Editing Nichiren Buddhism (section)

==== 19th century: From Tokugawa to Meiji periods ====
Nichiren Buddhism was deeply influenced by the transition from the [[Edo period|Tokugawa]] (1600–1868) to [[Meiji period|Meiji]] (1868–1912) periods in nineteenth-century Japan. The changeover from early modern (''kinsei'') to modern (''kindai'') was marked by the transformation of late-feudal institutions into modern ones as well as the political transition from shogunal to imperial rule and the economic shift from national isolation to integration in the world economy.  This entailed creating a centralized state, stitching together some 260 feudal domains ruled by hereditary leaders (''daimyō''), and moving from a caste social system to a meritocracy based on educational achievement.  Although commonly perceived as a singular event called the [[Meiji Restoration]], the transition was full of twists and turns that began in the [[Bakumatsu|later Tokugawa years]] and continued decades after the 1867–1868 demise of the shogunate and launch of imperial rule.<ref>{{Cite book|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=I7b_AwAAQBAJ|title=Japan in Transition : From Tokugawa to Meiji.|last1=Jansen|first1=Marius B.|last2=Rozman|first2=Gilbert|author-link1=Marius Jansen|author-link2=Gilbert Rozman|chapter=Overview|date=2014|publisher=Princeton University Press|others=Marius B. Jansen and Gilbert Rozman|isbn=9781400854301|location=Princeton|oclc=884013523|access-date=1 March 2018|archive-date=20 February 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220220181013/https://books.google.com/books?id=I7b_AwAAQBAJ|url-status=live}}</ref>{{rp|3–4,14}}

By this time [[Buddhism in Japan|Japanese Buddhism]] was often characterized by [[syncretism]] in which local [[kami|nativistic]] worship was incorporated into Buddhist practice. For example, Tendai, Shingon, Jodō, and Nichiren temples often had chapels within them dedicated to [[Inari Ōkami|Inari]] Shinto worship.<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ybljDQAAQBAJ&q=hardacre+shinto|title=Shinto : a history|last=Hardacre|first=Helen|isbn=9780190621728|location=New York|oclc=947145263|date=2016-11-01|access-date=1 November 2020|archive-date=20 February 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220220181023/https://books.google.com/books?id=ybljDQAAQBAJ&q=hardacre+shinto|url-status=live}}</ref>{{rp|266}} Within Nichiren Buddhism there was a phenomenon of ''Hokke Shintō'' (Lotus Shinto), closely influenced by [[Yoshida Shintō]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://eos.kokugakuin.ac.jp/modules/xwords/entry.php?entryID=355|title=Hokke Shinto|website=Encyclopedia of Shinto|access-date=1 March 2018|archive-date=23 June 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180623060740/http://eos.kokugakuin.ac.jp/modules/xwords/entry.php?entryID=355|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|chapter=Hokke Shinto: Kami in the Nichiren tradition|last=Hardacre|first=Helen|publisher=Routledge|year=2003|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=dw9_ov-GxtQC&q=hokke+shinto&pg=PT267|title=Buddhas and Kami in Japan: Honji Suijaku as a Combinatory Paradigm|others=Fabio Rambelli, Mark Teeuwen (eds.)|pages=222–254|isbn=9781134431236|access-date=1 November 2020|archive-date=20 February 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220220181121/https://books.google.com/books?id=dw9_ov-GxtQC&q=hokke+shinto&pg=PT267|url-status=live}}</ref>

Anti-Buddhist sentiment had been building throughout the latter part of the Tokugawa period (1603–1868). Scholars such as [[Tominaga Nakamoto]] and [[Hirata Atsutane]] attacked the theoretical roots of Buddhism. Critics included promoters of Confucianism, nativism, Shinto-inspired Restorationists, and modernizers.  Buddhism was critiqued as a needless drain on public resources and also as an insidious foreign influence that had obscured the indigenous Japanese spirit.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.thezensite.com/ZenBookReviews/Of-Heretics_and_Martyrs.html|title=Zen Books Reviewed: Of Heretics and Martyrs in Meiji Japan: Buddhism and Its Persecution by James Edward Ketelaar|last=Stone|first=Jacqueline I.|website=The Zen Site|access-date=1 March 2018|archive-date=23 October 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111023154354/http://www.thezensite.com/ZenBookReviews/Of-Heretics_and_Martyrs.html|url-status=live}}</ref>

Under attack by two policies of the day, ''[[shinbutsu bunri]]'' (Separation of Shinto Deities and Buddhas) and ''[[haibutsu kishaku]]'' (Eradication of Buddhism), Japanese Buddhism during the Tokugawa-to-Meiji transition proved to be a crisis of survival. The new government promoted policies that reduced the material resources available to Buddhist temples and downgraded their role in the religious, political, and social life of the nation.<ref name=Collcutt2014>{{Cite book|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=I7b_AwAAQBAJ|title=Japan in Transition : From Tokugawa to Meiji.|last=Collcutt |first=Martin |chapter=Buddhism: The threat of eradication |date=2014|publisher=Princeton University Press|others=Marius B. Jansen and Gilbert Rozman |isbn=9781400854301|location=Princeton|oclc=884013523}}</ref>{{rp|143,153–156}}

The policies of ''shibutsu bunri'' were implemented at the local level throughout Japan but were particularly intense in three domains that were the most active in the Restoration: Satsuma, Choshii, and Tosa. In Satsuma, for example, by 1872 all of its 1000+ Buddhist temples had been abolished, their monks laicized, and their landholdings confiscated. Throughout the country thousands of Buddhist temples and, at a minimum, tens of thousands of Buddhist sutras, paintings, statues, temple bells and other ritual objects were destroyed, stolen, lost, or sold during the early years of the restoration.<ref name=Collcutt2014 />{{rp|157,160}}

Starting in the second decade of the restoration, pushback against these policies came from Western powers interested in providing a safe harbor for Christianity and Buddhist leaders who proposed an alliance of Shinto and Buddhism to resist Christianity. As part of this accommodation, Buddhist priests were forced to promote key teachings of Shinto and provide support for national policies.<ref name=Collcutt2014 />{{rp|98}}

Nichiren Buddhism, like the other Buddhist schools, struggled between accommodation and confrontation. The Nichiren scholar Udana-in Nichiki (1800–1859) argued for a policy of co-existence with other schools of Buddhism, Confucianism, Nativism, and European religions.<ref name=Stone1994 />{{rp|246–247}} His disciple Arai Nissatsu (1830–1888) forged an alliance of several Nichiren branches and became the first superintendent of the present [[Nichiren Shū]] which was incorporated in 1876. Nissatsu was active in Buddhist intersect cooperation to resist the government's hostile policies, adopted the government's "Great Teaching" policy that was Shinto-derived, and promoted intersectarian understanding. In the process, however, he reinterpreted some of Nichiren's important teachings.<ref name=Stone1994 />{{rp|248–249}} Among those arguing against accommodation were Nichiren scholar and lay believer Ogawa Taidō (1814–1878) and the cleric Honda Nisshō (1867–1931) of the [[Kempon Hokke]] denomination.<ref name=Stone1994 />{{rp|249–250}}

After the above events and centuries of splintering based on dogma and institutional histories, the following major Nichiren temple schools, according to Matsunaga, were officially recognized in the Meiji era:
* 1874: [[Nichiren-shū]] (formerly ''Minobu monryū'').  This school's headquarters was at [[Kuon-ji]] temple and held the ''Itchi'' perspective that advocated the equal treatment of all sections of the Lotus Sutra. However, it also included five schools that maintained the ''Shoretsu'' perspective which emphasized the latter half of the Lotus Sutra: Myōmanji, Happon, Honjōji, Honryūji, and Fuji-ha
* 1876: The Fuju-fuse-ha was recognized by the government after years of clandestine operation following episodes of persecution.  In 1882 a second ''Fuju-fuse'' sect was recognized, the Fuju-Fuse Kōmon-ha.
* 1891: The five ''Shoretsu'' schools changed their names
:Myōmanji-ha became [[Kempon Hokke]] based at Myōmanji, Kyoto
:Happon-ha became Honmon Hokkeshū based in Honjōji, Niigata
:Honjōji-ha became Hokkeshū based in Honryūji, Kyoto
:Honryūji-ha became Honmyō Hokkeshū, also based in Honryūji, Kyoto
:Fuji-ha became Honmonshū in Monmonji, [[Shizuoka Prefecture|Shizuoka]]
* 1900: The [[Taisekiji]] temple of Shizuoka broke off from the Honmonshū and became Nichirenshū Fuji-ha. In 1913, this group was renamed [[Nichiren Shōshū]] which was popularized by the [[Soka Gakkai]] lay organization.  Although the latter has a sizeable membership and it is one of the important [[Japanese new religions]] (''shinshūkyō''), it is not included in many treatments of Nichiren lineages.<ref name=Matsunaga1988 />{{rp|180–181}}