[Buddha-l] Pure Conversation vs koan

[Wong Weng Fai]

Curt wrote...

> One last question - it looks like "qing tan" means (roughly) "pure
> conversation"? This sounds like a potentially useful alernative to the
> term "koan", which many people find off-putting.

Yup. "Qing" is the character for "pure" and "tan" is the character for 
"conversation". I believe it is suppose to mean "a conversation pure of 
worldly concerns." The world, dust etc. being characterized as pollutants.

By the way, I found the content page of a 1963 Taiwanese MA thesis in 
Chinese on this topic:

http://cnfj.org/html/77/n-2377.html

The title roughly translates (any translation fault is mine alone) as "The 
relationship between Wei-Jin pure conversations, the Gentleman ideal and 
Buddhism" by one Zeng Qingchang of Fu-ren University in Taiwan.

>From the content, it seems to talk about the interactions between Taoism, 
Confucianism and Buddhism during this crucial formative period.

W.F. Wong