Kōshō-ji

Founded in 1233, and people still meditate there: it opens at 10:00 and closes at 16:00.

From the riverbank you leave the street of shops and climb the Kotozaka, the sloping avenue that leads to the gate: twenty minutes’ walk from the Keihan station. At the top there is not a museum but a working monastery, where the monks do zazen (the seated meditation of Zen) and copy Buddhist scriptures by hand, and anyone passing by can take part in these two things too.

Founded in 1233 by Dōgen, the monk who brought the Sōtō branch of Zen to Japan, and rebuilt here in Uji in 1648. The temple's website gives it as the oldest training monastery of its own branch in Japan and as the first Zen temple in the country. Its full name is Butsutokusan Kannon-dōri-in Kōshō Hōrin Zenji.

ℹ️ A narrow window: 10:00–16:00, and closing days are not stated. The admission price is not on the official page: ask at the gate or by phone. From Keihan Uji Station it is twenty minutes on foot, thirty from the JR station, and the last stretch is uphill: anyone with tired legs should know this beforehand. There is a car park. Zazen and scripture copying are held regularly, with longer retreats.

🚉 Uji · 14 min walk

Sources: uji-koushouji.jp

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