Abstract
Filip Gurjanov's contribution analyses the Zen Buddhist textual form of the koan with respect to the complexity of its form and the way these forms change. Alongside offering a brief historical account, Gurjanov discusses two possibilities to ground the changeability of the koan form.
Firstly, he present the linguistic-cultural context (Elberfeld) and secondly, the rhetorical-sociological (Foulk).. The article closes with offering a "third way", with which it is attempted to approach the unique paradoxes of the Koan form from a specifically philosophical point of view.
To this end, Tohishiko Izutsu's and Hans Rainer Sepp's theories are brought in a dialogue.