Mountain Buddhism and the emergence of a Buddhist cosmic imaginary in ancient Japan

Abstract

This article attempts to clarify the emergence of a Buddhist “cosmic imaginary,” or a generally shared understanding of the natural world, in early Heian Japan. Through examination of poems preserved in the 751 Kaifūsō and the 759 Man’yōshū, it shows how this cosmic imaginary first took shape as an inflection of prevailing Confucian and Daoist ways of understanding the natural world among monks and poets who pursued the Buddhist teachings in the mountains. It then situates the introduction of Tendai and Shingon Buddhism in the early ninth century by Saichō and Kūkai, respectively, in the context of this trend toward mountain practice. Based on analysis of Saichō’s and Kūkai’s poetical and doctrinal writings, the argument is made that the teachings and practices of their new schools reconfigured the cosmic imaginaries of the Nara period and thus effected a transformation of the way people in Japan understood and imagined their world.