East Asian Buddhist Schools?

[edwhys211]

What are the different Schools from China and Japan, what makes each unique, and what are their beliefs on karma and rebirth?

[Seishin]

That's a lot to process and the last questions could get louded.

Chinese Buddhism is predominantly Chan of various schools; see here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zen
There are also Chinese Pureland Schools http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pure_Land_Buddhism
Chinese Tientai http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiantai
Chinese Buddhism http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_Buddhism

Japanese Buddhism http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddhism_in_Japan
Including the various zen schools, (soto, rinzai, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_Zen) Japanese Tendai http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tendai, Shingon http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shingon_Buddhism, Japenese Pure Land (Jodo Shu, Jodo Shin Shu) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J%C5%8Ddo-sh%C5%AB

I'm sure there are many more to add to that list however my memory is not great!

As for their beliefs of karma and rebirth, to my limited knowledge, officially all these schools see them in the orthodox sense (ie they are true and literal) however some schools like Japanese Zen tend not to place much emphasis on it compared with Pure Land for example. However I'm sure there are some teachers within these traditions who dissagree with the orthodox stance, especially in the West.

I hope that helps to answer your question and I look forward to other posters adding/correcting this

Gassho,
Seishin.

[Astus]

Right now it shows that the service is temporarily unavailable, but this is a very good summary of Chinese Buddhist schools: Buddhism In a Nutshell Archives

This is a summary of the ten Chinese schools: The Chinese Buddhist Schools

Traditional view of karma and rebirth is practically identical in all schools.

One more important thing to know about Chinese Buddhism is that "schools" exist only in theory, they are simply philosophical and practical categories of different types of teachings, but monasteries and communities seldom if ever specialise in only one or two of the schools.

[icylake]

in fact after 8-9th centuries, in Chinese buddhism, the "school" lost it's importance. only chan and pure land remained as distictive schools. and even those two schools were assimilated each other.

in Japanese buddhism, the meaning of "school" was almost the same to that of chinese counter parts in ancient times. but later, many schools have evolved into independent "sects or denominations", have their owm distinctive costumes, have their own distinctive ceremonies, have their owm distintive basic sutras. have their independent monasteries, even the buddha statues enshrined in the dharma halls are different accordng to their sectarian sutras. i've read this phenomena was owing to japan's "political Fudalism" in their middle age which other east asian countries had never experienced.

when it comes to the concepts of "karma" and "rebirth", they are almost the same. they still belong to east-Asian mahayana buddhism.

[Astus]

in fact after 8-9th centuries, in Chinese buddhism, the "school" lost it's importance. only chan and pure land remained as distictive schools. and even those two schools were assimilated each other.

Chan as a school with its own organisation did not exist before the Song dynasty, but even then it just meant that a "Chan monastery" is a public monastery led by an abbot who is affiliated to the Chan lineage, but beyond that the monks' lives were as in any other monastery in the kingdom. Pure Land never had its own organisation, except for certain lay devotional communities. Tiantai was the major rival lineage, but again, it is an administrative issue rather than actual difference in daily monastic life. Strong distinct schools as in Japan never existed in China, because of the difference in regional and imperial government.

[icylake]

in fact after 8-9th centuries, in Chinese buddhism, the "school" lost it's importance. only chan and pure land remained as distictive schools. and even those two schools were assimilated each other.

Chan as a school with its own organisation did not exist before the Song dynasty, but even then it just meant that a "Chan monastery" is a public monastery led by an abbot who is affiliated to the Chan lineage, but beyond that the monks' lives were as in any other monastery in the kingdom. Pure Land never had its own organisation, except for certain lay devotional communities. Tiantai was the major rival lineage, but again, it is an administrative issue rather than actual difference in daily monastic life. Strong distinct schools as in Japan never existed in China, because of the difference in regional and imperial government.

yes, i agree. "the school' i used here is just reffering unorganized "trend" in a wise sense. but incorrect..

and it's very interesting that Korea had had distinctive buddhist sects from Koryo dynasty up to early Joson dynasty also(From Zen, Avatamsaka up to esoteric buddhism), but it's not owing to fudalism like Japan, to the contrary, because of national official exam by centralised government.
the government released licenses, and registered the supreme temple of every sect. it's very different from China's situatuion. even though they had had the monk license(du die) and administrative institutions, but helding nation-wide exam , like confucianist one-was very rare. so even now(after unification and assimilation of each sects after 16th century), we can clearly classify the chantings used in korean services into some sectarians. as Avatamsaka, Zen,(although, after the purification in 1960, most Avatamsaka ceremonies and prayers were discarded) it' funny the seemingly simmilar results came from totally different cause.