Such studies were pioneered by the Nichiren Shū scholar Asai Yōrin (1883-1942), who aimed at recovering a “pure” Nichiren doctrine based on “scientific” investigation of the canon and the identification and elimination of apocryphal texts. Asai’s findings, which he began to publish in the 1930s, were startling and revisionist. He pointed out that, of the works traditionally attributed to Nichiren that deal with original enlightenment thought, most do not exist in Nichiren’s autograph or in transcriptions made by his immediate disciples, nor do they appear in the earliest indices of his writings. Moreover, they employ terminology and concepts that, while common to medieval Tendai oral transmission texts, appear only infrequently or not at all in those of Nichiren’s writings whose authenticity can be verified. Maeda, Shimaji, and Uesugi were in error, Asai declared, because they had assumed that the essence of Nichiren’s doctrine was expressed by writings in his corpus reflecting the influence of medieval Tendai hongaku thought. In fact, Asai argued, these writings were not Nichiren’s work at all but the forgeries of later disciples who, influenced by their study on Mt. Hiei or at Tendai seminaries in eastern Japan, had incorporated hongaku thought into their understanding of Nichiren’s teaching. Even if some of these texts should conceivably be Nichiren’s writings, they did not represent his “primary thought,” as expressed in his two major treatises, which Asai held should be normative: the Kaimoku shō (Opening of the eyes) and the Kanjin honzon shō (The contemplation of the mind and the object of worship). While presenting itself as objective and scientific, Asai’s argument proved a timely and effective weapon in defending Nichiren against the charge of being derivative of medieval Tendai. (Page 68-70)