Huayan studies were founded in Japan when, in 736, the scholar-priest Rōben 良辯 (originally a Hossō 法相 specialist) invited the Korean Simsang 審祥 to give lectures on the Huayan jing at Konshu-ji 金鐘寺. When the construction of Tōdaiji 東大寺 was completed, Rōben entered that temple to formally initiate Kegon as a field of study in Japanese Buddhism, and the Kegon shū would become known as one of the "six Nara 奈良 schools." Kegon thought was later be popularized in Japan by Myōe 明惠, who combined its doctrines with those of the esoteric school 密教, and Gyōnen 凝然, who is most responsible for the establishment of the Tōdaiji lineage of Kegon. The most important philosophical contributions of the Huayan school were in the area of its metaphysics, as it taught the doctrine of the mutual containment and interpenetration of all phenomena shishiwuai 事事無礙: that one thing contains all things in existence, and that all things contain one.
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