Ohigashi schism

The Ohigashi schism (お東騒動) was a religious schism in the Ōtani-ha (also known as Higashi Honganji) subsect of the Jōdo Shinshū school of Buddhism that occurred in 1969 after a reformist group created internal divisions.

History

The Dobokai Movement (同朋会運動), a reform group within Higashi Honganji, officially began on the 700th memorial of Shinran in 1962, though its roots were in a movement started in 1947 by a group of practitioners calling themselves the shinjinsha "true person community".[1] The grass-roots reform group was led by Kurube Shin'yū. Akegarasu Haya, Soga Ryōjin, and other disciples of Kiyozawa Manshi were also closely involved.[2]

The goal of the Dobokai movement was to awaken and unite members of Higashi Honganji due to internal conflict over differences of doctrinal opinion such as over the idea of shinjin and whether the pure land was to be entered in death or in this life. The Dobokai movement based itself largely on the Tannishō, a collection of sayings attributed to Shinran with commentaries by Yuien-bo, one of his disciples, and the idea of cutting through spiritual differences.[1]

The movement split Higashi Honganji into four different groups. What is now known as the Higashi Honganji-ha is centered in Tokyo. The physical property of Higashi Honganji temple is run by the much-larger Ōtani-ha, which changed the temple's name to "Shinshū Mausoleum". Meanwhile, the treasure of Higashi Honganji-ha at the time, amounting to about $200 million in donations, was seized for use by a "nonprofit organization" which does not maintain any temples. In 2012 a court ruled that this money must be returned.

References

Notes

  1. Popular Buddhism In Japan: Shin Buddhist Religion & Culture by Esben Andreasen, pp. 26, 69-73 / University of Hawaii Press 1998, ISBN 0-8248-2028-2
  2. Higashi Honganji sanjūnen funsō 東本願寺三十年紛争 by Tahara Yukio 田原由紀雄, pp. 37-41 / Hakubasha 2004, INBN978-4-938651-51-0

Bibliography

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