Myokyoji Main Hall

The temple's Buddhist heart

The Myokyoji Main Hall (妙教寺本堂, Myōkyō-ji Hondō) is a Buddhist hall of 1882 in the south-eastern part of the grounds of Saijo Inari Myokyoji in Takamatsu Inari, Kita Ward, Okayama City, registered as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property on 2009/01/08. The temple calls it the Konpon Daido, and it enshrines the Nichiren sect's core image group, a stupa flanked by two Buddhas and four bodhisattvas, together with the founder Nichiren.

Saijo Inari has two centres. The shrine-like main sanctuary handles prayers for this world; the Myokyoji Main Hall handles memorial rites for the dead. If the sanctuary is the Inari face of the place, this is its face as a Nichiren temple, where the spring and autumn equinox services and the October memorial for Nichiren are held.

The sources disagree by a year on its date. The national database and an Okayama City article give 1882; the temple's website says it was rebuilt in 1881. Work done in 2006 is described as a relocation by the national database and as a renovation by the temple.

A Zen-style hall for a Nichiren temple

The Myokyoji Main Hall faces west under a hip-and-gable roof of heavy tiles, with a second, lower roof wrapped around it. It has only one storey, but from outside it reads as two. The front is three bays wide and the sides six bays deep, with a one-bay porch at the front, a veranda on three sides, and a memorial-tablet room one bay deep along the back.

Inside, an outer hall for worshippers is set in front of the inner sanctum, its plan stepping back around the sanctum in a U shape; the altar platform stands against the tablet room at the rear. The Agency for Cultural Affairs describes the building as a Nichiren hall that carries on the form of a Zen Buddha hall. Its building area is 202 square metres.

According to the Okayama City article, the master carpenter was Aoyama Choshichi of Nagoya, who also built the front halls of the Reioden and the Gosha Tennosha shrine. He was the central figure in Myokyoji's Meiji-era building programme, and with this hall Nagoya workmanship arrived on a hillside in Okayama.

What to look for, and visiting

The Myokyoji Main Hall stands on the lower terrace, near the guest hall and the Kanshotei garden. From the west front, look at how the two tiers of tiled roof stack up and how the hall runs back six bays behind its three-bay face. Walk round the side to see the lower roof of the tablet room tucked against the rear.

The exterior can be seen freely and at no charge. The interior is used for memorial services, and attending one may require a booking; the temple's website says nothing about viewing the interior at other times, so ask at the temple if you hope to go in. Opening hours and directions are on the Saijo Inari Myokyoji page.