{Inter} Cultural Japan

Enryakuji is huge. Its buildings fill a whole mountain, its presence dominates the history of Japanese Buddhism. The temple was founded as a simple meditation hut, but grew into a monastery with its own army. Set up to protect Kyoto from the evil direction of the northeast, it often brought destruction to temples with different ideas. Growing in the sacred atmosphere of the high mountain, it firmly put down roots into the dust of the world. The temple’s worldly power was finally broken by Nobunaga in 1571. The whole temple complex was destroyed and countless art treasures were lost. But this was for the better, because it allowed Enryakuji to concentrate again on its Buddhist message alone.

From the beginning, Enryakuji was first and for all a center of scholarship. It brought forth a long line of famous priests and thinkers, like Ennin, Enchin, Ryogen and Gensho. It also acted as the incubation center for all new Kamakura sects. Honen, Shinran, Eisai, Dogen and Nichiran all studied on Mt. Hiei, before discovering their own direction. The Light of the Law, symbolically kept burning in a lantern in Enryakuji’s main hall, has been shining through the ages.

I visit Enryakuji when the summer is still at its height. When I walk from the JR station in Sakamoto to the cable car, the afternoon heat is so intense that it almost crushes me. The street leading to the mountain and the Hiyoshi Shrine standing at its foot is deserted. So is the old cable car that faithfully hauls me up the mountain. Through the trees, Lake Biwa appears, and then falls away again. Ten minutes later, with relief I stand on the mountain and breathe the much cooler air.

Enryakuji consists of three precincts: the Toto or Eastern Precinct, where the main temple stands; the Saito or Western Precinct; and the Yokawa area, which is four kilometers further north. First I check-in at the Enryakuji Kaikan, the temple quarters where I plan to stay the night. On the way there, I pass through the Eastern Precinct and find it full of pilgrims and tourists. They have been hauled up the mountain by the busload and stand in throngs around the massive Konponchudo, Enryakuji’s Main Hall, and the Daikodo or Great Lecture Hall. I find a quiet refuge in the temple’s museum, which is almost deserted. That is a shame: the two floors of the treasure house contain a beautiful collection of Buddhist sculpture, paintings, calligraphy and ritual implements.

Lighting the Lamp
When I come out of the museum, the afternoon is already advanced and as I plan to visit the Main Hall in the Eastern Precinct the next day for early morning services, I end the day by walking to the Western Precinct. This is a quiet part of the temple, too, and the half hour walk leads me through a deep forest. On the way I pass the Amida Hall where also the grave of Saicho is. This is closed to visitors, but walking alone under the towering cedars of the mountain, I feel closer to Saicho than in the noisy Eastern Precinct. On portraits Saicho (767-822) looks small and frail. He was a scholar, by nature suited to the study and meditation that form the core of Tendai. Saicho was fond of books and set up a large library on Mt. Hiei, copying all sutras and other books he could lay his hands on.

Central in Tendai Buddhism is the study of the Lotus Sutra of the Wonderful Law, which was first translated into Chinese in the third century. Three-hundred years later the Chinese monk Zhiyi founded a monastery on Mount Tiantai in southeastern China, where he taught his interpretation of the sutra. This was the start of a new school, named after the mountain. Zhiyi organized all other sutras into various levels of teaching revealed by the Buddha and placed the Lotus Sutra at the top as the unifying framework of Buddhist doctrine. This synthesis of all Buddhist schools and their writings made Tendai Buddhism a broad stream, wherein all rivers flowed together. It must certainly have appealed to library-builder Saicho - Tendai Buddhism helped him organize his book collection and the knowledge in his head.

Another fundamental Mahayana teaching emphasized in Tendai Buddhism is that of emptiness. All things are impermanent and therefore void, without essential reality. This is the major theme of Japanese Buddhism in general, and it is most succinctly expressed in the short Hannya Shingyo Sutra. Tendai Buddhism also emphasized the need for meditation, another practice that must have been congenial to Saicho in the quiet mountain atmosphere.

After in 785 setting up the first temple, perhaps not more than a meditation hut, Saicho stayed for more than twelve years on Mt. Hiei. In the meantime, the new capital Heiankyo had been established at the foot of the mountain. Saicho gradually created a small monastic community by attracting disciples and lay patrons. Importantly, one of these patrons was Emperor Kammu, who perhaps sponsored this new school as a means to weaken the Nara temples. The link with the government gave Saicho in 804 the chance to join a Japanese mission to China. Such missions were sent with some regularity for diplomatic purposes, but also to have access to books, art, medicine and the latest technology from China. Saicho managed to visit Mt. Tiantai, collected many scriptures and, perhaps most importantly as the founder of a new school in Japan, received accreditation from a Chinese Tiantai master.

A Voice on the Mountain
Musing upon Saicho and Tendai Buddhism, I pass two square halls standing in a still spot in the woods. One of them is the Hokkedo or Lotus Sutra Hall, established for holding recitations and meditations on the Lotus Sutra. The other is the Jogyodo or Forever Walking Hall where monks circumambulate an Amida statue while chanting. This reminds me of the fact that Amidism, the Pure Land Buddhism of Honen and Shinran, also originated on Mt. Hiei. Suddenly I hear a loud voice chanting. The sound reverberates off the mountain and rings out over the valleys. It comes from a small cloister, where, before an open window stands a monk. After every phrase, he prostrates himself in what must be a strenuous exercise. Enryakuji’s discipline is strict, every monk is expected to follow in the footsteps of Saicho.

I reach the Shaka Hall just before it is closed for the day. This silent hall is the spiritual center of the Saito, the West Precinct and it enshrines a secret statue of the Buddha Sakyamuni. The hall stands in a quiet spot at the bottom of a valley and dates from the Kamakura period, but was brought from a rival temple at the foot of the mountain after Enryakuji’s destruction.

That night I sleep in a spartan tatami matted room in the rather functional guest house on the mountain. The building has no temple atmosphere, but the vegetarian meal it serves is excellent. From my room, I only see the forest, a green curtain which I do not have to close. I sleep well in the fresh and pure air.

Chanting of Emptiness
The next morning I wake up early to attend the service in the Konponchudo, the temple’s Main Hall and heart of Tendai Buddhism, standing on the site of Saicho’s original hermitage. The present hall dates from 1642 and is a good example of Edo-period “High-Church” architecture. At this early hour it is very quiet on the mountain, the only sound comes from the birds singing in the trees. In Tokyo, I never hear birds, so I feel all the more grateful for this beautiful morning. I enter the open doors of the hall, looking in awe at its huge copper roof with the curved gable over the entrance. Along the cloister, which encloses the hall, I walk to the back where the worship hall is. Here, I kneel in front of a wooden separation. There are almost no other visitors. Last night, at dinner in the guest house, there was only a Korean family, apparently from a temple in their own country, and they are already sitting here, too, intently listening to the chanting that rises up from the altar below.

As all Tendai main halls, the interior is split into an outer worship hall and inner hall with a deeply sunken floor on which stands the raised altar. The altar enshrines the statue of the Yakushi Buddha carved by Saicho, and here, too, this statue is hidden in a closed cabinet. The well below me is dark, but both the altar and the floor where I sit are lit. In other words, through the lattice I see the altar on eye level, but separated by a black gulf. This is the darkness of the world that keeps me apart from the Buddha. I am separated from him by an abyss that can only be bridged by the priests working in the dark space below.

Bells tinkle, incense wafts up to me. I peer in the dark, but only see vague shadows in the faltering candle light. It is better to close the eyes and concentrate on the rhythmical intonation of the Hannya Shingyo or Heart Sutra:

Form is emptiness, emptiness is form…
Sensations, perceptions, formations, and consciousness are also emptiness…
There is no birth and no cessation, no purity and no impurity, no decrease and no increase…
In emptiness there is no form, no sensation, no perception, no formation, no consciousness; no eye, no ear, no nose, no tongue, no body, no mind; no sight, no sound, no smell, no taste, no touch…
There is neither ignorance nor extinction of ignorance; neither old age and death, nor extinction of old age and death; no suffering, no origin of suffering, no cessation of suffering, no path, no wisdom, no attainment and no non-attainment…

Illuminating One Corner
After the service, I wander for a while in the grounds and pass the Kaidanin, or Ordination Hall. The present building dates from the 17th century and is a closed hall with bell-shaped windows. The present setting little speaks of how important it was for Saicho. It was Saicho’s greatest wish to establish his own Ordination Platform to break free from Nara Buddhism. Already in 818 Saicho asked the court for the authority to ordain monks based on the pure Mahayana precepts, but it took almost ten years before the opposition of the Nara sects, who held the sole right for the ordination of novices according to the Hinayana precepts, was broken. Saicho’s wish was only granted by the emperor after his death in 827. At that time the court also gave official recognition to the Tendai center on Mt. Hiei by renaming it “Enryakuji,” after the designation of the rule period of Emperor Kammu, who had been close to Saicho.

In the Konponchudo a symbolic lamp, originally lighted by Saicho, has been kept burning through the ages. It is the sacred light of Tendai Buddhism and although it only seems a small and simple flame, it is symbolic of a long tradition. Saicho promised the court that he would educate his monks to be ‘national treasures,’ people with the ability to illuminate their corner of society. “Illuminating One Corner” is also the slogan of modern Tendai Buddhism. I like to interpret it in my own way: it is enough for every human being to shed a little bit of light, in just a small corner. We do not have to light up the whole world, an impossible task that only leads to arrogance and disaster, it is sufficient to keep a small light burning in the darkness that surrounds us.

Sakamoto Honmachi Otsu-shi Shiga Pref.
Tel. 077-578-0001
The most scenic way is by cable car from Sakamoto. Take a JR train on the Kosei line to Hieizan-Sakamoto St or a Keihan train to Keihan Sakamoto St. Then walk towards the hills, to the cable car station (5 min from the Keihan St and 10 min from the JR St). The cable car whisks you in about 10 min up the mountain (there is a train every 30 min). From there, it is another 15 min to the temple. As an alternative, there is a 60-min bus from Kyoto St. There are 4 buses in the morning and 1 in the afternoon (slightly more buses leave from Keihan Sanjo St). In winter, however, there are only 2 buses. See the schedule on the Enryakuji website.
Festivals: March 13: Gomaku, Modern Service for World Peace in which Gomaki wooden planks are burned. In the Saito, in front of the Dengyo Daishi statue (10:00-15:00)
August 9-11: Light-up of Konponchudo (18:00-21:00). At 18:00 there is a shomyo servive in the Konponchudo; at 19:00 the lanterns are lighted.
Dec 31: Shusho-e, with Tsuina-shiki in which a demon symbolizing evil deeds is chased away (23:00). Followed by the ringing of the bell for the New Year.