Virtual Sayama 33 Kannon Pilgrimag #11 Tokuzo-ji Temple

 

     In 1558, Eiroku Great Famine started.  It didn't rain enough in the summer.  Farmers and peasants managed to survive till next spring.  Yet, another drought hit the whole country next summer.  People starved to death even before the winter of 1559.  In the autumn of 1560, Uesugi Terutora (1530-1578), who was the warlord of Echigo Province, invaded the Northern Kanto Region and plundered what little crops the farmers and peasants harvested.  Every warlord tried desperately to survive.  Tokuzo-ji Temple was founded in those days.  Tokuzo literally means Virtue Warehouse.  They might have desperately wanted warehouses not only of virtue but also filled with crops.

     At the beginning of the Edo Period, Monk Zensoyu revived the temple, inviting Priest Hekiei (?-1635).  The temple's main deity is a Pandara Vasini Avalokitesvar statue.  It means Zensho might have been a retired samurai, who might have become a farmer after Tokugawa Ieyasu (1542-1616) moved to Edo.

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