Daruma-shū. An early Japanese zen school founded by Dainichibō Nōnin (d. c.1194). This school received severe criticism from the nascent Rinzai and Sōtō traditions, who found it antinomian and lacking in serious practice. However, recent research into texts emanating from the school itself reveal a different picture. The school saw itself as direct Dharma-descendant of the first Chinese Ch'an patriarch Bodhidharma (Daruma is the Japanese rendering of his name), whom it honoured with esoteric ceremonies. It also based its teachings on three treatises attributed to Bodhidharma, as well as the Mahāyāna scripture the Śūraṇgama-samādhi Sūtra, giving the school its cognomen ‘the school of one scripture and three treatises’. It taught the equality of all beings with Buddhas, universal emptiness (śūnyatā), and also the magical efficacy of esoteric formulae and rituals in bringing about good fortune. The school flourished briefly, but was overly dependent on Nōnin's personal charisma. Upon his death, members migrated to other Zen schools, primarily the Sōtō-shū.

A Dictionary of Buddhism, Oxford University Press, 2003, 2004 (which is available in electronic version from answer.com)