Mugai Nyodai 無外如大 (1223–1298) became a nun when Rinzai Zen was just being introduced into Japan in the thirteenth century. Born within imperial circles, possibly to the Saionji family, she most likely trained, along with other members of the imperial court, under the monk Enni 円爾 (Shōichi Kokushi聖一国師; 1202–1280), who founded Tōfukuji in Kyoto after returning from China where he had studied under the eminant priest Wujun Shifan無準師範 (1178–1249).[1]
By 1277, when Nyodai was fifty-five (by Japanese count), her reputation as a nun with notable “guiding wisdom” gained her a land grant for building a convent. The Rihō kishinjō an (Rihō Land Donation Letter) dated to the twenty-ninth day of the eighth month of Kenji 3 (1277) stipulates a location in Kyoto at the intersection of Itsutsuji and Ōmiya streets (which corresponds to the location of the former palace of Emperor Gosaga), with the purpose to generate prayers for the imperial family. The “Riho” who issued this land grant is said to be the Buddhist name of Imabayashi Jugō Fujiwara Sadako (1196–1302), a consort of Saionji Saneuji (1194–1269) and the mother of two imperial princesses who married emperors. The wording of her land grant suggests Nyodai was a close relative of Imabayashi Jugō, possibly her daughter or the daughter of her husband by another woman.
Nyodai’s convent, Keiaiji, became a center for women’s Zen training, and Nyodai was admired for her ability to teach and lead others. Two contemporary Zen monks described her talents in the following way. Hakuun Egyō 白雲慧暁 (1223–1297/8) stated: “In life, [she] daily brought benefit to those with whom [she] came in contact.” Muzō Jōshō 無象静照 (1234–1306) declared that “With all her energy, she spread the teachings…With inexhaustible wisdom, she opened a Path for many; With unending merit, she extended benefits to all people.” These comments were genderless and spoke to Nyodai’s influence on both men and women.
After Enni died in 1280, Nyodai turned to the newly arrived Chinese immigrant priest Mugaku Sogen (1225–1286) who, like Enni, was a disciple of Wujun Shifan and had come to Kamakura in 1279. After an exchange of letters and Zen dialogues, Mugaku certified her enlightenment in 1285. He also presented her with a transmission robe (kesa), thereby acknowledging her as a dharma heir. In addition, he agreed to write an inscription for her on a portrait of himself. The inscribed verse ends with a reference to one of the most difficult Zen kōan: Huanlong Huinan’s Three Barriers (“Why is my hand like Buddha’s hand? Why is my leg like a donkey’s leg?” This is the kōan Nyodai is reported to have answered profoundly and thereby gained her certification. The transmission robe and inscribed portrait she received from Mugaku Sogen were passed down through generations of nuns as symbols of their membership within his/her lineage.
In 1286, when Mugaku was nearing death, he called his disciples together and informed them of his certification of Nyodai and that he had requested her to establish a temple in Kyoto as a memorial site containing a reliquary of his nails (or bones) and hair. A copy of that letter, delivered after his death by a courrier, is preserved in Hōkyōji, a convent that traces its origins back to Nyodai. Nyodai’s founding of Mugaku Sogen’s memorial temple, Shōmyakuan, its subsequent care under Mugaku’s disciples, and its conversion into a larger complex renamed Shinnyoji are narrated in the Bukkō Kokushi goroku (Collection of Mugaku Sogen’s Sayings, vol. 9) and the Musō Kokushi nenpu (Chronicle of Musō Soseki’s Life).
During the fourteenth century, the two temples founded by Nyodai were both incorporated into the Five Mountain (gozan) system. Keiaiji was designated the head of the Five Mountain Convents (amagozan), while Shinnyoji/Shōmyakuan became a jissetsu temple, one rank lower than a “mountain” temple. This ranking system put both temples under the authority of the ruling Ashikaga shogunate. As a result, the shogun became a participant in rituals and in the selection of successive abbots and abbesses. Since the shoguns preferred to mix lineages when choosing abbesses, this posed a challenge for the nuns at Keiaiji to maintain the original character of the convent. Documents attest to a gradual erosion over two hundred years of the strict Zen training requisite for deserving to be a recipient of the Mugaku/Nyodai robe and inscribed portrait, both symbols of dharma transmission in the Nyodai lineage. While the portrait was stolen in the mid-fifteenth century, the robe was entrusted to Shinnyoji/ Shōmyakuan in 1455. Keiaiji burned down in 1498 and was never rebuilt.
The Keiaiji legacy, however, was carried on by three Kyoto convents—Daishōji, Hōkyōji, and Hōjiin. Hōjiin, a subtemple within the original Keiaiji complex, houses not only the large Amida statue that was Keiaiji’s main object of worship, but also the oldest portrait sculpture of Nyodai. Hōkyōji became a repository for documents from several Keiaiji subtemples and along with Daishōji continued to refer to its abbesses as belonging to Nyodai’s Keiaiji lineage. All three convents, as well as Shinnyoji and Shōkenji (introduced below) have honored Nyodai through the centuries, celebrating her death anniversaries with special rituals.
The Nyodai Legend
Modern tradition associates Nyodai with the legendary woman Chiyono. A commoner who came to do menial work at a convent, Chiyono observed nuns doing zazen and wished to try herself. Despite being jeered at, she succeeded with the help of an older nun. She became more and more focused till she was oblivious to all around her. One full-moon night when she was collecting water, the bottom of her bucket fell out. Instantly enlightened, she composed a poem: “Somehow the well-made bucket lost its bottom: Now it holds no water; nor does it hold the moon.”
Stories of Chiyono are set in various geographical locations. The oldest known manuscripts, one at Kongōji and one in the Waseda University Library, date to the second half of the fourteenth century. Another was described by a monk traveling through the Mino area (present-day Gifu prefecture) and mentions the Chiyono Pond at Shōkenji where she supposedly experienced her revelation.
The tales of both Chiyono and Nyodai exemplify women who achieved enlightenment, a concept not generally held to be possible in past eras. Zen priests retold anecdotes about them in their sermons to encourage other women to seek training. Some of these kōan-like stories were written down, such as in the Daitokuji yawa 大徳寺夜話 (Daitokuji Night Tales; ca. early sixteenth century) and the Shōnan kattōroku 湘南葛藤録 (Record of Shōnan [Kamakura] Kōans) collected in 1545. The former has separate entries for Nyodai and for Chiyono, who is described as located at Shōkenji in Mino, and does not draw a connection between the two women. The latter text was heavily annotated in the twentieth century, obscuring its historical accuracy.
It is only in the seventeenth century that the identities of these two women became intertwined. The revival of the convent associated with the Chiyono Pond, Shōkenji, provides a key. The nun behind the restoration, Tetsugan Yōshin 鐵岩養心 (d. 1687), requested a history of the convent, claiming Nyodai as its founder. It remains unclear how she came upon the idea, but the resultant Shōkenjiki 松見寺記（History of Shōkenji; 1677) by Kakuzan Yagikyō 鶴山野宜卿 (also Hitomi Chikudō 人見竹洞; 1638–1696) narrates a biography of Nyodai that incorporates a concise version of the Story of Chiyono. To create this biography Kakuzan turned to his friend Korin Chūken 虎林中虔 (1627–1678) who had composed a draft of a Nyodai Zenji shōden （Short Biography of Nyodai Zenji ). That draft, like the entry for Nyodai in the encyclopedia of Zen prelates compiled in 1678 by the Myōshinji priest Mangen Shiban, the Enpō dentōroku 延宝伝灯録(Enpō-era Record of the Transmission of the Lamp; published in 1706), ascribes the name of Chiyono to Nyodai and quotes her poem but does not include details of Chiyono’s story, though a later revision dated to 1676 does incorporate her story.
All three of the seventeenth-century biographies mentioned above relate that Nyodai was also called Mujaku. However, this name belongs to a different nun, who like Nyodai studied under Mugaku Sogen. The real Mujaku無著 (ca. 1250–ca. 1317) was some twenty-five years younger than Mugai Nyodai. The 1349 Shijuin okibumi 資寿院置文by Musō Soseki 夢窓疎石 (1275–1351) [collection of Shōkokuji’s Jishōin 相国寺慈照院] notes facts about her life, benefactors, and the Shijuin temple she founded. Mujaku, it states, is the daughter of Adachi Yasumori 安達泰盛 (1231–1285) a prominent member of the Kamakura government who was closely connected to the Hōjō rulers. She is the wife of Kanesawa (Hōjō) Akitoki 金沢(北条)顕時 (1248–1301), likewise an important member of the shogunal government during the Kamakura period. Importantly, she was also the mother of Shakadō-dono 釈迦堂殿 (ca. 1270–1338), who became the wife of Ashikaga Sadauji 足利 貞氏 (1273–1331), father of the first Ashikaga shogun, Takauji足利尊氏 (1305–1358). In this way, Mujaku is a key figure connected to both the Kamakura and Ashikaga shogunates. Living first in Kamakura and later in Kyoto, she bridges these centers of political power.
The seventeenth-century biographies and those that came later ascribe Nyodai with Mujaku’s background, situating her in Kamakura rather than Kyoto. The fact that her father was said to have been born eight years after Nyodai has perturbed modern scholars to no end. In addition, both temples Nyodai founded were in Kyoto and her communication with Mugaku (who spoke no Japanese) is mentioned by several contemporaries as having been done by letter.
Just when the identities of the two nuns were merged is unclear. In the Hōjō family lineage chart (Hōjō uji keizu 北条氏系図), compiled after the middle of the fifteenth century, Mujaku is identified as Shakadō’s mother: “Chiyono, also called Nyodai Zenji and Mujaku.”[2] Chiyono was a common given name for women at the time and could have been Mujaku’s name before she took the tonsure, but with no connection to the Story of Chiyono.
The Hōjō lineage, however, was not public property. The early sixteenth century text
Daitokuji yawa does not mention Mujaku as an alternative name for either Nyodai or Chiyono, both of whom have separate, unconnected entries in this work. The mid-sixteenth century Shōnan kattōroku Case 7 “The Bucket Without a Bottom,” associates Mujaku and Chiyono, but makes no mention of Nyodai or her accomplishments.
Numerous questions remain, particularly with regard to the process and timing for the overlapping of identities. The scant attention to women by the dominant male clergy allowed a kind of obliviousness and lack of distinction among active women over the years as the Buddhist clergy became more fullyfirmly institutionalized and Buddhist history was solely in the hands of male monks. By separating the stories of each of the three women who were merged to form the post seventeenth-century image of Mugai Nyodai, a clearer picture of Nyodai’s stature and importance emerges. Insightful, compassionate, and devout, she was instrumental in establishing the Bukkō (Mugaku Sogen) lineage in Kyoto for both women and men through the temples she founded.
[1] For details and source material for the information presented here, please refer to Mugai Nyodai: The Woman Who Opened Zen Gates (order here).
[2] 足利 讃岐守源貞氏妻、母安達陸奥太守藤原泰盛女、千代野、所謂如大禅師、無著也. [Nagai, Kanazawa Hōjōshi no kenkyū, pp. 16–17, 128.]