Jōza (上座)

Becoming a Sōtō-Zen priest starts with shukke tokudo (出家得度).^{[web 3]} In this ceremony, the novice receives his outfit ("inner and outer robes, belts, o-kesa, rakusu, kechimyaku (transmission chart) and eating bowls"^{[web 3]}) and takes the precepts. One is then an Unsui, a training monk. This gives the rank of jōza, except for children under ten years old, who are called sami.^{[web 3]}

Zagen (座元)

The next step, after one has been a monk for at least three years, is risshin (立身) and hossen-shiki (Dharma combat ceremony), while acting as a shuso (首座), headmonk, during a retreat. Risshin is "To raise one's body into a standing position":

It means to gain physical stability. Confidence in oneself and one's role as a monk. The ability to express oneself and share a wider perspective, not restricted to one's own needs only. He starts to function like a pillar that supports the sangha.^{[web 3]}

Hossenshiki is a ceremony in which questions and answers are exchanged. After this ceremony, one is promoted to the rank of zagen.^{[web 3]}

Oshō

Dai-oshō (大和尚)

After having become oshō one may become a dai-oshō, resident priest in a Zen-temple. It takes further training in a sōdō-ango, an officially recognized Sōtō-shū training centre.^{[web 6]}

A prerequisite to become dai-oshō is to do ango, "to stay in peace" or "safe shelter".^{[web 6]} It is derived from ancient Indian Buddhism, when monks retreated into shelter during the rain-season. Ango is a period of 90 or 100 days of intensive practice. There is no fixed stage on the training-path when ango has to be done, but ordination as a monk is necessary, and it has to be done in a sōdō-ango.^{[web 6]} The aspirant dai-oshō has to spend at least six months there, but one or two years is the usual span of time.^{[web 6]} Ango is necessary because it "grinds" the future dai-oshō:

The point of ango is: Sessa-takuma. I used this term a number of times in the past. It consists of four Chinese characters: 切磋琢磨 The first means to cut (a bone or elephant tusk), the second to rub, the third to crush (a stone or gem), the fourth to polish. As a whole, it describes how various hard materials grind each others and during this process are all refined [...] Ango is important exactly because it can be a pain in the ass to live with others who go on our nerves, occupy our space and demand our time, have different habits and different vies, different outlooks on life etc. They often show us a mirror because life in the monastery forces them to do so, when people in the world would just step out off our way.^{[web 6]}

Ango (安居) helps to become a mature person:

[T]hat is the real meaning of ango. Sharing all of your time and space and energy. Does it help to balance your nerves? In my case: Not always so. But it certainly helps to mature, and in my view, practice has something to do with being an adult.^{[web 6]}

After ango one can start to work in a temple. The newly acquired status is confirmed in the kyōshi-honin ceremony. There-after follows the first practice-period in one's own temple, with the aid of a susho (head monk). This is followed by the Jūshoku-himei ceremony, which confirms one's status as dai-oshō.^{[web 6]}

Shike (師家)

To supervise the training of monks, further qualification is necessary:

The relatively low status of dharma transmission means that in and of itself it does not qualify one to accept students or to train disciples. According to the regulations, Zen students should be supervised only by a teacher who has attained supervisory certification (i.e. sanzen dōjō shike status), that is, someone who in the popular literature might be called a Zen master. To attain supervisory certification requires not just high ecclesiastical grades and dharma seniority but also at least three years' experience as an assistant supervisor at a specially designated training hall (tokubetsu sōdō), during which time one undergoes an apprenticeship.^[4]

There are two grades for training supervisor, namely shike and jun shike.^[4] Appointment as shike is done by cooptation:

There are about 50 or so of these in Soto (the Rinzai roshis can also be addressed as "shike"). One big difference between the rinzai roshi and the Soto shike is that the shike transmission [...] is not vertical at all. That means that even if your teacher is a shike, he can not appoint you as a shike. So who does appoint a shike? In fact, there is a kind of committee, called the "shike-kai", consisting of all Japanese Soto shike. The shike-kai can appoint anyone as a shike whom they consider their equal, i.e. who has done genuine training and study, cultivated himself and reached whatever understanding that might be considered enlightened enough to match the enlightenment of the other shike. So shike appointment can be called horizontal in a way.^{[web 7]}

Kaikyōshi

A special title, Kaikyōshi（開教使）, was created for foreign practitioners, which is not being used anymore, but replaced by the title Kokusai Fukyōshi.^{[web 8][lower-alpha 2][lower-alpha 3]}

Shami

Ordination, called tokudo-shiki,^[12] usually takes place at a young age, between 6 and 20. Most of the ordained are temple sons, and often no special value is given to the ceremony.^[13] The time since ordination is the hōrō seniority, which is one of the factors in obtaining Tokyū-grades.^[10]

Lay-ordination into the Rinzai-school takes place through the jukai.

Jūshoku

The suiji-shiki ceremony is performed when one has finished the formal training period and is ready to start as assistant-priest, "often one's father temple".^[14] hereby one gains the rank of oshō, priest.

In the Rinzai-school, a difference is made between acknowledgement of insight and succession in the organisation:

From the Rinzai perspective, true realization (jisshō) and succession to a master (shijō) are two different stages in the course of practice，the latter implying a comprehensive integration of awakening in the activities of everyday life.^[15]

The most common form of transmission in Rinzai Zen is the acknowledgement that one has stayed in the monastery for a certain amount of time, and may later become a temple priest.

After finishing the koan-study, further practice is necessary:

[I]t would take 10 years to solve all the kōans [...] in the sōdō. After the student has solved all koans, he can leave the sôdô and live on his own, but he is still not considered a roshi. For this he has to complete another ten years of training, called "go-go-no-shugyō" in Japanese. Literally, this means "practice after satori/enlightenment", but Fukushima preferred the translation "special practice". Fukushima would explain that the student builds up a "religious personality" during this decade. I would say it is a kind of period that functions to test if the student is actually able to live in regular society and apply his koan understanding to daily life, after he has lived in an environment that can be quite surreal and detached from the lives of the rest of humanity. Usually, the student lives in small parish temple during this decade, not in a formal training monastery.^{[web 7]}

Shike

Three of the highest ranks are shike ("Zen master"^[16] (of the training hall^[17])), rekijō^[18] and tokujūshoku (kancō, abbot).^[19]

According to roshi Sokun Tsushimoto, the title of shike is equivalent to Zen master and roshi:^{[web 10]}

'Roshi' is the title compatible with the most formal title 'Shike' who got officially authorized as a Dharma successor by authentic master.^{[web 10][lower-alpha 4]}

The shike has received inka-shōmei or dharma transmission. Inka-shōmei is used for the transmission of the "true lineage" of the masters (shike) of the training halls.^[17] There are only about fifty^{[web 7]} to eighty^{[web 12]} of such inka-shōmei bearers in Japan:

In Rinzai Zen, it is relatively easy to say who is a rōshi and who is not. Anyone who is authorized by another roshi (i.e. his teacher) is a rōshi. This authorization (officially the "inka-shōmei" document) is documented on a piece of paper, that is why it is also called colloquially "ichi-mai", that is "one sheet (of paper)". The transmission is totally vertical from teacher to student, no peer control is involved. That means that the Rinzai sect has no means to control who is made a rōshi and who is not. In spite of that, the number of Rinzai rōshi is relatively low, maybe around 50 or so.^{[web 7][lower-alpha 5]}

Inka is usually attested by a written document:

[T]he full recognition conferred by a master upon a disciple whom he intends to make his successor [...] sometimes takes the form of written certification (inka)，but there have been cases of true acknowledgement in which no document has been bestowed.^[15]

According to roshi Sokun Tsushimoto,

Authorization as a Roshi should be done in the most formal and explicit way. In Rinzai tradition a master gives a calligraphy of Inka-certificate to disciple as a proof of authorization. Needless to say authorization must be backed up by the fact that the disciple spent many years in zen training under the master earnestly and continuously.^{[web 10]}

But according to Mohr,

In the Rinzai school the issue of Dharma transmission is essentially subjective, that is，left to the discretion of the master，and the ambiguity of terms such as “successor in the Dharma” (hassu 法B司) has persisted down to the present. According to the context or the circumstances, it can signify either spiritual recognition or inheritance of a temple lineaee.^[21]

The shike is not married. He...

[H]as the prestige and generally owns the respect of being a true Zen master, a living symbol of the Zen monastic tradition, the quintessence of Zen virtues ideally incarnating wisdom, spirituality, strict discipline, individuality, and yet gentle social personality.^[22]

The shike is also the head of the sect (subschool of the Rinzai-school, with its own head temple). He appoints and dismisses the priests, and appoints the titles in the ranking system.^[23] Yet, "the position as abbot [at Myōshinji] is based on election, each elected period lasting four years".^[24]