Background
Nothing is known for certain of his place of birth or background.
Nothing is known for certain of his place of birth or background.
In 948 he received formal ordination as a monk from Ensho of Mt. Hiei, taking the religious name Kosho.
In his youth he wandered about the country as an ubasoku or shatni, a religious practitioner who has not received formal ordination as a monk. In his travels, he devoted himself to religious teaching and at the same time worked to build roads and bridges and perform other works of benefit to society.
In 938 he went to Kyoto, where he labored to spread the practice of the nembutsu, or invocation of the name of the Buddha Amida, among the citizens. As a result, he came to be called Ichi-no-hijiri, “saint of the streets,” or Amida-hijiri, "saint of Amida.”
He continued to use the name Kuya, by which he had been known when he was a shami. He died at Saiko-ji, a temple that he founded in Kyoto and that was later renamed Rokuharamitsu-ji.
He seems to have recited the nembutsu formula in a rapt and even ecstatic manner and to have urged others to do likewise. Because of the fervency with which he went about the streets of Kyoto reciting it, he has come to be regarded as an early practitioner of the so-called dancing nembutsu, a practice later advocated by Ippen.
After his death, Minamoto no Tamekanc wrote a biographical account of him in eulogy form entitled Koya rui, and his biography is also included in the Nihon ojo gokuraht-ki of Yoshishige no Yasutane.