title: Coal Chamber

text: "Revolver" magazine talked about the impact of the band's self-titled debut: "Coal Chamber may have looked more like industrial goths at the warehouse rave than nu-metal moshers in the Ozzfest pit, but don't judge a coal by its chamber. Led by future DevilDriver frontman Dez Fafara, the L.A. band's 1997 self-titled debut rages somewhere between the rabbit-like springiness of Korn, the ragged grooves of Sepultura and the apoplectic rap-metal tantrums that would become Slipknot's calling card a couple years down the pike. "Loco" is the hit, but other cuts like "Oddity" and "Big Truck" will scratch that itch for the genre's heavier, more confrontational early days."


title: Automotive industry in Japan

text: The automotive industry in Japan is one of the most prominent and largest industries in the world. Japan has been in the top three of the countries with most cars manufactured since the 1960s, surpassing Germany. The automotive industry in Japan rapidly increased from the 1970s to the 1990s (when it was oriented both for domestic use and worldwide export) and in the 1980s and 1990s, overtook the U.S. as the production leader with up to 13 million cars per year manufactured and significant exports. After massive ramp-up by China in the 2000s and fluctuating U.S. output, Japan is currently the third largest automotive producer in the world with an annual production of 9.9 million automobiles in 2012. Japanese investments helped grow the auto industry in many countries throughout the last few decades.


title: Automotive industry in Japan

text: Japanese business conglomerates began building their first automobiles in the middle to late 1910s. The companies went about this by either designing their own trucks (the market for passenger vehicles in Japan at the time was small), or partnering with a European brand to produce and sell their cars in Japan under license. Such examples of this are Isuzu partnering with Wolseley Motors (UK), Nissan partnering with British automaker Austin, and the Mitsubishi Model A, which was based upon the Fiat Tipo 3. The demand for domestic trucks was greatly increased by the Japanese military buildup before World War II, causing many Japanese manufacturers to break out of their shells and design their own vehicles. In the 1970s Japan was the pioneer in the use of robotics in the manufacturing of vehicles.


title: Automotive industry in Japan

text: The country is home to a number of companies that produce cars, construction vehicles, motorcycles, ATVs, and engines. Japanese automotive manufacturers include Toyota, Honda, Daihatsu, Nissan, Suzuki, Mazda, Mitsubishi, Subaru, Isuzu, Hino, Kawasaki, Yamaha, and Mitsuoka. Infiniti, Acura, and Lexus are luxury brands of Nissan, Honda and Toyota.


title: Automotive industry in Japan

text: Cars designed in Japan have won the European Car of the Year, International Car of the Year, and World Car of the Year awards many times. Japanese vehicles have had worldwide influence, and no longer have the stigma they had in the 1950s and 1960s when they first emerged internationally, due to a dedicated focus on continual product and process improvement led by Toyota as well as the use of the Five Whys technique and the early adoption of the Lean Six Sigma methodology. Japanese cars are also built in compliance with Japanese Government dimension regulations and engine displacement is further regulated by road tax bracket regulations, which also affects any imported cars sold in Japan.


title: Automotive industry in Japan

text: In 1904, Torao Yamaha produced the first domestically manufactured bus, which was powered by a steam engine. In 1907, Komanosuke Uchiyama produced the Takuri, the first entirely Japanese-made gasoline engine car. The Kunisue Automobile Works built the Kunisue in 1910, and the following year manufactured the "Tokyo" in cooperation with Tokyo Motor Vehicles Ltd. In 1911, Kaishinsha Motorcar Works was established and later began manufacturing a car called the DAT. In 1920, Jitsuyo Jidosha Seizo Co., founded by William R. Gorham, began building the Gorham and later the Lila. The company merged with Kaishinsha in 1926 to form the DAT Automobile Manufacturing Co. (later to evolve into Nissan Motors). From 1924 to 1927, Hakuyosha Ironworks Ltd. built the Otomo. Toyota, a textile manufacturer, began building cars in 1936. Most early vehicles, however, were trucks produced under military subsidy. Isuzu, Yanmar and Daihatsu initially focused on diesel engine development.


title: Automotive industry in Japan

text: Cars built in Japan before World War II tended to be based on European or American models. The 1917 Mitsubishi Model A was based on the Fiat A3-3 design. (This model was considered to be the first mass-produced car in Japan, with 22 units produced.) In the 1930s, Nissan Motors' cars were based on the Austin 7 and Graham-Paige designs, while the Toyota AA model was based on the Chrysler Airflow. Ohta built cars in the 1930s based on Ford models, while Chiyoda and Sumida, a predecessor of Isuzu, built cars resembling General Motors products 1935 Pontiac, and 1930s LaSalle.


title: Automotive industry in Japan

text: Automobile manufacture from Japanese companies was struggling, despite investment efforts by the Japanese Government. The 1923 Great Kantō earthquake devastated most of Japan's fledgling infrastructure and truck and construction equipment manufacturing benefited from recovery efforts. Yanase & Co., Ltd. (株式会社ヤナセ Yanase Kabushiki gaisha) was an importer of American-made cars to Japan and contributed to disaster recovery efforts by importing GMC trucks and construction equipment. By bringing in American products, Japanese manufacturers were able to examine the imported vehicles and develop their own products.


title: Automotive industry in Japan

text: Transportation and mobilization in the early 1900s was largely monopolized by the Japanese Government's Ministry of Railways, and private automobile companies emerged to further modernize the transportation infrastructure.


title: Automotive industry in Japan

text: From 1925 until the beginning of World War II, Ford and GM had factories in the country and they dominated the Japanese market. The Ford Motor Company of Japan was established in 1925 and a production plant was set up in Yokohama. General Motors established operations in Osaka in 1927. Chrysler also came to Japan and set up Kyoritsu Motors. Between 1925 and 1936, the United States Big Three automakers' Japanese subsidiaries produced a total of 208,967 vehicles, compared to the domestic producers total of 12,127 vehicles. In 1936, the Japanese government passed the Automobile Manufacturing Industry Law, which was intended to promote the domestic auto industry and reduce foreign competition; ironically, this stopped the groundbreaking of an integrated Ford plant in Yokohama, modeled on Dagenham in England and intended to serve the Asian market, that would have established Japan as a major exporter. Instead by 1939, the foreign manufacturers had been forced out of Japan. Under the direction of the Imperial Japanese Government, the fledgling vehicle production efforts were redirected to heavy duty truck production due to the Second Sino-Japanese War and the Isuzu TX was the result of three Japanese companies combining efforts to manufacture a standardized, military grade heavy duty truck.


title: Automotive industry in Japan

text: During World War II, Toyota, Nissan, Isuzu and Kurogane built trucks and motorcycles for the Imperial Japanese Army, with Kurogane introducing the world's first mass-produced four-wheel-drive car, called the Kurogane Type 95 in 1936. For the first decade after World War II, auto production was limited, and until 1966 most production consisted of trucks (including three-wheeled vehicles). Thereafter passenger cars dominated the market. Japanese car designs also continued to imitate or be derived from European and American designs. Exports were very limited in the 1950s, adding up to only 3.1% of the total passenger car production of the decade.


title: Automotive industry in Japan

text: In the 1960s Japanese manufacturers began to compete head-on in the domestic market, model for model. This was exemplified by the "CB-war" between the most popular compact sedans called the Toyota Corona and the Nissan Bluebird. While this initially led to benefits for consumers, before long R&D expenditures swelled and other companies offered competing compact sedans from Mazda, Subaru, Isuzu, Daihatsu and Mitsubishi. Towards the late 1980s and early 1990s Japanese automobile manufacturers had entered a stage of "Hyper-design" and "Hyper-equipment"; an arms race leading to less competitive products albeit produced in a highly efficient manner.


title: Automotive industry in Japan

text: During the 1960s, Japanese automakers launched a bevy of new "kei cars" in their domestic market; scooters and motorcycles remained dominant, with sales of 1.47 million in 1960 versus a mere 36,000 "kei" cars. These tiny automobiles usually featured very small engines (under 360cc, but were sometimes fitted with engines of up to 600cc for export) to keep taxes much lower than larger cars. The average person in Japan was now able to afford an automobile, which boosted sales dramatically and jumpstarted the auto industry toward becoming what it is today. The first of this new era, actually launched in 1958, was the Subaru 360. It was known as the "Lady Beetle", comparing its significance to the Volkswagen Beetle in Germany. Other significant models were the Suzuki Fronte, Daihatsu Fellow Max, Mitsubishi Minica, Mazda Carol, and the Honda N360.


title: Automotive industry in Japan

text: The keis were very minimalist motoring, however, much too small for most family car usage. The most popular economy car segment in the sixties was the 700-800 cc class, embodied by the Toyota Publica, Mitsubishi Colt 800, and the original Mazda Familia. By the end of the sixties, however, these (often two-stroke) cars were being replaced by full one-litre cars with four-stroke engines, a move which was spearheaded by Nissan's 1966 Sunny. All other manufacturers quickly followed suit, except for Toyota who equipped their Corolla with a 1.1-litre engine - the extra 100 cc were heavily touted in period advertising. These small family cars took a bigger and bigger share of an already expanding market. All vehicles sold in Japan were taxed yearly based on exterior dimensions and engine displacement. This was established by legislation passed in 1950 that established tax brackets on two classifications; dimension regulations and engine displacement. The taxes were a primary consideration as to which vehicles were selected by Japanese consumers, and guided manufacturers as to what type of vehicles the market would buy.


title: Automotive industry in Japan

text: Exports of passenger cars increased nearly two hundred-fold in the sixties compared to the previous decade, and were now up to 17.0 percent of the total production. This though, was still only the beginning. Rapidly increasing domestic demand and the expansion of Japanese car companies into foreign markets in the 1970s further accelerated growth. Effects of the 1973 Arab Oil Embargo accelerated vehicle exports along with the exchange rate of the Japanese yen to the U.S. Dollar, UK Pound, and West German Deutsche Mark. Passenger car exports rose from 100,000 in 1965 to 1,827,000 in 1975. Automobile production in Japan continued to increase rapidly after the 1970s, as Mitsubishi (as Dodge vehicles) and Honda began selling their vehicles in the US. Even more brands came to America and abroad during the 1970s, and by the 1980s, the Japanese manufacturers were gaining a major foothold in the US and world markets.


title: Automotive industry in Japan

text: In the early 1970s, the Japanese electronics manufacturers began producing integrated circuits (ICs), microprocessors and microcontrollers for the automobile industry, including ICs and microcontrollers for in-car entertainment, automatic wipers, electronic locks, dashboard, and engine control. The Japanese automobile industry widely adopted ICs years before the American automobile industry.


title: Automotive industry in Japan

text: Japanese cars became popular with British buyers in the early 1970s, with Nissan's Datsun badged cars (the Nissan brand was not used on British registered models until 1983) proving especially popular and earning a reputation in Britain for their reliability and low running costs, although rust was a major problem. Exports were successful enough that Japanese cars were considered a severe threat to many national car industries, such as Italy, France, the United Kingdom, as well as the United States. Import quotas were imposed in several countries, limiting the sales of Japanese-made cars to 3 percent of the overall market in France and 1.5 percent in Italy. As for the United States, the Japanese government was pressured to agree to annual export quotas beginning in 1981. In other countries, such as the United Kingdom, Japanese importers made gentlemen's agreements to limit import in an effort to forestall stricter official quotas. As a result, Japanese manufacturers expanded local production of cars, establishing plants across North America and Europe while also taking advantage of plants already created in third countries not covered by the quotas. Thus, South African-built Daihatsu Charades were sold in Italy and a number of Australian-made Mitsubishis found their way to North America and Europe.


title: Automotive industry in Japan

text: With Japanese manufacturers producing very affordable, reliable, and popular cars throughout the 1990s, Japan became the largest car producing nation in the world in 2000. However, its market share has decreased slightly in recent years, particularly due to old and new competition from South Korea, China and India. Nevertheless, Japan's car industry continues to flourish, its market share has risen again, and in the first quarter of 2008 Toyota surpassed American General Motors to become the world's largest car manufacturer. Today, Japan is the third largest automobile market(below the United States and China) and is the second largest car producer in the world with its branded cars being among the most used ones internationally. Automobile export remains one of the country's most profitable exports and is a cornerstone of recovery plan for the latest economic crisis. In 2019 Japan was the second largest car exporter in the world.


title: Automotive industry in Japan

text: The following are vehicle production volumes for Japanese vehicle manufacturers, according to the Japan Automobile Manufacturers Association (JAMA).


title: Apollo Intensa Emozione

text: The Apollo Intensa Emozione, sometimes referred as the IE, is a mid-engine sports car manufactured by German automobile manufacturer Apollo Automobil GmbH, in partership with Manifattura Automobili Torino, designed by their chief designer Joe Wang. The name itself means 'intense emotion' in Italian.


title: Apollo Intensa Emozione

text: This is the first vehicle made by Apollo since the Gumpert Apollo that went into production 14 years before.


title: Apollo Intensa Emozione

text: Apollo came out with a teaser video for the Intensa Emozione on October 17, 2017 and the car was fully revealed on October 24, 2017.


title: Apollo Intensa Emozione

text: The Intensa Emozione will be sold for $2,670,000 in the United States, and €2,300,000 in Europe. Only ten will be produced, all of which have been reportedly sold.


title: Apollo Intensa Emozione

text: In June 2018 it was revealed that Apollo would be partnering with HWA AG, a tuning and racing team spin-off from Mercedes-Benz tuner AMG, to complete the final stage of development for the car.


title: Apollo Intensa Emozione

text: The exterior design is based on airflow and nature, insects and marine animals in particular. The interior is based entirely on the nature theme, with a cocoon-style carbon fiber tub cockpit, in the style of a leather-wrapped prototype race car. Apart from the natural thought, the car was also intended to have a design that would stand out from all other sports cars.


title: Apollo Intensa Emozione

text: The Intensa Emozione uses a Ferrari derived 6.3-litre naturally-aspirated "F140FE" V12 developed by Autotecnica Motori and HWA AG. It is rated approximately at 8,500 rpm and around of torque at 6,000 rpm. The engine reportedly has a redline of 9,000 rpm. All of the power is sent to the rear wheels through a 6-speed Hewland sequential manual transmission. The weight stands at .


title: Apollo Intensa Emozione

text: The dampers are built by Bilstein, and are three-way adjustable (comfort, sport, auto). The car utilises Brembo carbon ceramic brakes with sizes 380 x 34 mm at the front and rear along with 6-piston callipers up front and 4-piston callipers at the rear. Michelin supplies their Sport Cup 2 high performance tires for the cars, to allow for maximum performance and grip. Pankl Racing Systems is the supplier for the differential.


title: Apollo Intensa Emozione

text: The Intensa Emozione is capable of accelerating from 0– in 2.7 seconds, with a projected top speed of . The car produces a maximum downforce of at .


title: Apollo Intensa Emozione

text: The car is made almost entirely out of carbon fibre, but it does include high-strength steel, aluminium, and titanium components. The engine bay is left uncovered, to allow the air intake to operate with maximum efficiency. The entire chassis weighs only .


title: Apollo Intensa Emozione

text: Production of the Intensa Emozione started in April 2019 with deliveries beginning in the third quarter of 2019. The carbon fibre monocoque chassis of the car is produced by Capricorn Group and chassis adjustment along with final assembly are carried out by HWA AG. The car is assembled and completed in Affalterbach, Germany where HWA manufactures its race cars.


title: Apollo Intensa Emozione

text: Its Carbon fibre body colour was changed twice and is currently present in black. The second production Apollo IE was delivered in November 2019. This is also called the "ML" (initials of its Malaysian owner Michael Loke) version due to a very distinct colour scheme. Overall, only 10 Apollo IEs will be produced.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: The Great Dividing Range, also known as the East Australian Cordillera or the Eastern Highlands, is a cordillera system in eastern Australia consisting of an expansive collection of mountain ranges, plateaus and rolling hills, that runs roughly parallel to the east coast of Australia and forms the fifth-longest land-based mountain chain in the world, and the longest entirely within a single country. It is mainland Australia's most substantial topographic feature and serves as the definitive watershed for the river systems in eastern Australia, hence the name.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: The Great Dividing Range stretches more than from Dauan Island in the Torres Strait off the northern tip of Cape York Peninsula, running the entire length of the eastern coastline through Queensland and New South Wales, then turning west across Victoria before finally fading into the Wimmera plains as rolling hills west of the Grampians region. The width of the Range varies from about to over . The Greater Blue Mountains Area, Gondwana Rainforests and Wet Tropics of Queensland World Heritage Areas are located in the Range. The highest place in Australia, the Mount Kosciuszko, resides in the Snowy Mountains portion of southern Great Dividing Range.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: The Dividing Range does not consist of a single continuous mountain chain, but is rather a combined complex (cordillera) of mountain ranges, plateaus, hilly upland areas and escarpments with an ancient and complex geological history. The physiographic division name for the landmass is called the "East Australian Cordillera". In some places the terrain is relatively flat, consisting of very low hills. Typically the highlands range from in height. The mountains and plateaus, which consist of limestones, sandstone, quartzite, schists and dolomite, have been created by faulting and folding processes.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: The crests of the Great Dividing Range is defined by the watershed boundary between the drainage basins of river systems east (the coastal or "rainward" side) and west (the inland or "leeward" side) of it. The higher and more rugged parts of the "range" do not necessarily form part of the crest of the range, but may be branches and offshoots from it. The term "Great Dividing Range" may refer specifically to the watershed crest of the range, or to the entire upland complex including all of the hills and mountains between the east coast of Australia and the central plains and lowlands. At some places it can be up to wide. Notable ranges and other features which form part of the range complex have their own distinctive names.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: As a rule of thumb, rivers east/southeast of the Dividing Range drain directly eastward into the South Pacific and the Tasman Sea, or southward into the Bass Strait. Rivers west of the Dividing Range drain in various westerly directions according to latitudes: the Murray–Darling basin in southeastern Australia (Darling Downs/eastern South West Queensland, West/Central New South Wales, Northern Victoria and the Murraylands/Riverland region of southeastern South Australia) drain southwestwards into the Great Australian Bight via the coastal Lake Alexandrina; the eastern half of the Lake Eyre basin in east central Australia (the Cooper Creek and Warburton River systems in Central/western South West Queensland and eastern Far North of South Australia) drain southwestwards into the endorheic Kati Thanda–Lake Eyre; the numerous rivers of western Cape York Peninsula in northeastern Australia (North/Far North Queensland) drain westwards or northwestwards directly into the Gulf of Carpentaria.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: The sharp rise between the coastal lowlands and the eastern uplands has affected Australia's climate, mainly due to orographic precipitation, and these areas of highest relief have revealed an impressive gorge country. Areas to the east of the mountain range in southern NSW usually experience a Föhn effect, which is a dry wind originating from the Great Dividing Range that abruptly raises the air temperature in the lee of that mountain range and reduces atmospheric moisture. This dry wind, which elevates fire danger in the warm months, occurs because of the partial orographic obstruction of relatively damp low-level air and the subsiding of drier upper-level air in leeward of the mountains. The drier air is then heated more because of the adiabatic compression as it comes down the lee slopes, forming a rain shadow.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: In the cool season, the Great Dividing Range would shield much of the southeast (i.e. Sydney, Central Coast, Hunter Valley, Illawarra, the ACT, the Monaro and South Coast) from south-westerly polar blasts that originate from the Southern Ocean, which bring freezing rain, sleet and snowfall in the upwind side of the ranges, such as in the Central Tablelands, South West Slopes and Snowy Mountains regions – All which have wetter winters. Being on the exposed western edge of the Great Dividing Range, places like Crookwell, Bright, Khancoban, Myrtleford, Batlow, Tumut and those in West Gippsland (namely the Latrobe Valley and Wilsons Promontory) receive significant precipitation in the winter and are therefore windward; whereas Cooma, Goulburn, Omeo, Bowral, Bombala, Nimmitabel, and Canberra on the eastern edge of the Great Dividing Range are relatively warmer and drier, particularly in the cool season, therefore making them on the leeward side, in addition to being sheltered from both easterly flows and western frontal systems due to their sandwiched positions.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: Moreover, Oberon, Delegate, Lithgow, Shooters Hill and Sunny Corner are on the crest of the ranges and thus exposed from all directions, hence their evenly spread rainfall. The main ski resorts in New South Wales, such as Thredbo Village, Perisher and Charlotte Pass, lie transitionally between the leeward and windward side (the former town being more leeward and the latter more windward). Although they receive substantial precipitation from over the crest of the ranges, they lack the persistent cloud cover which characterises truly windward locations on the western face, which are; Cabramurra, Kiandra, Mount Buller, Falls Creek, Mount Hotham and Mount Buffalo.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: With leeward areas, precipitation is predominantly derived from the Tasman Sea to the east, since the Great Dividing Range blocks westerly cold fronts from the Southern Ocean (which tend to arrive between winter and early spring). Therefore, winters in leeward zones are drier (due to the foehn effect) with the summers being relatively wet. When it comes to windward areas, little or no precipitation is received from the Tasman Sea to the east due to the large distances and the Great Dividing Range; instead, precipitation derives from the South Indian Ocean and the Southern Ocean, advancing eastwards or northeastwards across Victoria. Winters in windward areas are generally wet and summers tend to be (relatively) dry. Transitional areas can be exposed to both westerly fronts and easterly flows, where they feature fairly uniform rainfall.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: The Great Dividing Range was formed during the Carboniferous period—over 300 million years ago—when Australia collided with what are now parts of South America and New Zealand. The range has experienced significant erosion since. (See Geology of Australia.)


title: Great Dividing Range

text: For tens of thousands of years prior to British colonisation the ranges were home to various Aboriginal Australian nations and clans. Evidence remains in some places of their traditional way of life including decorated caves, campsites and trails used to travel between the coastal and inland regions. Many descendants of these nations still exist today, and some remain the traditional owners and custodians of their lands.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: After British colonisation in 1788, the ranges were an obstacle to exploration and settlement by the British settlers. Although not high, parts of the highlands were very rugged. Crossing the Blue Mountains was particularly challenging due to the mistaken idea that the creeks should be followed rather than the ridges, and almost impenetrable, labyrinthine, sandstone mountains. Although the most daunting obstacle to western expansion of the colony, the Blue Mountains actually lie to the east of the watershed that divides the Hawkesbury-Nepean system and the Murray-Darling system, the true Great Dividing Range. The watershed in this area lies to the west of Lithgow, passing near the locality of Mt Lambie and village of Capertee. There, as in some other places in New South Wales, the Great Divide is only a slight rise in the surrounding topography.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: Knowing that local Aboriginal people had already established routes crossing the range and by making use of Aboriginal walking trails, a usable ridge-top route was finally discovered by Europeans directly westward from Sydney across the Blue Mountains to Bathurst by an expedition jointly led by Gregory Blaxland, William Lawson and William Charles Wentworth. Towns in the Blue Mountains were later named after each of these men. This was the start of the development of the agricultural districts of inland New South Wales. A road was built to Blaxland by convicts within six months. Easier routes to inland New South Wales were discovered towards Goulburn to the southwest, and westwards from Newcastle.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: Subsequent explorations were made across and around the ranges by Allan Cunningham, John Oxley, Hamilton Hume, Paul Edmund Strzelecki, Ludwig Leichhardt and Thomas Mitchell. These explorers were mainly concerned with finding and appropriating good agricultural land.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: By the late 1830s the most fertile rangelands adjacent to the mountain ranges had been explored, appropriated from the traditional inhabitants and some settled. These included the Gippsland and Riverina regions in the south, up to the Liverpool Plains and the Darling Downs in the north.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: Various road and railway routes were subsequently established through many parts of the ranges, although many areas remain remote to this day. For example, in eastern Victoria there is only one major road crossing the highlands from north to south, the Great Alpine Road.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: Parts of the highlands consisting of relatively flat and, by Australian standards, well-watered land were developed for agricultural and pastoral uses. Such areas include the Atherton Tableland and Darling Downs in Queensland, and the Northern Tablelands, Southern Highlands and Southern Tablelands in New South Wales. Other parts of the highlands are too rugged for agriculture and have been used for forestry. Many parts of the highlands which were not developed are now included in National Parks.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: All of mainland Australia's alpine areas, including its highest mountain, Mount Kosciuszko ( AHD), are part of this range, called the Main Range. The highest areas in southern New South Wales and eastern Victoria are known as the Australian Alps.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: The central core of the Great Dividing Range is dotted with hundreds of peaks and is surrounded by many smaller mountain ranges or spurs, canyons, valleys and plains of regional significance. Some of the major plains include the High Plains of South-Eastern Australia, the Southern Highlands, the Central Highlands and Bogong High Plains of Victoria. Other tablelands considered part of the Great Dividing Range are the Atherton Tableland, Canberra wine region and the Southern Tablelands.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: The Dandenong Ranges, Barrington Tops, Bunya Mountains, Blue Mountains, Liverpool Range, McPherson Ranges and the Moonbi Range are some of the smaller spurs and ranges that make up the greater dividing range. Other notable ranges and tablelands which form part of the Great Dividing Range include the Liverpool Range, Mount Royal Range and the Monaro District. Whilst some of the peaks of the highlands reach respectable heights of a little over , the age of the range and its erosion mean that most of the mountains are not very steep, and virtually all peaks can be reached without mountaineering equipment.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: In some areas, such as the Snowy Mountains, Victorian Alps, the Scenic Rim and the eastern escarpments of the New England region, the highlands form a significant barrier. The eastern escarpment is the site of many spectacular waterfalls which were formed by rivers plunging off the tablelands. In other areas the slopes are gentle and in places the range is barely perceptible.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: Well known passes on the range include Coxs Gap, Cunninghams Gap, Dead Horse Gap, Nowlands Gap, and Spicers Gap.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: Major cities located on the upland areas of the range include Canberra, Toowoomba and the outer suburbs of Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Gold Coast and Cairns in north Queensland. Many towns and cities are located on the range, and also in lowland areas and foothills adjacent to the highlands. There is a strong natural history and cultural attachment to the Dividing Range region in towns and on many, sometimes remote, landholdings.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: The lower reaches are used for forestry, an activity that causes friction with conservationists. The range is also the source of virtually all of eastern Australia's water supply, both through runoff caught in dams, and throughout much of Queensland, through the Great Artesian Basin.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: Valleys along the chain of mountains have yielded a water source for important reservoirs and water supply projects such as the Upper Nepean Scheme, Snowy Mountains Scheme and Warragamba Dam.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: The Bradfield Scheme has been mooted as a way to transport water from the Wet Tropics of Queensland in the coastal northeast of Far North Queensland via a series of Dams & Tunnels, southwest to inland dryer regions, including a tunnel through the Great Dividing Range into the Flinders River then a tunnel into the Torrens Creek in the White Mountains National Park then flows south into Thompson River / Cooper Creek, part of the Eyre Basin. Many other variations have been proposed.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: The Great Dividing Range creates the drainage basins of the Australian south-east coast drainage division and the Australian north-east coast drainage division, whose water flows to the east coast and into the Pacific Ocean, Tasman Sea, and Bass Strait with the westerly Murray–Darling basin which flow inland, away from the coast into the interior plains.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: Some of the rivers which flow west of the ranges includes the Condamine River, Flinders River, Herbert River, Lachlan River, Macdonald River, Macintyre River and Namoi River. Rivers that flow north into the Murray–Darling Basin from Victoria include the Goulburn, Mitta Mitta, Kiewa, Ovens, King, Loddon and Campaspe rivers. Rivers that flow east into the Pacific Ocean include the Brisbane River, Burdekin River, Burnett River, Clarence River, Fitzroy River, Hastings River, Hawkesbury River, Hunter River, Karuah River, Macleay River, Mary River, Richmond River and the Shoalhaven River. Those that flow south, primarily through Victoria, include the Snowy, Cann, Tambo, Mitchell, Latrobe, Thomson, Yarra, Werribee, Hopkins and Glenelg rivers.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: The engineers of early rail passages across the Great Dividing Range needed to find low sections of the range to cross, as well as suitable, "low" gradient paths up the mountains on either side. Rail passages include:


title: Great Dividing Range

text: Many of Australia's highways such as the Alpine Way, Great Alpine Road, Snowy Mountains Highway, Hume Highway, Illawarra Highway, Northern Highway, Melba Highway, Maroondah Highway, Midland Highway, Pyrenees Highway, Sunraysia Highway, Monaro Highway, Olympic Highway, Newell Highway, Lachlan Valley Way, Barton Highway, Federal Highway, Kings Highway, Great Western Highway, Mitchell Highway, Mid-Western Highway, Castlereagh Highway, Mulligan Highway, Capricorn Highway, Cunningham Highway, Gore Highway, Flinders Highway, Gregory Highway, Peak Downs Highway, Dawson Highway, New England Highway, Golden Highway, Bruxner Highway, Gwydir Highway, Oxley Highway, Warrego Highway, Summerland Way, Waterfall Way, Thunderbolts Way, the Calder Highway, the Western Highway, and the Murray Valley Highway traverse parts of the range.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: Much of the range lies within a succession of national parks and other reserves. Most of the national parks are listed below, and there are almost double that amount of state forests.


title: Great Dividing Range

text: In 2009 as part of the Q150 celebrations, the Great Dividing Range was announced as one of the Q150 Icons of Queensland for its role as a "location".


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: The 1985 season was the Chicago Bears' 66th in the National Football League (NFL) and their fourth under head coach Mike Ditka.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: The Bears entered 1985 looking to improve on their 10–6 record from 1984 and advance further than the NFC Championship Game, where they lost to the 15–1 San Francisco 49ers. Not only did the Bears improve on that record, but they also put together one of the greatest seasons in NFL history.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: The Bears won their first twelve games of the season before losing to the Miami Dolphins on "Monday Night Football". The loss to the Dolphins would be the only loss the Bears would suffer that season, as they finished with a 15–1 record. This matched the 49ers' mark from the year before and tied the then-record for most wins in a regular season; the record would be reached twice more in 1998 (Minnesota Vikings) and 2004 (Pittsburgh Steelers) before the New England Patriots ended the 2007 NFL season with a 16–0 regular season record.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: The Bears' defense was ranked first in the league and only allowed 198 total points (an average of 12.4 points per game). The Bears won the NFC Central Division by seven games over the second-place Green Bay Packers and earned the NFC's top seed and home-field advantage throughout the playoffs at Soldier Field. In their two playoff games against the New York Giants and Los Angeles Rams, the Bears outscored their opponents 45–0 and became the first team to record back-to-back playoff shutouts.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: Then, in Super Bowl XX at the Louisiana Superdome against the New England Patriots, the Bears set several more records. First, their 46 points broke the previous record of 38 that had been scored by the Los Angeles Raiders in Super Bowl XVIII and again by the 49ers in Super Bowl XIX. Their 36-point margin of victory also topped the 29-point margin of victory that the Raiders recorded over the Washington Redskins in Super Bowl XVIII. Both of those records would stand until Super Bowl XXIV in New Orleans four years later, when the 49ers defeated the Denver Broncos by 45 points, 55–10.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: It was the Bears' first NFL Championship title since 1963. As of 2022, it is also their most recent championship.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: The 1985 Chicago Bears are one of the few teams to consistently challenge the undefeated 1972 Miami Dolphins for the unofficial title of the greatest NFL team of all time. In 2007, the 1985 Bears were ranked as the second greatest Super Bowl championship team on the NFL Network's documentary series "", ranking behind only the 1972 Dolphins. They also ranked #2 behind only the Dolphins on the 100 greatest teams of all time presented by the NFL on its 100th anniversary. Other sources rate the 1985 Chicago Bears as the greatest NFL team ever.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: The defense led the league in points allowed (198), yards allowed (4,135) and takeaways (54), a feat that wouldn't be accomplished again until the 2013 Seattle Seahawks defense.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: After the draft, the Bears signed 3 undrafted free agents, quarterback Mike Tomczak from Ohio State, along with defensive back Ken Taylor and receiver Keith Ortego of Oregon State and McNeese State, respectively.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: In a trade with the San Diego Chargers, the Bears acquired linebacker Cliff Thrift and punter Maury Buford by trading away their 12th round draft picks from 1985 and 1986, respectively.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: During training camp, seven players, including Mike Singletary, Steve McMichael, Keith Van Horne and rookie William Perry, were either unsigned or holding out due to their contracts. Perry, McMichael and Van Horne eventually reported to training camp. Perry held out until August 5, when he signed a four-year, $1.35 million contract. However, after an unimpressive showing at training camp, defensive coordinator Buddy Ryan tabbed Perry as a "wasted draft-pick". Before the team's season opening game against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, players Al Harris, Todd Bell and Richard Dent requested to be traded. Dent and the Bears had been attempting to work out a contract extension, as his contract ran through the 1985 season, and paid him $90,000. Bell played for $77,000 the year before, and made the 1985 Pro Bowl roster, but asked for $950,000 annually, which would have made him the highest-paid player on the team. Bell and Harris would eventually hold out for the season.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: In the season opener against the Bucs, the Bears defense seemed lost for much of the first half of the game by allowing 28 points, and trailed 28–17 at halftime, but the offense was able to lead the Bears to a victory after Jim McMahon scored 3 touchdowns, with Matt Suhey scoring on another. Leslie Frazier was also able to give the Bears defense their first highlight of the season by returning a Steve DeBerg interception 29 yards for a touchdown on the second play of the third quarter. The Bears had allowed 212 yards in the first half, but eventually allowed only 95 in the second half. Walter Payton had rushed for 120 yards on 17 carries, and McMahon completed 23/34 passes for 274 yards, two touchdowns and one interception.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: In the Super Bowl XX preview, the Bears defense was able to find their groove by forcing 4 turnovers on New England, and allowing them to only score a touchdown in the fourth quarter.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: The following week against rival Minnesota, backup quarterback Steve Fuller was called up to take the place of Jim McMahon, who was sidelined with a pinched nerve. With the Bears trailing the Vikings, an anxious McMahon was allowed to return to the game. Without any delay, McMahon famously spearheaded a Bears comeback and victory, with the game being nicknamed "The Viking Miracle".


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: Week 4 saw Chicago trailing 10-0 early to the Joe Theismann-led Washington Redskins. They would score the next forty-five points. One play turned the game, a 99-yard kickoff return by Willie Gault. This cut the lead to 10-7 and importantly, on the play, Washington's punter injured his knee and was sidelined for the remainder of the game. On the next possession, Theismann punted for 1 yard (his only punt in the NFL), and Chicago scored on the very next play to take a 14–10 lead, and they cruised from there.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: Nine months after their humiliating defeat at the hands of the 49ers in the NFC Championship Game, the Bears claimed their revenge by sacking Joe Montana a then-career high seven times. In return for 49ers coach Bill Walsh’s idea of sending lineman Guy McIntyre in as fullback the season before, Mike Ditka sent in rookie William Perry, but as a runner rather than a blocker. Shortly after the game and the flight back to Chicago, Ditka was arrested for DWI.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: This was the Bears’ last victory at Candlestick Park. and their last win at San Francisco until 2014 at Levi's Stadium.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: The Bears defeated the Packers on Monday Night Football in a decisive 23–7 victory, with Perry becoming a folk hero after scoring his first career touchdown on a 1-yard run.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: The Packers increased tensions in the Bears-Packers rivalry after putting horse manure in the Bears locker room. However, the Bears had the last laugh against their hated rival, winning 16–10, and Perry scored his first career receiving touchdown along the way. Green Bay's Mark Lee and Ken Stills intensified the game after Lee sent Payton over a bench and Stills leveled Matt Suhey. With the Bears in trouble and trailing 10–7 in the 4th quarter, a Steve McMichael safety proved to be the key play that turned the game. This cut the lead to 10-9 and the Bears got the ball at midfield following the safety free kick. On the ensuing drive, Walter Payton sealed the victory with a 27-yard touchdown run, putting Chicago up for keeps 16–10.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: The Bears defeated the Lions 24–3, while Walter Payton and Matt Suhey ran for 105 and 102 yards, respectively. As of February, 1, 2021, this was the last time the Bears had two 100-yard rushers in a game.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: In a student vs teacher matchup, the Bears shut out the Cowboys, handing them their worst loss in franchise history, as well as the first time they were shut out in 15 years. The win also gave the Bears the NFC Central division title.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: In the coldest game of the season, the Bears recorded their second straight shutout, and third straight game without giving up a touchdown, against Atlanta, with defensive lineman Henry Waechter sacking Bob Holly in the endzone for a safety.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: The Bears’ hopes for a perfect season were thwarted when Dan Marino and the Dolphins defeated the McMahon-less Bears on Monday Night Football, 38–24, and kept the '72 Dolphins the only undefeated regular season in league history (it wouldn't be until 2007 when the 2007 New England Patriots were able to tie this record). Miami struck first when Marino hit Nat Moore for a 33-yard touchdown. Bears backup Steve Fuller then threw a 69-yard pass to Willie Gault, and eventually snuck in for a 1-yard touchdown. After a Fuad Reveiz field goal to put Miami up 10–7, Marino hit Moore again that set up a Ron Davenport touchdown to increase the gap by 10 points. After the Bears scored on a Kevin Butler field goal, Marino hit Mark Duper on a crossing pattern for 52 yards. On 3rd and 7, he connected with Mark Clayton for 26 yards down to the Bears 1-yard line. Davenport then ran in, and the Dolphins led 24–10. Later, the Dolphins would increase their lead to 31–10. The Bears had not allowed 31 points in one half since the 1972 season opener. The Bears then scored in the third quarter, but any momentum they gained was lost when Butler muffed the ensuing kickoff, which Dolphins rookie Alex Moyer recovered at the Bears 46. Dan Hampton then tipped a Marino pass into the air, but it sailed downfield for 30 yards before landing in the hands of Clayton, who went into the end zone to make it 38–17. Fuller hit Ken Margerum for a 19-yard touchdown, but that would be the last score of the night for the Bears. Mike Singletary said in "America's Game: 1985 Chicago Bears":


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: The day after this loss, the Bears recorded "The Super Bowl Shuffle", a Grammy Award-nominated and Billboard charts #41 charting rap single that delivered over $300,000 to the Chicago Community Trust.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: The 12-1 Bears hosted the 3-10 Colts and were 20-point favorites in Week 14. The Colts marched the ball 72 yards to the Chicago one-yard line on the first drive of the game. But on third and goal, Gary Fencik stuffed a pitch play for a five-yard loss and the Colts' kicker missed a 22-yard-field goal attempt wide left. Both teams struggled to a 3-3 halftime score as Indianapolis actually outgained Chicago in the half. Chicago finally pulled ahead on a 16-yard Walter Payton TD run near the end of the third quarter, and held on for a 17–10 victory.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: The game featured a hit on Lions quarterback Joe Ferguson where he was knocked unconscious by Bears linebacker Wilber Marshall.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: The Bears' defense dominated the game by allowing only 32 rushing yards and sacked Giants quarterback Phil Simms for 60 yards. Simms was 14/35 for 209 yards while running back Joe Morris, the NFL's regular-season touchdown leader, finished with 32 yards on 12 carries. Chicago's first touchdown resulted on a New York punt attempt from their own 12-yard line. The wind, blowing at 13 mph, caught the ball just enough for punter Sean Landeta to completely miss it, and Shaun Gayle picked it up and ran 5 yards for a touchdown. Bears quarterback Jim McMahon later threw two touchdown passes in the third quarter, both to Dennis McKinnon. McMahon finished the game with 216 passing yards, while running back Walter Payton rushed for 94 yards.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: At the start of the week leading up to the NFC Championship Game, Ditka commented on what he perceived as the NFL's unfavorable treatment of his team by famously stating, "I don't think we come in great favor with certain people. I think it's the same reason people look with disfavor on the Raiders. There are some teams that are fair-haired; there are some teams that are not fair-haired. There are teams named Smith; there are teams named Grabowski. The Rams are a Smith. We're a Grabowski."


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: The Bears defense dominated the game by limiting Rams running back Eric Dickerson to 46 yards, and holding quarterback Dieter Brock to 10 out of 31 completions for 66 passing yards. Los Angeles only gained 130 yards of total offense. Chicago quarterback Jim McMahon scored on a 16-yard touchdown run in the first quarter, and later threw a 22-yard touchdown pass to Willie Gault in the third quarter. Kicker Kevin Butler kicked a 34-yard field goal in the first period. In the fourth quarter, defensive lineman Richard Dent forced Brock to fumble, and linebacker Wilber Marshall picked up the loose ball and returned it 52 yards for a touchdown.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: The Patriots took a quick lead after linebacker Larry McGrew recovered a fumble from Walter Payton at the Chicago 19-yard line on the second play of the game, setting up Tony Franklin's 36-yard field goal 1:19 into the first quarter. The Bears struck back with a 7-play, 59-yard drive, featuring a 43-yard pass completion from Jim McMahon to wide receiver Willie Gault, to set up a field goal from Kevin Butler, tying the score 3–3.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: After both teams traded punts, Richard Dent and linebacker Wilber Marshall shared a sack on Eason, forcing a fumble that lineman Dan Hampton recovered on the Patriots 13-yard line. Chicago then drove to the 3-yard line, but had to settle for another field goal from Butler after rookie defensive lineman William "Refrigerator" Perry was tackled for a 1-yard loss while trying to throw his first NFL pass on a halfback option play. On the Patriots' ensuing drive, Dent forced running back Craig James to fumble, which was recovered by linebacker Mike Singletary at the 13-yard line. Two plays later, Bears fullback Matt Suhey scored on an 11-yard touchdown run to increase the lead to 13–3.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: New England took the ensuing kickoff and ran one play before the first quarter ended, which resulted in positive yardage for the first time in the game (a 3-yard run by James). But after an incomplete pass and a 4-yard loss, they had to send in punter Rich Camarillo again, and receiver Keith Ortego returned the ball 12 yards to the 41-yard line. The Bears subsequently drove 59 yards in 10 plays, featuring a 24-yard reception by Suhey, to score on McMahon's 2-yard touchdown run to increase their lead, 20–3. After the ensuing kickoff, New England lost 13 yards in 3 plays and had to punt again, but got the ball back with great field position when defensive back Raymond Clayborn recovered a fumble from Suhey at their own 46-yard line. Patriots coach Raymond Berry then replaced Eason with Steve Grogan to see if he could spark the Patriots offense. But Grogan could only lead them to the 37-yard line and they decided to punt rather than risk a 55-yard field goal attempt. The Bears then marched 72 yards in 11 plays, moving the ball inside the Patriots 10-yard line. New England kept them out of the end zone, but Butler kicked his third field goal on the last play of the half to give Chicago a 23–3 halftime lead.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: The Bears had absolutely dominated New England in the first half, holding them to 21 offensive plays (only 4 of which resulted in positive yardage), −19 total offensive yards, 2 pass completions, 1 first down, and 3 points. Meanwhile, Chicago gained 236 yards and scored 23 points themselves.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: After the Patriots received the second half opening kickoff, they managed to get one first down, but then had to punt after Grogan was sacked twice. Camarillo, who punted 4 times in the first half, managed to pin the Bears back at their own 4-yard line with a Super Bowl record 62-yard punt. But the Patriots defense still had no ability to stop Chicago's offense. On their very first play, McMahon faked a handoff to Payton, then threw a 60-yard completion to Gault. Eight plays later, McMahon finished the Super Bowl record 96-yard drive with a 1-yard touchdown run to make the Bears lead 30–3. On New England's second drive of the period, Chicago cornerback Reggie Phillips intercepted a pass from Grogan and returned it 28 yards for a touchdown to increase the lead to 37–3.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: On the second play of their ensuing possession, the Patriots turned the ball over again, when receiver Cedric Jones lost a fumble after catching a 19-yard pass from Grogan. A few plays later, McMahon's 27-yard completion to receiver Dennis Gentry moved the ball to the 1-yard line, setting up perhaps the most memorable moment of the game. William "the Refrigerator" Perry was brought on to score on offense, as he had done twice in the regular season. His touchdown made the score 44–3.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: The Patriots finally scored a touchdown early in the fourth quarter, advancing the ball 76 yards in 12 plays and scoring on an 8-yard pass from Grogan to receiver Irving Fryar. But the Bears defense dominated New England for the rest of the game, forcing another fumble, another interception, and defensive lineman Henry Waechter's sack on Grogan in the end zone for a safety to make the final score 46–10.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: One oddity in the Bears victory was that Payton had a relatively poor performance statistically running the ball and never scored a touchdown in Super Bowl XX, his first and only Super Bowl appearance in a Hall of Fame career. However, if one views the game and watches the Patriots' defense, it is clear that their primary goal was stopping Payton and he frequently had three and four defenders keyed on him on nearly every play. This allowed the rest of the Bears' offense far more opportunities to score than had the Patriots employed a more balanced defense. Ultimately Payton was the Bears' leading rusher during the game, but the Patriots defense held him to only 61 yards on 22 carries, with his longest run being only 7 yards. He was given several opportunities to score near the goal line, but New England stopped him every time before he reached the end zone (such as his 2-yard loss from the New England 3-yard line a few plays before Butler's second field goal, and his 2-yard run from the 4-yard line right before McMahon's first rushing touchdown). Thus, Chicago head coach Mike Ditka opted to go for other plays to counter the Patriots defense. Perry's touchdown and McMahon's rushing touchdowns are widely considered as scoring opportunities that were denied to Payton. Ditka has since gone on record stating that his biggest regret of his career was not creating a scoring opportunity for Payton during the game.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: McMahon, who completed 12 out of 20 passes for 256 yards, became the first quarterback in a Super Bowl to score 2 rushing touchdowns. Bears receiver Willie Gault finished the game with 129 receiving yards on just 4 receptions, an average of over 32.2 yards per catch. He also returned 4 kickoffs for 49 yards. Suhey had 11 carries for 52 yards and a touchdown, and caught a pass for 24 yards. Singletary tied a Super Bowl record with 2 fumble recoveries.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: Eason became the first Super Bowl starting quarterback to fail to complete a pass, going 0 for 6 attempts. The Bears also dominated Patriots starting running back James, holding him to 1 yard on 5 carries, with 1 fumble. Grogan completed 17 out of 30 passes for 177 yards and 1 touchdown, with 2 interceptions. Although Fullback Tony Collins was the Patriots leading rusher, he was limited to just 4 yards on 3 carries, and caught 2 passes for 19 yards. New England receiver Stephen Starring returned 7 kickoffs for 153 yards and caught 2 passes for 39 yards.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: The Bears were first in scoring defense, allowing only 198 points in the regular season with an average of allowing only 12.4 points/game, as well as scoring more points than given up. The 198 points allowed were 65 less than the second-most allowed that year, while the point differential of plus-258 is 110 more than the second-ranked differential and the third-highest in NFL history. They were also second in scoring with 456 points (28.5 points/game), trailing only the Chargers that season. They also led the league in turnover differential at plus-23. The team also had 4 shutouts, two in the regular season over the Dallas Cowboys, and Atlanta Falcons, followed by the New York Giants and Los Angeles Rams in the postseason.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: The Bears' iconic 46 defense (named after the jersey number of former Bears' safety, Doug Plank), led by mercurial defensive coordinator Buddy Ryan, was an "attack from all angles" scheme that resulted in, arguably, one of the greatest overall team defenses in league history. With future Hall of Famer Mike Singletary (#50) flanked by the supremely athletic Wilber Marshall (#58) and Otis Wilson (#55), the linebacking unit ranked in at #5 of the greatest linebacking corps in NFL history in NFL Top 10. Coupled with a solid backfield anchored by safeties Gary Fencik (FS) and Dave Duerson (22), and a defensive line that included future Hall of Famers Richard Dent (#95) and Dan "Danimal" Hampton (#99), along with the gritty Steve McMichael (#76) and breakout media superstar rookie, William "The Refrigerator" Perry (#72), the Bears were famous (or infamous) for getting to the quarterback early and often and completely disrupting their opponent's offensive game plans.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: As a testament to their toughness, a hit by Marshall where he knocked Detroit Lions quarterback Joe Ferguson unconscious is still replayed as just one example of the ferocity with which this team played.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: The irony of the defense's success was that two of the Bears' top defensive players, linebacker Al Harris and strong safety Todd Bell, missed the entire season due to contract disputes. Additionally, the team possessed several talented offensive players to back up their defense.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: The 1985 season was the team's cheerleading squad Chicago Honey Bears' final season with the team, as team owner Virginia Halas McCaskey eventually severed all ties with them.


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: After the loss to the Miami Dolphins, most of the team recorded the song "The Super Bowl Shuffle" (defensive lineman Dan Hampton refused to participate due to the song's arrogance), becoming the first sports team to record a rap song (The 49ers recorded a post-disco song the year before). The song's popularity led to it being #41 on the US Billboard Hot 100, and the song funded $300,000 in profit for the Chicago Community Trust to help needy families in Chicago with clothing, shelter, and food, hence Walter Payton's rap lyric: "now we're not doing this because we're greedy, the Bears are doing it to feed the needy".


title: 1985 Chicago Bears season

text: In 2011, the Bears made their visit to the White House, 25 years after their originally intended visit was cancelled due to the Space Shuttle "Challenger" disaster, as former President Barack Obama is a Bears fan. At that time, Obama called them the greatest team ever; however, he called his own words into question when hosting the 1972 Dolphins, the only NFL team with a perfect season. Obama noted that the only loss the 1985 Bears had was to the Dolphins.


title: Franz Stangl

text: Franz Paul Stangl (; 26 March 1908 – 28 June 1971) was an Austrian-born police officer and commandant of the Nazi extermination camps Sobibor and Treblinka. Stangl, an employee of the T-4 Euthanasia Program and an SS commander in Nazi Germany, became commandant of the camps during the Operation Reinhard phase of the Holocaust. He worked for Volkswagen do Brasil and was arrested in Brazil in 1967, extradited to West Germany and tried for the mass murder of one million people. In 1970, he was found guilty and sentenced to the maximum penalty, life imprisonment. He died of heart failure six months later.


title: Franz Stangl

text: Stangl was born in 1908 in Altmünster, located in the Salzkammergut region of Austria. He was the son of a night watchman and had such an emotionally distressing relationship with his father that he was deeply frightened by and hated the sight of the elder Stangl's Habsburg Dragoons uniform. Stangl claimed his father died of malnutrition in 1916. To help support his family, Franz learned to play the zither and earned money giving zither lessons. Stangl completed his public schooling in 1923.


title: Franz Stangl

text: In his teens, he secured an apprenticeship as a weaver, qualifying as a master weaver in 1927. Concerned that this trade offered few opportunities for advancement – and having observed the poor health of his co-workers – Stangl sought a new career. He moved to Innsbruck in 1930 and applied for an appointment in the Austrian federal police. Stangl later suggested that he liked the security and cleanliness that the police uniforms represented to him. He was accepted in early 1931 and trained for two years at the federal police academy in Linz.


title: Franz Stangl

text: Stangl became a member of the Austrian Nazi Party in 1931 when it was an illegal association for an Austrian police officer at that time. After the war, he denied having been a Nazi since 1931 and claimed that he had enrolled as member of the party only to avoid arrest following the Anschluss of Austria into Nazi Germany in May 1938. Records suggest that Stangl contributed to a Nazi aid fund but he disavowed knowing about the intended party purpose of the fund. Stangl had Nazi Party number 6,370,447 and SS number 296,569.


title: Franz Stangl

text: In 1935, Stangl was accepted into the "Kriminalpolizei" as a detective in the Austrian town of Wels. After Austria's "Anschluss," Stangl was assigned to the "Schutzpolizei" (which was taken over by the Gestapo) in Linz, where he was posted to the Jewish Bureau (). Stangl joined the SS in May 1938. He ultimately reached the rank of "SS-Hauptsturmführer" (Captain).


title: Franz Stangl

text: After the onset of World War II, in early 1940, Stangl was instructed to report for work at the Public Service Foundation for Institutional Care ("Gemeinnützige Stiftung für Anstaltspflege"), a front organization of the T-4 Euthanasia Program. Stangl purposely solicited for a job in the newly created T-4 program in order to escape difficulties with his boss in the Linz Gestapo. He travelled to the RSHA in Berlin, where he was received by Paul Werner, who offered Stangl a job as supervisor in charge of security at a T-4 facility, and in the language commonly used during recruitment, described Action T4 as a "humanitarian" effort that was "essential, legal, and secret". Next Stangl met with Viktor Brack, who offered him a choice of work between Hartheim and Sonnenstein Euthanasia Centres; Stangl picked Hartheim, which was near Linz.


title: Franz Stangl

text: Through a direct order from "Reichsführer-SS" Heinrich Himmler issued in November 1940, Stangl became the deputy office manager (Police Superintendent) of the T-4 Euthanasia Program at Hartheim Euthanasia Centre, and in late summer 1941 at Bernburg Euthanasia Centre, where people with mental and physical disabilities, as well as political prisoners, were sent to be killed.


title: Franz Stangl

text: At Hartheim, Stangl served under Christian Wirth as an assistant supervisor in charge of security. When Wirth was succeeded by Franz Reichleitner, Stangl stayed on as Reichleitner's deputy. During his brief posting to Bernburg Euthanasia Centre Stangl reorganized the office at that T-4 facility. In March 1942, Stangl was given a choice to either return to the Linz Gestapo or be transferred to Lublin for work in Operation Reinhard. Stangl accepted the posting to Lublin in the General Government, where he would manage Operation Reinhard under Odilo Globočnik.


title: Franz Stangl

text: Stangl was appointed by "Reichsführer-SS" Heinrich Himmler to be the first commandant of Sobibor extermination camp. Stangl was Sobibor's commandant from 28 April until the end of August 1942, at the rank of "SS-Obersturmführer". He claimed that Odilo Globočnik initially suggested that Sobibor was merely a supply camp for the army and that the true nature of the camp became known to him only when he himself discovered a gas chamber hidden in the woods. Globočnik told him that if the Jews "were not working hard enough" he was fully permitted to kill them and that Globočnik would send "new ones".


title: Franz Stangl

text: Stangl studied the camp operations and management of Bełżec, which had commenced extermination activity. He then accelerated the completion of Sobibor. Around that time Stangl also had further dealings with Wirth, who was running extermination camps at Bełżec and Chelmno. Between 16 and 18 May 1942, Sobibor became fully operational. However, Stangl quickly realized that the extermination process was being encumbered by constant turnover among its prisoner labor force. He ended arbitrary culling of "work Jews" and established semi-permanent work teams, each overseen by a kapo. In the three months before Stangl was transferred to Treblinka, Yitzak Arad estimates that approximately 90,000 Jews were killed at Sobibor.


title: Franz Stangl

text: Stangl avoided interacting with his victims, and he was rarely seen except when he greeted arriving prisoner transports. On these occasions, he stood out because of the all-white linen riding coat he would wear, an affectation which earned him the nickname "White Death". Prisoners who did interact with him regarded him as one of the "moderates" among the camp staff. He was only ever accused of a single act of hands-on violence, and on one occasion, he convened a meeting to address what he regarded as Kurt Bolender's "bullying" of the "Sonderkommando" prisoners working in the extermination area. Stangl took an interest in one prisoner, Shlomo Szmajzner, who was forced to make gold jewelry for the SS officers. After the war, Szmajzner recalled Stangl as an arrogant man who stood out for "his obvious pleasure in his work and his situation. None of the others --although they were, in different ways, so much worse than he – showed this to such an extent. He had this perpetual smile on his face."


title: Franz Stangl

text: Around 100,000 Jews are believed to have been killed there while Stangl was the administrator until the furnaces broke down in October, by which time Stangl had left. Stangl was succeeded as Sobibor commandant by his Hartheim Euthanasia Center colleague, Franz Reichleitner.


title: Franz Stangl

text: On 28 August 1942, Odilo Globočnik ordered Stangl to become "Kommandant" at the newly opened but disorganized death camp, Treblinka, then under the incompetent command of Irmfried Eberl. Globočnik trusted that Stangl could restore order at Treblinka, since Stangl had a reputation as a highly competent administrator and people manager with an excellent grasp of detail.


title: Franz Stangl

text: Stangl assumed command of Treblinka on 1 September 1942. Stangl wanted his camp to look attractive, so he ordered the paths paved and flowers planted along the sides of Seidel Street, near camp headquarters and SS living quarters. Despite being directly responsible for the camp's operations, Stangl said he limited his contact with Jewish prisoners as much as possible. Stangl rarely intervened with unusually cruel acts (other than gassing) perpetrated by his subordinate officers at the camp. He usually wore a white uniform and carried a whip, which caused prisoners to nickname him the "White Death".


title: Franz Stangl

text: He claimed while in prison that his dedication had nothing to do with ideology or hatred of Jews. He said he matter-of-factly viewed the prisoners as material objects rather than people, including their extermination: "That was my profession. I enjoyed it. It fulfilled me. And yes, I was ambitious about that, I won't deny it." Stangl accepted and grew accustomed to the killings, perceiving prisoners not as humans but merely as "cargo" that must be destroyed. Stangl accepted the extermination of the Jews as a fact. At about this time, Stangl began drinking heavily. He is quoted as saying:


title: Franz Stangl

text: In September 1942, Stangl supervised the building of new, larger gas chambers to augment the existing gas chambers. The new gas chambers became operational in early autumn 1942. It is believed that these death chambers were capable of killing 3,000 people in two hours, and 12,000 to 15,000 victims easily every day, with a maximum capacity of 22,000 deaths in 24 hours. According to Jankiel Wiernik: "When the new gas chambers were completed, the "Hauptsturmführer" [Stangl] came and remarked to the SS men who were with him: 'Finally the Jewish city is ready' ()".


title: Franz Stangl

text: In August 1943, along with Globočnik, Stangl was transferred to Trieste, where he helped organize the campaign against Yugoslav partisans and local Jews. Due to illness, he returned to Vienna in early 1945, where he served in the "Alpine Fortress" ("Alpenfestung").


title: Franz Stangl

text: At the end of the war, Stangl fled without concealing his name. He was detained by the United States Army in 1945 and was briefly imprisoned in Linz, Austria, in 1947, pending investigation. He was suspected of complicity in the T-4 euthanasia programme.


title: Franz Stangl

text: On 30 May 1948, he escaped to Italy with his colleague from Sobibor, SS sergeant Gustav Wagner. Austrian Roman Catholic Bishop Alois Hudal, a Nazi sympathizer, forced to resign by the Vatican in 1952, helped Stangl to escape through a "ratline", and he reached Syria using a Red Cross passport.


title: Franz Stangl

text: Stangl was joined by his wife and family, and lived in Syria for three years. In 1951, they moved to Brazil. After years in other jobs, he found work with the help of friends, at the Volkswagen do Brasil plant in São Bernardo do Campo, still using his own name.


title: Franz Stangl

text: Although Stangl's role in the mass murder of men, women and children was known to the Austrian authorities, a warrant for his arrest was not issued until 1961. Despite being registered under his real name at the Austrian consulate in São Paulo, it took another six years before he was tracked by Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal and arrested by Brazilian federal police on 28 February 1967. He never used an assumed name during his escape, and it is not clear why it took so long to apprehend him. After his extradition to West Germany by Brazilian authorities, he was tried for the deaths of around 1,000,000 people. He admitted to these killings but argued: "My conscience is clear. I was simply doing my duty..."


title: Franz Stangl

text: Stangl's attempt to justify his actions as non-criminal in the face of German law was quoted by Arad:


title: Franz Stangl

text: Philosopher John Kekes discussed Stangl and the degree of his responsibility for war crimes in chapter 4 of his book "The Roots of Evil". The Schwurgericht Düsseldorf court found Stangl guilty on 22 December 1970 and sentenced him to the maximum penalty, life imprisonment. While in prison, Stangl was interviewed extensively by Gitta Sereny for a study of him, published under the title "Into That Darkness".


title: Franz Stangl

text: Stangl had pronounced the words 'my guilt': but more than the words, the finality of it was in the sagging of his body, and on his face. After more than a minute he started again, a half-hearted attempt, in a dull voice. 'My guilt,' he said, 'is that I am still here. That is my guilt.'


title: Franz Stangl

text: He died of heart failure 19 hours after the conclusion of that interview in a Düsseldorf prison on 28 June 1971.


title: Koan

text: A (; , ; , ; ) is a story, dialogue, question, or statement which is used in Zen practice to provoke the "great doubt" and to practice or test a student's progress in Zen.


title: Koan

text: The Japanese term is the Sino-Japanese reading of the Chinese word (). The term is a compound word, consisting of the characters "public; official; governmental; common; collective; fair; equitable" and "table; desk; (law) case; record; file; plan; proposal."


title: Koan

text: According to the Yuan dynasty Zen master Zhongfeng Mingben ( 1263–1323), originated as an abbreviation of (, Japanese —literally the "official correspondence; documents; files" of a "government post"), which referred to a "public record" or the "case records of a public law court" in Tang dynasty China. / thus serves as a metaphor for principles of reality beyond the private opinion of one person, and a teacher may test the student's ability to recognize and understand that principle.


title: Koan

text: Commentaries in collections bear some similarity to judicial decisions that cite and sometimes modify precedents. An article by T. Griffith Foulk claims


title: Koan

text: developed during the Tang dynasty (618–907) from the recorded sayings collections of Chán masters, which quoted many stories of "a famous past Chán figure's encounter with disciples or other interlocutors and then offering his own comment on it". Those stories and the accompanying comments were used to educate students, and broaden their insight into the Buddhist teachings.


title: Koan

text: Those stories came to be known as , "public cases". Such a story was only considered a gongan when it was commented upon by another Chán master. This practice of commenting on the words and deeds of past masters confirmed the master's position as an awakened master in a lineage of awakened masters of the past.


title: Koan

text: practice developed from a literary practice, styling snippets of encounter-dialogue into well-edited stories. It arose in interaction with "educated literati". There were dangers involved in such a literary approach, such as ascribing specific meanings to the cases. Dahui Zonggao is even said to have burned the woodblocks of the "Blue Cliff Record", for the hindrance it had become to study of Chán by his students. literature was also influenced by the pre-Zen Chinese tradition of the "literary game"—a competition involving improvised poetry.


title: Koan

text: During the Song dynasty (960–1297) the use of took a decisive turn. Dahui Zonggao (1089–1163) introduced the use of , "observing the phrase". In this practice students were to observe () or concentrate on a single word or phrase (), such as the famous of the .


title: Koan

text: In the 11th century this practice had become common. A new literary genre developed from this tradition as well. Collections of such commented cases were compiled which consisted of the case itself, accompanied by verse or prose commentary.


title: Koan

text: Dahui's invention was aimed at balancing the insight developed by reflection on the teachings with developing samatha, calmness of mind. Ironically, this development became in effect "silent illumination", a "[re-absorbing] of -study into the "silence" of meditation ()". It led to a rejection of Buddhist learning:


title: Koan

text: This development left Chinese Chán vulnerable to criticisms by neo-Confucianism, which developed after the Sung Dynasty. Its anti-intellectual rhetoric was no match for the intellectual discourse of the neo-Confucianists.


title: Koan

text: The recorded encounter dialogues, and the collections which derived from this genre, mark a shift from solitary practice to interaction between master and student:


title: Koan

text: This mutual enquiry of the meaning of the encounters of masters and students of the past gave students a role model:


title: Koan

text: In China and Korea, "observing the phrase" is still the sole form of practice, though Seung Sahn used the Rinzai-style of practice in his Kwan Um School of Zen.


title: Koan

text: Japanese Zen, both Rinzai and Sōtō, took over the use of study and commenting. In Sōtō-Zen, commentary was not linked to seated meditation.


title: Koan

text: When the Chán tradition was introduced in Japan, Japanese monks had to master the Chinese language and specific expressions used in the training. The desired "spontaneity" expressed by enlightened masters required a thorough study of Chinese language and poetry. Japanese Zen imitated the Chinese "syntax and stereotyped norms".


title: Koan

text: In the officially recognized monasteries belonging to the (Five Mountain System) the Chinese system was fully continued. Senior monks were supposed to compose Chinese verse in a complex style of matched counterpoints known as . It took a lot of literary and intellectual skills for a monk to succeed in this system.


title: Koan

text: The Rinka monasteries, the provincial temples with less control of the state, laid less stress on the correct command of the Chinese cultural idiom. These monasteries developed "more accessible methods of instruction". It had three features:


title: Koan

text: By standardizing the curriculum every generation of students proceeded to the same series of s. Students had to memorize a set number of stereotyped sayings, , "appended words". The proper series of responses for each were taught by the master in private instruction sessions to selected individual students who would inherit the dharma lineage.


title: Koan

text: In the 18th century the Rinzai school became dominated by the legacy of Hakuin, who laid a strong emphasis on study as a means to gain and develop insight. There are two curricula used in Rinzai, both derived from the principal heirs of Rinzai: the Takuju curriculum, and the Inzan curriculum. According to AMA Samy, "the s and their standard answers are fixed."


title: Koan

text: During the late 18th and 19th century the tradition of commentary became suppressed in the Sōtō school, due to a reform movement that sought to standardise the procedures for dharma transmission. One reason for suppressing the tradition in the Sōtō school may have been to highlight the differences with the Rinzai school, and create a clear identity. This movement also started to venerate Dogen as the founding teacher of the Sōtō school. His teachings became the standard for the Sōtō teachings, neglecting the fact that Dogen himself made extensive use of commentary.


title: Koan

text: The popular western understanding sees "kōan" as referring to an unanswerable question or a meaningless or absurd statement. However, in Zen practice, a kōan is not meaningless, and not a riddle or a puzzle. Teachers do expect students to present an appropriate response when asked about a kōan.


title: Koan

text: Koans are also understood as pointers to an unmediated "Pure Consciousness", devoid of cognitive activity. Victor Hori criticizes this understanding:


title: Koan

text: Comparable statements are: "Look at the flower and the flower also looks"; "Guest and host interchange".


title: Koan

text: Study of kōan literature is common to all schools of Zen, though with varying emphases and curricula. The Rinzai-school uses extensive koan-curricula, checking questions, and "jakogo" ("capping phrases", quotations from Chinese poetry) in its use of koans. The Sanbo Kyodan, and its western derivates of Taizan Maezumi and the White Plum Asanga, also use koan-curricula, but have omitted the use of capping phrases. In Chinese Chán and Korean Seon, the emphasis is on Hua Tou, the study of one koan throughout one's lifetime. In Japanese Sōtō Zen, the use of koans has been abandoned since the late eighteenth and nineteenth century.


title: Koan

text: In the Rinzai-school, the Sanbo Kyodan, and the White Plum Asanga, koan practice starts with the assignment of a "hosshi" or "break-through koan", usually the mu-koan or "the sound of one hand clapping". In Chinese Chán and Korean Seon, various koan can be used for the hua-tou practice.


title: Koan

text: Students are instructed to concentrate on the "word-head", like the phrase "mu". In the Wumenguan (Mumonkan), public case No. 1 ("Zhaozhou's Dog"), Wumen (Mumon) wrote:


title: Koan

text: Arousing this great inquiry or "Great Doubt" is an essential element of kōan practice. It builds up "strong internal pressure ("gidan"), never stopping knocking from within at the door of [the] mind, demanding to be resolved". To illustrate the enormous concentration required in kōan meditation, Zen Master Wumen commented,


title: Koan

text: Analysing the koan for its literal meaning won't lead to insight, though understanding the context from which koans emerged can make them more intelligible. For example, when a monk asked Zhaozhou (Joshu) "does a dog have Buddha-nature or not?", the monk was referring to the understanding of the teachings on Buddha-nature, which were understood in the Chinese context of absolute and relative reality.


title: Koan

text: The continuous pondering of the break-through koan ("shokan") or Hua Tou, "word head", leads to kensho, an initial insight into "seeing the (Buddha-)nature.


title: Koan

text: But the use of the mu-koan has also been criticised. According to AMA Samy, the main aim is merely to "'become one' with the koan". Showing to have 'become one' with the first koan is enough to pass the first koan. According to Samy, this is not equal to prajna:


title: Koan

text: Teachers may probe students about their kōan practice using "sassho", "checking questions" to validate their satori (understanding) or kensho (seeing the nature). For the "mu-koan" and the "clapping hand-koan" there are twenty to a hundred checking questions, depending on the teaching lineage. The checking questions serve to deepen the insight or "kyōgai" of the student, but also to test his or her understanding.


title: Koan

text: Those checking questions, and their answers, are part of a standardised set of questions and answers. Students are learning a "ritual performance", learning how to behave and respond in specific ways, learning "clever repartees, ritualized language and gestures and be submissive to the master’s diktat and arbitration."


title: Koan

text: In the Rinzai-school, passing a koan and the checking questions has to be supplemented by "jakugo", "capping phrases", citations of Chinese poetry to demonstrate the insight. Students can use collections of those citations, instead of composing poetry themselves.


title: Koan

text: After the initial insight further practice is necessary, to deepen the insight and learn to express it in daily life. In Chinese Chán and Korean Seon, this further practice consists of further pondering of the same Hua Tou. In Rinzai-Zen, this further practice is undertaken by further koan-study, for which elaborate curricula exist. In Sōtō-Zen, Shikantaza is the main practice for deepening insight.


title: Koan

text: In Chinese Chán and Korean Seon, the primary form of Koan-study is "kanhua", "reflection on the koan", also called Hua Tou, "word head". In this practice, a fragment of the koan, such as ""mu"", or a "what is"-question is used by focusing on this fragment and repeating it over and over again:


title: Koan

text: The student is assigned only one hua-tou for a lifetime. In contrast to the similar-sounding "who am I?" question of Ramana Maharshi, hua-tou involves raising "great doubt":


title: Koan

text: This importance is reflected in writings in the Rinzai-school on the koan-genre. Zhongfeng Mingben (1263–1323), a Chinese Chán-master who lived at the beginning of the Yuan Dynasty, revitalized the Rinzai-tradition, and put a strong emphasis on the use of koans. He saw the kung-ans as "work of literature [that] should be used as objective, universal standards to test the insight of monks who aspired to be recognized as Ch'an masters":


title: Koan

text: Musō Soseki (1275–1351), a Japanese contemporary of Zhongfeng Mingben, relativized the use of koans. The study of koans had become popular in Japan, due to the influence of Chinese masters such as Zhongfeng Mingben. Despite belonging to the Rinzai-school, Musō Soseki also made extensive use of "richi" (teaching), explaining the sutras, instead of "kikan" (koan). According to Musō Soseki, both are "upaya", "skillful means" meant to educate students. Musō Soseki called both "shōkogyu", "little jewels", tools to help the student to attain satori.


title: Koan

text: In Rinzai a gradual succession of koans is studied. There are two general branches of curricula used within Rinzai, derived from the principal heirs of Rinzai: the Takuju curriculum, and the Inzan curriculum. However, there are a number of sub-branches of these, and additional variations of curriculum often exist between individual teaching lines which can reflect the recorded experiences of a particular lineage's members. Koan curricula are, in fact, subject to continued accretion and evolution over time, and thus are best considered living traditions of practice rather than set programs of study.


title: Koan

text: Koan practice starts with the "shokan", or "first barrier", usually the mu-koan or the koan "What is the sound of one hand clapping?" After having attained "kensho", students continue their practice investigating subsequent koans. In the Takuju-school, after breakthrough students work through the "Gateless Gate" (Mumonkan), the "Blue Cliff Record" (Hekigan-roku), the "Entangling Vines" (Shumon Kattoshu), and the "Collection of Wings of the Blackbird" (, "Chin'u shū"). The Inzan-school uses its own internally generated list of koans.


title: Koan

text: According to Akizuki there was an older classification-system, in which the fifth category was "Kojo", "Directed upwards". This category too was meant to rid the monk of any "stink of Zen". The very advanced practitioner may also receive the "Matsugo no rokan", "The last barrier, and "Saigo no ikketsu", "The final confirmation". "The last barrier" when one left the training hall, for example "Sum up all of the records of Rinzai in one word!" It is not meant to be solved immediately, but to be carried around in order to keep practising. "the final confirmation" may be another word for the same kind of koan.


title: Koan

text: Completing the koan-curriculum in the Rinzai-schools traditionally also led to a mastery of Chinese poetry and literary skills:


title: Koan

text: Hakuin Ekaku, the 17th century revitalizer of the Rinzai school, taught several practices which serve to correct physical and mental imbalances arising from, among other things, incorrect or excessive koan practice. The "soft-butter" method ("nanso no ho") and "introspection method" ("naikan no ho") involve cultivation of ki centered on the tanden (Chinese:dantian). These practices are described in Hakuin's works Orategama and Yasen Kanna, and are still taught in some Rinzai lineages today.


title: Koan

text: Though few Sōtō practitioners concentrate on kōans during meditation, the Sōtō sect has a strong historical connection with kōans, since many kōan collections were compiled by Sōtō priests.


title: Koan

text: During the 13th century, Dōgen, founder of the Sōtō sect in Japan, quoted 580 kōans in his teachings. He compiled some 300 kōans in the volumes known as the Greater Shōbōgenzō. Dōgen wrote of Genjokōan, which points out that everyday life experience is the fundamental kōan.


title: Koan

text: The Sanbo Kyodan school and the White Plum Asanga, which originated with the Sōtō-priest Hakuun Yasutani, incorporates koan-study. The Sanbo kyodan places great emphasis on kensho, initial insight into one's true nature, as a start of real practice. It follows the so-called Harada-Yasutani koan-curriculum, which is derived from Hakuin's student Takuju. It is a shortened koan-curriculum, in which the so-called "capping phrases" are removed. The curriculum takes considerably less time to study than the Takuju-curriculum of Rinzai.


title: Koan

text: To attain kensho, most students are assigned the mu-koan. After breaking through, the student first studies twenty-two "in-house" koans, which are "unpublished and not for the general public", but are nevertheless published and commented upon. There-after, the students goes through the "Gateless Gate" (Mumonkan), the "Blue Cliff Record", the "Book of Equanimity", and the "Record of Transmitting the Light". The koan-curriculum is completed by the Five ranks of Tozan and the precepts.


title: Koan

text: Kōans collectively form a substantial body of literature studied by Zen practitioners and scholars worldwide. Kōan collections commonly referenced in English include:


title: Koan

text: In these and subsequent collections, a terse "main case" of a kōan often accompanies prefatory remarks, poems, proverbs and other phrases, and further commentary about prior emendations.


title: Koan

text: The "Blue Cliff Record" (Chinese: Bìyán Lù; Japanese: Hekiganroku) is a collection of 100 kōans compiled in 1125 by Yuanwu Keqin ( 1063–1135).


title: Koan

text: The "Book of Equanimity" or "Book of Serenity" (Chinese: Cóngróng lù; Japanese: Shōyōroku) is a collection of 100 Kōans by Hongzhi Zhengjue (Chinese: ; Japanese: Wanshi Shōgaku) (1091–1157), compiled with commentaries by Wansong Xingxiu (1166–1246). The full title is "The Record of the Temple of Equanimity With the Classic Odes of Venerable Tiantong Jue and the Responsive Commentary of Old Man Wansong" (Wansong Laoren Pingchang Tiantong Jue Heshang Songgu Congrong An Lu) (Taisho Tripitaka Vol. 48, No. 2004)


title: Koan

text: "The Gateless Gate" (Chinese: Wumenguan; Japanese: Mumonkan) is a collection of 48 kōans and commentaries published in 1228 by Chinese monk Wumen () (1183–1260). The title may be more accurately rendered as "Gateless Barrier" or "Gateless Checkpoint").


title: Koan

text: Five kōans in the collection derive from the sayings and doings of Zhaozhou Congshen, (transliterated as Chao-chou in Wade-Giles and pronounced Jōshū in Japanese).


title: Koan

text: Dahui Zonggao (大慧宗杲) (1089–1163) the "Zhengfayan zang" (正法眼藏), "Treasury of the true dharma eye" (W-G.: Cheng-fa yen-tsang, (J.: Shōbōgenzō) a collection of koans and dialogues compiled between 1147 and 1150 by Dahui Zonggao . Dahui's 'Treasury' is composed of three scrolls prefaced by three short introductory pieces. The Zongmen liandeng huiyao 宗門聯燈會要 was compiled in 1183 by Huiweng Wuming 晦翁悟明 (n.d.), three generations after Dahui in the same line; the sermon is found in zh 20 (x 79: 173a).


title: Koan

text: Huìnéng asked Hui Ming, "Without thinking of good or evil, show me your original face before your mother and father were born." (This is a fragment of case No. 23 of the "Wumenguan".)


title: Koan

text: Gentō Sokuchū, the 18th century abbot of Dogen's Eihei-ji, aggressively sought to reform Sōtō from all things 'foreign' and associated with Rinzai, including kōans. The unorthodox Zen monk Ikkyū contemplated kōans for years while creating dolls for a merchant in Kyoto, specifically penetrating the case no. 15 from "The Gateless Gate" and thereafter earning his dharma name "Ikkyū".


title: Koan

text: Facing criticism by Buddhists such as Philip Kapleau and D. T. Suzuki for misunderstanding Zen, Alan Watts claimed that a kōan supported his lack of zazen practice. On the topic, Suzuki claimed: "I regret to say that Mr. Watts did not understand that story."


title: Koan

text: Douglas Hofstadter's 1979 book "" discusses Zen kōans in relation to paradoxical questions and perceiving reality outside of one's experience. Inspired by Zen teachings (including kōans), Frank Herbert wrote on the subject of the paradoxical elements of his "Dune" series:


title: Koan

text: The 1989 South Korean film "Why Has Bodhi-Dharma Left for the East?" bases much of its narrative on kōans, with its title deriving from a particular kōan about the founder of Zen, Bodhidharma.


title: Koan

text: After becoming smitten with Zen (even offering to turn his own house into a zendo), filmmaker Alejandro Jodorowsky meditated and studied koans with the traveling monk Ejo Takata (1928-1997). After the release of "The Holy Mountain", Jodorowsky gave a talk at the University of Mexico on the subject of kōans. After this talk, Takata gifted Jodorowsky his keisaku, believing that the filmmaker had mastered the ability to understand kōans.


title: Koan

text: In the 1958 novel "The Dharma Bums", Jack Kerouac paraphrases the Yunmen "shit-stick" kōan as: "The Buddha is a dried piece of turd." The second volume of the manga "Lone Wolf and Cub" by Kazuo Koike and Goseki Kojima is titled 'The Gateless Barrier' and revolves around a Linji kōan (""If you meet a Buddha, kill him."") as the protagonist is tasked to kill a troublesome “living Buddha”.


title: Koan

text: In hacker culture, funny short stories concerning computer science developed, named hacker koans. The book Jargon File contains many kōans, including the "AI Koans". "The Codeless Code" is another book about software engineers at big businesses instead of unix hackers, deriving its title from the "Gateless Gate".


title: Koan

text: The song False Prophet by Bob Dylan includes the line: "I climbed a mountain of swords on my bare feet", a reference to a Gateless Gate kōan ("You must climb a mountain of swords with bare feet"). British musical artist Brian Eno collaborated with Intermorphic on developing a generative music software system named "Koan". In 2009, American composer and multi-instrumentalist Tyshawn Sorey released his second album, "Koan".


title: Koan

text: The 1997 novel "The Sound of One Hand Clapping" by Richard Flanagan (and its 1998 film adaptation of the same name) derives its title from a kōan by Hakuin Ekaku. The episode of the 2014 first season of "Fargo" entitled "Eating the Blame" derives its episode title from a koan of the same name from the "Shasekishū". Cyriaque Lamar of io9 stated that the approach to technology in "" was reminiscent of kōans.


title: Woodblock printing

text: Woodblock printing or block printing is a technique for printing text, images or patterns used widely throughout East Asia and originating in China in antiquity as a method of printing on textiles and later paper. Each page or image is created by carving a wooden block to leave only some areas and lines at the original level; it is these that are inked and show in the print, in a relief printing process. Carving the blocks is skilled and laborious work, but a large number of impressions can then be printed.


title: Woodblock printing

text: As a method of printing on cloth, the earliest surviving examples from China date to before 220 AD. Woodblock printing existed in Tang China by the 7th century AD and remained the most common East Asian method of printing books and other texts, as well as images, until the 19th century. "Ukiyo-e" is the best-known type of Japanese woodblock art print. Most European uses of the technique for printing images on paper are covered by the art term woodcut, except for the block books produced mainly in the 15th century.


title: Woodblock printing

text: According to the Book of the Southern Qi, in the 480s, a man named Gong Xuanyi (龔玄宜) styled himself Gong the Sage and "said that a supernatural being had given him a 'jade seal jade block writing,' which did not require a brush: one blew on the paper and characters formed." He then used his powers to mystify a local governor. Eventually he was dealt with by the governor's successor, who presumably executed Gong. Timothy Hugh Barrett postulates that Gong's magical jade block was actually a printing device, and Gong was one of the first, if not the first printer. The semi-mythical record of him therefore describes his usage of the printing process to deliberately bewilder onlookers and create an image of mysticism around himself. However woodblock print flower patterns applied to silk in three colours have been found dated from the Han dynasty (before AD 220).


title: Woodblock printing

text: The rise of printing was greatly influenced by Mahayana Buddhism. According to Mahayana beliefs, religious texts hold intrinsic value for carrying the Buddha's word and act as talismanic objects containing sacred power capable of warding off evil spirits. By copying and preserving these texts, Buddhists could accrue personal merit. As a consequence the idea of printing and its advantages in replicating texts quickly became apparent to Buddhists, who by the 7th century, were using woodblocks to create apotropaic documents. These Buddhist texts were printed specifically as ritual items and were not widely circulated or meant for public consumption. Instead they were buried in consecrated ground. The earliest extant example of this type of printed matter is a fragment of a dhāraṇī (Buddhist spell) miniature scroll written in Sanskrit unearthed in a tomb in Xi'an. It is called the "Great spell of unsullied pure light" ("Wugou jingguang da tuoluoni jing" 無垢淨光大陀羅尼經) and was printed using woodblock during the Tang dynasty, c. 650–670 AD. A similar piece, the "Saddharma pundarika" sutra, was also discovered and dated to 690 to 699.


title: Woodblock printing

text: This coincides with the reign of Wu Zetian, under which the Longer Sukhāvatīvyūha Sūtra, which advocates the practice of printing apotropaic and merit making texts and images, was translated by Chinese monks. The oldest extant evidence of woodblock prints created for the purpose of reading are portions of the Lotus Sutra discovered at Turpan in 1906. They have been dated to the reign of Wu Zetian using character form recognition. The oldest text containing a specific date of printing was discovered in the Mogao Caves of Dunhuang in 1907 by Aurel Stein. This copy of the Diamond Sutra is 14 feet long and contains a colophon at the inner end, which reads: "Reverently [caused to be] made for universal free distribution by Wang Jie on behalf of his two parents on the 13th of the 4th moon of the 9th year of Xiantong [i.e. 11 May, AD 868 ]". It is considered the world's oldest securely dated woodblock scroll. The Diamond sutra was closely followed by the earliest extant printed almanac, the "Qianfu sinian lishu" (乾符四年曆書), dated to 877.