanshu or Chinese Encyclopedia

1360-457: A thing, would be a booming, buzzing confusion, a sensory field of flashes of light, unidentifiable sounds, ambiguous shapes, color patches without significance. This is not the consciousness of the enlightened Zen master. Gōng'àn literature developed at some point in between the late Tang dynasty (10th century) to the Song dynasty (960–1279), though the details are unclear. They arose out of

1445-656: A very accurate Shanhai Yudi Quantu world map . The 1621 Wubei Zhi ("Treatise on Armament Technology") is the most comprehensive military encyclopedia in Chinese history . The 1627 Diagrams and explanations of the wonderful machines of the Far West was an illustrated encyclopedia of Western mechanical devices translated into Chinese by the Jesuit Johann Schreck and the scholar Wang Zheng 王徵. Song Yingxing 's (1637) Tiangong Kaiwu ("Exploitation of

1530-470: Is a compound word, consisting of the characters 公 ('public; official; governmental; common; collective; fair; equitable') and 案 ('table; desk, altar; (law) case; record; file; plan; mandate, proposal.') According to the Yuan dynasty Zen master Zhongfeng Mingben ( 中峰明本 1263–1323), gōng'àn originated as an abbreviation of gōngfǔ zhī àndú ( 公府之案牘 , Japanese kōfu no antoku —literally

1615-513: Is a story , dialogue , question, or statement from Chinese Chan Buddhist lore, supplemented with commentaries, that is used in Zen Buddhist practice in different ways. The main goal of kōan practice in Zen is to achieve kenshō (Chinese: jianxing 見性), to see or observe one's buddha-nature . Extended study of kōan literature as well as meditation ( zazen ) on a kōan

1700-701: Is a 10-volume comprehensive reference work published by the Chinese Culture University in Taiwan. An online version is also available. The 1985–91 Chinese-language edition Concise Encyclopædia Britannica or Jianming Buliedian Baike Quanshu is an 11-volume translation based on the Micropædia portion of the 1987 15th edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica . Among major online Chinese encyclopedias, for Standard Chinese ,

1785-638: Is a major feature of modern Rinzai Zen. They are also studied in the Sōtō school of Zen to a lesser extent. In Chinese Chan and Korean Seon Buddhism, meditating on a huatou , a key phrase of a kōan , is also a major Zen meditation method. The Japanese term kōan is the Sino-Japanese reading of the Chinese word gong'an ( Chinese : 公案 ; pinyin : gōng'àn ; Wade–Giles : kung-an ; lit. 'public case'). The term

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1870-480: Is another text sometimes characterized as the first Chinese "encyclopedia". Although its content is "encyclopedic", the text was compiled to show rulers and ministers how to govern well, and was not intended to be a comprehensive summary of knowledge. During the Han dynasty , the 2nd century BCE Shiben ("Book of Origins") was the earliest Chinese dictionary / encyclopedia of origins. It explained imperial genealogies ,

1955-456: Is the 'table' or 'bench' an of a 'magistrate' or 'judge' kung . Gong'an was itself originally a metonym—an article of furniture involved in setting legal precedents came to stand for such precedents. For example, Di Gong'an ( 狄公案 ) is the original title of Celebrated Cases of Judge Dee , the famous Chinese detective novel based on a historical Tang dynasty judge. Similarly, Zen kōan collections are public records of

2040-416: The kōan was eliminated in the focus on a single point", that is the hua-t'ou (which was said to have no meaning), such a practice became a śamatha -like zazen practice (which even resembles Caodong silent illumination ), even if this was never acknowledged by the masters of the Linji school in the Song. Furthermore, Wright also argues that this practice was anti-intellectual since all learning

2125-666: The àndú ('official correspondence; documents; files') of a gōngfǔ ('government post')), which referred to a "public record" or the "case records of a public law court" in Tang dynasty China. Kōan / gong'an thus serves as a metaphor for principles of reality beyond the private or subjective opinion of one person, and a teacher may test the student's ability to recognize and understand that principle. Commentaries in kōan collections bear some similarity to judicial decisions that cite and sometimes modify precedents. An article by T. Griffith Foulk claims: Its literal meaning

2210-617: The Cefu Yuangui ("Models from the Archives"), was the largest Song encyclopedia, almost twice the size of the Taiping Yulan . Li Fang began compilation in 1005 while Wang Qinruo and others finished in 1013. It comprises quotes from political essays, biographies, memorials, and decrees. Another notable Song leishu encyclopedia was the polymath Shen Kuo 's 1088 Mengxi Bitan ("Dream Pool Essays"), which covers many realms of

2295-756: The Guoyu , Stratagems of the Warring States , the Compendium of Materia Medica , and other classics. Chinese encyclopedia The Chinese language has several translation equivalents for the English word encyclopedia . Diǎn 典 "standard; ceremony; canon; allusion; dictionary; encyclopedia" occurs in compounds such as zìdiǎn 字典 "character dictionary; lexicon", cídiǎn 辭典 "word/phrase dictionary; encyclopedia", dàdiǎn 大典 "collection of great classics; big dictionary"; and titles such as

2380-1089: The I Ching to those written during the Qing. Included within the 44 subcategories are the Analects of Confucius , Mencius , the Great Learning , the Doctrine of the Mean , the I Ching , the Rites of Zhou , the Classic of Rites , the Classic of Poetry , the Spring and Autumn Annals , the Shuowen Jiezi , the Records of the Grand Historian , the Zizhi Tongjian , The Art of War ,

2465-477: The Annotated Bibliography of the Four Treasuries if their contents could be verified through central government records. In the Siku Quanshu itself, documents that could not be verified were often included by title only. Even officially sponsored writings, such as local gazetteers, were not safe from the scrutiny of the compilers. Medical knowledge was often documented through case studies, on

2550-815: The Cambridge Encyclopedia of China , the 2009 Brill's Encyclopedia of China , and the 5-volume 2009 Berkshire Encyclopedia of China . Koan The way The "goal" Background Chinese texts Classical Post-classical Contemporary Zen in Japan Seon in Korea Thiền in Vietnam Western Zen A kōan ( / ˈ k oʊ æ n , - ɑː n / KOH -a(h)n ; Japanese : 公案 ; Chinese : 公案 ; pinyin : gōng'àn [kʊ́ŋ ân] ; Korean : 화두 ; Vietnamese : công án )

2635-610: The Huanglan ) that were intended to provide information for rulers and government officials, these new anthologies were intended for scholars who were trying to enter into government, and provided general information, and especially literary knowledge about the classics. For instance, the famous calligrapher Ouyang Xun supervised compilation of the 624 Yiwen Leiju ("Collection of Literature Arranged by Categories") encyclopedia of literature, which quotes 1,431 diverse literary texts. Specialized encyclopedias were another innovation during

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2720-643: The Qianlong Emperor in order to show that the Qing dynasty could surpass the Ming Yongle Encyclopedia . This colossal collection contained some 800 million Chinese characters, and remained the world's largest encyclopedia until recently being surpassed by the English Misplaced Pages . The emperor ordered the destruction of 2,855 books that were considered to be anti-Manchu , but were listed in the 1798 Annotated Bibliography of

2805-510: The Qing dynasty ordered the creation of the Siku Quanshu in 1772. Local and provincial officers were put in charge of locating and collecting important books, and the emperor encouraged owners of rare or valuable books to send them to the capital. At first, few did, because of concerns about the Literary Inquisition , but towards the end of 1772 the emperor issued a decree stating that books would be returned to their owners once

2890-457: The Siku Quanshu risked becoming part of the Siku Jinshu ( 四庫禁書 ), a catalogue of over 2,855 books that were rejected and banned during the completion of the Siku Quanshu . An additional four to five hundred books were also edited or censored. The majority of the books that were banned had been written towards the end of the Ming dynasty and contained anti-Qing sentiment . The Siku Jinshu

2975-483: The Siku Quanshu , especially in relation to works expressing anti-Qing sentiments . This can be exemplified in the compilers' handling of the story of Zhang Shicheng and his rival Zhu Yuanzhang . The Qianlong Emperor sought to discredit the Ming dynasty by highlighting the cruelty of its early rulers and contrasting it with the policies of his the Qing. The compilers did not see Zhang Shicheng's rule as legitimate, but as

3060-465: The Song dynasty (960–1279), "when the venerated past became the general standard in Chinese thought for almost one whole millennium". The Four Great Books of Song were compiled by a committee of scholars under the supervision of Li Fang . First, the 978 Taiping Guangji ("Extensive Records of the Taiping Era") was a collection of about 7,000 stories selected from over 300 classic texts from

3145-521: The Tang dynasty (618-907), Song dynasty (960-1279), Ming dynasty (1368-1644), and early Qing dynasty (1644-1911). Some leishu were huge publications. For instance, the (1726) Complete Classics Collection of Ancient China contained an estimated 3 to 4 times the amount of material in the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition . Although most scholars consider the 222 CE Huanglan (see below) to be

3230-619: The hagiographical Jingde Record of the Transmission of the Lamp (Chinese Jǐngdé Chuándēnglù , early 11th century). Zhongfeng Mingben (1263–1323), a Chinese Chan master who lived at the beginning of the Yuan Dynasty , revitalized the Chinese Linji school . Zhongfeng put a strong emphasis on the use of gōng'àn , seeing them as a "work of literature [that] should be used as objective, universal standards to test

3315-451: The origins of surnames , and records of legendary and historical inventors. Among subsequent encyclopedias of origins, the largest was Chen Yuanlong's 1735 Gezhi Jingyuan (格致鏡元, Mirror of Scientific and Technological Origins ). Shortly after the fall of the Han dynasty, the first true Chinese leishu encyclopedia appeared. The 222 Huanglan ("Imperial Mirror"), which is now a lost work ,

3400-517: The 1408 Yongle Encyclopedia , which was a collection of excerpts from works in philosophy, history, arts, and sciences—and the world's largest encyclopedia at the time. The 1609 Sancai Tuhui ("Pictorial Compendium of the Three Realms" [heaven, earth, and people]) was compiled by Wang Qi and Wang Siyi . This early illustrated encyclopedia comprised articles on many subjects including history, astronomy, geography, biology, and more, including

3485-546: The 3,593 titles in the Siku Quanshu and about 6,793 other books that were not included in it. The Annotated Bibliography of the Four Treasuries , which was published in 1793, became the largest Chinese book catalog of the time. The initial compilation of the Siku Quanshu started with the Siku Quanshu Zongmu Tiyao bibliography, which was completed by 1773. The first workable drafts were completed in 1781. These included bibliographical information on all

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3570-495: The 801 Tongdian ("Comprehensive Encyclopedia") and 1408 Yongle Dadian (" Yongle Emperor 's Encyclopedia"). Lèishū 類書 (lit. "category book") "reference work arranged by category; encyclopedia" is commonly translated as "traditional Chinese encyclopedia", but they differ from modern encyclopedias in that they are compendia composed of selected and categorically arranged quotations from Chinese classics , "the name encyclopedia having been applied to them because they embrace

3655-469: The Confucian heritage." The last great leishu encyclopedias were published during the Qing dynasty (1644–1911). The 1726 Complete Classics Collection of Ancient China was a vast encyclopedic work compiled during the reigns of Emperors Kangxi and Yongzheng . The 1782 Complete Library of the Four Treasuries (or Siku Quanshu ) was the largest Chinese leishu encyclopedia, and commissioned by

3740-473: The Four Treasuries annotated catalog. The 1773 Vân đài loại ngữ ("Categorized Sayings from the Library") is a Chinese-language Vietnamese encyclopedia compiled by the scholar Lê Quý Đôn . Present-day Chinese encyclopedias—in the common Western sense of "comprehensive reference work covering a wide range of subjects"—include both printed editions and online encyclopedias . Among printed encyclopedias,

3825-576: The Han to the Song dynasties. Second, the 983 Taiping Yulan ("Imperial Reader of the Taiping Era") anthologized citations from 2,579 different texts, ranging from poetry, proverbs, and steles to miscellaneous works. Third, the 985 Wenyuan Yinghua ("Finest Blossoms in the Garden of Literature"), quotes from many literary genres, dating from the Liang dynasty to the Five Dynasties era . Fourth,

3910-590: The Tang period. The 668 Fayuan Zhulin ("Forest of Gems in the Garden of the Dharma ") was a Chinese Buddhist encyclopedia compiled by the monk Dao Shi 道世. The 729 Kaiyuan Zhanjing ("Treatise on Astrology of the Kaiyuan Era") is a Chinese astrology encyclopedia compiled by Gautama Siddha and others during Emperor Xuanzong of Tang 's Kaiyuan era (713-741). The Golden Age of encyclopedia writing began with

3995-484: The Works of Nature") was an illustrated encyclopedia of science and technology, and notable for breaking from Chinese tradition by rarely quoting earlier works. In Ming China, with the spreading of written knowledge to strata outside the literati, household riyong leishu 日用類書 ("Encyclopedias for daily use") began to be compiled, "summarizing practical information for townsfolk and others not primarily concerned with mastering

4080-649: The cities of Hangzhou , Zhenjiang , and Yangzhou . All seven libraries also received copies of the imperial encyclopedia Complete Classics Collection of Ancient China , completed in 1725. The copy kept in the Old Summer Palace was destroyed during the Second Opium War in 1860. The two copies kept in Zhenjiang and Yangzhou were also completely destroyed, while the copy kept in Hangzhou

4165-475: The collections of the recorded sayings of Chán masters and "transmission" texts like the Transmission of the Lamp . These sources contained numerous stories of famous past Chán masters which were used to educate Zen students. According to Morten Schlütter "it is not clear exactly when the practice of commenting on old gongan cases started, but the earliest Chan masters to have such commentaries included in

4250-570: The compilation was finished and that the owners would not be punished if their books contained Anti-Qing sentiment . Less than three months after the issue of this decree, four to five thousand books were handed in. By March 1773, an editorial board composed of hundreds of editors, collators, and copyists had been created in Beijing to gather and review books brought to them. This board included more than 361 scholars, with Ji Yun and Lu Xixiong ( 陸錫熊 ) as chief editors. Around 3,826 scribes copied every word by hand. They were not paid in cash , but each

4335-608: The compilation, they analyzed the main points of the author's argument. This short annotation, which reflected their own opinions, was put at the beginning of the Siku Quanshu and formed the Complete Catalogue. The catalogue divided the Siku Quanshu into its four sections ( 庫 ; kù ; 'repository'). The books are divided into 44 subcategories ( 类 ; 類 ; lèi ). The Siku Quanshu includes most major Chinese texts, from pre-Classical Zhou dynasty works like

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4420-400: The compilers of the Siku Quanshu redefined the classifications in several compilations and set boundaries based on authors' biographies and the purposes of their writings. The Qianlong Emperor reviewed many of the works that were being compiled, and his opinions were conveyed through direct comments or imperial edicts. These colored the compilers' criteria for works suitable for inclusion in

4505-555: The earliest was the (1917) The Encyclopaedia Sinica compiled the English missionary Samuel Couling. The 1938 Cihai ("Sea of Words") is a general-purpose encyclopedic dictionary that covers many fields of knowledge. The Zhonghua Book Company published the first edition, and the Shanghai Lexicographical Publishing House issued revised editions in 1979, 1989, 1999, and 2009, making the Cihai

4590-410: The encyclopaedia. The dividing line between a language lexicon (such as glossaries, onomastica and rhyming dictionaries) and a factual lexicon, to which all general and special encyclopaedias belong, is only clearly drawn when, in addition to the definitions, necessarily supported by literary references, an interpretation appears which takes into consideration not only the current literary usage but also

4675-527: The essence of enlightenment, since "its verification was always interpersonal. In effect, enlightenment came to be understood not so much as an insight, but as a way of acting in the world with other people." This mutual inquiry of past cases gave Zen students a role model and a sense of belonging to a spiritual family since "one looked at the enlightened activities of one's lineal forebears in order to understand one's own identity." The practice also served to confirm an individual's enlightenment and authority in

4760-531: The first Chinese leishu encyclopedia. Needham , Lu , and Huang call the late 4th to early 2nd centuries BCE Erya the oldest Chinese encyclopedia, and consider its derivative literature (beginning with the Fangyan and Huanglan ) as the main line of descent for encyclopedias in China. The c. 239 BCE Lüshi Chunqiu , which is an anthology of quotes from many Hundred Schools of Thought philosophical texts,

4845-481: The first modern encyclopedia, the English-language 1917 Encyclopaedia Sinica . While English usually differentiates between dictionary and encyclopedia , Chinese does not necessarily make the distinction. For instance, the ancient Erya , which lists synonyms collated by semantic fields , is described as a dictionary, a thesaurus, and an encyclopedia. The German sinologist Wolfgang Bauer describes

4930-536: The genre was called niangu ('picking up the old ones'), and when poems were used to comment, the genre was termed songgu ('eulogizing the old ones'). Further commentaries would then be written by later figures on these initial comments, leading to quite complex and layered texts. The style of these Song-era Zen texts was influenced by many Chinese literary conventions and the style of "literary games" (competitions involving improvised poetry). Common literary devices included: There were dangers involved in such

5015-527: The historical parallel between Western encyclopedias and Chinese leishu , all of which arose from two roots, glossaries and anthologies or florilegia . The boundaries between both are quite fluid at first; the shorter the entries and the more exclusively they are directed to the definition of the word concerned, the more the work partakes of the character of a dictionary, while a longer commentary delving into history and culture and provided with extensive quotations of sources is, conversely, more characteristic of

5100-524: The humanities and natural sciences. The 1161 Tongzhi ("Comprehensive Records"), which was compiled by the Southern Song dynasty scholar Zheng Qiao 鄭樵, became a model for later encyclopedias. The Ming dynasty period (1368–1644) was, in comparison with the Song period, of less significance for the history of Chinese encyclopedias. However, the Yongle Emperor commissioned compilation of

5185-401: The insight of monks who aspired to be recognized as Ch'an masters". He also promoted Dahui's famous kanhua chan method of meditating on a huatou and influenced several Japanese Rinzai masters of the time who came to China to study with him, including Kosen Ingen, Kohō Kakumyō, Jakushitsu Genkō (1290–1367). According to Zhongfeng: The koans do not represent the private opinion of

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5270-488: The language of law. Originally, such a story was only considered a gōng'àn when it was commented upon by another Chán master, i.e. when it was used as a "case" study for enlightenment. This practice of commenting on the words and deeds of past masters also served to confirm the master's position as an awakened master in a lineage of awakened masters of the past. According to Schlütter, these stories were also used "to challenge Chan students to demonstrate their insights:

5355-420: The material in the recorded sayings collections of individual Song Chan masters consists of the master quoting ("raising"; ju ) a story about a famous past Chan figure's encounter with disciples or other interlocutors and then offering his own comments on it. The stories held up for comment came to be referred to as gongan, "public cases," or guze , "old model cases," both terms borrowed, it would seem, from

5440-503: The model of twenty-five instances in Sima Qian 's Records of the Grand Historian , which blended narrative with analysis. Similarly, works on philosophy took Huang Zongxi 's writings as their model, though they came to be divided into two types: "archival", meaning scholarly articles, and "cultural", meaning Buddhist koans . Because authors and previous compilers had not considered philosophical works to form part of historical records,

5525-403: The notable sayings and actions of Zen masters and disciples attempting to pass on their teachings. The popular Western understanding sees kōan as referring to an unanswerable question or a meaningless or absurd statement. However, in Zen practice, a kōan is not meaningless, and not a riddle or a puzzle. Teachers do expect students to present an appropriate response when asked about

5610-594: The phrase "father and mother" alludes to duality. This is obvious to someone versed in the Chinese tradition, where so much philosophical thought is presented in the imagery of paired opposites. The phrase "your original face" alludes to the original nonduality . Comparable statements are: "Look at the flower and the flower also looks"; "Guest and host interchange". Kōan are also understood as pointers to an unmediated "Pure Consciousness", devoid of cognitive activity. Victor Hori criticizes this understanding: [A] pure consciousness without concepts, if there could be such

5695-473: The poisoned drum that kills all who hear it, or like a great fire that consumes all who come near it. What is called "the special transmission of the Vulture Peak" was the transmission of this; what is called the "direct pointing of Bodhidharma at Shao-lin-ssu" is this. In later periods like the Ming dynasty , Chinese Chan developed in different directions, such as incorporating Pure Land elements and

5780-415: The practice of going to a private interview with one's Zen master ( sanzen ) where one has to prove one's understanding of kōan "is the real point of the whole exercise". Some of the key Song-era gōng'àn collections are: These texts mostly draw and develop stories which are found in other sources, mainly the Anthology of the Patriarchal Hall (Chinese Zǔtángjí , mid-10th century), and

5865-494: The recorded sayings attributed to them appear to be Yunmen Wenyan and Fenyang Shanzhao (947–1024)." According to Robert Buswell , the gōng'àn tradition "can be viewed as the products of an internal dynamic within Chan that began in the T'ang and climaxed in the Sung." By the beginning of the Song era, Chan masters were known to use these stories in their sermons, as well as to comment on them and to use them to challenge their students. Schlütter also writes: [M]uch of

5950-408: The role the kanhua technique played in standardizing Chan practice. He argues that this contributed to the routinization of the tradition, resulting in a loss of some of the more open and creative aspects of earlier Chan. According to Kasulis, the rise of gōng'àn contemplation in Song-era Zen led to a greater emphasis on the interaction between master and student, which came to be identified as

6035-407: The subject, they rarely contain an original opinion. Robert L. Fowler, Professor of Greek at the University of Bristol , says that although comprehensiveness is a primary criterion in defining an "encyclopedia", there are encyclopedias of individual subjects (e.g., Encyclopaedia of Chess Openings ) that defy the etymology from Greek enkyklios paideia "the circle of subjects". He says, "To call

6120-402: The subsequent transmission histories also became sources of gongan ." Over time, a whole literary genre of gōng'àn collection and commentary developed which was influenced by "educated literati " of the Song era. These collections included quotations of encounter-dialogue passages (the "cases", gōng'àn ) with a master's comment on the case attached. When a prose comment was added,

6205-540: The teacher student relationship is seen in modern Japanese kōan training which always requires an authorized teacher ( rōshi or oshō ) in a specific lineage who has the ability to judge a disciple's understanding and expression of a gōng'àn . In the Rinzai Zen school , which uses kōan extensively, the teacher certification process includes an appraisal of proficiency in using that school's extensive kōan curriculum. According to Barbara O'Brien,

6290-549: The thing itself, which not only describes the subject but also, at times, evaluates and thereby forms a true connection between the new and the old. The very characteristic of the traditional Chinese encyclopaedia as in contrast to that in the West is that these distinctions were never clearly drawn. All Chinese encyclopaedias are anthologies, upon which were grafted greatly varying forms of dictionary arrangement. They consist of (generally quite long) quotations arranged in one order or another and, although they may include an opinion on

6375-680: The two largest both began in 2005, the Baike.com Encyclopedia and the Baidu Encyclopedia . There is the Chinese Misplaced Pages (2002–present), and for varieties of Chinese , there are Cantonese , Mindong , Minnan , Wu , and Gan Wikipedias , as well as the Classical Chinese Misplaced Pages ( zh-classical: ). Lastly, there are modern English-language encyclopedias of China. For example, the 1991 2nd edition of

6460-446: The whole realm of knowledge" (Teng and Biggerstaff 1971: 83). Bǎikē 百科 (lit. "hundred subjects") in the words bǎikēquánshū 百科全書 (with "comprehensive book") and bǎikēcídiǎn 百科辭典 (with "dictionary") specifically refer to Western-style "encyclopedias". Encyclopedia titles first used Bǎikēquánshū in the final decades of the 19th century. Encyclopedic leishu anthologies were published in China for nearly two millennia before

6545-430: The works included in the Siku Quanshu in full as well as a large number of works that are mentioned only by title. As indicated by its title, the work is structured in four categories, which reference the divisions of the imperial library: In the course of editing, a large number of corrections were made to local records. Personal documents, often describing the actions of noteworthy local people, were often included in

6630-427: Was a negative one, "nonconceptualization,"... As Robert Buswell explains, this emphasis on non-conceptual meditation on a gōng'àn meant that "there is nothing that need be developed; all the student must do is simply renounce both the hope that there is something that can be achieved through the practice as well as the conceit that he will achieve that result." Wright argues that since "the narrative structure of

6715-419: Was bound into 36,381 volumes ( 册 ; cè ), with more than 79,000 volumes ( 卷 ; juàn ). In total, each copy is around 2.3 million pages, and has approximately 800 million Chinese characters . The scholars working on the Siku Quanshu wrote a descriptive note for each book, detailing the author's name along with place and year of birth. Next, after they determined what parts of the author's work would go into

6800-622: Was compiled for Cao Pi , the first emperor of the Three Kingdoms Cao Wei state (r. 220-226), in order to provide rulers and ministers with conveniently arranged summaries of current knowledge (like the Lüshi Chunqiu above). An important new type of leishu encyclopedia appeared in the early Tang dynasty (618–907), after the administration made the imperial examination obligatory for all applicants into government service. Unlike earlier Chinese encyclopedias (such as

6885-445: Was given a government position after he had transcribed a set number of sections of the encyclopedia. Following its ten-year-long compilation, seven copies were produced of the completed encyclopedia, which were distributed throughout the empire. By 1782, the Siku Quanshu Zongmu Tiyao ('Annotated Bibliography of the Four Treasuries'), a guide to the Siku Quanshu , had also been completed. It contains bibliographical information about

6970-957: Was only about 70 to 80 percent destroyed during the Taiping Rebellion . The four remaining copies suffered some damage during the Second Sino-Japanese War . Today, those copies are located in the National Library of China in Beijing, the National Palace Museum in Taipei, the Gansu Provincial Library in Lanzhou , and the Zhejiang Library in Hangzhou . It is said that the Qianlong Emperor did not keep his promise to return books to their owners. Any books that did not make it into

7055-465: Was partially the Qianlong Emperor's attempt to rid China of any remaining Ming loyalists by executing scholars and burning any books that made direct or implicit political attacks on the Manchu people . However, it has been also pointed out that most works banned under the Qing's censorship have been preserved, whereas most of the works lost were not among those prohibited. Each copy of the Siku Quanshu

7140-461: Was penetrating into all of them. He went even further, arguing that this new meditation technique was the only way of achieving enlightenment for Chan practitioners of his day. Thus, Schlütter writes that "in this insistence, he was unusual among the Song Chan masters, who generally tended to take a rather inclusive view of Buddhist practice. It is therefore fair to say that Dahui not only developed

7225-402: Was to be renounced in the practice of kanhua chan . According to Wright, this development left Chinese Chán vulnerable to criticisms by a resurgent neo-Confucianism. According to Mario Poceski, although Dahui's kanhua Chan (in which one focuses on a huatou ) purports to be a sudden method, it essentially consists of a process of gradually perfecting concentration. Poceski also observes

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