''Unsui'' ( ja, 雲水), or ''kōun ryūsui'' () in full, is a term specific to

Zen Buddhism Zen ( zh, t=禪, p=Chán; ja, text= 禅, translit=zen; ko, text=선, translit=Seon; vi, text=Thiền) is a school of Mahayana Buddhism that originated in China during the Tang dynasty, known as the Chan School (''Chánzong'' 禪宗), and ...

which denotes a

postulant A postulant (from la, postulare, to ask) was originally one who makes a request or demand; hence, a candidate. The use of the term is now generally restricted to those asking for admission into a Christian monastery or a religious order for the pe ...

awaiting acceptance into a

monastery A monastery is a building or complex of buildings comprising the domestic quarters and workplaces of monastics, monks or nuns, whether living in communities or alone ( hermits). A monastery generally includes a place reserved for prayer whic ...

or a

novice A novice is a person who has entered a religious order and is under probation, before taking vows. A ''novice'' can also refer to a person (or animal e.g. racehorse) who is entering a profession with no prior experience. Religion Buddhism ...

monk who has undertaken Zen training. Sometimes they will travel from monastery to monastery ( angya) on a

pilgrimage A pilgrimage is a journey, often into an unknown or foreign place, where a person goes in search of new or expanded meaning about their self, others, nature, or a higher good, through the experience. It can lead to a personal transformation, aft ...

to find the appropriate

Zen master Zen master is a somewhat vague English term that arose in the first half of the 20th century, sometimes used to refer to an individual who teaches Zen Buddhist meditation and practices, usually implying longtime study and subsequent authori ...

with which to study.Baroni, 365

Etymology

The term ''unsui'', which literally translates as "cloud, water" comes from a Chinese

poem Poetry (derived from the Greek '' poiesis'', "making"), also called verse, is a form of literature that uses aesthetic and often rhythmic qualities of language − such as phonaesthetics, sound symbolism, and metre − to evoke meanings ...

which reads, "To drift like clouds and flow like water."Snyder, 44-45 Helen J. Baroni writes, "The term can be applied more broadly for any practitioner of Zen, since followers of Zen attempt to move freely through life, without the constraints and limitations of attachment, like free-floating clouds or flowing water." According to author

James Ishmael Ford James Ishmael Ford (Zeno Myoun, Roshi) is an American Zen Buddhist priest and a retired Unitarian Universalist minister. He was born in Oakland, California on July 17, 1948. He earned a BA in psychology from Sonoma State University, as well as ...

, "In Japan, one receives unsui ordination at the beginning of formal ordained practice, and this is often perceived as 'novice ordination.'"Ford, 55 According to the Oxford Dictionary of Buddhism,Dictionary of Buddhism, 316 the term ''unsui'' is also used for Therefore, the translation of itinerant monk found on several Japanese-English online dictionaries. Jim Breen's

WWWJDIC WWWJDIC is an online Japanese dictionary based on the electronic dictionaries compiled and collected by Australian academic Jim Breen. The main Japanese–English dictionary file (EDICT) contains over 180,000 entries, and the ENAMDICT dictionar ...

Jeffrey Friedl'
Jeffrey's Japanese<->English dictionary server
/ref>

Notes

References

* * * * Zen Japanese Buddhist titles {{zen-stub

Etymology

See also

Notes

References