- published: 28 Apr 2015
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A kōan ( /ˈkoʊ.ɑːn/; Chinese: 公案; pinyin: gōng'àn; Korean: 공안 (kong'an); Vietnamese: công án) is a story, dialogue, question, or statement, which is used in Zen-practice to provoke the "great doubt", and test a student's progress in Zen practice.
The word koan, literally "public case", comes from the Japanese pronunciation of the Chinese characters (公案).
Kōan is a Japanese rendering of the Chinese term (公案), transliterated kung-an (Wade-Giles) or gōng'àn (Pinyin).
Chung Feng Ming Pen (中峰明本 1263–1323) wrote that kung-an is an abbreviation for kung-fu an-tu (公府之案牘, Pinyin gōngfǔ zhī àndú, pronounced in Japanese as kōfu no antoku), which referred to a "public record" or the "case records of a public law court" in Tang-dynasty China.Kōan/kung-an thus serves as a metaphor for principles of reality beyond the private opinion of one person, and a teacher may test the student's ability to recognize and understand that principle.
Commentaries in kōan collections bear some similarity to judicial decisions that cite and sometimes modify precedents. An article by T. Griffith Foulk claims
Sound is a mechanical wave that is an oscillation of pressure transmitted through a solid, liquid, or gas, composed of frequencies within the range of hearing and of a level sufficiently strong to be heard, or the sensation stimulated in organs of hearing by such vibrations.
Sound is a sequence of waves of pressure that propagates through compressible media such as air or water. (Sound can propagate through solids as well, but there are additional modes of propagation). During propagation, waves can be reflected, refracted, or attenuated by the medium.
The behavior of sound propagation is generally affected by three things:
When sound is moving through a medium that does not have constant physical properties, it may be refracted (either dispersed or focused).
The perception of sound in any organism is limited to a certain range of frequencies. For humans, hearing is normally limited to frequencies between about 20 Hz and 20,000 Hz (20 kHz), although these limits are not definite. The upper limit generally decreases with age. Other species have a different range of hearing. For example, dogs can perceive vibrations higher than 20 kHz, but are deaf to anything below 40 Hz. As a signal perceived by one of the major senses, sound is used by many species for detecting danger, navigation, predation, and communication. Earth's atmosphere, water, and virtually any physical phenomenon, such as fire, rain, wind, surf, or earthquake, produces (and is characterized by) its unique sounds. Many species, such as frogs, birds, marine and terrestrial mammals, have also developed special organs to produce sound. In some species, these produce song and speech. Furthermore, humans have developed culture and technology (such as music, telephone and radio) that allows them to generate, record, transmit, and broadcast sound. The scientific study of human sound perception is known as psychoacoustics.
Can I ascend the hill of the Lord?
Can I stand in that holy place?
There to approach the glory of my God,
Come towards to seek your face.
Purify my heart
Purify my hands
For I know it is, on holy ground I'll stand.
I'm coming up the mountain Lord
I'm seeking you and you alone.
I know that I will be transformed
My heart unveiled before you.
I'm longing for your presence Lord
Envelop me within the clouds.
I'm coming up the mountain Lord
My heart unveiled before you
I will come.
Can I ascend the hill of the Lord?
Can I stand in that holy place?
There to approach the glory of my God,
Come towards to seek your face.
Purify my heart
Purify my hands
For I know it is, on holy ground I'll stand.
I'm coming up the mountain Lord
I'm seeking you and you alone.
I know that I will be transformed
My heart unveiled before you.
I'm longing for your presence Lord
Envelop me within the clouds.
I'm coming up the mountain Lord
My heart unveiled before you
I will come.
I'm coming to worship
I'm coming to bow down
I'm coming to be with you.
(repeat x 4)
I'm coming up the mountain Lord
I'm seeking you and you alone.
I know that I will be transformed
My heart unveiled before you.
I'm longing for your presence Lord
Envelop me within the clouds.
I'm coming up the mountain Lord
My heart unveiled before you
I will come.
I'm coming to worship
I'm coming to bow down
I'm coming to be with you............