^213:1 It is said of Eon that he was so strict in his observance of discipline that when, on his deathbed, he was ordered to take honey, he first set his pupils to find out whether the Buddhist rule permitted it. While they were still examining, he died. Once he broke his rule of retirement by mistake, being so engrossed in conversation that he inadvertently went outside the bounds of his hermitage. This is a favourite theme for artists. We may here mention another theme, frequently found in Buddhist pictures, which may be called the "Narrow Way." A pilgrim, pursued by wild beasts, demons, and evil spirits, arrives at the edge of a precipice. In front of him are two lakes, the one of water, filled with sharks and other monsters of the deep, the other of fire and peopled with devils. Between the two is a very narrow strip of precipitous rock, necessitating the wariest of walking, the first false step meaning instant destruction on the one side or the other. It is dark; but on the other side of the narrow pathway stands Amida, who has accomplished salvation. A ray of light issues from him, and the legend above him is Namu Amide Butsu, which Zendo taught men to translate "Trust ME, for I will save you"--the meaning of the word Jesus, but not that of the Buddhist legend.

^214:1 The Chow [circ. 560) were a northern Kingdom, a rival, of the Wei, whose territories and powers they gradually usurped.

^214:2 Donran died in 533. Like all the Amidaists, he was not a pure Chinaman, but a subject of one of the small northern kingdoms. Wu-ti, of the Liang, circ. A.D. 528, was a great admirer of Donran's. It is interesting to note that shortly after Donran's death, within the lifetime both of Doshaku and Zendo, an attempt was made (the forerunner of the Ryobu Shinto in Japan) to amalgamate Buddhism with Taoism). I quote it to show that this was an age of syncretic aspirations, Donran may almost have been a contemporary of Vasubhandhu. Some trace of the tendency to make common cause with Taoism may be perhaps found in the syllable Do () in the assumed names of Doan, or Doshaku. Donran was certainly a Taoist before becoming a Buddhist. The Do in Zendo's name is slightly different (), as though to emphasize some new principle that had come into his teaching.

^215:1 Tada, "Shoshinge Kowa," p. 349.

^215:2 This is Mr. Murakami's division in Bukkyo Hyakkwa Hoten. But there are other disciples of Zendo in Japan, who do not trace their descent through Genku and Shinran, notably the Yudzunembutsu and Ji sects, concerning whom a note will be given later on in this chapter.

^215:3 Murakami, "Bukkyo Hyakkwa Hoten," p. 493.

^216:1 P. Gaubil, "Mem. des Chinois," vol. xv. p. 399.