Virtual Adachi Bando 33 Kannon Pilgrimage (the South) #10 Hosho-ji Temple

 

     It is unknown when Hosho-ji Temple was founded in Oyaba Village, Adachi County, Musashi Province.

     The Oyaba Kitchen Middens in Urawa City consist of 6 small kitchen middens scattered in irregular shapes at the end of the Omiya Plateau facing the Ancient Great Tokyo Bay.  In one kitchen midden, a large dwelling site with 9-meters length and 6-meters width was discovered.  In another kitchen midden, another large dwelling site with the length of 8 meters and the width of 6 meters was excavated.  These residential sites are the largest of the residential sites excavated to date.  A house with this large area would have been able to accommodate around 10 to 20 people, which is equivalent to 2 to 4 houses found in other kitchen middens. It is hard to imagine that the Oyaba Kitchen Midden alone supported 60 to 120 people simultaneously.  The 6 residences and kitchen middens could have been built in succession, with each one supporting 10 to 20 people living as a family.

     It is also a mystery that extremely few animal bones have been excavated in the kitchen middens.  Their life centered solely on shellfish.  They might not have been good at hunting.  Was the Oyaba people's origin completely different from that of the other people living in the Omiya Plateau?

     When Mamiya Kotonobu (1777-1841) compiled the New Topography and Chronology of Musashi Province at the beginning of the 19th century, Oyaba Village had over 60 households with 2 temples: Hosho-ji Temple and Tokusho-in Temple, which was the shrine temple of Oyaba-Hikawa Shrine.  Hosho-ji Temple's main deity was Acalanatha.  It had 2 Kannon-do halls: One enshrined Thousand-Armed Sahasrabhuja and the other enshrined Arya Avalokitesvara, who is the human-figure prototype of the other 6 metamorphoses.  Its precincts also had a Bhaisajyaguru hall.  Tokusho-in Temple's main deity was Amitabha.

     Today, Hosho-ji Temple enshrines Ksitigarbha wooden standing statue, whose history is unknown.  The statue is 64.4 centimeters tall.  Its body and head is carved out of one timber.  Its inside was carved out to make it lighter and easier to handle.  Its arms, hands, legs, and feet were made of another timber.  Its orb, stick, halo, and pedestal seem to have been added or replaced during the Edo Period (1603-1867).  It has a mild and gentle look on its face while its body and clothes are realistic.  It shares the features of the golden age of the Fujiwara Clan (884-1086) and the Kamakura Period (1185-1333).  It is presumed to have been made at the beginning of the Kamakura Period.  The statue seems to have been made by a first-class Buddhist sculptor.

     The temple also enshrines the 105-centimeters-tall wooden standing statue of Arya Avalokitesvara, who is the human-figure prototype of the other 6 metamorphoses.  Although its many parts have been added or replaced, its face and main part of its body keep their original Song-Dynasty style, which was popular in the Kanto Region in the Southern and Northern Courts Period (1336-1392) and the beginning of the Muromachi Period (1336-1573).  It is the temple's main deity today, replacing Acalanatha, which stands beside the Arya Avalokitesvara statue.

     The temple also enshrines the Eleven-Faced Ekadasamukha standing wooden statue, which 71.5 is 71.5 centimeters tall.  Its body and head was carved out of one wood.  The statue is supposed to have been damaged either in flood or fire.  Many parts of the statue seem to have been fixed or replaced at the beginning of the Edo Period.  Still, it keeps the Song-Dynasty style well.  It might have been carved in the latter half of the Kamakura Period.  The statue seems to have been made by a local Buddhist sculptor.

     The 3 Buddhist images were made when samurai's days were on the rise.  They survived the Warring States Period and welcomed the Pax Tokugawana.  Were they built by the family with the same bloodline?  Or, as different bloodline families arrived at Oyaba, each made their own Buddhist image?  The first one seems to have the best quality.  Does that have something to do with the political and economical conditions corresponding to the samurai families?  Deeper and wider research may teach us the dynamism of local samurai society.

     The two temples were both abolished in 1871, 3 years after the Gods and Buddhas Separation order was issued by the Meiji Restoration Government in March, 1868.

     In 1955, the area was rezoned and all the Buddhist images were gathered in the site of Hosho-ji Temple, which was then revived and registered as a religious corporation in 1979.  Today, it is the only Buddhist temple in the ex-Oyaba-Village area.

Address: 2 Chome-13-4 Minamihoncho, Minami Ward, Saitama, 336-0018

Phone: 048-822-1964