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Tales of the Gods
Saraswati has been worshipped in Japan for twelve hundred years, on an island in Tokyo Bay, under another name.
Go to Enoshima, an island off the coast near Tokyo.
You will find a shrine that has been drawing pilgrims for over a thousand years.
The deity there is Benzaiten, and she is Saraswati.
The gods did not come directly. Almost none of this arrived by ship from India to Japan.
Indian Buddhist texts were carried north and east into China, and translated into Chinese.
Then they passed to Korea and Japan. Largely in the Nara and Heian periods.
The gods came inside the scriptures. As attendants, protectors and guardians of the Buddhist order.
The rest of this story, read aloud, and a new one every day.