their willingness or capacity to actually practice med-
itation. But it is also true that many Buddhists see med-
itation as a value in itself, as an ideal that may be
difficult to achieve, too difficult for most of us, but
nevertheless as a spiritual discipline that represents the
highest accomplishment that a human being is capa-
ble of achieving. A Buddhist expressing this second
view of meditation can also consider meditation as es-
sentially a practice, something to be done or accom-
plished, and therefore, as something that is not merely
a belief or an ideal.
See also:Bodhi (Awakening); Chan School; Nenbutsu
(Chinese, Nianfo; Korean, Yo ̆mbul); Psychology;
Vipassana(Sanskrit, Vipas ́yana); Yogacara School
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LUISO. GO ́MEZ
MEIJI BUDDHIST REFORM
The collapse of the Tokugawa regime and the wave of
changes accompanying the restoration of imperial rule
and the formation of a new government at the start of
the Meiji period (1868–1912) stimulated directly and
indirectly numerous significant changes in Japanese
Buddhism. The harsh critiques of Buddhism by Con-
fucians, Nativists, and Shintoists during the waning
years of the Tokugawa period (1600–1868) and at the
start of Meiji culminated in the state-mandated sepa-
MEIJIBUDDHISTREFORM