interjection
consider the following; can you answer this?
Used in Zen dialogues when posing a question to a student, akin to 'What about this?' or 'How do you respond?'. Highly domain-specific to Buddhism.
老師は「作麼生」と問いかけた。
The master asked, 'What about this?'
禅の問答で「そもさん」と切り出す。
In a Zen dialogue, one begins with 'Somosan'.
From Chinese 作麼生 (zuòmáshēng), a classical Zen term meaning 'what is it?' or 'how is it?'. The reading そもさん is a Japanese approximation of the Chinese pronunciation.