We can sense the deep sorrow that the Venerable Master must have felt at having to cut ties with his own flesh and blood. It would have been different if the misunderstanding was about some other matter, but when it came to the Nembutsu, he could not look on indifferently.

After writing the letter disowning Zenran, the Venerable Master wrote many other works explaining the Nembutsu.

On the 28th day of the 11th lunar month (January 16th of our modern calendar) during the year 1263 CE (K?ch? 2), the Venerable Master passed away in Kyoto, surrounded by his younger brother Jinyu-shi, youngest daughter Kakushin-ni, and his son Masukata Nyudo.

According to the work “Notes on Correcting Errors” (Gaijasho) written by the Venerable Master Shinran’s great-grandson, Master Kakunyo, the poem that the Venerable Master wrote on the eve of his passing (referred to as a jisei), is:

When my eyes are closed (forever),
Please offer (my body)
To nourish the fish in Kamo River.

In other words, the Venerable Master expressed his wish to help other sentient beings even after death.

Further, a work titled Hanazono Bunko, published during 1847 to commemorate the 650th year of the Regent Kujo Kanezane’s passing, contains the following passage titled “Honorable Writing on the End (of the Venerable Master’s) Life” (Gorinmatsu-no-gosho):

Though I now go to the Pure Land of Peace,
Like the waves of Waka-no-ura Bay,
I will return again and again.
When you rejoice alone in the sacred teaching,
Consider that there are actually two.
When there are two who rejoice,
Consider that there are actually three…
And that third will be Shinran.

In other words, although I (Shinran) have become aged and am now allowed to be born in the Pure Land of Peace and Tranquility (Amida Buddha’s world of Enlightenment), I will not remain there. Rather, I will return to this world again and again, doing all that I can to bring even one more person to the awareness of the precious Nembutsu teaching. (In Jodo-Shinshu doctrinal terms, returning from the Pure Land to help those who remain in this world of delusion (this shaba world), is referred to as “aspect of returning from the Pure Land” (genso).)

The Venerable Master Shinran’s entire life was lived seeking truth and transmitting that truth to even one more person. I believe his sole concern was the happiness of all.