Niwa Butsuan Emyō

Niwa Butsuan (丹羽佛庵, c. 1864–1937) was a Japanese Sōtō priest and head of Tōkei-in in Shizuoka Prefecture in the late Meiji and early Shōwa periods. His chief historical importance is as the ordaining and Dharma-transmitting teacher of his nephew Niwa Rempō (the future 77th abbot of Eihei-ji): Rempō was ordained at age 12 (1916) under Butsuan at Tōkei-in and received Dharma transmission (shihō) from him in 1926^[1]. Outside this transmission line, biographical information on Butsuan is sparse in English-language sources, and a fuller portrait would require Japanese-language primary materials from Tōkei-in's own succession registers^[1][2].