禅Masters

Baiyun Shouduan

Yangqi line

Baiyun Shouduan

c. 1025 – c. 1079

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Baiyun Shouduan was a student of Yangqi Fanghui who played a crucial role in transmitting the Yangqi branch of the Linji school to the next generation. He taught at Mount Baiyun (White Cloud) and was known for a teaching style that combined the spontaneity of Yangqi with his own methodical precision. His most important student was Wuzu Fayan, through whom the Yangqi tradition reached its full flowering.

Baiyun's teaching maintained the Yangqi branch's characteristic balance of freedom and rigor. He could be playful and unpredictable like his teacher Yangqi, but he also demanded thoroughness and consistency from his students. This combination of spontaneity and discipline became one of the defining features of the Yangqi lineage and contributed to its eventual dominance over the Huanglong branch.

Names

dharma · enBaiyun Shouduan
alias · enHakuun Shutan
alias · enPai-yün Shou-tuan

Teachers

Students

Teachings

  • sayingNot Deceived by Words

    (traditional attribution)

    Baiyun said: "The ancients used words to dispel delusion, the way a physician prescribes medicine according to the illness. If you take the words of the ancients to be the truth itself, you are like a man who swallows the prescription instead of taking the medicine. Once the illness is cured, throw away the remedy. Do not let the teachings become a new disease."

    Attributed_to: Baiyun Shouduan

Master Record Sources

  • nameChart of the Chan Ancestors

    Baiyun Shouduan

    Reliability: scholarly

  • schoolChart of the Chan Ancestors

    Linji/Yangqi

    Reliability: scholarly

  • nameZen Editorial Overlay - Originals Curation

    Baiyun Shouduan

    Reliability: editorial

  • teachersZen Editorial Overlay - Originals Curation

    Yangqi Fanghui

    Reliability: editorial