(1290-1366) was a Japanese

Sōtō Sōtō Zen or is the largest of the three traditional sects of Zen in Japanese Buddhism (the others being Rinzai and Ōbaku). It is the Japanese line of the Chinese Cáodòng school, which was founded during the Tang dynasty by Dòngsh� ...

Zen Zen ( zh, t=禪, p=Chán; ja, text= 禅, translit=zen; ko, text=선, translit=Seon; vi, text=Thiền) is a school of Mahayana Buddhism that originated in China during the Tang dynasty, known as the Chan School (''Chánzong'' 禪宗), and ...

monk A monk (, from el, μοναχός, ''monachos'', "single, solitary" via Latin ) is a person who practices religious asceticism by monastic living, either alone or with any number of other monks. A monk may be a person who decides to dedica ...

famous for his

Buddhist poetry Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and gr ...

who lived during the late

Kamakura period The is a period of Japanese history that marks the governance by the Kamakura shogunate, officially established in 1192 in Kamakura by the first ''shōgun'' Minamoto no Yoritomo after the conclusion of the Genpei War, which saw the struggle bet ...

and early

Muromachi period The is a division of Japanese history running from approximately 1336 to 1573. The period marks the governance of the Muromachi or Ashikaga shogunate (''Muromachi bakufu'' or ''Ashikaga bakufu''), which was officially established in 1338 by t ...

. According to Steven Heine, a

Buddhist studies Buddhist studies, also known as Buddhology, is the academic study of Buddhism. The term ''Buddhology'' was coined in the early 20th century by the Unitarian minister Joseph Estlin Carpenter to mean the "study of Buddhahood, the nature of the Budd ...

professor, "Daichi is unique in being considered one of the great medieval Zen poets during an era when

Rinzai The Rinzai school ( ja, , Rinzai-shū, zh, t=臨濟宗, s=临济宗, p=Línjì zōng) is one of three sects of Zen in Japanese Buddhism (along with Sōtō and Ōbaku). The Chinese Linji school of Chan was first transmitted to Japan by Myōan ...

monks, who were mainly located in

Kyoto Kyoto (; Japanese language, Japanese: , ''Kyōto'' ), officially , is the capital city of Kyoto Prefecture in Japan. Located in the Kansai region on the island of Honshu, Kyoto forms a part of the Keihanshin, Keihanshin metropolitan area along wi ...

or Kamakura, clearly dominated the composition of verse."

Biography

He was originally a disciple of one of Eihei Dōgen's students Kangan Giin, but after Giin's death he practiced under Keizan Jōkin for seven years. He also traveled to China in 1314 and remained there until 1324; his stay out of Japan was unintentionally extended when he was shipwrecked in Korea on his return journey, preventing him from actually returning until 1325. Upon returning to Japan, he received dharma transmission under Keizan's disciple

Meihō Sotetsu (1277-1350) was a Japanese Sōtō Zen monk who lived during the late Kamakura period and early Muromachi period. He practiced with Keizan Jōkin, often considered the second most important figure in Sōtō Zen after Eihei Dōgen, for twenty-nine ...

. He is considered to be part of the ''Wanshi-ha'' poetry movement based on the writing style of the Sōtō monk-poet

Hongzhi Zhengjue Hongzhi Zhengjue (, ), also sometimes called Tiantong Zhengjue (; ) (1091–1157), was an influential Chinese Chan Buddhist monk who authored or compiled several influential texts. Hongzhi's conception of ''silent illumination'' is of particular ...

. While in China, Daichi studied under the poet Gulin Qingmao (). His

kanbun A is a form of Classical Chinese used in Japan from the Nara period to the mid-20th century. Much of Japanese literature was written in this style and it was the general writing style for official and intellectual works throughout the period. ...

poetry often praises the teaching of Eihei Dōgen, especially Dōgen's

Shōbōgenzō is the title most commonly used to refer to the collection of works written in Japan by the 13th century Buddhist monk and founder of the Sōtō Zen school, Eihei Dōgen. Several other works exist with the same title (see above), and it is som ...

. For example, when he was able to obtain a copy of the Shōbōgenzō despite living in Kyushu, hundreds of kilometers from Dōgen's home temple

Eiheiji 250px is one of two main temples of the Sōtō school of Zen Buddhism, the largest single religious denomination in Japan (by number of temples in a single legal entity). Eihei-ji is located about east of Fukui in Fukui Prefecture, Japan. In E ...

, he wrote, A poem entitled ''Rai Yōkō Kaisantō'' indicates that sometime before the year 1340, Daichi visited the temple Yōkōji (永興寺) that had been founded by Dōgen's student

Senne Senne may refer to: Places * Senne (Germany), a natural region of Germany *Senne, a district of Bielefeld, Germany * Senne (river), a river of Belgium *Senné (disambiguation), places in Slovakia People with the name *Yōkō Senne, a 13th-centur ...

(not the same Yōkōji that Keizan founded on the

Noto Peninsula The Noto Peninsula (能登半島, ''Noto-hantō'') is a peninsula that projects north into the Sea of Japan from the coast of Ishikawa Prefecture in central Honshū, the main island of Japan. The main industries of the peninsula are agricultur ...

, which uses the characters 永光寺), but he described the temple as already being in a state of decline by that time. ''On Practicing Throughout The Day'' () is one of the few pieces of writing by Daichi Sokei available in full in English. In it, Daichi lays out instructions for lay people to practice with monks, giving details on how to behave during each hour of the day. According to Shōhaku Okumura, a translator of the text and a Sōtō Zen priest himself, Sokei stresses the importance of maintaining concentration in each moment of the day, which he equates with awakening itself. For example, Sokei, writes, "When you have breakfast, just attend fully to the gruel with both body and mind...This is called clarifying the time of gruel and realizing the mind of gruel. At this time, you have a pure realization of the mind of the buddha-ancestors" In Okumura's footnotes on the text, he writes, "Each activity hat Sokei describesis not a step, means, or preparation for other things; rather each step should be completed in the moment."

References

Soto Zen Buddhists Zen Buddhist monks Japanese Zen Buddhists 1290 births 1366 deaths Kamakura period Buddhist clergy Muromachi period Buddhist clergy {{Zen-stub