Virtual Chichibu 34 Kannon Pilgrimage #21 Kannon-ji Temple

 

      When the god of Yawata Shrine came to Chichibu, local earthly gods resisted.  Yawata allied with the god of Mt. Buko, and defeated the local gods with their arrows.  Yawata claimed itself to be a manifested form of Avalokitesvara, and enshrined the statue of Arya Avalokitesvara, who is the human-figure prototype of the other 6 metamorphoses, built a hermitage for it, and named the hermitage Yano-do, namely Arrow's Hermitage.  The legend might have reflected the incidents between indigenous people and those of foreign origin.  A pro-central-government forces invaded the Chichibu Valley and the locals there resisted.  The forces proclaimed themselves to be representatives of Buddhism and allied with mountain people who were based around Mt. Buko and who believed in Japanese mountain asceticism, which was synthesized with Buddhism.

     The Avalokitesvara Hermitage burned down in 1923, caught by the fire of the neighboring elementary school.  As some temples had been abolished after the Meiji Restoration Government issued the Gods and Buddhas Separation Order in 1868, they used their scrap wood and waste lumbers to rebuild the hermitage.

Address: 2352 Terao, Chichibu, Saitama 368-0056

Phone: 0494-24-7263