Showing posts with label fukuoka. Show all posts
Showing posts with label fukuoka. Show all posts

Saturday, August 26, 2023

Hagio Amida-do Temple 47 Sasaguri Pilgrimage

 


Hagio is a small farming settlement in a mountain valley above Sasaguri in Fukuoka. It is said that the inhabitants are descended from samurai who hid out here and returned to farming after their lord was defested.


I passed through Hagio on the way up the mountainside on the first day of walking the Sasaguri Pilgrimage. There is a cluster of three pilgrimage temples in the village, 2 of which, Raionji, and Yakushido, I had stopped in at on my way up the mountain.


Now on my way down after visiting the group of temples higher up in the mountains centred around Nomiyama Kannonji, I stopped in at the third, Amida-do.


There was a fire in the village back in 1883 that caused the principle Amida statues to break into three pieces and so it was replaced with a new one, though to the right of it the original is still on view.


A little further downhill and the route branches off this road and heads toward the Narafuchi Dam and Sasaguri.


The previous post in this series on the Sasaguri Pilgrimage was Tenno-in temple 36.

Wednesday, November 2, 2022

Amagi to Tosu. Day 55 Walking Around Kyushu

Saturday, January 4th 2014

It's still dark when I leave my hotel and walk to Kurume Station. I take a train north across the river towards Amagi where I will continue my pilgrimage, but first, get off after a couple of stops at Kitano Station. A few hundred meters from the station is a shrine I want to visit, a branch of Kitano Tenmangu, the first shrine to Sugawara Michizane in Kyoto.


Amagi to Tosu.

 The village here is called Kitano after the shrine's name. That is not unusual, many places in Japan are named after the local shrine or temple. It is quite a big shrine and has a single statue of a white horse, fairly common at shrines, but also has three orange horses,... quite unusual. The walls of the corridors of the shrine are covered with examples of calligraphy, something the Kami Tenjin, the enshrined spirit of Michizane, is known for.


 I jumped back on a train to the last station of the line, Amagi, and when I arrive the sun is up promising another fine day. I had some trouble finding the first pilgrimage temple of the day, Kotokuin,number 7 in the order they are listed. It was located in a suburban area a little north of the station but was not a large temple with a typical large curved roof, but a small single-storey building, so I could not see it from a distance. I asked several passers-by but had no luck. Often in Japan if a place is not famous then even people who live nearby will not know where it is. I find it eventually and there is not much to see. My route now heads west across the wide plain. 


Japan is often characterized as being a mountainous country, and while that is true, there are plenty of wide-open flat areas, this being one of them. While I haven't yet traveled in many parts of Japan, so far in my experience Kyushu seems to have a lot of these flat areas. It is of course mostly farmland, and several times I pass near huge structure with silos. The fields and paddies are also interspersed with small settlements, marked by trees, the largest of the trees often indicate a shrine, none of the ones I visited had any visitors though. The shrines I visited were  Ushiki Tenmangu, Nomachi Takano, Shisojima Tenmangu, Otoguma Tenmangu, and Yokoguma Hayabusataka.


 By lunchtime, it is becoming more urban and I reach temple number 3, Nyoirinji, and it is very busy. It's not a very big temple but is obviously very popular. The most noticeable thing is a large number of frog statues. They are everywhere. In the car park are a line of large metal ones covered in what appears to be graffiti, but what is in fact prayers and wishes. I had hoped to meet with the head priest of the temple, the father of the young priest I had met at temple number 93 some 53 walking days ago, but he was obviously very busy. The grounds did have a nice walk with many fines statues so I leisurely explored before heading off. 


I headed south, now into urban Ogori, and walked parallel to several train lines as well as the main road and expressway. There were several larger shrines to stop at and explore, Rikitake Kamado, Misetaireiseki,  and Ogori Susano. I pass under the East-West expressway and turn west parallel to it.  At a big shrine I am surprised to find many statues of monkeys, not the Three Wise Monkeys, but mostly mother monkeys in red hats holding baby monkeys. It's a Hiyoshi Shrine, a branch of the famous shrine at the base of Mount Hiei whose guardian animal is the monkey.


 In Tashiro I find the last pilgrimage temple of the day, Fudo-in, number 4. It took some finding as it is a small concrete structure in the middle of a crowded suburban area. Nothing much to see except for a nice statue of Fudo Myo O, the temple's namesake. It's now getting late and I head south back toward Kurume. I get as far as Tosu before deciding to call it a day


As usual, I took photos of the many unique manhole covers I saw along the way.

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Thursday, October 13, 2022

Ogori Hiyoshi Shrine

Ogori Hiyoshi Jinja


Monkeys are the messengers of Hiyoshi shrines, so its not surprising that at the Ogori Hiyoshi Shrine in Ogori, Fukuoka,  there are monkey statues around the grounds.


It is one of almost 4,000 branches around Japan of Hiyoshi Taisha located at the base of Mount Hiei in Shiga.


Before the Meiji period many of the Hiyoshi shrines were called Hie Shrine or Sanno Shrine, as the shrine was based on the Sanno cult, or Mountain King.


The cult was a kami cult based on Tendai Buddhism and the main kami was Oyamakui, and when the imperial court moved to the area temporarily in the late 7th century (in fear of attacks from Korea), Okuninushi was added, though as the area was earlier settled by Korean immigrants there was certainly Korean "kami" in the mix also.


The main building of the Ogori Hiyoshi Shrine had some really nice carvings.



The shrine seemed to be quite popular which usually indicates "this worldly benefits" and several of the monkey statues had babies. There was also a tall tree that had split into two trunks, commonly a symbol of marriage.


There was also a set of statues of the # Wise Monkeys, and while they are not purely of Sanno Shinto origin, several of the strands that make up their origin in Japan have strong Tendai connections.


Tuesday, October 11, 2022

Nyoirin-ji-Temple-3 on the Kyushu Pilgrimage

 


Temple number 3 on the Kyushu pilgrimage is Nyoirinji in Ogori, southern Fukuoka. Because of how I planned my route I did not visit it until day 55, about three-quarters of my way along the walk.


All 108 temples of the pilgrimage belong to the Shingon sect, one of the 2 ancient esoteric sects, and consequently many of the deities have their roots in Hinduism.


The temple is named after the honzon, a Nyoirin Kannon, the "wish-fulfilling" Kannon, one of 6 main manifestations of Kannon, derived from the word nyoi, the wish-fulfilling jewel.


The honzon here is a "hidden buddha" and is only open to public view every 12 years. It is very unusual because it is standing and most Nyoirin Kannon are seated.


The grounds contain numerous halls and shrines, including this one to Benzaiten.


Founded in the first half of the 8th century by the famous monk Gyoki. Some say he carved the honzon, but other sources say it was much later in the Heian period. The temple was burned down at the emnd of the 16th century but later rebuilt.


I had wanted to speak with the priest as his son had told me that he had walked this pilgrimage,  but it was early January and was very crowded. The temple is also popular in July when the grounds are filled with wind chimes.

The temple is most famous for its collection of thousands of frog statues and has the nickname Frog Temple.


Sunday, October 9, 2022

Frog Temple Nyoirin-ji

Frog Otera


Nyoirinji, a venerable and ancient Buddhist temple in Ogori, Fukuoka, is known as Kaeru Dera, or Frog Temple.


It has earned this unusual nickname by being home to about 5,000 small statues, figurines, and other representations of frogs.


This "tradition" started more than 25 years ago when the head priest returned from a trip to China and brought a small jade frog carving with him.


In Japanese the word for frog, kaeru, is also the word for "return", and so frogs have been linked with the notion of returning safely, and with coming back.


As is now very common in contemporary Japanese culture, an awful lot of the frog figures here are "cute".


Inside there are several versions of Kermit, the famous Sesame Street character....


But not all the frogs descend into cuteness...


Many of the statues have accrued specific meanings for a variety of "this worldly benefits".


previously I posted on the wide variety of Fudo Myo statues here at Nyoirinji, and next, I will post on the temple's history and other attractions.



Ema Votive Plaques

Friday, October 7, 2022

Fudo at Nyoirinji

Fudo at Nyoirinji


Without planning to, I think I may have created the biggest collection of photos of Fudo Myoo statues on the internet.


All of these photos are from a single temple, Nyoirinji, located in Ogori, Fukuoka, that I visited while walking the Kyushu pilgrimage.


Much of what I post about on my blog are from my walks around Japan, mostly following Buddhist pilgrimages, so statues are obviously going to feature....


With fangs, flames, and wielding a sword, the deity Fudo Myo is striking and noticeable.


One of the reasons I take so many photos is because I am fascinated by diversity.... the same thing, whether a statue or not,  made by people, will be different in intriguing ways......


As well as Fudo Myo, other similar topics in my blogs would be Nio guardians, or komainu guardians....


Another reason for the diversity of statues of Fudo is that though he is considered to be a single deity, he manifests in a multitude of individual forms, with people worshipping specific statues with specific identities, for instance, one of the Fudo statues here at Nyoirinji is known as a "cancer-cutting Fudo".


The longest piece I wrote on these different aspects of Fudo is this post from the Sasaguri pilgrimage.


Fudo is not the main deity here at Nyoirinji, that would be Kannon, and the temple is most well known for its frogs!!!...... more on that next......


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