Final Review Flashcards
Describe Saicho’s life
- received ordination in Todaiji at 19
- created foundation of Enryaukuji temple on mt. Hiei
- appointed as naigubu monk
- promoted Lotus sutra
- tiantai master
- received zen transmission and esoteric initiation
- 1st person to bring zen to japan
Describe the basis of tendai buddhism
practice - study of doctrine, meditative concentration, esoteric and pure land chanting, vinyasa discipline
- mandate rigorous study of lotus sutra and esoteric texts/practices
- taught realization of threefold truth through meditation
Buddhist vocabulary: Samsara Nirvana Karma Anitya Dukkha Anatman
Samsara - birth and rebirth, a cycle we want to escape
Nirvana - release from rebirth
Karma - drives the cycle of birth and rebirth, want it completely depleted
Anitya - impermanence
Dukkha - suffering
Anatman - non self
What are the buddhist 3 modes of practice
Sravaka - voice hearer: disciple of buddha
Prayukabuddha - solitary buddha: become buddha on own
Bodhisattva - detached from self, liberate others
Describe the tendai story burning house
Explains that there is one true vehicle, but the rich man uses other means to get the other kids out of the burning house
- true vehicle: lotus sutra
- lesson: adapt teachings for certain students according to their level of understanding
Describe universal buddhahood
promise of buddhahood for everyone, even women
- Devadatta chapter
- dragon girl
describe primordial buddha
sakyamuni achieved enlightenment billions of eons ago
- emanation of a cosmic buddha: had better teachings
- multiple buddhas can exist at once - identical to historical buddha
What did Saicho teach?
- mahayana precepts (enkai) and ordination platform on mt. hiei
- one vehicle and perfect teachings (engyo) - lotus sutra
- direct path to enlightenment (jikido) or sudden teachings (tonkyo)
- sokushin jobutsu - enlightenment in this body: not necessarily this lifetime
What religion is saicho associated with?
Tendai Buddhism
Describe Kukai
- went to china to study with Huigo
- received esoteric consecration (kanjo)
- granted temple Toji by saga
- joined gov’t prelates office
What type of buddhism served as the infrastructure for other forms of buddhism?
esoteric buddhism
What did Kukai teach?
- efficacy of extraordinary language (mantra)
- buddha nature
- possibility of becoming buddha in one’s body
- the three mysteries: speech (mantra), body (mudra), mind (mandala)
- Buddha Mahavairocana: by speaking, you preach mahavairocana
- we are small constituents that make up the whole
Describe esoteric buddhist practice
- consecrations: for ppl who want to become masters
- fire rituals
- ajikan meditation
- confessionals, memorial services, offerings to specific deities
- sexual rituals
- womb mandala, diamond mandala
Describe the power shifts after the 10th century (heian period)
- Fujiwara regents
- retired emperors era: no longer had any power
- emergence of tax-free manors (shoen): changed economy of japan. land given to monk and courtiers - more powerful
- military supremacy in the provisional regions
Describe the time before and during the Kamakura period
- before the kamakura period: mega conflict between two warrior clans, Minamoto and Taira
- Kamakura shogunate, ruled by minamoto no yoritomo est. capital in Kamakura
- emergent school of Kamakura buddhism: focus on single practice
What religion is kukai associated with?
esoteric buddhism
What religion is honey associated with?
pure land buddhism
Describe Honen’s life
- tendai monk at mt. hiei
- convinced japan entered final age of Dharma
- Senchacku Hongan nenbutsu: argued that the nenbutsu is the highest form of buddhist practice
What is the final age of the dharma?
- aka mappo, people no longer able to practice buddhism
- true dharma: 1000 years after buddha died
- semblance of buddha: next 1000 years
- final age of the dharma: next 10000 years, started in 1052
- claimed that practitioners should become devoted to amida buddha
What is the nenbutsu?
- chanting namu amida butsu: intoning the name of amida as the sole path of salvation
- do it as often as you can
- have mind geared toward faith/devotion
What is Senju nenbutsu?
single minded attention to nenbustu
What did Honen believe about the relationship between religion and faith
believed that practice is the base for faith, and that faith is not the basis of practice
What is raigo (the coming of amida buddha)?
- chant this on your deathbed
- him and other bodhisattvas come and will take your soul and lead you to the west
- practice buddhism properly
What did Honen believe about the salvation of low people?
for low people, ignorant people, warriors and farmers, honed believed that they can attain enlightenment through nenbutsu
What parts of buddhism did Honen criticize?
the prevailing form of buddhism did not allow women to become enlightened - argued women should be preachers
What were issues people had with Honen’s views?
- simplification of practice: questions the validity of monastic buddhism, destroying distinction between ordained/not, break down of morals (antinomianism)
- senju - interpreted as exclusive practice
- dismissed the kami and openly denigrate their worship
what was the response to honen?
- tendai monks appealed to the abbot to abolish practice of exclusive nenbutsu
- Jokei said his teachings were heresy
- 2 members of Honen’s group executed for having sex w women
- exiled to Tosa
- Myoe wrote critique of honey’s teachings - Zaijarin
What religion is Shinran associated with?
true pure land buddhism (jodo shinshu)
Describe Shinran’s life
- trained Tendai on Mt. Hiei
- left to follow Honen
- married a woman, pursued life as monk and master
- banished to Echo
- moved to Hitachi, spread amida faith among peasants
What is the role of nenbutsu in True Pure Land Buddhism?
- lay at the head of buddhist practice as an act of gratitude for their gift of faith
- act that has merit effects in itself
- faith directly given by Amirada
what is the view that true pure land buddhism on monks and laymen?
ignored the distinction between them
What are the TPLB views of the mapco?
- believed that the world was already in the 683 year of mapco
- belief in the power of amida buddha was the only choice
What did TPLB do with self power and other power?
self power (jiriki) and other power (tariki) were distinguished from each other
What religion is nichiren associated with?
The Lotus (nichiren) school
what is the daimoku for the lotus school?
Namyo ho renge kyo!
- prose the wonderful dharma of the lotus sutra scripture
Describe nichiren’s life
- son of a fisherman
- founded Lotus school in kamakura
- created daimoku: intoning the title of the lotus sutra
- wrote Rissho Ankokuraon, sent to regent Hojo Tokyori
- kicked out for coming same time Kamakura was threatened
- mongol attack came, nichiren pardoned
What did Nichiren’s Rissho Anokokuraon predict and call for?
- predicted that there would be a military conquest from the Mongols
- calls to reprimand the promoters of pure land and zen buddhism
What were nichiren’s views of the lotus sutra?
believed that the Kamakura leadership and buddhist establishment did not give the lotus sutra its rightful place
During Nichiren’s time, describe the politicization of religion
- linked the possibility of personal salvation to the creation of an ideal state that upheld the worship of the lotus sutra
- the age of decline is an opportunity to practice to the lotus sutra
What was nichiren’s views of the mappo?
accepter theory of mappo, rejected pessimism
From what did the Koshin cult derive from?
sanno shinto and Ieyasu’s deification
