Shinran 1173 – 1263
Shinran was a Japanese Buddhist monk and the founder of the Jodo Shinshu, or True Pure Land, school. A student of the earlier Pure Land master Honen, he was exiled with him during a period of imperial persecution and used the time of exile to deepen and radicalize his teaching. Against any reliance on monastic discipline or self-cultivation, he taught that human beings in the present age are utterly incapable of saving themselves and that liberation is received entirely as the gift of Amida Buddha's compassion, accepted in the simple recitation of the nembutsu. His thought has shaped one of the largest branches of Japanese Buddhism.
Key facts
- Nationality
- Japanese
- Era
- Medieval
- Movements
- Buddhism
Selected quotes
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Attributed to Shinran:
“Faith alone is the cause of birth in the Pure Land.”
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Attributed to Shinran:
“I am a being of total karmic evil, yet I am saved by the boundless compassion of Amida.”
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Attributed to Shinran:
“If even a good person can be born into the Pure Land, how much more so an evil person.”
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Attributed to Shinran:
“When I consider deeply the Vow of Amida, I find it was for myself alone.”
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Attributed to Shinran:
“The light of Amida illuminates the heart that becomes aware of itself.”