En no Gyōja
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En no Gyōja (役行者), or En no Ozunu (役小角), born 634, was a Japanese ascetic and mystic, traditionally held to be the founder of Shugendō, a conglomerate religion incorporating aspects of Taoism, Shinto, esoteric Buddhism (especially Shingon Mikkyō and the Tendai sect but some Zen sects have also been heard of) and traditional Japanese shamanism. He is venerated as a bosatsu (bodhisattva, or pursuer of enlightenment) Jinben Dai.
Authorship of the non-canonical Sutra on the Unlimited Life of the Threefold Body is attributed to En no Gyōja.
In Koji Suzuki's novel Ring, Shizuko Yamamura draws a statuette of En no Gyōja up from the sea, upon which she receives supernatural powers such as precognition. Because her daughter Sadako was born with these powers, some have suggested that En no Gyōja (referred to as En no Ozunu in the novel) is in fact Sadako's father.
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