Zen: Koans & Meditation

Arcadia

Contains adsIn-app purchases

About this app

Make room for a koan, a quiet sitting and a few words of your own.

Zen brings together all 48 cases of the Gateless Gate in original Arcadia retellings, the ten ox pictures, the Heart and Diamond Sutras, a meditation timer with optional bells, and a private reflection journal. Read a case slowly, return to a question, or put the screen aside for a timed sitting.

FORTY-EIGHT KOANS
Browse the full collection, search its text, filter by theme and bookmark cases to revisit. Change the reading size as you go. Each case has an original reflection, a small practical exercise and a question for your journal.

The case numbering follows the Senzaki and Reps 1934 edition. Retellings and Arcadia commentary are identified separately so you can distinguish the encounter from its reading companion.

TEN OX PICTURES
A herder looks for a lost ox, finds it, tames it and rides home, then the pictures empty into a circle and end in a market street. Each of the ten pictures is retold in plain prose, drawn as a simple ink mark, and paired with a reflection, an exercise and a question you can answer in your journal.

THE HEART AND DIAMOND SUTRAS
Read both texts in full in F. Max Müller's 1894 translation, with an original introduction to each. The Diamond Sutra opens at any of its thirty-two sections.

WALKING THROUGH A TEMPLE
Visit eight places in a Zen monastery, from the mountain gate to the kitchen, the bath and the bell tower, with one small practice from each for an ordinary house.

A DAILY READING
Today's case follows your local calendar date. Read the reflection, carry its question into an ordinary task, or mark a day of practice. Practice has no streaks, scores or rankings. Add the home-screen widget or choose an optional daily reminder.

A QUIET SEAT
Set a sitting from 1 to 120 minutes. Choose preparation time, optional interval bells and an ending bell, or sit silently. A line from the Heart Sutra waits before you begin, and the four great vows follow a completed sitting. Grant Android's Alarms & reminders access when asked so bells can ring with the screen off. Pause or end from the timer notification. A completed sitting is recorded once in Journal.

TWENTY-THREE ARTICLES
Original Lore articles on reading a koan, taking a seat, Bodhidharma's two entrances, Huineng's verse on the wall, Hakuin's song of sitting, the four vows, and how Zen came to America.

YOUR REFLECTIONS
Write, edit and delete notes linked to a koan or an ox picture. Review completed sittings in the same journal. Journal notes and sitting history stay on this device and are excluded from automatic backup and device transfer.

SHARE A READING
Share the day's reading as an image with its date, credit and Zen install link. The install link also travels in the share caption.

READ OFFLINE
Everything you read is bundled in the app. Reading, journaling and the timer work offline. Advertising, analytics, consent and Google Play purchases use network services.

All reading and timer features are free. Zen contains ads; an optional one-time purchase removes advertising only. Ads do not interrupt an active sitting.