Sōji-ji (Ibaraki)
The Sōji-ji ( Japanese 総 持 寺 ) is a Buddhist temple in the city of Ibaraki , Osaka prefecture in Japan . The temple is associated with the Shingon-shu belief . The main image of the temple is a statue of the thousand-armed Senju- Kannon . The Sōji-ji is the 22nd temple on the Saigoku pilgrimage route ( 西 国 三十 三 箇 所 , Saigoku sanjūsankasho ).
overview
There is no historically reliable information about the founding of the Sōji-ji. According to temple tradition, the Sōji-ji was founded in 879 by Fujiwara Yamakage. The occasion was the miraculous rescue of Yamakage as an infant by a turtle and his intention to donate a statue of Kannon as a thank you. The legend can also be found in the Konjaku Monogatarishū collection . The temple flourished during the mid- Heian period when a granddaughter of Yamakage became the wife of Emperor Ichijō . Later the Sōji-ji also received donations from the emperors Shirakawa and Toba . The temple was burned down by Oda Nobunaga's troops in 1572 and then rebuilt on a smaller scale.
The annual festival on April 18, when a carp is ceremoniously cut up by a top chef from Osaka, ties in with the temple legend.
literature
- Patricia Frame Rugola: The Saikoku Kannon Pilgrimage Route . Dissertation, Ohio State University, 1986.
- Valeria Jana Schwanitz and August Wierling: Saigoku. On the way in Japan's western lands . Manpuku-Verlag, Potsdam 2012, ISBN 978-3-9815168-0-7 .
Web links
- Official Website - Japanese
Coordinates: 34 ° 49 ′ 44.8 " N , 135 ° 34 ′ 53.6" E