Show and Tell 2: Six Schools, Shingon and Tendai, and Pure Land Buddhism

During the Nara and Heian periods, Japanese Buddhist thinkers engaged in a series of attempts to interpret or reinterpret Buddhist teachings to fit their contemporary circumstances and needs. The three primary attempts were the Six Schools of the Nara court, the Tendai and Shingon movements of the early Heian, and the Amida Buddha-dependent Pure Land sect in the late Heian.

When Buddhism first arrived in Japan, it did so as a belief system for the nobility, where a great deal of importance was placed on the finer points of the religion. As originally spread by Prince Shotoku, Buddhism was not intended as a religion for the masses, but only for the elites.¹ Moreover, early Japanese Buddhism did not attempt to really add its own influence to the religion, but instead preferred to borrow wholesale from the Indians, Chinese, and Koreans from whom they had imported it.² Indeed, once the Nara court got around to forming their own six schools of Buddhist thought, the emphasis was still on understanding various aspects of Buddhism that the Indians and Chinese had focused on rather than adding native Japanese interpretations. These six schools were the Jojitsu, Sanron, Hosso, Kusha, Kegon, and Ritsu.³ Each school focused on a particular Buddhist scripture, working to expand the understanding of that writing. Despite the fact that they were still heavily reliant on the Chinese influences for their conclusions, the six schools were nonetheless the first example of truly Japanese scholarly work on trying to understand the Buddhist teachings.⁴

The next wave of Buddhist thought also had its origins in China, but in a less dependent way. The originators of the “new Buddhism” of the Heian period were two monks, Kukai and Saicho, who both had been sent to China in order to learn more advanced Buddhist teachings and practices.⁵ Upon their return, both men began new movements in Japan, with Kukai beginning the Shingon sect and Saicho founding the Tendai sect.⁶ Both innovators saw their role as improving the traditional, six schools based tradition. Interestingly, Byron Earhart describes both men as being “committed to the ideal of establishing a genuinely Japanese Buddhism.”⁷ The result was that both men found new areas of Buddhism in Japan to innovate. For Kukai, the area of most interest was ritual.⁸ His Shingon approach emphasized the use of ritual in order to attain enlightenment. Meanwhile, Saicho focused on the Lotus Sutra as the ultimate basis for his teachings. To Saicho and his Tendai sect, the Lotus Sutra was the “prefect” teaching; it promised that every being would eventually achieve Buddhahood.⁹

As the Heian period wore on, new Buddhist ideas began to take hold in Japan. One of the most influential of them was the concept of Mappo. In Mappo, as time continued, the world gets further and further away from the light of the Buddha. As the world gets more distant from the light, it becomes increasingly harder to actually achieve enlightenment.¹⁰ In absence of the chance for direct enlightenment, Buddhist thinkers turned to another, more indirect way to achieve nirvana. To do so, they looked to the vows taken by Amida Buddha before achieving Buddhahood. According to these vows, Amida Buddha will help any living being who sincerely calls upon him to reach enlightenment.¹¹

The way that Amida Buddha helps those who call on him to reach enlightenment is through his pure land. In Buddhist theology, many different realms exist, with this world being just one of them. One such realm is Amida Buddha’s: the Pure Land. In this Pure Land, a being could enjoy a perfect existence, meaning that they would be away from any and all temptation, able to finally achieve nirvana.¹²

Perhaps the best part of this Pure Land was that the only requirement for getting into it was to call on Amida Buddha by name. This was done by saying the ritual words “namu Amida butsu”, which can loosely be interpreted as “homage to Amida Buddha.”¹³ This saying is known as the nembutsu, and forms the basis of Pure Land worship. In one of the more radical forms, developed by the monk Honen, the recitation of the nembutsu is the only practice necessary for rebirth in the Pure Land and the accompanying enlightenment.¹⁴ In Honen’s version of Pure Land Buddhism, all other parts of Buddhist practice are rejected. This includes the basic pillars of the tradition, such as aspiration to full enlightenment or even meditation. Honen was not the only monk to focus on the nembutsu to the exclusion of other practices; the monk Kuya became known for spreading worship of Amida Buddha through dance, and the monk Ryonin used his talents in singing to propagate the recitation of nembutsu. Interestingly, both Kuya and Ryonin drew on Tendai traditions for their inspirations, showing the interconnectedness of Buddhist traditions in Japan, drawing all the way from the Nara up through the late Heian period.¹⁵

¹  H. Byron Earhart, Religion in Japan: Unity and Diversity, 5th ed. (Wadsworth, 2014), 52-53.

2  H. Byron Earhart, Religion in Japan: Unity and Diversity, 5th ed. (Wadsworth, 2014), 54-55.

³ Ibid.

⁴ Ibid.

⁵  H. Byron Earhart, Religion in Japan: Unity and Diversity, 5th ed. (Wadsworth, 2014), 98-113.

⁶ Ibid

⁷ Ibid

⁸ Ibid

⁹ Ibid

¹⁰  Marra, “The Development of Mappō Thought in Japan (I).”

¹¹  De Bary Wm Theodore, Carol Gluck, and Arthur E. Tiedemann, Sources of Japanese Tradition, 2nd ed., vol. 1 (New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 2005), 212-213.

¹² Ibid.

¹³ Ibid.

¹⁴ Ibid.

¹⁵ Ibid.

Works Consulted

Earhart, H. Byron. Religion in Japan: Unity and Diversity. 5th ed. Wadsworth, 2014.

Marra, Michele. “The Development of Mappō Thought in Japan (I).” Japanese Journal of Religious Studies 15, no. 1 (1988): 25–54.

Theodore, De Bary Wm, Carol Gluck, and Arthur E. Tiedemann. Sources of Japanese Tradition. 1. 2nd ed. Vol. 1. New York, NY: Columbia University Press, ., 2005.