Chan’s iconoclastic rhetoric and its fondness for using such apparently negative terms as no-thought, no-mind and no-cultivation as cardinal points of liberating practice might suggest seeing Chan as a premodern form of deconstructivism. But given its affirmation of Buddhist teachings about karma and the role of values and intentionality in shaping experience, Chan might just as well be seen as constructivist. The humor and apparent absurdity of Chan’s premier literary form—vernacular encounter dialogues—might alternatively suggest existentialist leanings, while its celebrations of everyday life, embodied action and doing what works now rather than following past precedents can be seen as pragmatic. Philosophically, Chan presents itself as an enigma.