25 Feb 2016

GOKURAKU - kaidan ordination platform


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kaidan 戒壇 platform for Buddhist ordination

A special hall to perform a Buddhist ordination (kairitsu 戒律).


source : pikapikasos.blog95.fc2.com
戒壇巡り Kaidan meguri
岐阜県関市西日吉町35 / 関善光寺 Seki Zenko-Ji in Gifu

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Kaidanin 戒壇院 Kaidan-In 戒壇堂 Kaidan-Do


source : todaiji.or.jp/contents
Nara, Todai-Ji, 戒壇堂 Kaidan-Do

- quote -
A Tendai 天台 sect building that contains an ordination platform used exclusively for the ceremony to impart the Buddhist precepts upon priests and nuns.
At the ceremony, called jukai 受戒, the initiates vow to accept and follow the precepts of Buddhism. The Chinese priest Jianzhen (Jp; Ganjin 鑑真, 688-763), who reached Japan in the mid-8c is said to have ordered an ordination platform to be erected in front of Toudaiji 東大寺 (Todai-Ji)  (Nara), in April 754, for the precepts of Emperor Shoumu 聖武. In May 754, it was relocated west of the Daibutsuden 大仏殿 where a building had been erected for the platform. This is considered the first in Japan. The building was often destroyed and rebuilt. Finally, in 1731 at Reiunji 霊雲寺 in Tokyo, it was rebuilt in its original form.

Another kaidan-in was built in 1678 as the center of the Tendai sect. It is called the Enryakuji Daijou Kaidan-in dou 延暦寺大乗戒壇院堂 and is located in Shiga prefecture. It is a 5×5 bay square, single-storied structure. The kaidan is 3×3 bays and a 1-bay wide aisle surrounds it. This aisle is called a mokoshi 裳階 and has a pent roof. The kaidan-in has a coffered ceiling, and the roof over it is pyramidal hougyou-zukuri 宝形造, with an undulating bargeboard karahafu 唐破風. Roofing is tochibuki 栩葺, that is, wood roofing 1cm to 3cm thick and 9 cm to 15cm wide.
The kaidan-in or daijou kaidan-in correspond to the Kanjoudou 潅頂堂 of the Shingon 真言 sect.
- source : JAANUS -

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kanjoodoo 潅頂堂 Kanjo-Do

- quote -
Also called kanjouin 潅頂院 Kanjo-In.
The hall used to conduct the ceremony to confer the basic precepts and mystic teachings of Esoteric Buddhism, mikkyou 密教, on young men who are to be trained as Buddhist priests. An important part of the ceremony is the pouring of water over the young men's heads as part of their initiation rites. Kanjou are known to have existed at Mt. Kouya 高野, Wakayama prefecture, the headquarters of the Shingon 真言 sect, and at Jingoji 神護寺 in Kyoto.
Only one Shingon sect kanjoudou still exists at Kyouougokokuji 教王護国寺 (also called Touji 東寺) in Kyoto.
This building, called the Kanjouin 潅頂院, was rebuilt in 1634. The TOUHOUKI 東宝記 describes the original kanjoudou, at Mt. Kouya, as having been constructed in the twin hall style narabidou 双堂, with a large main hall shoudou 正堂, of 5×4 bays and a separate worship hall raidou 礼堂. These two halls were connected by a passage-like hall called an ai-no-ma 合の間.
- reference source : JAANUS -

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- - - - - H A I K U - - - - -

. Kobayashi Issa 小林一茶 - Introduction .

かいだんの穴よりひらり小てふ(ちょう)哉
kaidan no ana yori hirari kochoo kana

lightly, from a passageway
beneath Amida Buddha
a small butterfly

Tr. Chris Drake

This hokku is from the third month (April) of 1818. In Issa's diary the hokku is placed next to a hokku about Zenkoji Temple, and he also mentions making a pilgrimage to Zenkoji on the morning of 3/7 (April 11), so presumably this hokku is based on that visit to the temple, which is located only a few miles from his hometown. This large temple is very famous and attracts pilgrims from throughout Japan. One of the highlights of a pilgrimage to the temple was (and still is) passing through a completely dark passageway under the raised main hall, a hall in which a very old statue of Amida Buddha is worshiped. The statue is so fragile that it is never shown, and at official "showings" an exact copy, itself very old, is shown instead.

The corridor beneath the high floor of the main hall is known as the "ordination platform," but its larger purpose is to allow all people visiting the temple to form a close relationship with Amida Buddha. People do this by wholly depending on and trusting completely in Amida in spite of being unable to see anything down in the corridor. Feeling their way in the dark through the winding corridor, an experience that is said to be a bit frightening for some pilgrims, their hands eventually touch a large metal key attached to the wall on their right. The key is located directly beneath the statue of Amida Buddha in the hall above, and it symbolizes entrance into the Pure Land. If people think wholly of Amida while touching this key, it is believed that Amida will feel their sincerity and promise to accept them into the Pure Land. After symbolically touching Amida and sensing his promise, people then feel their way to the exit, a stairway located a few feet from the entrance. See the contemporary picture of the passageway entrance at the link below.

In the hokku one of the pilgrims is revealed to be a small butterfly. Since ancient times in Japan and the Ryukyus, butterflies have been evoked in songs and poems as the physical manifestations of souls and gods, so Issa may feel that the butterfly fluttering so freely out of the passageway exit is the soul of someone who sincerely prayed to Amida down in the darkness and is now flying through the air of the Pure Land. Or perhaps Issa takes the butterfly to be a sign that his own recent underground feelings toward Amida have been mutual. If so, his own feet must now feel as light as the butterfly.

The link below is to a picture put up by the Issa Memorial Museum of two pilgrims in Issa's age going down into the dark corridor beneath the high floor of Zenkoji Temple's main hall, a corridor that passes directly under an especially revered statue of Amida Buddha. Two monks stand at lower right:



Chris Drake

一茶と善光寺 - 戒壇巡り」
- source : issakinenkan.com/diary -


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kaidan no ana yori hirari ko chô kana

from a hole in the temple's
pulpit, swish!
little butterfly


Kaidan doesn't signify, as I first thought, the step of a staircase. Shinji Ogawa notes that it means "an ordination platform" in a large Buddhist temple, like Zenkôji Temple in Issa's home province.

From this platform, Buddhist precepts are taught; Kogo dai jiten (Shogakukan 1983) 499, and so I've chosen the English word, "pulpit," to approximate its meaning. No longer a caterpillar, Issa's butterfly has been reborn as a pure, innocent embodiment of enlightenment. This little "priest" has more to teach about Buddha's law than human preachers.

- source : David Lanoue -

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戒壇院裏の崖なる穴施行
Kaidan-In ura no gake naru ana segyoo

Kaidan-In hall
in the cliff behind it
offerings in the holes


茨木和生 Ibaraki Kazuo (1939 - )

. ana segyoo 穴施行 placing alms food at the holes for animals .
kigo for late winter

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戎壇院辺りは静かお山焼 橋本道子

戒壇院前に屯す袋角 森孝子

戒壇院霰ひと撒きして雪に 赤松[けい]子

杉花粉とぶ下野の戒壇院 大坪貞子

余寒なる戒壇院址何の花弁 橋本榮治

靴音一つ戒壇院の秋の昼 鷲谷七菜子

端居して戒壇院に女あり 高野素十

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. Pilgrimages to Fudo Temples 不動明王巡礼
Fudo Myo-O Junrei - Fudo Pilgrims - INTRODUCTION .



. Japan - Shrines and Temples - ABC .


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Posted By Gabi Greve to Gokuraku - Jigoku on 2/22/2016 09:42:00 am

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