History

A Tiantai teaching was number 1 bring round Japan per Chinese monk Jianshen (鑑眞 Jp: Gishin) in the middle of the 8th century, but it was non widely accepted. Within 805, the Japanese monk Saichō (最澄; also called Dengyō Daishi 伝教大師) returned from China with new Tiantai texts and made the temple that he had built on Mt. Hiei (比叡山), Enryakuji (延暦寺), a center for the study and practice of what became Japanese Tendai.

Philosophically, a Tendai school did non vary substantially from either a beliefs that got been created per Tiantai school inside China. But, what Saichō transmitted from either China was non solely Tiantai, however likewise involved Zen (禅, trad. 禪), esoteric Mikkyō (密教), and Vinaya School (戒律) elements. the tendency to include a range of teachings became further marked in the doctrines of Saichō's successors, like Ennin (圓仁) and Enchin (圓珍).

A Tendai sect flourished under a patronage of the imperial family and nobility inside Japan; in 784, the Purple capital was stirred from Nara to nearby Kyoto. Tendai Buddhism became a dominant form of mainside-stream Buddhism inside Japan for several years, & bring about to virtually all of the developments in in the future Japanese Buddhism. Nichiren, Honen, Shinran, and Dogen- tons illustrious thinkers around non-Tendai schools of Japanese Buddhism- were all ab initio trained when Tendai monks. Japanese Buddhism was dominated per Tendai school to a lot greater degree than Chinese Buddhism was by its forebearer, the Tiantai.

Due to its patronage & growing popularity among a upper classes, a Tendai sect became non just respected, however likewise politically- & possibly militarily- powerful. A Tendai school utilized its patronage to try to oppose a incubation of rival factions- partcularly a Nichiren school, which began to grow within power among a merchandiser bourgeoisie, & a Pure Land school, which eventually come to claim a loyalty of numerous of the poorer classes. Enryakuji, the temple complex in Mt. Hiei, became the straggling center of power, attended non sole by ascetical monks, however as well by brigades of warrior monks (sohei) who fought in the temple's interest. Following, inside 1571 Enryakuji was razed by Oda Nobunaga as part of his campaign to unify Japan. Nobunaga regarded a Mt. Hiei monks when a likely threat or even competition, as it can uses religious claims to attempt to rally a public to their side. A temple complex wwhen in a future rebuilt, & continues to serve as the head temple of the Tendai school now.

See Also
Tiantai Buddhism, the Chinese sect that Tendai developed from Nichiren Buddhism, which developed the Tendai emphasis on the Lotus Sutra into a distinctive Japanese Buddhist school