The Concise Oxford Dictionary of World Religions (2465 page)

(Chin.,
t’ien-t’ai
). An academic school of Buddhism established in the 6th cent. CE, in China by
Chih-i
on T’ian-T’ai Shan (‘Heavenly Terrace Mountain’), and introduced to Japan in the 9th cent. by the Japanese monk
Saich
.
Sometimes called the Lotus school (i.e. Hokkesh
, from the Jap. for
Lotus S
tra
,
Hokekyo
), Tendai evolved as a distinctively Chinese interpretation of the enormous variety of Indian Buddhist
s
tras
available in Chinese translation by the 6th cent. Chih-i developed a comprehensive synthesis of this literature by arranging them chronologically into five periods of the
Buddha's
career, four methods of teaching, and four types of doctrine.
In 788 a Japanese Buddhist monk named
Saich
(Dengy
Daishi, 766–822) established a small temple NW of
Ky
to
on Mount Hiei. Saich
studied Tendai in China during the year 804, and after his return to Japan introduced it in his temple, Enryaku-ji, on Mount Hiei. With the emperor's approval he ordained 100 disciples in 807. The traditional Tendai synthesis of Buddhist teaching and practice was maintained by Saich
, but he also widened this tradition by introducing a number of doctrines and practices of the esoteric tradition of Buddhism, known in Japanese as
Shingon
or ‘True Word’, which was being taught by his contemporary
K
kai
on Mount K
ya. Later, especially under his successor
Ennin
, the esoteric tradition of Buddhism came to dominate Japanese Tendai even though Chinese T’ien-t’ai maintained its distance from it. A further synthesis of Japanese Tendai occurred when attempts were made to include Shinto beliefs and practices under the name
ichijitsu shint
(‘One-truth Shinto’).
The Tendai school is also of major historical importance since it was, because of its synthesis of the major forms of Buddhist teaching and practice, the source of the four 12th-cent. ‘Kamakura schools’ of Japanese Buddhism.
H
nen