10/06/2026
October 5 is observed in the Sōtō Zen tradition as Daruma-ki (達磨忌), the memorial of Bodhidharma, known in China as Damo and in Japan as Daruma.
The historical Bodhidharma remains difficult to pin down. He was probably a Buddhist monk active in China in the fifth or sixth century, coming from India or regions to China’s west. Later Zen tradition identifies him as the 28th Indian ancestor and the First Patriarch of Chan in China.
One of the best-known stories places Bodhidharma before Emperor Wu of Liang, a major patron of Buddhism. When the emperor asks what merit he has gained by building temples and supporting monks, Bodhidharma answers, “No merit.” Asked for the highest meaning of the sacred truth, he replies, “Vast emptiness, nothing holy.” The encounter later became the opening case of the Blue Cliff Record.
Bodhidharma is also linked with Huike, regarded as the Second Chinese Patriarch. In later Zen tradition, Huike waits outside in the snow, asking to become Bodhidharma’s student. To demonstrate his resolve, the story says he cuts off his own arm.
Huike then asks Bodhidharma to pacify his troubled mind.
Bodhidharma tells him: “Bring me your mind, and I will pacify it.”
Huike searches and replies that he cannot find it.
Bodhidharma answers: “Then I have pacified it for you.”
The story is legendary rather than securely historical, but it became a classic expression of Zen’s direct approach: rather than explaining the mind, Bodhidharma asks Huike to look for it directly.
The scripture most closely associated with Bodhidharma is the Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra, which early tradition says he transmitted to Huike. The teaching most closely connected with the earliest Bodhidharma tradition is the Two Entrances and Four Practices: accepting adversity, adapting to conditions, seeking nothing, and practicing the Dharma without attachment to reward or achievement.
Bodhidharma is also strongly associated with Shaolin Monastery. Tradition says he practiced wall-gazing meditation there for nine years. Later legend credits him with teaching exercises that eventually became Shaolin kung fu. The martial tradition of Shaolin is historically real, but there is no early evidence that Bodhidharma created it. His strongest connection to Shaolin is as a spiritual ancestor of its Chan tradition.
In Japan, Bodhidharma became Daruma, and his image evolved into the familiar round Daruma doll, a symbol of perseverance and resilience.
Behind the stories of the emperor, Huike, Shaolin, wall-gazing, and Daruma is the teaching that came to define Bodhidharma’s place in Zen: awakening must be realized directly, not merely understood conceptually.
By the Song dynasty, this was expressed in four famous lines traditionally associated with his legacy:
A special transmission outside the scriptures;
not dependent upon words and letters;
directly pointing to the human mind;
seeing one’s nature and becoming Buddha.
Those lines continue to influence Zen today through zazen, face-to-face teaching, kōan practice, Dharma transmission, and the emphasis on direct experience over intellectual understanding alone.
Further reading:
Sōtō Zen — Annual calendar and the October 5 Daruma Memorial
https://www.sotozen.com/eng/practice/event/index.html
Sōtō Zen — Issho Fujita, “Daruma Memorial (Darumaki)”
https://www.sotozen.com/eng/library/sermon_archive/pdf/sermon_archive_03_10.pdf
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy — Chan Buddhism
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/buddhism-chan/
Jeffrey L. Broughton — The Bodhidharma Anthology: The Earliest Records of Zen
University of California Press
https://www.ucpress.edu/books/the-bodhidharma-anthology/epub-pdf
Red Pine — The Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra: Translation and Commentary
https://www.counterpointpress.com/books/lankavatara-sutra/
Meir Shahar — The Shaolin Monastery: History, Religion, and the Chinese Martial Arts
University of Hawai‘i Press
https://uhpress.hawaii.edu/title/the-shaolin-monastery-history-religion-and-the-chinese-martial-arts/
