Virtual Musashi 33 Kannon Pilgrimage #30 Hosho-in Temple

     Tosho-ji Temple was founded in 1552 by Ken'ei (?-1576).  The temple had 2 branch temples, Konzo-in and Shinsho-ji, and 2 hermitages, Jiko-an and Toko-an, in its precincts.  Tosho-ji Temple merged with Kannon-ji Temple, which had been founded by Priest Sonken in 1523, and which enshrined an Arya Avalokitesvara, who is the human-figure prototype of the other 6 metamorphoses.  The statue was the #30 of the Musashi 33 Kannon Pilgrimage.

     In 1523, the Later Hojo Clan occupied the southern and the western parts of Musashi Province.  As it was in 1524 that they occupied the eastern part of the province, the area where the Musashi 33 Kannon Pilgrimage was located about 2 centuries later, was still under the rule of the Uesugi Clan in 1523, when Kannon-ji Temple was founded.

     In January, 1552, Hojo Ujiyasu (1515-1571) finally drove away Uesugi Norimasa (1523-1579), the last Regent of the Kanto Deputy Shogunate, to Echigo Province.  Tosho-ji Temple might have been founded just after the collapse of ancien regime in the Kanto Region.

     It is unknown when Tosho-ji became Hosho-in, merging Kannon-ji Temple.

 

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