The Nio-mon of Gokoku-ji

One last full day in Japan. I tried again to see if the curry restaurant was open for lunch, but it was not. So it was on to my next stop.

  While I couldn't find any place there that I wanted to eat at, I did find sakura.

I also found the IKEBUS. What is the IKEBUS? 

This is the IKEBUS. 

It is a slow moving electric bus that takes people to different places in Ikebukuro. And for a bus, it is cute. It also comes in red. 

As for me, I was going to a Buddhist temple with lots of shrines and a mountain to climb. 

I know I went to a lot of shrines and temples during this trip. It wasn't what I had planned to do. But in life, one has to be flexible. Besides many places being closed and the cancellation of events and concerts, the challenge was to find places that would be safer to visit. Plus I didn't want to go too far from my hotel in case my flight was changed again.

As for this place, it is 護国寺, Gokoku-ji Temple in Bunkyo. And this is 仁王門, Nio-mon, the first entrance gate into the temple grounds.

I've written about Nio before. They are the guardians of the Buddhist temple. They often are placed inside the first or front gate. 

The Nio on the left is 吽形, Ungyo. Closed mouthed, he symbolized latent strength.

While on the right is 阿形, Agyo. Opened mouthed, he is the expression of overt violence. Their names and the open and closed mouths are representative of the vocalization of "Aum" or "Om". Which is a sacred sound in Buddhism, representing birth and death of all things, all creation, everything. Koimanu protection statues also have this, one mouth open and one mouth closed.

Looking back through the gate to modern Bunkyo. 

And ahead to the long walkway into the temple grounds. I was impressed at the size of this place. Obviously there was some importance to this temple and what was here. 

 The back or north side of the gate held two more statues. They represent two of the heavenly kings of Buddhism.

 One is 増長天, Zocho-ten and the other is 広目天, which might be Hirome-ten or Komoku-ten. Zocho-ten causes things to grow, and Komoku-ten sees all. It's actually what their names in kanji mean. Zocho-ten has the kanji for "increase" and Komoku-ten has the kanji for "wide eyes". I'm going to guess that their presence at Gokoku-ji was to increase one's wisdom of Buddhism, to know more and see more.

One other feature to note about Nio-mon was the protector 鬼瓦, onigawara, the demon roof tiles. It is interesting the parallels to gargoyles found in other countries.

Just to note, the benches on the side were popular with men who wanted to smoke. 

One of the first things I saw going into the temple ground were these large 手水鉢, chozubachi.

There were two, one on each side of the path. 

I am not sure if they are in use now, since it would be difficult to reach the basins. As for what Otowa Fuji is, I will get to that in a later post. 

For now, just a little more from the outer area of Gokoku-ji. Where there are also modern buildings.

But I thought it would be nicer to show the beautiful koi swimming there.