Is there such a thing as philosophical zen and religious zen as in Taoism

Yes there is, let me explain

Many people try to decern the philosophical Zen by pulling apart the quotes from selected Zen Masters and examining them. In this effort, they hope to distill a ‘Zen philosophy’ that is apart from the religion of Zen.

Religion is a divine mandate, a flow of authority in which one is obedient to the divine mandate to receive the divine blessings. You see this in Zen with the fictional ‘Transmission of the Lamp’ in which it is claimed that the ‘Buddha-mind’ is transmitted from master to disciple going all the way back to Sidhartha Gautama himself. Zen uses this myth as a Divine Mandate and expects the disciples to be obedient to the lineage ‘traditions’ and to the teachers of the lineage.