Buddhism in Japan

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  • Created by: gemshort
  • Created on: 29-05-18 19:20

Japanese Buddhism is unique and characterised by its extensive secularisation

  • Apart from the Pure Land school, it is not concerned with escape from samsara or with transcendental states and realities; it focuses more on this-worldly questions, on the importance of finding oneself and realising enlightenment here and now
  • Japan developed a unique form of Buddhist clergy, which is highly secularised
    • The largest sect, True Pure Land, abandoned monastic celibacy altogether and created a priesthood, whose priests can marry, take paid jobs and will pass responsibility for their temples from father to son
  • As part of modernisation, in the late 19th century, the emperor decreed that monks could marry

There are three features that make Japanese Buddhism

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