Chion-in, perhaps the highlight of this tour, is open daily from 9:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. Free entry. However, the Hojo and Sho Hojo are only open in the autumn, for a modest fee. On leaving the temple, buses 11, 12, 18, 203, 206 and 207 stop at the Chion-in-mae bus stop on Higashi-oji-dori just to the west of the temple’s San-mon Gate. These can take you to the south or the north of the city.
Walking Tour 4
KENNIN-JI AREA
The Six Realms of the Dead, the Dancing Saint and Zen Beginnings
1 Chinko-ji Temple 六道珍皇寺
2 Rokuhara-mitsu-ji Temple 六波羅蜜寺
3 Ebisu Shrine 京都ゑびす神社
4 Kennin-ji Temple 建仁寺
5 Yasui Kompira Shrine 安井金比羅宮
The contrast between the secular and the religious has always permeated Kyoto life and history. Kennin-ji, one of the earliest and most important of Kyoto’s Zen monasteries, for example, is a next door neighbor to the Pleasure Quarters that have made the name Gion synonymous with the pursuits of the “floating world” of kabuki and of the ochaya (tea houses) where men can be well fed while being entertained by geisha (if they can afford such luxurious pleasures and have the proper introduction to the proprietress of the ochaya), as well as other delights both licit and illicit. This is the area to be explored on this and the next walk.
The Rokuhara district, which forms part of this tour, has its own major sites, such as Ebisu Shrine, whose festive occasions are thronged by businessmen and the general public in the hope of increasing their wealth. It has the Wakamiya Shrine just north of Gojo-dori (Fifth Street), which presides over the district itself as well as the great pottery fairs held annually on Gojo-dori. Here, too, is the Rokuhara-mitsu-ji Temple, which en-shrines the magnificent, realistic image of that Saint of the Marketplace, Priest Kuya, portrayed as though still walking the streets of the city, beating his drum while repeating the Nembutsu (“Praise to Amida Buddha”) that issues from the image’s mouth in the form of tiny Amida figures.
The Rokuhara district where this walk begins was once the seat of the proud and powerful. Here, in the mid-1100s, the Taira clan and their followers had their mansions and governmental offices—before Taira-no-Kiyomori made the mistake, after his forces had killed Minamoto-no-Yoshitomo, of permitting the Minamoto children to live if they were placed in monasteries to become monks. In time, they grew up and revolted against Taira rule, a revolt which in 1185 led not only to the burning of the palatial mansions of the Taira (and much of eastern Kyoto) but to the death of Kiyomori’s family, his followers and his Imperial grandson. Here, after 1185, the Minamoto victors set up their Kyoto headquarters, so that the area remained the locus of political power in the city under the rule by the Minamoto Shoguns from Kamakura between 1185 and 1333.
Visitors crowd the entrance to Chinko-ji, the “Six Realms of the Dead Temple.”
There is the mysterious in this sector as well, for portions of the Rokuhara district were once the burial grounds for the common people, and here is supposed to be located the “Six Avenues” that lead to the other world, where the souls of the dead reside until called back for the brief O-Bon period each mid-summer by the bell of the Chinko-ji Temple. The Yasui Kompira Shrine in the district, while not mysterious in itself, has its mystery in that Kompira, the deity worshipped at the shrine, has never been truly identified, and confusion reigns as to his true identity—which in no way discourages those who pray to him for safety in travel.
It was at Kennin-ji that tea first became popular as a beverage that alerts but does not intoxicate. When Priest Eisai established the Kennin-ji monastery, he reintroduced tea as a beverage from China, a refreshment that had previously not received the welcome it was to engender from this time on. Tea moved eventually from the monastery into daily life, and special establishments were created for the enjoyment of the beverage. While the ochaya (Honorable Tea Houses) of the area serve a more potent beverage today, the origin of tea culture is still remembered not only in the formal tea ceremony but in the historical procession each spring to commemorate the bringing of the first, tender tea leaves to Kyoto from Uji each year for the benefit of the Shogun—a procession still celebrated as a remembrance of times past.
1 CHINKO-JI TEMPLE
The Rokudo-mairi, the “Six Roads Pilgrimage,” is the legendary road that links the world of the living and the world of the dead, or the spirit world. One old belief held that if you were to stand in the middle of this road while beating a gong and calling out the name of a deceased family member, the voice and sound would guide the ancestral spirit back to this world for the annual visit of such spirits to their former homes.
The Rokudo-mairi is thought to be near the Chinko-ji Temple, which is also known as the Rokudo-san, the “Six Realms of the Dead Temple.” The association of the temple with the road of legend can be attributed to the fact that the Toribeno Cemetery once extended from Kiyomizu-dera and the adjacent Nishi Otani mausoleum to the Rokuhara-mitsu-ji area, which lies north of Gojo-dori (Fifth Street) and between Higashi-oji-dori and the Kamo-gawa River to the west. This area was known as the “land of the dead,” a place where the bodies of those who died without family were often abandoned, and a pilgrimage to Toribeno was a symbolic journey through Rokudo (Six Realms of the Dead). The small Rokudo-no-Tsuji square in front of Chinko-ji is said to stand at the beginning of the six avenues leading to the several levels of hell. This connection of the temple with the supposed avenue led to the custom among the poorer people of Kyoto of praying here for the souls of their deceased loved ones.
Chinko-ji is a small, rather nondescript temple which lies north of Matsubara-dori. Walk north from Matsubara-dori into the short street that leads to the small square formed by the Chinko-ji Temple buildings on the east, north and west sides. The buildings at Chinko-ji are only open occasionally, thus it is best to inquire at the Tourist Information Center downtown as to their times of admission.
In the middle, before the Hondo (Main Hall), is a modern, stylized sotoba (five-part memorial stone), 16 feet (4.5 m) tall, within a stone fence and with pine trees along its side. On the left (west) side of the square is a small shrine, and just beyond it to the north is a plastic-roofed area covering a large Jizo image with a stone lantern before it and a stone flower holder on either side. Around this central unit are some 200 smaller Jizo image or inscribed stones. (Images of Jizo are often placed in cemeteries or places associated with death since he is a protector of the dead.)
On the right side as one enters the square is a small kura (storage building) and then a building that houses those connected with the other world (see below). This right side of the entrance to the square was a favorite meeting place for the itinerant nuns who gathered here in the mid-summer Bon season, when the souls of the dead return to this world for a brief stay. Here they would solicit alms by exhibiting picture screens of hell to the people who gathered to pray for the souls of the deceased. (The “floating population” of Japan in the period after the 1500s, despite the attempts to control the movement of the populace by the Tokugawa government, consisted of pious monks and nuns and artists raising funds for their own benefit.)
The hall beyond the kura can be looked into from the outside even when it is not open. It is divided into two parts: the left section contains an image of Emma, the king of hell, with an attendant on either side. The right half of the building holds a statue of Ono-no-Takamura, a noted poet of the first half of the 800s, whose fame as a writer led many to believe that he was a messenger to and the secretary of the ruler of hell itself. He is accompanied by two emissaries from hell. At the north end of the square is the Hondo (Main Hall), which contains a statue of Yakushi, a particularly