Although Shimaji characterized original enlightenment thought as the “climax” of Buddhist philosophy in Japan and the “matrix” of the new Kamakura Buddhism, he perceived a moral danger in an idea that affirmed all activities of life as precisely the activities of the originally inherent Tathāgata. Tendai thought concerning an inherently enlightened Buddha, Shimaji said, had proceeded in two major directions: “One took form as the bright Kamakura Buddhism that purified original enlightenment thought, while the other sank to a naturalistic, corrupt thought and brought about the deterioration of the Buddhism of Mt. Hiei.” Elsewhere using “original enlightenment thought” in a very broad sense to encompass all the immanentalist forms of Buddhism that had developed in East Asia—Shimaji suggested that the notion of all things as inherently enlightened had encouraged an incorporation of non-Buddhist elements that inevitably brought about the destruction of Buddhism. In the case of Japan, he said, this process had fortunately been halted at the critical moment by the emergence of the new Kamakura movements, which “were able to remove the danger that inevitably accompanies original enlightenment thought, purify and actualize it, skillfully harmonizing it with the idea that enlightenment is acquired.” Scattered throughout Shimaji’s writings are indications that, despite his conviction of their philosophical indebtedness to Tendai hongaku thought, he considered the Kamakura thinkers superior in the areas of practice and ethics. In the case of Nichiren, for example, while judging that “the content of his doctrine scarcely differs from medieval Tendai thought,” Shimaji wrote that Nichiren had brought the vitality of faith to a medieval Tendai that had not transcended philosophical conceptualizing and introduced national concerns to an original enlightenment doctrine that had hitherto been concerned purely with individual salvation. (Page 64-65)