Virtual Buso 48 Kannon Pilgrimage #33 Kakuen-bo Temple

 

     Kakuen-bo Temple was founded by Priest Kakuen in 1063 as one of 621 branch temples in Onjo-ji Temple in Omi Province.  Its main deity was an Arya Avalokitesvara statue.

     In Medieval days, the followers of Enryaku-ji Temple burned Onjo-ji Temple 50 times.  In 1141, Kakuen-bo Temple was burned as one of the 50 incidents.  Monk Daishin escaped with the statue to Mt. Hando in Koka County in the same province.

     In 1351, Monk Ginen moved the statue to Gichu-ji Temple (1 Chome-5-12 Banba, Otsu, Shiga 520-0802).  By Chance, it had the grave of Minamoto Yoshinaka (1154-1184), who was killed in battle against his cousin, Minamoto Yoritomo (1147-1199).  Yoshinaka’s son, Yoshitaka (1173-1184), had been sent to Kamakura as a hostage, and stayed in the area where Kakuen-bo Temple is located today.  A few months after Yoshinaka’s death, Yoshitaka was killed on the bank of Iruma River in Musashi Province.

     Monk Gensho moved the Arya Avalokitesvara statue in Gichu-ji Temple to its present place in 1351, founded a temple. and named it Kakuen-bo in the middle of the Kanno Disturbance, which lasted from October 26, 1350, to February 26, 1352.

     On August 4, 1351, Ashikaga Naoyoshi (1307-1352) escaped from Kyoto to Kamakura.  On November 4, Ashikaga Takauji (1305-1358) left Kyoto and got to Suruga Province on December 3 to fight against his brother, Naoyoshi, as a part of the Kanno Disturbance.  It is unknown why Gensho moved from Omi Province to Musashi Province during the disturbance.

     At the beginning of the Kamakura Shogunate, Minamoto Yoritomo forced Minamoto Yoshinaka into death.  At the beginning of the Muromachi Shogunate, Ashikaga Takauji cornered Ashikaga Naoyoshi.  Did Gensho’s move had something to do with the similarity?  We have to notice that the Chinese charcter for Gensho’s gen is the same as the Chinese charcter for Minamoto of the Minamoto Clan and that the Ashikaga Clan was a branch clan of the Minamoto Clan.

     If the simultaneity hadn’t been just a coincident, there could have been 3 possibilities.  First, Gensho was rather pro-Naoyoshi and followed him to the Kanto Region.  Second, Gensho was rather pro-Takauji and joined in his establishing a new shogunate.  Third, Gensho was worried over the split of Takauji and Naoyoshi as a member of the Minamoto Clan in its broad sense, and was trying to stop the historic tragic refrain of the clan by showing the Arya Avalokitesvara statue of the temple associated with Minamoto Yoshinaka, without knowing the statue itself had nothing to do with Yoshinaka.  Gensho might have been blinded by the prejudice that Genchu-ji Temple’s deity must have something to do with Yoshinaka.

     Kakuen-bo Temple claims to be the last member temple of the Buso “33" Kannon Pilgrimage, but the pilgrimage has 15 more member temples.

Address: 4 Chome-7-33 Kisonishi, Machida, Tokyo 194-0037