Ōbaku Zen is a school of Japanese Zen Buddhism rooted in the Chinese Linji (Rinzai) tradition and brought to Japan by the monk Yinyuan Longqi, known in Japanese as Ingen Ryūki. It emerged as a distinct current within Japanese Zen through the transplantation of late-Ming Chinese Chan forms, preserving characteristic features of Chinese monastic life, including ritual style, chanting, and temple aesthetics. Its head temple, Manpuku-ji in Uji near Kyoto, stands as a symbol of this transmission, embodying Chinese architectural and artistic sensibilities within a Japanese setting. Within the broader landscape of Japanese Zen, Ōbaku is often regarded as one of the principal schools, alongside Rinzai and Sōtō, though it remains the smallest in terms of institutional size.

What sets Ōbaku Zen apart is its deliberate integration of Pure Land elements into a Zen framework. Alongside zazen and traditional Zen methods such as kōan practice, Ōbaku emphasizes the recitation of the Buddha Amida’s name (nembutsu), treating this devotional act not as a departure from Zen but as a complementary discipline. Devotion to Amida Buddha and the imagery of the Pure Land are held together with the rigorous meditative and monastic practices inherited from Chinese Chan, suggesting that self-power through meditation and other-power through faith can work in tandem. In this way, Ōbaku articulates a vision in which the mind that sits in silent contemplation and the mind that recites the nembutsu are understood as expressions of the same awakened potential.

Culturally and ritually, Ōbaku Zen preserves a distinctive Chinese flavor within Japanese Buddhism. Its temples, liturgy, calligraphy, and monastic regulations reflect Ming-era Chan, including a strong emphasis on formal chanting, strict discipline, and Chinese-style ceremonies. Even aspects of daily life, such as vegetarian cuisine and the rhythm of communal practice, bear the imprint of its Chinese origins. For a practitioner or observer, Ōbaku thus appears as a living bridge: a tradition in which Zen and Pure Land, China and Japan, meditation and devotion, all meet without erasing one another, inviting contemplation of how diverse forms can converge around a single aspiration for enlightenment.