Hi rianbowgardener
Thank you for posting. I am not good writer and often short of what I like to explain. Please forgive misspeling ,wrong English grammer.
fierst of all ,Buddism sutra Zen sects use don't mention anything garden.
Soto sect, Rinzai sect, Ohbaku sect , and Tendai sect Those four sects are Japanese Zen school.
I woud like you know that all buddsim, no matter of sect/school, or counrty, all Buddism practice zen. Poreland buddism call"kanso" Shingon sect call "Ajikan" Tendai sect call " showshikan"
I belong to "Mususa" Korean zen sect of JoGa order, root of JoGa order is same as Japanese zen sects , It go back to 7 centuly of China.
Other hand, Purland sutras Japanese purelnad school use three main sutra fo purland school. Chinese pureland school use three main sutras and two other sutras which are portion of Hokke kyo and Kegon kyo.
("kyo" means sutra in Japanese)
By the way, Korean Zen school has nothing to do with garden
JoGa order is largist sect of Korean Buddism , Korean buddhism has about 20 sects , 35 % of korean Buddists belong to JoGa order, far more than any other Buddism scet of Korea.
The way Joga monks see garden is much different, master said, nature is garden, Temple don't need to garden like Japanese have.
Zen practice came to Japan early 600's, by Doshow who went to China to study Buddism. At the time zen was just another part of study of other schools teach.
Text book of Japanese garden, Japanese garden histroians, Old Japanese gardeing book such as Sakuteiki which is written around AD 1,000
indicate that Eisai who brought Rinzai school of teach, and Dogen who brought Soto school's of teach , both of then have nothing to garden.
Only pureland school's sutras relate to garden.
Kamakura piriod and after "Doboshu" who were low cast of socciety become monk, they become artist/painter. performance artist such as
Noh ,serving tea, or general sever in high society, some become gardener.
Do you know that Sen no Rikyu's grandfather was dobo shu. Senno Rikyu associated with Zen monks. His name of "Rikyu koji " Rikyu is his dharum name and " koji ' means that he took precept of Buddism. Similar to Baptize. I have my Dharuma name as "Suigetsu Koji" means water and moon.
Japanese garden has great infulence of "Kanmuryo jukyo" and Amida kyo.
other hand, Zen's sutras have no connection to Garden.
Zen and Pureland Buddhism coexsited well from beginging of both schools.
Some of teach conflict between Zen School and Pureland school. they look this way < they are (sutras) all good as others>
If you don't read sutras, it may be hard to understand
Beging of my Buddhism study I had handfull of question and couldn't find any answer from Books
After practing Zen and studying Pureland Buddhism, 7years or so,Now I am beging to understad what is Zen.
In Japan we have about 13 schools of Buddhism, all practice Zen, not only so called Zen sect.
Word of Zen is now well known to west, Because eraly 1900's Japanese Buddhist, Buddhist scholor spread Buddhism. Chinese call "Chan" korean call" son " teaching all same. study text are very simlor.
Purland monks also study Zen text too.
Some of well known Zen garden was designed by Doboshu who are pureland buddist, Daitokuji,daisenin Some of pureland temples are designed by Zen monk or Shingo sect,Tendai sect monk.
Byotoin, Kinkakuji, Ginkakuji were build by based on Pureland Buddhism sutras. back then, boundry of between sects weren't high as today.
mike yamakami