Enichiji Temple

A Zen Temple Founded by Hosokawa Yoriyuki

Enichiji Temple (慧日寺, Enichi-ji) is a Rinzai Zen temple of the Myōshinji branch in Ōta, Sannan-chō, Tanba City, Hyogo Prefecture, founded in 1375 by Hosokawa Yoriyuki, chief deputy (kanrei) of the Ashikaga shogunate, and his younger brother and adopted heir Yorimoto. Five of its buildings, the abbot's quarters, the priests' quarters, the sutra repository, the bell tower and the back gate, were entered together on Japan's national register on December 19, 2014. Each is a Registered Tangible Cultural Property (Registered Tangible Cultural Property) with its own page on this site.

The temple stands beside the Sasayama River, its precinct opening eastward with a wooded ridge at its back. According to the Hyogo Prefectural Museum of History, Enichiji once headed a network of 46 branch temples and 16 sub-temples.

That first complex did not survive. In 1575, during Akechi Mitsuhide's campaign to subdue Tanba Province, the temple burned. Rebuilding began in the Kan'ei era (1624–1644) and continued through the Keian era (1648–1652). The Tokugawa shogunate later confirmed the temple's landholdings in vermilion-seal letters issued by seven successive shoguns, beginning with Yoshimune, the eighth, and ending with Iemochi, the fourteenth. The seven letters remain at the temple as cultural properties of Tanba City.

Dating the Five Registered Buildings

The buildings standing today went up gradually after the rebuilding. The register kept by the Agency for Cultural Affairs gives the earliest date to the back gate, placed in the mid-Edo period (1661–1751). The abbot's quarters, the priests' quarters and the sutra repository belong to the late Edo period (1751–1830), and the bell tower is the youngest, dated to 1867, the year before the Meiji Restoration. The priests' quarters were remodelled in 1924.

Not every source agrees. The Hyogo Prefectural Museum of History describes the Buddha hall, the abbot's quarters and the bell tower as rebuilt in or after the Genroku era (1688–1704), citing one account that gives 1718. For the bell tower the gap with the national register is about 150 years. The individual building pages on this site follow the register.

The register assesses the five on two different grounds. The abbot's quarters, the priests' quarters, the bell tower and the back gate were listed for their contribution to the historic landscape. The sutra repository alone was listed as a structure that would be difficult to reproduce, on account of the palace-like sutra cabinet inside it.

How the Enichiji Precinct Fits Together

The abbot's quarters is the anchor of Enichiji Temple. It stands at the rear centre of the precinct, facing east, and every other building is easy to locate from it. The priests' quarters extend east to west on its north side, with the back gate directly in front of them. The sutra repository faces the abbot's quarters from the east, the bell tower stands to the south, and the Buddha hall lies to the southeast.

Covered corridors tie the core together. A bridge-like corridor that turns at a right angle links the abbot's quarters to the Buddha hall, and a second corridor with a formal Shikidai entrance joins the abbot's quarters to the priests' quarters. The two large thatched roofs sit side by side, and in front of them are the tiled roof of the sutra repository and the cypress-bark roofs of the bell tower and Buddha hall. Three roofing materials in one small precinct give the eye a simple way to sort the buildings.

A sensible route starts in front of the sutra repository, looking west at the façade of the abbot's quarters, then circles south past the bell tower and Buddha hall and ends on the north side at the priests' quarters and back gate. The temple's main gate (sanmon) is not one of the registered five; it became a cultural property of Tanba City in 1979.

The Buddha Hall and Other Enichiji Treasures

The Buddha hall deserves a look alongside the registered five. Its ridgepole was raised on the eighth day of the third month of 1702, and it became a Hyogo Prefecture cultural property in 1985. The hall is a single bay square, wrapped in a skirt roof (mokoshi) that gives it two tiers of eaves beneath a Hiwadabuki cypress-bark roof of hip-and-gable form. Tanba City describes it as an almost complete example of the Zenshūyō Zen style, rare in the prefecture.

Inside, the floor is paved with tiles, and a dragon is painted on the flat mirror ceiling over the inner sanctuary. The painting appears to be on paper mounted like a sliding panel rather than applied directly to the boards, and tradition credits it to the priest Kokan. On the altar sits a seated Shaka Nyorai thought to date from the Muromachi period, flanked by Fugen on a white elephant and Monju on a blue lion.

The temple also holds four hanging-scroll portraits of Zen masters, Bukkō Kokushi, Bukkoku Kokushi, Musō Kokushi and Butsuin Shinden Zenji, which became Hyogo Prefecture cultural properties in 1987, and a seated wooden figure of Butsuin Shinden Zenji recognised by Tanba City.

Visiting Enichiji Temple

Enichiji Temple is open to visitors between 9:00 a.m. and 4:00 p.m. The admission fee is 300 yen for adults, and the official Tanba regional tourism site lists high-school students and younger as free. Groups are asked to book with the temple in advance. The temple's phone number is 0795-77-0354.

Official tourism listings say nothing about how much of the building interiors visitors may enter or whether photography is permitted, so ask at reception before stepping inside.

The nearest station is Tanikawa, where the JR Fukuchiyama Line meets the JR Kakogawa Line; a taxi from there takes about 10 minutes. By car, allow about 30 minutes from the Tannan-Sasayamaguchi interchange on the Maizuru-Wakasa Expressway, or about 40 minutes from the Takino-Yashiro interchange on the Chugoku Expressway. The temple has parking, with room for coaches.

In autumn Enichiji is one of the temples on the Tanba Momiji Meguri, a maple-viewing circuit of temples in Tanba City. The Tanba City Tourism Association posts foliage updates each season, and they are worth checking before planning a trip.