MYOKIAN
妙喜庵
Myokian 妙喜庵
Escape the more crowded city center with a visit to Yoshiminedera, a temple nestled in the mountains on Kyoto’s southwest border. This storied temple complex boasts magnificent views of the city and is well known for its seasonal offerings, which include gorgeous autumn colors, ephemeral cherry blossoms, vibrant azaleas, and lush hydrangeas. Also home to what is said to be the best pine tree in Japan, Yoshimine-dera overflows with natural energy, no matter where you travel on its paths that connect various Buddhist halls across the mountainside alongside pilgrims worshiping Kannon, the bodhisattva of compassion.
Yoshiminedera was founded by Gesan, a distinguished pupil of Bishop Eshin on Mt. Hiei, as a small personal mountain temple in 1029 at the age of 47. He chiseled the eleven-faced Kannon statue as the object of worship at the temple.
Soon after its establishment, Yoshiminedera was favored with imperial rank by Emperor Go-Ichijo in 1034. In 1042, Emperor Go-Suzaku gave the temple a thousand-armed Kannon which is now the temple's most important image. Favored with imperial patronage, Yoshiminedera expanded with many halls built up the hillside in a similar style to Kiyomizudera in the opposite, eastern hills of the city.
By the Kamakura and Muromachi periods Yoshiminedera had grown from a single monk’s private retreat to a sprawling temple complex with over fifty priest’s quarters. Unfortunately, like many other temples in Kyoto, Yoshiminedera was destroyed in the Onin War in 1467. The temple was to remain in ruins for two centuries until the Edo Period, when Keishoin, the mother of the fifth Tokugawa shogun sponsored its rebuilding. Thus, many of the present temple buildings date from this time - the end of the 17th century.
Originally a grocer’s daughter from Kyoto before she became one of the shogun’s concubines in Edo (Tokyo) and found her position elevated by virtue of her son rising to power, Keishō-in devoted herself to Buddhism in her later years, and many sites on the temple grounds relate stories of her life.
To this day, Yoshimine-dera is visited by pilgrims in straw hats clad in white as the twentieth of the thirty-three sites on the Saigoku Kannon Pilgrimage, a route connecting temples in the Kansai area that worship the bodhisattva of compassion.
To this day, Yoshimine-dera is visited by pilgrims in straw hats clad in white as the twentieth of the thirty-three sites on the Saigoku Kannon Pilgrimage, a route connecting temples in the Kansai area that worship the bodhisattva of compassion.