Sunday, March 16, 2008

Hongwanji Trip - Ryukoku University


Ryukoku University is a Jodo Shinshu university and is affiliated with Nishi Hongwanji. It is considered to be Japan's oldest university, found in 1639. In comparison, Harvard University in Boston was founded in 1636. Originally, Ryukoku is the school to train priests for the Hongwanji. It became a secular school in 1876.

The president of Ryukoku University does not have to be affiliated a priest, but generally is a member of the Hongwanji. The chair of the department of religion has to be affiliated with the Hongwanji.

We visited two of the campuses. Omiya which is within the Hongwanji Complex and Fukasaka, which is the main campus.

http://www.ryukoku.ac.jp/english/index.html

The university is small and has seven faculties. Its central theme is Science, Humanities and Religion. It is known as one of the top school for engineering science in Japan.

We met the public information person in the religious hall - a simple and sparse hall with a contemporary naijin, consisting of the myoji as written by Shinran. It has has morning services every morning, but in this secular world very few students attend regularly each morning.

It is a beautiful campus with many brick buildings.

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