is a historic

Zen Zen ( zh, t=禪, p=Chán; ja, text= 禅, translit=zen; ko, text=선, translit=Seon; vi, text=Thiền) is a school of Mahayana Buddhism that originated in China during the Tang dynasty, known as the Chan School (''Chánzong'' 禪宗), and ...

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

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 c ...

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 n ...

, and head temple of its associated branch of Rinzai Buddhism. It is considered to be one of the so-called Kyoto ''Gozan'' or "five most important Zen temples of Kyoto".

History

Kennin-ji was founded in 1202 CE and claims to be the oldest Zen temple in Kyoto. The monk

Eisai was a Japanese Buddhist priest, credited with founding the Rinzai school, the Japanese line of the Linji school of Zen Buddhism. In 1191, he introduced this Zen approach to Japan, following his trip to China from 1187 to 1191, during which he w ...

, credited with introducing Zen to Japan, served as Kennin-ji's founding abbot and is buried on the temple grounds. For its first years the temple combined

Tendai , also known as the Tendai Lotus School (天台法華宗 ''Tendai hokke shū,'' sometimes just "''hokke shū''") is a Mahāyāna Buddhist tradition (with significant esoteric elements) officially established in Japan in 806 by the Japanese m ...

, and

Shingon Shingon monks at Mount Koya is one of the major schools of Buddhism in Japan and one of the few surviving Vajrayana lineages in East Asia, originally spread from India to China through traveling monks such as Vajrabodhi and Amoghavajra. Kn ...

practices, but it became a purely Zen institution under the eleventh abbot, (1213–1278). The Zen master

Dōgen Dōgen Zenji (道元禅師; 26 January 1200 – 22 September 1253), also known as Dōgen Kigen (道元希玄), Eihei Dōgen (永平道元), Kōso Jōyō Daishi (高祖承陽大師), or Busshō Dentō Kokushi (仏性伝東国師), was a J ...

, later founder of the Japanese

Sōtō Sōtō Zen or is the largest of the three traditional sects of Zen in Japanese Buddhism (the others being Rinzai and Ōbaku). It is the Japanese line of the Chinese Cáodòng school, which was founded during the Tang dynasty by Dòngsh� ...

sect, trained at Kennin-ji. It is one of the Rinzai sect's headquarter temples.

Kennin-ji school

Kennin-ji is the main temple of the Kennin-ji branch, one of the 14 divisions of the Rinzai sect. The branch is regarded to have 72 temples throughout Japan, and approximately 25,000 adherents.

Architecture

When first built, the temple contained seven principal buildings. After suffering from fires through the centuries, it was rebuilt in the mid-thirteenth century by Zen master

Enni Enni Ben'en (圓爾辯圓, pinyin: ''Yuán'ěr Biànyuán''; 1 November 1202 – 10 November 1280), also known as Shōichi Kokushi, was a Japanese Buddhist monk. He started his Buddhist training as a Tendai monk. While he was studying with Ei ...

. In the 13th century, it was damaged by fighting during the

Onin War Onin may refer to: * Ōnin, a Japanese era ** Ōnin War The , also known as the Upheaval of Ōnin and Ōnin-Bunmei war, was a civil war that lasted from 1467 to 1477, during the Muromachi period in Japan. ''Ōnin'' refers to the Japanese era duri ...

as well as several unrelated fire incidents, precipitating its reconstruction during the 16th century with donations of buildings from nearby temples

Ankoku-ji is a kind of Buddhist temple. Ankoku-ji may mean "Temple for National Pacification". There are numerous Ankoku-ji throughout Japan and the world. The ''Ankoku-ji'' system was developed under the Ashikaga shogunate, as part of its stabilizing t ...

and

Tōfuku-ji is a Buddhist temple in Higashiyama-ku in Kyoto, Japan. Tōfuku-ji takes its name from two temples in Nara, Tōdai-ji and Kōfuku-ji.Japan ReferenceTōfuku-ji/ref> It is one of the Kyoto ''Gozan'' or "five great Zen temples of Kyoto". Its ...

. Due to further damage and destruction in the succeeding centuries (including the Haibutsu kishaku movement during the Meiji era), many of its structures were also rebuilt during the

Edo Edo ( ja, , , "bay-entrance" or "estuary"), also romanized as Jedo, Yedo or Yeddo, is the former name of Tokyo. Edo, formerly a ''jōkamachi'' (castle town) centered on Edo Castle located in Musashi Province, became the ''de facto'' capital of ...

period and the Meiji, Taisho and Showa eras, such as the ''Kuri'' (rebuilt in 1814), the ''Reito-in'' (rebuilt in 1853) and the ''Kaisan-dō'' (rebuilt in 1884). Today Kennin-ji's buildings include the Abbot's Quarters (''Hōjō''), given by Ankoku-ji in 1599; the Dharma Hall (''Hatto''), built in 1765; a tea house built in 1587 to designs by tea master

Sen no Rikyū , also known simply as Rikyū, is considered the historical figure with the most profound influence on ''chanoyu,'' the Japanese "Way of Tea", particularly the tradition of '' wabi-cha''. He was also the first to emphasize several key aspects ...

for

Toyotomi Hideyoshi , otherwise known as and , was a Japanese samurai and ''daimyō'' (feudal lord) of the late Sengoku period regarded as the second "Great Unifier" of Japan.Richard Holmes, The World Atlas of Warfare: Military Innovations that Changed the Cour ...

; and the Imperial Messenger Gate (''Chokushimon''), said to date from the

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 b ...

, and still showing marks from arrows. It also has 14 subtemples on the Kennin-ji precincts and about 70 associated temples throughout Japan. In 2002, the architectural setting was enhanced by a dramatic ceiling painting of two dragons by

Koizumi Junsaku was a Japanese painter and pottery artist. Biography Koizumi was born in Kamakura, Kanagawa in 1924 and, in 1952, graduated from Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music (present name Tokyo University of the Arts; Jap. 東京芸術大� ...

(1924–2012). The piece was first painted in the sport hall of a former Elementary school. This bold artwork was installed to commemorate the temple's 800th anniversary. The dragon symbolises the rain of Buddhist teachings. The Shōkoku-ji in Kyoto also features a dragon on the ceiling of its main hall.

Artworks

Wind God and Thunder God Screens by Tawaraya Sotatsu hi-res

Kennin-ji contains notable paintings by Tamura Sōryū and

Hashimoto Kansetsu Hashimoto Kansetsu (, November 10, 1883 – February 26, 1945) was a painter of nihonga (Japanese-style paintings) who was active in the Kyoto art world during the Showa and Taisho eras. Born in Kobe, he was the son of the painter Hashimoto Ka ...

. '' Fujin and

Raijin , also known as , , , and Kamowakeikazuchi-no-kami is a god of lightning, thunder and storms in Japanese mythology and the Shinto religion. He is typically depicted with fierce and aggressive facial expressions, standing atop a cloud, be ...

'', a pair of two-fold screens by Tawaraya Sōtatsu, are currently on display at the

Kyoto National Museum The is one of the major art museums in Japan. Located in Kyoto's Higashiyama ward, the museum focuses on pre-modern Japanese and Asian art. History The Kyoto National Museum, then the Imperial Museum of Kyoto, was proposed, along with the Impe ...

. On the left is Raijin (雷神), a god of lightning, thunder, and storms in the Shinto religion and in Japanese mythology. On the right is Fūjin (風神) or Futen, the Japanese god of the wind and one of the eldest Shinto gods. He is portrayed as a terrifying wizard-like demon, resembling a red headed green-skinned humanoid wearing a leopard skin, carrying a large bag of winds on his shoulders. According to the Kennin-ji website, "Twin Dragons" by

"commemorates the 800-year anniversary of Kenninji's founding, and a ceremony to mark its installation was given in April 2002. It measures 11.4m by 15.7m (the size of 108 tatami mats) and is drawn with the finest quality ink on thick traditional Japanese paper. It was created in the gymnasium of an elementary school in Hokkaido and took the artist just under two years to complete."

Notes

References

* Dumoulin, Heinrich. (2005)
''Zen Buddhism: A History'' (Vol. II: Japan).
Bloomington, Indiana: World Wisdom. * ''Kennin-ji: The Oldest Zen Temple in Kyoto'', undated brochure from temple * Ponsonby-Fane, Richard Arthur Brabazon. (1956). ''Kyoto: The Old Capital of Japan, 794-1869.'' Kyoto: The Ponsonby Memorial Society.

External links

Kennin-ji official web site

Kyoto Prefectural Tourism Guide Kennin-ji

Buddhist Travel Kennin-ji

The Buddhist Channel, "Kenninji key to Japan's tea culture
{{Authority control 1200s establishments in Japan 1202 establishments in Asia Buddhist temples in Kyoto Important Cultural Properties of Japan Religious organizations established in the 13th century Kennin-ji temples 13th-century Buddhist temples