In 717 (the fifth year of the Tang Dynasty), the prefectural governor of Dajibi led the Japanese Tang envoys from the port of Namba (present-day Osaka) to the Tang capital Chang'an (present-day Xi'an), and Nakamaru, at the age of nineteen, was selected as a student of the Tang Dynasty, and was accompanied by a foreign student, Yoshibe Zhenji, who later became the right minister of Japan, and a group of 557 people on four ships, which traveled westward across the East China Sea and landed in Yangzhou (one of the capitals of the state of China). In September, they arrived in Chang'an to study at the Imperial College.
Abe Nakamaru
Nakamaru, after several years of hard study, sat for the imperial examination of the Tang system, and passed the jinshi examination with excellent results. Nakamaro Abe was the only one among Japanese who could successfully pass the examination for the rank of jinshi.
In 725, he was appointed as a schoolmaster (in charge of the organization of the canonical books, under the ninth rank) of the Luoyang Division, and accompanied the Crown Prince in his studies.
In 728, he was appointed as the Left Gleaner (from the top of the eighth rank).
In 731, the post of Left Supplementary Que (from the top of the seventh rank) was created. After serving as the emperor's attendant, Abe often met with Emperor Tang Xuanzong at Xingqing Palace, who was so impressed by Abe's talent that he gave him the Chinese name Chao Heng. He called him "Chao Ching", "Chao Ju Ching", "Chao Supervisor", and "Chao School Scribe", "Japanese envoy of Hiraga", and was highly regarded.
In 733, the eighth envoy to the Tang Dynasty, Dajibi Guangcheng, returned to the country, when Nakamaro had been in the Tang Dynasty for seventeen years, and requested to return to the country with the envoys to the Tang Dynasty, but out of the respect for Nakamaro, Emperor Xuanzong did not allow him to do so. After that, he was appointed as the Secretary of the Ministry of Justice and Secretary of the Ministry of Defense.
Kaiyuan 12 years (753), Japan's ninth envoys to return home, Zhongma Lu once again asked to return to the Emperor Xuanzong's permission, and ordered for the Tang Dynasty's ambassadors to escort the Japanese envoys back to their home country, which should be said that this is a privilege. He was 56 years old at this time. It was on this occasion that they met with Jianzhen at Yangzhou Yanguang Temple on October 15, realizing the plan for the sixth trip to the East. In order not to put the important people at risk of being killed again, they traveled in separate boats. Jianzhen and his entourage and the deputy envoy of the Suimei Huma with the ship, the ambassador Fuji in the clear river and Zhongma Lu and so on with the ship, Puzhao and JiBeiZhenBei with the ship, when sailing to the Arnaibo (Okinawa Island), was hit by a big storm, and the other three ships later each returned to Japan, only Abe ZhongmaLu's ship is nowhere to be seen and heard. The news of Abel's shipwreck soon reached the Tang Dynasty. In fact, Abe was not killed, and the ship he was traveling on drifted to the coast of present-day Vietnam.
In June, 755, Abe returned to Chang'an after a long and difficult journey.
In the winter of 755, when An Lushan revolted against the Tang Dynasty, Abe followed Emperor Xuanzong and traveled with him until he returned to Chang'an in December 757 A.D., after An Lushan had been killed. Later on, he served as a permanent attendant of the Left Scattered Cavalry and as a guardian of the southern part of the city.
In 766, Abe was appointed by Emperor Li Yu of the Tang Dynasty as the governor of Annan, and soon after he took office, he became seriously ill.
In January 770, Abe died in Chang'an after a long illness. He was buried in Chang'an, and was posthumously honored by Emperor Tang Daizong with the title of "Governor of Luzhou".
Ganzhen (688~763) was a Chinese monk of the Tang Dynasty, whose common surname was Chunyu, and who was a native of Jiangyang County, Yangzhou (present-day Yangzhou, Jiangsu Province). He was a descendant of the Nanshan sect of Buddhism, the founder of the Japanese Buddhist Ruling Sect, and a renowned medical doctor. The Japanese people called Jianzhen "the ridge of Tenpyo", meaning that his achievements represented the roof (meaning peak) of culture in the Tenpyo era.
When he was 14 years old, he was accepted by Jiman as a sanyasi and was assigned to Daiunji Temple. In the first year of Shenlong (705), he received the Bodhisattva precepts from the lawyer Dokan. In the first year of Jinglong (707), he traveled to Luoyang and then to Chang'an. In the following year, he received the full precepts at the Actual Temple in Chang'an under the guidance of Lawyer Hengjing. He traveled around the two capitals and studied the Three Tibetans. His attainments in the Sutras were particularly deep. Daoan and Hengjing, who ordained him, were both renowned scholars of the Ruling, and they were also re-transmitted disciples of Nanshan Sect's founder, Rendao Xuan. His legal science, although inherited from Nanshan Sect, but he did not hold a family opinion. Tang dynasty legal science, in addition to the dominant Nanshan sect, there are Sangju sunlight temple Farto's Sangbu sect and the west Taiyuan temple Huaisu's east tower sect, a moment and three. Later, Jianzhen carried with him to Japan both of the latter and the latter two sects. In the transmission of the Fatao's "four points of the law", Dingbin (belonging to the Sangbu Sect) of the "decorated Zongyi Ji" and Daoxuan's "Acting Notes" three books, focusing on the Fatao, Dingbin's two books.
He also made a lot of achievements in Buddhist architecture and sculpture. According to the "Tang Dahe Shang Dongzheng biography" records, Jianzhen returned to Huainan, teaching precepts, each in the "between lectures, building temples and houses, ...... made statues of Buddhas and Bodhisattvas, the number of its countless". In terms of medicine, the Boda Duojie, characterization is extremely fine, once presided over the Dayun Temple of sad field hospital, for people to cure the sick, personally for the sick to fry adjust the medicine, medical practice is very high.
Tianbao first year (742), the Japanese monks Rong Rui, Puzhao by the Japanese Buddhist community and the government commissioned him to go to Japan to pass the precepts, Jianzhen readily agreed, from the beginning of the year to Tianbao seven years, 12 years, has five times rate of the crowd to the east, due to the sea wind and waves, reefs, shipwrecks, sacrifices, and the obstruction of some local officials and failure; especially the fifth was hit by the attack of the winds, waves, drifted on the sea for 14 days, and finally drifted to Hainan Island. It took 14 days, and finally drifted to Zhenzhou (present-day Yaxian County) on Hainan Island. Returning to the way through the Duanzhou, Japanese disciple Rong Rui died, Jianzhen mournful grief, coupled with the heat, a sudden eye disease, resulting in double blindness. However, his will to go east to propagate the Dharma was firm and never wavered. Tianbao twelve years of the sixth trip to the east, and finally reached the Japanese Kyushu, the following February to the Heijo-kyo (now Nara).
Ganjin in Japan by the dynasty and the wild grand welcome. Spin for the Japanese emperor, empress, crown prince and other people awarded the bodhisattva precepts; for the shaman witnessed more than 440 people such as repair precepts; for the 80 monks shed the old precepts awarded the new precepts. Since then there has been a formal legal tradition in Japan. In 756, Emperor Hyakken appointed Kanjin as the head monk of the Sangha, in charge of the affairs of Japanese monks and Buddhists, and in 759, Kanjin and his disciples painstakingly designed and constructed the Tang Shoti Temple, where he preached and taught the precepts ever since. In the construction, statues, murals, etc., he and his disciples using the most advanced technology of the Tang Dynasty, for the formation of Japan's Tenpyo era of artistic climax, adding a colorful. For example, the Tang Shoti Temple complex is a masterpiece left by Jianzhen and his disciples. The entire structure and decoration, all reflect the characteristics of Tang Dynasty architecture, is the largest and most beautiful building in Japan's existing Tenpyo era. Before his death, Ganjin's disciples also made a portrait of him using the latest technique of dry lacquer folder. Japan is regarded as a national treasure, and in February 1980, the Japan-China Friendship Organization sent the statue back to Beijing and Yangzhou for the Chinese people and Buddhists to pay homage to in order to enhance the friendship between the two peoples for generations to come. Jianzhen and most of his disciples are good at calligraphy, went to Japan with Wang Xizhi, Xianzhi father and son of the real works, the influence of the Japanese people still love Chinese calligraphy art is not declining. At that time, Japan's Buddhist texts, mostly imported from North Korea, oral teaching, hand-copying, errors are inevitable. According to the "renewed Japanese chronicle" records, the emperor had commissioned Jianzhen correction of the scripture error. Kanjin's most outstanding contribution to the Japanese people is the teaching of medical knowledge, by the Japanese people as the originator of medicine. Japan's tofu industry, food industry, brewing industry, etc. also believe that their industry skills are taught by Jianzhen.