Jianzhen's Voyage to Japan

Jianzhen (688–763), born Chunyu, from Jiangyang County, Yangzhou, was a senior monk of Daming Temple in Yangzhou, expert in monastic discipline and also versed in medicine and architecture. In 742 the Japanese student monks Eiei and Fusho came to Yangzhou and begged Jianzhen to go to Japan to teach Buddhist precepts. Ignoring his disciples' warning that “the sea is vast and out of a hundred attempts, hardly one arrives”, he resolutely agreed. Over the next ten or so years he made five attempts, all of which failed through official obstruction, storms at sea or ships striking rocks. On the fifth, his ship drifted for fourteen days and was blown to Hainan Island; on the return journey Eiei died, and Jianzhen lost his sight from long travel, exhaustion and heat. Yet he did not waver. In 753 he sailed on a Japanese embassy ship for the sixth time and finally reached Japan in early 754, aged sixty-six. The journey had taken twelve years, and more than thirty of his companions died along the way. In Japan he was warmly welcomed by the emperor and the court, and at Todai-ji in Nara he set up an ordination platform to give precepts to the emperor, the empress and many monks. He later oversaw the building of Toshodai-ji, a temple in Tang style that is now a Japanese national treasure. Jianzhen lived in Japan for ten years; besides teaching monastic discipline he introduced Chinese medicine, literature, calligraphy, architecture, sculpture and painting, deeply influencing Japanese culture, and is honored as the founder of Japan's Ritsu school and the “father of medicine”. He died at Toshodai-ji in 763. In 1980 his seated statue came back to Daming Temple on a “home visit”, a celebrated moment in Sino-Japanese friendship.