The moment
Chinese records of the 6th and 7th centuries mention a monk from the west called Bodhidharma who taught a meditation known as 'wall-gazing'. Later Chan (Japanese Zen) lineages made him their first patriarch, and Song-dynasty compilers gave the school its famous motto of a transmission outside the scriptures that does not rest on words; most scholars treat this history as the tradition's own construction.
People: Bodhidharma, Huineng