Devotional cult of the buddha Amitabha .
It is one of the most popular forms of Mahayana Buddhism in East Asia today. Pure Land schools believe that rebirth in the Western Paradise (the Pure Land) is given to all those who invoke Amitabha's name with sincere devotion. In China the Pure Land cult can be traced back to the 4th century, when the scholar Huiyuan (333416) formed a society of monks and laymen who meditated on the name of Amitabha. His successors systematized and spread the doctrine in the 6th7th century. The Pure Land teaching was transmitted to Japan by monks of the Tiantai school.