Cha'an Buddhism, sometimes Chan Buddhism, is better known in America as Zen Buddhism. Zen Buddhism is Buddhism that is adapted from the Chinese, though it became prevalent in Japan. Zen is discipline of enlightenment. It is the religion of jiyu, or "self-reliance," and jizai, or "self-being (Suzuki 6). In metaphysics, Zen absorbed much of Taoist teaching modified by Buddhist speculations, but in its practical conduct of life, it ignored both the Taoist transcendentalism and the Indian aloofness from productive life. Thus, Buddhism has many ingredients shared in Zen.
"Zen" is an abbreviation of the word "zenna" and is the Japanese way of reading the Chinese word "ch'an-na," or in short form, "ch'an." In turn, this is the Chinese word for the Sanskrit term "dhyana," which refers to collectedness of mind or meditative absorption in which all dualistic distinctions, such as I/you, subject/object, or true/false, are eliminated. Zen can be regarded both exoterically and esoterically. Zen is a school of Mahayana Buddhism, which developed in the sixth and seventh centuries in China from the meeting of Dhyana Buddhism and Taoism. Zen is in this sense a religious sect, the teachings and practices of which are directed toward self-realization leading finally to complete awakening, or enlightenment, as experienced by Buddha after intensive meditative self-discipline under the Bodhi-tree:
More than any other school, Zen stresses the prime importance of the enlightenment experience and the uselessness of ritual religious practices and intellectual analysis of doctrine for the attainment of liberation (enlightenment) (Fischer-Schreiber 442).
Esoterically, though, Zen is not a religion but rather an indefinable, incommunicable root, free from all names, descriptions, and concepts, and it can be experienced only by each individual for him or herself:
In this sense Zen is not bound to any religion, including Buddhism. It is the ...