Zen Zen Zen (; ) is a school of Mahayana Buddhism that originated in China during the Tang dynasty as Chan Buddhism. It was strongly influenced by Taoism and developed as a distinct school of Chinese Buddhism. From China, Chan Buddhism spread south to Vietnam which became Vietnamese Thiền, northeast to Korea and east to Japan, where it became known as Seon Buddhism and Japanese Zen, respectively. The term Zen is derived from the Japanese pronunciation of the Middle Chinese word 禪 (Chan) which traces its roots to the Indian practice of Dhyāna ("meditation"). Zen emphasizes rigorous self-control, meditation-practice, insight into
Buddhism and psychology Buddhism. British barrister Christmas Humphreys has referred to mid-twentieth century collaborations between psychoanalysts and Buddhist scholars as a meeting between: "Two of the most powerful forces operating in the Western mind today." One of the most important influences on the spread of Buddhism in the west was Zen scholar D.T. Suzuki. He collaborated with psycho-analysts Carl Jung, Karen Horney and Erich Fromm. Carl Jung wrote the foreword to Suzuki's "Introduction to Zen Buddhism", first published together in 1948. In his foreword, Jung highlights the enlightenment experience of "satori" as the "unsurpassed transformation to wholeness" for Zen practitioners. And while acknowledging