Virtual Modern Edo 33 Kannon Pilgrimage #31 Ryugen-ji Temple

 

     Priest Ryohaku was from Shimousa Province.  He finished his ascetic Buddhist practices in Enryaku-ji Temple in Mt. Hiei, and was on his way back to his hometown.  One night, he stayed in Yanagishima, Kameido, an island in the estuary of the Old Tone River.  Avalokitesvara appeared in his dream and told him to find Arya Avalokitesvara and Ninigi statues.  Next morning, he found them and prayed to them intently.  Then, the plague in the village was wiped out.  He founded Rygen-ji Temple to enshrine the Arya Avalokitesvara statue. 

     At the turn of the 18th century, Priest Genchin gathered more than 100 kinds of bush clovers.  Those flowers gathered writers and calligraphers.  They composed tanka poems, haiku poems, and Chinese poems.  Matsuo Basho (1644-1694), for example, composed:

In the rain,

Both men and bush clovers

Are getting soaked.

Address: 3 Chome-34-2 Kameido, Koto City, Tokyo 136-0071

Phone: 03-3681-2620