How well this latter teaching is practised may be demonstrated when one goes into a Buddhist temple of the J[=o]-d[=o] sect in Japan, and hears the constant refrain,—­murmured by the score or more of listeners to the sermon, or swelling like the roar of the ocean’s waves, on festival days, when thousands sit on the mats beneath the fretted roof to enjoy the exposition of doctrine—­“Namu Amida Butsu”—­“Glory to the Eternal Buddha!"[3]

The apostolical succession or transmission through the patriarchs and apostles of India and China, is well known and clearly stated, withal duly accredited and embellished with signs and wonders, in the historical literature of the J[=o]-d[=o] sect.  In Buddhism, as in Christianity, the questions relating to True Churchism, High Churchism, the succession of the apostles, teachers and rulers, and the validity of this or that method of ordination, form a large part of the literature of controversy.  Nevertheless, as in the case of many a Christian sect which calls itself the only true church, the date of the organization of J[=o]-d[=o] was centuries later than that of the Founder and apostles of the original faith.  Five hundred years after Zen-d[=o] (A.D. 600-650), the great propagator of the J[=o]-d[=o] philosophy, H[=o]-nen, the founder of the J[=o]-d[=o] sect, was born; and this phase of organized Buddhism, like that of Shin Shu and Nichirer Shu, may be classed under the head of Eastern or Japanese Buddhism.

When only nine years of age, the boy afterward called H[=o]-nen, was converted by his father’s dying words.  He went to school in his native province, but his priest-teacher foreseeing his greatness, sent him to the monastery of Hiyeizan, near Ki[=o]to.  The boy’s letter of introduction contained only these words:  “I send you an image of the Bodhisattva, (Mon-ju) Manjusri.”  The boy shaved his head and received the precepts of the Ten-dai sect, but in his eighteenth year, waiving the prospect of obtaining the headship of the great denomination, he built a hut in the Black Ravine and there five times read through the five thousand volumes[4] of the Tripitaka.  He did this for the purpose of finding out, for the ordinary and ignorant people of the present day, how to escape from misery.  He studied Zen-d[=o]’s commentary, and repeated his examination eight times.  At last, he noticed a passage in it beginning with the words, “Chiefly remember or repeat the name of Amida with a whole and undivided heart.”  Then he at once understood the thought of Zen-d[=o], who taught in his work that whoever at any time practises to remember Buddha, or calls his name even but once, will gain the right effect of going to be born in the Pure Land after death.  This Japanese student then abandoned all sorts of practices which he had hitherto followed for years, and began to repeat the name of Amida Buddha sixty thousand times a day.  This event occurred in A.D. 1175.

H[=o]-nen, Founder of the Pure Land Sect.