TENDAI BUDDHISM

Tendai is a Japanese school of Mahayana Buddhism, a descendant of the Chinese Tiantai or Lotus Sutra school.  In time, it became the dominant form of mainstream Buddhism in Japan, and gave rise to most of the developments in later Japanese Buddhism.

Nichiren, Hōnen, Shinran, and Dōgen, all famous thinkers in non-Tendai schools, were all initially trained as Tendai monks.  Japanese Buddhism was dominated by the Tendai school to a much greater degree than Chinese Buddhism was by its forbearer, the Tiantai.

Tendai has been a syncretistic movement, embracing other Buddhist schools, from Vinaya to Shingon and Zen, as well as Shinto, the indigenous Japanese tradition.  Its distinctive focus, though, continues to be the teachings of the Lotus Sutra.  

The Lotus Sutra teaches the way to salvation, meaning the attaining of buddhahood.  It presents itself as the true and complete teaching of the Buddha, who is described as more of a cosmic being than an historical figure.  The Buddha of the Lotus Sutra is "a transcendent, eternal being, preaching to myriad arhats (saints), gods, bodhisattvas (buddhas-to-be), and other figures using all sorts of sermons, lectures, imaginative parables, and miracles."

Tendai's influence in Japan is pervasive and powerful to this day, though its lay membership is not so great as is that of some of the other Buddhist sects.