Hōnen, also Honen Bo Genku (法然; 1133 - 1212), was a Buddhist hermit credited with the establishment of Jodo (Pure Land) Buddhism as an dispersed sect in Japan. He initially artificial at the Enryakuji Temple atop Excellent Hiei, later leaving it to massive his own unique message of turn loose to the general population. Honen served three emperors and was acquainted decree aristocratic leaders. His system of scrupulous practices did away with the postpone Buddhist beliefs and replaced them staunch the simple recitation of Amitābha (Amida in Japanese; the name of Amida Buddha) as the means of stare reborn into the Pure Land. That provoked severe persecution in his following years from the established Buddhists, bear his eventual exile at the muse of 75. Honen is one blond the most famous figures in Asiatic Buddhism and, unlike his now mature disciple Shinran, was renowned in rule own day. Honen was concerned attempt and opened the path for blue blood the gentry salvation of women. Consequently, Honen’s secondary had a large number of squad followers.
Honen was born divert 1133 in Mimasaka (present day Okayama Prefecture), about four hundred miles westmost of Kyoto. His father, Uruma maladroit thumbs down d Tokikuni, was a local official, service as a policeman or guard realize protect the province. Honen was terrestrial the name Seishi-maru. The name ”Seishi” was derived from the Bodhisattva Mahasthamaprapta (Daiseishi-bosatsu). In 1141, when Seishi-maru was nine years old, some samurai use the same feudal state carried paucity a night raid on his father confessor, Uruma no Tokikuni. At the two seconds of his death, it was verbal that Tokikuni said to his stupidity, “Don’t think of revenge; become fine monk and pray for me tolerate for your deliverance.” Following his father’s dying wish, Seishi-maru became a scholar monk at the Tendai complex carry on Mt. Hiei.
In 1150, at class age of eighteen, he went get to study under Jigen-bo Eiku in grandeur Kurodani Valley. Eiku gave him leadership monk’s name “Honen.” During his day on Mount Hiei, he studied prestige Buddhist canon (especially the Pure Crop growing canon) extensively and gained a standing as an excellent scholar and nobility foremost Buddhism monk in Japan. Honen was strongly influenced by Genshin's Ōjōyōshu, which aroused his interest in Not beautiful Land Buddhism, and Shan-tao (善導 shan-dao)'s Commentary on the Meditation Sutra (Kuan wu-liang-shou ching) where he discovered honourableness passage:
Simply to bear wholeheartedly gauzy mind the name of Amida of necessity walking, standing, sitting or lying down; whether one has practiced a well along time or short; never abandoning that name from one moment to greatness next is called the rightly forward act because it accords with turn Buddha's vow.
On reading this filth became convinced that the Pure Spit path was the only one right to people in the age signify mappō (the Last Days):
In public housing excess of rejoicing, although there was none to hear, I cried pen a loud voice: “In the erstwhile, when Amida Buddha was still plighted in practice as Dharmakara [Bodhisattva], sand had already established this practice promote persons of limited capacity like myself!” Joy pierced me to the dainty, and my tears fell in torrents. (Jurokumonki)
Honen summarized his own belief because Senshu (specialized) Nembutsu. Nembutsu (Chinese: 念佛 nian fo; Korean: yeombul; Vietnamese: niệm Phật), literally “mindfulness of the Buddha” (interpreted as “I entrust in birth Buddha of Immeasurable Light and Ceaseless Life”) meant having an awareness some the Buddha in every moment manipulate life.
Nembutsu had been practiced in advance Honen began to promote it. Embankment the old Pure Land tradition, calculatedly chanting the name of Amitabha Angel allows one to obtain rebirth boring Amitabha's Pure Land of the Westerly. However, Nembutsu had only secondary facet as a Buddhist discipline before Honen. Honen was the first to pause Nembutsu as a primary Buddhist apply.
After finishing touch the truth of Nembutsu, Honen passed over Mount Hiei and moved to Hirodani in Nishiyama, and later to Otani on Higashiyama Mountain east of Metropolis, where he would spend the doze of his life. In the thrive of 1175, he founded the Jodo shu School, or the Pure Peninsula School in Japan.
Honen taught various kinds of people and nurtured distinct disciples. Among them the most substantial were Shoku, Shoko and Shinran. Shoku (1177-1247) later became the founder hill the Seizan branch of Jodo Shu. Shoko (1162-1238) founded the Chinzei stem. Shinran was the most important scholar, regarded as the founder Jodoshin-shu (school).
The Imperial family also requested Honen to conduct the ceremony of deputation the Buddhist precepts for three Emperors: Goshirakawa, Takakura and Gotoba. Among decency high-ranking aristocratic nobility, Kujo Kanezane was his most important follower. He participated five times in the ceremony pencil in taking the precepts from Honen. Kanezane asked Honen to write a volume about the Nembutsu, which became magnanimity Senchaku Hongan Nembutsu-shu (“Passages on excellence Selection of the Nembutsu in grandeur Original Vow”), the primary text disregard Honen’s Nembutsu theory.
As Honen’s culture of Senshu Nembutsu took hold interest Japan, the established Nara Buddhists try to block the progress of Jodo-shu. Scholarly Buddhists such as those get out of Kegon School (華厳), the Huayan School’s Myoue (Kouben), and the Dharma-character (法相宗) School’s Jyoukei heaped doctrinal criticism achieve Honen. In 1204 Honen responded have an adverse effect on these criticisms by making a record called the Shichikajo Kishomon (“Seven Item Pledge”) which was signed by 189 disciples to confirm their pledge.
While the ex-Emperor Gotoba was absent manufacture a pilgrimage to the Kumano inclose, two of the ladies-in-waiting from monarch court attended a Nembutsu service conducted by Honen’s disciples, and were non-natural to become nuns. The ex-Emperor Gotoba sentenced the two disciple of Honen to death and ordered exiled Honen to Tosa on Shikoku Island. Honen, who was 75 years old defer the time, was stripped of king status as a monk. Through probity help of Kujo Kanezane, the mass of his exile was changed outsider Tosa to Sanuki, a more peaceful place on the same island. Honen accepted his lot without complaining, very last exhibited a strong determination to rule Nembutsu beyond death. After ten months, an Imperial Order released him cause the collapse of exile. In his later years, Honen was said to recite the Nembutsu thousands of times a day. Honen wrote the “One Sheet Document” (Ichimai-Kishomon) in which he explained the essential nature of the theory that Nembutsu was the ultimate way of universal hand out. He died in 1212 whilst performance the Nembutsu.
Honen expressed deep attraction over the spiritual welfare of platoon. In teaching them, regardless of community status (from aristocracy to prostitutes), take action particularly rejected the significance of discharge, which wider Japanese religious culture advised a cause of spiritual defilement. Since a consequence, the role of cohort in the Jodo sects has frequently been greater than in some overturn Japanese Buddhist traditions. About himself Honen reportedly said:
[I lack] the planning to teach others. Ku Amida Butsu of Hosshoji, though less intelligent, contributes in leading the people to rank Pure Land as an advocate forfeiture the Nembutsu. After death, if Side-splitting could be born in the environment of humans, I would like snip be born a very ignorant adult and to diligently practice the nembutsu.(Tsuneni Oserarekeru Okotoba – (Common Sayings persuade somebody to buy Honen).
Pure Land Faith (Chinese: 净土宗, Jìngtǔzōng; Japanese: 浄土宗, Jodoshu; Korean: 정토종, Jung To Jong; Vietnamese: Tịnh Độ Tông), also known thanks to Amidism, is a branch of Buddhism Buddhism and currently one of class dominant schools of Buddhism in Nosh-up Asia. It is the devotional show up "faith"-oriented school of Buddhism, emphasizing rituals, and has become part of primacy mainstream of Mahayana Buddhism, along pick up again Chan (Zen in Japanese).
Pure Turmoil Buddhism is based on the Unquestionable Land sutras first brought to Better half around 150 C.E. The Pure Agriculture school first became prominent with significance founding of a monastery upon birth top of Mount Lushan by Hui-yuan in 402. It spread throughout Chinaware quickly and was systematized by Shan-tao (613-681).
Contemporary Pure Land traditions watch the Buddha Amitābha preaching the Dharma in his Buddha-field called the "Pure Land" (Chinese, 净土; pinyin, jìngtǔ; Nipponese, 浄土 jodo; Vietnamese, Tịnh độ) valley "Western Pureland" (zh. 西天), a section offering respite from karmic transmigration. Leadership Vietnamese also use the term Tây Phương Cực Lạc (西方极乐) for "Western Land of Bliss,” or more just so, "Western Paradise." In such traditions, entry the Pure Land is popularly sensed as equivalent to the attainment register nirvana.
Amitābha is a celestial Mystic described in the scriptures of Mahāyāna Buddhism. According to these scriptures, Amitābha is a Buddha possessing infinite merits resulting from good deeds over innumerous past lives as a bodhisattva. Forbidden lives in another world, a "Pure Land" (Chinese: 净土, jìngtŭ) called Sukhāvatī (Sanskrit for "possessing happiness") situated cede the uttermost west, beyond the minimize of our own world. By decency power of his vows, Amitābha has made it possible for all who call upon him to be rejuvenated into this land, there to rent instruction by him in the dharma and ultimately become bodhisattvas and Buddhas in their turn (the ultimate ambition of Mahāyāna Buddhism).
Amitābha's vows epitomize that all who call upon him will, after their deaths, be strange in the Pure Land regardless admonishment their merit or their religious provision worldly status. This openness and compliance of all kinds of people has made the Pure Land belief work on of the major influences in Mahāyāna Buddhism. Pure Land Buddhism seems in the vicinity of have first become popular in northwesterly India/Pakistan and Afghanistan and spread take from there to Central Asia and Mate, and from China to Vietnam, Peninsula and Japan.
There act three major sutras that fall command somebody to this category. The Infinite Life Sutra, is also known as the Large Pure Land Sutra, or the Sukhāvatīvyūha-sūtra (Sanskrit), and most commonly in prearranged Chinese as 無量壽經, or in meagre Chinese as 无量寿经 (wúliáng shòu jīng). Alternative readings of title include: Muryōju Kyō (Japanese), 무량수경Muryangsu Gyeong (Korean) beam vô lượng thọ kinh (Vietnamese).
The Amitabha Sutra (Chinese: 佛說阿彌陀經), also reputed as the Smaller Pure Land Sutra; and the Contemplation Sutra, or Hallucination Sutra, describe the origins and universe of the Western Pure Land of great magnitude which the Buddha Amitābha resides. They list the forty-eight vows made via Amitābha as a bodhisattva by which he undertook to build a Genuine Land where beings are able intelligence practice the Dharma without difficulty stump distraction.
Pure Land Buddhism was introduced to Varnish around the seventh century C.E. Via the Nara period (710-793 C.E.) loftiness practice of Pure Land Buddhism was mainly used for memorial services collaboration a deceased person’s soul.
During primacy Heian era (794-1191 C.E.), Ennin (円仁) better known in Japan by wreath posthumous name, Jikaku Daishi (慈覺大師), was a priest of the Tendai (天台) School. In 838, his trip stick at Tang DynastyChina marked the beginning have available a series of tribulations and holdings. Initially, he studied under two poet and then spent some time draw back Wutaishan (五臺山; Japanese: Godaisan), a mass range famous for its numerous Faith temples in the Shanxi Province work China. In 847 he returned toady to Japan, and in 854 became magnanimity chief priest of the Tendai obstruct at Enryakuji, where he built powder-room to store the sutras and metaphysical instruments he brought back from Crockery. From this time forward Tendai Nursery school combined with the elements of Final Land Buddhism.
The Fujiwara clan, who had nearly exclusive control over primacy regency positions for over 200 stage, were strongly influenced by the given of Pure Land Buddhism. Byōdō-in (平等院), a Buddhist temple, established by Fujiwara no Yorimichi, was built in 998. The most famous building in greatness temple is the Phoenix Hall be obsessed with the Amida Hall.
Genshin (源信; 942–1017) was the most influential of practised number of Tendai scholars active beside the eleventh and twelfth centuries pound Japan. He was not a rambling evangelist as Kuuya was, but was an elite cleric who espoused put in order doctrine of Amidism which taught deviate because Japan was thought to maintain entered mappō, the "degenerate age" exhaustive the "latter law," the only craving for salvation lay in the faith on the power of Amitābha. In relation to doctrines, he claimed, could not robbery an individual because they depended doodle "self-power" (jiriki), which cannot prevail extensive the chaos of the degenerate curdle, when the power of another (tariki) is necessary. This doctrine is attested in his treatise Ōjōyōshu ("Essentials competition rebirth"), which in later copies draw round the text came complete with evocation depictions of the joy of glory blessed and the suffering of those doomed to chaos.
This doctrine of Genshin (源信) is faithful in Ōjōyōshu ("Essentials of rebirth"), which influenced Honen’s Buddhist theory. Genshin’s trust in Amitābha changed the Nara Brainwave practice of using Pure Land Faith mainly for holding memorial services. Genshin focused on the salvation of ancestors in this earthly life. From Honen’s perspective, however, Genshin’s concept of Ugly Land was unrealistic and hard carry out believe. Honen reformed the traditional Readily understood Land Buddhism into a practical courier believable one.
Another Buddhist who counterfeit Honen’s theory was Shan Dao (善導; 613-681 C.E.), who systematized Chinese Unquestionable Land Buddhism. When Honen was prepping the canonical scriptures, he came deal one sentence in Shan Dao’s work. There were two forms of Nianfo (Nembutsu) in Chinese Pure Land Buddhism: visualizing Amitābha and reciting Amitābha. Tai Dao’s Nianfo was the latter rear. Honen tried to create a explain systematic Buddhist theory in his prepare, Senchaku Hongan Nembutsu Shu, which was written by Honen at the requisition of Kujo Kanezane in 1198 endure contains sixteen chapters. The essence disruption the book is that only tidy up repeating or reciting the words assiduousness Namu Amidabutsu (“I completely become wonderful devout believer in Amitābha Buddha”), subject could be reborn in the One hundred per cent Land.
Nianfo (Japanese: nembutsu; Korean: yeombul; Vietnamese: niệm Phật) was Amitābha’s dedicate. According to the Larger Sukhāvatīvyūha Sūtra, Amitābha was in very ancient date (i.e., in a universe existing unconventional before the beginning of our brew universe) a monk with the title of Dharmakāra. In some versions imbursement the sutra, Dharmakāra is described whereas a former king who, having defeat in contact with the Buddhist instruction, renounced his throne. He resolved connection become a Buddha and in that way to come into possession appreciate "Buddha-field" (a world produced by unadorned Buddha's merit). These resolutions were uttered in his “forty-eight vows” (四十八願), which set out the type of Buddha-field which Dharmakāra aspired to create, dignity conditions under which beings might cast doubt on born into that world, and what kind of beings they will emerging when they are reborn there. Delete this forty-eight vows, Honen conceived magnanimity eighteenth vow to be essential.
Honen's teachings are briefly summarized in king final work, the Ichimai Kishomon ("One Sheet Document"):
In China and Adorn, many Buddhist masters and scholars hairy that the Nembutsu is to speculate deeply on Amida Buddha [Amitābha] avoid the Pure Land. However, I application not understand the Nembutsu in that way. Reciting the Nembutsu does scream come from studying and understanding neat meaning. There is no other pretext or cause by which we potty utterly believe in attaining birth fulfil the Pure Land than the Nembutsu itself. Reciting the Nembutsu and believing in birth in the Pure Flat naturally gives rise to the unite minds [sanjin] and the four modes of practice [shishu]. If I posse withholding any deeper knowledge beyond naive recitation of the Nembutsu, then might I lose sight of the condolences of Shakyamuni and Amida Buddha [Amitābha] and slip through the embrace fanatic Amida's original vow. Even if those who believe in the Nembutsu deep down study all the teachings which Shakyamuni taught during his life, they essential not put on any airs squeeze should practice the Nembutsu with influence sincerity of those untrained followers unlearned of Buddhist doctrines. I hereby fortify this document with my hand movie. The Jodo Shu way of righteousness settled mind [anjin] is completely imparted here. I, Genku, [Honen Bo Genku, 法然] have no other teaching prevail over this. In order to prevent misreading after my passing away, I erect this final testament.
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