Zenkōji

photo by 快速踊り子 · CC BY-SA 4.0

photo by micah craig · CC BY-SA 2.0

In total darkness beneath the altar you grope for a key: whoever touches it is said to be saved.

Beneath the altar runs a corridor in complete darkness (お戒壇めぐり): the pilgrim moves along the right-hand wall until the hand finds a metal handle, the ‘key to paradise’, which is said to bind whoever touches it to the Buddha hidden in the altar, never seen even by the monks.

Founded, according to tradition, in 642, when the Amida triad statue was brought here, believed to have come from Korea in 552: the oldest Buddhist image in Japan, never shown to anyone since the seventh century. The temple does not belong to a single Buddhist sect: it is run jointly by monks of the Tendai and Pure Land sects, the only such case in Japan. The present building, the fifth on the same site and among the largest wooden buildings in Japan after the Daibutsuden of Tōdai-ji, was completed in 1707 after centuries of fires and rebuilding. Every seven years counted the Japanese way (six by the Western calendar) the Gokaichō is held: a copy of the statue is put on display, and pilgrims touch a wooden pillar connected to it by a rope.

ℹ️ Naijin and Kaidan meguri open from an hour before the morning service until 16:30 (April–October), 16:15 (March, November), 16:00 (December–February); on 31 December they close at 13:00. Ticket 800 yen adults, 300 yen junior high/high school, 100 yen elementary school.

🚉 Zenkojishita · 11 min walk

Sources: zenkoji.jp · zenkoji.jp · ja.wikipedia.org

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