The Concise Oxford Dictionary of World Religions (1004 page)

see
WIRD
.

 
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(Arab.,
izb Allah
, ‘party of God’). Quranic term for Muslims as opposed to idolators, in the early struggle for Islam (5. 62, 58. 23). The term has been repeatedly adopted by movements within Islam (e.g. by Indonesian rebels in 1945), as, recently, by a radical group in the Lebanon, which retained links with Iran.

 
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Ho
.

The ear-splitting shout of a Ch’an master, designed not only to startle into sudden enlightenment (
tongo
) but also to mark the line of transmission from teacher to pupil. The Japanese pronunciation of the Chinese character is
katsu
, and in Zen it is used in ways comparable to the
kyosaku
, the ‘wake-up stick’. It is also a manifestation of transmission without concepts, words, or symbols. It was introduced by
Ma-tsu
, but established in teaching by
Huang-po Hsi-yün
.

 
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(Chin., ‘crane’). Taoist symbol of immortality and wisdom.

 
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Ho
.

Jap., for
dharma
.

 
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Hoa Hao
.

A simplified neo-Buddhist religion in the Mekong Delta of Vietnam with
c.
1 ½ million followers. It arose in Hoa Hao village in 1939 when an infirm
Roman Catholic
peasant, Huyan Phu So (1919–47), had a convulsive religious healing experience. He began vigorous teaching of the new faith in which he claimed to be the reincarnation of earlier religious leaders and uttered prophecies that were later fulfilled. As a militant and nationalist religion, it set up its own virtually autonomous government in the Delta and joined the independence struggle, but opposed the Viet Minh which captured and executed the founder in 1947.

 
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