ABSTRACT

Chan is a transliteration of the Sanskrit word Dhyana, which means meditation, a type of self-cultivation highly valued by all of India's Buddhist sects. The infiltration of Chan into Chinese poetry can nowadays be viewed from two angles. The first is the way Chan thought penetrated poetry, both directly and indirectly. Poems which directly adopted Chan terms and Chan principles have the outward form of poems but not the esthetic value of poetry. However, more important than the infiltration of Chan into poetry is the fact that Chan gives rise to discussion about poetic creativity and appreciation. Chan's stress on innermost experience and analogy, and its pursuit of the meaning outside the words have an inspirational effect on poetic creativity and appreciation. The function of the personal enlightenment stressed in Chan-influenced poetry is to bestow on such poetry a high artistic standard in which limited words and unlimited meaning are combined in harmony.