Which Buddhist rituals did rural Zen monks help popularize in Japan?

In rural Japan, Zen monks and nuns played a significant role in making various Buddhist rituals accessible to the broader population, including lower-status merchants, warriors, and peasants. These monks helped popularize several practices that are now common throughout Japan, including:

• Prayer rites for worldly benefits1
• Conferment of precept lineages on lay people1
• Funerals and ancestral memorial rites1
• Exorcisms1

While urban Zen monasteries—particularly those within the elite Five Mountain system—focused heavily on the importation of Chinese arts, literature, and government administration, rural Zen institutions prioritized religious services and worship ceremonies. These rural lineages eventually gained such prominence that they came to dominate all Zen institutions in Japan following the political upheavals of the 15th and 16th centuries.1