Thus Come One Zen

Thus Come One Zen
如来禅 (Jpn nyorai-zen )

    Also, Tathagata meditation or Thus Come One meditation. A reference to the type of meditation that Bodhidharma introduced to China in the early sixth century with his founding of the Zen (Chin Ch'an) school. The school maintained that the Buddha's enlightenment was transmitted wordlessly, outside the sutras, from Shakyamuni Buddha to Mahakashyapa and finally to Bodhidharma in the lineage of Zen masters. Later, however, an opinion arose within the school that the expression Thus Come One Zen connotes meditation based on the sutras. For this reason, Bodhidharma's seated meditation, which aims to perceive the Buddha-mind intuitively and directly, came to be called patriarchal Zen, forming a tradition that regards Bodhidharma as its founding patriarch. The school asserts that patriarchal Zen is the highest form of meditation.