This study focuses on the twelfth-century Buddhist monk Jōkei (1155–1213) of the Hossō school. Jōkei's life spans the dawn of the Japanese medieval era and perhaps the most momentous period in the development of contemporary Japanese Buddhism. Despite being widely recognized as one of the most prominent monks during this important transitional period, Jōkei has been seriously neglected by Japanese scholars and largely ignored by Western scholars. Studies of Kamakura Buddhism have tended to focus on the founders of the new sects that emerged during this period (e.g., Pure Land, Zen, etc.). Meanwhile, the established schools of Buddhism, still dominant centuries later, have often been ignored or seriously misrepresented. This study is meant to recover one prominent voice of the established schools.
Chapter one provides a general biographical overview and highlights important social and political events relevant to Jōkei's life.
Chapter two examines Jōkei's Hossō doctrinal heritage and his innovative efforts to adapt Hossō doctrine to the dominant views of his day. Jōkei has not been fully recognized as one of the first innovators of Hossō doctrine who attempted to reconcile long-standing disputes between Hossō and the other established schools, especially Tendai.
Chapter three examines Jōkei's life of devotion and practice in all its color and diversity. Here, Jōkei provides a striking contrast to the exclusive, single-practice tendencies of the “new” Kamakura founders. This chapter argues that Jōkei's pluralistic conception of practice is grounded in his Hossō heritage, the broader Buddhist tradition, and the importance of “place” in Japanese religious devotion.
Chapter four explores the well-known, but under-analyzed, dispute between Jōkei and Hōnen Jōkei's petition to the Court ( Kōfukuji sōjō) to suppress Hōnen's senju-nembutsu movement is often reductively interpreted or dismissed as a “politically motivated” attack. This chapter contends that Jōkei offers very substantive doctrinal arguments in this critique of Hōnen.
Finally, Chapter five reexamines the dominant interpretations of “Kamakura” Buddhism in light of this close study of Jōkei. It attempts to provide a few fundamental correctives to the “new-Buddhism-centric” analyses that tend to dictate most interpretations.
In summary, this study contends that there are important similarities and differences between Jōkei and the “new” Kamakura Buddhist movement. For example, Jōkei appears quite progressive in his innovative doctrinal efforts, his “reclusive” move beyond the institution, and his emphasis on the soteriological necessity for some “other” power. But Jōkei also retains fundamental and conservative aspects of the broader Buddhist tradition in his emphasis on the importance of causality and his “inclusive” understanding of devotion and practice. In the end, Jōkei reminds us that something important was being lost in the radical and exclusive teachings of some of the “new” Kamakura founders.
