Kōans are short stories, questions, dialogues, or statements that test a Zen student's progress. kōan is a compound word consisting of two characters. It originated as an abbreviation for what means official documents of a government post. As a whole, it means "public record" or "case records of a public law court".The word "kōan" thus serves as a metaphor for principles of reality beyond the private opinion of one person, and a teacher may test the student's ability to recognize and understand that principle. Kōan literature was partly influenced by a pre-Zen Chinese "literary game". It is a competition involving improvised poetry. In literary game there were:
Examples: One day as Manjusri stood outside the gate, the Buddha called to him, "Manjusri, Manjusri, why do you not enter?" Manjusri replied, "I do not see myself as outside. Why enter?" A monk asked Master Haryo, "What is the way?" Haryo said, "An open-eyed man falling into the well." A monk asked Kegon, "How does an enlightened one return to the ordinary world?" Kegon replied, "A broken mirror never reflects again; fallen flowers never go back to the old branches." As the roof was leaking, a zen master told two monks to bring something to catch the water. One brought a tub, the other a basket. The first was severely reprimanded, the second highly praised. Source: Kōan. (n.d.). Retrieved November 25, 2014, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kōan Koan. (n.d.). Retrieved November 25, 2014, from http://neijiaquan.co.uk/Koan.htm
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