Kannō-ji ( ja, 神呪寺) is a

Buddhist Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and ...

temple in the middle of

Mount Kabutoyama {{nihongo, Mount Kabuto, 甲山, Kabuto-yama is a mountain in Nishinomiya, Hyōgo, Japan. It is located in the east end of the Rokko Mountains, and the height is 309.2m. Outline Mount Kabuto is a famous picnic spot in the Kansai metropolitan ...

Nishinomiya 270px, Nishinomiya City Hall 270px, Aerial view of Nishinomiya city center 270px, Hirota Shrine is a city located in Hyōgo Prefecture, Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 484,368 in 218948 households and a population density of 48 ...

, Hyōgo,

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

. The other name of the temple is Kabutoyama-daishi (甲山大師).

Objects of Worship

The original object of worship at this temple was Mount Kabutoyama. In this region, Mount Kabutoyama was believed to be "a mountain of god". Until the

Edo period The or is the period between 1603 and 1867 in the history of Japan, when Japan was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and the country's 300 regional '' daimyo''. Emerging from the chaos of the Sengoku period, the Edo period was characteriz ...

, the temple was a mixture of

Shinto Shinto () is a religion from Japan. Classified as an East Asian religion by scholars of religion, its practitioners often regard it as Japan's indigenous religion and as a nature religion. Scholars sometimes call its practitioners ''Shintois ...

and Buddhism, as many Japanese temples or shrines. Today, the main object of worship at this temple is a statue of Nyoirin (如意輪半跏像). The statue is known as one of the three most famous Nyoirin statues in Japan, with those of Kawachi-Kannon-ji temple in

Osaka Prefecture is a Prefectures of Japan, prefecture of Japan located in the Kansai region of Honshu. Osaka Prefecture has a population of 8,778,035 () and has a geographic area of . Osaka Prefecture borders Hyōgo Prefecture to the northwest, Kyoto Prefecture ...

and

Murō-ji is a Buddhist temple belonging to the Shingon school, located in the city of Uda, Nara Prefecture, Japan. The temple shows typical aspects of Shingon Buddhism, with its buildings laid on the mountainside of , and historically served as a place o ...

temple in

Nara Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Kansai region of Honshu. Nara Prefecture has a population of 1,321,805 and has a geographic area of . Nara Prefecture borders Kyoto Prefecture to the north, Osaka Prefecture to the northwest, Wakayama P ...

History

According to '' Genko Shakusho'', a famous history of Japanese Buddhism written in the fourteenth century, Kannō-ji was established by the fourth queen of

Emperor Junna was the 53rd emperor of Japan, Emperor Junna, Ōharano no Nishi no Minenoe Imperial Mausoleum, Imperial Household Agency according to the traditional order of succession. Junna reigned from 823 to 833. Traditional narrative Junna had six empre ...

. However, another history, Teio-Hennnenki, writes that Ujikimi Tachibana (橘氏公) and Shunjo Mihara (三原春上) established the temple at the command of

Empress Masako is as the Queen consort, consort of Emperor of Japan, Emperor Naruhito, who 2019 Japanese imperial transition, ascended to the Chrysanthemum Throne in 2019. Masako, who was educated at Harvard and Oxford, had a prior career as a diplomat. E ...

, the first queen of Emperor Junna in 827. Genko-Shakusho wrote that the fourth queen of Emperor Junna secretly escaped from the Royal Palace in

Kyoto Kyoto (; Japanese: , ''Kyōto'' ), officially , is the capital city of Kyoto Prefecture in Japan. Located in the Kansai region on the island of Honshu, Kyoto forms a part of the Keihanshin metropolitan area along with Osaka and Kobe. , the ci ...

and moved to

in 828 with

Kūkai Kūkai (; 27 July 774 – 22 April 835Kūkai was born in 774, the 5th year of the Hōki era; his exact date of birth was designated as the fifteenth day of the sixth month of the Japanese lunar calendar, some 400 years later, by the Shingon sec ...

's help. Kūkai made a statue of Nyoirin of woods in Mount Kabutoyama in 830, and built the main building of the temple next year.

Cultural Properties

This temple has four national Important Cultural Properties selected by the Japanese government. *Nyoirin-Kannon-Zazo(木造如意輪観音坐像),

Heian period The is the last division of classical Japanese history, running from 794 to 1185. It followed the Nara period, beginning when the 50th emperor, Emperor Kanmu, moved the capital of Japan to Heian-kyō (modern Kyoto). means "peace" in Japanese. ...

*Hijiri-Kannon-Ritsuzo(木造聖観音立像), Heian period *Fudomyoo-Zazo(不動明王坐像),

Kamakura period The is a period of Japanese history that marks the governance by the Kamakura shogunate, officially established in 1192 in Kamakura by the first ''shōgun'' Minamoto no Yoritomo after the conclusion of the Genpei War, which saw the struggle bet ...

*Kobodaishi-Zazo(弘法大師坐像), Kamakura period

References

* *

External links

Kanno-ji Homepage (Japanese)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kanno-ji Buddhist temples in Hyōgo Prefecture

Objects of Worship

History

Cultural Properties

See also

References

External links