This year marks the 1,200th anniversary of the founding of the Buddhist Tendai sect in Japan, when Priest Saicho (767-822), posthumously known as Dengyo Daishi, received court permission to establish a school of religious study and training at Enryaku-ji Temple on Mount Hie to the northeast of Kyoto.
The purpose of the center was to train spiritual leaders, since -- according to Saicho's book "Essential Teachings for the Priests of the Tendai Hokke Sect" -- "one who can illuminate even one corner in the world . . . is a National Treasure."
In commemoration, a major exhibition, "Faith and Syncretism: Saicho and Treasures of Tendai," is at the Tokyo National Museum till May 7, showing sculptures, paintings, calligraphy and other religious objects selected mainly from temples throughout the country.