BODHIDHARMA

Bodhidharma (circa 470-543 A.D.) was a Buddhist monk from India, the third son of a South Indian king. Arriving in Canton, China, about 520, he founded the meditative school known as Ch'an (Zen in Japanese), after the Sanskrit word "dhyana" (meditation). 

Frustrated in dealing with a local king who did not understand his blunt, often enigmatic explanations, Bodhidharma withdrew into a cave for nine years.  Tradition has it that he stared at the wall during this period, hence his reputation as the "Wall-gazing Brahmin." 

Biographical accounts, the first appearing about a century after his death, include much legendary material.  Overall he is presented as a crusty, no-nonsense exponent of Buddhism in its meditative form. 

Contemporary scholars are divided about his very existence, some saying he is a complete fiction.  Others, among them Hu Shih and T'ang Yung-t'ing, believed he was actually in China from 420 to 479.

Bodhidharma gave Chinese Buddhism, which had become routine and stagnant, a much needed lift, although arguably his disciples had the greater effect. 

The teachings of Bodhidharma are based on the Lankavatara Sutra, a somewhat fanciful and unsystematic Indian work, even as it is one of the nine principal texts of Mahayana Buddhism.  It is in the form of a dialog between Buddha and the king of Lanka (Ceylon, now Sri Lanka).

Bodhidharma's methods were simple and were based on concentration while sitting.  This was before the development of koans, mondos, shouts, blows, and other means of triggering enlightenment in a monk.  His school of teaching was known at first as the Lanka sect. 

A text, the Leng-chia-tzu chi, found in the Tun-huang caves, details the Lanka sect's history and mentions not only Bodhidharma but also the Fifth Patriarch and some of his disciples, including Hui-neng who became the Sixth Patriarch.  Bodhidharma, listed in Buddhist genealogies as the twenty-fourth in the apostolic succession after Gautama Buddha, is considered the First Patriarch of Ch'an.