Free Practice Question
RC · Reading Comprehension
705-805
Short Passage - Social Science
Reading Passage
The origins of tea as a beverage can be traced back more than 5,000 years. Chinese mythology first addresses the drink in 3000 BC, when the emperor Nin Song was said to have discovered it. Nin Song was something of a visionary. Among other innovations, he believed that water should be boiled before drinking as a health precaution. As the story goes, he was traveling with some members of the court when they stopped to rest. Some leaves from a bush fell into the water being boiled for the weary travelers, and thus was tea born. In AD 800, a man named Lu Yu wrote the first known book on tea cultivation and preparation. The work, called the Ch’a Ching, melded Zen Buddhist teachings with the art and craft of tea, forever linking the drink to spirituality.
In AD 1191, the cultivation and brewing of the leaves spread to Japan when a monk named Yeisei returned from pilgrimage, bringing seeds back with him. Yeisei had observed tea being used in and enhancing meditation and spiritual awareness in China. He shared this discovery with his peers and the tradition quickly caught on—all the way to the highest levels of society, including the imperial court. Tea was so well-received in Japan that it was elevated to an art form, culminating in the creation of the well-known Japanese Tea Ceremony. The ceremony evolved and grew both more intricate and more exclusive, with students of the art receiving years of practice and training before they were allowed to perform it.
The once-lowly leaf had been raised to the pinnacle of spiritual and social grace. In the words of Lafcadio Hearn, an historian and writer of Irish origin who emigrated to Japan in the late 19th Century, “The Tea ceremony requires years of training and practice to graduate in art … yet the whole of this art, as to its detail, signifies no more than the making and serving of a cup of tea. The supremely important matter is that the act be performed in the most perfect, most polite, most graceful, most charming manner possible.”
In AD 1191, the cultivation and brewing of the leaves spread to Japan when a monk named Yeisei returned from pilgrimage, bringing seeds back with him. Yeisei had observed tea being used in and enhancing meditation and spiritual awareness in China. He shared this discovery with his peers and the tradition quickly caught on—all the way to the highest levels of society, including the imperial court. Tea was so well-received in Japan that it was elevated to an art form, culminating in the creation of the well-known Japanese Tea Ceremony. The ceremony evolved and grew both more intricate and more exclusive, with students of the art receiving years of practice and training before they were allowed to perform it.
The once-lowly leaf had been raised to the pinnacle of spiritual and social grace. In the words of Lafcadio Hearn, an historian and writer of Irish origin who emigrated to Japan in the late 19th Century, “The Tea ceremony requires years of training and practice to graduate in art … yet the whole of this art, as to its detail, signifies no more than the making and serving of a cup of tea. The supremely important matter is that the act be performed in the most perfect, most polite, most graceful, most charming manner possible.”
Based on the passage, Lafcadio Hearn would have agreed with which of the following statements about Japanese Tea Ceremony?
Answer Choices
Correct answer marked belowA
It is needlessly complex and intricate.
B
It is important that students of the art spend many years mastering it.
C
It is the pinnacle of Japanese taste and culture.
It is both a simple act and one that is rich with cultural significance.
Correct
E
It is an inextricable part of Japanese history and spirituality.
See the full step-by-step explanation
You can see the correct answer above. Sign in for free to unlock the complete worked solution.
Track your performance and improve
Get detailed analytics, unlock full explanations, and move up difficulty tiers as you practice.
Explanation
Unlock the full explanation
Create a free account to reveal the correct answer, see the step-by-step explanation, and start tracking your GMAT progress.
Comments
Sign in to join the discussion
No comments yet
Be the first to share your thoughts and help others understand it better.
Sign in to commentWhat this question tests
What it tests
Your ability to understand a passage, its structure, and what the author is really saying. At the 705-805 level, accuracy and speed both matter.
Common trap
Answering from memory or outside knowledge instead of strictly from the passage.
Details
Difficulty
705-805
Type
RC
Category