During the Tang and Song Dynasties, Tiantai Sect formed a unique Buddhist poetry writing tradition that differs from Zen. Their tradition manifests three characteristics. First, Tiantai Sect advocates the literati’s way of life, and their poetry is full of secular contents, unlike Zen poetry. Secondly, Tiantai Sect prefers the five-character octave with emphasis on the two verse lines in the middle, while Zen monks prefer confessions and quatrains to express the sentiments of Zen. Thirdly,Tiantai Sect expresses its emotions in an extremely restricted way, often grey and cold, while the Buddhist hymn of Zen is becoming more prominent and warm. The tradition of the poetry creation of the Tiantai Sect has long been obscured, because on the one hand, a certain period of history after Zhiyi of Tiantai Sect was misunderstood, which led to the negligence of the Tiantai Sect background of many poets during this period. On the other hand, the rise of Zen influences people’s attention to Tiantai Sect, which made the academia misunderstand the "Zen" in the poems. From the perspective of Buddhist sects, the study on the poetry creation tradition of Tiantai Sect can not only reveal and avoid the deficiencies in the study of Buddhist literature, but also restore the original facet of poetry creation of Tiantai Sect in the history of literature.
