Beginning today and running through April 28, I’ll be publishing quotes taken from “The Collected Teachings of the Tendai Lotus School,” which was written by Gishin in 830 CE and translated from the Japanese by Paul L. Swanson. The book was published as part of the BDK English Tripiṭaka (97-II) in 1995. (PDF)

Having read Swanson’s Foundations of T’ien-T’ai Philosophy and Haiyan Shen’s The Profound Meaning of the Lotus Sutra: Tien-tai Philosophy of Buddhism and Paul Groner’s Saicho : The Establishment of the Japanese Tendai School, I have a dilettante’s understanding of the basics of the teachings of Chih-i, a Chinese monk who lived in the 6th century CE and wrote extensively on the structure and ideas of the Lotus Sūtra. And having had that introduction I found Gishin’s explanation of the Tendai teachings an excellent summary.

Nichiren’s teachings draw extensively from Tendai and Chih-i, but I’m not confident in my understanding of where Nichiren’s teachings diverge. That has led me to wonder whether there is a reason why  Nichiren Shu appears to have ignored Gishin’s text and instead embraced the work of Korean monk Chegwan, who wrote “A Guide to the Tiantai Fourfold Teachings” in the late 10th century. (See History and Teachings of Nichiren Buddhism, p 99.)

I asked Rev. Ryuei McCormick whether there is a specific issue with Gishin’s work that troubles Nichiren Shu, and he replied:

This is a question I have also asked and not received a satisfactory answer from anyone. I can’t remember who replied to me but the answer from a Nichiren Shu priest was basically that Chegwan’s book wasn’t tainted by the Tendai esoteric associations. But as Paul Swanson points out, neither is the book by Gishin. So I can only shrug. I have certainly found nothing in Gishin’s book that would go against Nichiren’s teachings. Frankly, I think Chegwan and Gishin’s books are very complimentary.

I will return to the question of how Nichiren’s teaching departs from  Tendai and Chih-i on April 29 after I’ve finished publishing the selected quotes from Gishin’s “The Collected Teachings of the Tendai Lotus School.”