Virtual Arima County 33 Kannon Pilgrimage #28 Kosho-ji Temple

 

     It is unknown when Kosho-ji Temple was founded in Takasugi Village, Arima County, Settsu Province.  As the temple is located near Takasugi-Hachiman Shrine, they had something to do with each other.

     From ancient times, Takasugi Village had the Dasai Shrine, which enshrined Toshigami.  Toshigami was the god of abundant harvests, and specifically of grain or rice.  Toshigami is recorded in the Kojiki, or Records of Ancient Matters, which is an early Japanese chronicle of myths, legends, hymns, genealogies, oral traditions, and semi-historical accounts dating as far back as 641, but Toshigami isn't recorded in the Nihon Shoki, or the Chronicles of Japan, whose compilation was finished in 720.  It is unknown why Toshigami was excluded from the Shintoism hierarchy.  In 1562, the villagers invited Hachiman Shrine, which engulfed Dasai Shrine.

     Takasugi Village first appeared on Keicho Kuni-ezu, or the Keicho Maps of the Provinces, as Tasugi Village.  Tokugawa Ieyasu (1542-1616), the founder of the Tokugawa Shogunate, conducted a land survey of the distribution and rice yields of the feudal lords' territories and the lands of temples and shrines across Japan in September, 1605.  He appointed Nishio Yoshitsugu (1530-1606) as magistrate in charge of Eastern Provinces and Tsuda Hidemasa (1546-1653) as magistrate in charge of Western Provinces.  The maps are said to have been made based on this survey.

     The village name Takasugi first appeared in the Shoho Go-cho, namely Shoho Village Notebooks, which is the statistics books of villages across the country.  The Tokugawa Shogunate ordered all the domains to make the statics of the villages in their domains in 1644.  As the year was the 1st year of the Shoho Era, the books were called Shoho Go-cho.

     On December 2nd, 1644, which is the first year of the Shoho Era, the 3rd Shogun, Tokugawa Iemitsu (1604-1651), ordered Inspector Generals, who were superintendents of feudal lords, Inoue Masashige (1585-1661) and Miyagi Masayoshi to have the lords of all the domains to prepare and submit village registers.  Starting on the 16th, Masashige and Masayoshi summoned the daimyo's officers in Edo and ordered them to submit the registers by the end of the following year.  They also issued similar instructions to the shogunate's magistrates in provinces.  In addition to the village registers, they also ordered to submit maps of provinces, castle maps, and road registers which listed land routes, sea routes, and abolished castles.  The lords with castles along the Tokaido Highway were also required to submit wooden models of their castles.  Many provinces took several years to submit their records, with some even delaying their submission beyond the Shoho era (1644-1648).

     Village registers recorded the land area of ​​each village, but the shogunate instructed that the total land area of ​​each domain be adjusted to match their official land area.  Omote-daka are the rice outputs recorded when a lord was granted their territory, and were different from the actual outputs.  Rather than understanding the domains' actual productivity, the shogunate was reluctant to change the lords' ranking and status, which was measured by Omote-daka.  This kind of formalism constantly damaged the shogunate’s economic policies.

     In principle, the unit of statistics was the province, but Ezo, Ryukyu, and Shodoshima each became a unit, and Mutsu Province was divided into seven units.  In provinces with domains, a powerful domain would be appointed as the coordinator, or a couple of domains would share the responsibilities and work together.

     Masashige also played an important role in the persecution and eradication of early Christians in Japan. 

Address: 2 Chome-11-16 Takasugi, Sanda, Hyogo 669-1512

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