With the overthrow of the Kamakura bakufu in 1333, the Kemmu Restoration of 1333 to 1336, and the establishment of the Muromachi bakufu after 1336, political power shifted back to Kyoto. The early Kamakura Gozan included Kench ōji, Engakuji, and Jufukuji. From the mid-thirteenth century on, Chinese monks from these monasteries, fleeing the advancing Mongols and seeking a new mission field for Chan, made their way to Japan, where they were patronized by shoguns, provincial warrior chieftains, and members of the imperial court.īefore the close of the thirteenth century a similar three-tier hierarchy of Zen monasteries was beginning to take shape in Japan under the patronage and regulation of the H ōj ō regents who dominated the Kamakura bakufu. They were visited by such Japanese monks as Eisai, D ōgen, and Enni, who went to China in search of Zen beginning in the late twelfth century. These were among the most prestigious Chan training centers in China. During the Song dynasty some fifty large Chan monasteries in the Hangzhou and lower Yangze regions of China were brought under the regulation of civilian officials and organized into a three-tier hierarchy headed by five great monasteries ( wushan Jpn., gozan ). This article will outline the development of the Gozan administrative organization, define the Gozan style of Zen, and introduce Gozan literature and culture.Īs with Zen itself, Gozan organization, learning, and culture had their origins in China, and throughout their history in Japan the Gozan monasteries remained major conduits for the dissemination not only of Zen but also of Chinese culture in the broadest sense. Thus the expression "five mountains" is also applied to the literature produced by monks from these monasteries ( gozan bungaku ), the wood-block books printed in these monasteries ( gozan-ban ), and the art and culture associated with them ( gozan bunka ). These monasteries developed a distinctive pattern of Zen monastic life, a common organizational hierarchy, and a characteristic cultural style. Gozan organization began to develop in China during the Song dynasty (960 –1279) and was transmitted to Japan during the Kamakura period (1185 –1333). The "five mountains" were a designated group of Zen (Chin., Chan) monasteries. Because many Buddhist monasteries in premodern China and Japan were located on mountains and conceived of as being secluded from the world, the word mountain came to connote a monastery.
The Japanese term gozan (also pronounced gosan Chin., wushan "five mountains") refers to a system of monastic organization and its associated culture that flourished in Song-dynasty China and medieval Japan.
0 kommentar(er)
