[web 1] The dharma ranks (法階) point to the stages in the training to become an Oshō, priest or "technologist of the spirit".
[web 3] The next step, after one has been a monk for at least three years, is risshin (立身) and hossen-shiki (Dharma combat ceremony), while acting as a shuso (首座), headmonk, during a retreat.
d) Actually, in the lineage of Sawaki Roshi (and maybe other lineages as well) a student is told to write a fourth document on an extra sheet of paper, which is called Hisho (the secret document, which is encoded, but the code for deciphering is on the same paper, so once you hold it in your hands it is not so "secret" anymore.
)[web 4]The procedure has to take place only once in one's life, and binds the student to the teacher forever: Dharma transmission can happen once, and only once, or never at all.
[web 4] Since the time of Manzan Dokahu (1636–1714), multiple dharma transmissions are impossible in Sōtō Zen.
Thus, in present day Sōtō Zen, Dharma transmission constitutes a preliminary step, after which one's real development begins [...] Today, the key authority conferred by Dharma transmission is that it qualifies a priest to manage an ordinary (jun hōchi) local temple.
Abbotship gave severe duties, and financial burdens, for which reason many tried to avoid the responsibility of abbotship:[5] Tsūgen, Baisan and Jochū each demanded that future generations excommunicate any Zen teacher who failed to fulfill his obligation to serve as abbot of a head temple.
Baisan decreed that the obedient Zen successors should seize defiant ones and then burn the offender's succession's certificate (shisho) before his eyes.
[5]The ceremony has to be done at both Eihei-ji and Sōji-ji, the main temples of the Sōtõ school, within the time span of one month.
It consists of four Chinese characters: 切磋琢磨 The first means to cut (a bone or elephant tusk), the second to rub, the third to crush (a stone or gem), the fourth to polish.
To attain supervisory certification requires not just high ecclesiastical grades and dharma seniority but also at least three years' experience as an assistant supervisor at a specially designated training hall (tokubetsu sōdō), during which time one undergoes an apprenticeship.
[web 7]Promotion in priest-rank (僧階, sōkai) depends on school education and the amount of time spent in monastery training.
[8] The stay at the monastery is meant to learn the skills and social role necessary to function as a priest: [T]he goal of Zen is not simply an inner state of tranquility but the social reconstruction of the self"[11]Ordination, called tokudo-shiki,[12] usually takes place at a young age, between 6 and 20.
[citation needed] The suiji-shiki ceremony is performed when one has finished the formal training period and is ready to start as assistant-priest, "often one's father temple".
In the Rinzai-school, a difference is made between acknowledgement of insight and succession in the organisation: From the Rinzai perspective, true realization (jisshō) and succession to a master (shijō) are two different stages in the course of practice，the latter implying a comprehensive integration of awakening in the activities of everyday life.
[15]The most common form of transmission in Rinzai Zen is the acknowledgement that one has stayed in the monastery for a certain amount of time, and may later become a temple priest.
Usually, the student lives in small parish temple during this decade, not in a formal training monastery.
[web 7]Three of the highest ranks are shike ("Zen master"[16] (of the training hall[17])), rekijō[18] and tokujūshoku (kancō, abbot).
[web 7][e]Inka is usually attested by a written document: [T]he full recognition conferred by a master upon a disciple whom he intends to make his successor [...] sometimes takes the form of written certification (inka)，but there have been cases of true acknowledgement in which no document has been bestowed.
Needless to say authorization must be backed up by the fact that the disciple spent many years in zen training under the master earnestly and continuously.
[10]A 'part-time' career program is offered by the ange-o-system, aimed at persons wishing to become full-time or part-time temple-priest, who don't have the opportunity to spend the required years in the sōdō.
[25] Besides the official ranking, several honorific titles are being used: The Sanbo Kyodan is a lay lineage mixing Soto and Rinzai-elements.
[26] Students in this school follow the Harada-Yasutani koan curriculum, in which great emphasis is placed on kensho, the initial insight into one's true nature.
[28] After working through the Harada-Yasutani koan curriculum, which may take as short as five years,[29] the student receives a calligraphy testifying that he or she "has finished the great matter".
[30] In dharma transmission, the student receives the sanmotsu, in a lay version of the Soto shiho ceremony.
[30] In the White Plum Asanga, the first step in a practitioner's teaching career is to receive the rank of "Hoshi" or Dharma Holder.
This usually signifies that the practitioner has completed all or a portion of the White Plum koan curriculum and can start giving Dharma talks and seeing students in private interviews under the supervision of their teacher.
There are four kinds of teachers in the Kwan Um tradition, all having attained a varying degree of mastery and understanding.
An Abbot serves a Zen center in an administrative capacity, and does not necessarily provide spiritual direction, though several are Soen Sa Nims.
[3][35][36] The term rōshi has been applied to implicate a certified state of awakening, implying impeccable moral behaviour.