茶道 vs. 茶の湯

[Puerlife]

I've been reading some tea books and when it comes to Japan, the books usually use the term 茶の湯 (chanoyu) but when I lived in Japan I more often heard the term 茶道 (sadou). Are the terms interchangeable? Does sadou also refer to the Japanese zen practice of tea ceremony with all its rigidity or is it closer to the Chinese 茶艺 (tea art)?

Edit: And another word, chado. : -- )

[chamekke]

I'll take a stab at this, but I also welcome correction of any errors!

Short answer: they are essentially interchangeable.

Longer answer: 茶道 means the "way (dou) of tea", and some tea practitioners feel it better represents what "tea ceremony" is about because it is actually a complete path or dou that can be studied for the purpose of gaining realization. (I think the humility of the term "chanoyu" captures the same thing in a different way, however. Also, Rikyuu is quoted as having used that term so its history is equally venerable.)

茶道 can be correctly pronounced as either chadou or sadou. In my experience most Japanese practitioners favour sadou but most books written for Westerners render the kanji as chadou, possibly because to the casual Western ear sadou sounds too much like "sado-", possibly because "cha" is popularly recognized as the Japanese word for tea, but "sa", not so much.

Anyway the nice thing about using "chanoyu" is that everyone pronounces the first syllable as cha and there is no ambiguity about the transliteration or pronunciation whatsoever.

[Puerlife]

You've given me a much better understanding for all three terms, Chamekke. Thank you very much.

[Drax]

For what it's worth, the Japanese Wikipedia's main page is on 茶道. Typing in 茶の湯 redirects to 茶道. I'd have to give it a better read later, but there's lot of other early variations mentioned (茶湯, chatou; also 茶の道, which I assume is cha no michi).

[Puerlife]

Interesting, thank you, Drax.