Ishiteji Temple Part 2

 

Through the tunnel to the Okunoin

This is the second part of four on Ishiteji Temple in Matsuyama, Ehime.

It is the 51st temple on the Ohenro Shikoku Pilgrimage but is also very popular with non-pilgrims.

There are two tunnels that lead from the main temple, through the hillside, to emerge in a small valley behind the temple where the Okunoin, the inner temple, is located.

The tunnels have no lighting at all, so you need to take flashlights with you.

What you will encounter are some fairly standard jizo statues,....

But, a lot of very crude, wooden statues.....

I did hear one time that the carver of these statues was a relative of the head priest, however there are dozens and dozens of them throughout the temple, if not hundreds...

I took so many photos of these weird statues, which is why this post on Ishiteji is so big and spread over multiple parts.

There are a couple of "chapels" or altars along the way....

before the tunnel emerges into daylight and an imposing statue of Enma, king of Hell

There are also a series of other crude statues, some type of cement of plaster over a chicken wire frame....

These are already starting to deteriorate....

A huge, almost spherical, golden structure appears.....

This is the Okunoin, guarded by golden komainu.....

but thats for the next post....

Just outside the Okunoin was this skeletal statue of the historicalBuddha fasting.....

Ishiteji Temple Part 1            Ishiteji Temple Part 3

Togitsu Yutoku Inari Shrine

 

Not far from the Honjin I discovered in Togitsu I encountered a small Inari Shrine.

Apparently, it is a branch of the famous Yutoku Inari Shrine not far away in southern Saga and not a branch of the head Inari shrine Fushimi Inari near Tokyo.

As with almost all Inari shrines, there were fox guardian statues. Though Inari is often mistakenly referred to as a "fox god", the foxes are messengers of Inari, not representations of Inari

There were multiple vermillion torii, though no actual "tunnel" as at many Inari shrines.

Surprisingly all the ema depicted horses, as this was spring 2014, a "Horse Year".

There were multiple Inari shrines in the grounds. Inari is well known for being a "peronalized" kami that exists in thousands of thousands of different forms.

The Chinses style guardian lion was unusual, though not too surprising as this was Nagasaki.

Thet two main representations of Inari are either as an old man carrying rice, or, as seen here, as a young maiden on the back of a white fox.

This representation has connections with the primarily Buddhist identity of Inari as Dakiniten.

Inari is sometimes connected to Benzaiten, another goddess with heavy Buddhist-shinto cross-over, and that may be behind the small figurine of the white snakes wrapped around the jewel of wisdom.

The previous post in this series on day 64 of my walk around Kyushu was on Togitsu.

Ishiteji Temple Part 1

 

Ishite-ji Temple is number 51 on the 88 temple Shikoku Pilgrimage known as Ohenro.

It is located near Dogo Onsen in Matsuyama City and is very popular with non-pilgrims as well as pilgrims.

My dilemma when it came time for this post was in how to choose from the almost 200 photos I took here, and decided to post about half of them but spread over 4 posts to make them manageable.

The temple was said to be founded by Gyoki in 728.

Later Kukai visited and changed it to be a Shingon temple.

At that time it was called Anyo-ji.

The Niomon, dating all the way back to 1318, is a National Treasure.

The honzon of Ishiteji is a Yakushi Nyorai.

The three-storey Pagoda is about the same age as the Niomon, and it is an Important Cultural Property.

Ishite-ji literally means "stone hand temple" and refers to the legend of Emon Saburo.

His story can be found in the post on Monjuin Temple that I had visited earlier in the day.

A small stone with an inscription is viewable in the temple treasure house is said to be the one found in the hand of the new-born baby.

The belfry, 3 photos above, also dates back to the early 14th century, though the bell is said to be a little older.

Many temples are quite, sedate, meditative places, conforming to a certain image of Buddhist temples.

Some, however, are noisy, colourful, and crowded, and Ishiteji is one of this katter kind.

There are numerous smaller halls and shrines scattered around, and an unusually large number of statues and paintings.

Part of the reason I took so many pictures was that the light was great, but also there werejust so many statues, many of which, in the upcoming posts, are most unusual

The previous temple was Hanta-ji Temple, number 50.

Next part click below

Ishiteji Temple Part 2

Togitsu Town

 

One of the benefits of walking everywhere rather than using a faster method of travel is that you get to see things you would miss if you were in a hurry. You get to see many of the "boring places" thta you would normally avoid.

Heading north out of Nagasaki I had to pass through Togitsu. In essence it is really just a suburb of Nagasaki now and seems to be composed of the multitude of national chain businesses that cover the country.

However, the draincovers of the town showed an intriguing rock formation, a spire of rock with what appears to be a boulder perched precariously on top. The rock was previously known as Tsugi ishi bozu but is now more commonly referred to as Sabaku Sarakashi Ishi after a well known story.

According bto the story a mackerel seller was coming down the road with a basket full of mackerel to sell but when he saw the rock her decided it looked like it was about to fall off the spire of rock so he decide to wait until it did before passing on safely. The rock never did fall and all his fish rotted leading to a variety of "the moral of the story is....."

Not far from the rock was a very large mansion-type building. It is called a tea-house but was in fact one of the buildings making up a honjin, a residence for lords while they are travelling.

It is said that the hinjin was originally about twice the size of the remaining building. Unfortunateky it was not open to the public.

Nearby, Togitsu Town Hall had a statue in front that I felt must surely refer to a local myth or legend, but apparently not. It is titled "Fureai", which is a world of recent origin that refers to a kind of feeling of solidarity between different members of a community. It seems to have appeared in the 1970's after modern Japan's social structure had altered from what had been traditional.

The previous post in this series on day 64 of my first walk around Kyushu was the diary of day 63.