June is an important month because we together celebrate all fathers and fatherhood on June 16th. The Sunday service will be all music that will entertain us in sharing the joy of being presence together. Don’t miss out the delicious lunch prepared by the Board Members.

Everyone has a father, father-in-law, grandfathers, and someone like providing you with fatherhood. Thinking about the fatherhood, Keely Chase says in the Hallmark site, “A dad has arms to lift high, a heart to love, shoulders to support, a smile to reassure, a hand of blessing to send you out into the world, a warm embrace to welcome you back home.” That is very nice.

My father departed to the Great Nirvana twenty years ago. We lived together for 22 years until I left Japan. I still remember on the day when I left Japan over forty years ago, he told me, “Come home any time if you have any troubles. I will always welcome you back no matter what the reason will be.” I appreciated my father’s deep love to think about me as an only child. When I heard his sudden passing, I felt so sorry and guilty that I could not be with him at his last moment. As soon as the sad news came, I flew to Kansai airport from LAX that took almost twelve hours, but I felt it was the longest flight that I had ever had. I was in tears all the way to my hometown in remembering my father, many memories came out just like a scene from a movie. After the funeral and inurnment services, I returned to California. Looking at his photos, I felt so much grateful to my father who loved and cared me even sacrificing himself. At the same time, facing his death, I felt like having a new dialogue with my father. It was a completely different perspective to see my father as a human and his fatherhood.

The parent-child relationship is special. With the various karmic conditions, the relationship is established. It is in the relationship of interdependency. I need my parents to be a child, vice versa, my parents need me to be called a father and mother. It means I and my parents are the same age since we established the parent-child relationship. We hope the relationship is understandable, caring, and compassionate, but sometimes a hard decision is required.

Our founder Shinran Shōnin was a father of several children. Marriage was forbidden in the Buddhist monk precept, but Shinran publicly married Eshinni. There were many Buddhist monks who secretly married and had family, but Shinran was different and he was honest. Because he loved and respect Eshinni who shared the same spiritual path with him. With his marriage, the Shin Dharma was carried on by the blood lineage, while Zen school delivers by the Dharm lineage in the relationship of a master and student. Shinran and Eshinni started the family Buddhism where the Dharma is shared in everyday life with family members, friends, and neighbors, rather than in the monastic environment.

After Shinran left the Kanto area (Ibaragi prefecture) for his hometown Kyoto at the age of 60’s, the disturbance arose among his followers who were radical nembutsu proponents. Those were advocating licensed evil that is indulgence in wrongdoing because birth in Pure Land seems assured. This kind of wrong understanding dominated certain Kanto congregation and began to stigmatize Shinran’s teaching at that time. Shinran attempted to communicate his views in letters to Kanto followers and in conversations with those who visited him in Kyoto. However, staying so far away, Shinran finally decided to dispatch Zenran, one of his sons, to act in his behalf in the Kanto area. Zenran was in the early 40’s and tried to handle the difficult situation with senior followers and local civil authorities. However, the situation was getting worse and worse, and eventually it got out of Zenran’s hands. Zenran finally began to claim that his father Shinran had imparted secret teachings at night to him alone. Zenran wanted to have attention and allegiance from the Kanto followers. The news of Zenran’s wrong activities arrived in Kyoto and Shinran disowned Zenran in 1256 with a broken heart when Shinran was 83 years old. It must have been a hard decision for Shinran, but he had no choice in order to protect the teaching of Pure Land way and convince his followers of his determination to rectify Zenran’s false claims. This may appear a strict aspect of Shinran’s fatherhood.

Other disownments happened later on in the Shin history. Kakunyo (1270-1351), the 3rd generation, disowned his oldest son Zonkaku (1290-1373) twice in his life. Kakunyo named the Hongwanji temple and organized the institution. While Kakunyo was working hard to unite the Shin followers, Zonkaku, by contrast, maintained a close relationship with the mainstream Buddhist schools and with other Pure Land groups, and he tended to express Shinran’s ideas in the context of the boarder Pure Land movement. Ultimately, Kakunyo’s concerns were directed inwardly toward the definition of Shinran’s teaching and the consolidation of the Hongwanji organization. Zonkaku’s, on the other hand, were directed outwardly toward the unity of all Pure Land believers and the furtherance of the Pure Land teachings in general. With the main reason, In 1322 Kakunyo formally broke ties with Zonkaku. He never appointed his oldest son as his successor. After a few years, Kakunyo and Zonkaku mended the relationship, however unfortunately they broke up again. It seems clearly their focuses are different that causes the unfortunate disownment.

The last story about the 11th generation Kennyo (1543-1592) and his oldest son Kyōnyo (1558-1614) and the youngest son Junnyo (1577-1631). The location of the Ishiyama Hongwanji was strategically ideal for Nobunaga Oda to make it a stronghold for thrusting his power against the western part of Japan which was ruled by the Mori clan during the Warring Period (1462-1615). Nobunaga demanded the Hongwanji to retreat from Ishiyama. Kennyo did not give up Ishiyama and persisted against Nobunaga in 1570, which lasted almost ten years. The Imperial Court persuaded the Hongwanji and both parties agreed on the conditions of peace settlement. Hongwanji retreat from Ishiyama, and Kennyo moved to Wakayama in 1580. However, Kennyo’s first son Kyōnyo was discontented with his father, and insisted to stay at Ishiyama against Nobunaga for about one month, which made Kennyo upset and disown Kyōnyo. Ishiyama Hongwanji was burned down right after Kyōnyo left.

After Nobunaga’s sudden death by assassination in 1582, his successor Hideyoshi Toyotomi became the next powerful lord. Hideyoshi donated a piece of land in Kyoto (current location) to the Hongwanji in 1591, and the youngest son Junnyo succeeded his father Kennyo and became the 12th spiritual head, while Kyōnyo received a land from Iyeyasu Tokugawa and became the first spiritual head of the Ōtani (Higashi) Honganji. Since then, the founder Shinran’s Hongwanji became spirit into two entities of the Nishi (west) Hongwanji and Higashi (east) Honganji in Kyoto.

Celebrating the Shin Buddhist 800-years history, we appreciate its religious richness. Shinran, Kakunyo, and Kennyo made a hard decision to protect the Hongwanji from other Buddhist schools and political power.

Namo Amida Butsu

Rev. Dr. Mutsumi Wondra

Disownment and Succession in the Shin History

OCBC

Disownment and Succession in the Shin History

Korin - July 2024

Living a Lesson

OCBC