Kaneko Daiei 金子大栄 （1881-1976）, a Shin Buddhist priest and scholar of the Huayan sūtra 華厳経, presented innovative views on the samantabhadracaryā, which he saw as the core teaching of the Huayan sūtra. This paper examines his ideas on the ultimate embodiment of the samantabhadracaryā, which he discussed through his analyses of the story of the young practitioner Sudhana’s pilgrimage with various mentors （kalyāṇamitra）, described in the Huayan sūtra.
In his book, Various Issues in Buddhism （Bukkyō no shomondai 仏教の諸問題, 1934）, Kaneko discussed the completion of the samantabhadracaryā with a focus on female mentors, centered on nine goddesses, the Buddha’s former consort Gopā, and the Buddha’s mother Māyā. Kaneko, agreeing with the Chinese Huayan school patriarch Fazang 法蔵 （643-712）, regarded these female mentors as symbolizing compassion, thereby interpreting Sudhana’s pilgrimage as a journey to ultimately embody compassion. Kaneko emphasized the significance of the distant memories of the past lives of practice that the goddesses recount to Sudhana, and argued that they take us back to “the fond memories” of “the homeland of the soul.” This resonates with Kaneko’s view on “the unseen homeland of the soul,” a key concept in his controversial book, The Idea of the Pure Land （Jōdo no kannen 浄土の観念, 1925）. This paper argues that “the homeland of the soul” can be interpreted as the original authentic state of our inner selves equal to the Buddha’s awakening which, although stained by worldly desires at present, is a state to which we yearn to return.
