Kawasaki Daishi

Japan – Kawasaki: 30 th July 2005

I got to know about this place from a friendly (most of them are) Japanese while traveling in a bus. After much mis-communication, he figured out what I wanted (info on good tourist places nearby). He highly recommended me to this place, he even wrote the name of the place in his language, incase I had trouble finding the place and gave me the list of bus numbers to get there.
 

Historical Overview of Kawasaki Daishi a.k.a. Heikenji

In the early 12th century, there was a feudal lord named Kanenori Hirama holding a fief (land) in Aichi Prefecture. Yoshimitsu Minamoto, his boss and chief of the Minamoto clan, deprived him of the fief because of a false charge filed against him. In distress, he started on a roaming journey and settled finally at the marshland near estuary of the Tama {tah-mah}River circa 1130, where he began earning a livelihood by fishing at Tokyo Bay.

Legend narrates that in the sea near the house Hirama lived in, there was something that emitted light every night. While he was asleep one night, a great-looking priest appeared in his dream and identified himself as Priest Kukai (774-835), the founder of the Shingon Sect. The Priest told him, “When I was in China to study Buddhism, I carved my own statue and threw it into water offering a prayer to save suffering people. The radiating object off the beach is the statue of my own. Cast a net and pick it up. If you continue to embrace the statue, you will be protected from evils.” Hirama was exactly 42 years old at the time, believed to be an evil year for men. He deferred to the Priest’s revelation in the dream and went into the sea with a net. As had been predicted, he found the statue and caught it in the net. He brought it back home and worshiped it faithfully night and day.

Shortly afterward, an itinerant priest of Kongobuji, Sonken by name, visited Hirama’s house and watched the statue, which looked precisely like Priest Kukai. Moved by Hirama’s faith in Priest Kukai and the statue, he built a small temple for Hirama so that Hirama might enshrine the statue. This small temple was the origin of today’s Heikenji. (Hirama can also be pronounced Heiken {hay-ken} in Chinese characters and the namesake of Heikenji).Hirama’s faith seem to have brought him a miraculous virtue. The false charges against him proved to be groundless. Hirama was acquitted and permitted to assume the original position as the lord of a fief in Aichi. Upon returning to Aichi, he donated half of his fortune to the Temple to express his deep sense of gratitude. The story spread fast and people began to believe that the Temple has a magical power to prevent ill fortune. Gaining a reputation for being able to ward off evils, it turned into a magnet for the faithful.

Priest Kukai, a.k.a. Kobo Daishi

He is known as the founder of the Shingon Sect, or the Esoteric Buddhism (also referred to as Tantric Buddhism) in Japan. The Buddhist honorable title Kobo Daishi was conferred on him. Daishi is literally a great master, an honorific title given by the Imperial Court to prelate-like priests with high virtue.

Shingon Sect and Esoteric Buddhism

Yakuyoke, or warding off evil fortune

Yaku denotes every sort of misfortune, be it man-made calamity or natural disaster. The Japanese still harbor the belief that those misfortunes befall them by the power of evil spirits or divine punishments, and they have to exorcise those evil spirits in order to drive them out. Esoteric Buddhism as represented by the Shingon Sect seems to fit for those who want to be free from ill fortunes rather than those who seek happiness, since the Sect supplicates the gods with greatest fervency.

Yaku-doshi or yaku year and yaku age are also of great concern for the Japanese. According to the Onmyo school, the age 25 and 42 for men and 19 and 33 for women are thought to be critical years. Those whose age reach yaku-doshi are usually at a crossroad in life and are deemed vulnerable for evil influences. Here again, Yakudoshi men and women visit temples or shrines to get divine favors. The Yaku-doshi concept is not necessarily superstitious. Statistically, those ages are climacteric ones and those who reaches yaku-dosh are most likely to experience one misfortune or another.

There is no information about this idols anywhere. These idols looks more like fusion of Western and Indian style.

Sunsets, be it in Mysore or Japan will always make me run for my camera and try to capture that moment.

This street is usually filled with people, but that day being a weekday and pretty late in the evening, all the shops were closed.