Ryomo Kyokai

Ryōmō Kyōkai (両忘協会 "Ryōmō Society", was a lay Rinzai Zen Buddhist practice center located in Tokyo, Japan.

Ryōmō Kyōkai means "Association for the Abandonment of the Concepts of Objectivity and Subjectivity". It was founded at the beginning of the Meiji restoration, when Japan started to modernize:

The Zen lay practitioners Yamaoka Tesshū, Takahashi Deishu and other top leaders of our country asked Soryu-kutsu Imakita Kosen Roshi, the chief abbot of Engaku-ji Temple in Kamakura, to establish a group for intensive Zen meditation (the later Ryobo-Kai) in order to train promising figures, being anxious for the future of the State.

It attracted figures such as Imakita Kōsen (1816–1892) (abbot of the Rinzai monastery Engakuji, and teacher of Soyen Shaku), Nakajima Nobuyuki, Kawajiri Hōkin, and Nakae Chomin (1847–1901). Kōsen was its honorary leader but not its founder.

It served as an intellectual society for the discussion of Buddhism and zazen practice. The rules of the society were as follows:

Ryōmō Kyōkai was revived by Tetsuo Sōkatsu, dharma descendant of Soyen Shaku. The revival was more frequently called "Ryōbō Zen Kyōkai" or "Ryōbō Kai" in Japan, owing to a more modern kanji reading. Tetsuo Sōkatsu received the name Ryobo-an from Ryoga-kutsu Roshi. He opened Ryōbō Kai for lay practitioners, and went so far as to give dharma transmission to lay practitioners, which before was restricted to priests.

In 1906 Sōkatsu traveled to the USA with a group of students, among them Sokei-an Sasaki and Gotō Zuigan, who would become two of his dharma heirs. A branch was established on Sutter Street in San Francisco after Sōkatsu arrived in America. It attracted lay Buddhists and possibly inspired the form of Zen practice centers throughout the Western world. Sōkatsu stayed in the USA four years before returning to Japan, leaving only Sokei-an behind.

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