Ryochu
Also known as Nen'amidabutsu or Nen'a. The third patriarch of the Japanese Pure Land ( Jodo) school, after Honen and Bencho.
A native of Iwami Province, he entered Gakuen-ji temple to study in 1211 and received the precepts at Enryaku-ji, the head temple of the Tendai school on Mount Hiei in 1214.
He studied the doctrines of the Dharma Analysis Treasury (Kusha), Tendai, True Word (Shingon), Dharma Characteristics (Hosso), Zen, and Precepts (Ritsu) schools until 1232 when he went to his native place and began to practice the Pure Land teaching.
In 1236 he traveled west to Chikugo to learn the Pure Land doctrine from Bencho and then went east to the Kanto region to propagate that teaching.
He won the support of HojoTsunetoki, the fourth regent of the Kamakura shogunate, and other members of the Hojoclan and founded Goshin-ji temple (later renamed Renge-ji and then Komyo-ji) in Kamakura in 1243.
He made this temple the center of propagation of the Pure Land teaching and went on to win support from other shogunate authorities.
see also: Nen'a
Source
http://www.sgilibrary.org/search_dict.php?SearchSelect=dict&p=2&m=2&in=2&q=patriarch
