Wikipedia
were mobs of peasant farmers, Buddhist monks, Shinto priests and local nobles, who rose up against daimyo rule in 15th- and 16th-century Japan. They followed the beliefs of the Jōdo Shinshū (True Pure Land) sect of Buddhism, which taught that all believers are equally saved by Amida Buddha's grace. They were organized to only a small degree; if any single person could be said to have had any influence over them it was Rennyo, the leader of the Jōdo Shinshū Hongan-ji sect at that time. Rennyo's attitude to the Ikkō-ikki was, however, highly ambivalent and pragmatic. Whilst he may have used the religious fervour of the Ikkō-ikki in the defence of his temple settlements, he was also careful to distance himself from the wider social rebellion of the Ikkō movement as a whole, and from offensive violence in particular.