Virtual Hachioji 33 Kannon Pilgrimage #29 Daigi-ji Temple

 

     Grandpa Toku (?-1337)founded Daigen-ji Temple.  The 10th priest, Seiman (?-1547), renamed it Daigi-ji.  Why did Seiman replace “gen” with “gi”?  Because Seiman was a member of the Ashikaga Clan.  Why again did he use “gi”?

     East Asia, especially China, Vietnam, and Korea, had the custom of generation name.  The generation name is one of the 2 Chinese characters in a traditional Chinese, Vietnamese and Korean given name.  The custom is called "generation name" because members of one generation share that character.  Japan didn't import that custom as it was but in a crooked way.  In Japan, an aristocratic stock or a samurai stock used to share one Chinese Character for generations.  Let me call the custom a hereditary or descended name.

     For example, the Ashikaga Clan, the shogunate clan, inherited “yoshi” character for generations and the other pronunciation of “yoshi” is “gi”.   Seiman wanted to show off that he was a relative of the then shogun, Ashikaga Yoshitane (1466-1523), the 10th shogun of the Ashikaga Shogunate.

     At the turn of the 18th century, Priest Shinsho (?-1703) revived the temple.

     Daigi-ji Temple burned down in the Hachioji Air Raid.  After 00:00 on August 2, 169 Boeing B-29 Superfortresses raided Hachioji City, dropping 1600 tons of incendiary bombs for about 2 hours.  2.9 out of 3.5 square kilometers of urban area was burned.

     The precincts have the grave of the 4th priest, Seiben (?-1395), Matsubaraan Seifu (?-1814), a woman tanka poet, and Okutsu Ganko (1842-1918), who established a private school, Shibun Gakuin, in Hachioji City.  They also have a monument in honor of Shindo Sosuke, who drowned in 1878 on his way to Hokkaido to join the anti-Meiji-Restoration-government movement at the age of 28.  When he died, his wife, Koto, was 23 years old and was 8 months pregnant. 

Address: 2 Chome-8-4 Motoyokoyamacho, Hachioji, Tokyo 192-0063

Phone: 042-642-1940