Jiànzhēn 鑒真 (Ganjin)
Táng Vinaya master (688–763), Japanese honorific Ganjin. Native of Jiāngyáng 江陽 in Yángzhōu 揚州, lay surname Chúnyú 淳于. Trained in Vinaya under 道岸 Dào’àn at Cháng’ān; succeeded to the abbacy of Dàmíngsì 大明寺 in Yángzhōu where he became a leading southern Vinaya teacher with thousands of disciples.
After repeated invitations from Japanese monks Yōei 榮叡 and Fushō 普照 (begun 742) Jiànzhēn made six attempts to cross to Japan, the first five aborted by storms, official interdictions, and the loss of his eyesight; on his sixth attempt (753) he reached Japan and in Tiānpíng Shèngbǎo 天平勝寶 6 = 754 he established a properly canonical Vinaya ordination platform at Tōdai-ji 東大寺. Founded Tōshōdai-ji 唐招提寺 in Nara (759) as the principal Japanese Vinaya monastery; the institution remains the head temple of the Japanese Risshū 律宗 (Vinaya school).
Jiànzhēn’s transmission established the Sìfēnlǜ tradition as the institutional Vinaya basis of Japanese Buddhism and shaped the Japanese reception of the Chinese Nánshān school. His arrival in Japan is recorded in 思託 Si-tuo’s Tō-daiwajō tōseiden 唐大和上東征傳 (compiled by his disciple Si-tuo and rewritten in Japanese-Chinese by 真人元開 Mahito no Genkai, 779).
Sources: 《宋高僧傳》卷十四; 思託《唐大和上東征傳》; DILA A000515.