Thread by @durdfarm

There are various factors in the development of koans as religious texts, but one of the more important ones is not particularly obvious.

One should first note that many / most of the zen masters of the Tang Dynasty began their monastic careers as monks of the Vinaya School. 1

The Vinaya School was dedicated to the practice and study of the monastic rules handed down by the Buddha, and so understood Buddhist practice from what we would see as a more Pali Canon angle. 2

Even further, every Chinese monk had to be ordained according to the Vinaya, and had to follow its hundreds of precepts to be licensed by the imperial government. This was non-negotiable. 3

From the Vinaya it was taught that in order to attain enlightenment, it would take a practitioner hundreds, thousands, maybe even millions of rebirths to gradually burn off their unskillful karma and escape samsara. 4

And then along come these zen guys who say that all of this can be accomplished in just one lifetime if you practice their techniques. 5

This, from the broadest level, is what koans are trying to get across. They’re an advertisement of sorts, displaying the most unique aspects of zen over and over again: hey, sudden enlightenment is a real thing, this is what it looks like, and this is how it happens! 6

You’ll often find people, especially online, who take these koan cases at extremely face value and assume that zen monks did nothing but say odd things and smack each other around. 7

They in fact did all the things Buddhist monks typically did. Meditation, sutra study, summer and winter retreats, etc. Koans mainly showcase their differences vis-a-vis the various Buddhist schools. 8

Of course, koans aren’t only about advertising zen or setting it apart from other schools, but knowing they’re doing both helps us see them more clearly and use them more skillfully. 9