Dr. V.K.Maheshwari, M.A. (Socio, Phil) B.Sc. M. Ed, Ph.D.
Former Principal, K.L.D.A.V.(P.G) College, Roorkee, India
The Japanese are only a moderately religious people not profoundly and overwhelmingly religious like the Hindus, nor passionately and fanatically religious like the tortured saints of medieval Catholicism or the warring saints of the Reformation; and yet they are distinctly more given to piety and prayer, and a happy-ending philosophy, than their sceptical cousins across the Yellow Sea.
It took several centuries for Buddhism to travel from India to Japan. Once Buddhism was established in Japan, however, it flourished. Buddhism had an incalculable impact on Japanese civilization.
In the 6th century — either 538 or 552 CE, depending on which historian one consults — a delegation sent by a Korean prince arrived at the court of the Emperor of Japan. The Koreans brought with them Buddhist sutras, an image of the Buddha, and a letter from the Korean prince praising the dharma. This was the official introduction of Buddhism to Japan.
In the centuries that followed, Buddhism in Japan developed robustly. During the 7th through 9th centuries Buddhism in China enjoyed a “golden age,” and Chinese monks brought the newest developments in practice and scholarship to Japan. The many schools of Buddhism that developed in China were established in Japan also.
Buddhism was brought to Japan from China at different periods by various individuals whose studies and practice differ widely. Buddhism as practiced in Japan has been shaped by Japanese cultural practices and values and has developed differently from Buddhism practiced elsewhere in Asia. In Japan, Zen Buddhism has become one of the major forms of Buddhist practice and is the most well-known form of Japanese Buddhism outside of Japan.
In 522 Buddhism, which had entered China five hundred years before, passed over from the continent, and began a rapid conquest of Japan. Two Clements met to give it victory: the religious needs of the people, and the political needs of the state. For it was not Buddha’s Buddhism that came, agnostic, pessimistic and puritan, dreaming of blissful extinction; it was the Mahay ana Buddhism of gentle gods like Amida and Kwannon, of cheerful ceremonial, saving Bodhisattwas, and personal immortality. Better still, it inculcated, with irresistible grace, all those virtues of piety, peacefulness and obedience which make a people amenable to government; it gave to the oppressed such hopes and consolations as might reconcile them to content with their simple lot; it redeemed the prose and routine of a laborious life with the poetry of myth and prayer and the drama of colourful festival; and it offered to the people that unity of feeling and belief which statesmen have always welcomed as a source of social order and a pillar of national strength.
We do not know whether it was statesmanship or piety that brought victory to Buddhism in Japan. When, in 586 A.D., the Emperor Yomei died, the succession was contested in arms by two rival families, both of them politically devoted to the new creed. Prince Shotoku Taishi, who had been
born, we are told, with a holy relic clasped in his infant hand, led the Buddhist faction to victory, established the Empress Suiko on the throne, and for twenty-nine years (592-621) ruled the Sacred Islands as Prince Imperial and Regent. He lavished funds upon Buddhist temples, encouraged and supported the Buddhist clergy, promulgated the Buddhist ethic in national decrees, and became in general the Ashoka of Japanese Buddhism. He patronized the arts and sciences, imported artists and artisans from Korea and China, wrote history, painted pictures, and supervised the building of the Horiuji Temple, the oldest extant masterpiece in the art history of Japan.
Buddhism began with the experiences of a man who is known mainly as the Buddha (Butsu – the enlightened one, Shakyamuni — the sage of the Shakya clan, Siddhartha Gautama —personal name) (b 563 B. C. died at age 84). The philosophy/religion is based on his teachings after his experience of being enlightened [satori — (kenshô jobutsu "seeing one’s own true nature") enlightenment — awakening — an understanding of the entire universe, emptiness and phenomena are one. satoru — to know.] It is often not considered a religion because there is no god. There are powerful beings who are petitioned for assistance in reaching this goal but they are not identified as gods.
The term butsuor buddha is used to refer to anyone who is aware or enlightened as to the true nature of existence. All people are hotoke — buddhas.Shakyamuni is the historical buddha for this age. Kâshyapa — buddha of past ages (there are 6 buddhas of earlier epochs). Maitreya (Miroku) — future buddha, associated with the attribute of wisdom.
The main ideas of the philosophy are to be found in the Taishô issaikyô (Tripitaka, three baskets). The Japanese is a modern version of the Buddhist canon which consists of
1) Vinaya — pitaka accounts of origins of Buddhism,
2) sutra-pitaka — teachings of the Buddha,
3) abhidharma-pitaka — compendium of Buddhist psychology and philosophy
Three main sutras:
Lotus sutra — transcendental nature of Buddha and possibility of universal liberation. Discourse of the Buddha at Vulture Peak.
Heart Sutra — “form is no other than emptiness, emptiness is no other than form” Maka hanya haramita shingyo. Essential teaching of non-duality.
Diamond Sutra - all phenomena are not ultimate reality but rather illusions, projections of one’s own mind.
Buddhism came from its founder a cloud of pessimistic exhortation, inviting men to death; but under the skies of Japan it was soon trans- formed into a cult of protecting deities, pleasant ceremonies, joyful festivals, Rousscauian pilgrimages, and a consoling paradise. It is true that there were hells too in Japanese Buddhism indeed, one hundred and twenty-eight of them, designed for every purpose and enemy. There was a world of demons as well as of saints, and a personal Devil (Oni) with horns, flat nose, claws and fangs; he lived in some dark, north-eastern realm, to which he would, now and then, lure women to give him pleasure, or men to provide him with proteins. But on the other hand there were Bodhisattvas ready to transfer to human beings a portion of the grace they had accumulated by many incarnations of virtuous living; and there were gracious deities, like Our Lady Kwannon and the Christlike Jizo, who were the very essence of divine tenderness. Worship was only partly by prayer at the household altars and the temple shrines; a large part of it consisted of merry processions in which religion was subordinated to gaycty, and piety took the form of feminine fashion-displays and masculine revelry. The more serious devotee might cleanse his spirit by praying for a quarter of an hour under a waterfall in the depth of winter; or he might go on pilgrimages from shrine to shrine of his sect, meanwhile feasting his soul on the beauty of his native land. For the Japanese could choose among many varieties of Buddhism: he might seek self-realization and bliss through the quiet practices of Zen (“meditation”); he might follow the fiery Nichircn into the Lotus Sect, and find salvation through learning the “Lotus Law”; he might join the Spirit Sect, and fast and pray until Buddha appeared to him in the flesh; he might be comforted by the Sect of the Pure Land, and be saved by faith alone; or he might find his way in patient pilgrimage to the monastery of Koyasan, and attain paradise by being buried in ground made holy by the bones of Kobo Daishi, the great scholar, saint and artist who, in the ninth century, had founded Sh’mgon, the Sect of the True Word.
All in all, Japanese Buddhism was one of the pleasantest of man’s myths. It conquered Japan peacefully, and complaisantly found room, within its theology and its pantheon, for the doctrines and deities of Shinto:
Buddha was amalgamated with Amaterasu, and a modest place was set apart, in Buddhist temples, for a Shinto shrine. The Buddhist priests of the earlier centuries were men of devotion, learning and kindliness, who profoundly influenced and advanced Japanese letters and arts; some of them were great painters or sculptors, and some were scholars whose painstaking translation of Buddhist and Chinese literature proved a fertile stimulus to the cultural development of Japan. Success, however, ruined the later priests; many became lazy and greedy (note the jolly caricatures so often made of them by Japanese carvers in ivory or wood) ; and some travelled so far from Buddha as to organize their own armies for the establishment or maintenance of political power. Since they were providing the first necessity of life a consolatory hope their industry flourished even whenothers decayed; their wealth grew from century to century, while the poverty of the people remained.” The priests assured the faithful that a man of forty could purchase another decade of life by paying forty temples to say masses in his name; at fifty he could buy ten years more by engaging fifty temples; at sixty years sixty temples and so till, through insufficient piety, he died.( “It was mainly in seasons when people were starving,” says Murdoch, “or dying in tens of thousands from pestilence, that the monks in the great Kyoto and Nara monasteries fared most sumptuously; for it was in times like these that believers were most lavish in their gifts and benefactions.”)
Under the Tokugawa regime the monks drank bibulously, kept mistresses candidly, practised pederasty,(“In 1454 . . . boys were often sold to the priests, who shaved their eyebrows, powdered their faces, dressed them in female garb, and put them to the vilest of uses; for since the days of Yoshimitsu, who had set an evil example in this as in so many other matters, the practice of pederasty had become very common, especially in the monasteries, although it was by no means confined to them.”) and sold the cozier places in the hierarchy to the highest bidders.
Schools of Buddhism in Japan
Kegon (School of the Flower Garden) established at Todaiji in Nara brought to Japan from China by Shen-hsiang (Shinshô)around 740. Established the relationship of Buddhism to the state.
Shingon (School of the True Word) founded in Japan by KûKai (Kôbô Daishi) (774-835) settled on Mt Koya. Truth is passed secretly from teacher to student. The three secrets: body, speech and mind, are the ways in which the student can come to understand the truth. KûKai introduced the Shinto deities into Buddhism. Ryobu-shintô: Shintô gods were shown to be manifestations of Buddhist saints.
Tendai (Celestial Platform) Chinese T’ien-Tai brought to Japan by Saichô, established at Mt Hiei in 8th century. No difference between the Chinese and Japanese forms of Buddhism which is based on the Lotus Sutra. The temple on Mt. Hiei founded by Ennin in Kyoto is the main location for this school.
Nichiren Shu “School of the Lotsu of the Sun” founded by Nichiren (1222-1282) Teaching is based on the Lotus sutra. The recitation of “namu myoho renge kyô” if said with complete devotion can realize buddhahood. The school venerates the three mysteries: the mandala (go-honzon), daimoku the title of the sutra itself and third the kaidan, a sacred shelf. Numerous schools have developed in Japan based on Nichiren’s teaching. One of the most important of these in modern Japan is Sôka Gakkai — founded in 1930 by Makiguchi Tsunesaburo (1871-1944) a follower of Nichren Buddhism. An aggressive form of Buddhism that actively seeks converts (shokubutsu). The leader was arrested for refusal to participate in Shintô rites. It is known as NSA (Nichiren Shoshu America) and founded but later separated from the political party Kômeito.
Jôdô (Pure Land) established by Honen (1133-1212) one of the schools of the “easy path” or tariki (outside assistance, as compared to Zen and other schools which rely on jiriki or one’s own efforts) based on faith and reliance on the Buddha through recitation of the nembutsu: “namu amida butsu” There are 5 pure lands which correspond to the 5 directions. The pure land is a stage before entering nirvana, after which it is not possible to retrogress. These are states of mind not places.
Jôdô Shin Shu (New School of Pure Land) founded by Shinran (1173-1262) Honganji and Otani temples are the main branches of this school. This school has dropped monasticism. Its followers may marry. Liberation is to be attained exclusively through the help and grace of Buddha Amida.
Zen — no ritual, no texts. Zen practices meditation as a means to enlightenment.
Daruma (Bodhidharma) First Chinese Ch’an (Zen) patriarch, 28th after Shakyamuni Founded the school in China in the 6th century and is considered an important person in the development of Japanese practice.
In Japan there are two main schools Rinzai and Soto. They are similar in teachings but differ slightly in practice. Rinzai zen uses the kôan as a major teaching technique but Soto zen emphasizes mokushô (no reliance on words) and the practice of dokusan (meeting of a zen student with the master) has died out.
Rinzai Enni Ben’in (Shoichi Kokushi 1202-1280) founder. He went to China to study and returned in 1241, established Tofukji in 1255, Kenninji in Kyoto. This school has two main lineages Yôgi and Oryo
Musô Soseki — (1275-1351) wandering monk, aboot of Tenryu-ji most known for garden design.
Daito Kokushi —(Myôcho Shûhô) founder of Daitokuji in Kyoto in 1319.
Sôtô Dôgen Zenji (1200-1253) Eiheiji (1243) brought the practice to Japan.
Obaku — this school is a subsidiary of Rinzai and has one temple, Manpuku-ji in Uji. Founded in the 17th century, mainly known for its relationship to osencha (style of tea ceremony).
In the 13th century the Nichiren school emerged.
During the eighteenth century Buddhism seems to have lost its hold upon the nation; the shoguns went over to Confucianism, Mabuchi and Moto-ori led a movement for the restoration of Shinto, and scholars like Ichikawa and Arai Hakuseki attempted a rationalist critique of religious belief. Ichikawa argued boldly that verbal tradition could never be quite as trustworthy as written record; that writing had not come to Japan until almost a thousand years after the supposed origin of the islands and their inhabitants from the spear-drops and loins of the gods; that the claim of the imperial family to divine origin was merely a political device; and that if the ancestors of men were not human beings they were much more likely to have been animals than gods. The civilization of the old Japan, like so many others, had begun with religion and was ending with philosophy. In the 19th century Shintoism was elevated to the state religion. After the Second World War there was a renaissance of Buddhism in Japan and a whole series of popular movements have arisen: Soka Gakkai, Rissho Koseikai and Nipponzan Myohoji, to name a few, which have adapted Buddhism to modern times.