Temples

Chapter 7 examines how temples were constructed and maintained to enable trainees to attain a transcendent spiritual state through monastic discipline and studies of various kinds of sacred writings paired with carefully structured activities of everyday practice. It stresses the significance of Zen temples by examining the role of monks as those who depart from their home to retreat from ordinary society, replacing ordinary family relationships with a new sense of lineal identity and hierarchy in the monastery. This chapter also discusses regional transfers brought about by evangelical teachers to various centers of secular power, such as the capital cities of Hangzhou in China and Kyoto in Japan, or hubs of transit, such as the ports of Ningbo in China and Hakata in Japan, where all wayfarers embarked or disembarked from their journeys.