Sanmei-in Temple 8 Kyushu Fudo Myoo Pilgrimage

 

The 2nd of March, 2018, and I begin day 6 of my walk around Kyushu on the Kyushu Fudo Myoo Pilgrimage in the rural suburbs of Nakatsu. The first 5 days were spent in the Kunisaki Peninsula.

Sanmei-in is temple number 8 on the pilgrimage, and the Fudo is enshrined within the Goma Hall. I had visited this temple some years ago as it is also temple 20 on the Kyushu 108 Pilgrimage. That post can be viewed here.

It is a pretty new temple, founded after the experience of the priest performing austerities for 50 days on a sacred mountain.

each time I have visited the main hall, the elevated hexagonal building was closed.

It houses an eleven-faced, thousand-armed Kannon.

The Fudo in the Goma Hall is a "stand-in" as the original statue split in half during a ritual for the healing of the priest's father.

It is a Shingon temple and has a miniature Shikoku Pilgrimage in the grounds.

The previous post was on Miyahata Shrine, my last stop on day 5.

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Manju-ji Temple Gardens

 

Manju-ji Temple in Matsue has a delightful pond garden behind the main hall, and an extensive, well-manicured karesansui garden in the front.

It is a large Rinzai Zen temple at the top of the narrow Okutani valley to the north of the castle.

Entry to the temple and garden is free, but the temple remains off the tourist radar.

The temple was established in a different location in 1600, some years before the castle was built.

Its original name was Chojuin.

In 1644 it was moved to its current location after being given the site by Naomasa Matsudaira, the new daimyo of the castle.

At that time it was renamed Shobuyama Chojuji.

Later the name was changed to Manju-ji, though a big fire in 1848 destroyed all records, so the date is unknown.

When I visited in June, the azaleas were in bloom, which added to the visit.

One curious feature, seen in photo 4, is an Imperial Messenger Gate in front of the main hall.

To the right of the main hall is a Kannon Hall, and above it is a Myoken Shrine which enshrines Marishiten, Benzaiten, Daikokuten, and Aizen Myoo. From the shrine you can look down on the pond garden.

The front garden is quite sparse, but subtle.

One nice touch was the small turtle at the centre of the concentric circle of ridges.... exactly how it would appear when a turtle surfaces in a pond.

I can find no date or creator for the rear garden, but it appears to be fairly standard.

There is a small one-room teahouse.

And a few koi in the pond.

The previous post in this series on Matsue and Izumo was on Kanden-an, the remarkable samurai teahouse, villa, and gardens not too far from Monjuji Temple.

Matsue has an unusually large number of quality gardens, in large part due to the legacy of the great Tea Master, Fumai Matsudaira, the daimyo of Matsue Castle.

Some recent garden posts from Matsue I recommend would be Fumon-in temple, garden and Teahouse, the gardens at Lafcadio Heans House, and the garden at Gesshoji Temple.

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The 500 Rakan at Unpenji Temple

 

A combination of snow and the low, golden sunlight made these pics of Rakan a little special.

Unpenji Temple straddles the border of Tokushima and Kagawa Prefectures on Shikoku.

Sitting atop Mount Unpenji, it is temple 66 of the famous 88 temple pilgrimage of Shikoku.

At 900 meters altitude, it is the highest of all the 88 temples.

The rakan statues are life-size, and spread over quite a wide area. I do not know for sure if they have the full 500.

I wish I had spent more time exploring and photographing them, but I was bushed from the climb.

The previous temple on the pilgrimage was the 14th Bangai temple Tsubaki-do, down at the base of the mountain.

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Saidoji Rokkakudo

 

Seemingly floating in Esaki Bay, Saidoji Temple has a distinctive hexagonal hall.

The origin dates back to the early part of the 15th Century and a wealthy family by the name of Nabeyama who had an ony daughter named Okiku. They had hoped to marry her off but she fell in love with a servant named Shichigoro.

When she became pregnant by him, her parents drove him away, and in her sorrow, she threw herself into the sea.

Her parents searched for her for three days and three nights, to no avail, however they did pull up in a et from the sea a Jizo statue holding a child. They took this to be a reincarnation of their daughter and enshrined it on the tiny island.

Seven years later, Shichigoro returned in the guise of a monk and converted the shrine into a temple.

In the 17th Century when the Mori had control of the area they rebuilt the temple with a hexagonal hall. This was to protect the building against the powerful stormy winds. At the same time, they planted a Black Pine, which still grows today.

I have seen other hexagonal buildings in temples around Japan, but the signboard here claims that this one os one of only two in existence, so I suspect they are talking about some aspect of its construction.

The dragon carving was quite nice....

A Boke Fuji Kannon for protection against senility..... an increasingly common Kannon statue in Japan....

The previous post was on the walk to Esaki from Susa.

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