Place · mountain temple · Japan
Chōgosonshi-ji, Mount Shigi
The head temple of the Bishamonten cult, on Mount Shigi in Nara prefecture, where tradition has Prince Shōtoku receive the god’s help in battle on the day of the tiger. Bishamonten is Vaiśravaṇa, who is Kubera: the yakṣa lord of wealth and guardian of the north in India became a warrior god in armour in Japan, petitioned for victory.
- Function
- Sacred site & pilgrimage
- Confidence
- Established / referenced
- Location
- 34.609, 135.671
Worth knowing
The same deity is the god of wealth in India and the god of war in Japan, and both readings are in the original: Kubera is lord of the yakṣas, and yakṣas are guardians. The temple is full of tigers because of the day the vision is said to have come.
Connections (2)
- TransmissionSānchī
The standard account runs from the yakṣa guardians of early Buddhist sites like Sānchī, through the Four Heavenly Kings of the Chinese canon, to Bishamonten in armour on Mount Shigi. Kubera was lord of the yakṣas and guardian of the north, and both halves of that are in the Japanese god: he is petitioned for wealth as Vaiśravaṇa and for victory as Bishamonten, which are the same office read twice.
- Site adjacencyHōzan-ji, Mount Ikoma
Two mountain temples eight kilometres apart on the hills between the Nara basin and Osaka, each the head of a cult of one Indian god: Bishamonten on Shigi, Kangiten on Ikoma. Both draw Osaka petitioners rather than pilgrims — one for victory and one for trade — so a pair of Indian deities divides the commercial devotion of a Japanese city between two neighbouring peaks.
On these journeys
Sources
Wikipedia, “Chōgosonshi-ji”, “Vaiśravaṇa” and “Kubera”.
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