Chan
/tʃɑːn/noun
A Chinese school of Mahayana Buddhism emphasizing meditation and direct insight into reality.
Did you know?Chan and Japanese Zen are written with the same Chinese character, 禪, and ultimately trace back to Sanskrit dhyāna, meaning meditative absorption.
Etymological Timeline
Ancient India
Sanskrit
dhyāna
“Meditation or profound mental absorption”
Early Buddhist Sanskrit
Sanskrit
dhyāna
“A state of concentrated contemplative awareness”
Medieval China
Middle Chinese
禪 / dʑjɛn
“Meditation; the meditative Buddhist tradition”
Tang Dynasty
Chinese
chán
“A Chinese Buddhist school centered on meditation and direct realization”
Medieval Japan
Japanese
zen
“The same Buddhist tradition, pronounced according to Japanese sound patterns”
20th Century
English
Chan
“The Chinese form of this Buddhist school, distinguished from its Japanese form, Zen”