Kaso Sodon

Kasō Sōdon (華叟宗曇, 1352–1428) was a Daitoku-ji-line Rinzai master in the Daitō Kokushi tradition who served briefly as the twenty-second abbot of Daitoku-ji but is best remembered for the austere hermitage he maintained at Katada on the shore of Lake Biwa, where he taught a small circle of students in deliberate avoidance of the increasingly politicised atmosphere of Kyoto's Gozan monasteries^[1].

Kasō's enduring place in Japanese Zen history rests almost entirely on his role as the teacher who confirmed Ikkyū Sōjun's awakening: tradition records that the young Ikkyū, meditating alone in a small boat on the lake one night, was thrown into great awakening by the sudden cry of a crow; when he reported the experience Kasō withheld approval until satisfied, then formally confirmed his attainment — though Ikkyū famously refused to accept the certificate Kasō offered as recognition^[2].