Gongendo

Gongendo, the Kumano shrine of Ishigaki

Gongendo (権現堂, Gongen-dō) is a shrine in Ishigaki, Ishigaki City, Okinawa, whose Main Hall and Worship Hall were rebuilt around 1786 in the late Edo period and were designated an Important Cultural Property on 5 June 1981, together with its front gate and stone walls as appurtenances. Also known as Yaeyama Gongendo, it stands beside Tōrin-ji, a temple of the Rinzai school of Zen.

Its story begins with the Satsuma domain. According to Ishigaki City, after Satsuma surveyed the Yaeyama Islands in 1611 it urged King Shō Nei to build a shrine and a temple there, and in 1614 Gongendo and Tōrin-ji were founded side by side. The deity is Kumano Gongen, invited from the great Kumano shrines of mainland Japan, and the pair are counted as the beginning of shrine and temple building in Yaeyama.

The first buildings were destroyed by the great tsunami of 1771, which struck the Yaeyama Islands with devastating force. The present Main Hall and Worship Hall are taken to be the reconstruction of around 1786, and in an Okinawa that lost most of its traditional architecture in the war, they are a rare survival.

Gate, Worship Hall and Main Hall in one line

The precinct faces southwest, and the front gate, Worship Hall and Main Hall stand in a straight line. The Agency for Cultural Affairs records them as follows. The Main Hall (shinden) is a 3-bay Nagare-zukuri sanctuary roofed with interlocking clay tiles. The Worship Hall (haiden) measures 3 bays by 2 bays, single-storied, with a hipped roof, pent roofs front and back, and a tiled roof. The front gate is a single-bay Yakuimon with a gabled tiled roof. The stone walls run 74.2 meters east of the gate, turning as they go, and 10.4 meters to the west.

Ishigaki City notes that the Worship Hall takes an earthen floor into its interior, with an altar on each side of it, one of the regional forms the Agency singles out. During the dismantling repair of 1984 and 1985, investigation of the building allowed its original partitions to be restored.

The object of worship in the Main Hall is a bronze mirror. Ishigaki City describes it as said to be the oldest casting made in Okinawa, dated 1772, and notes that Buddhist images are enshrined as well. Kami and buddhas side by side are exactly what the name Gongen implies: a buddha appearing in the form of a Japanese deity.

Why Gongendo is designated

The Agency's commentary begins with the details of the Gongendo Main Hall. Bar-shaped bracket arms carved with peonies, solid frog-leg struts (Kaerumata) carved with waves and demons, stair rails (Kōran) set with Chinese lions, and door jambs carved with dragons: such work is rarely seen in shrine architecture on the main islands of Japan. Ishigaki City adds a flaming jewel at the center of the ridge and dragon heads at either side. The Worship Hall, the gate and the walls are also said to show techniques peculiar to Okinawa.

The second reason is survival. The Agency describes Gongendo as the only remaining full-scale example of early modern shrine and temple architecture in Okinawa, where war destroyed so much, and also as the southernmost such structure in Japan.

One caution on dating. While the reconstruction of around 1786 is taken to be the present buildings, Ishigaki City points out that the gate and the Worship Hall may have been rebuilt when the Main Hall was renovated in 1882. The Agency's database calls the gate simply the front gate, and describes its form as a single-bay yakuimon.

What to look for at Gongendo, and its many repairs

Pass through the gate and look past the Worship Hall to the Main Hall, and the three buildings line up one behind another. Then go close to the Main Hall and study the woodwork under the eaves: peonies on the bracket arms, waves and demons on the struts, lions in the rail, all packed densely across the front. The flaming jewel and dragon heads on the ridge read better from a few steps back.

The colors you see are the product of repair. The Japanese Association for Conservation of Architectural Monuments records that between October 1984 and December 1985 the Main Hall was repainted except for the doors of the two side bays, which were remade from surviving evidence. The demon masks were copied and the copies installed, with the originals kept separately. On the Worship Hall, the old tiles were reused, and the shortfall was made up with secondhand red tiles of matching size and shape gathered from around the island.

The record of repairs is long. The Main Hall had partial repairs in 1882 and 1910, and the gate was reroofed in 1935. Ishigaki City says Gongendo was badly damaged in the Pacific War and repaired in 1947, and that the Main Hall, Worship Hall and gate were restored again in 2008. The Association's archive also lists a dismantling repair of the Main Hall in 1972, as disaster recovery, along with reroofing of the Worship Hall.

Visiting Gongendo

The grounds of Gongendo are open, and there is no admission charge. Ishigaki City publishes no official visiting hours and no information on opening the interiors, so expect to view the buildings from within the precinct. No restrictions on outdoor photography are posted; please be considerate of worshippers.

Gongendo is in central Ishigaki, next to Tōrin-ji. It lies about 600 meters north of the Ishigaki Port Remote Island Terminal in a straight line, roughly a 15-minute walk through town.