About Chado
Sen Rikyu (1522-1591), like his Tea teachers, studied Zen Buddhism and Tea from an early age. The close relationship between Chado and Zen Buddhism had already begun. Rikyu moved from his native Sakai, near present day Osaka, to Kyoto to study Tea under Takeno Jo-o, the most prominent Tea master of his day. He also studied Zen under Kokei Shochin, the abbot of Daitokuji temple, one of the prominent Zen temples in Kyoto.
His many innovations in Chado incorporated the essence of his Zen experience and he strived to do away with the discriminations of the everyday mind: for example, between man and nature, nobleman and commoner, beautiful and ugly, religious and secular.
Rikyu designed the tea hut and surrounding garden to heighten one’s awareness of nature; he used the design of the mountain recluse’s hut for his tea huts and created the sense of traveling into nature without leaving the city. His entrance to the tea hut was tiny so all guests, regardless of social rank, entered by the humble act of crawling. The samurai were obligated to remove their swords, a symbol of their high rank in society which otherwise never left their sides, before entering.
Rikyu found beauty in the simple, everyday crafts of Japan, using them in assemblage with, and even in place of, the valuable Chinese antiques. This not only integrated Japanese-made wares into the tea world, which was comprised mainly of Chinese made objects, but offered a new philosophy of beauty which to this day distinguishes Japanese aesthetic traditions. It is written that "Rikyu moved mountains and valleys in the tea room."
At the same time, Rikyu was the tea master for the highest ranking political figures of his day: Oda Nobunaga (1534-1582) and Toyotomi Hideyoshi (1536-1598). He was often at the center of political struggles. His most famous innovations occurred during the final ten years of his life when he served Hideyoshi, who was a great lover of Chado.
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