Dharma combat, called or in Japanese

Japanese language

is a language spoken by over 130 million people in Japan and in Japanese emigrant communities. It is a member of the Japonic language family, which has a number of proposed relationships with other languages, none of which has gained wide acceptance among historical linguists .Japanese is an...

, is a term in some schools of Buddhism

Buddhism

Buddhism is a religion and philosophy encompassing a variety of traditions, beliefs and practices, largely based on teachings attributed to Siddhartha Gautama, commonly known as the Buddha . The Buddha lived and taught in the northeastern Indian subcontinent some time between the 6th and 4th...

 referring to an intense exchange between student and teacher, and sometimes between teachers, as an occasion for one or both to demonstrate his or her understanding of the Dharma

Dharma

Dharma means Law or Natural Law and is a concept of central importance in Indian philosophy and religion. In the context of Hinduism, it refers to one's personal obligations, calling and duties, and a Hindu's dharma is affected by the person's age, caste, class, occupation, and gender...

 and Buddhist tenets. It is used by both students and teachers to test and sharpen their understanding. Practice is primarily seen in Zen

Zen

Zen is a school of Mahāyāna Buddhism founded by the Buddhist monk Bodhidharma. The word Zen is from the Japanese pronunciation of the Chinese word Chán , which in turn is derived from the Sanskrit word dhyāna, which can be approximately translated as "meditation" or "meditative state."Zen...

 traditions, particularly Sōtō Zen and the Kwan Um School of Zen

Kwan Um School of Zen

The Kwan Um School of Zen is an international school of Zen centers and groups, founded in 1983 by Seung Sahn Soen Sa Nim. The school's international head temple is located at the Providence Zen Center in Cumberland, Rhode Island, which was founded in 1972 shortly after Seung Sahn first came to...

. In both, it is a key component in the Dharma transmission

Dharma transmission

Dharma transmission refers to "the manner in which the teaching, or Dharma, is passed from a Zen master to their disciple and heir...

 process.

Zen practitioners will often have a sanzen

Sanzen

, aka , means going to a Zen master for instruction. In the Rinzai school, it has the same meaning as dokusan, which is specifically a private interview between student and master, often centering around the student's grasp of an assigned koan...

, where the student has a face to face interview with their master. This is also called nishitsu, which literally means "entering the room" and refers to the student entering the room for private dharma combat.

An exchange is initiated when a master issues a challenge to members either individually or as a group. The master will use confrontation as an emotionally charged tool to push a student into immediate realization.

The Dharma combat usually appears to be in the form of a debate, with questions and answers that seem illogical to an outside observer. These encounters may involve dialogues with non verbal elements as well as verbal. An exchange between combatants will often show disjointed comments, shouting and even slapping. These encounters, where the student's flaws in understanding or practice of dharma are exposed, have left students with a reluctance to enter the room used for combat.

As Peter D. Hershock asserts, the term itself provides insight into the risks of the encounter between student and master. Traditionally, Buddhism is known for helping others to attain peace and freedom from affliction. The usage of a martial term to describe enlightenment, he attests, cannot be accidental. The student is in danger of losing the ability to maintain their prior chosen heading, much the same as in a battle.

History

The first known recorded examples of Dharma combat occurred during the “Classical” period of Zen history. Stretching roughly from 765 to 950 C.E., this period saw the rise of many Zen masters whose work is still widely studied in modern Zen Buddhism today.

One of these masters was Línjì Yìxuán (Rinzai Gigen in Japanese). Linji died in 866 and was the founder of the Linji school of Zen Buddhism during the Tang Dynasty

Tang Dynasty

The Tang Dynasty was an imperial dynasty of China preceded by the Sui Dynasty and followed by the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms Period. It was founded by the Li family, who seized power during the decline and collapse of the Sui Empire...

 in China. Many examples of dharma combat can be found in the collection of sayings by and about Línjì

Linji

Línjì Yìxuán was the founder of the Linji school of Chán Buddhism during Tang Dynasty China. Linji was born into a family named Xing in Caozhou , which he left at a young age to study Buddhism in many places....

. On occasions the Dharma combat of Linji even extended to physical handling, as in the following example:
In another example, he recounts a question from Ma-yu: "Of the eyes of the thousand-armed bodhisattva

Bodhisattva

In Buddhism, a bodhisattva is either an enlightened existence or an enlightenment-being or, given the variant Sanskrit spelling satva rather than sattva, "heroic-minded one for enlightenment ." The Pali term has sometimes been translated as "wisdom-being," although in modern publications, and...

of compassion, which is the true eye?" Línjì repeats the question, adding "Answer me! Answer me!" Then, Ma-yu "dragged the Master down from the lecture seat and sat in it himself."