Virtual Chichibu 34 Kannon Pilgrimage #19 Ryuseki-ji Temple

 

     The Chichibu area used to be under the sea.  About 15 million years ago, the Chichibu outer rim mountains rose.  Their earth and sand, including some angular chart stones, crumbled and flowed into the surrounded seabed. They were flattened with new sediment over them, and hardened.  The land continued to rise, and the seabed became a valley about tens of thousand years ago.  The Ara River washed the valley and washed away mudstone with hard sandstone left outstanding.  The monolith sandstone under Ryuseki-ji Temple has no dust or dirt on it but has potholes pitted with the river water.  It shows the rock used to be under river water.  The huge riverbed rock stands out with no dust or dirt on it.  Ancient people regarded it as holy.  For them, it could have been a dragon who had raised the riverbed rock outstanding.  Actually, when the locals prayed to the dragon for rain after a long spell of drought, it answered.  However, it sometimes didn't answer but just showed its anger.  The locals were grateful to the dragon for its blessing rain but were also afraid of its merciless harm.  After Buddhism came to the area, the locals prayed to Avalokitesvara for removing the dragon's harm.  One day, a Shingon School monk brought a thousand-armed Sahasrabhuja statue that had been carved by Kukai (774-835).  The locals were relieved and delighted, and built a hermitage to enshrine the statue.

     Ryuseki-ji Temple, namely Dragon Stone Temple still enshrines the Thousand-Armed Sahasrabhuja statue, and also keeps a dragon's nail, which is 7 centimeters long, 4 centimeters wide, and 3 centimeters thick, with its tip sharp.  Incidentally, Ryuseki-ji Temple's sango is Hien-zan, namely Flying Deep Pool Mount.

Address: 15-31 Obatakemachi, Chichibu, Saitama 368-0011

Phone: 0494-22-1669