Virtual Quasi-Saigoku Inage 33 Kannon Pilgrimage #32-2 Yakuo-an Temple

 

     #32-2 is Yakuo-an Temple, which used to be a hermitage of the Yamada Family.

     Yamada Heishichi first tried to make 33 Avalokitesvara statues.  As he sensed it was his time, he instead chose 33 temples which had Avalokitesvara statues.  It meant he organized a 33 Kannon Pilgrimage.  Toward the end of the organization, he realized it hard to find some more temples.  One day, a monk presented a statue of Cintamanicakra, who usually has 6 arms and holds chintamani (a wish-fulfilling jewel) in one of the six, to him.  With his wish fulfilled, Heishichi enshrined the statue in Yakuo-an Hermitage, and picked up Keshi-zan as its sango.  “Keshi” is a poppy.

     When he finished organizing Quasi-Saigoku Inage 33 Kannon Pilgrimage, he built a stone statue, collecting small contributions almost like poppy by poppy.

     Who was Yamada Heishichi?

     A few of the illegitimate offsprings of Fujiwara Korechika ((974-1010) came down east.  One of them settled in Aizaigawara, Suruga Province.  They came to call themselves the Omori Family.  They advanced to Izu and Sagami Provinces.  It was the Omori Family that built Odawara Castle first.

     Another, named Tota, came down further east directly to Sagami Province, and settled in Sugita Village near Kamakura.  He named his family the Sugita Family.  When the Kamakura Shogunate was established, the family didn’t want to work for samurai and fled to Taira Village, Inage Manor, Musashi Province.  As they were not good at farming, they reluctantly worked as samurai, and were permitted to rule the village.

     Later, Ise Shinkuro (1432-1519) came from Kyoto to become a warring-states-period hero.  when he occupied Sagami and Musashi Provinces, the Sugita Family followed him.

     When Odawara Castle fell to Toyotomi Hideyoshi in 1590, the then head of the family was killed in the battle.  His 2 daughters were brought up by his relative, Katayama Yahei, and the younger one was married to Yamada Hisaemon.  Heishichi was  one of the descendants.

     Another oral tradition says that one of the illegitimate children of the Omori Family started the Katsurayama Family in Katsurayama, Aizaigawara, Suruga Province.  The family committed themselves to Shinkuro’s attempt, and one of the female members of the family was married to Shinkuro.  One of the family members was ruling Taira Village.  Katayama Yahei was one of their relatives, and bla bla bla.

     The Yamada Family seems to have tried to decorate their family tree, picking up this and that locally known historical figures.  Without the help by intellectuals, they made some chronological and genealogical inconsistencies.  If they were well-off enough, they didn’t make such contradictions.  It’s not so difficult.  Some who couldn’t make samurai at the end of the Warring States Period or who couldn’t succeed in life in Pax Tokugawa were even selling their family trees.  Not only some well-off farmer families but also some upstart samurai families, the Tanuma Family for example, bought them.

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