OF CHRISTIANITY UPON OTHER RELIGIOUS SYSTEMS. 39 



In Japan, although all sects of Buddhists are Pantheists in 

 theory, yet in the " Pure Land " sects there are many resem- 

 blances to Christian doctrine.* The belief that Salvation — i.e., 

 deliverance from transmigration, or, more properly, the chain 

 of karma — may be obtained by devotion to and trust in 

 Amitabha (or, as he is usually called, Amida) Buddha is, no 

 doubt, the old Hindu doctrine of hhakti, but it has developed in 

 Japan as in India, under Christian influence. The Jo-do sect 

 recognise Amida as the only Saviour, yet they also worship 

 Kwan-non (the Chinese goddess Kwan-yin) and various Buddhas. 

 A reformed sect entitled Shin Shu, founded by Shinran, who 

 died in a.d. 1262, make Amida their sole object of worship, and 

 in this sense are Monotheists. 



A recent writerf says that the Pure Land sects (i.e., the Jo-do 

 and the Shin Shu) bear in many points of doctrine an obvious 

 likeness to Christianity. " The virtual Monotheism, especially 

 of the Shin Shu ; the emphasis on man's inability to achieve 

 salvation by his own powers ; his dependence on the power of 

 another ; the infinite compassion of Amida, who before innumer- 

 able ages provided this way by which even the weakest and the 

 most ignorant and the greatest fsinners may be saved ; faith in 

 Amida's gracious purpose to save all as the essence of religion ; 

 gratitude as the spring at once of piety and morality — such are 

 the salient points of comparison. To not a few students it has 

 seemed that a teaching so widely at variance, not only with 

 primitive Indian Buddhism, but with its later developments, 

 and so closely akin to Christianity, not in certain isolated 

 features, but in a whole complex of fundamental ideas, can only 

 be explained by Christian influence." 



But here we should remember that the worship, love and 

 devotion are given to a being that never existed, instead of to 

 our Lord Jesus Christ ; that the salvation aimed at is deliver- 

 ance not from sin, but from transmigration ; and that we should 

 guard against the danger of reading Christian meanings into 

 Buddhist phraseology. 



Christianity has recently exercised an immense influence 

 upon Japanese life and customs in general, quite apart from its 

 doctrinal effect upon Buddhism and Shintoism. Hence a great 

 change has come over the scene since Professor Chamberlain 

 wrotej : " 'Not the loosest of European viveurs, not the lewdest 



Dr. Grifiis, Religions of Japan. 

 t Moore, vol. i, pp. 135,' 136. 



X Quoted by Otis Gary, Japan and its Regeneration, p. 28. 



