Schools of Japanese tea


"Schools of Japanese tea" refers to the various lines or "streams" of the Japanese Way of Tea. The word "schools" here is an English rendering of the Japanese term ryūha.

''San-Senke''

There are three historical households directly descended from the 16th-century tea master Sen no Rikyū which are dedicated to transmitting the Way of Tea that was developed by their mutual family founder, Sen no Rikyū. They are known collectively as the san-Senke, or "three Sen houses/families". These are the Omotesenke, Urasenke, and Mushakōjisenke. Another line, which was located in Sakai and therefore called the Sakaisenke, was the original Senke. Rikyū's natural son, Sen no Dōan, took over as head of the Sakaisenke after his father's death, but the Sakaisenke soon disappeared because Dōan had no offspring or successor. The school named Edosenke is not descended by blood from the Sen family; its founder, Kawakami Fuhaku, became a tea master under the 7th generation head of the Omotesenke line, and eventually set up a tea house in Edo, where he devoted himself to developing the Omotesenke style of the Way of Tea in Edo.
The san-Senke arose from the fact that three of the four sons of Genpaku Sōtan inherited or built a tea house, and assumed the duty of passing forward the tea ideals and tea methodology of their great-grandfather, Sen no Rikyū. Kōshin Sōsa inherited Fushin-an and became the head of the Omotesenke line; Sensō Sōshitsu inherited Konnichi-an and became iemoto of the Urasenke line; and Ichiō Sōshu built Kankyū-an and became iemoto of the Mushakōjisenke line. The names of these three family lines came about from the locations of their estates, as symbolized by their tea houses: the family in the front, the family in the rear, and the family on Mushakōji Street.
The Way of Tea perfected by Sen no Rikyū and furthered by Sen Sōtan is known as wabi-cha. The san-Senke have historically championed this manner of tea.
The three lines of the Sen family which count their founder as Sen no Rikyū are simply known as the Omotesenke, Urasenke, and Mushakōjisenke. Schools that developed as branches or sub-schools of the san-Senke, or separately from them, are known as "~ryū", which may be translated as "school" or "style."

''Buke-cha''

As opposed to the wabi-cha manner of tea, there is that called buke-cha, also referred to as daimyō-cha. This refers to the manner of chanoyu practiced by members of the warrior class mainly during the Edo period. In many cases, the daimyō of a domain would decide upon a certain official style of chanoyu, which would be the style practiced in his domain. Generally, chanoyu teachers were given the responsibility for teaching it, but there were some daimyō who themselves possessed deep knowledge of chanoyu.
Some of the main buke-cha styles are the Uraku, Sansai, Oribe, Enshū, Ueda Sōko, Sekishū, Chinshin, Fumai, Ogasawara, and Oie. Among these, the Sekishū, whose founder served as chanoyu instructor to the Shōgun, developed a notably large number of branches, and spread widely into warrior society.

Current schools