BUDDHISM IN JAPAN 243to the beauties of nature were two sides of a single faculty. Because the leader
of an uji was expected to be especially sensitive to the charisma of the kami,
he/ she was expected to have a highly developed aesthetic sense as well. Artis-
tic sensitivities, and the disciplines that fostered them, were thus regarded as
credentials for leadership, which explains the eagerness with which warriors
and others in high positions of power have tried to establish their reputations
as sensitive aesthetes in order to validate their rule. As the various forms of
Buddhism came to Japan, the aristocracy was especially attuned to the style of
each form, and took it for granted that one could intuit the essential message
of the teaching by intuiting its style, much as one could intuit the character of
another person through the aesthetic appreciation of an object that the person
had made. Thus each school ofBuddhism became associated with a particular
style: Shingon was sumptuous, Tendai and Zen were spare and vigorous. These
styles had a strong influence on Japanese arts and crafts. Particular skills, such
as the tea ceremony and the training of warriors, adopted the Zen style and
were pursued as "ways," (do or to, from Chinese tao), similar to the ways of
Buddhism (Butsudo) and Shinto.
The cult of charisma came to surround these aesthetic disciplines so
strongly that the belief arose that the discipline of the craft or skill enabled one
to develop one's spirit to the same pitch of sensitivity that one could achieve
through overt religious training. At its best, this fusion of aesthetic and reli-
gious faculties fostered the realization that all one's activities reflected the
depths of one's mind, and that one should give oneself with total sincerity to
one's present activities, however minor, for the sake of one's spiritual develop-
ment. At its worst, this attitude trivialized religious life into sentimentality and
the pursuit of ever-heightened sophistication in sensual beauty. In either event,
this fusion of aesthetic and religious faculties was one of the Japanese nation's
primary contributions to the Buddhist tradition.
10.2 The Importation of Korean Buddhism
Buddhism was probably first brought to Japan by Korean immigrants who set-
tled in the Asuka-Nara area of central Japan. The first recorded contact on the
royal level, however, was in 552, when King Syong-myong of Paekche sent
Buddhist statues and Sutras to the Japanese imperial court, motivated in part
by hopes of forging an alliance with the Japanese against his Silla rivals. The
Korean case for Buddhism was that the Triple Gem functioned as a very high
level of universal kami. If worshiped, it would safeguard the nation. Thus,
from the very beginning the Japanese regarded Buddhism as a political force,
centered in Buddha-images, and soon embroiled it in political controversies.
The ambitious Soga clan, descended from Korean immigrants, championed
the Buddhist cause and obtained the right to build a temple to house a Bud-
dha-image, at the same time arranging to have the first Japanese monks and
nuns ordained. When a plague then broke out, anti-Soga forces claimed that