Page:Things Japanese (1905).djvu/90

78 temple existing on the soil of Japan. A pestilence, which shortly broke out, was attributed by the partisans of the old religion to this foreign innovation. The temple was razed to the ground; but such dire calamities followed on this act of sacrilege that it was soon allowed to be rebuilt. Buddhist monks and nuns then flocked over from Korea in ever-increasing numbers. Shōtoku Taishi, who was prince regent under the Empress Suiko from A.D. 593 to 621, himself attained almost to the rank of Buddhist saintship; and from that time forward the new religion became established as the chief religion of the land, though Shintō was never entirely suppressed. All education was for centuries in Buddhist hands, as was the care of the poor and sick; Buddhism introduced art, introduced medicine, moulded the folk-lore of the country, created its dramatic poetry, deeply influenced politics and every sphere of social and intellectual activity. In a word, Buddhism was the teacher under whose instruction the Japanese nation grew up. As a nation, they are now grossly forgetful of this fact. Ask an educated Japanese a question about Buddhism, and ten to one he will smile in your face,—a hundred to one that he knows nothing about the subject, and glories in his nescience.

Chinese and Korean Buddhism was already broken up into numerous sects and sub-sects when it reached Japan,—sects, too, all of which had come to differ very widely in their teaching from that of the purer, simpler Southern Buddhism of Ceylon and Siam. Japanese Buddhism follows what is termed the "Greater Vehicle" (Sanskrit Mahâyâna, Jap. Daijō), which contains many unwarranted accretions to the original teaching of the Buddha. The most powerful sects now existing in japan are the Tendai, Shingon, Jōdo, and Zen, which are of Chinese origin, the Shin (also called Ikkō or Monto), and the Nichiren or Hokke, both native Japanese